448
After Bayam returned to peace, Azik, who had witnessed the entire incident alongside Klein, quietly said goodbye and prepared to leave.
Klein hurriedly stopped him.
"Mr. Azik, there's something I'd like to ask you." After some hesitation, Klein finally voiced the worries and pain that had lingered in his heart for a day and a night.
Azik responded gently, "What is it?"
"I'm sorry. This may reopen old wounds for you..."
"Some things happened to me that made me realize Edward Vaughan wasn't lying to me. I really did, I really... I really came from an ancient era, from the world of the past." It took Klein a great deal of effort to get those words out. He no longer wore the crazy adventurer's face; he looked young, like an ordinary university student. "...I always thought this was another world, that my family and friends were still waiting for me, so I worked hard to find a way home... But now, I've suddenly learned that I might be someone who survived from the past, brought to the present by Sefirah Castle. My family, my friends, everything is already gone..."
Listening to Klein's increasingly low, distant voice, Azik seemed to understand something.
"...Time." Azik spoke with deep emotion. "In my countless past lives, I rarely had the chance to miss the past, because by the time I remembered those things, my life had already reached its end."
"I had already become cold and unfeeling, unable to feel sorrow or joy."
He had existed for a very long time, but lived merely for the sake of existing. Perhaps he had once had wishes and goals during his long life, but in the end, they had all fallen silent in darkness and cold. Each successive life often ended too quickly. Those few