"Open the gate."

The moment he said that, he felt like he was sucked somewhere. When he finally reopened his eyes, he was sitting in the room Madness called The throne.

As always, this room was magnificent.

When he looked at the one seated in front of him, he could feel that Madness changed a little. In the past, even though they had basically the same face, there were many little things that differentiated them. Now though, he felt like the differences weren't that great.

The present madness seemed more mischievous. He wore a white t-shirt with a black hooded pull over. But this wasn't all. In his hand, a pair of scissors was twirling gently. For a moment Kuroha wondered if he become even more crazy and created a new personality

"Seen enough?"

This question was asked with a calm smile. So calm it was infuriating. Ah, this feeling of wanting to punch someone. No doubt. It was truly Madness.

"Let's talk."

Kuroha closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He always wondered how he could breath in his own mind. Then perhaps he wasn't really breathing here. Anyway he calmed himself. Finally, he opened his eyes and asked

"What happened this morning?"

Madness didn't answer immediately. He twirled the scissors around his finger as he looked lifelessly at Kuroha. Finally he opened his mouth

"Say. Do you think it's normal to be unable to sleep?"

Kuroha paused. He knew this style. This is the style he acquired from Nighteye. The one asked a question plays mysterious by asking another one that has a relationship with the first question. This gives you the time to prepare yourself and answer the first question later.

"Don't do this. You know it won't work on me."

"*sigh* I'm being serious here. Your suspicions hurt my heart. Well, don't worry. I will tell you the truth. But I need to go there step by step."

Kuroha nodded

"Okay. There's no way that being unable to sleep for years and still be fine would be normal."

"Why?"

"Sleep is necessary both for the mind and the body. Normally staying awake too long would be extremely tiring and detrimental and might make someone go crazy in the long run. Well, generally, when one reaches his/her limit, the body will automatically shut down."

"Yet. You stayed awake for years without ever sleeping."

"..."

"Another question. Kuroha what do you think we are?"

"Personality that were created by my subconscious ."

Madness let out a mocking laugh,

"Hum… I see. This is how you see us. Well You aren't exactly wrong. You see. Be it you, me or the others, in reality, none of us are the main personality. At the same time, we are all the main personality."

"What do you mean?"

"Another question. Do you remember our true name?"

"No"

"Do you remember our number?"

"...No."

"Do you remember our true family?"

"...."

"You finally understand. Yep. You don't remember any of that. But weirdly you never cared about remembering it. Don't you think it's weird?"

"..."

"Let me tell you a story. A boring story about the pitiful fate of a boring boy. Years years ago. A young child had to see the death of his parents and was kidnapped by a group of sadistic bastards. The child suffered inimaginable pain. He wished to be saved. He wished for his hell to end. Then, after a while, his HOPE died or more precisely was casted away."

"..."

"After his HOPE died. It was remplaced by total MADNESS. He cursed the world, cursed the researchers, cursed and cursed. He wished to kill them all, to make them feel pain, to make them beg as they kneel in front of him. But as time passed, he whoke up from his MADNESS."

"..."

"He didn't wake up naturally you see. Those researchers wanted to study his power more deeply. Well, some of them wanted. So they taught him how to fight. How to kill. How to eradicate all life. They gave birth to a SLAYER."

"..."

"Do you get it? HOPE, MADNESS AND SLAYER. Those three personalities are those who were born from our years of torture."

"..."

"During a long time. SLAYER was the main personality. Then something happened. The boy was saved. When he was saved, HOPE came back stronger than ever and took over."

"..."

"But HOPE despite being strong enough to take the control was at the same time extremely fragile. So fragile that any little damage would destroy him. As such, HOPE discarded all the memories he couldn't handle. A selective memory loss. Very boring story don't you think so?"

"..."

Kuroha was speechless. How could this be possible?

"Hehe...I can feel your disbelief. Then let me ask you. You have read so many books about different case of PTSD. Tell me, do you think it's normal for you to function so well in society despite years of torture? Oh sure you're a little crazy but that is still not enough. Do you remember what happened to the other children? Do you remember their faces? Did you ever ask about them? No. You didn't. Not because you didn't care, but simply because you forgot."

Madness let out a sneer,

"Personalities created by you? Don't make me laugh. You talk as if you're any different from us.We are all the same. What's more, there's another one. RULER. He is someone totally different from what you could ever imagine. He is... "

(ENOUGH!!!)

"Tch"

Madness grumbled as he was stopped from speaking. He was clearly the only one who heard this judging by Kuroha's, no, Hope's expression.

He sighed internally, Ruler had too much power in the throne. Frankly, if they weren't all one and the same, he would worry that Ruler was a traitorous snake who wanted to erase all of them and take control of the body. Pretty cliche but hey, cliche works for a reason.

Kuroha wanted to ask what Madness was on the verge of saying. Ruler? So another personality existed? Still he didn't. He didn't like asking question that will clearly get no answer.

"You didn't explain why I can stay awake for so long, and what the vision of this morning was."

Madness looked at Kuroha before shaking his head and answering

"Lack of sleep is bad for the body and mind. But technically you only represent one fourth of or mind. Even though you're always awake. We are mostly asleep."

Kuroha looked strangely at Madness. What kind of logic was thzr?

"Also about our body? Please, our body is close to being a perpetual machine. Even though we can feel tired, it will never last. I must say, you did well on your training. The more we break, the stronger we become"

Madness grinned at those words. He was born from the desires of destruction. He could generally control himself but it became harder as time passed.

Soon, soon, they will be strong enough to fucking destroy them all. Still, he didn't show his smug appearance to Kuroha. He had his dignity to preserve,

"Finally, about what you saw. Hum... You could say that's its another quirk. But a passive one. Let's call it [Future sight]"

Kuroha couldn't stay silent anymore,

"What?..."

But before he could even finish his sentence, he found himself back in his room.

Kuroha stared blankly at the ceiling. He felt his blood boiling and he had to control his urges to not scream. Madness seemed like he answered his questions, but in reality he said nothing of importance apart from confirming his suspicions.

The more he thought about it the more he felt something was weird. Then he remembered one of the things Madness said

"So fragile that any little damage would destroy him. As such, HOPE discarded all the memories he couldn't handle."

He understood something. It wasn't that Madness didn't want to tell him but rather that he himself didn't want to choose?

For a short moment Kuroha was confused. Should he ask for his memories? But what's the use apart from causing himself more pain?

Unable to think clearly, he teleported to the beach were Izuku trained and stayed there, looking at the sea without speaking nor moving for the rest of the night. His back seemed awfully sad and lonely.