Mashia

Always, Mashia begins their training with a thoughtful stroke of their goatee, projecting an aura of seasoned wisdom far beyond their trainee status. They hail from a long line of shadow-steppers, expected to move silently through the high-altitude chill of The Great Panda City. Yet, Mashia’s true gift is for noise. Their masterpiece, a tribute to the minstrel Shijin, was so spectacularly clumsy it’s now sung as a cautionary tale among the city's poets. Their instructors despair, noting that Mashia spends more time contemplating rhymes for 'bamboo' than observing patrol routes. They still practice stealth along the city streets, but their feet are never as quiet as the verses they scribble on cherry blossom petals when no one is watching.