Light poured through the shattered temple roof.
It was not sunlight, but something older — the radiance of beginnings. Every root, every petal, every stone glowed from within, as though the heart of the world itself had begun to beat again.
The spiritwalker opened his eyes to find the world changed.
The lake had turned to a mirror of gold, and at its center stood Sakura, no longer the fallen spirit nor the sorrowful shade, but the goddess reborn — her hair a cascade of living light, her eyes twin dawns.
The torn kimono had transformed into flowing silks of white and rose gold, the hem whispering with petals that dissolved into light at every step.
Around her, the blossoms bloomed again, endless and radiant.
Yet her expression was not joy — it was pain.
> "The seal is broken," she said softly. "But the gods stir. They feel my return."
The temple trembled. From the air itself, voices rose — deep and thunderous, the echo of divine will.
> 'Sakura no Hime — You defied the Cycle. You loved a mortal and stained eternity with memory. The world will not forgive such imbalance.'
The goddess lifted her face toward the unseen heavens. "You call it imbalance — I call it life."
The air split.
Columns of light descended, and from them the Ashen Lords emerged — the remnants of the gods who once destroyed her. Their forms towered above, faceless and blinding, armored in grief and flame.
The spiritwalker drew his blade, though he knew it was meaningless against such beings.
Still, he stepped forward, between her and them.
> "You'll have to pass through me first."
> 'Mortal,' they thundered, 'you are but a fragment of her sin — the echo that chained her to the flesh. Be erased, and the world will heal.'
Sakura's voice rose, soft yet commanding. "No. He is not my sin. He is my choice."
And with that, her power erupted — a storm of petals and light, spiraling upward. Her aura struck the Ashen Lords like a tidal wave, driving them back. But as she fought, the color began to fade from her form, her essence scattering with every blow.
> "You're burning yourself away!" he cried.
> "To protect this cycle," she answered, voice trembling. "And to protect you."
The spiritwalker rushed forward, reaching for her — but the divine wind hurled him back.
The air grew thick with fire and petals, screams and memory. He fell to his knees, watching her silhouette through the blinding light — the goddess who had loved a mortal so fiercely that even death could not still her heart.
And then — silence.
The light dimmed. The Ashen Lords stood faltering, their forms dissolving. The temple shuddered, its stones cracking, its roots groaning as though the world itself exhaled.
When the light cleared, Sakura stood alone at the heart of the lake.
Her glow was fading now, her body barely more than a shimmer of spirit and sorrow.
> "It's done," she whispered. "The balance restored. The world will bloom again."
He stumbled toward her. "You can't leave it like this — you'll fade!"
She smiled — the same soft, aching smile she had worn long ago beneath the spring trees.
> "The goddess will fade. But the memory… will remain."
> "Then I'll follow you into that memory."
> "You already have, in every life since."
The air around them began to dissolve — petals turning to starlight, roots uncoiling from the earth. The temple itself lifted in the wind of her power, shedding centuries of decay.
Above, the sky split open — dawn breaking for the first time in a thousand years.
Sakura raised her hand, pressing her fingers against his chest, where the sigil still glowed faintly.
> "When the last petal falls," she whispered, "you will forget this pain. But when spring returns, you'll find me again — not as a goddess, not as a ghost, but as someone who smiles at the blossoms and feels her heart ache without knowing why."
Tears stung his eyes. "Then I'll wait," he said, voice trembling. "Every spring."
She leaned forward, resting her forehead against his. "And I'll return. Every dawn."
Their hands intertwined — light and flesh, divine and mortal — and the world around them exploded into a rain of blossoms.
The Ashen Lords were gone. The temple was gone. Only the sky remained — awash in gold and crimson, petals drifting like snow.
And in that endless spring, where sorrow and love were one, the goddess of blossoms smiled as she faded — not into death, but into the cycle itself.
---
> Thus, the world remembered the tale of Sakura no Hime and the spiritwalker — a goddess who defied eternity, and a mortal who taught her the meaning of life. When cherry blossoms bloom, her laughter stirs in the wind, and petals fall not as tears… but as promises. 🌸