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The Snow Covered with Peonies :: Epilogue
by littlemaiko
"You suddenly like peonies."
"Bah, I do not."
"You do, Luca. You don't crush them like you used to."
"...You call these 'beheading flowers'. Who told you?"
"Gremio."
"Elaborate."
"...Gremio, the manservant who raised me in place of my mother. He had the prettiest blond hair. He died because of me."
"I see."
"You are not a very good listener."
"I never was. Go on with the story."
"There is nothing more to the story. Gremio told me to keep the flowers out of the house and I did, though that did nothing to prevent him from dying. I killed him. I killed everyone. ...I have killed everyone for whom I could have lived for."
That short conversation with Kohaku McDohl gave me reasons to mock him for the weakness, but I now see that I am no better off. As much as it shames me to admit, I follow the same path that he had tread. The path to death.
No, I refuse to give in to the sentimentality of grief for the lost ones. Those who are gone are gone. Whether by my hands or... like my mother, a victim to despicable tragedy, the dead are not to be mourned over. I cannot be sure if this philosophy came into play from the self-defense of a child that I was at the time of the visit to Muse.
I have killed many, Jowstonian pigs and others who had stood in my mad rampage. Although I feel no regret, I look back to the days of the Dunan Unification War and feel empty at the lack of its accomplishments. All that I had done was destroy cities and wipe out the populace. Nothing about the world had changed. Somewhere, some day, or perhaps every day, the same dastardly fate that had befallen my mother crashes over another woman. Perhaps it would be by the hands of Highlander men.
The utter hollowness that resides within my bosom now is the same as the one that had haunted the young demon of the snow peonies. He had taught me the bliss in awaiting the eternal darkness. In him, I had seen the truth of what I had wanted all along. Beneath the madness, there had always been the desire to depart from this world. Whether I destroyed the world or it destroyed me, it would not have mattered.
I shall soon destroy myself. The sword that I hold now, the one that had ended the equally miserable life of an immortal child, will grant me what I seek. In this clearing filled with the snow covered with peonies, I have buried Kohaku McDohl. I wonder if the color of my blood will be the same crimson as that of his dying blood and the beheaded flowers scattered exquisitely over the white? I have yet to find it out.
THE END
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The Snow Covered with Peonies :: Epilogue
by littlemaiko
"You suddenly like peonies."
"Bah, I do not."
"You do, Luca. You don't crush them like you used to."
"...You call these 'beheading flowers'. Who told you?"
"Gremio."
"Elaborate."
"...Gremio, the manservant who raised me in place of my mother. He had the prettiest blond hair. He died because of me."
"I see."
"You are not a very good listener."
"I never was. Go on with the story."
"There is nothing more to the story. Gremio told me to keep the flowers out of the house and I did, though that did nothing to prevent him from dying. I killed him. I killed everyone. ...I have killed everyone for whom I could have lived for."
That short conversation with Kohaku McDohl gave me reasons to mock him for the weakness, but I now see that I am no better off. As much as it shames me to admit, I follow the same path that he had tread. The path to death.
No, I refuse to give in to the sentimentality of grief for the lost ones. Those who are gone are gone. Whether by my hands or... like my mother, a victim to despicable tragedy, the dead are not to be mourned over. I cannot be sure if this philosophy came into play from the self-defense of a child that I was at the time of the visit to Muse.
I have killed many, Jowstonian pigs and others who had stood in my mad rampage. Although I feel no regret, I look back to the days of the Dunan Unification War and feel empty at the lack of its accomplishments. All that I had done was destroy cities and wipe out the populace. Nothing about the world had changed. Somewhere, some day, or perhaps every day, the same dastardly fate that had befallen my mother crashes over another woman. Perhaps it would be by the hands of Highlander men.
The utter hollowness that resides within my bosom now is the same as the one that had haunted the young demon of the snow peonies. He had taught me the bliss in awaiting the eternal darkness. In him, I had seen the truth of what I had wanted all along. Beneath the madness, there had always been the desire to depart from this world. Whether I destroyed the world or it destroyed me, it would not have mattered.
I shall soon destroy myself. The sword that I hold now, the one that had ended the equally miserable life of an immortal child, will grant me what I seek. In this clearing filled with the snow covered with peonies, I have buried Kohaku McDohl. I wonder if the color of my blood will be the same crimson as that of his dying blood and the beheaded flowers scattered exquisitely over the white? I have yet to find it out.
THE END