Xiao Zheng stood before the green bamboo, the evenly spaced segments stretched upward, seemingly endless, yet all things that exist ultimately have an end, and so it finally stopped at its gently curved tip.
"An inch longer, an inch stronger."
He murmured, his fingers trailing over the fuzzy yellow bamboo shoots, gliding slowly over the straight bamboo stalk, somewhat absent-minded. A sleepless night, strange fragments flickering before his eyes, leaving him puzzled.
These were memories from the past, he knew.
But what they were... he did not know.
He was somewhat weary, clearly longing for an ordinary life, yet constantly being drawn into one vortex after another by extraordinary things, difficult to extricate himself from.
He had thought about leaving, he muttered inwardly, had thought about leaving, but some things held him back, always needing to be resolved before he could walk away.
