#because its

In Ka Bue, there is an old belief that outdates the origin of even hundreds of Expressions: The Red String of Fate.

Despite the meaning of the word “red” being lost to time, tradition says that the visceral-shaded string binds two souls together, and that you are destined to meet the one tethered at the other end. For those that have undergone trials or honed their Craft in order to see their invisible string, they will spend their entire lives following them, seeking out companionship or romance from their promised soulmate.

Sachiko has always harbored a deep resentment for her own string, feeling the idea of a soulmate is too suffocating. But despite seeking out various illegal underground surgeries and relentlessly studying Body Craft to change her own body into something more suitable, there was one change she could never manage to make to herself: Performing the highly forbidden and shameful act of cutting her own string. She had certainly tried, but as a born paper type, there’s some things out of even her capabilities. And so she soon forgot about the tugging at her soul altogether… Perhaps she’d secretly hoped that after all her change, the string would unwind from her all on its own.

What she hadn’t expected was to actually find her soulmate after so many years… right under her nose, traveling with her in an entirely new land…

And especially not to see that they’d cut the string before she could.

It should be fine. It was exactly what she had wanted all along. To free herself of destiny and foolish superstition… so why did she feel so hollow? So indignant? So angry?

… Who gave this brat the right to free himself from her? As if she was a burden?