episode_0062

Ordinary people do not perceive it.

War.

How heavy a meaning is contained in that short reverberation.

For most, it was just a word to glance over, but at least for those directly involved, it fully signified the end of life.

Scars that could never be erased in a lifetime.

Was it a holy war to realize justice?

Or merely a means for the greed of adults?

It was a meaningless contemplation.

It was laughable to reconsider the justification now.

What was important, however, was that war had broken out, and countless children had cried out loudly.

The world was painted with the light of despair.

Even after the armistice, the war continues.

Those who died were said to have had their lives pardoned by death as an indulgence, but those who survived were inescapably forced to pay the price.

The dripping pus merely mimics recovery with the word ‘armistice’.

Even while ignoring the festering wounds.

The boy was no different.

A letter received one day.

Cruel reality spares no one.

After carefully unfolding the neatly folded paper, even solid hope shatters into pieces.

Unbelievable contents filled the body of the text, one after another.

[The village was annihilated.]

A coldly written sentence.

The boy’s hometown, which he had left with lingering attachment, was completely scorched by the enemy nation’s annihilation magic.

Those cornered had finally resorted to forbidden magic.

The hometown transformed overnight into an uninhabitable land.

In the aftermath of the magic, the village turned into a desert, and monsters born carrying twisted mana roamed freely.

People died one by one, as if stricken with disease.

A city facing destruction.

This was the true nature of the desert we had wandered through for several days.

The old man laughed bitterly and spoke.

“I had no intention of deceiving you.”

Years were etched into the old wrinkles.

The old man, who had been caressing the tombstone for a moment, soon looked at us, who stood with blank expressions.

“It was like that from the beginning. I started this journey to meet Rosaline.”

“……”

“……”

We remained silent, unable to easily utter a word.

[Rosaline Meryar, rests here.]

A single tombstone erected before our eyes.

The reunion of two people who had waited a lifetime was perhaps sealed with the most unwanted sorrow.

The old man calmly continued his explanation.

“Isn’t it strange? For only one tombstone to stand alone on such a secluded hill.”

His hazy eyes fell into recollection for a moment.

It was a memory left from childhood.

It was a promise made right on this hill.

Lying side by side in the bushes, counting the brilliant stars as if they were pouring down.

It was also a moment the boy had lived his entire life without forgetting.

And.

“She asked that if she died… she absolutely be buried on this hill.”

The girl was no different.

She, too, had lived, reflecting on the fifteen years she had spent with the boy, until the moment she reached the end of her life.

The two had never forgotten each other, not once.

“Like a fool.”

She should have forgotten such a promise.

She should have left that tiresome village, charmed a handsome man, gotten married, and lived happily ever after in blessings.

Does it make sense that she never even met a man by that age?

If only he had known this would happen.

“……If I had known this would happen, I should have at least smiled a little when we parted ways.”

The last scene he remembered.

It was the part where they turned their backs on each other in anger.

It wasn’t even that important, so why had they wasted the moment of farewell on a mere emotional quarrel?

The old man gently caressed the tombstone.

“Where in life is there no regret?”

Summarizing a life is but a single sentence.

The old man, who had been contemplating for a while, soon composed himself and turned his gaze towards us.

“Please, don’t think ill of me.”

“Elder-nim.”

“My words about guiding you to a nearby city were sincere. If you keep walking in this direction for a few more hours, you’ll find a new village.”

“Are you not coming with us?”

“I have somewhere else to go, you see.”

“Somewhere to go, you mean…”

“I have to go keep a promise.”

He smiled along with his enigmatic words.

As we stood there, stiff and still, the old man soon coughed.

Bright red blood spilled onto the floor.

“Cough, cough…!”

It was something he had experienced several times before, but this time, his condition was noticeably worse.

His legs wobbled as if he were dizzy.

The old man soon leaned his back against the tombstone and slumped down.

It was a pitiful sight, watching him collapse.

“E-Elder-nim!”

We reached out our arms to support him, but the old man firmly refused our help.

He merely continued to cough and murmur.

“Cough! I’m, fine.”

“It really seems like you’ve reached your limit now, wh-what should we do? At least you need to get to a village to receive treatment…!”

“In any case, I was given, ugh, a death sentence… They said I have a month at most.”

The old man showed no trace of disorder.

His voice echoed calmly.

It was his end, long prepared for.

Perhaps realizing the meaning of his words belatedly, Regia’s eyes welled up blankly with tears.

The old man smiled.

“Why do you all have such sad faces?”

“……”

“E-Elder-nim…”

“Cough… It would be nice if you smiled.”

His pupils remained transparent.

The gentle echo extended calmly on the soft morning breeze.

“It may look like I’m dying, but I won’t be.”

“……”

“As you all know, stars are very far away, aren’t they? It’s too much to take this body there. It’s too heavy.”

The star where they had promised to meet.

The old man… no, the boy, was finally going to meet the girl.

That one rose he had loved so dearly.

“So, won’t you congratulate me?”

It would be a magnificent sight.

When the old man looked at the stars, all of them would appear like wells with pulleys.

For every star would give him water to drink.

This was not death.

It was merely preparation to embark on a distant journey.

Now, the boy from fifty years ago would gain new wings and embark on a journey towards the most brilliant star floating in the night sky.

It was a beautiful fairy tale page just by imagining it.

“Thank you for accompanying me on this long journey.”

“The honor was all mine.”

“E-Elder-nim… *hiccup*.”

We finished our farewells.

As we listened to his continuous coughing for a while, a subtle light suddenly swirled around the old man’s body.

It was a mysterious color.

*Fizzle*.

The sickly body gradually became transparent, then slowly began to crumble into a pure white light.

Like dust scattering with the wind.

The old man was scattering, becoming remnants of the desert.

“Ah,”

A faint gasp escaped.

Old eyes stared blankly up at the sky.

He was watching the stars, just like in the old days.

*Whoosh*.

Sparkling specks were densely embedded across the pitch-black background, painted over with darkness.

A cluster of stars lifting the veil of the deep night.

A million embroidered stars erased loneliness with a million lights.

Perhaps that was.

An axis of time representing an entire lifetime.

The old man reached out his arm towards the sky.

What his trembling hand pointed to was none other than the brightest star in the night sky.

He faintly murmured.

“I’m coming to meet you, Rosaline.”

With that, the old man closed his eyelids.

His body, completely disintegrated, then soared freely into the sky.

Towards the star where the girl would be waiting.

***

We stood in place for a while.

The old man who had embarked on a distant journey.

Regia was shedding silent tears.

Having formed quite a bond over the past ten days, the sorrow of farewell was enough to make the girl cry.

Even these fragmented moments would become a stepping stone for the protagonist’s growth.

“Hnngh, huhn…”

For some, it was the dawn of a long journey, but for others, it was the morning marking the end of a long journey.

We had finally safely escorted the old man to his destination.

The episode’s clear conditions were met.

At the same time, a signal announcing the end washed over our ears.

*Screech!*

A sound like creaking hinges echoed.

Following the sudden noise, when we looked up, a small door stood wide open in the sky.

A door attached to a perfectly ordinary sky.

It was an alien yet mysterious sight.

Now it was time to leave this world.

I took the sobbing girl’s hand and carefully led the way.

*Thud, thud.*

Stairs that seemed to be made by folding the night sky.

As we steadily ascended, stepping on the empty air, the door opening in the sky soon welcomed us.

Beyond the door, a pure white light swirled.

“It’s all over now.”

Though we hesitated, turning back, we moved our steps towards the light.

Our vision was brilliantly colored, then faded to black.

[EP???. How to Cross the Desert]

-The Door Opening in the Sky, The Boy Who Watched the Stars-

The episode concluded thus.

***

When we opened our eyes again, we were standing in an empty alleyway.

“Hmm.”

“W-Where is this…?”

We quietly looked around.

A familiar sight within our view.

We had returned to the academy.

Unlike the ten days we had spent within the book, it seemed not much time had passed in reality.

Perhaps at most two hours.

“……”

I calmly surveyed the surroundings.

We had clearly been inside an old shop before we left, but somehow the building had vanished without a trace.

Only a desolate, empty lot greeted us.

As if such a shop had never existed here in the first place.

It seemed to follow the original work, after all.

Originally, once an episode ended, the shop would be completely erased from the game’s records.

All that remained for the player was the reward item.

And the strange book we had picked up at first.

“Young Master-nim… What could have happened?”

“I wonder.”

I picked up a book lying on the floor.

It was a book covered in old leather.

On its cover, the title [How to Cross the Desert] shimmered in golden letters.

I gently turned the page.

*Rustle*.

A single illustration appeared when I reached the very end.

It was a drawing depicting a boy and a girl.

Below it, only a simple title was attached.

[Josh and Rosaline]

The two were embracing each other with brilliant smiles in a world as beautiful as the night sky.

They looked as if they had just been reunited.

A faint smile spread across my lips.

I, who had been idly touching the page, soon answered the girl standing beside me.

My voice colored the dark backdrop warmly.

“It’s just that a fairy tale has ended.”

I closed the book.

Before I knew it, a new sentence, not the original title, was written on the cover.

It had changed in the brief moment I looked away.

I murmured that one phrase to myself.

[Thank you.]

A greeting left by someone unknown.

We looked down at the letters in silence for a while.