The snowfield was bitterly cold… colder than Siberia had ever been… so cold that even her own body heat seemed to want to flee.
After a sudden, thunderous roar, the girl's ears rang with the clamor and chaos. Gently buried by the white snow, she let the cold brutally steal her life away.
The delicate snowflakes arrived late, falling from the sky like pale ribbons carelessly tossed down by a god, a lament for the sorrow of the world.
Warfare… a fire more common on this land than the hearth fire. The smoke people saw most often wasn't from cooking fires, but from gunpowder.
Poison, bombs, slaughter, corpses… They tore apart all past beauty, peeling away layer after layer of pretense from human nature.
Until, with tears in their eyes, people finished peeling this giant, beautiful "onion" and discovered how ugly the core within truly was…
Darkness and coldness pressed in from all sides. The girl no longer had the strength to open her eyes, nor the courage to continue living.
"Just let it end… At least there's a blanket," she thought, resolving to stop struggling, to stop hoping for the sun.
Lost in the snowfield for so long, she missed her mom and dad…
The sound of a shovel biting into the snow pierced the drifts, becoming the only sound in the girl's world. A faint call reached her, causing her dimming consciousness to flicker back.
Turning her head… she saw the sun…
She brushed aside the purple hair that framed her face, her golden eyes shone like a sun breaking through the clouds. The snow seemed to avoid her, or perhaps it melted into the white coat she wore.
She bent down and gently wiped the snow from the girl's face, then embraced her tightly.
It was a familiar warmth, one she hadn't felt in so long. It was the girl's joyful sobs beside her ear, a fragrance that shouldn't exist amidst the vast, white snow…
She said, "Don't be afraid, Sirin knows magic… Sirin can protect everyone…"
She said…
"Sirin won't abandon anyone."
When life, warmth, the world, friends, parents, and even the girl herself had given up on her, she said, "I won't give up on you."
She loved the girl in place of everyone, including the girl herself.
White snow scattered from her shoulders, and the girl felt…
…that these were flowers scattered by God.
---||---
The girl forgot her own name, only sitting listlessly beside her, curled into a ball, unwilling to interact with anyone else.
The girl seemed to have contracted some kind of illness… Her body felt increasingly strange and uncomfortable. Looking around, the others in the vehicle either wore heavy protective suits or were children just as strangely deformed as she was.
The protective suits were too cold, making the girl reluctant to approach. The other children's contorted postures frightened her… She also feared mirrors, feared any smooth surface that could reflect her appearance.
Except for her… The only normal one sat in the center of the vehicle, her head bowed low.
The children huddled around her, as if she were the only torch in this place. The girl mustered her courage and squeezed beside her, then timidly and self-consciously raised a hand to cover the horn on her head.
The girl had become very strange, like a monster. A single horn grew asymmetrically from one side of her head, twisting and pushing aside her taro-colored hair…
Like all the children here, the girl feared that her appearance would scare her away, too. The timid child even started to cry, but quickly stifled the sound out of ingrained habit.
Children in Siberia never cried loudly because cries didn't summon their mom and dad… Before learning to speak, they first learned to cover their mouths.
But sadness couldn't be contained. Even those in protective suits turned their heads away, sorrowful sobs escaping from beneath their thick helmets.
Even she was…
No… She shouldn't cry… Such a radiant person shouldn't sit there crying alone… She should be smiling under the blue sky, just like she smiled at her…
The girl didn't want to see those brilliant golden eyes clouded with tears.
So, the girl quietly approached her and gently took her hand.
When her mother left, she had held her hand just like this, telling her not to cry… She had promised her mother she wouldn't cry… so she couldn't cry… absolutely not…
She paused, looking at the girl and noticing the horn on her head.
She instinctively reached out. The girl flinched, pulling back her hand and covering her horn.
But she gently stroked the parts the girl hadn't covered, sighing with longing.
"So beautiful… just like a dragon's horn…"
The girl froze, turning to look at the glass of the vehicle.
In the reflection… she really did look like a dragon…
---||---
It was time to leave…
The girl and she had watched together as everyone who entered the Tower of Babylon with them was led into small "rooms." They watched as many others were laid down in those tiny spaces where they couldn't even turn over.
Now, it was her turn to witness the girl's own departure…
The girl looked more and more like a dragon… Miraculously, she had grown a symmetrical pair of wings, capable of supporting her in short flights.
Sharp claws had grown on her hands, but after she accidentally scratched Sirin, the girl pulled them out, hiding for days with her bloodied hands. When they found her, she was about to enter hibernation.
Her face always wore that melancholic expression, grieving for everyone. Now it was the girl's turn…
But she didn't want her to be sad… She wanted her to smile…
Just before entering the room, the girl turned back and boldly walked up to Sirin.
"Lady Sirin… Bella is just going to sleep for a while. Please don't be upset because of me…"
She paused, shaking her head. "I'm not upset… I just…"
The girl reached out, taking Sirin's hand in hers, her resolve hardening.
The girl wanted an extravagant gift… a promise from her…
"Lady Sirin, can you promise Bella one thing?" the girl asked timidly. It was the first time she had ever made a request.
She was silent for a moment, then slowly nodded.
The girl gazed into her brilliant golden eyes and smiled.
"When Bella wakes up, can you smile at me like that?"
She agreed. The girl turned and left, content, a smile on her face. But with every step, a tear rolled down her cheek.
The girl froze, raising a hand to wipe away the tears, then continued forward, still smiling.
The tears kept flowing, but her smile never faltered.
"I promised… I promised I wouldn't cry again…" she murmured, wiping her tears and smiling.
"Hibernation"… It sounded so cold… But the girl wasn't afraid, because she knew that Sirin would one day dig her out from that icy place again.
---||---
The only image the girl thought of before falling asleep was Sirin's smile under the snow that day.
That smile… was something she would protect with everything she had.
"Lady Sirin… you have to smile…"
Bella took the remaining vial of Honkai-suppressing serum from Sirin's hand and smiled gently.