[It makes sense, more than he'd like to admit. For someone who had so adamantly denied the existence of anything supernatural or superhuman, anything greater than themselves or the lives they built with their own hands — fortune and fate, gods and gifts, things wished into existence by those who wanted them to — by logic, it so follows that one would become an exorcist after experiencing a haunting.
But for someone as arrogant as Matoba, so confident and boastful in his power to still be followed by something... Something that could even cross worlds just to find him...
If a god had betrayed him, and they continue to search for him in this way... one can assume it was not yet satisfied. That Matoba resisted. Fled, even? Whatever the terms that he had managed to escape from — perhaps not entirely, but enough to gain this distance — HiMERU has a feeling he would've done the same.
There is no god he would surrender to, but there are people he would sacrifice himself for. One person, at least.
... In that case, perhaps Matoba has a point. If HiMERU himself gets entangled with some awakened evil, he won't be able to protect the person he's doing this for in the first place. Doing nothing is no better... but at least he has reason to believe he will wake up again, no matter how close he comes to death's door.]
This was the most efficient way, within my power alone. [Because like hell he was getting anyone else involved.] If my blood is not potent enough to be of use, then perhaps it would not have mattered either had it drained me entirely. The gemstone would've made sure of that.
[No, he's not one for wastefulness on principle. But sometimes other tethers will require them to take wasteful actions, and at least knowing he'd come back from it made it easier to carry out.]
Matoba-san. You spoke of your duty as an exorcist, to bear the weight of the world that people... people like me know nothing about. And is that a duty you would give your life for?
Again and again, if it called for it?
[He has a feeling he knows the answer, but he can't claim Matoba doesn't surprise him still.]
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But for someone as arrogant as Matoba, so confident and boastful in his power to still be followed by something... Something that could even cross worlds just to find him...
If a god had betrayed him, and they continue to search for him in this way... one can assume it was not yet satisfied. That Matoba resisted. Fled, even? Whatever the terms that he had managed to escape from — perhaps not entirely, but enough to gain this distance — HiMERU has a feeling he would've done the same.
There is no god he would surrender to, but there are people he would sacrifice himself for. One person, at least.
... In that case, perhaps Matoba has a point. If HiMERU himself gets entangled with some awakened evil, he won't be able to protect the person he's doing this for in the first place. Doing nothing is no better... but at least he has reason to believe he will wake up again, no matter how close he comes to death's door.]
This was the most efficient way, within my power alone. [Because like hell he was getting anyone else involved.] If my blood is not potent enough to be of use, then perhaps it would not have mattered either had it drained me entirely. The gemstone would've made sure of that.
[No, he's not one for wastefulness on principle. But sometimes other tethers will require them to take wasteful actions, and at least knowing he'd come back from it made it easier to carry out.]
Matoba-san. You spoke of your duty as an exorcist, to bear the weight of the world that people... people like me know nothing about. And is that a duty you would give your life for?
Again and again, if it called for it?
[He has a feeling he knows the answer, but he can't claim Matoba doesn't surprise him still.]