Suffering
Water ran in a fury from the stormy mountainside as it carried the bustling leaves, branches, and sediment with it. The river current cried out as it rushed beyond the rocks, only to be drowned out by the greater sound of screams and yells. Shaking with all their might, the trees cowered through the raging battle as it occurred next to and between them; and the chilly winds that come from the far northern mountains swept the world below in a freezing current.
Metal clangs dispersed throughout the forest, and the sound of arrows became insignificant in the face of the rain and thunder. Soldiers here and there fell to each other and to themselves as mud gave way beneath them and iron pierced through flesh. There was a choking sense of uncertainty– a suffocating sense of mysticism. It was much too dark to see well, with the fires of torches being put out, and only the occasional lightning allowed the eye to hark at the battlefield. A night should be still and serene, but the night was treacherous and merciless, and its clutches inescapable.
Nightmares eventually end. By the time the sun began to show its glisten against the puddles of rainfall, and the trees began to bathe in the day's morning sunshower, the cries of men had already died out, and the day was still. Dripping from the edges and points of leaves; running down the hardwood bark; soaking the ground below. The freshness of the morning's humidity invigorating the nose, and the sparkle of the moistened environment cleansing the eyes.
As tranquil as the morning could be after a nighttime storm, this was not a sight to behold in envy. Weapons lay soiled upon the ground; tattered leather and articles of fabric plagued the earth; red puddles formed upon indentations of the earth; and the bodies of men stooped lifelessly, collapsed on the roots of trees and in the riverbank. It was still. Certainly, it was still. The chaos had passed, but in its wake was death. Unburied, the bodies would serve as the nutrients for future flowers, for future fungi, for the insects, and the animals. Unattended, they would return to where they came–the drizzling substance of the heavens–and their souls would be carried somewhere up above.
The river itself did not flow red with the blood of mortals, as it instead continued to flow blue as water should when it reflected the sky in its eyes. The river itself was not littered with the bodies of those now deceased, and it continued to flow endlessly–eternally–as it should when water runs down its stream.
But just as the river reflected the azure of the sky, it was also reflecting the blue hue of a man's youren yi shirt as it–as he–had floated downstream and became stuck upon the bank. His head was pointing upwards, but his eyes were closed; still, he had short breaths: he was alive. He had bits of his armor, and his shirt was torn where blood was seeping through into the water; and his ku pants had been stained with red. A number of cuts moved across his abdomen, and one gash lay near his shoulder. His face still had blood splattered across it, and several bruises made themselves known through darkened discoloration and swelling. His right hand gripped his sword as it lay across his chest. Despite being left in a state of charred wood and its embers, the fire of life continued within him.
As the river flowed blue, the river within him flowed red.
Abruptly, the calmness of the river was broken when a white figure frantically entered the waving waters. Grasping for life; reaching for life; clinging to life. It approached the unconscious man in awkward, slow, and long strides. When one of the hands locked itself onto his cloth, it began its desperate move towards the direction whence it came. Several seconds of struggling later, several long seconds of frenzied swimming later, the water once again became calm.
Emerging from the river was a young girl dressed in white robes that mimicked the color of the god's brilliant clouds way up in the sky. Although she had a feud with her clothes due to their now-soaked state, she continued her long strides out of the water. Dripping and dropping, the water fell. She panted and wobbled out of the riverbank, all the while gripping onto the boy's shirt and trying her hardest to tug him along. But it was a difficult task; bruised along her face, and likely across her body, she pulled with every ounce of strength she had. Her green eyes remained aware of her surroundings, yet–out of exhaustion–lowered themselves to a state of half-openness. As she fully escaped the river's embrace, she stumbled on the riverbank and came down to her knees. Fearing not for her own safety, she looked back to the man she was dragging and ensured that he would not float away if she let go, and finally did so to fall forward. The strength in her body seemed to leave her, but she was too determined to let that stop her. Having rested for no more than a few seconds, she furrowed her brows and attempted to lift herself up with her arms and her legs and once again grabbed the boy. Pushing upwards, she cried out in pain. Physical pain, however, was nothing compared to the terror of loss. Such a fear numbed the burning in her arms, in her stomach, and in her legs. She clenched her teeth together as she pushed forward through an unforgiving beach of mud that attempted to burrow her feet within itself; but she was to tread onwards–her once white robes becoming more sullied with the brown mud as she went on.
Pulling above the riverbank, finally away from the water current, she collapsed to her own weight, and the loss of her strength. For longer than her previous brief moment of rest, she lay upon the grass and the dirt; her head facing upwards, and her back against the earth. The boy behind her, albeit unconscious, and she kept mindful of his status. After allowing herself to catch her breath and having had the time to realize a calm state of mind, she began to crawl towards him. Regardless of her exhaustion, she had a duty to perform. Quickly, she made a case of removing unnecessary clothing so that it could dry, and then walked to the riverbank to wipe herself down from the earth's soot and inspect her own injuries. For the most part, it seemed to be mostly bruises with a few shallow cuts.
She stood upon her legs, those that walk upon the earth, and approached the incapacitated body of the man to inspect his injuries more closely and tend to them. The noticeable gouges in his flesh were no more invisible to the eye than the sun as it sat in the sky on a sunny day; and they were undoubtedly painful, but not to him at this moment. Carefully, she removed his shirt and decided that at the very least, some of the fabric that was laying around could be used as bandaging. So, she hung different fabrics she could gather, as well as the boy's own shirt, up on a low-jutting tree branch. Then, she reached into one of her various hidden pockets for a shell container for an ointment that she had been collecting to treat bleeding wounds like those that the boy had. Although it would not completely stop the bleeding, it was better than nothing; and most certainly, there would not be enough for herself. With her shaky hands, she dipped her fingers into the opening crevice of the shell and began to lather his wounds where she could. However, there was one wound in particular on him that looked worse than the others, right across his stomach, that seemed to tempt death.
As the pieces of fabric, now thinned and hung, began to dry, she wrapped them around his wounds so as to keep them from profusely bleeding more. These wouldn't last for very long, but it was all that she had available to her besides her own clothes, and the nearest settlement was probably a few days away, if the last relative location she remembered being was of any use. For his most concerning wound, she took one of a few small needles that she kept on her and decided she would use animal hairs from an inner pocket to use as stitches. She worried that her hands would be too shaky, or that she would be unable to perform well enough, but leaving the wound in its current state was not a satisfying option.
Finishing her work on the boy, she finally found the time to put herself into a moment of relaxation. She looked around as she slumped herself against a tree and found that there were no bodies around them. Unfortunately, she couldn't bring herself to continue fighting the pain, soreness, and immense tiredness more than she already had, so she could only hope that they would not be bothered by scavengers or scouts as they lay helpless like wounded cattle in a forest of wolves. Her head was propped against the tree, and she held her sword in hand; she might lose a fight if one occurred, but she would still put one up. And to that, she consigned herself to sleep; to the paradise of the world of dreams, or the hell that a nightmare might bring about.
Clawing
By the time she woke up, midday had already come and left. The orange-colored hue of an evening sky painted all below it with a golden shine. Animals active during the day would soon come to their close and enter sleep for the night, whereas the girl understood that she needed to be productive to some degree in securing their lives. Assisted by the strength of her sword, she lifted herself up and fought through the pain and weakness. Not confined by the baggy attire she usually wore, nor the scarf that concealed her face in a wrap, she attempted to stretch and move about, but found any and all movement requiring an amount of agility to be extraordinarily difficult to perform. Although, nothing felt broken, nor did she feel sickly, as a silver lining to it all; thus, the swelling and bruises really were the only points of concern, but for the most part, her injuries were not such a problem that they required further medical attention, as far as she could tell.
Despite the supposed positive aspect of her injuries, there wasn't much to be elated about considering how much of a significant issue her lack of movement would end up being, especially due to the fact that the boy had still not woken up, so moving herself–not to mention him–to an area with better protection or even basic shelter would not be a particularly easy task. Detrimental to their well-being was, of course, the possibility of another storm occurring soon, and their lack of ability to fight back against bandits or the state's army should they be found.
Nonetheless, she couldn't just do nothing. As much as her body required rest, and begged for it, she had to act with every bit of strength that she could muster. To falter is to die, and dying wasn't an option. Stress and fatigue could kick her as consequences later on, but for now she wanted to at least try to commit herself to foraging for food or materials. The boy might be unconscious, but he still needed some sort of sustenance, and she wasn't going to promptly recover by starving herself. Essentials for regaining strength; herbs for pain relief or production of more ointments; or whatever she could possibly find in this place to help them stay alive were, obviously, necessary.
She attempted to wield her sword, to see how much she could defend herself if the need called but found it to be difficult and nigh impossible to use effectively. Her stature was already much smaller than one would expect of a warrior. Most veteran soldiers were larger with either extreme portions of fat and muscle or on the skinnier but lean side; of course, peasants brought into the army were unlikely to be either. Her petite frame did not discourage her from the battlefield or strength, however; as fragile she may have appeared to be, the muscles in her body and agility were a force to be reckoned with. Very few women warriors existed in any army anyway, but among those was Yo Tan Wa, the head of the confederated Xirong people whom King Ei Sei of Qin regarded as a venerable leader. As unlikely as it was, Yo Tan Wa's status was symbolic of what women could do, especially to the Qin women who knew of her– Kyou Kai herself, and Karyou Ten. None of them was to be undermined.
She began to tread her way around the area and encountered various bushes and plants on which berries grew. There were some animals around, but hunting and capturing them would be much too hard for her in her current state, and so she decided upon mainly collecting edible plants that she knew like some of the berries. Bamboo, twigs, and sticks blown by the storm lingered about in myriads of discordic groups. She now had some food, and some materials to make either adhesives or something rope-like; and the bamboo could be used to collect and hold water or other material; and most importantly, firewood for the coming night.
Though, she had to stop at some point when she noticed he was sweating a bit more than he should and blood was starting to dye his bandaged areas. The blood did not seep through in an excessive amount, but it was enough to warrant her stopping her activities and tending to him before proceeding any further. As she approached, she watched as a bead of sweat trailed along from brow to ear, from skin to ground; and his breaths became more laborious than before.
But there wasn't much she could do regardless of how much she wanted to. For now, she was limited to cleaning him and wiping up the sweat as best as she could; adding her diminishing supply of ointment where possible; and replacing his 'bandages'. Certainly, that's the most anyone could do for the time being, but she knew she needed to find somewhere, or someone, to help out just a little bit. This was not the first time that he had been in such a precarious situation with a fever, but in that previous time he at least had the comfort of being alone in a tent and tended by the various helpers of the Hi Shin–mainly her and Karyou Ten–whereas this location was obviously desolate of practical shelter or the assistance of another person.
By the time she found herself with nothing that she could do, having exhausted her strength once again, it was dusk. She had collected some water from the river with her canteen and gave it to her comrade before drinking any herself. Although the upstream water may have been flowing with the bodies of the battlefield–a contaminant that she had known could cause sickness–there were no options to heat up the water to a boil using the little containers that she had. At the very least, the boy had come into a state of semi-consciousness when she gave it to him, but it seemed that he was unaware of their circumstances and couldn't find the strength to speak or even the words to say anything. She fed him some of the berries she had collected, too, before feeding herself. It was not the Shiyuu Clan way to place a higher value on another life, but the Shiyuu Clan way was far behind her.
For a while, only the sound of the environment could be heard: the calm stream of water, as well as the insects and nighttime animals, and the burning wood from the fire she had started as it consumed air to create light and heat. For a while, there was only the light from that fire as it glimmered from its spot on the ground, the metal of swords as sullied from their illustrious bodies as they were, and the waning of a girl's eyes staring at the sleeping man. She stared with no expression, as if she was looking nowhere at all.
The pearls in her eyes refused to glance elsewhere–their stillness contrasting with the raging fire before her. The sparks flew from burning wood to air as though they were mimicking the beaconing of fireflies. They were quickly born from the ashes and buzzed through the air; and just as quickly, they faded away. Just like a life that ends too fast, the sparks of fire burned through all that they could and found themselves withering away just as quickly as they had brightly shown off. They were born, wrought though life, and dissipated. In that silent stare, observing the livelihood of sparks dancing about, she thought about her past, where she came from, and her journey. She still remembered her life before this: her friends, her training, and her home; as well as the killings and the war brought upon them. She still remembered that sparkle in her life that was abruptly put out by an unrelenting wind of destruction.
Life was never fair, or particularly forgiving, but the cry of pain in the face of incomprehensible agony echoed against the confining walls of perception, nonetheless. She allowed herself to close her eyes, to think about that past, and to recall the implicit and vague memories that used to hold the fragility of her vengeance together.
"Kyou Shou," she remembered calling out. That was her kin, a comrade in a forest of selfish wolves, and her best–if not only–friend in the whole of existence. "Kyou Shou," she remembered giggling as she was told a funny idea. Great hills and mountains surrounded them; and as one hid among the trees, "Kyou Shou", the other would call out in search. "Kyou Kai", she'd hear in response; and on her way, she would try her hardest to track Kyou Shou down. Sometimes, Kyou Kai would catch her, and other times Kyou Shou would drop from her place within the trees, or emerge from the tall bushes, and startle the younger assassin; and even other times, she would be silent until Kyou Kai completely gave up. Autumn leaves drifted downwards, and the two would take walks through the woods. Winter trees died, and the two would huddle up as the season turned. Spring blossoms came to life, and the two sat upon patches of grass telling poems of beauty. Summer rains poured limitlessly, and the two watched the droplets fall in their battle with the earth.
"Kyou Kai," she could hear in her dreams: the land where the impartiality of death was not a fear. Those fuzzy moments of innocent smiles complimented by those indescribable moments of pure laughter filled that land now and then. Sometimes, such dreams felt insignificant, however; even the happiest of memories can become hard to appreciate against the harsh retrospective of nostalgia and longing–that which replaces content and joy. These feelings were nothing like nightmares, but in some ways they may be worse. In nightmares, everything was bad; but in these dreams, there was a luring of joy, before promptly being damned with the thoughts that lingered after she awoke: the pain of intangibility, an incapability of experiencing those moments once more, created regret.
It wasn't Kyou Kai's fault that Kyou Shou died–not at all, but the feeling of being unable to live with herself knowing that Kyou Shou could still be alive if she was not so ignorant, or if she had just woken up from the incense earlier, or that it was her fault because Kyou Shou desired to protect Kyou Kai. Yuu Ren wouldn't have killed her during the clan ritual, then. Kyou Shou was strong, but against the ruthless, conniving behavior of Yuu Ren, there was no way for her to win in the situation she was in; and that inability to do anything for her beloved sister is what angered Kyou Kai the most.
One day, they wanted to leave the clan. One day, they were to venture into the world beyond the clan. One day, they would have both been sipping green tea to the sight of the blooming flowers, far from the cage of their mountainous people who knew only how to kill. But Kyou Shou wanted to win, to become the Shiyuu, and leave with Kyou Kai–the victor of the ritual, after all, was the last person standing. But Kyou Shou died. And that was it. There was no more wood left to burn.
Life was never exactly fair, or particularly forgiving, as even the days long gone had hardships and injustice that occasionally thrived; but some hardships are more tolerable than others. In the heavens, Kyou Shou might've been calling Kyou Kai names, angry or disappointed with the path Kyou Kai took: the path of revenge. After all, she was going against what Kyou Shou wanted, and that was actively pursuing danger in the name of 'Kyou Shou', rather than living for herself. It was antithetical to what their idealized life outside was, yet Kyou Kai felt it to have been necessary in order to feel unchained from past memories, or that she at least owed that much to Kyou Shou, or that she didn't know how else to live in such a world. It was a vow she had already made, and a vow she followed through with.
Though Yuu Ren was now dead, with Kyou Kai's revenge completed, she had stiffened herself to move forward with those around her. Finally, her eyes would look forward to the future. Yet the feeling of a desolate emptiness filled partially by a slowly growing dream to become a great general, and to be beside her close allies, chained her wrists to ensure she did not fall into the pits of despair. An ugly world was no longer ugly, it was a little bit monochrome, but the dashes of light that shone through urged her to continue to strive forward.
Unattainable to grab in the sky, as humans were not meant to fly; unattainable to reach in the heavens, as humans were not meant to be divine. Dreams are dreams, but they sometimes provide moments of solace, and can help to explain purpose. She was alive.
The embers burned warmly.
Remembering
The sound of the morning bird's chirps filled the woods. Kyou Kai awoke to herself slumped against a tree, with her hands gripping her sword–Ryoku Sui–tightly. Remains of a fire lingered in a pile, and a soft breeze pushed itself against all; greeted, anew to the world.
She looked around to assess the morning situation; or rather, she tried to. The immediate soreness stopped her momentarily as she recalled the state of her body. Dredging through the soreness, she glanced around and was relieved that it seemed as though no one had been around, and nothing terrible had happened to her friend. Although there were a few foot tracks nearby, they seemed to be those of herbivorous animals, not predators.
Food was scarce. There were a variety of edible berries and other fauna about, but living off of just these would not be possible. And though there was a river nearby providing ample water, it simply wasn't enough. They would have to move somewhere better eventually, whether that meant prowling the woods for animals to eat, or finding a town, they needed to find some sort of sustainability. Therefore, she would gather all that she could in the stalks of bamboo or containers that she had and attempt to craft some sort of device that could help drag the man for he was much too heavy for her smaller stature to be able to carry all on her burdened lonesome.
Prior to any of that, though, she knew she needed to tend to him. Not much about his situation had changed since yesterday, although he seemed to be doing a little better as his breathing had calmed.
Against the fleetingness of life, they would prevail– they had to. Not only for their own lives, but for the vows they made to the important people in their lives, both those who still lived and those who had lost their lives.
Compiling her thoughts, and having finished her duties, she promptly began her journeys to and from the other areas of the woods surrounding them and amassed a small pile of more bamboo and other tough material. She was able to make a small board upon which she could lay a part of him on and hopefully drag him with her as she started to make rope-like strands to pull him using cloth and plant material, like twigs and roots, that could withstand the weight and friction of being pulled heavily. The entire ordeal took the better part of half of the day, but that was fine, as any form of productivity was welcome regardless of the slowness of the process. Upon its completion, she hoisted him up. Upon its completion, she felt a wave of relief collapse on her all at once. Upon its completion, she collapsed to her own knees and sat back against her tree, and once again she was enveloped by the darkness of the night and bright firewood burning slowly next to her.
She tried to feed herself and her superior again and fell quickly into a sleep so that her body did not deteriorate more than desired; and the distant water flowing, and the faint cracking of firewood made for a good backdrop to her fleeting consciousness to relax itself as much as it could.
Dreams call forth the subconsciousness. They bring forth the hidden desires, and they bring forth the repressed feelings. They signal unto the desires that an individual may not know, and they signal unto the fears they may have. Disdain towards those feelings of fear, or those vestigial memories, was an understandable emotion.
Kyou Kai dreamed of the times she spent with the Hi Shin Unit. She thought about her role as Shin Ri's lieutenant, her other comrades, and so forth. She thought about what it meant to have a family, and if this was really what she and Kyou Shou had hoped to find outside of their isolationist clan. Somewhere out there she was watching over Kyou Kai, and somewhere in Kyou Kai's heart she was calling for an answer.
To Kyou Shou, Kyou Kai's well-being mattered most. Ideals of revenge, vengeance, and so forth were unimportant and unnecessary conceptually; at the end of the day, all that she wanted was for Kyou Kai to find herself somewhere comfortable far away from the Shiyuu Clan, their antiquated and cultist teachings, and away from the killings that held no purpose than appealing to some traditionalist values that supposedly gave them power and might.
As much as Kyou Kai once had the burning desire for revenge against Yuu Ren, it wasn't all that lingered around the forest of her heart as the many different fauna sprouted during the springtime of her life. "Revenge" was her number one goal during said time, as it was a vow she had made to herself, but she came to be someone who understood that she had more in her life than just revenge. Having met Shin, and all of the people thus far, a whole new world of possibilities was opened up to her. It was what Kyou Shou would have wanted, surely: to move beyond the tragedy of "an end", and to grab hold of "a beginning." Her goal was now to be a general, a venerable addition to the Qin army alongside Shin, but moving past her revenge was difficult, as she found Yuu Ren's death on its own to be unsatisfying. It satiated the desire to avenge Kyou Shou, of course, but it did not spur positive feelings in Kyou Kai that eased the tension of her heart to spur forward just as Shin's heart set aflame seemed to do all on its own, or with just the slightest of nudges from those around him. Instead, she felt lost, in a way.
From the land of the spirits, Kyou Shou couldn't do anything for Kyou Kai anymore. From then on, Kyou Kai's life would revolve around her and her decisions. It was a miracle that she came across Shin that fateful day on the battlefield. It happened by chance in actuality, but her decision to stick with him was not on a whim nor by chance, nor was it simply because it was her duty as a member of the Qin army now– it was because she was attracted to his leadership and charm, or what she called his "idiocy." That's how he became a general in the first place despite being a peasant, after all: he could attract people to his cause regardless of status or class, and he could rally them using just the passion of his words and the raging wildfire that was his soul. An immature flame, yet one that she was enamored by.
Following Shin, Kyou Kai found more to life in the outside world than just a manhunt and endless wars and… and those things. Her dreams were changed by him. No longer were they filled with revenge, and no longer did they simply end as soon as that revenge was had. She now had a goal that coincided with his: to become a great general. In their journeys together across the Qin State, across the various other lands they came across in Ei Sei's conquering of the empire, she developed that desire. Not everyone is special in the way Shin was, but she was special to him, and him to her. People don't need to be special, or have a special role in life, to find themselves being special, or to find something special to them. His mere existence allowed for the propagation of a continued existence to thrive in her dreams.
And so, the Hi Shin became the ground for her desire. It became her home. As she believed to have lost her home with the death of her older sister, she found another with a rowdy group of farmers, tough guys, and complete idiots. But those idiots accepted her for her: all of her. To them, it mattered not whether she was a woman, an assassin, hiding her sex, younger than almost all of them, shorter than all of them, or even one of the more introverted among them. None of that mattered, and none of it would ever matter to them, because she was family just as much as anyone else in the Hi Shin was.
Shin wouldn't have it any other way, either. This, she knew. It wasn't a miracle that they met, but it was a miracle that she had been able to open up to him… at least from her perspective. Even though she did not have herself completely figured out, he accepted her– everything that she had to offer, and that which she could not. At times they argued, at times they fought, but to no detriment of their friendship.
As she prepared herself when morning came, she readied herself for the journey she was to undertake. It likely wasn't going to be any more harrowing than the Qin's campaigns against the Zhao, but it was just the two of them in a place they didn't know. They had no maps, only her sense of direction.
She readied herself and gathered everything that she thought she might need, and Shin's own belongings that he had, and then grabbed his raft by one of the ropes she had made and wrapped it around the entirety of one of her hands, and then did the same with the other. She started to go away from the river and towards the outside of the woods perpendicular to the river itself. Although Shin tended to rejuvenate himself quicker than the average person, his injuries were more perilous than he usually dealt with–a once in a year event, of sorts. She had assumed that they were still within the Qin state's borders, as they had not crossed into another country during the battle two days ago, but there wasn't much way of telling with the unfamiliarity of the landscape. It would be a guess as to who or what they might find themselves confronted by. At least until he was well-enough to move on his own and put up some sort of fight, being as arrogant as he was, their options were limited to simply moving forward and resting.
"Of all the times you could've gotten so hurt, why did it have to be now?" She mumbled to herself.
Light peaked through the thicket of leaves where it could. Though they did not belong to the dense cathays from the south, above them they acted almost like clouds as a large shield. Below on the ground, some areas were completely shaded, and others burned bright with the glowing gold. The pouring of the sunshower falls.
Time went on, and left foot passed right foot, and right foot passed left foot, but the trees thinned on and on. No more was there a crowd of green, but instead a flat area with a sporadic number of gingkos about. Some of these had burned to a crisp, and others thrived healthily; upon confrontation of one of the burned trees, Kyou Kai encountered the leftovers and remains of soldiers long-deceased. Whatever had occurred here happened prior to the battle from the other day, but it looked very much like a connecting graveyard, where the souls of the animals and the plants met with those of the humans, and together they would reach the next life.
She untied her straps and looked around for anything useful she could use from their belongings, albeit her efforts were fruitless. Only the remains of charred leather, fabric, and bodies of wood lay upon their resting place, but there was nothing of value to be had here. Scavengers, perhaps, had already come by and picked the place clean, or maybe they didn't have anything useful on their persons in the first place– regardless, she reattached herself to the raft to continue the journey, and thought nothing more of the encounter.
Kyou Kai pressed forward, and the trees continued to thin until she finally exited the woods. Far from the scorched earth, and less than a horizon away, she bore witness to a grassy plain and hills. She was ecstatic–somewhere near there should be a road–but was also uneasy noticing the lingering of daylight receding every waking moment. Her legs were also starting to feel much sorer, so she needed rest soon, and while these plains would not be the worst conditions for such a camp, it would mean holding off on finding somewhere to properly take care of Shin even more.
She took a drink from her canteen and looked into the air. The beautiful twilight at dusk provided a brilliant array of colors stretching from the powerful orange where the sun was hiding beyond the horizon, all the way to the deepest of purples across the edges of the sky. Between those was the deepening hue of the blue azure. She tilted her head behind her and glanced at him, his breaths forceful, and the occasional twitch of a finger or his eyelids. A slight frown grew on her face. There was no way she could just stop here.
Reminding herself of Shin, she tried her best to remove the soreness–the pain–from her mind; though, as Shin's status remained the same, the pain inside could be felt more deeply than the pain outside. The bleeding, at least, seemed to have calmed down a bit, but his fever was as stormy as that night. She could feel the friction tearing at the palms of her hands and ripping away the skin of her fingers as she oh-so-desperately held onto the ropes she was dragging him along on.
Storming her feet against the ground through seemingly trifling thoughts up a hill, she happened to see a traveler in the distance. Her hands shook, and her eyes swirled with anticipation. He had gathered wood for a fire and had an enormous number of wooden boxes and bags all tied together that he seemed to have fitted to allow him to carry it in a small cart pulled by two horses. Unknown to her was his knowledge, his kindness, or who he was, but desperation eats away at the mind. Cautious, but as hopeful as she could be.
Dragging Shin closer and closer to him, he noticed her and stood up from his position on the minor hill he had set himself up on. By now, she could see some of the details of his person. He did not appear to be a warrior but was somewhat well-built; his face had no hanging plantations of hair, but it appeared to be stubbly like a shrub; and he wore the most ordinary of gray of youren yi shirt robes complete with a beige sitao waistband, stitched sandals, and a conical farmer's hat– although, this hat was not the particular, simple conical hat farmers usually wore. It had a few decorative spines stretching from its center to the rim, and hanging from the end of each of those spines was a coin held by a piece of dyed string interlaced from somewhere in the hat itself that dropped down about a half of finger in length, to the void center of the circular-shaped coin charms themselves. When he moved towards them, as they moved towards him, each of those charms swayed back and forth and with the light wind.
Kyou Kai attempted to raise her voice to ask him if he could provide her with any assistance, still a bit of a distance away, and struggling more and more to pull Shin, but nothing came from her voice.
He quickly inspected her as she walked and noticed the markings on her face, the sheathed sword, and the state of the man she was pulling. Though her robes were much more than a peasant's, they looked nothing like those of the soldiers of the area. He noticed that blood dripped slowly from her hands, and the little raft that was pulling the man had been wearing out bit by bit.
She was parched, but there was a feeling of relaxation that was dawning over her– this man gave no semblance of hostility. Satisfied with her work thus far, and with her mind cleansed of all negative thoughts, her knees gave way and she collapsed herself onto the ground. Her head rose up to look at the man in his eyes, and through the burning feeling of sweat moving around her eyes and her drooped, tired eyes, she was able to call out to him. "If you can help him, please…"
Though she slowly started to drift away, to wherever sleep carried her, the peculiar warmth of the man's voice echoed through the cloudy chambers of her half-asleep state, and she forced herself to continue to observe. He brought out a few small containers, then crouched over to Shin to observe him closer. He took a clean knife from one of the containers and cut the bandages off. To his surprise, Shin's wounds weren't nearly as bad as they seemed at first. He looked inside of his cart's tent and came out with his own ointments and proper bandages to apply.
For several minutes, or several hours, or several days, or several lives, she waited in her eternal slumber. For the entire length of time that stretched onward, she was exhausted. Agonizing was every muscle in her body; trembling was every movement she made; unwavering she watched. No matter the trial, the obstacle, or the state of mind, this is the path she walked– the path she chose. To watch over was more than a duty, it was more than proclivity, it was what she had set her heart on for the moment. The warm fire heated them.
Sparks of fire twinkled against the backdrop of shadowy figures standing tall above the barely lit skyline; gently, their masses showed against the fading oranges and deep blues; and above, way in the hues of the shaded heavens, the sparkling specs of white hung above with watchful gazes; and besides them, the crescenting moon emitted but the faintest of light. Did Chang'e mourn her lover on this day's night? Was she calling for Houyi to reach out to her from the ground below? An encapsulating stillness.
The sadness of war and the suffering of destruction were emotions she was introduced to at a young age, but although desensitized to death, she still felt those emotions in every battle, in every violent encounter, and with every memory of Kyou Shou. Now, as well, she could feel the thorns as she picked the roses. They pricked, and they hurt, and then shed blood. They would not kill her, but the drops of blood as they splattered across the ground–as they splattered across the grass and the orchids–left crimson scars.
Was Kyou Kai "strong"? Too broadly is strength defined, so what is strength? What could she define herself as in order to properly answer her inquiry into herself? Was she physically strong? Was she mentally strong? Was she emotionally strong? Did she have the strength to keep an oath? Or did she have the strength to break it? And what were Kyou Kai's weaknesses? Was she strong in one area, but weak in another? Even to Shin, strength was not just about brute force, nor was it about intellectual capability, or about one's coolness in the heat of the fire–it was something more abstract, though more accurately undefinable in his case.
To a person whose childhood ended sooner than it had begun, such a concept was perhaps needless. The strength to survive, or the strength to push forward; or the weakness of living, and the weakness of wandering aimlessly. It was all perspective. To Kyou Kai, the only perspective that mattered was the will to continue burning. She is weak when it comes to understanding family, friends, and otherwise; not because she does not have experience with them, but because of the difficulty in re-experiencing the sparks that once flashed before her eyes. Though what she had once cherished was taken from her, she received more from that life than could ever be taken from each other, including the source of her strength. And now, a group of loud, gaudy men were reigniting the flames of "family" for her.
The Hi-Shin was more than just a group of arrogant farmers looking for fame or wealth, they were people who accepted Kyou Kai for who–for what–she was. She was an assassin, she was a girl, she was far younger than a majority of them, she didn't speak too much, she enjoyed being quiet– and yet, she also enjoyed the feasts she had with them, she was respected for her combat and strategizing abilities, and most importantly: they enjoyed her company, and she enjoyed theirs. It wasn't conditional, it was unconditional, isn't that love?
A bell that rings endlessly when dropped. Sometimes, its sound was too piercing. Sometimes, it was as ambivalent as morning birds. Draped by the curtain of thoughts, it reverberated.