Tag: 30 characters #30characters

#23 E’so

Though having the body of a ghost, Akio Sogomo is the spirit of death by birth. She owns a small portion of Otherworld devoted to the dead, and she rarely leaves her designated area except to escort those who die in childbirth to her realm. She has a king-subject relationship with Huang Mu. Quiet and often with a bedside manner, she is strangely said to be cold to child spirits. In northern Nippon, Ao Lai, it is tradition to gift a family whose lost a woman to childbirth with a small image of Sogomo.

#21 E’bi

E’bi holding a cherry blossom petal

Yamamoto Bikomi loved trees, and most of all, she loved the cherry tree. Her and her family went to see the first blossoming of the cherry trees every spring. There’s a saying in southern Nippon, Ao Lai: “Girls who collect cherry blossoms are more beautiful.” The cherry blossom is a symbol of traditional Nippon, and the thought behind the saying is that girls who subscribe to traditional Nippon values are more beautiful than those that don’t. Most girls understand that, but Bikomi, who always lacking a sense of subtlety, took the saying literally. She was last seen wandering off into a midst of the spring’s radiant cherry trees. No one is really sure how she died; perhaps she got lost. Some have said that they’ve seen her ghost still wandering amongst the trees, sadly holding a delicate cherry blossom petal.

#20 E’ke

E’ke holding a cup and bottle of rice wine

Waru Kegoku was said to be an amiable enough man while sober, but as a drunk, they said he was a silly and sloppy person. He owned an inn that served a fragrant brand of rice wine called I’sake’i, simply “sweet, sweet wine” when translated from Harayin, that is still popular and sold in southern Nippon today. Kegoku would often drink with the customers deep into the night and was said to have gotten in trouble for many different reason relating to this habit. His last time ended in a drunken brawl that somehow killed both involved. Waru Kegoku’s ghost is said to still be in his old inn, drinking, enjoying himself, and savoring the taste of his wine as he did in life.

#19 E’na

E’na holding a long cloth

During the last years of her short lifetime, Xiu Janyang resident Chun-Yu Naminbak was a writer of short poems. But far from being a full-time poet, Naminbak also wrote secret reports on the often unethical doings of the emperor’s men (his soldiers). She was a great believer in justice and fair treatment of the Ou’s subjects.  She began writing when she was around 17 and disguised some of her less inflammatory works as poems condemning her own ideas. She passed out her other works to villagers in Papuromura, and according to history, her writings reached at least a town or two away from hers. Strangely, she married a court official, but all evidence suggests she did that for cover and to be closer to the subject she wrote about. More than once, she was accused of peddling anti-government material, but she hid scraps of her work in a long pink cloth which she claimed held her underclothes, which was partially true because it wasn’t uncommon for her to write snippets of her work on her underclothes.  Her oblivious husband was a proud man and refused to allow his subordinates to search through his wife’s underclothes. As Ao Lai is not a nation of free speech, almost as soon as she was discovered passing her works out in another town, she was jailed and soon put to death. She was said to handle her incarceration bravely, never relinquishing her beliefs, and die with her dignity intact. Naminbak was said to be a very prolific writer; her works are said to not be entirely accounted for, and they’ve found over 200 individual works. She’s said to be haunting the Papuromura main police office, decrying the practices still common today.

#17 E’zu

E’zu grasping a red swan emblem

Lumeng Zumei did not have a happy life. Frail and ill as a child, she rarely left her home, and when she did, she faced discrimination. With their men strong, wealthy, and just, and their women beautiful, fertile, and wise, the Lumeng were known for being a fast-growing family of great status. Zumei was a disgrace in the eyes of the Ao Liese community even though the family itself did not treat her as an untouchable. Zumei herself hated bringing shame to her family name. Gloomy and self-loathing, she was known for having a love-hate “relationship” with the red swan emblem of the Lumeng. The symbol stood for strength and grace, two things Zumei never had. When she was 17, the heads of the family arranged a marriage for her, but she was only just barely strong enough to move into her new husband’s home when she was 19. Despite her chronic depression, Zumei and her new husband grew to love each other quickly, and it would seem that she would have some happiness in life after all. The blow would come when the couple realized that she was more than just too weak to have a child, she was barren. The sadness was too much for Zumei, and she commited suicide. She’s now said to visit orphanages and watch the children, trying to pick out one that looks enough like her and her husband so she may claim a child and prove she was not a waste of a woman.

#16 E’oo

E’oo holding the Eye of Ao Lai

In life, Chion Oowing was a treasure hunter, and a clever one. He was not always in it for the money: he loved to record the historical artifacts and study their aethetic beauty. A famous collection of treasures in Ao Lai consists of the many artifacts buried by Ao Lai and her allies, and the one that held his interest was what native Ao Liese call the Eye of Ao Lai for its vivid violet hue. As with many treasures, he was not the only one after it. Others tried to capture this treasure and sell it; during Oowing’s time, the jewel had only been buried for a few decades, and it hadn’t yet gained the status of national treasure. Oowing wanted to find it first to ensure its protection. He did manage to outwit the others many a time. The race for the Eye of Ao Lai was long and brutal, and in the end, Chion Oowing was killed by the opposing hunters. However, thanks to his ingenuity, he had safely hidden the Eye where still no one has found it. They say he can be seen wandering the sites where he tricked his opponents about the location of the Eye of Ao Lai. Every place he’s been seen, there has been extensive mining in order to find the Eye. No one has found it so far.

#14 E’ji

E’ji smoking from a bottle

As a man from the Xiu Janyang Province, the late Soo Jiyung was a reserved, opinionated but well-meaning scholar of Ao Lai history. People rarely saw him, but when they did, they described him as slightly cold even though he was intelligent and wise. He even had a wife who said Jiyung may have barely loved her more than his work. Shortly before his demise, Jiyung was said to have stated that he was at a historical breakthrough in his research. In one of the most mysterious and shady murder cases in Ao Lai history, Soo Jiyung’s charred remains were found in a ceramic bottle not a week after that. To this day, no one has found the murderer(s), a provable motive, or even the scene of the crime, though speculation dictates that he was about to uncover something in Ao Lai history someone didn’t brought to public knowledge. Even so, many agree that he haunts the Nation’s Library of Ao Lai, floating amongst the aisles of books, saying, “It’s a lie. It’s a lie.”