Night arrived upon the Lunar Realm, before I was aware of it.

Night Time here did not mean that it got dark. For although it did get darker, the world was still composed of the White Above, and the White Below.

The difference was in the snow in between, who thinned in the number they mustered, in their downwards march.

I had waited for Lord Houyi to arrive, positioning myself in a place I thought most likely for him to appear, based on where he had first arrived in his earlier visits.

But the wait was long, and my body felt new and uncomfortable, and my consciousness slowly nodded, as I sat there upon the snow.

When the moment came that Lord Houyi was before me, I could hardly tell if it was dream or reality.

‘Yutu…!’ he whispered softly, lulling me to wakefulness.

I blinked and rubbed my eyes, uncertain of what I was seeing. ‘...Lord Houyi?’ I said, drowsily. ‘Lord Houyi!’

‘It’s me!’ he smiled softly.

In a moment of startled instinct, I rose in my foreign body to make my obeisance.

But my clumsy feet tripped--

And I fell into his arms as he caught me.

Instead of tipping my ears to the ground, the top of my forehead brushed against the front of his robe.

My face felt hot.

‘Easy now!’ he laughed with a note of surprise, as he lifted me away from his surprisingly broad chest. ‘I can see that you’ve been hard at work.’

The words clogged in my throat, as my thumping heart jumped, and jammed the way of my breathing itself.

I could only nod furiously.

Lord Houyi smiled as he let me go.

‘This is a gift’, he said as he took a small wooden box out from his wide long sleeves. It was similar to the dimensional vessels that held the rice cakes that we made here.

‘...A gift?’ I repeated dumbly.

He nodded. ‘From the River God to the Lunar Realm.’

My heart dropped for a second, when I realized that it was not for me. Nor was it from Lord Houyi.

But my hands felt electric to receive the box from him anyway.

‘I’ll—take good care of it!’ I cried energetically, black hair becoming ruffled as I violently nodded my head in resolve.

Lord Houyi laughed, and extended his closed fan toward my messy head, removing a large bundle of hair that had covered my face.

‘I’m sure you will.’

He went past me as my emotions jumbled, and when I turned to follow after him—

He was gone.

I looked at the distant banyan grove with a conditioned reflex, and sure enough, I could see the Whiteness of my sister upon the top of its canopy.

I raced toward her.

My feet were longer now, but they were foreign and clumsy, and I could not run with them as quickly as I had done before.

But I did it anyway, running as fast as I could.

Stumbling.

Fueled by a feverish fervour in my chest that I did not understand.

Not knowing what I would find…

…When I reach the finishing line.

…I looked up from the base of the banyan tree.

My heart…

...felt like stopping.

Lord Houyi…

And Sister.

They were hugging each other.

Tightly.

So very tightly.

I could hear their whispering voices.

‘...I thought—that you wouldn’t come!’

‘...I’m sorry.’

‘You didn’t even contact me!’

‘I had no time.’

‘When the Magpie Bridge was starting to disperse—I thought you would never come!’

‘...I am sorry.’

'...'

‘...I am here now.’

‘...You are!’

Slowly, the two of them parted.

‘But I cannot be here forever…’

‘...’

‘So let me give you something that can, in my place.’

Sister ringed crystally.

‘What will you give me this time? Banyan seeds—mortars—or maybe flowers?’

Lord Houyi chuckled.

‘Why give flowers to flowers?’

‘Then what?’

He took out something small, and dark.

‘A wooden pin?’

‘An ebony pin, to be exact.’

He put his hand upon her long black hair.

‘I know that having long hair can be inconvenient at times.’

Sister snickered, as she allowed him to come behind her and bundle up her hair.

‘But why black? It would hardly stand out.’

‘It doesn’t need to!’

He placed the black pin into place, sinking inconspicuously into the streams of her hair.

‘...You are perfect as you are.’

I had always wanted for Sister to find her happiness with Lord Houyi...

But why did my heart wrench from within me to see them together?

I wanted... for him to look at me the way he looked at her.

...For him to hold me like he held her.

I found my gaze slowly lowering, until I realized that I was still clutching the box I had received from Lord Houyi.

Clenching it so tightly that my fingers had shivered.

I knew that it was not a gift to me.

But at that moment…

I didn’t care.

Lord Houyi had handed it over to me.

And I wanted to know what was inside.

I knelt….

And opened the box.

What was inside it…

Was bright.

White.

…It was then that I realized everything.

A shining white pearl.

A personal note from the sender read:

‘The brightest pearl from my domain can only dream to match that radiance of your own person.’

Tears rolled along the sides of my cheek.

Reflecting the light of the pearl.

As the pearl reflected my own face.

I realized…

…that I had been crying.

I looked…

…like my sister.

My dearest, perfect sister.

But I’m not.

Sister wouldn’t be making these sorts of expressions.

Sister wouldn’t be crying pathetically like this.

…She was the one that Lord Houyi wanted.

The one that everybody wanted.

…Not me.

Never me.

Whenever they were praising me…

What they meant was the shadow of my sister...

…I was just an extra.

Icing on the cake.

An imperfect snowflake.

A white rabbit…

…In this vast land of snow.

A tiny pearl within an ocean...

…A black pin!

Suddenly-

I dashed away.

I wanted to get away from everything.

To get away from here!

Bamboo and herbs and the whiteness of snow flitted behind me as I ran.

I ran and ran.

Not knowing where I was going.

This had been everything I had known.

Where was I supposed to go?

That was when…

A black portal appeared before me.

‘No!’ ‘Yu’er!’

I could hear their voices calling after me.

They were concerned about me.

Telling me to turn back.

To stay.

‘You mustn’t enter the portal!’

They cared about me.

But that only made me want to leave even more.

In less time than it took me to think a thought…

I was inside the portal.

‘Yu'er!’

The portal swallowed me up, and I was moving at speeds that I had never even imagined possible.

My course fluctuated wildly within the dark corridor as I did not know to control it.

But I didn’t care.

I just wanted to leave.

Time seemed to stretch, as I hurtled across the darkness.

But ultimately, I was spat out.

Into an expanse of clear blue.

There was also green, and yellow, and red.

A great patch of the foreign colours approached me at a ferocious speed.

The ground zoomed in rapidly before me.

The collision when I landed was violent.

Clouds of smoke bloomed into the air.

And I simply lay there, unmoving.

But I was alive.

Somehow, I had been able to cover myself in magic.

And now I was drained.

As my mind wrestled with the throb and ache of my exhausted body, it finally started to register my situation.

My entire body ached from a pressure I did not know.

My senses filled with sounds and scents I did not recognize.

I was... somewhere else.

My feet started feeling kind of wet…or dry…or wet...I wasn’t sure...

I stared at the Blue Above before me, until my vision blurred…

…in a distant corner of my hearing—or my mind, I wasn’t sure—I could hear the name of my sister.

…I guess I couldn’t let go of everything so easily…

…as I stared into the emptiness above me...

…the silhouette of a man appeared.

‘Who are you?’ he asked.

And that was…

…a very good…

…question…

…

…

…