( He is better than the slip of his gritting teeth, friction ennobling his voice with the grind of irritation. )
Did you think the task facile?
( That exorcists and cultivators and the wayward sons of petty sects thrived off an absence of talent and a benediction of routine? That any part of their work lacked guile?
No matter. She shivers, body recalling the small rituals of wakefulness — the gasps, the moans, the crawl of angered claws on ground — before its pains. When she bolts up, fierce, the silvered length of Bichen already walks hairs' breadths before her neck, urging her still, so very still. )
no subject
Did you think the task facile?
( That exorcists and cultivators and the wayward sons of petty sects thrived off an absence of talent and a benediction of routine? That any part of their work lacked guile?
No matter. She shivers, body recalling the small rituals of wakefulness — the gasps, the moans, the crawl of angered claws on ground — before its pains. When she bolts up, fierce, the silvered length of Bichen already walks hairs' breadths before her neck, urging her still, so very still. )
This is why. Better not to murder first.