Perfection. That's what you'll apply to Shiki's eyes. If you were to make his eyes perfect, then the drawbacks of them destroying his mind with continued usage would be gone as well? After all, nobody could call something that kills its user for the mere act of using it normally perfect, right? You focus. Calming your mind as you begin to call your magical energy forth, directing it into Shiki's eyes and seeking out the connection to the root you know for certain exists within them.

You're going to use up all your magical energy doing this, you realize halfway through drawing upon your circuits, and you frown. Looks like you might actually have to put off going after Rizo and Altrouge tonight after all. What a nuisance. Ah well, it's for a good cause, right? "I am truth given form." The first line.

"I look upon the falsehoods of reality." The second line of your aria has no effect on the process.

"An infinity of lies." As you speak your third line, you think you can see something, it's a connection! It's not as unnatural and corrupting as Roa's is, but it's there!

"Blind to the beyond!" You shout out the fourth line of your aria as you direct your magical energy to surround the connection. It's not a true pathway to the root, yet it's good enough for your purposes, after all, if it receives it's information from the root, then you don't care whether or not the connection is only supposed to go one way, you're going to alter it!

You manifest the concept of perfection upon the pathway, perfecting not just the pathway, but also the eyes connected to it! Of course, you haven't much of an idea just how much of an effect that's going to have on Shiki's eyes beyond the fact that they should theoretically work better now. It was something of a gamble, but you think you succeeded. You didn't have to go all the way like you did with Roa, but even so, the act has once more left you totally drained. While you don't think you're going to fall unconscious, you're certainly not going to be any sort of state to fight until after you've rested.

You move away from Shiki, catching yourself as you stumble, and look at the boy. Who is still blinking as a result of the alteration to your eyes. "What... What do you see Shiki?" The boys eyes don't appear to be currently under the effects of his Mystic Eyes, even though his glasses aren't on right now, yet he still reaches for his glasses as if he were still wearing them.

"N-nothing. The lines are gone!" Shiki sounds terribly happy at no longer having to wear his glasses, though there's one last thing you need to check.

"Now, Shiki... Can you... try to focus? See if you can see the Lines of Death if you focus on seeing them." You hope you haven't ended up removing his ability to see them entirely. While he shouldn't end up needing them, he might end up having to use them at some point in the future, especially thanks to living in this damn town. At least with Fuyuki the Grail Wars only occur once every fifty or so years under normal circumstances, in Misaki Town you never quite know when a vampire is going to show up and cause some disaster.

As he focuses upon doing so, his eyes change to a shining blue color, and he falls backwards in surprise. "T-there are so many more lines than usual! But... it doesn't hurt to look at them?" Shiki's eyes quickly return to their normal shade, and you sigh in relief. Looks like you made the right choice when it came to the application of a concept. Now that Shiki has complete control over his apparently upgraded Mystic Eyes of Death Perception, he'll never need to blindfold himself.

Part 17