"The dead do not speak, but their silence is louder than screams."
The world should have stopped.
But it didn't.
The wind still moved, carrying the stench of blood and fire. The embers still flickered, struggling against the dying light. The ruins still stood—silent, uncaring, indifferent to the bodies strewn across them.
Aya was still gone.
And Rei was still breathing.
That was the cruelest part.
He sat motionless, knees dug into the dirt, his fingers curled too tightly against his palms. His breath came in slow, shallow gasps, each one feeling like it shouldn't be there.
She should be breathing. Not him.
His body moved without thought.
Slow, careful, like he was afraid of breaking her more than she already was.
He reached forward and gently closed her eyes.
A useless gesture. A lie to make death look softer than it was.
But he did it anyway.
He pressed his forehead to hers. Her skin was still warm.
"She was just a kid."
The words repeated in his head, over and over, like a blade dragging against bone.
Something inside him screamed.
Not out loud. It had no sound.
Only an unbearable pressure pressing against his ribs, a sickening, gnawing emptiness that threatened to hollow him out from the inside.
He exhaled, slow and uneven.
Then, in a voice barely above a whisper—so quiet that maybe even he didn't believe it—
"Rest now."
A prayer that meant nothing.
Because no God had ever answered him before.
A ragged cough broke the silence.
Rei didn't move. Didn't turn.
But he felt it.
The weak, shallow breaths of a man on the edge of death.
Alistair was still alive.
Somehow.
Rei closed his eyes.
There was no rage left in him. No fire. No thirst for revenge.
Just a quiet, suffocating exhaustion.
"You should finish it," Alistair rasped. His voice was hoarse, barely holding together. "You always were… sentimental." A bitter chuckle. "That was always your weakness."
Rei opened his eyes and looked at his own hands.
They were shaking.
Not from anger. Not anymore.
His fingers curled slowly into fists.
"Do you regret it?" His voice was raw, low.
A long pause.
Then, a breath.
"…No."
Rei finally turned.
Alistair lay on his back, golden ichor pooling beneath him, his greatsword broken in half beside him. His once-pristine armor was shattered, his face bruised, blood smeared across his lips.
But his eyes—they were the same.
Clear. Steady.
Unshaken, even now.
And somehow, that was worse.
Rei stared at him for a long moment, searching for something—anything.
A flicker of doubt. A shadow of guilt. A sign that maybe, just maybe, Alistair was human after all.
But there was nothing.
Only the unwavering belief that he had done what was necessary.
Even if it meant killing Aya.
Even if it meant standing over a battlefield of corpses, convinced it was all for a righteous cause.
Even if it meant dying like this.
"You're a coward," Rei said softly.
Alistair didn't flinch. Didn't react.
Just stared up at the sky.
And then, after a moment—
"Maybe."
A breath.
Then silence.
Rei didn't remember standing.
Didn't remember walking away from Alistair's broken body, leaving him behind to fade into the embers.
But suddenly, he was standing.
Aya's weight was in his arms—small, fragile, too light. Too still.
He looked down at her, something tightening in his throat.
He had carried so many bodies before.
Comrades. Friends.
People whose names he had forced himself to forget.
But not her.
Never her.
The thought of leaving her behind felt wrong.
So he carried her.
Through the ruins. Through the ashes. Through the battlefield that had once held his past, his sins, and everything he had ever lost.
Each step was heavy.
Like the weight in his arms wasn't just her, but everything he had failed to protect.
Like he wasn't just carrying a body.
But a graveyard.
His chest ached. His breath was shallow. His ribs screamed in protest.
But he kept walking.
Because if he stopped, if he let her go, if he left her here among the ruins—
Then he would have to accept that she was really gone.
And he wasn't ready for that.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
So he kept moving.
One step at a time.
Carrying what was left of him.
And the world kept burning.