In the high valley of Yunon, where clouds clung to the cliffside like drifting veils, a monastery overlooked the world. Its white walls were weathered by countless seasons, yet within, all was stillness—so complete that the girl named Eun-Ha often wondered if the place existed outside time itself.
She had been brought to the sanctuary as an infant, left in a basket at the monastery gates. The monks claimed she never cried, not once. They called her a gift of the Sky Father, a child whose presence calmed the mind. In truth, Eun-Ha felt no such divinity. She merely watched and listened, her pale hair catching the dawn light as she moved like a quiet breeze between stone pillars.
At thirteen, she already served as an acolyte healer. Even grown men came to her when sickness laid them low. They knelt, embarrassed to reveal their weakness to a slip of a girl, and she would lay her hand on their brow, whispering the old invocations in a voice soft as snowfall. The monks said her touch drove away pain itself.
One morning, Master Gyun summoned her to the garden. He sat cross-legged beneath the plum tree, robes pooled around him like rippling water.
"Eun-Ha," he said without opening his eyes, "you must learn to accept what you are."
She bowed her head. "Master, I am nothing. I am only your student."
"That is untrue," he murmured. "Even the Abyss knows of you. Rumors come from the lowlands—of a child whose spirit shines so purely that corruption recoils. If this is your gift, you must not deny it."
Her throat tightened. She did not want to be known, to become some talisman people clung to when darkness rose. She only wished to tend the sick and recite her prayers until her hair turned white.
As if sensing her reluctance, Master Gyun opened his eyes, the corners crinkled with a sadness she could not name. "One day, the Abyss will come here, as it has come everywhere. When that day arrives, you must choose whether to remain hidden or to stand before it. Understand that I will not stop you either way."
Eun-Ha lowered herself onto the cushion opposite him. She laid her slender hands in her lap, studying how the morning light gleamed against her skin—so ordinary, and yet, if the monks were right, something in her was not.
"I will try," she whispered at last. "But…I am afraid."
"That, too," he said gently, "is a form of grace."
Shall we continue to Chapter 7: Mia—The Child of Creation?