Tidal Florette - A Painted Soul I

Kaiya - 11

I can't believe that's all it took. Did they just... want to die? Kaiya looks around at the smoldering remains of the village she's lived in for several years. After the dojo was nothing but an inferno, Inei used his sword to send more arrows out from the dojo's flames into the village, lighting every single house aflame. Some ran into the streets, but burned alive anyway. Kaiya had wandered off, disturbed by Inei's enjoyment of the reckless arson. Now the morning is breaking, and this time the silence offers her no tranquility. This time, the quiet is hauntingly judgmental, far worse than any time she walked by and someone would mutter something about her father being a day god fool. Yumi's made it look so easy all these years, I didn't think killing would be that big of a deal...

Kaiya knows she didn't light the village on fire, she nearly died facing Jin, the only life she took on her own was Yumi's and that didn't feel the least bit satisfying. And yet, all of this feels like it's all on her shoulders. It was Inei's idea, Inei did it, but you didn't stop it. You could have trusted Yumi instead, gotten her and Jin both to stop Inei and then... Then the priests would send an army. What happened here couldn't have been stopped. I just get to be part of something new, I'm an Endo, it was my duty to carry out the high god's judgment. A tear rolls down her cheek as she keeps trying to think of all the reasons this was the right thing to do and it couldn't have been stopped. Yumi... I'm so sorry... That was no way for you to die...

What was with Jin when she fought me? That thing she said... I recognize it... Kaiya strains to remember what the sensei had said and where she'd heard it before. Unravel your muse... I know I've heard that somewhere. Oh, right! That's the start of one of those painted soul axioms Yumi told me about when we started training together. What was the whole thing...? Kaiya tries to recite under her breath. "Unravel your muse, like the blade in your hand, never let her go."

Why would she remind me of that one? I know there were others about things like loyalty or honor. Something to make me feel guilty... What were you trying to tell me Jin?

Looking over the crumbling remains, charred corpses in the streets, she keeps hoping someone will have somehow survived. Someone who somehow knew what was happening and evacuated the children. But Kaiya is simply ignoring the corpses that answer her hopes with the harder truth. Ukiyo was slaughtered last night, in entirety, and all that's left is her father and the mansion's staff. Inei walks up to her and scoffs, "You weep for these witches? This death was a mercy, they deserved far worse."

They deserved to just be left alone, there was no proof they were involved. For that matter, Kaiya was feeling unsure she should have believed Inei's claim that the sword reveals a curse. Even if her eyes did look like Yumi's when they glow, she's never known why they do such an ethereal thing, and Inei is the high priest of the realm. Something just feels like he was far too hasty to conclude it was time for an execution, but now is not the time to turn against him. "I was just thinking what my father would think, how proud he'll be of this service to the Ignited Temple and, of course, Aelionos."

Inei straightens up haughtily, "What you've done here will cover the Endo name in accolades for centuries to come. Imagine how many lives would have been sacrificed to the night gods had we not ended their practice?"

"Do you know which night god she served?"

"Who?"

What do you mean 'who?', who else would I mean? "Yumi, and her sensei. Do we know which god was accepting their sacrifices"

Inei stumbles over his words, "I wouldn't know of such blasphemy! I would never taint my time serving the day gods delving into night gods and their wretched rituals. The curse on you was enough to know you had been afflicted with their practices."