"So, it is time to let the legacy move forward."
After fifty years, the idea finally seemed fascinating. The woman had fulfilled her role with perfect competence, without a trace of excess ambition. She closed the Book of Life with its — false — three hundred pages, then gazed out through the glassless window of the Una Tower, a cylindrical gray stone structure that rose several hundred meters into the sky when seen from outside.
She was dying; or rather, she was taking her own life for the sake of a greater good, for the sake of endless continuity. With the final considerations written in the Book of Life, only the farewell remained. The role of the Memorious no longer belonged to her, for the natural enemy had already grown accustomed and begun preparing a new successor. It was time for her to do the same.
She even considered the same madness Olaf the Insane had embraced in the previous generation: reincarnating once more as the heir to the legacy. He had done it ten times before the natural enemy cut his path once and for all, severing him from everything, preventing him from advancing or retreating within history. But no. Henna had no such inclination. She wanted a normal life, with children and grandchildren, as it should have been before she was pulled into another generation of a war whose roots and origins only the Memorious could recall.
Despite her age, her flesh was as fresh as that of a young woman. She was slender, tall, from the Western Union. She bore beautiful strands of black hair and eyes as blue as the ocean. Overall, one might call her beauty ordinary; it did not reach the angelic levels of some physiologically blessed women, but she was beautiful nonetheless.
She descended the spiral staircase of the Una Tower, each floor lined with endless shelves of books. The ascent or descent itself was infinite, yet to her, by nature and authority, it felt no different: the staircase seemed as ordinary as any other. Outside, it was night. She was home, in the Western Union, on the same hill where she was born and had lived until she was taken away. The house itself no longer existed, but the hill was still the same.
The Una Tower stood precisely where her parents' home should have been...
... And yet, there was no sadness. Henna smiled, joyful and confident, with the same certainty of someone who had always done things right and never strayed from her own path, regardless of doubts or fears.
She knew the world.
She knew the universe.
Because she was one of the authors of the Book of Life, she had nothing to fear about the future. She had arranged everything so she would reunite with her already deceased parents in the next generation... and that was enough. She would make it up to them for everything.
A crow of ordinary size appeared at the entrance of the Una Tower. Henna looked at it with an anticipatory longing. She was about to speak when the bird took the lead, its voice trembling yet unshakably proud:
"I could expect nothing less from someone trained by me, always determined, without hesitation, just as it should be! You earned what you achieved, don't waste it, or I'll peck your eyes out!" He turned his back and made a gesture with his wing. "Now go, you must be reborn. I'll come visit you."
For the first time, the crow let its guard down before Henna, and so it did not notice her approach as she crouched and gathered him into her lap like a child, giving him the gentlest, warmest embrace of her life. She knew him well and made no speeches, for she knew such things irritated him. The student had to be a reflection of the master, without hesitation.
She placed him back on the ground and did not turn him to face her, because she knew he did not want her to see his face at that moment.
"Take care, little Yun," she said as she walked away.
Without a set direction, Henna knelt on the ground and prostrated herself deeply nine times, touching her head to the earth each time. When she rose again, she smiled and accepted her own end.
"Choose your next successor wisely. Let it be an unsurpassable generation!"
In the sky, the stars shone brighter than usual. Few in the world noticed the subtle shift of the constellations, and those who did knew it was a response. They knew it marked the end of an era.
On the verdant hill, Henna's body dissolved into rose petals that the wind carried away until they vanished completely. The Una Tower faded into tiny golden sparks of light, until it seemed it had never been there at all, taking the crow with it, who still let slip one final complaint:
"It's Mighty Unbelievable Lord of the Turbulent Night Yun... brat!"
That was all, for now.