The morning air was crisp, salt-touched. Ships swayed in the harbor, ropes creaked, and seagulls cried overhead like echoes of another world calling.
Herzl stood at the edge of the docks, cloak billowing behind him like a banner that had never belonged to a nation. The ship before him was small, unremarkable — but it pointed toward something vast. Not freedom. Not healing.
Possibility.
Behind him, Alexandria buzzed with rebirth. Buildings rising from ash. Markets filling again. Politicians plotting in newly painted chambers. The war was over, but the world was not still — it never would be. That was fine. Herzl had no interest in stillness.
He wasn't leaving to run. He was leaving because he'd earned the right to choose.
Kael stood beside him, squinting at the sea. "You know we don't even have a map for half the places we're heading."
"That's the point," Herzl replied. "The known world is crowded with dead men's decisions. I want to see what hasn't been touched by their hands."
Kael smirked. "So we're explorers now?"
"No," Herzl said, his voice calm. "We're free men."
The Farewells Came With Weight.
Elira approached in silence. No armor. No titles between them.
"You always planned to leave," she said.
"I always planned to live," he answered. "The war just delayed it."
She looked away, hurt flickering behind her composed face. "And what if the world out there takes more from you than it gives?"
"Then it'll have to fight harder than the last one did," Herzl said.
She almost smiled. Almost. "You're still impossible."
"And you're still waiting for someone who doesn't exist anymore."
A pause.
Then, she stepped forward, placed something into his hand — a silver ring with no stone.
"What's this?"
"A reminder," she said. "That even men who walk away leave pieces behind."
Others came. Not to mourn, but to witness.
Varrin, the old commander, gave him a blank journal.
"You were made to carry more than swords," the old man muttered.
Aeron handed him a bottle of ink and a pen. "Write the world you see. Not the one we lied about."
Children ran barefoot on the docks, waving painted flags — not of kingdoms, but of colors that meant nothing and everything.
One girl held a wooden bird in her hands and gave it to Herzl.
"It doesn't fly," she said.
Herzl examined it, smiled faintly. "Most things worth carrying don't."
Kael raised an eyebrow as they boarded. "You really think there's more to find out there?"
"There's always more," Herzl said. "The mistake is thinking we already know what matters."
As the ship pulled away, Alexandria did not vanish — it stayed in the back of his mind like a chapter well-read but unfinished.
Herzl stood at the bow, arms crossed, the wind catching his coat.
He wasn't leaving because he was lost.
He was leaving because he finally knew who he was — and the world needed to meet that man.