What Winter Left Behind (6)
It was a common story.
A girl who had lived her whole life in darkness sees the light for the first time, but is instead frightened by the unfamiliar comfort and runs away.
It was a paradox of misfortune.
While shedding tears, not wanting to be unhappy, in the end, she returns to the most familiar misfortune.
Because that sorrow was the only thing that had become a home in her wandering life.
Ultimately, a life that stays in life.
The girl before my eyes was the same.
"I found you here, Miss Neria."
"You...?"
Silver hair fluttering in the fierce wind.
Starlight rippling around her.
Cheeks with blood and tears dripping down, and a large wound on her right face.
Her clear eyes are staring blankly in this direction.
"I'm not too late."
I speak as if answering that gaze.
I realized the girl had disappeared and chased after her, and at least I was able to stop her before things got to the worst.
The sound of flesh sizzling escapes from the palm of my hand, which hastily covered the dagger.
The temperature of the steel fully embracing the starlight.
Nevertheless, I met her eyes without a hint of pain.
"I was so worried."
The girl makes a complex expression at my nonchalant teasing.
Her lips, which had been silent for a moment, soon murmur with a hoarse voice.
"......You came after all. Even through this terrible blizzard."
"Because I promised to take responsibility."
"That's right..."
You are that kind of person.
The girl smiles with a strange atmosphere, as if she has given up.
Her calm voice rather reveals resignation.
"That's why I left you."
Because you are too good of a person.
The warmth and kindness you casually threw, your dedication to become a home beyond misfortune, were too much and overwhelming for a mere monster from the bottom.
I was afraid that this cursed fate would hurt you too.
I decided to leave your side on my own.
"This is my choice."
"Miss Neria."
"Still, the time I spent with you was enjoyable. To the point where I unknowingly felt even more thirst... but now it's over."
The futile dream shatters into pieces.
The smile still lingers on her lips.
The girl seemed to have made a decision while wandering through the blizzard.
Her faint warmth declares her end towards me.
"You know, I have one last request."
Her silver eyes lacked any trace of vitality.
She was like a flower on the verge of breaking.
"Please, kill me."
It was a prayer for suicide.
A fleeting hint of relief could be seen in her expression, but it was quickly crumbling away.
The starlight that had been surrounding them was gradually becoming clearer.
"I'm tired now."
The girl did not want to become a monster.
She didn't want to hurt others, nor did she want to tremble in loneliness and darkness forever.
In the end, the choice she made was to escape into misfortune once more.
Towards the most familiar home.
"So that I don't become a monster, before I do... please kill me with your own hands."
"......"
"I don't think I'll regret it if it's you."
I couldn't give her any answer.
Tears flowed down her wounds.
It felt as if I was being crushed by the atmosphere.
Perhaps taking the silence as acceptance, the girl slowly moved the dagger we were holding together.
The still-hot blade soon aimed at her slender neck.
She didn't apply any force.
It was as if...
She was asking me to do the stabbing.
It was truly malicious.
"My body is about to go berserk. I tried my best to suppress it, but I can feel my reason fading away."
Whoosh-!
Was it as if those words were a signal flare?
Her condition began to deteriorate in earnest.
The light that had been surrounding them all burst into brilliance, and began to unleash the power originating from the stars, one by one.
The scenery was gradually engulfed in high temperatures, and even the weather seemed to fade away.
Her eyes closed tightly, as if to emphasize her point.
"If you don't kill me... this entire area will be swept away by starlight."
A warning.
It meant that if she wasn't killed here, more people would die.
As if proving that point, the resistance of the light intensified.
The flashes of light surged like thousands of thorns, piercing and entering the skin.
The pain of flesh being cooked in real time was not pleasant.
I lowered my head.
"Please."
A wish echoed in my ear.
I savored the texture felt from the words, and reminisced about myself.
It was the time I had spent with the girl.
-Why... why are you doing so much for me?
I quietly recalled that question.
At the time, I had brushed it off with a vague answer, but this time, I had to come to a conclusion about that question.
Even as I became increasingly bloodied, I continued my contemplation.
As if looking back at myself.
'Why... is it?'
Why did I dedicate myself so thoroughly?
The other party was just an extra.
Moreover, a seed of disaster that would completely burn 10% of the continent in the future.
What was the reason for offering comfort to such a monster?
'Well.'
Perhaps.
It had been so long since I had felt the sensation of caring for another.
That faint warmth was particularly dear.
She was clearly a girl who didn't resemble my younger sister in any way, but every time I faced her, the mourning I had left behind in the depths of my memory resurfaced.
In a withered flower, there lives a heart that could not be burned.
I smile faintly.
'I, to you.'
In you, that child.
Or perhaps, I may have been seeing myself overlapped.
Completely abandoned by the world, despairing at unintended misfortune, yet still struggling to live, but with an unyielding injustice that was too ruthless to endure with mere youthful spirit, love lost so futilely, with nowhere to rely on, we, who even had the words that made us who we were, shattered into pieces, leaving only me behind in that winter, there were children shivering in the cold just like you are now.
That is why I couldn't pass by you, the monster.
Even though you were a seed of disaster, I couldn't kill you.
Because I thought that every scar left on your existence resembled us.
I wanted us from that time to be completely happy.
'A personal desire.'
The devotion I offered was based on such selfishness.
Because I kept worrying about the reflection of myself in the mirror, it was a hypocritical act of mercy that prioritized myself over others.
I wasn't ashamed of it.
I just wanted to be a pardon for enduring your pain.
I didn't want you to hate yourself in the mirror.
I wanted you not to give up on your life that resembled mine, and to keep breathing that fragile breath.
It's a somewhat selfish desire, but.
Even so, I.
"Neria."
I wanted you to live.
"I told you I would be okay."
I release the hand that was holding the dagger.
The silver blade falls to the floor.
At the same time, before she can even react, I open my arms and pull her frail body into an embrace.
The violent starlight rages as if to swallow us whole.
Even so, I don't let go.
'Just as I tamed you... you also tamed me.'
The responsibility of taming isn't something only one side bears.
Because we formed a relationship together.
It's a matter of striving without placing superiority on either side.
Therefore, I did not allow your escape.
Just as I took responsibility for you from unhappiness, you also had the duty to take responsibility for me from loneliness.
I held onto that faint breath and slowly let the lie seep in.
It was the fulfillment of responsibility.
"It's okay, you don't have to hurt anymore."
Cut, stabbed, burned.
Responsibility is painful.
Yet, if there's a reason why I don't turn my back on this pitiful girl, it's simply.
"Let's go home together."
To you, who is hurting.
With the desire to offer comfort.
***
"Please."
The girl was waiting for death.
The final moment of life, finally reached.
There was no regret in the choice she made herself.
Because this was the best for everyone.
A story where even a monster becomes happy, there was clearly no such thing to be found in any fate.
The tightly closed eyelids block the vision blurred with tears.
'It's all over.'
It was a painful time.
But.
She felt like she could close her eyes comfortably, at least for the last moment.
Because there was someone who would tie off that knot.
-I've come to take you.
The boy who had shown her warmth for the first time in her life.
This was an excessive ending.
The heat lingering near her neck proves the existence of the dagger.
Once that sharpness completely pierces through this breath, peace would come to this wretched life.
Tears flow down.
'Still... it's a little scary after all.'
Her shoulders stiffen involuntarily.
She calms her mind.
Even amidst the jumble of emotions, the stars shine brighter.
Fear, freedom, resentment, tranquility, liberation... while recalling all those words, she was waiting for the conclusion when something covered her body.
Whoosh-!
"I told you I'd be okay."
Lukewarm body temperature.
In her eyes that reflexively opened, the figure of the boy hugging her was reflected.
He was holding the burning starlight.
"Let's go home together."
At the voice that followed, the girl regained her senses.
A scene where starlight was dyeing everything in real-time.
The monster desperately tried to push off the body that was clinging to her.
It was clear that both of them would be consumed at this rate.
"What are you doing! Get away right now...!"
I asked for death.
I didn't ask for a suicide pact.
The reason I left your side was because I didn't want you to get hurt, but what's the point if we're going to burn so meaninglessly like this?
The girl struggles with all her might, pushing away from the warm embrace.
But it's no use.
"You'll get caught up too! Do you want to die together?!"
"Shhh."
However.
Despite her desperate cries, the boy only smiles.
It must hurt, but his expression is calm.
Darkness flickers on his lightly flicking fingers.
Snap-!
"Please focus."
Shadows creep and envelop the surroundings.
The pitch-black darkness, like a curtain, slowly obscures the brilliant starlight.
The rampaging power regains its calm flow.
A sense of incongruity is felt at this point.
"......Ah."
The girl stops struggling and stands in place.
It was a different feeling from her usual treatments.
The violent energy slowly subsides.
It wasn't just a feeling of being suppressed, but rather, the vast power was being refined at a rapid pace.
The boy was interpreting the starlight in real-time.
Swoosh...
The deployed formula quickly permeates the starlight, neutralizing it.
The boy murmurs with a tired voice.
"Fortunately... I found it. A way to seal that starlight."
Although it took three months, I'm glad it wasn't too late.
The light gradually diminishes and eventually goes out completely.
The rampaging flow also returned.
No... it was not enough to say it simply returned.
It disappeared.
The power that had been with her for her entire life was no longer felt.
It had been arbitrarily sealed away.
"N-No way... What is this, how, how...?"
The girl shows a confused reaction.
It was a truly unbelievable situation, but the boy only smiled mischievously as usual.
Their bodies, still pressed close, were warm.
"Because I am by your side."
It was a promise he had made a few days ago.
A promise to protect her.
The boy whispers in her ear.
It was the moment he was releasing her from the curse of the past.
"From now on, you will have no loneliness, no pain, no misfortune."
"......"
"I will make it so."
A voice that pledged his entire life.
Like a lie.
And like a miracle.
The boy arrived.
"So... won't you come back?"
To embrace the lonely monster.
"To our home."
"......Ugh."
Words she had longed to hear so much.
Anyone would do.
Even with this cursed fate, just a single word of permission, that it was okay for her to remain in this world.
A single word that gifted a home to her, who was all alone.
"Ugh..."
The girl couldn't hold back the tears that poured out.
Tears scattering like hot droplets.
The meaning of those tears was no longer resignation or despair.
Only pure white joy overflowed.
-Why was I born?
Since the day she saw the light of the world.
Nearly twenty years of winter in her life. It was the first spring that had come to such a season.
Even the blizzard that seemed like it would last forever had stopped.
Transparent dew drops fall.
The girl embraces the boy's body.
"It's warm... hugh, it's warm, so warm..."
Warmth.
Body heat.
Cozy.
How much she had longed for those words.
How much she had longed for that thirst.
As if quenching a long thirst, the girl buried her face in his broad chest.
The childlike weeping sound completely filled the empty snowfield.
"Ugh, hugh..."
"You've worked hard all this time."
Only a fallen name is visible on the ground.
A single denial that held the past.
Beside that dagger, a single flower suddenly bloomed.
As if to announce that the long winter was over.
What winter had left them was.
Spring.
A single flower that bloomed from that beginning.
Even the withered heart sprouted again, and all the pain blossomed like petals.
We.
We can live through the coming seasons.
Promising pure white hope.
Like that.
Towards the future.
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