Once upon an orbit of planet Fait, a playful young girl and her flustered yet resourceful single father must endure sickness, encounter exotic creatures, escape a predatory government, and outwit a wicked wizard to survive just one more day. Having...
Alas, while, yes, her father had told her to stay put, to stay hiding atop that mushroom cap and stay safe, apart from the panic, far from the fray, and, while, yes, Nariah was most always, nine-sentos-out-of-ten, a good girl to obey her good father's good directions, but this sento-this one time-Nariah did not. She could not. She had to see. She had to make sure her daddy would be okay. She had to watch him save Ophiuchus. She had to know what would happen with her own two big brown eyes. And, even though she was more scared than she had ever been before in all her five orbits of life, Nariah Naza had to know, "What's a 'Bruiser'?"
Into the white fog, into the screams and panic from the Neathers running to and fro, Nariah slipped stealthily. Instead of Hide-and-Don't-Peek, this would be her own game-of "Hide-and-Go-Sneak." Clicking to a clarifying lens, her ultra-goggles helped her to see through the white fog all the black outlines of everything, of running people and shanty huts and mounds of trash. While everyone else was running loudly away from the Sylva Dome, Nariah tip-toed, with her back pressed against the wall of South Tower, until she made it to the Sylva Dome.
She kept running her fingers up and down her braid of rainbow beads, for she believed they would protect her. As Ophiuchus had removed each one from a special branch on the Mundi Tree and given them, one by one, to her, the shinseon had explained that each bead housed a very special, very powerful sylva. They would give her power, in their own ways and at sentos of their own choosing. Surely this must be one of those sentos. She had to believe it was. She kept rubbing and twisting her rainbow braid around, softly repeating to herself, trembling as she did,
"'Second Precept. Render No Destruction to Spirit, nor Mortal, nor Verdant...'"
The Sylva Dome, from between the slats of the stacked rocks that comprised it, pulsed with light. First pulsed red. Then, yellow. Now, green, green. Blue, red, red, yellow. Orange, green, green, red! Beams of light shot out of the Dome and off into the air at strange trajectories. She whispered to herself, "'Third Precept. Remember Your Pain, for Pain is Power to Heal.'"
From South Tower's base wall she darted across to beside the Sylva Dome, where she crouched.
"'Fourth Precept. Recall No Spirit, Once Departed, to Flesh nor Leaf...'"
Clicking her ultra-goggles to a magnifying lens, Nariah peered in through one of the slats between the stacked stones of the curved wall. "'Fifth Precept. Requite Enemies' Hate as Love into Miracle. R-Requite Enemies' Hate as Love into Miracle. Requite, requite.'" What did "requite" mean? Did it mean being especially quiet? Or quiet again? What had the wizard said, again? She took the ultra-goggles off. Somehow she didn't want anything between her and what she had to see. Although terrified, through one of the slats, Nariah peered inside the Dome to the uncanny battle within.
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