Submission (#247) Approved

Im out of ideas and energy to draw anything for this prompt orz;; Here’s a general idea:

Nyxx to work at a remote shrine in a mountainous area that had taken him in when he was a child. He served as a lightbearer and guide there for people lost in the mountains and woods. As a shinshoku (male shrine worker/priest) he would offer passerbys to stay at the shrine for temporary refuge. He also helped set up tools and supplies for rituals but didnt have the rank to actively participate in any.

Most of the more important rituals were in buildings hidden from ‘unholy’ / ‘tainted’ workers who didnt come from prosperous backgrounds or important family lineage. Because of its remote location, Nyxx’s shrine was a place of pilgramage in ancient times, but now has had fewer and fewer visitors due to its inconvenient location and due to rumors that the surrounding woods were dangerous.

Although beasts and hungry wild animals never encroached on the shrine grounds, people back then complained that ghosts and other restless spirits could be seen in some of the shrine buildings. They claimed strange and disfigured silhouettes could be seen in the main building windows at night.

(In fact, people who tend to stay there now had this strange tendency to go missing...)

Nyxx, not one to pry due to his humble origins, never questioned these rumors. Until he was forced to face the truth behind them. He burned down the shrine himself after discovering terrible blood rituals were secretly performed every few months by leadership, some of which sacrificed the people Nyxx himself had invited to the shrine as safe haven. (Something something beheadings and dismemberment and burying bodies in surrounding forest areas to keep animals at bay and crops growing year round.) The blood of these sacrifices had painted their torii gate deep red. Nyxx didnt find everything out until he was chosen as a sacrifice in the next ritual. He was not able to escape but knocked over several lanterns in the area and took down everyone involved with him.

But he has plenty of happy memories from back then too! Except that now as a Kyr, he can’t recall them. Maybe his most notable ones would be leading people lost in the woods home by firelight, lighting candles on shrine altars to keep the grounds from getting too dark at night, and climbing trees in the woods nearby to moongaze.