"Not exactly. But he and I were born together. Er, conjoined," he added to clarify. "So I could feel his heartbeat right around here." He patted that left hand over the right side of his chest gently, even though there was nothing to feel there anymore. "When we were separated our powers went off in separate directions, too, but even after that, it always felt like we were part of each other, so it did always feel like we were one body split in half, in a way. It took a while, but..." A while was an understatement, as well as what it entailed to get there. The smile when he recalled finally uniting with Albedo was a bit of a sad one, mainly because he had to lose somebody else in the process.

"But he's back where he belongs, now. It's what he always wanted." Through the obsessions and the torture and torment and the insanity, every reckless, rash and destructive act Albedo had performed, every single action he took was for that one simple goal.