Onside, the f warmth of the cottage enveloped them. Skuld let out a soft sigh, her shoulders rexing slightly as she took in the familiar surroundings. Helios closed the door behind them, the click of the lock eg in the quiet space.

  “Why don’t you get some rest?” Helios suggested, his toler than usual. “It’s been a long day.”

  Skuld hesitated, her gaze flickering to him. “What about you?” she asked, her voice soft but filled with . “You look like you haven’t rested in days.”

  Helios offered her a faint smile, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’ll rest soon,” he assured her. “I just o take care of a few things first.”

  Relutly, Skuld nodded and headed toward her room. She paused at the dng back at him. “Thank you, Helios,” she said quietly, her gratitude clear despite the exhaustion in her voice. “For everything.”

  Helios gave her a small nod. “Goodnight, Skuld.”

  She disappeared into her room, the door closing softly behind her. Helios stood in the hallway for a moment, before heading to his own room. His bed was still occupied by Cloud’s atose body, his chest rising and falling faintly with each shallow breath. Although he found the situation weird there was nowhere else to put the body.

  Helios walked over and leaned closer to his puter s, his eyes with dark shadows underh narrowed as he observed the se unfolding in Xehanort’s b. The grainy footage revealed Xehanort, Even, and Ienzo standing in front of peared to be a mae modeled after the lifeboats built in aimes by the Master of Masters. These lifeboats, he knew, had been inally designed for travel between worlds and even through time, though they required stri ditions to fun.

  He watched as the three apprentices adjusted the trols, their expressioral but focused. Despite the resembnce, Helios khese maes couldn’t be actual lifeboats—if they were, Xehanort would have exploited their capabilities far earlier. Still, the design hi Xehanort’s subscious e to the Keybde War, a e even the apprentice himself seemed unaware of.

  "Iing, isn’t it?" Kurai’s voice slithered into his mind, an uling mix of amusement and intrigue. "That boy, Xehanort… so ambitious, so cold. He’s fasating now, just as he was back then."

  Helios frowned but didn’t respond immediately. Kurai’s cryptients often grated on his nerves, especially when they hi information beyond Helios’s uanding. While he khe overall truth tiails escaped his uanding and Kurai found no reason to share. Instead, he focused on the mae. Its purpose seemed clear—to separate the heart from the body. If successful, this process would send the heart to its most signifit location while leaving the body behind in a nexus world banced between light and darkness. Nexus worlds like Twilight Town, Traverse Town, and Castle Oblivion.

  As he observed, Helios couldn’t help but analyze the potential applications. With exteweaking, an uanding of lifeboats, and access to Xehanort’s research, it might be possible to recreate the a lifeboat teology iure. The prospect was tantalizing. Such teology could prove invaluable for his pns. It never hurt to have a wild card in one’s back pocket in case of emergencies.

  His thoughts were interrupted when the apprentices wheeled a small child into the room. Aest subject; the little girl couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old, her small frame trembling as she was guided toward the mae. Her wide, tearful eyes darted around the room, seeking escape or salvation.

  Helios while feeling a tinge of sadness knew he couldn’t intervene now; his dark form’s identity had to remain hidden, and his presence here couldn’t be revealed any more than it already was. This was a moment of grim y—Helios would see how far Xehanort and his allies were willing to go and how far he himself could go.

  “Ready?” Xehanort’s voice carried through the speakers, calm aached.

  Even nodded, his gaze fixed on the girl as though she were no more than a test sample. “The parameters are set. Let’s see if this iteration yields better results.”

  Ienzo, the you among them, g the trols, his expression unreadable. Helios couldn’t tell if there was hesitation in his movements or just methodical precision. He couldn’t afford to dwell on it.

  The mae powered up with a low hum that quickly escated into a pierg whihe girl’s screams cut through the noise, sharp and agonized, as the mae began its work. Bright light engulfed her, and Helios could see her body t, her small hands g at the air as though trying to grasp something—anything—that could save her.

  Then, with a final, deafening hum, the girl’s form flickered and disappeared. The room fell into silence, broken only by the meical beeping of the mae as it recorded data. Xehanort, Even, and Ienzo stood by, their faces unreadable as they reviewed their notes.

  Kurai’s voice returned, quieter now but aunting. “And there it is. The lengths they’ll go to, the sacrifices they’ll make. Are you ready for this, Helios? Ready to face what you’ve aligned yourself with?”

  Helios calmed himself, his eyes never leaving the s. “Was the experiment a success or failure?” he murmured under his breath. “It’s different when you see firsthand how the data was gathered.”

  Kurai chuckled softly, the sound slithering through Helios’s mind like a serpent. “You’re avoiding the question, my dear Helios. Success or failure? Is that all that matters to you now?”

  Helios didn’t answer immediately. His eyes remained fixed on the s, where Xehanort and the others were now reviewing the data from the experiment. The girl was gone, her fate sealed by the ambitions of those in the b. The s dispyed no sign of her heart, body, or any remnants that could offer a clue to what had bee of her. How would they know if it worked?

  After a moment, Helios leaned ba his chair, his expression impassive but his mind rag. “What matters,” he said finally, his voice low and steady, “is uanding. Uanding the process works. It’s a critical piece of the puzzle.”

  “Why?” Kurai pressed, its voice dripping with malice. “With your keybde, you could effortlessly do what they’ll use many lives to aplish. So why do you wish to see how they do it? Might it be that somewhere deep inside you wish to py with lives as they do? Do you want to wish to py the role of creator and see what wonders and horrors you could make if you were not weighed down by morality?”

  Helios’s jaw tightened, his eyes still locked on the s. “You assume too much, Kurai,” he said coldly. “This isn’t about ambition or pying god. It’s about preparation. Uanding the limits of their experiments, the lengths they’ll go to—these are things I o know. Not to emute them, but to know how to ter them.”

  Kurai chuckled, the sound reverberating in Helios’s mind like a whispering shadow. “Oh, I’m sure that’s the story you tell yourself. But the liween observation and participation is thihan you think, my dear Helios.”

  Helios ighe jab, his focus returning to the b feed. The apprentices were methodically pag up their data, their faces betraying no hint of emotion as they discussed the steps. Xehanort, however, stood apart, his gaze fixed on the mae as though seeing beyond its physical form to the potential it represented.

  Helios’s fingers drummed lightly on the desk. He had to admit, for all his distaste for Xehanort’s methods, the apprentice’s drive was something to be reed with. Helios couldn’t afford to uimate him—not now, not ever.

  As the apprentices left the room, the feed switched to a different camera angle, showing Xehanort walking down a dimly lit corridor. He stopped at a dnced over his shoulder, aered, leaving the door slightly ajar.

  Helios leaned forward, his i piqued. The angle of the camera didn’t allow him to see ihe room, but he could tell from Xehanort’s posture that something signifit was happening. His mind raced with possibilities. Was this a private moment of refle, or was he meeting with someone? Perhaps Braig, or another aplice?

  Kurai’s voice returned, softer now, almost ptive. “You’re drawn to him, aren’t you? To his ambition, his vision. You see pieces of yourself in him.”

  Helios’s lips pressed into a thin line. “I’ve seen what he had hoped to bee. What he will bee. And I know the cost of letting him roam unchecked.”

  “A,” Kurai said, its toaking on a mog edge, “you’re tent to let him roam for now. Because you need him, don’t you? You need him to py his part, to set the stage for whatever grand pn you have in mind. To let the people of many different worlds suffer so you get what you want. Every so often I find myself uanding you and now these moments are happening more often.”

  Helios didn’t respond, his thoughts too tao untah a simple retort. Kurai wasn’t wrong, but admitting that aloud—even to himself—was a step too far. He turned his attention back to the s, letting the sileretch between them.

  Eventually, Kurai broke the quiet, its voice low and almost spiratorial. “So, what’s , Helios? Do you wait and watch, or do you act? Every moment you hesitate, someone else pays the price.”

  Helios exhaled slowly, his gaze unwavering. “I’ll act wheime is right,” he said firmly. “Not a moment before.”