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Blue skies expanded out to forever. The plentiful sunlight raining down from on high brought the limitless fields of green grass to a dazzling sparkle while the calm breeze played with its blades. The peaceful sight of trees gifted inconsistent but welcomed shade to the innumerable monuments that rose from the earth.

Upon every hewn stone made to line the fields was one particular detail which remained consistent among them despite how unlimited they were.

Each listed the date of 2010 October the 9th on their faces.

Carrying through, peering from one to the next, their conditions were variable. Some were sculpted as grand displays for the memory of the one they had honored. Others were so simple, small and insignificant that many could be oblivious to them if they had not kept their wits about themselves. While there were many that were given much care and love, overcoming the years to remain as new, there were those among the lot that were worn to the point of nigh illegibility.

So it was. A cemetery for the departed.

In the stillness of that land of the dead there was but one living person who could know the many graves that continued on beyond the horizon without cease.

The sight of her crimson hair was an immediate contrast to the grass and the skies. Its flourishing bangs flowered like the petals of a rose towards its end which came at her jawline. A large, cute bow was fastened at the back of her hair and it accentuated her large, green eyes that were as verdant as the rolling hills she journeyed through. Yet those innocent eyes held such immense sorrow within them. A dimming hopelessness latched tightly in their green and yet just behind that dark shroud was a shining of hope even if it was minuscule.

By all appearances of her soft and youthful complexion, she was a young girl in the mid of her teen years. Though seeming to be little more than an untested youth, her white and red clothing were that of a knight’s. That uniform was completed with a small mantle and pure white piece of armor at her left shoulder. Her chest, meanwhile, was guarded by a breastplate bearing an etching of the Roman numeral for the number eleven.

Although there was no danger to be found in the vast cemetery, she’d kept a sword fastened and ready in the sheath hanging at her hip.

As she explored the headstones, her eyes glanced from one to the next. Surveying the dates one after another, seeking among them to find the one which held the greatest significance to her. After what she had felt to be years of walking, she had at last met her destination.

It was the most decrepit of all. So much so that the engraved message for the deceased’s final day was but a haze on the stone. Still, it couldn’t keep her from knowing that this was the very one that she had sought. She knew in her heart beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was his.

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Removing the thick glove on her hand, she extended her bare finger to touch its face. Tracing the date she knew all too well on the decayed engraving, her lips moved to speak its message silently to herself.

It was the grave of the Celestial Knight.

The grave of her hero.

As humble as it was the first day she had seen it for herself. As humble as he had requested it be the day he knew his death would come.

Seeing his resting place, she had finally felt a sense of ease wash over her. Though that ease had brought streams of tears to flow from her now glassy eyes. They slowly ran across her cute face for which sorrow was ill suited.

Memories of his deaths began to resurface, beginning with his first. As the images continued to flow, she relived one of those moments which had made a permanent etching in her memory.

Held in her hands, his body slowly losing its life as it pooled beneath him and soaked into her clothes. The weary smile he wore as he looked into her eyes and smiled to himself.

“I’m so grateful… that you’re still here. Live.” His final words that rode on weary breath.

He had touched her cheek, wishing to feel her warmth before his parting. She had held his hand close and dearly. She had experienced intimately the very moment it had fallen slack in hers. The red marking of his life he’d given her remained as she could barely register that she would never see him alive again.

All of the adventures, all of the time she’d spent by his side had lead to his goodbyes again and again. There were countless beautiful memories with him but at this time as her heart ached all she could see were those moments of death each headstone encompassing her memorialized.

Some were bloody. There were those that were sudden and traumatic and yet there were others too that were peaceful and came at the end of a long and storied life.

Even with all of those histories, she was still here.

There was a gripping, rending fear in her heart tangling with the will to do and the drive to act.

Now was her final chance to save the man she had looked to as her greatest inspiration. But there was one glaring problem which kept her from his rescue.

In this final life, she was never born to him.

Fatigue overtook her as she began praying, imagining any way that she could meet him and be there until he could at last complete his purpose. In her running imagination, an emotion more powerful than the thoughts of his rescue warmed her heart and came coupled a bittersweet pain that made the tears flow ever stronger.

All she wanted at this moment was to be with him and to feel his arms around her.

Giving in to her exhaustion and defeat at the hands of her emotions, she laid herself on the grass of his grave. Unbuckling her sword, she brought it close to her body and wrapped her arms tightly around it.

Her mind turned inwards as she began to dream. In her pained heart it wasn’t a sword that she was embracing, but the Celestial Knight himself.