Celeste's right hand stroked the back of Noenvi's hand. As he felt it slowly grow cold, his heart grew heavier and heavier.
"Forty years of companionship ends here."
After murmuring that, Celeste stood, lifted Noenvi's body in his arms, and walked into the house.
In the side room sat a coffin, one Noenvi had begged Celeste to prepare half a year ago.
He washed her, changed her clothes, and finally laid Noenvi inside.
Picking up a shovel, Celeste left the room and went beneath the great locust tree, where he began digging into the earth.
By the time night fell, a pit three meters long, two meters wide, and three meters deep appeared before him.
Celeste returned to the room, carried the coffin on his back, and placed it in the deep pit.
Then he picked up the shovel again and began filling the earth back in.
The whole process was long. With every shovelful of earth he filled in, scenes of their past together surfaced in Celeste's mind.
At some unknown point, the moon hung high in the night sky.
Looking at the mound of earth before him, Celeste set down the shovel, moved over a boulder, and carved words into it with a homemade stone-carving knife.
But after he carved Noenvi's name, his hands hung suspended in the air.
"Forty years ago, you asked if I was willing to be your man. Now I can tell you the answer."
After taking a deep breath, Celeste continued carving. The movements of his hands did not pause in the slightest, but the speed of his carving clearly slowed.
In the silent night sky, apart from the sound of the waves, only the rhythmic tapping remained.
Xuemya looked at Celeste in the scene and suddenly asked, "How about we end it