But that still lowers the stakes. We reading it need to feel like there's a chance shit could go bad. If the MC and all his friends always come away from battles without taking any serious losses, then it ruins the tension.
The only serious loss so far is Michael, and he's going to be reintroduced anyway.
Sure faceless NPC's always die in superhuman, but for the most part you can nearly save every single named character.
Like even duncan is still alive.
You focus too much on the ending.
And even then there are a lot of endings where things go sideways quick and you can bet your ass in endings where MC dies his friends will follow soon after, like that building that rested half its weight on a single pillar at the bottom would if that pillar goes on a permanent holiday.
...You know that is basically the secret bad end with Eye during the Cole fight where the big guy just eats a whole pocket dimension wholesale.
That said, the ending does not determine the journey as long as the journey is real.
The only way this VN could blow up if we go 'it was all a dream' and the universe ceases to exist if eye wakes up and then goes to fucking school or something.
...that said if this were a secret ending that leads you into a low effort romcom minigame with eye, not mc, as the main character I would probably dig it from the sheer effort of shitposting.
Anyways: stakes. The stakes have never been higher. But the destruction of humanity is a threat beyond personal problems. That also means that it's kind of a killer to emotional attachment. Because there is no room to be a person when
everything is on the line, you just have to function.
And I agree insofar as the personal drama is the only real stake of the twin's situation. I also disagree that it's everything they have. Because whether they remain like that or split again, their circumstances have changed the way they interact with each other and the people around them. It is already permanent.
Life or death, change or stagnation, all of this has already meant something and the arc has hit its purpose and until you want to do something else with them, all paths are open again. Just be aware:
there cannot be infinite drama. It has to settle at some point, the story has to finish or it will mean a bad end for any future with both of them in it. So the question is what ending you want.