Every World (after battle)
All that remained on the rooftop was a burnt Golden Bough inside the coffin.
The Golden Bough is burnt white. It appears that someone has made off with the other.
<Nelly... took the other one. The one that's intact.>
She must've taken it to her.
... Hermann.
…….
This isn't a failure.
We'll get it back.
Even if our hearts may be broken apart, if I give it my all... we'll be connected once again.
As they did, even in the world where Catherine and I were both dead.
Is Catherine... the name of the person in this coffin?
I'm sorry, everything feels so... foggy...
The coffin and the person that lies within will be taken back to the headquarters by the After Team.
<…….>
I wanted to ask him if he was okay, but... I already knew the answer. So many things had gone wrong.
No. I'm still... not okay.
Heathcliff's one and only goal... was gone.
But Heathcliff was no longer trapped in a living dream.
... Perhaps that is precisely why he could open the door to see a new, wider world.
Not a single color remained in the silent Wuthering Heights once the tempest passed.
All monochromatic, save for...
... patches of color...
Those flowers... are called heath.
The loneliest flowers that take root and bloom in the wild moorlands... But they're also flowers that survive no matter what devastating tempest comes their way. They endure it all and wait.
<Wait for... what?>
I don't know. The time, I suppose.
That is when Heathcliff finally told us the name of the flowers.
Woahh! Go after it! GO!
Oi, it took off. Where the bloody hell are you lookin' at?!
Well, maybe you should've told me that first?!
Another day, another Distortion hunting in the streets of T Corp. as per LCD's orders.
Looks like it didn't take too long for Heathcliff to be his usual energetic self once agai -
Oi, I told you to send 'em this way! I'll smash your head in once this is over!
... Maybe he's gotten too passionate.
<…….>
<Long time no - Wait. Why are you... how do you still have color?>
Because the light is yet to reach me.
Because a star is an unfathomable distance away.
Do you like flowers too, Dante?
<Um...>
<I think I've come to like them.>
Imagine that there was a single rose you've taken care of for a long time.
Your room was always brimming from the sweet aroma of that flower.
But one day, you leave the rose behind to go on a long, long journey.
In your journey, you come across a large garden... and there, you see thousands of the very same rose you once cared for. That sight... brings you to tears, and you drop to your knees.
... Why do you suppose that is?
<…….>
Demian... he's appeared before me in the past. He would always leave me with these cryptic riddles.
But I'm starting to understand what his riddles are supposed to represent.
<Because I've finally come to understand.>
<That the one I truly loved was the rose I'd left behind.>
Correct.
Even though there are thousands of roses in this world, there is but one rose that is mine.
You've watered it diligently, cared for it, even as its thorns pricked your fingers. So that your care makes its aroma bloom.
I suppose that's how it was for Heathcliff and Catherine as well. Knowing that there are infinite Catherines and Heathcliffs in countless worlds... they wished not for the happiness of infinite Catherines and Heathcliffs but for the happiness of each other. Because to them, each other was the one that truly mattered.
But it would take most people a long, long time to understand that. Because most people are foolish.
Do you understand? Once I learn to properly love my very own flower...
I no longer need to protect the thousands of other roses in the world.
People of this star care for thousands of rose blossoms in their own gardens... but still fail to find what they really desire.
<... But what of the other flowers that have already bloomed?>
<What happens to them?>
Demian smiled at my question.
You will find the answer to that question yourself...
... when you can draw me a sheep.
With that, Demian disappeared.
... I hear the faint cry of a distant lamb.