[center][img]https://i.postimg.cc/h4s2gHXg/Nameplate.png[/img]
[img]https://i.postimg.cc/NMtdzW41/165794418463517055.png[/img]
[h3][u][color=#99A9D6]Shrine of a Forgotten God, Henan[/color][/u][/h3]
[hr][/center]

	She hadn't intended to eavesdrop. Really, she hadn't.

	Xiáyīng hadn't even thought about the conversation the two people outside might have been having at first, as she had been almost entirely preoccupied with self-concealment. But once she had erased her already meager presence, and had tucked herself nicely out of their line of sight, her mind had begun to wander away from the silence of her own quiet breathing, to the voices she could hear outside. And so it was that, without really meaning to, she heard what was being discussed.

	[color=d65e5e]"-- isolated village a few hours out seemed to have up and vanished. Not too strange to happen during the war, but a peddler seemed to have traded with 'em 3 months ago."[/color]

	...So the village she had encountered before wasn't the only one to suffer such a fate? Her heart felt heavy, and her head drooped. Of course, it wasn't as though she expected that the only evils in the world were the ones which she had beheld with her own two eyes, but even so, the reminder and the remembrance that came with it weighed heavily upon her.

	If they were investigating such things, though, then didn't that mean they were martial artists? Honorable and upstanding folk, like the man who... Well, at any rate, her curiosity was stirred, and so, against her better judgment, she peered meekly out around the fringe of the doorway when she thought nobody was looking, and --

	[b][color=#99A9D6]The wind whistled between the mountain's twin crests. The boughs rustled, their petals plucked -- life strewn carelessly upon the surface of the water far below. Ripples formed around her where she lay, soaked and chilled to the bone, merely gazing up at the sky. She had always been here. She would never be able to leave. She clawed at the stone with bloodied fingers, trying in vain to rise, only to fall and sink deeper -- ever deeper into the dark water.

	Silent and still. All was silent and still. Ever and always, silent and still. She was but a single droplet in a boundless spring. A single life within a vast world. A tiny and frail thing that could do naught but sink.

	Yet even from within those soundless depths, she could still see the ones who stood above.[/color]

	[color=d65e5e]One was a warrior ascendant upon a steep and winding road, whose every stride carried him closer -- ever closer to the clouds. But though he bore a thousand blades upon his back, the way was so narrow and so treacherous that none could walk beside him to bear his steel, or share in his burden.[/color]

	[color=cccccc]The other's burdens were of a different sort. The road ahead of her was easy, and well-traveled -- if only she could but walk it. Yet shadows hounded her -- their grasp stayed her feet, even as the tracks she followed faded into nothing before her eyes. As the sun began to set behind the mountain, the shadows in her wake grew long indeed -- like jaws opened wide to devour her, while she but stood, and waited for the journey's end.[/color][/b]

	Xiáyīng gasped, and drew back behind the threshold, shutting her aching eyes -- yet the echoes of the vision still seemed painted upon the insides of her eyelids, drifting phantasms and lingering silhouettes dancing across the darkness despite her attempts to blink and rub them away. Why had she dared to look, when she knew she wouldn't be able to control what she might see? Foolish, utterly foolish, and now --

	[color=d65e5e]"I know that you're lookin' after someone here already, so I'd understand if you'd want to stay."[/color]

	Xiáyīng's heart sank. Now they knew she was here.

	The woman called out to her a moment later -- or, rather, seemed to be addressing her indirectly, but nevertheless showed that she, too, had witnessed Xiáyīng's moment of indiscretion. But how much had they seen? Just her face, or had they even noticed her eyes? If they had, would they try to hurt her? She'd be able to tell if she looked at them again, but if she looked then they might see if they hadn't already, and if they saw then they definitely would, so should she just stay hidden? But she couldn't stay hidden because they'd already seen her. Should she say something? But what? Saying "I'm not a thief" would only make them think she was one, but if she asked permission to stay only after already entering the temple then -- then...

	Her racing thoughts carried her completely away, and ultimately she became so preoccupied wondering what she should say or how she should say it that she said... nothing at all.