The strand of hair hovered.
Not falling.
Not binding.
Just listening.
Shi Mu and Fu Yunshen stood in silence.They didn't move.They didn't prompt.
Sometimes, the greatest kindness is not rushing what took years to begin.
Then, from the shadows, a shape emerged.
At first, it was barely there—a shimmer, like heat off pavement. Then it formed—
Small. Curled.
Knees drawn to chest.
Arms wrapped tight.
A child.
No older than thirteen.
Shi Mu inhaled softly.The child didn't react.
Fu Yunshen stepped forward slowly, crouching until he was eye-level with the figure.
"Is it okay if we sit?" he asked.
The child didn't answer.But didn't disappear either.
They took that as permission.
They both sat.
Cross-legged.
Close, but not too close.
The figure trembled slightly.And then—spoke.
Not in full words.
Just fragments.
"They told me I was nothing…""…took my name away…""…made me forget where I ended and they began."
Shi Mu didn't interrupt.Didn't offer comfort too quickly.
The thread that trembles must unravel on its own.
Fu Yunshen's voice was low. Gentle.
"Did someone silence you?"
A nod.
Barely there.
"They said my voice was too loud. That I made others uncomfortable."
"And so you stopped speaking?" Shi Mu asked softly.
"No. They… took it."
The child reached up.
Their mouth was sealed—not with stitches.Not with symbols.
With absence.
A blank space where identity should have lived.
[System Notification]
Suppressed Spirit Identified – Classification: Silenced Vessel
Age of Death: 13
Name: Withheld by External Authority
Oathbearer Status: Required to Speak in Place
Brotherhood Value +210 (Silenced Spirit Contact + Core Memory Revealed)
Current Total: 9,045 / 1,000,000
Shi Mu reached into her coat and pulled out her notebook.
She flipped to a blank page and wrote three words:
"You are heard."
Then she turned it toward the child.
Their shoulders shook once.
And the thread of hair—
wrapped softly around the message.
The child looked at her for the first time.
Eyes wide.
Glass-like.
But beneath the terror—
Recognition.
As if, somehow, deep inside…
they knew Shi Mu had once been silenced too.
She smiled gently.
"We won't let them take you again."