Chapter 6 - Episode 1 - The Start of Life (6)

[ Solaria Forest, Outskirts of Solaria Western Baronial Walls ]

The windy cold night send shivers to my spine. My body tries grasp the heat under my cloak as I walk through the vast fields into the woods. Right in front of me, is the tall knight with the luggage of a dead person he is dragging down the ground.

Caesar opted to -in his own words- hide -although I strongly said bury- the body in the western part of the land. Outside the fortress wall, the wide and enormous forest of Solaria is located. Fortunately, as useless as I perceive Caesar is he redeemed himself partially by suggesting we don't touch Fedrick's unnecessary belongings and just bring the body and documents with us.

When Caesar suggested we also take care of the knight I knocked out outside, I knew this guy is seriously worrying about his future that I threatened.

" There is a spot in the forest where the soil is easy to shovel, it will take a while but I think it's much better to hide him there. Usually, dead animals are buried there by countless of predators so no one will ever suspect a human body amongst it."

I stare at his back as he continue to walk. -How the hell does he know that?-

" We often go to this forest to hunt so I'm quite familiar."

As if he had read my mind, his answer sounded firm. He did not turn around to face me, he continue dragging Fedrick's body.

I grimace at the sight, the poor corpse might be uncomfortable with all that dragging. 

" Can you at least respect the dead and carry him properly? Must you drag him viciously?"

Even if Fedrick is wrap in a duvet, I am sure his body must have been suffering from the sharp edges of the ground.

" All you do is whine." Caesar glared on my way before crouching down and hastily picks up the corpse.

" Dead bodies are something you can just handle carelessly, I didn't know a person like you can be that cold." 

This man, with his dark raven hair and grey eyes I know he looks as cold as ice but I have no faint idea that he is that freezing. He acts as if dead bodies are broken tools to be discarded, and the worst of it I can't even see a single clue of guilt among those hard eyes.

-Caesar, now I understand how you were able to destroy the kingdom. Such absence of humanity does it, right?-

The night falls deeper, the dark skies and it's clouds passing through the moon and slightly blocking it's light. Entering the forest, my body feel the familiar feeling of instinct and survival. Something that has been embedded in me for a very long time.

The forest sings the danger to me. A path in which I had journey for many times. The rich brazen trees had become my escape, my hiding, my home, and even my death. In the many lives I have, the forest had witness me too many times.

And so I wish this will be the last time.

" Let's do it here." 

Caesar carelessly drop the body on the ground, the sound of it hitting the surface made me feel sorry. I admit, a partial point of such incident that is between me and Caesar, I too have some fault. After all, I am the one who demanded to meet Fedrick. While I am quite busy trying to console myself and remind myself that if Fedrick did not die tonight, then he will be a villain for this empire and will be Caesar accomplice later on. And this will eventually lead to my death, once again.

-Yes, his death will do us, especially me a huge favor.-

Yet, I could not erase the feeling of uneasiness as I keep my gaze on the wrapped body. 

A corpse is not new to me, I have seen countless of them. I have buried many people before, and I alone had been a corpse too. One would think that I am far used to this, and yes, I am. I am too used of seeing dead bodies, but being used to it is no equivalent to being alright with it. Death will always bother me even at just the slightest.

While I watch Caesar as he shovels the soil with his own sword, the sight of the open ground puts me into an unsettling feeling. Another body, in this lifetime that I shall bury and and carry the burden. Although Fedrick's death is favorable for my sake, it doesn't settle in me that fine.

" Let me help." I discarded my thoughts.

Taking off my cloak, I drop into my knees and started helping Caesar with my own hands. The cold and muddy soil against my skin makes me wonder what it would feel like to be six feet underground. To rest in peace forever, to lie my cold and unmoving, breathless body to it's eternal rest and never find itself back to the life she wanted to survive from. 

When will I ever get the chance to be buried in peace?

" Refrain from doing so, Giselle." 

Before I could realize what is happening, Caesar is already in front of me with my hands in his. The dirty hands of mind, covered with mud from the palm to my nails. Caesar soft touches around it made my mind clear. 

"I may not regard you as my master, but it is not fitting for the lady of the house to kneel before a knight or soil her hands with labor."

With the white handkerchief he took out of his pocket, his soft and delicate touch while he tried to clean my hands separates who he is from what I am seeing. His grey eyes almost reflecting the light from above us, and it dappled shadows casted into his raven hair. The delicate look he has while he is kneeling down to me, Caesar couldn't look more tamable.

" That's enough." I withdrew my hands. the sudden absence of his touch give me a certain loss.

" From my experience, it will take too long to dig a hole without the proper tools, thus two people should make it easier." I reasoned out, and when I moved to continue helping him he surprised me again by stopping me.

"Stay here." His eyes examined my state for a moment before giving me his own coat. " I am knight, Giselle. I have my own honor and pride."

- So that was his problem? His pride being toppled on.-

" Then, at least let me take some flowers for the dead." I moved closer to Fedrick's body. 

Opening the duvet, I was met with a chilling sight. There, nestled within the once comforting folds of fabric, lay the lifeless body of the person I had been eager to speak with. Their features, once vibrant and animated, were now shrouded in an eerie stillness, their skin taking on a ghostly pallor that seemed to drain the warmth from the room. Death had claimed them, leaving behind only a haunting semblance of the person they once were. The subtle changes had already begun to take hold. Though not immediately evident to the naked eye, the silent grip of rigor mortis had begun to tighten its hold on their limbs, while the faintest hint of cooling hinted at the irreversible march of time. 

" Giselle-" Caesar's voice trailed off as I started to roam the dark place.

" I'll be back." I immediately responded when Caesar called out for me, although it was dark I could see the questioning look in his eyes. " He ought to be buried properly."

I ventured into the forest, the dappling moonlight filtering through the canopy above casting a mesmerizing pattern on the forest floor. There is nothing that I can properly see, nor I don't have any plans to go further away from where Caesar is. All I need is a decent plant that would at least make his death and burial respectable. 

Or maybe, I who had experience death for many times feels this undying guilt no matter how much I tell myself I have no sense of care for his loss-but here I am, trying to ease what I feel by trying to be respectful.

The thing is, even though I claimed that this is for my sake and I had plan this-and his or anyone's death is inevitable, I fear that what I am doing might haunt me tenfold.

.

[ Later that night, at the crack of dawn ]

" Can you bury these with him?" 

The arrange of assorted flowers that I managed to collect looks exactly like this night. Cold and not alive, the pathetic attempt of mine to console myself over the death I am used to seeing yet still feel resigned. In my hands, are the once beautiful flowers who are alive until I plucked them out recklessly.

" I have seen you in many form of emotions, but I have never witness such look." Caesar took the flowers out my hands and dropped it in the body. " Such sadness in your eyes makes me question if you really haven't met this man before."

" He is no one." I quickly replied.

" No one, yet you bear the look of someone who lost someone."

I sighed, unable to answer the knight in front of me. Maybe he is right, I look sad. The look in my face probably confuses him into thinking that Fedrick is quite the someone for me. But the truth is, I could not help myself but feel that way when I am seeing a dead body as it reminded me of myself and probably my future in many lifetimes.

I am not even sure if this lifetime will succeed even at the expense of Fedrick's early death.

Maybe, it will end up the same.

I watch Caesar finally covered Fedrick's body in the ground. The scene is hauntingly bothering me, and it rendered me uncapable of regressing the memories in my head. As the realization commences its nature in my being, I know this start of my decision is also the start of my new life. The first step of the plan I made to survive this 28th life, I feel the heaviness of what could be the outcome or is there a way out of this.

How many people should I involve in this? How many people will I have to use, how many lives will I take for this plan of mine?

Will the death of others will finally let me escape my death?

" Let's get you home, the sun is almost rising." 

I looked around, noticing how the skies are slowly breaking out from its darkness as the stray of early lights streaking. The sight of the both of us in our dirty garments is already visible. The rugged shirt of Caesar full of soil and mud, as well as his hands and boots. The once sharp double edge sword of his, unrecognizable under the pit of dirt. And I am sure, I also look unpresentable.

" You're right." I nod.

I handed him his coat as I took my own from the ground. It was left there for how many hours, that the mud on its hems could not be shaken off anymore. No matter how hard I try to sweep it off, it won't come off. The tight grip of it on the fabric will never loosen, that dirt might stay in there forever.

Just like how this dirt between us would never be forgotten, not even once. I have the leash of Caesar's neck, I have him under me for the same dirt we both know we share the same responsibility for. Yet, it feels like the heavier burden is at his side of the leash and what is mine, is the side of guilt and hesitations. Because in this new life, I decided to start it with death.