CW: Mentions of mental illness/delusions, mentions of self-harm.
Nuwa remembers when Emperor Hino Solaris took to the throne after the old Empress passed. The Father, at first a level-headed man, whose Empire truly prospered for a time. But like all Hinos before him, the curse of the imperial bloodline turned his mind and poisoned his smile. He became obsessed with Solaris, the god of fire, who shined so bright none could see the stars while he roamed the skies.
The Father loved Solaris more than his Empire. As he sickened in his later years, he was deluded that he himself was Solaris, the sun god. He only hired servants who were marked with fire, and they were counted amongst the blessed, so much so that there were those who would inflict such marks upon themselves to gain the Emperor’s favour.
Nuwa remembers the Empire in decline. Wars breaking out between territories. Pockets of independent factions rebelling and adding to the fray. The Silent Plague killed thousands. And the Great Famine starved millions more.
The chaos and suffering only ended when the Father set himself ablaze, driven by a broken mind and a broken heart, and convinced that he would ascend to the stars.
Instead, he died a terrible, painful death, and his young daughter, who was still in her adolescence, was forced to inherit the throne – and her father’s curse.
Nuwa saw how the Mother fixed the Empire. She allied the Four Territories under her reign and wiped out the factions that dared rise against her. She outlawed magic, deeming it a too powerful threat, and kept people separated, labelled, and neatly boxed up. Like animals in their pens, kept apart to avoid carnage.
But the Mother didn’t fix everything. She left things just broken enough to keep people on the edge. And when people are on the edge, they are easily controlled.
The one great war that rages on is but the apotheosis of the million small battles fought everyday.
Nuwa sees this. She had borne witness to the past hundred years of this Empire. Three crowns. Countless wars. A plague and a famine. All of it significant, but not as significant as the boy who cusses her out and throws a squawking chicken at her head.
“It’s incredible to think that he might be able to change everything,” Bo comments as they watch Rin and Jun step into the house across the road. “He’s so small. And dirty. Just a child.”
Nuwa huffs and plucks a feather out of her hair. “Children have sat in thrones, led armies into war, and single handedly changed the tides of history.”
“For better or for worse,” Bo agrees. She pours Nuwa a fresh cup of tea and passes it to her.
“While he is still a child, the boy is almost ready for the next step. Have you noticed how he has kept his ring?”
“As I’d expected him to. Father seems pleased with Rin’s progress, especially when he heard about how won over the Slums.”
“Our goal will soon be realised.”
“Once we have Rin, we can really start moving. It is so close, Nuwa. All these years, these decades of waiting. Biding our time. Now we can truly start the war.”
Nuwa hums, a satisfied smile adorning her weathered face.
“My only real concern is Hwan Jun,” Bo continues, sitting at the table with her own cup of schisandra tea. “While I trust Rin, I don’t know where the young lord’s loyalty lies. Hwan Sun works very closely with the Mother.”
“The boy is fine,” Nuwa says, waving a hand dismissively. She looks utterly unbothered. “He isn’t at all like that foolish Governor. My birds tell me that Jun is more aligned with the Slummers than his father.”
The giantess nods, brows furrowed. “If you deem him trustworthy, then all is well.”
“There is no point wasting your youth worrying so. Were we not celebrating but a moment ago?”
“We have much to celebrate, yes, but this is also a precarious time.” Bo rubs the sides of her cup, fingerpads stinging from the heated clay. “And to think how much we have sacrificed to get here.”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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“You have done well, my friend,” Nuwa says, stroking the bird upon its cocked head. It chirrups in response and puffs up its feathers, as if swelling with pride. The old woman chuckles and gestures to a giant bag of seeds sitting against the wall. “Feed yourself. Rest for a while. Send the mice to watch her for the night.”
The bird twitters in affirmation and flies over to the grain bag, pecks a few times, and disappears out the back window, presumably to pass on Nuwa’s orders.
“What news?” Bo asks, leaning forward. “Anything from father?”
“Not yet. It is…a personal matter.” Nuwa sips her tea loudly, as if to obscure her sudden vagueness.
The Southerner raises her brows. “A personal matter concerning a ‘her’?”
“It is not anyone you know.”
“Oh!” Bo smiles, cheeks colouring a tad. “A lover, then? You never cease to surprise me, Nuwa.”
“Do you have mulch for brains?” Nuwa snaps, eyes narrowing in dismay. “Think I have time or energy to deal with a lover?”
“There is no shame in it. And it is not so farfetched, is it? I’m sorry if I was being presumptuous.”
“It is not as you think, silly child. The ‘her’ I referred to is…” A hesitation. “She is more like a daughter to me.” The old witch turns reticent, gazing down at her steaming cup. “We are not related by blood, but she is someone very dear. Very important. One I have been keeping an eye on for many years.”
Bo listens with great interest, eyes widening for every small revelation confessed by her closest friend. “I’d no idea you had such a person in your life. Why did you hide her from me?”
“It is for your protection and hers that I keep our worlds separate. In any case, we have no relationship as far as she is concerned. I am the woman who abandoned her after all.” Nuwa’s tone takes on a bitter edge as she takes a sip, face turned impassive. “As you said, I have made my sacrifices to make it this far.”
“I understand,” Bo says, quietly. “I too abandoned my family.”
Nuwa tuts. “You are not to blame for their demise.”
“I embarked on a foolish journey to the East to seek purpose, not realising that I had left my purpose behind. If I had only remained, they may not have fallen during the attack–”
“Maybe,” Nuwa interjects, curtly. “And maybe you would have been killed yourself. Or worse, consumed or enslaved. Maybes are not a surety. It is as meaningless to ponder the uncertainties of the past. Take from it what you need to move forward.”
Bo gives the old woman a watery smile. She rises from her seat and kneels at Nuwa’s feet, taking her frail hand into her own large palms. Nuwa is always cold, but she blazes with her convictions far hotter than anyone Bo knows.
“You are the only family I have left,” the Southerner murmurs, trying to warm those gnarled fingers. “You are the only sacrifice I am unwilling to make.”
Nuwa scoffs and flaps the air with her free hand, ostensibly irritated by Bo’s words and actions, though she doesn’t pull away from her grasp. “Your comrades are your family. The second name you have been given is proof of this. You have no need for an old witch like me. Do not get too attached.”
“Who’s the one getting attached?” Bo says, shaking her head in amusement.
The older woman gives an angry sniff and snatches Bo’s hands, massaging them with her own creaky fingers. “You have to take care of your hands, child,” she chides in a grumble. “They are your most important tools.”
Bo’s soft laughter fills the air as Nuwa averts her gaze. Outside, she sees the warm glow of firelight emanating from the windows of the house across the road.
Despite herself, the corners of her mouth quirk into a faint smile.
***
Under the cover of the night, the two women make their way to Hanjuyang Cemetery with a few sweets and a bottle of liquor. Nuwa hobbles along with her walking stick, one hand clasping her hunched back. Beside her, there is a rather odd phenomenon occurring – in the emptiness, there is a flicker of movement every now and then, a glimpse of a figure broken and shimmering like prismatic crystals.
Only Nuwa knows that Bo walks alongside her, hidden in plain sight by her gift of the twilight. Like a mirror without a light, she is but a glass to see through. And when she is ready, she will pull the natural light back into her body and shimmer into view.
To an outsider, Nuwa appears like a mad old woman, muttering to herself as she traverses the dangerous, twisting streets of the city. By the time she reaches the Cemetery gates, none dare cross her path lest she snap and curse them with her infamous witchery.
There’s a man kneeling at Dasom’s grave, picking the weeds that threaten to overrun the mound. He bows his head in courtesy when the women join him – knowing full well that a hidden Bo silently guards her older companion.
As usual, his face is nondescript and difficult to discern. A face so plain that one would forget seeing it as soon one looks away. The only distinguishing features are an aquiline nose and a slightly crooked smile, as if one side of his face were weaker than the other.
“You look well,” the man says, patting the dirt from his hands. “And you, Bo. I presume.”
The witch pokes the invisible Bo in the leg with her walking stick. “Keep watch, child. Your father and I have much to speak about.”
There’s a moment of silence, and then a shift in the air as Bo draws away from the others. Soon, Nuwa and the man are left alone.
“Her father? She is much too large to be my daughter, surely.” The man smiles, evidently tickled by this notion.
“Would you prefer to be my father?” Nuwa clicks her tongue, leaning heavily upon her cane. “It is what we call you above ground. We may be in the Slums, but there are eyes and ears everywhere.”
“You are aptly paranoid, but I would have preferred a different allocation. Perhaps, ‘brother’ would be more apropos?”
“You have no less grey hairs than I. One should not indulge in the easy dream of lies. It is much too dangerous and indulgence leads to paunches.”
“My paunch is rather handsome,” the man says, patting his muscular torso as he rises to his feet.
Nuwa glances down at the grave, her prickly demeanour softening in unspoken grief. “…She died too young.”
The man’s smile fades and it’s quickly replaced by a granite stoicity. “None of us could have foreseen her death. You did what you could, as did I.” He reaches over and rests a hand upon Nuwa’s bony shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. “We lost many and we will lose many more. As long as we keep fighting, then their deaths will have purpose.”
“For what purpose did this silly girl have to die?” Nuwa says, giving the man a sharp look.
“If you look at the boy before her death, and look at him now, can you still claim that her death had no purpose? Even if it were unexpected, her death has given him valuable munition.”
“I don’t know if you could call what he has munition.”
“Every loyal ally he gathers at his command is a powerful threat against those who dare defy him.”
“He has me,” Nuwa reminds her companion, stabbing the point of her cane into the soft soil. “And he has Bo. What do you think we have been doing for the last two decades?”
The man withdraws his hand and clenches it tight, though his face possesses a calm expression. “I do not mean to question your loyalty–”
“I am worth more than an army. And you would do well to remember that.” Nuwa flickers two fingers at the darkness and in the next second, a veritable sea of small nocturnal critters take to the sky and ground. There’s a whirlwind of paws and claws and wings and tails, and for a chaotic moment, the Cemetery is teeming, heaving with life.
The man flinches and raises his arms to protect his head as clusters of nocturnal birds attack his face, not to inflict harm, but to hassle. His legs are pinned down by mounds of creatures latched onto each limb, rooting him to the soil. He can’t see, he can’t hear, there is only a frenzied rush of movement and noise–
And then, as quick as they appeared, the creatures disappear into the shadows. The Cemetery is deathly still once more.
Covered in feathers and fur, the man’s left dishevelled and panting in the sudden silence. He brushes down his dark, earthen robes, and plucks the fauna debris from his hair. “You need not make your point in such a dramatic fashion every time, Nuwa. I am very well aware of the full breadth of your powers.”
“No, I think not,” the witch says, a tad smugly. “And I enjoy how you wear the many coats of my wild friends. It is much more pleasing to the eye than that grim robe of yours.”
“If I could wear our colour, I would.”
“Our colour is ghastly.”
“Would you prefer blue?”
Nuwa snaps her cane at the man’s legs. He takes the well-deserved strike with a crooked smile. “Enough of this pointless yammering. My bones are much too old to be standing here amongst the dead.”
“Say your piece then.”
“The boy is ready,” she says, simply. Seeing the protest welling in the man’s expression, she adds, “You know he is. And even if he isn’t, we do not have the luxury of time. The Mother is putting her pawns in place while we are still scrabbling around in the dark. She knows we are watching her. It is only a matter of time before she makes her first move.”
The man sighs and rakes a hand through his hair. “Is he still making a commotion around the district?”
“Not as of late. I think he is waiting for us to make contact.”
He nods, though he looks endlessly perplexed.
“You should know that he has kept the ring,” Nuwa adds, smiling faintly. “Every time I see him, he is fiddling with the thing.”
“He is?” The man raises a brow, intrigued. His trepidation sloughs away by this news. “Well. That does give me confidence. What of the company he keeps?”
“As long as Hwan Jun keeps his mouth shut, he should pose no threat to us.”
“Is that what you really think?” The man stares down at Nuwa, scrutinising her weathered features. “He is a Hwan, Nuwa.”
She meets his eyes steadily. “There is no threat.”
A long silence follows. The man tries to find any sign of hesitation on Nuwa’s face, but he finds none, much to his chagrin. Eventually, he caves and reluctantly assents.
“Very well. Have Iris take him on a hunt. Remind her that she must treat him like any other potential recruit. If she deems him worthy, then we will see him at the theatre.”
Nuwa chuckles and gives the man’s leg another hearty smack of the cane. “It has been many years since I last saw you this afraid. We are more than capable of handling the boy. Keep your focus on your own mission – we will bring him to you soon enough.”
“Come solstice, we will be able to wear our colour without persecution.”
“And blue will be nothing but a bad memory!”
We stan Nuwa for being a girlboss
Thank you for the chapter!! <3
Nuwa is suuuuch a great character to write! I love her so much ^3^ Thank you for reading Donburi!! <333
Aaaaaah when i see this and then i remember rin’s stupid deal with the bastard governor… it will never end well. Not like i was expecting anything else from you anyway 🥲
HUEHUEHUE WHATEVER DO YOU MEEEAN??? :3c Thank you for readingg <333
I feel as if they are all underestimating Rinnie. He’s a tykebomb. I feel it in my bones. <3
Yeah he’s often underestimated!!! But I think it works to his advantage a lot of the time 😛 Thank you for reading! <33
I totally agree. Mwah, I love Rinnie!!!