Once upon a time, there was a knight in ruby red armor.

He was travelling the wastelands in search of an ancient artifact that may save his village from certain destruction. He travelled these wastelands for three days, battling many monsters with only the flesh of his fallen victims for food, and a canteen half filled with water to quench his thirst.
Another day has passed, his water was now exhausted, and he hasn't been able to hunt for food, as there were no more monsters around for him to hunt. It wasn't long before the hunger became unbearable.

Another day passed.....still no monsters, and no sign of the temple which contained the artifact. The hunger soon got the best of him.....the knight fell to his knees. All seemed hopeless, untill he caught the glimpse of something in the corner of his eyes......It seemed to resemble a woman. She seemed vaguely familiar, and he felt as if he knew her from the past.... The knight called out to her, but there was no answer.
He could not shake the feeling that he knew her from somewhere.....soon he forgot the hunger, and struggled to his feet, and started towards the woman. He got closer and closer....she seemed so far away. As he inched closer, her face became visible to the knight. The knight froze. Her face.....

What the knight saw when he gazed upon her face, was something he could never anticipate, or be prepared to encounter. It was the face of his wife....his soul mate. The one person on the planet he swore everything to on the day of their wedding. A person who, untill the end of time, he would love and protect her. A person that has been dead for ten years. The knight was at a loss for emotion..... She has never left his thoughts, not for a second, since she was taken. Taken by his own sword.

She could not be here, standing in front of him....he remembered the incident like it was yesterday. The memory, burned at the back of his mind.....torturing his soul. He remembered his sword, peircing her body and he still felt her form, falling dead into his arms...

On that day, ten years before, the knight was forced to make an impossible descision.
Ten years ago, she fell ill. Consumed by a mysterious desease that no doctor could diagnose. The disease left no physical mark on her body.....but she suffered. She was dying, slowly, but surely. All hope was lost, as there was no cure, but one. The disease didn't poison her body, it poisoned her soul. The only cure, was to release her soul, in order to prevent the disease from consuming it. Death was the only method to do so.

The knight could not bear to see the love of his life suffer....with a poisoned soul, she could no longer laugh, no longer cry....she was no longer human.
She understood what had to be done, when her husband entered her quarters, his sword unsheathed, and gripped firmly within his hands. He slowly approached the bed, where his wife lay. He knelt beside her, and stared into her eyes....she stared back. In that brief moment they shared, gazing into each others eyes, all the memories of the life they shared, seemed to rush before his eyes... The woman he loved...the woman he vowed to protect...was about to die at the tip of his own sword.
After a long hesitation, he brought the sword into the air, and as became ready to plunge the sword into the woman he loved, she moved off of the bed, and came to her feet. He lowered his sword, as she took him into her arms.....she whispered into his ears, "It wasn't you'r fault, it was just my time." With those final words, the knight peirced her heart.

It was now ten years since she died, and yet, she now stood not more than a few yards away, staring at him.....just as she did the night she died. He finally began to approach her....
He stopped, right in front of her. Then the most unexpeted thing happened. She reached out and grabbed his hand.....the knight could not believe this was real, untill he felt her warm hands grasping his. She then spoke.....
"My love....I will rid you of your pain....you no longer have to suffer." Suddenly, a white aura surrounded the knight, enveloping him.
The aura began to fade....

Once the aura cleared, he was no longer standing in the wastelands. He was standing in his village, but it was not as he left it. It was engullfed in flame. He than saw himself.....standing in the midst of the blaze. A mirror image of himself.....surrounded by the corpses of his friends and family. His entire village was slaughtered......and he was the one who caused the destruction.
The knight watched in horror as the mirror image of himself brutally murdered the villagers, one by one, untill there was not a soul left alive. The village was destroyed, and the inhabitants were dead. Many lives ended, by the very same sword used to ends his wife's suffering. The mirror image of the knight now stood still, covered in the blood of his people. The knight continued to watch, as the mirror image of himself raised his sword, and after a short period of hesitation, drove the blade through his own heart.

It was at this moment, when the knight in ruby red armor stared at his own dead self, that he began to remember. Began to realize the truth.
After his wife died, the knight blamed himself for her death. Her last words, that he should not blame himself, went ignored. He vowed to protect her, yet he was unable to do so. The guilt he felt, was just as powerfull as the love he felt for his wife, and drove him mad.
His guilt turned to anger, and he unleashed his anger on all, who he now in his ensuing madness, accused of being responsible for the death of his wife. He slayed every villager, as he felt that they did not do everything they could to save her, then he took his own life.

The knight was naive to the truth...but it was as clear as day to him now. The ten years of his life that he experienced after the death of his beloved, was nothing more than a illusion. Even the artifact he sought to retrieve, did not exist. He had been dead for ten years......dead by his own hand on the same day he ended the life of his cherisihed wife. The tortured soul of the knight was now forced to roam the planet, ignorant to the destruction that he caused in the name of his love, and to be forever tormented by his memories of his wife's death.

The knight again, heard the sound of his wife's voice:
"You have suffered long enough. Your soul has become poisoned far beyond repair, even death was not enough to cleanse it. Your suffering will stop, once your soul ceases to exist. I will now help you, just as you helped me."

His wife now appeared before him, and once again clutched his hand. She leaned towards the Knight, and after giving him the last kiss that they would ever share, she released the grasp of the Knight's hand.
Once again, the white aura enveloped the Knight, but never faded.

The Absolute End.