Shikina

Shikina is an optimist, even in the pouring rain. Their traveling partner, a cartographer who trusts only ink and parchment, believes optimism is just a failure of imagination. The two were charting the forest's wilder, greener edges—far from the amber-leaved clearings where locals sing about dinner—when the river swelled and washed the path away. Lost and soaked, with their partner muttering about being eaten by unseen things, Shikina recalled the tales of Sutaraito’s guiding light. They focused, and a soft glimmer radiated from their back, a small, personal star. It led them to a hollow log full of edible mushrooms. Their partner still grumbles about the wet, but they are now the one who always checks that Shikina’s raincoat has no tears.