Psychic Overlord

Anir remained silent during Kaizer's shock, not telling him that there was, in fact, some form of backlash, though it did not stem from the psychic ability he had awakened.

The first question one should ask was: Why did Rina's subconscious suddenly decide to split itself to create Anir? Was it really just because Rina couldn't handle the power of death?

Obviously, deeper thought on the subject would lead one to conclude that this was nonsensical. Otherwise, why didn't Kaizer's own mind split to handle his psychic power?

Rina's death power definitely had a limit—just like every esper out there—and it had to do with its method of usage. Her power worked similarly to traditional pure magic casting in the sense that the death power she claimed from external kills did not strengthen her body, her mind, or her soul, but was simply fuel for her various abilities.

When Rina killed someone, the death power stripped away was absolutely not meant to be ingested or imbibed in any way.

However, when that part of her ability mixed with Kaizer's power, it naturally warped itself to suit his main ability, just as his did hers. So the death power that should be extracted upon murder for death-related abilities became psychic power that Kaizer stripped away from corpses, adding to his own psychic ability's baseline.

And because the targets were obviously dead, this psychic power was pure, not infused with their remnant thoughts, worries, or hatred that could cause him to go crazy or lose his mind later on. It really was pure, usable psychic power, just like Rina gained pure, usable death power.

So no, the typical "backlash" that Kaizer had been worried about didn't exist. Maybe there was a super-talented psychic out there today—or in history—who trained themselves to strip away psychic power from people, but such a person definitely could not do it after their targets' deaths since—as one just saw with Rina—the mindscape quickly evaporates after death.

If one stripped away psychic power while the person was alive, then yes, expect a big problem in the future when you accumulated too much. Only Rina's special death power with its unique authority to strip away death power upon a successful personal kill could allow for this.

Rina wasn't even the only death-related esper out there—obviously—just like Kaizer was definitely not the only psychic esper. However, different espers had different abilities, like how some death-related espers might follow the necromancer archetype, raising dead minions instead of engaging in direct combat.

For Kaizer to obtain this special ability was stringent. It could only have happened with someone who possessed the exact same power as Rina, and that same person who had this unique death power had to do something as stupid—at least in Anir's opinion—as making a covenant as a child when they had the least control over their explosive power to "share everything together."

Rina had benefited far less from the deal than Kaizer—in Anir's opinion, once more—through the overarching circumstance and due to her own burning love for her "older brother." The idiot of a girl could even endure the misunderstanding of being rejected and take being spiritually "cuckolded" for many years, showing how much she was willing to sacrifice for him.

Anir had nothing to say about this sister of hers.

However, Kaizer would face a backlash of his own making. Previously, the young man only had to train honestly and overcome various obstacles to reach his peak and enjoy a life of strength, self-confidence, and adoration from others.

Unfortunately, he now had a clean and painless shortcut that was far more efficient than any amount of effort could ever match. All he had to do was simply end the lives of people, and his power would continuously soar to limits that Anir did not even dare to dream of.

Even if he was a stickler for morality and felt that killing innocents was wrong, he could easily convince himself that it was fine as long as he killed criminals, right? As long as those he killed were "bad people," then he would not only be doing the world a favor but also increasing his power in tandem.

A win-win!

Or was that really the case?

Anir was created to handle Rina's death power, so her understanding of death was the purest. Even when Rina was about to die, she didn't panic or overdo anything, because to her, death was just another stage of life. Sure, Rina wouldn't exist anymore, which was saddening, but death was also a part of life—why run from it?

However, the issue was that Kaizer clearly did not have this calm outlook toward death, much less embrace it. He was still a young man who did not want his family and friends to perish and became extremely agitated when their end was imminent, even doing whatever he could to reverse it.

If he was unwilling to cope with the death of himself and those he loves, what gave him the idea that he could cope with the ability to bring death to others?

To kill was a dangerous road of no return, especially when one became mired in it. Could this young man possibly resist the temptation of easy power and "limit" his killing to "bad people"? Or would everyone who crossed him even slightly in the future become a "bad person" worthy of death, including their entire families?

This was a challenge Kaizer would have to face on his own, and even if Anir explained it to him in detail, it wouldn't change anything. In fact, given his surprisingly sharp insight from earlier, Anir was willing to bet that Kaizer had already realized this fact—or soon would.

It would be interesting to see how he developed and what choice he would make.

Kaizer closed his eyes and took a deep breath to calm himself down and put the matter aside, for the implications bothered him greatly.

"What happens to you now?" Kaizer asked the question that was on his mind.

"Us? We will be fine after some rest," Anir answered carelessly.

Kaizer gave the alternate personality a pointed look. "I said what happens to you specifically, Anir."

There was a familiar period of silence.

"I will return to the background as always, nothing more, nothing less."

Her reply was soft and spoken in a muted tone.

"Will Rina know about you? About what happened here? Also, wouldn't she need you to help her with her power?" Kaizer asked quickly, seeing that Rina's flaming star was building stronger momentum, on the cusp of revival.

"No, she wouldn't know about me, and no, she wouldn't be aware of what transpired after she died. There is a great filter between us that prevents us from spilling over to each other. Her subconscious created me but does not want me to entertain thoughts of taking over the body, so I can only exist in the background."

Anir began to slowly fade away while turning to look at Kaizer with a hint of complexity.

"Also, Rina has awakened and wouldn't need me. Her subconscious created me the moment she was born to help her handle the power of death within her, but your covenant granted her psychic power from your end, which made her consciousness strong enough to control the power on her own."