“Frieren,” he said, staring up at the constellation of the Goddess’s Harp. “The next time we see that meteor shower… the one that falls every fifty years… let’s go see it together.”

It was a moment of triumph. The end of an age of darkness.

“Because,” she said, her voice soft but resolute, “I want to know them. Before they disappear. I want to learn how to say goodbye properly.”

Himmel the Hero, his silver armor polished to a blinding sheen, waved to the adoring masses with a radiant smile. He was the picture of a legendary savior. Beside him, the stout warrior Eisen grunted, more interested in the weight of his own axe than the applause. And Heiter, the jovial priest, offered blessings with a mischievous glint in his eye, already scheming for his next cup of wine.

Frieren tilted her head. “Fifty years? That’s not very long.”

The meteor shower blazed overhead—a river of diamonds poured across the heavens. It was even more beautiful than she remembered. But Frieren barely saw it. She was watching Himmel’s face as he wept silently, tears tracing the deep wrinkles on his cheeks.

She arrived to find an elderly man with wispy white hair and a stooped back, leaning on a polished cane. A child—his granddaughter—held his free hand.

All the other funerals she had attended—of humans she had barely known—had been abstract. But this was different. The man who had called her name with joy. The man who had carried her when she was too lazy to walk. The man who had looked at her not as a tool or a monster, but as a friend.

Those were the last words he ever spoke to her.

Her first mission was simple: find a new companion. Heiter, on his deathbed, had begged her to take in a young human girl named Fern—an orphan he had raised. The girl was serious, diligent, and carried a quiet sadness that mirrored Frieren’s own.

Frieren felt nothing.

“It was… a good journey,” he said.