**Lucian**
Celestria hadn’t died, though some days I wished she had—at least then there would have been closure, a sense of finality. But no, she had left me. Vanished without a word, without a trace, as if the bond between us had meant nothing. She walked away, leaving me to wonder, to hate, to question every moment we’d shared. I searched for her, but it was like chasing a ghost. My love for her had turned into a festering wound, a raw anger that I buried under duty and blood.
She had been the center of my world, and then, just as easily, she was gone.
I remembered her vividly—the way her laugh had softened the sharp edges of my life, the way her touch had brought me peace in a world full of chaos. She had been my calm, my escape. I was a fool to think it had been real, that we had b
