//------------------------------//
// On the Other Side 
// Story: Pony Psycho 600 
// by Trenzalor 
//------------------------------//

Things are looking really bad right now. Just as Toichiro was getting serious about his fight with Shigeo, he lost control of all of the energy stored up in his body. Now it's just building and building inside of his body. It's only a matter of time before it reaches critical mass and he explodes, destroying everything around him. Shigeo can't believe that so much psychic energy was condensed into one person. His charred and beaten body falls to its knees as he screams out in pain from trying to get control back over all of the energy in his body, but Toichiro isn't succeeding which is made evident by all of the light radiating off of him and the shaking of the underground reservoir that the fight ended up in. Shigeo has to shield his eyes with his hands in order to still be able to even look at Toichiro.

'I think it's going to, I think it's going to explode!'

Shigeo quickly turns away from Toichiro and starts running out of the crater that they had turned the area into. When he gets to the lip of the crater he looks out at all of the people who're still around, including his brother Ritsu and his master Reigen. He can see the worried looks on their faces and knows that he looks just as scared. While he's doing that a gigantic pillar of light explodes out of the ground behind him.

"Everyone! Run away."

Shigeo leaps towards his friends and family as they all marvel over that fact that he's still okay even after his fight with Toichiro. He lands near his master who gawks and Shigeo's bleeding left arm.

"He ended up releasing too much energy and self destructed!"

While everyone else is freaking out over the amount of energy being released Reigen is looking Shigeo's arm over and worrying about his health.

"You're bleeding like crazy!"

Shigeo however doesn't notice the bleeding. He's too filled with adrenaline to notice the pain or the bloodloss. He's just focused solely on trying to get everyone away before Toichiro finished blowing up.

"Master! You need to run! All that's left is a massive amount of energy! It's just going to keep growing and churning, until it explodes like a bomb!"

Everyone looks shocked as the pillar of light grows larger and starts to make the ground they're standing on shake like crazy. Teru looks around at everyone and turns to start running way.

"And it looks like there won't be any way to contain it, so let's hurry!"

Teru and everyone else start to run away from the massive pillar of light as fast as their legs will carry them. But then Dimple notices something strange.

"Hey! Where Shigeo?!"

Everyone looks around as they're running but none of them can find him. While they all had their backs turned, Shigeo went back into the crater to confront Toichiro once and for all. He sees the man kneeling on the ground, glowing pure white from the energy coursing through his body, his head bowed in shame.

"You made the right decision. There's no avoiding this. You have to sever the energy source before the explosion happens, by putting an end to my life."

Shigeo takes a step closer to Toichiro, but instead of doing what Toichiro thought he would, Shigeo creates a barrier around the two of them as he kneels down in front of Toichiro. Toichiro gasps in shock at Shigeo's actions and wonders why he would do something like this instead of just killing him.

"Wait, what are you doing?"

Shigeo just looks him right in the eyes as hit sits there with the man who was trying to kill him, not a single bit of hatred in his eyes as his hair billows in an invisible breeze.

"Containing the explosion."

Shigeo says this without an ounce of hesitation. Toichiro's gaze returns to the floor in resignation as he contemplates the end of their lives.

"So in the end, not only were you unable to defeat me, but you also couldn't save your friends or even yourself. Such a tragedy. Someone with your abilities should have been able to handle this better."

Shigeo remains adamant in his drive to stay with Toichiro and contain the explosion so that his friends and his family won't be hurt by it.

"I may have powers, but they don't fix everything. And honestly, that's fine with me."

Toichiro can't understand what Shigeo is telling him. He can only sit there slack jawed as Shigeo keeps telling him about how he thinks.

"I still have a choice. And I control my own destiny. I get to be the protagonist. It's my life. That's why I chose to be here. No matter how much I dislike you, I can't just leave you here to suffer on your own. That would be too sad. And that's why, I'm staying."

All of the words start to carve into Toichiro, chipping away at everything he's believed and resurfacing memories that he'd long forgotten. While Toichiro is lost in his own head, Shigeo is taking the proactive approach. He reaches out and grabs one of Toichiro's arms and starts pulling all of the psychic energy into himself. Toichiro wakes up from his flashback and can feel the energy being funneled straight into Shigeo. Shigeo screams in pain but he grits his teeth and bares it as he keeps pulling more and more energy into his body.

"I-if I could just absorb it..."

Toichiro tries to pull his arm away. He can see the energy building up inside of Shigeo like it's building up inside of him, surrounding Shigeo in the same white aura.

"Don't do it! You'll only end up-"

Shigeo interrupts him with another scream of pain but he just bears all of the pain coursing through him and keeps pushing past his limits in order to try stop the explosion.

"You wanted to apologize, didn't you? Then you need to say it, loud and clear!"

Toichiro can only watch in awe as even though Shigeo lets out another pain filled scream he just keeps going, pouring the energy into himself even though it could very well kill him too.

"Y-you have to. The same goes for me. I need to tell someone how I feel about them too!"

Shigeo screams in pain a final time as the energy finally reaches its critical mass. For only an instant, a single infinitesimal fraction of time, everything stops. The light disappears, the energy stops growing, and everything goes silent. but just as quickly as the calm came, it disappears in a chaotic cacophony of sounds and lights and instead of expanding outwards, the energy condenses inwards into Shigeo. Every cell in his body becomes saturated in so much psychic energy that nothing could compare to him. And in an instant, all of that energy is released into an explosion of rainbow colored light that illuminates everything for miles. All of the other psychics can feel the energy and it doesn't feel like Toichiro or Shigeo. It just feels like a pure, calming energy. When it disappears, Toichiro can see that he's still alive. However, Shigeo is nowhere to be found.


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Shigeo feels like he's going to be sick. Just a moment ago he was trying to contain all of Toichiro's energy and now he's surrounded by so much energy that not even he could reach this level. It's as if everything around him is nothing but energy. And in this sea of infinite energy Shigeo is quickly falling. To where he has no idea. All he knows is that the only thing keeping him from being lost to this sea of energy is a different, strange energy that fills him with calm and is guiding him towards where his destination is. Shigeo follows that energy, and soon enough there's a flash of rainbow light that surrounds Shigeo and forces him to close his eyes.


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When Shigeo can finally open his eyes, the rainbow light is gone and the sea of energy is nowhere to be found. Slowly he starts to get a handle of himself again. He grunts in pain as he can feel that his entire body is still saturated in Toichiro's energy. However now that he has it he grits his teeth and does his best to try and bear it while he tries to wrangle it and stop it from detonating. He manages to get in under enough control that he can start to try and figure out where the heck he is. It looks like he's inside of some kind of old, decrepit castle ruins. However that's not what catches his eyes. What catches his eyes is the large black pony with a horn and wings and a group of six other ponies and a dragon standing on either sides of him. His eyes widen as an entirely new panic starts to set into Shigeo's bones.