Suiming

  “Where am I?” Suiming asked the man who pointed an axe at him. The man had Treisaulain features, his hair long and curled at the end, his eyes in a hue of the sky the caged birds yearn for. He wore a linen shirt with a woolen jacket over it.

  “Who are you?” the man said in Treisaulian, with a hint of accent suggesting that he came from the east of Treisaules.

  “Can we talk when you put down the axe?” Suiming said as he put his hands up. He couldn’t feel any waves of casting coming from that man, but he was sure that the man was no common folk. The man complied, lowering his axe and strapping it on his belt, but his hand was still on the handle, eyes staring Suiming down. It was then that Suiming realized that his hand was on Seren’s sword’s pommel.

  “So, where am I?” Suiming asked again.

  “The Silver Mountain.”

  “Who are you?” the man followed up.

  “I am kinda a traveler, you know,” Suiming answered as he grinned.

  “A young Euthian, carrying the sword of a messenger, yet speaking perfect Treisaulian…quite strange, wanderer, why would I trust you?” the man questioned as he raised his hand. Suiming could see that the man was about to release some kind of casting or otherworldly powers.

  “Oi, oi, no need to get so aggressive, bud!”

  Realm-art: Shattered Stars

  Right as Suiming tried to cast his Realm-art to create a barrier of stars, he felt the pain coming from his chest. The light burned before him as it flared from his chest; it blinded him before he could react. The pure white scorched his eyes, muted his senses as he felt a surge of power flowing through him. His blood churred as his bones trembled. Suiming felt the ground’s smell of soil and grass as his face crashed into the vegetation.

  “Magnesium?” Suiming muttered as he tried to stand up. He slowly recovered from the light, still feeling the warm tingle within him.

  “…What…he didn’t even let me finish! On the other hand, now I know where that Barricade is from.”

  As he expected the sight of birch trees and the tall grasses to return, he found himself in another place. The moon shone bright, painting the stone bricks in a silver tone. A veil of ink-green covered the land beyond the castle wall Suiming stood on. Stars of constellations he was strangers to hung on the night’s pure-black dome, with the full, perfect, and pure moon leading them. The contour of the far-away horizon was wavy, like a sea waiting to be explored. Just seeing this sight made Suiming want to jump off the castle wall and stride toward the distant adventure.

  As Suiming was intoxicated by the sense of curiosity, a series of urgent footsteps, distant croaking of some kind of foul creature, disturbed him. He saw firelight coming from the courtyard, as the sound of the chase and smell of soot approached, he quickly ran to a watchtower in sight. Between him and the tower was a stand covered in a silky cloth. Feeling no scent from it, Suiming ran past it.

  The watchtower sealed him away from the world he had just seen. Only a slit of moonlight shot from the window, a thread between the endless freedom and the confined imprisonment. Inside the watchtower hung a black robe, stained by blood. Suiming figured that it was the uniform the guards here wore. He put on the cloak over his straps and suit. Seren’s sword stuck out too much in the robe. Unsure if the guards here were equipped with swords, he took off the scabbard and the sword, then gently put the sword on the ground—Soundless, almost like putting a cat on the floor.

  Suiming glided his fingers across the fabric; it was smooth, but just wearing it made him feel strange. A weight heavier than all his regrets in the war fell on him. His skin itched, his stomach turned, his heart pumped fast. Suiming tried controlling his breath, but wearing that black robe made him feel uneasy; the smooth fabric ground against his trembling body, each and every contact felt like torture.

  “…Existence cursed…” Suiming groaned as he held onto the wall. His face was illuminated by the moonlight. He looked at the moon again. The mouth and eyes of the darker spots of the moon laughed at him. Why can’t you accept it? Weren’t you so capable and great? Look at you now, unable to look into the mirror.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Suiming cursed as he took off the monocle from his face. He needed time to adjust. The world fell into silence as the hands of time turned on the monocle. Far away, the trees became specimens of time sealed in the silver amber of the moon, firelight stopped flicking, and the aroma of smoke halted. But the disgusting sensation of wearing that robe disturbed Suiming. After a quarter that felt like an hour, Suiming felt like the robe was becoming bearable.

  “I need to know what this place is about.”

  Suiming walked out of the chamber, jumped onto the side of the castle wall, and inspected the structure of the castle. On another tower, an observatory was built, featuring a brass dome and a large telescope. Inside the walls, though the walls were high, he could see an oak planted in the middle of the courtyard, peeking over the shadows and the bricks.

  “…I can’t even tell when and where this place is built…” Suiming muttered. The air was frozen in time, but he could still feel its cold and gentle strokes.

  As he wandered on the castle wall, he felt more comfortable in the robe. It felt more than just wearing a piece of clothing. His heart had changed, filled with sour tears of regret and guilt. It was a sin that could fill an entire cemetery, but Suiming was carrying it, trying to stand tall with the pain he felt by acknowledging the blurry past he didn’t want to look back upon.

  The time had come. Sounds, flicking shadows, the emptiness in his heart, and the guilt all came in at once. Smoke came to his nose as he walked back to the chamber that he had exited. As he ran toward it, Suiming heard a loud croak. He turned around and met the eyes of a creature of wrinkled skin, wearing a robe akin to his. The creature held a broom and charged toward Suiming.

  Not an abnormality, ain’t feeling nothing.

  Right as the broom was about to strike him, Suiming took out the knife in his pocket. He held the broom’s handle, controlling the thing’s movement. The creature fell to the ground as Suiming pushed it further down, shoving the broom onto the thing’s neck, then stabbed it, right next to where he thought that thing’s heart was. Despite how deep he pushed, Suiming felt nothing. The sensation of flesh being torn and tissues being parted didn’t come; instead, it felt like piercing a paper box with a toothpick. After many stabs, only a small shot of blood stained his chest as it ejected from the thing’s chest.

  “…Tsk, who did you think you were?”

  Realm-art: Shattered Stars

  Starlight emerged, and smaller constellations joined the choir of destruction and rebirth, forging a glowing sphere of heat and light. It was a fraction of the glory of the night, a piece of the forever shining sun and its uncountable kin that bring the dew of creation. The surface of that miniature star flashed, tiny solar flare burst out as it spun on its axis.

  Suiming eyed the flaming orb. Without hesitation, he let the orb fall into the body of that creature. Just like he did in the days that flew past, he made the manifestation of the star enter a state where it blew like a bubble. Suiming could feel and see the light, the heat coming from the inside of that creature as it tried to scream, but its voice could barely squeeze out of its throat while Suiming pushed the broom on its neck. His hand trembled as his mind returned to the time he had done the same thing before, a time when he saw himself as another person.

  This is not me.

  “I can never be happy with the skin I wear,” Suiming said to the creature, who had long stopped moving.

  “But this time, I have to confront the person I used to be.”

  Seeing the burnt chest of that creature, Suiming stood up and walked away. He didn’t look at the things remaining while he strode toward the observatory. Right as Suiming stopped casting when the star had disappeared, he heard a voice, a whisper. A whisper so quiet that it was like sand dropping down in an hourglass.

  “You had long forgotten your mission,” the voice said. Despite it being a delusional whisper, Suiming felt that it was something calling him from behind.

  He looked back, only to find the corpse of that creature standing, its voice coming out of its beak-like mouth.

  “Sui…Ming…”

  “Whose servant are you?” Suiming asked.

  “I am the servant of the one I cannot name. One of your students tried to study my true master; if you joined his study, you could’ve been freed from the shackles of This World.”

  Suiming didn’t say anything. He quickly went through the library of people he could call ‘students’, but none of the peers of Josh entered the world that dealt with things beyond this World.

  “I have no interest…Speaking of which, darling, why is an Existence willing to speak with me so politely?”

  “…This place is a prison, an empty, silent prison. Whether to free its prisoner or not is your choice…They do not care, after all, chaos is their liking.”

  “Alas, may the cycle of thoughts and creation never end,” the creature said, collapsing to the ground. Lifeless once again.