Kusurou

Kusurou remembered the first time they applied the paint: the bitter taste of the pigment, the solemn vow they whispered to their own reflection. These days, the ritual was mostly habit, performed while listening to the distant roar of the falls. They had arrived in Waterfall City expecting conflict, a blade for hire in a city teeming with deals and danger. But the only ambushes were the sudden, chilly sprays from the main cascade and the boisterous greetings from the frog merchants by the docks. The war paint, once a promise of violence, now just made the local children giggle. The bowler hat was a gift from a grateful fisher whose boat they'd helped unmoor. Their wide-eyed, shocked expression wasn't from past trauma; it was from the constant, baffling peace of it all.