Chapter 11

In the final moment before his death, Garrison saw Hugo.

"You think dying will atone for your sins?" Hugo asked him.

"I know of a ritual," Garrison said calmly, "to exchange my life for her rebirth."

"Do you know the cost?"

"I do," he smiled, "I'll forever lose the chance to reincarnate, becoming the bridge keeper on the Bridge of Helplessness."

"Do you regret it?"

"No," he looked at the hairpin in his hand, "as long as she can live well."

Hugo sighed, "What a pity, she has already reincarnated. And you will wait for her on this bridge forever, waiting for someone who will never appear."

"It's alright, this is what I owe her."

Ninety years later on the Bridge of Helplessness.

Garrison stood at the head of the bridge, sending off batch after batch of departed souls as usual.

He looked back at me with a complicated gaze, not one of pity, but as if calculating something.

On this day of "this life," an elderly couple with white hair arrived.