Dio was blinded by his desires and continued to laugh hysterically. He had reached his goal, the gates of paradise. He let her cold body slip out of his hands and stepped towards the Shangri-la. The golden doors opened with every passing step he took.

Looking through the hazy window, he saw her. "Leda!" he called out to her. Tears spilled over as he ran faster towards the gate. Leda looked over to him, welcoming a warm smile, holding out her hands to him. He leaped into her arms, embracing her warmth, her touch, her smell, her love.

"Why Dio?"

"I can't live without you. I did this for you." he looked up into her eyes.

"But you failed."

"What?"

"You failed your judgment." her face began to melt away replaced by a noh mask. "For your sins you will be punished." Her warm touched turned into ice. He began shaking from fear.

"I... I failed?" he stuttered. "Impossible. All I ever wanted was you. Everything I did was to see you again." Her grip around him tightened and he watched as the surrounding disappeared from a blissful valley into dark never ending void. Leda disappeared, in her place were chains, locking him to the cold ground. A fire broke out around him. He could feel the heat beginning to strip his face and for the first time, he knew what pain was. A black being begun to sow his eyes shut ignoring his cries of pain.

"Please! Just kill me!"

In a dark demonic voice returned his cry. "You have been granted the ultimate gift, eternal life. Now you shall repay for your sins. Watch through the windows of your eyes as you relive your most dreaded moment of your life." As quickly as he appeared, the noh masked black being disappeared.

Dio laid there, feeling the pain of his skin be constantly burned off the second it healed. A movie began playing behind his sewn eyes. He watched as Casshern, blinded by his berserk mode, ripped Leda in half, protecting Dio from his rage. Dio crawled over the top half of Leda and held her hand. She smiled at him, happy that he was safe. She mouthed the words 'I love you' before the ruin took over her, crumbling underneath his hand, blowing away in wind.

"No. No no no no no NOOOOOOO! I'm sorry! I never meant any harm! Please! I'm so sorry!" Just as he finished watching her die once, it began playing again, and again. Never stopping.

The shikrei-kei. Ruthless protectors of paradise, deems those worthy or unworthy of living a blissful life inside paradises walls. Those with a less fortunate fate will spend the rest of eternity in pain and torment, never knowing the joys of paradise.

The blood surrounded Venus. It felt warm and sticky as it soaked through her thin layer of clothing. Surprisingly she couldn't feel any pain. But then something flashed in her eyes. It was pink. It seemed to be floating gracefully to the ground, until she realized what had happened. She examined her own body and saw no puncture wound. She looked up to see Lyuze falling to the ground, lifeless. Venus froze up for a few seconds, letting her mind catch up and then crawled over to Lyuze's side. She held onto her hand, trying to stop the warmth from fleeting.

Lyuze looked up at Venus, smiling at the fact that she was safe. "I…" her voice began to gurgle with blood starting to fill her animatronic lungs. "I guess this is where my journey ends."

Her tears over flowed, spilling onto her friends chest. "Please don't go. I need you." Lyuze removed her hand from Venus' and reached up to remove a strand of her favorite colored hair, tucking it behind her ear, looking up into those purple eyes.

"Don't be sad. I'll finally be reunited with my sister." Her eyes began to glaze over. "Look I can see her now." She was still looking up at Venus. "Now I can braid your beautiful scarlet hair. I've missed you, Liza." Her hand rested on Venus' cheek until it dropped lifeless. Venus collapsed onto her chest, clutching whatever was left until Lyuze was nothing more but dust in the wind.

Casshern quietly walked over to Venus, knelt down beside her and held her close to him. Friender came over and began licking at her tears. The gate began to diminish, until all traces of there ever being an entrance to paradise, disappeared. The pendant cracked and shattered into dust.

"I'm sorry Venus. I failed you." He whispered into her ear.

"No you didn't. If anything, I failed you. It was my quest to find paradise, but instead I only brought death to those around me. You have died countless times on my behalf." His grip around her waist tightened.

"Nobody died because of you. Lyuze died protecting you. I know for a fact that she doesn't regret her death, if it meant saving you." Casshern heard the flowers rustle, and looked up to see Luna, staring at them. Something was off. Half of her face was rusted, and an arm was missing. The look in her eyes was of nothing that he had ever seen before.

She began approaching closer to them, her eyes boring into Venus' back. "What do you mean nobody died?" Her voice was off, deep, almost demonic sounding. "Everyone in the world is dying because of her. You two are so self-indulged in your romance to even notice that your own dog companion is beginning to die from the ruin as well." They both looked down at Friender to find that Luna's statement was true.

Venus turned to look at Luna. "But he wasn't like that only moments ago!" she tried repenting back at her sister.

"I warned you. I warned you that this would happen! Kaia, the child born of death, can only bring DEATH!"

"No! It isn't my fault!"

"Yes it is! You're a murderer! You killed the world, Kaia." By this point Luna was only inches Venus.

"My name is not Kaia." She said in a soft voice, clutching her heart.

"Kaia is death!"

"My name…"

"Kaia, the murderer!"

"Is not Kaia."

"Kaia, the killer of Earth!"

"MY NAME IS NOT KAIA!" Luna staggered back, but recovered and began snickering. "My name is Venus."

"Venus is the name given to you by a pitiful being."

"Casshern isn't pitiful! I've have enough!" Venus closed her eyes, grabbing Luna's shoulders and shoved her as hard as she could. A skull shattering crash hit the ground. The part of Luna's face that was ruined, began to fade away, leaving nothing, while the rest of her body followed suit.

Luna glared up at her sister, letting out a menacingly piercing laughter. She spat out a curse at her. "Let me tell you another secret about the pendants. The pendants gave us the ability to be immortal. It held our God like powers. With it gone, even you can die. But Casshern will live on. That is his curse for killing a God."

"How do you know all this?"

"Oh, and one other thing I forgot to mention, I wasn't lying when I said that Casshern would be the one to kill you."

Her eyes widened at her premonition. "Why?" But Luna was unable to answer that as her laughter faded with the rest of her body. Casshern stood behind her and wrapped her hands around her chest, burying his face in her hair, breathing in her aroma.

"Don't listen to her. I would never hurt you."

"But maybe I deserve it Casshern." She turned around and pushed him away. "The world you once knew is gone." She looked down, trembling. The roses had withered and died. "And it's my fault."

"Stop it! Don't think like that!... ngh." Casshern bent over in pain, clutching his chest. He felt a burning sensation course through his entire body. He could feel his mind and reasoning begin to slip away and the pain starts to consume his very being. Faintly through his laps of pain he can hear her voice. Her sweet and musical voice, calling him.

Suddenly he is ripped from her side and cast into a dark room that was hauntingly familiar. Through the darkness he heard someone. "Who are you?"

His eyes glazed over into berserk mode when he saw the owner of the voice. Luna. "My enemies call me…Casshern." Through his clouded judgment, he saw an image of her. The one he wanted to protect. The next image he saw was of Luna killing his beloved. His anger took over as he gritted his teeth, lunging at Luna. "Luna! I'm going to kill you!" He thrust his fist into her, not giving her the chance to hurt his beloved moon, his beloved Venus. "She can't hurt you Venus. She can't hurt us now."

"Casshern," he heard her voice ring in his head, "it hurts so badly." Casshern looked down. He was back in the mountain…with Venus in his arms.

"I…" he stammered, "I don't understand what happened. I… I saw Luna and… I felt like…" Venus placed a finger on Casshern's lips, silencing him.

"I don't blame you. The past was always meant to repeat itself." She began coughing up blood.

"What do you mean?"

"I'm sor…" more blood came splattering out. Her face dangerously paled and she looked up at Casshern with pleading eyes.

Casshern held her close, rocking back and forth trying to comfort her. He didn't ask her to continue the explanation of what she meant by her comment. Before she spoke her next words, he knew what she was going to ask of him. He shook his head vigorously, pleading her not to say another word. He closed his eyes and buried his head into neck. Venus reached up with what strength she had left and ran her bloodied fingers through his thick chocolate hair. "I love you, Casshern." He squeezed her tighter. "I hope that one day we can unite. Next time, lets fall in love sooner."

Casshern pulled away from her and forced a smile on his crying face. "It's a promise. I'll search for you, forever." His shaking hand reached inside of her opened wound and grabbed ahold of her shuddering heart. "I love you, Venus."

Sorry it took so long. Darn life got in the way and I had to push this project aside.
Anyways, I hope you enjoy the second to last chapter, and as a bonus for taking so long... I'm also going to post the last chapter as well!