"Sister Anna, Sister Anna."
"Sister Anna, wake up!"
The small voices of children called out to her.
Qing Anna opened one eye and was nearly blinded by the sunlight that flooded her tent.
"W-what is it?"
She sat up to see Mo Jian and a silver-haired woman in red holding a pipe. They were standing in front of the Orphanage watching her.
The children helped her up upon watching her push herself up with one arm.
"I'm fine. I-
They helped her anyway, stubbornness embedded in their little eyes that rendered her speechless.
Did she look that weak in their eyes?
She couldn't help sighing. Her stubborn pride caved into acceptance. No matter how hard she tried she was still just a weakling in their eyes... They've been at this for days now. I'm the past she had tried shoving them away but she wasn't their match. They would always come back.
"It would seem I owe you an apology." Mo Jian said when she bowed to greet them.
A question sign hung over her head.
"I should have apologized when I realized it earlier, but it seems like you're not who I thought you were."
She just blinked at him. He was only apologizing now? Whatever. Still she feigned politeness by smiling and resisting the urge to roll her eyes. In the end, she never knew who he thought her to be. Technically she may not have been lying.
"Is there something you needed from me?"
Half a week ago he said that he would wait until she got proper rest before resuming her training. Mo Jian looked to the woman who had been carefully watching her, she turned her head to puff out a string of smoke.
"This is the one?"
"Yes. She was injured in her sleep half a week ago."
"Ho?" The woman puffed a cloud of smoke in Qing Anna's face.
She extended a nicely manicured hand, her red nails reached for Qing Anna's arm.
"Well? Can you fix it?"
"Huh?"
Is that why he brought this stranger here?
"First, I want to hear about this dream of yours."
"That's classified."
The woman dropped her arm.
"Then forget it."
"Fine."
Qing Anna turned away with a completely unfazed expression, this intrigued the woman who quickly blocked off her path.
"Wait a minute. Why don't you wish to fix your arm?"
"Sister Anna..." The children's eyes were filled with worry as they watched her.
Over these past couple of months she felt animosity towards them. She felt they were against her. But the reason for the gazes they held for her now... What was it really? Qing Anna sighed. She didn't know what to think anymore.
In the past, they would keep their distance when she avoided them but now they kept following her around and had even pitched their own tents next to hers.
Those glistening little black eyes. She had never particularly cared for children in the past but... for some reason she felt bad, like she couldn't continue to be upset.
"The women in my family who are born with sisters, are spiritually bound. Half a week ago, I learned that not only was she alive but she had been injured." It was a half-lie but it didn't matter.
"Eh?" This was news to Mo Jian and the other onlookers.
The woman's eyes lit up like Christmas.
"Are you a child of Song?"
"Huh?"
"The first line of witches in this world were the sisters of Song. They were powerful witches, but they had an incredible weakness, they were all spiritually bound to each other. When one died. They would all receive a deathly blow and die shortly after. It was believed they completely died out when they vanished from the world one day..."
"...I don't really know much. My Grandmother mentioned something like that to me died a long time ago." If what this woman said was true then didn't the children of Song flee to another world? The truth of their lives being tied together might not be the case... unless they sought out a world that was less dangerous... then... hold on a sec, she needed to think. She had just accepted her reality but no matter how you look at isn't the idea of traveling to another world simply impossible? Not that her current situation made it any less difficult to acknowledge this. Just thinking about it... she felt she might go insane.
Watching her think, the stranger smiled.
"Such a waste of talent, a Song child raised in ignorance..." She was circling her. She was getting Mo Jian flashbacks. Were these two vultures in a past life?
"Didn't you say your last name was Qing?" Mo Jian raised a brow.
Qing Anna pretended not to hear him.
"Would you like to become my disciple?"
"Madam, I think it'd be a waste considering I will die if my sister dies."
"True, very true! But-
"Madam Ting, can you heal her?"
"Going to heal her?"
"Why no heal?"
"Please heeeeeaaaaal!"
The children finally interrupted the conversation, they had grown impatient.