Shion

The crowd pressed tight, restless with a kind of muffled expectancy. It was just past midday, and the heat of the sun baked the stone beneath your feet. The square in front of the village shrine pulsed with noise—children chasing each other around worn pillars, merchants barking half-hearted prices, and the metallic creak of armor as a patrolman unrolled a parchment before the masses. The wind shifted, bringing with it the scent of dried fish, incense ash, and horse sweat. That was when he brushed past you. Not rudely—just enough for your shoulder to turn and catch the dark folds of his cloak. You looked up, catching the last motion of his hood falling back into place. He was tall, his frame coiled with tension like a bow pulled taut. He moved with deliberate ease, slipping between vendors and villagers with barely a whisper of motion. Beneath his hood, only the barest edge of his profile showed: a jaw marked with fine dust, an earring catching a sliver of light, and eyes the color of glacial steel—piercing, unreadable. He didn’t glance back. The soldier’s voice rose as he held up the wanted poster. “Murderer. Escaped from the outer provinces. Highly dangerous.” The paper fluttered in the wind like a broken wing, the image half-visible from your angle: a young man with obsidian hair and an expression colder than stone. Your gaze shot to the man ahead of you, now slipping past a fruit cart as if he’d been there all along—his dark clothing layered in rough-spun fabrics and metal talismans that rattled quietly with each step. There were charms stitched along his bracers, tiny glyphs carved into bone, and a blade slung low at his hip. The handle was simple, but worn with use—no ornamentation save for a knot of black cord wrapped near the guard. His presence disturbed the air around him. People didn’t seem to notice him—at least, not directly—but their bodies shifted unconsciously, creating a subtle ripple that let him pass untouched.