The three of them gathered together and walked beneath the monument Joseph had mentioned.
The massive monument stood about twenty meters tall. To be honest, it was neither grand nor towering. Having lived in hive cities, they had long since seen countless taller buildings, but those had belonged to nobles or been chimneys belching poisonous smoke.
In the past, they would have cast indifferent glances at things unrelated to their lives, pinched their noses as they passed through the settling dust, brushed the grime from themselves, and gone about their own business.
But now, facing this modest, unadorned monument, Dovell felt his nose sting.
"This was the first building we put up. People need something to believe in. Honestly, I used to think that was just something Ecclesiarchy priests said offhand, but it turns out people really do need faith."
"So we raised it. We planned to call it the Unknown Heroes Monument... Too many people died. Too many bodies were thrown into the starch synthesizers. Those days were unbearable. There were pitifully few dog tags recovered from the battlefield; those little metal pieces had been buried together beneath all kinds of shrapnel..."
"So we made it clean and neat... There was really nothing left to decorate it with. If we had to name something, there was only an Aquila still being blessed by the Sisters, waiting to be hung up."
Joseph and Annie filled in each other's words, one after another. The two of them understood each other perfectly, neither trying to talk over the other. That quiet, ordinary feeling instead made Dovell feel the sweetness of love.
He had watched films before. Back when he was in school, he had gone with the girls in his class to see those sweet love stories. The male and female leads