GODDESS | RYEJI AU

(kiss to crack stone.) #1.

Yeji stepped into a circular room, a small bucket in one hand, and a soft cloth in the other. Before her stood her last chore for the day, but out of all her mundane, mind-numbing duties, this was the only one she actually enjoyed.

Cleaning the statue of their Goddess, Ryujin.

Yeji had lived in Ryujin's temple since she was small, brought there by her father, and now at twenty-three, she was still stuck cleaning. She'd hoped to be one of the scholars, or even one of the warriors, but none had picked her. She was told she was too small to be a warrior, not refined enough to be a scholar. Not disciplined enough to be a priestess.

So she was stuck cleaning the temple with a few others.

It wasn't all bad. The temple was beautiful, made of worn timber, grayed and polished by the winds and snow. The roofs rose in tall peaks but the night sky could be seen from inside, the timber beams overhead melting away when the sun set, befitting of the Goddess of the Moon and Stars. Silver and gold ran through the crevices in the worn wood, the walls sparkling like starts in the moonlight. Two pillars flanked the grand doors to the temple, intricately carved with runes and figures and inlaid with gold and silver, depicting the Goddess' life and deeds. Great leather and silk banners had once hung from poles that flanked the doors, and the tarnished golden basins that lined the stone steps had once merrily crackled with fire. A stone path wound down from the door and between the trees.

The temple itself sat high up on a craggy mountainside, surrounded by evergreen forests with a clear view of the sky for worship, and so that their scholars could study the starts and interoperate Ryujin's messages. Or so they tried. Ryujin had been quiet for several centuries now, but the cosmos remained steady and the panthers that resided in and around the temple, said to be descended from the ones she'd kept, still thrived, so some held out hope that she'd return. In the meantime though, the banners were forgotten, the tarnished golden basins remaining empty and unlit.

Several miles from the base of the mountain lapped a freezing sea.

Yeji knew every inch of the temple. She knew every corner of the library, having dusted the shelves probably thousands of times. She knew which floorboards squeaked, when to replace the candles that seemed to fill every crevice (enchanted, so as not to burn the books) when to rekindle the fire that always burned behind Ryujin's statue.

The one perk of being as small as she was, was that she was the only one allowed to clean Ryujin's statue, for fear that the others might break it. This one night a week was when Yeji's mind would quiet the most as she carefully dusted the statue, running the cloth along the polished marble. She loved this statue. The artist who carved it remained unknown, but Yeji was constantly in awe of the likeness of their goddess. She'd been studying it for years and still found new details every time. New folds in the fabric of her clothes, the waves of her hair, and the infamous burn scar across her shoulder from a clash with her sister Yuna, goddess of the Sun. Legend said that the spat between sisters had immediately ceased, and Yuna had healed the wound, but had been unable to avoid the scar.

Her statue was supposedly true to her size, which always amused Yeji because despite her large presence that all the legends spoke of, Ryujin only slightly smaller than Yeji herself. The statue was regal, Ryujin standing with her chin up, staring forward with a calm face, her palms facing forward, arms at her sides. She was dressed in what Yeji assumed to be a leather tunic and pants--it was hard to tell exactly when the entire statue was polished white marble--with an undertunic that seemed like it was supposed to be made of fine, sheer fabric, since it was carved to be nearly see through.