The first snow fell quietly.
It came without a sound, drifting through the cloudy sky and painting the ground in soft white. The wind whispered through the trees like a lullaby, as if the world itself was sighing.
The nameless adventurer walked with quiet footsteps along the snow-covered path, leaving behind the warm festival village. His breath came out in misty clouds. His coat was thin, hardly enough to fight the cold, but he had been through worse. Or so he thought.
The road was lonely now. No villagers, no travelers. Just the sound of the snow crunching beneath his worn boots.
Winter had arrived.
And with it… silence.
He stopped for a moment, looking up at the pale sky.
"Why does snow feel heavier when it falls on an empty road…?"
He didn't expect an answer. No one ever answered his questions.
That's when he saw them.
Two small figures huddled by the side of a ruined stone wall, barely sheltered from the wind. They looked like shadows in the snow. A boy and a girl. Maybe five or six years old. They were clutching each other tightly. Their clothes were torn, their skin pale. Their lips were purple from the cold.
He ran to them.
The boy opened his eyes slowly, weakly. "Sister… cold…"
The girl's hand moved just slightly.
He knelt beside them and took off his coat. "You'll be alright. Just hold on."
He wrapped them in it. They didn't react much. They were so light, too light, as if they hadn't eaten in days.
He reached into his bag. No food.
He had given his last loaf to a man back in the village. He had promised himself he'd find more later.
There was no later.
He picked them up, both at once, and began running. The nearest town was far. Too far. But he ran. Through the forest. Through the falling snow. His breath grew harsh. His arms trembled. But he didn't stop.
"I can still save them… I can…"
The boy's head rested on his chest. The girl was too still.
"Don't sleep," he whispered. "Don't close your eyes."
The wind howled.
He stumbled.
He fell.
The snow swallowed them all.
Minutes passed. Hours.
He got back up.
He screamed at the sky.
"HELP ME!"
No one answered.
His voice vanished in the white world.
He kept walking.
The boy stopped breathing first.
The girl followed not long after.
He didn't cry at first. He didn't scream. He just sat there in the snow, still holding them, as if time had frozen around him.
The snow kept falling.
And then… he broke.
The first tear slid down his cheek, hot against the cold.
It was the second time now
The second time he ever cried.
"They were just children…"
His voice trembled.
"They didn't even get to dream."
The world felt so wide… and yet so empty.
"Why couldn't I save them…?"
He buried them under the tree. The only tree that still had strength to stand. He placed his coat over the small grave and folded it like a blanket.
He carved no names.
He never asked for them.
The snow would take the memory.
But he remembered.
And that was enough.
"A man is not judged by the lives he takes," he whispered, "but by the lives he fails to save."
He sat beside their grave until the sun set.
And when night fell, the stars returned.
He looked up.
A cold wind swept through the forest.
Then he heard it, a soft sound, like a song. It came from nowhere, yet it was everywhere.
The same melody he once heard by the lake… from a mermaid's song.
A voice wandered with the wind.
A voice that said:
"Even the lost will find their way… if someone remembers their name."
He closed his eyes.
And the pain stayed.
Not as a wound.
But as a weight.
A truth.
The next morning, he stood up.
The snow still fell. But now, it felt different.
"I couldn't save them…"
He looked at his hand.
"But maybe… I can save someone else."
The road was waiting.
So he walked again.
And left footprints behind, for the first time, not just as a wanderer, but as someone searching for meaning.
"Some winters never end. Not in the world… but in the heart."
"Even the strongest man will cry, not when he is hurt… but when he cannot protect what matters."