Pei Yi saw that it was a face mask in the features of a white cat which covered her upper face. It was kind of cute. The part beside her cheeks curled up a little, akin to the scrunch on a cat's hair. On each of them dangled a bell from a string, and they actually jingled when she moved her head.
"To keep you from being lost," smirked Jun Sheng.
Pei Yi pouted indignantly and jingled her way in the direction that Jun Sheng had left a few minutes ago to the mask store then before she knew it, she got lost. A hand caught hers in the crowd and she whipped around only to see Jun Sheng smiling. Pei Yi stood there and calmed her panicking heart. This place is really busy. The two of them stood like rocks in a fierce current, holding each other's hand.
After a moment or so, Jun Sheng tilted her head."So, how long are we going to stand like this for?"
Pei Yi lifted her chin and said in a pretended pompous way, ''take me to that mask shop."
Jun Sheng obeyed.
Pei Yi gazed at all of the masks on display: tiger, phoenix, wolf, cat, fox… She scanned around the stall and tentatively spoke up to the person standing behind the stall.
"Is there something for her?"
"Pardon?"
Pei Yi took a breath in and spoke louder, "Is there something for her?"
"Oh, ok." She took a step back and took in Jun Sheng's features.
"Here." She unhooked one from the plank at the side. Seeing what animal it represented, Pei Yi's eyes lit up in a malicious way.
The mask was ash black, with vivid feathers carved out. It's also a half-mask that only covers the top part of your face. It's actually quite pretty, because it wasn't completely black, but with streaks of glowing red and green. More importantly, it's the mask of a raven.
"See, it suits you." Pei Yi dropped the lady a look of approval.
Jun Sheng laughed and said, "let's go to the pond now."
"Do you want to take a look of yourself now?"
"It's fine." She saw the pattern of it already, allowing such little tricks doesn't even count as tolerance. It's quite cute.
Even though Jun Sheng and Pei Yi are around the same age of 15, somehow Jun Sheng always treated Pei Yi as if she's a whole lot younger. Maybe it's because she's so protected from the world and Jun Sheng wants to keep protecting that innocence.
She listens to Pei Yi's comments about everything surrounding them as they walk towards their destination. Her concentration slowly drifted to her voice instead of what she was actually saying.
That is, until Pei Yi nudged her and said, "oooh, what's that?"
The pond was lit up by copious, scintillating light. From where they were standing, they could see clusters of lights on the bankside as well. Jun Sheng walked over and bought a couple of the larger ones. Two lotus river lanterns, one blue, one red.
She held them in her hands and tugged Pei Yi, "let's find ourselves a raft boat."
Even though she said 'find', she actually stepped onto one just as quickly.
"I wanna have a go at rowing these things." Pei Yi had taken a look at the pedals and turned around to Jun Sheng.
Jun Sheng slotted a single rune stone into the small raft boat's fuel box.
"Sure, go for it."
As soon as she said that, the boat started spinning, as she had predicted it to. She turned around to see Pei Yi in the driving box, turning one pedal after the other with an immense amount of time in between.
"Uh, why's it spinning and not moving?"
"Here, I'll take one, then it will be easier for you."
Reluctantly, Pei Yi agreed.
So they started rowing and, then due to Jun Sheng's steadiness and Pei Yi's immense effort, the boat finally started to go, even though it still was a little shaky and had a wriggling path. It started going well until Pei Yi soon ran out of strength. She laid the pedal on her lap and stared at it with disdain and sadness.
"I'll take it," Jun Sheng offered.
"No, no I- I can," Pei Yi tried to lift it into the water again.
Jun Sheng smiled, "it can be hard for people doing it for the first time."
"Who said I'm a beginner?"Pei Yi argued.
——————
After Jun Sheng's multiple rounds of coaxing, Pei Yi finally agreed to give Jun Sheng the pedal. Bored, she dangled her fingertips in the water and let it drag along, tracing ripples along with them. Then, she just had an idea.
Jun Sheng felt the force acting against her lighten, as if something was pushing the boat from behind. Naturally she turned around to see little dancing blue waves chasing behind the raft boat but it wasn't the usual kind of blue. The night had already set, the water looked dark wherever you looked while those waves had little dancing spirits in them.
Pei Yi grinned at her.
"How…?"Jun Sheng was dumbfound.
"Somehow I've always been better at water tricks than the rest of my mana's studies," Pei Yi explained.
"Hm. But…" Jun Sheng smiled, "count to three for me."
Clueless, Pei Yi did.
The moment her voice landed on three, the sky lit up. Orange lanterns filled the entire night sky, luminating the waters.
Jun Sheng cupped Pei Yi's icy hand and the little waves extinguished
"Sometimes it's nicer to see the scenery from a different perspective."
All of the flying lanterns slowly went out of sight as Jun Sheng took out the two lanterns. She first pushed the red one into the waters, then held Pei Yi's hand and whispered, "make a wish." Then pushed the lantern onto the water.
In that moment, as the last lantern was gone from sight, an explosion of fireworks started. Pei Yi tilted her head to look at Jun Sheng behind her, and her gaze bumped right into the depth of Jun Sheng's eyes. Fireworks and herself reflected in those eyes that seem to smile all the time.