I miss you so much it hurts.

On the rare days when exhaustion overtook him, and he managed to sleep, she would inevitably appear in his dreams. He had yearned with every fiber of his being to reach out to the retreating figure who always turned her back on him. How many times had he despaired, realizing he could never touch her? And yet, how pitifully happy had he been just to see her silhouette, even if only in dreams?

The stark reality that he had to face the waking world again felt unbearably cruel when he awoke.

Should I have smiled, knowing I could see you at all? Should I have cherished the sight of your back as though it was a gift?

If it were reality, I would have done so without hesitation. Even that would have been enough to make me happy.

But you are my dream.

And when I woke, what I mourned most was that very fact.

I cannot forgive myself. Perhaps I am the one who deserves the least forgiveness.

“…”

Still kneeling, the man silently gazed at the crumbled throne. A pitiful subject, he had nothing to offer to his only god.

She had been merciless, not even allowing herself to be missed. She had said she wanted to be forgotten entirely. She wanted no trace of her life to remain, to be erased completely.

“It was her last wish. She asked that nothing of her be left behind.”

“…What?”

“In history, she will remain only as the foolish princess of a fallen kingdom. That’s how she wanted it.”

“…Why?”

He had asked, though he had already guessed the answer. He could vaguely understand what had driven her to make such a wish.

She must have been utterly weary of it all—of the fact that she had ever lived in such a world. Perhaps she wanted to obliterate all evidence of her existence, to become someone who had never been here in the first place. She might have sought perfect freedom, where no one would recall or commemorate her. Perhaps she dreamed not of death but of complete erasure.

Ruben had silently carried out her final wish. He burned everything that could remind anyone of her, erasing every trace of her existence. With his own hands, he did so.

On the night he gathered and burned all the letters she had sent to the revolutionary forces, he had stood before the searing flames and asked:

“Let me ask just one thing.”

“Go ahead.”

“Why did you tell me? About that wish of hers?”

“…”

He couldn’t recall the guild leader Devon’s expression at that moment. What lingered was her parting words:

“Even someone like her deserves to be remembered by at least one person, don’t you think?”

She had been right. And if there was to be just one person who remembered her, it had to be Ruben Effenberg. He couldn’t relinquish even that role to anyone else. No matter how much it hurt, that wound was his alone to bear.

“I hope… you’ll be pleased.”

He had adhered to her wish with almost obsessive fidelity as if trying to reset everything he hadn’t been able to do for her in life. When he declared he would demolish the starlit estate where she had once stayed, even those around him tried to dissuade him. They whispered, wondering if he truly needed to go that far or was merely trying to erase her to forget her.

But it wasn’t Ruben’s will.

If it had been up to him, he would have begged for even a single blade of grass she had trodden on or a careless scribble she had made to remain. Those remnants alone might have been enough to sustain him throughout his life. That was how merciless the current situation was to him.

But she had allowed no trace of herself to remain. She had been cruelly unyielding, even to those left behind. Yet, who could call her cruel? No one. Not even she could reproach herself.

“…”

A person who had not even allowed a grave to lay a single flower upon. And so, before the throne was reclaimed, he could do nothing.

Still, he knelt before the throne, where his unyielding master had permitted not even a strand of her hair or a piece of her clothing. He knelt as if swearing eternal fealty.

“I…”

Perhaps the fact of existing in this world had been unbearable to her. Maybe she had longed to disappear entirely. He could not presume to grasp the depth of her feelings, but he could not fail to understand her resolve.

Yet you did exist; all lives leave marks as if burned into the world.

Look—here I am, longing for you.

“I… I will keep searching for you.”

I will wander endlessly for someone I can never meet again, perhaps for the rest of my life. As if my entire existence was meant to yearn for you, I will pursue every trace of you. And if I stumble upon something of yours by chance, I will erase it with my hands, over and over, like a madman.

Will I cry every time? While erasing your traces, endlessly longing for you?

“You…”

The incomplete confession dissolves into the air. It was a story I would repeat for the rest of my life. I would never entirely utter words, yet I could not help but keep trying to say. As if I were endlessly returning to that day, standing before you as you coughed up blood. Though I had already failed a thousand times and knew I would never reach you, foolishly, I would still run toward you again.

How many more times will I embrace your fading form and wail? How many more times will I feel the trembling in my hands, unable to hold you tightly for fear of harming you? How many more times will I have to face your pale face as life finally leaves you?

When memories of that day claw at me anew, I am overcome with sorrow. Sometimes, I even wished to die…

“Urgh…”

But the fear that my sins are so great I might never meet you even in death—that I might not even be able to long for you—terrified me. So, I could not even choose to die.

The man bowed his head before a master who no longer existed, tears spilling silently. Each drop darkened the ashes on the ground, leaving an even deeper shadow behind. A strong wind whipped through, scattering the ashes and brushing past the man. He seemed so faint as if he might vanish into the dust. Yet, no one could pull him out of the darkness.

Not long after, a deafening cheer erupted in the distance, shaking the sky. Everyone proudly chanted the name of the saintess. It was a monumental moment marking the birth of a new kingdom. Yet, amidst the jubilation, one man alone kissed the now-empty throne of a vanished kingdom—a sight unseen by anyone and thus destined to remain unremembered. Only the indifferent wind passed through, sweeping away even that desolate moment.