Climbing The Tower I can Change My Career Path

Long Gone

Altair had crossed the next bridge and then stepped onto the second small island.

The second memory, when the memory of his regret began to surface, was one where the young man had managed to see a memory that he truly regretted, one that genuinely saddened him.

This time, he was sixteen years old. It was a memory from before he left the orphanage of his own accord to study at a school.

It was a memory from a few days after he had been selected by a school because of his intelligence, learned that he could receive an excellent education on a scholarship, and accepted the offer.

The young man was in a room at the orphanage. It was a truly warm room, with the orphanage's elderly director present and the orphanage's children, both young and old, around him.

This place... was perhaps the best, most emotionally warm room in the orphanage.

Whenever anyone wanted to cry, whenever they wanted to laugh, whenever they wanted to shed tears of joy, they would come here, to this room where the director was.

When he turned sixteen, the director of the orphanage was already over eighty years old. In short, she was a very old woman.

This woman was the only person Altair considered family.

The young man realised that there was no conversation in this memory. Of course, this was natural because on that day, a child had been adopted from the orphanage and, naturally, taken away.

And of course, this meant that many children, big and small, were sad.

The director was singing a song. It was an old song; it could be called a folk song, in French, she was French after all. A song that Altair never wanted to learn the translation of, but in a way, it was a song about the departure of a loved one.

Ne pleure pas Jeannette.

The headmistress never mentioned the name of the child who had left. You could say this song was a little sad and a little disturbing. The reason was that every time this song was sung, the headmistress's eyes would fill with tears.

The elderly headmistress, when she was a younger girl, had unfortunately never been adopted, and as time passed, she had mothered many children as the headmistress of the orphanage.

In short, this elderly woman had seen many children go to happiness, but she was consumed by the departure of these little children she considered her own.

There was only one reason Altair was seeing this memory.

Half a year after the young man had accepted the school's offer and left the orphanage, he had received some sad news.

The headmistress... had sadly passed away.

Altair couldn't even see that old woman, whom he could have seen as his grandmother or even as his mother, pass away.

This... was truly his greatest regret.

The young man took a deep breath. He knew he had to respond to his memories now, that he had to answer, so he could finally put everything behind him.

Still... Ne pleure pas Jeannette... The director's voice was so beautiful, so soothing, so full of longing that Altair could only sit on the small island he was on and listen to this memory over and over again.

When Shuhar first looked at Altair from the small island, he honestly couldn't even imagine what to say.

It wasn't just him; it was the same for the gods and goddesses watching from the very top of the tower in the sacred land.

Everyone knew that humans, in particular, were a race deeply attached to memories.

Still, this... was a little too sad, wasn't it?

Just a song.

Just a voice...

Of someone who no longer existed...

Shuhar smiled beneath his mask and murmured, "What an interesting person..." and then simply continued watching Altair.

Altair had waited in that tiny spot for almost twenty minutes. With his eyes open, he had replayed the memory over and over again, and when the time came to move, he had stood up.

He had carefully watched the memory one last time and began to speak calmly:

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't say goodbye. I regret not being there on his last day, but there was nothing I could do. You are a memory, a memory I don't want to leave behind and won't leave behind. Anything can happen in this life, and I realise I will experience many memories in the future that I will regret."

"Still, I will continue to keep everything in the deepest parts of my mind, so as not to make the same mistakes again."

Immediately after saying these words, the young man bowed his head and said, "After all... Being human requires this, doesn't it?"

With these words, the memory cracked and shattered into pieces.

Each piece fell into the sea and sank to its depths.

Altair sprang into action immediately, moving straight to the next bridge and then to the last small island.

As soon as he set foot in the area, a sight appeared that angered Altair.

"Forgiveness."

A heavy word.

For some, it was incomprehensible; for many, it was absurd; for those who knew the truth and tried to forget, who tried to leave everything behind, it was an inevitable word.

What Altair had to forgive was now standing before him.

A woman, her face unseen, like the image of a drawing in a notebook.

Every sacred being watching him was glued to their seats. The young man's first two reactions were so different from what was happening now that it was impossible not to wonder what would happen.

"You don't deserve to be a mother. There are many children in the world, each one deserving to be loved, to laugh, to cry, and to live. Unfortunately, with women and men like you, not everyone can experience the same things. It's impossible to prevent that," said Altair.

"The woman whose face I don't even remember, whose name I don't know, whose voice I've never heard, and whose existence I've even forgotten. The day you left me in front of the orphanage, the day you abandoned me to enter the tower, everything between us ended," he added to his own words.

Immediately afterwards, he took a deep breath and then said, "You're not even worth my forgiveness... After all, the person I need to forgive... is myself, isn't it?" he said.

"Because I couldn't forget you, because I tried to find you, because I tried to remember your name, because I wanted to know what you looked like, because I wanted to feel your love... I must forgive myself for being so weak."

"Memories are precious, yet they are only precious when they involve people who love you and whom you love. You are neither of those things, so leaving you behind will not be a painful situation but a joyful one. Break and vanish forever."