"But the sun rises again."
FrostNova felt Patriot's analogy was somewhat inappropriate. The sun set and rose, its radiance shining equally upon everyone.
"The sun sets, then rises. When people die, they do not."
A finite life could not last forever, and individual strength was unreliable. Patriot had experienced this firsthand. His strength was waning; his guerrilla force had made it this far partly through personal might, partly through strategy, and partly through an illusory prophecy.
He was a Wendigo.
The last pure-blooded Wendigo.
"Back then, she really helped us a great deal at the border mine."
"Be grateful to her, but do not yearn for her."
"Oh."
The sun melted ice and snow, while bonfires scorched moths. Some people were destined from birth to shine in all directions. Someone like her could only melt away alone at the border.
FrostNova had considered her own ending. No matter what, it could never be a peaceful death of old age.
The guerrillas marched across the snowfields. Loose snow was crushed aside, and the small mobile settlement plowed broad tracks through the snow like a rainbow cutting across the sky—mighty and vast, yet lonely.
"Hah!"
"No. Not good at all."
The swords were tossed aside. Ch'en lay weakly atop moss-covered flagstones, endless cold seeping into her back and making her overheated body shudder. She felt that lying here like this would get her sick sooner or later, but she truly had no choice.
There was nothing left. She did not have even a shred of strength remaining.
Today was another day when she failed to unleash Chi Xiao: Shadowless. Ch'en watched the shrine maiden crouch down. Rather than wiping away her sweat like a traditional swordsmanship instructor, she shook her head with dissatisfied clicks of her tongue, lamenting how she had ended