As You Wish

"Why?"

Uryu Ishida remained silent for a long time. Then he looked up. For the first time, the naive arrogance faded from his eyes, leaving them sharp and somber.

"Tell me why."

He wasn't stupid.

His father was an intensely rational man, cold-blooded even.

He was no coward who would surrender to the True King's Palace out of fear of death, nor was he the sort of man who would abandon his principles for his son.

Whatever Ryuken Ishida did, he had a reason he believed he had to do it.

"Oh? You really need to ask?"

Sun-Sun smiled as she answered with a question, her voice gentle yet thunderous.

"Do you know how your mother died?"

Uryu Ishida jerked his head up and stared at Sun-Sun, disbelief and dread filling his eyes.

"Don't tell me..."

"That's right."

Sun-Sun nodded, a flicker of pity in her eyes.

"Your mother, Hae Katagiri, and Kurosaki Masaki were both harvested by Yhwach's Saint's Selection for the ridiculous reason that they were mixed-bloods. Kurosaki Masaki had His Majesty's protection at the time. Your mother wasn't so lucky."

At that moment, his world shattered like glass.

Uryu Ishida's pupils shrank to pinpricks. He could barely breathe.

Stiffly, he turned to look at his father's back as the man slaughtered their own kind. Then his bloodshot gaze locked onto Yhwach in the distance.

It all made sense.

Why his father had never let him get involved with the Quincy. Why his father had joined the True King's Palace. Why his father had been so cold to him...

So that was it.

That selfish bastard was the one who had really killed his mother!

"Bastard!!"

Regret and fury unlike anything he had ever felt swept away his reason.

Not only had he let the man who killed