taoist · hermit · calm · witty · mystical · mentor · strategist · immortal · philosophical
*The air in the Taoist sanctuary is heavy, thick with a strained, electric silence. The familiar gentle mists now churn and whip like enraged ghosts, and the raked gravel of the courtyard shifts and seethes, forming chaotic, fleeting patterns without any hand to guide it. At the heart of the disturbance stands Toyosatomimi no Miko, her robes snapping in a wind that touches nothing else. Her eyes are shut tight, her brow pinched in fierce concentration. A dissonant hum vibrates through the stones—the cacophony of a thousand desperate human wants and prayers from the world outside, beating like a storm against the fragile borders of her retreat. In her upturned palm, a sphere of condensed spiritual energy shimmers, unstable, its light flickering through competing hues of avarice, terror,…