COTE: New Game+

Prologue 1: Ayanokouji Kiyotaka's Soliloquy

I wonder what the sky looks like.

Ever since I've read about the sky when I was in the White Room, I always wanted to know what it looked like. I always wondered how large and expansive it truly was compared to the confines of the space I had always been in.

I've also wondered why I always wanted to see the sky. I know what it is and what it contains. The vast and empty cosmos that houses many stars. Yet somehow, I still wanted to see it. It's why I always subconsciously look up when I was in that place, only to see the same white ceiling everytime.

I've always thought that the reason was because the sky symbolized the one thing I never had.

Freedom.

No matter how much knowledge, skill, and wisdom I acquire, I was never free. I never once thought of it as a bad thing before. I had just been used to the life being contained inside that place, learning, fighting, and completing my tasks as I always have. There was no reason to desire the outside world, so why should I? It was only simple curiosity that made me want to ask that question.

When I did see the sky, though, I was mesmerized. I felt so refreshed and satisfied like never before. Even when I was lacking emotions that time, I still appreciated looking at the sky and how limitless it was.

I'm sure that's how humanity's ancestors felt when they were looking out at the sky as well. Humans are naturally curious beings, so they probably also wanted to know about the sky and its secrets. Now, in the 21st century, humanity now knows what lies beyond the abyss that is the sky. I'm sure that when humanity conquered the skies, it felt liberating, like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders.

I was the same when I finally acquired my freedom, after all. It felt refreshing and exhilarating, emotions that I never thought I would feel in my lifetime.

It was incredible. Truly incredible.

However, just as lives had been sacrificed in pursuit of humanity's ambitions to conquer the skies, lives had also been snuffed out in order to achieve the freedom that I so desperately wanted.

I then found out the cost of me getting my emotions back. I can also feel negative emotions now. Anger, sadness, disgust, hate, and the one I feel the most:

Regret

All of the cruel things that I have done before, all of the cruel choices that I made, all of my selfish and inhuman thoughts, they all came crashing down on me. I felt all the immense guilt that I never knew I had until now. I still believed that everything I ever did was necessary, but that didn't stop the guilt and remorse from eating at me from the inside.

However, the one thing I regretted the most was that conflict.

I knew from the beginning there would be casualties when I first heard of its existence. That man is extraordinarily powerful, and I was sure that they would fail. Even if they didn't fail, many will die.

Against all odds, they won, and even she managed to the unthinkable. I managed to be freed from the shackles of my past, but at what cost?

Ruined lives. Broken dreams. Was it all worth it? Do I deserve all this happiness?

That's why when that... being appeared and offered us a chance to do it all over again, to give ourselves a better ending, I took it, consequences be damned.

Was there a chance that I would fail? No, there isn't. I'll win, guaranteed.

Because that was how I was raised.

I'm the masterpiece, and I would prove why I had that title.