It had been over a week since Goblin Slayer had first awoken on the surface of Kaguya's moon; and that same level of surrealism he felt before was still resonating inside of his soul, as the first thing he saw upon opening his eyelids was the familiar sight of the vast star-ridden reaches of outer space above him. Without any clothes to cover his astral-projected body, the cold emptiness he felt around him was only kept at bay by the natural warmth that was glowing from the surface of the stark-white moon.
Basking in the white light reflecting off of the sun-bleached sands beneath his feet, it took Goblin Slayer a few attempts of trying to re-adjust to the low gravity of the moon, before he finally remembered how to traverse the strange environment. But unlike before, Kaguya wasn't caught off guard by his appearance; quite the opposite, in fact.
Standing before him in her true celestial form, Kaguya's red lips were curved in a way that was supposed to resemble a happy smile, but the look on her pearily-white eyes told Goblin Slayer otherwise. Towering over him by a couple feet, Kaguya slowly reached both of her slender arms up to cradled the sides of Goblin Slayer's cheeks in her palms; softly brushing his scarred cheeks with her fingers and thumbs, while gazing down into his curious scarlet eyes with a look of sympathy in hers.
"I… I had no idea that… What happened in your past was… If I would have only known, then perhaps…" Kaguya kept trailing off, while constantly trying to find her voice in the midst of thinking about all the horrors she had witnessed through Goblin Slayer's mind.
Understanding what Kaguya was trying to convey to him, Goblin Slayer reached up to grab the sides of her pale hands, smiling at her with a calm-gentleness that might as well have been an enigma to Kaguya, who couldn't understand how someone who went through so much pain as him could still be so kind and caring.
"... Don't worry about it," Goblin Slayer said with a soft smile, as he tried to dismiss the trauma that Kaguya was able to see through his memories. "My family isn't suffering anymore, nor or those who lived in that village. I'd like to think that they've found peace by now," Goblin Slayer added, and frowned slightly the moment he saw the goddess' eyebrows furrowing.
"That... That wasn't what I was referring to..." Kaguya muttered with a worried look in her eyes; searching in Goblin Slayer's scarlet eyes for any signs that he knew what she had actually seen. "You... You don't have any clue what I'm talking about, do you? The chair, the basement, the eleven days...? Nothing? Nothing about that sounds familiar?"
Oblivious to why any of those who key words were meant to mean to him, Goblin Slayer simply shook his head at her with a neutral expression on his face. "No, it doesn't... Why, what are talking about?"
Having been the one who calmed him down from his intense panic attack, Kaguya felt almost obligated at that point to safeguard Goblin Slayer from the god awful truth that he seemed to be unable to remember properly. "Oh, I... I think I was just confusing my past with yours was all... Would you like to hear about it?" Kaguya offered with a small smile across her red-lips, while hoping that Goblin Slayer would say "yes", so she could change the subject.
When Goblin Slayer told her that he was interested in hearing her own troubled past, Kaguya almost let out a sigh of relief before beginning to confess her sins to him; something that she felt inclined to do, especially after having seen the horrors of his past that even he was blocking out. "Allow me to start off by making one thing clear to you, young man: these past nine days that I've been with you have been the happiest I've ever been. You're an inspiration to everyone around you, and even though you may have your doubts about that, I know it's true because, well… I myself see you as… A role model."
Already having an idea of the conversation that Kaguya was trying to lead to, Goblin Slayer remained patient and respectful to the woman, as he could tell that what she had to say wouldn't be easy to talk about. "Thank you for the kind words, Kaguya, but the honor has been mine. Meeting you, it's been… It's been a miracle; you gave me a new chance at life," Goblin Slayer said reassuringly, as he opened his eyelids to see the vulnerable gaze of the celestial woman.
Touched by his words, there was no denying that Kaguya wanted him more than just as her champion. Just like how Goblin Slayer had been, Kaguya was terrified on the inside of opening up about it in general. However, whenever Kaguya looked into the understanding-gentleness she found inside of Goblin Slayer's scarlet eyes, she found herself feeling more warmth and love than she had ever experienced before. And from there, Kaguya continued to hold onto the sides of Goblin Slayer's head, confessing to him with heartache in her voice, as she told him about the very beginning of her existence.
Long ago, Kaguya had been born as the child of a high-ranking Ōtsutsuki clansman. Unlike the rest of her more prominent kin though, Kaguya had been born from the womb of a lowly concubine. From the moment she was first conceived, Kaguya was groomed for the sole purpose of being sacrificed to create a "God Tree"; a powerful and sentient plant that was capable of producing a single fruit called "Chakra Fruit". Treated like a farm tool like the rest of the lower ranking members of the Ōtsutsuki clan, whose mothers were seen as breeding stock, Kaguya was never shown any love by any of the other celestial beings, except for one.
Isshiki Ōtsutsuki, a high-ranking member of the clan whose mother was a princess, would often come to her in what Kaguya thought to be secrecy. Away from the eyes of the other Ōtsutsuki clan members, Isshiki would bring Kaguya gifts in her adolescence, and would take her with him to gaze down at the Earth whenever he could steal her away from the Ōtsutsuki's inter-dimensional compound. Admitting that she looked up to him as an older brother, Kaguya told Goblin Slayer how she once thought that Isshiki loved her as a younger sister as well.
That trust was broken the moment he took her to Earth for the final time, and only when Kaguya realized that he was about to stab her in the back did it finally dawn on her that he had been deceiving her the entire time since they had met. Isshiki wasn't ever interested in getting close to her for any sort of romantic or platonic purpose; the only reason why he ever bothered getting close to Kaguya, was for the purpose of wanting to have her guard lowered when it came time for him to use her blood to culminate the next God Tree.
Stressing to Goblin Slayer that she only acted out of self-defense, because of how she was too afraid of dying to be used as a sacrifice, Kaguya told him how she had ended up killing Isshiki by cutting him in half. The ritual had already been started, and since the act of betrayal had occurred on the blood soaked grounds of where millions of men had died throughout thousands of years of war, the God Tree ended up growing on its own while Kaguya was still in shock. When she came to, it dawned on Kaguya that her clan would see her as both a murderer and a traitor. Terrified of ever being found by them, Kaguya left the God Tree before it could fully grow; choosing to go into hiding rather than wanting to stick around to harvest the fruit for herself.
Revealing herself to a small and primitive country that no longer existed in present-day Konohagakure, the "Land of the Ancestors" as she called it, was where Kaguya met with its emperor, Tenji. When the empire's initial reaction to her honesty ended up with hostility, Kaguya immediately wiped the minds of everyone in the kingdom, including Tenji's memory as well. Blending in once more, Kaguya was seen as little more than a concubine who Tenji began to take an interest in above the rest.
In the midst of a land dispute with a neighboring country that no longer existed either, Tenji became accepting of Kaguya once he learned that, just like him, she too wished for world peace. Allowing her to live on his land, the two of them eventually fell in love, and ended up only having sex once, and that was the night Tenji had confessed his love to her.
Rumors of her existence reached the neighboring country who the Land of Ancestors had been on shaky terms with, causing Tenji's political rivals to inform the minister of the "Land of That" about Kaguya. When asked by Goblin Slayer if those two empires were really called by those two simplistic names, Kaguya couldn't help but to crack a smile as she admitted to him that they were both called something else entirely, but neither she nor history ever could remember the names of their kingdoms.
Feeling reminiscent of being reminded of the one person who she actually cared for, Kaguya then told Goblin Slayer about how much Hero's optimism and selflessness reminded her of the first friend who she ever had. "Aino… Her name was Aino," Kaguya said with a teary eyed smile, as she immediately felt the need to pull Goblin Slayer in closer to her, so that she could hug him while telling him all about the black-haired servant who she had befriended. From brushing her hair, picking out clothes with her, and exploring the nearby forest, Kaguya and Aino were almost always together, and it was from her that the celestial being found what true love looked like.
That brief moment of nostalgia was what Kaguya needed to help herself to get through with explaining to Goblin Slayer about how she once again was put into a position where she needed to kill out of self defense. Unlike before however, when Kaguya killed the soldiers who had tried to kidnap her from the Land of the Ancestors, the consequences of her morally justified actions had cost her the heart of the only person who she thought would love her unconditionally at the time.
Not wanting to start a war with the Land of That, Tenji had called forth his entire army to hunt down Kaguya, denouncing his love for her the moment he chose his political power of her life. Pregnant with two unborn children, Kaguya was weakened and thus chose to flee from the kingdom instead of fighting his army, with Aino being the only loyal friend who stuck to her side. When the two of them made their way to where the God Tree stood, Aino sacrificed her life to take a volley of arrows for Kaguya, and died so that the celestial being could eat the chakra fruit.
Kaguya then told Goblin Slayer that even though she had lost faith in humanity after Aino had died, she still sought to pursue world peace. Through the chakra fruit, she had obtained her Rinne-Sharingan, and used its god-like power to single-handedly end all wars. From there, Kaguya had taken control of all the world's nations, and was worshiped by the rest of humanity as the "Rabbit Goddess". Once she had finished telling Goblin Slayer about the rise of her power, Kaguya soon tightened her grip around his body, as she finally came to the part of her past that she dreaded talking about the most.
Revealing to Goblin Slayer that her fear of the Ōtsutsuki clan returning had worsened since she had eaten the chakra fruit, and with two sons on the way, Kaguya was afraid that she would be powerless to stop her clan, if they found out what became of the chakra fruit that she had taken for herself. Talking about how she had used her Infinite Tsukiyomi to control the minds and bodies of everyone on Earth, Kaguya had a hard time telling Goblin Slayer about how she sacrificed millions of lives, including Tenji's life as well, in order to create an army that was as loyal to her as Aion was.
"The White Zetsu", Kaguya called them, were abominations that were the result of humans being absorbed by the God Tree under Kaguya's control. She wanted to create an army of them to protect herself, for when the Ōtsutsuki clan inevitably would come to take her chakra and life from her. During this time, it was then that Kaguya's benevolence was tarnished, and it was then that humanity changed their views on her. Being deemed as pure evil, it wasn't long after she began to sacrifice people to the God Tree did Kaguya earn the name "The Demon".
Kaguya admitted to Goblin Slayer that during that dark time of her life she had changed into a completely different person than how she used to be, and had lost herself to paranoia and an obsession with self-preservation. Admitting to have once detested her two sons, Hamura and Hagoromo, for have standing up to her and sealing her ten-tailed beast form inside what became known as "The Moon", Kaguya explained to Goblin Slayer that she no longer held any resentment towards her children, nor did she even have any anger towards Naruto or Sasuke; the two legendary shinobis who were powerful enough to have sealed her back for the second time.
"I… I was so far gone by then. After everything that I've gone through, and all the fear and selfishness that had overtaken my soul throughout my lifetime… There came a point afterward where I had given up on ever becoming the woman who Aino thought I could be," Kaguya said with sadness in her eyes, as she lowered her head down to rest her chin on top of Goblin Slayer's head full of gray hair. "When I'm with you though… My pain, fear, sorrow… They all melt away, and it finally feels like I… It feels like I'm living life the way Aino would have wanted me to live, but when I'm with you though do I have that tranquility inside my soul."
Although Kaguya's past was filled with countless mistakes, tragedies, and death that had been caused mostly by her own hand, Goblin Slayer found himself unable to pass judgment upon her. Instead, what Goblin Slayer felt for her was empathy. "For what it's worth, I… I completely understand where you're coming from… You had reasonable fears that seemed always out of your control, so you sought power for the sake of protecting yourself from being hurt again… Fear can make us lose sight of what's really important," Goblin Slayer said wisely, as he raised his hands up to gently grab a hold of her hips. "Celestial being or not, at the end of the day, you're just as human as the rest of us, Kaguya," Goblin Slayer mused with a warm voice, and smiled softly when he heard her letting softly out a small laugh.
"Hehe…! I suppose if you were to compare our kind side-by-side through an encompassing enough scope, then yes, you and I aren't that much different from one another, are we~?" Kaguya replied back with a playful voice, as she took a small step back with Goblin Slayer's arms wrapping slowly themselves around her lower waist. Gazing down into his comforting scarlet eyes once again, Kaguya couldn't help but to feel her heart beginning to thump harder in her chest, as she felt her cheeks warming up the longer she admired every inch of him. "I'm… I'm beginning to fully understand why you're quite the catch with the ladies, young man…"
Raising a brow at her alluring eyes with a perplexed expression coming over him, Goblin Slayer remained smiling up at Kaguya as he asked her bluntly "Catch with the ladies…? What's that supposed to mean?"
Letting out another much needed laugh, after having delved into her own remorseful past, Kaguya smiled sweetly in a motherly-way as she reached up to pinch the side of Goblin Slayer's scarred cheek. "... You're precious," was all Kaguya said, before kissing her champion on the forehead as his astral projected body faded into a silhouette of white stardust.