Welcome to my fic! I did some research to help integrate the culture of each of the saints into the story, you'll see numbers next to some words - check the bottom of the paragraph he word was in to see the reference. Unfortunately won't allow me to insert the hyperlinks that point to the reference site I used for each reference... so please just take my word for it A
I will be posting other fics in my Anthology here, but they are all separate stories- feel free to jump to the story of whatever saint(s) you like best!
Constructive feedback is always welcome, and I hope you enjoy this fic!
SPECIAL THANKS TO OVERACTIVE IMAGINATION FOR HELPING ME WITH THIS SERIES!
The early morning was a clear gray in the town within the Chamdo(1) prefecture, with a thick fog winding around the ancient columns and brightly colored temples. The humble citizens passed through the streets between white rectangular buildings, gazing up to the grand mountains surrounding their home and quietly chanting their prayers to carry them through the day. Monks in bright red and orange robes walked in the crowd to their prayer sites, contemplating their dogmas in silence or in soft debate with each other. Children rushed past on the streets, chasing each other while their giggles filled and faded into the air.
(1 - Prefecture of Eastern Tibet)
In a small cement home within the city, one family was already wide awake. A man and a woman were seated at a table, tense as they looked to their guest across from them.
Seated there was a man with long blond hair and brown eyes, with two gray dots on his forehead in the place of eyebrows. He was garbed in gray and brown robes, atypical to the formal attire he had become used to wearing for his high position in Greece. He made the choice for plainer clothing today, since he didn't want to intimidate the parents of his potential new aide. Deep down, whether or not he wanted to admit it, he had also missed donning humbler garments. A pleasant look of peace was on the man as he engaged in introductory small talk with the couple.
The room they were in was surrounded in works of metal: bowls, jugs, weapons, prayer wheels and instruments. Made of copper or brass, the pieces looked like they had been made by the hands of a master craftsman.
The sound of a small hammer striking metal resonated through the house, which seemed to be coming from another room.
" Shion, it is a pleasure to have you here with us," the woman said to the man across from her, who nodded in acknowledgement.
"The pleasure is all mine, I assure you," Shion replied. "So you say he's always been like this?"
The man and woman, both with black hair, brown skin and eyes glanced at each other uneasily. "Y-yes. He works in my small forge all day and night," the man said, "He only stops to sleep and eat." he trailed off with a worrisome look on his face.
The woman continued in her husband's place, "We just don't know what to do to help him thrive- his place isn't here. We can sense it."
Shion smiled at them both. "He sounds dedicated to his passion and quite special. I think I may have a good place for him with me."
The parents smiled, relieved to hear that someone could care for their boy in a way that they could not. Shion rose from the table and gave a respectful bow, grateful that the parents allowed him the opportunity to train their child. The parents led him through the house to the origin of the racket. Shion held his breath as he entered the room. Finally, after all these decades, he could feel the psychic presence of a suitable heir to his cloth and craft.
A small, pale boy of about seven was forging a copper bowl at an anvil, striking it with key precision. His long lilac hair was pulled back by a loose ponytail.
"Mu…Mu!" the man called twice since the child was so focused on his work. Mu stopped hammering and looked up. His face seemed at peace, but there was no smile. The father beckoned him over and the boy complied, his plain colored robes just touching the ground. Shion kneeled down to the youth's level.
"Hello there, Mu," the stranger said gently, his eyes trying to meet the little blacksmith's.
"You're here to take me somewhere," the boy calmly said, keeping his green eyes on Shion's chin.
The man nodded. He opened his mouth to introduce himself, but before he could the child spoke again with the same level of composure.
"Then let's go. They'll be happy again once I leave."
-
The sweltering heat of the Rio de Janeiro evening made the city dwellers take to the streets, fanning themselves or eagerly buying drinks from small wheeled kiosks. Women went in and out of shops, trading stories and gossip, while men in cafes were downing coffee or beer- shouting and debating loudly over the sports that played on small screens. Vibrant music played from radios that were sitting on windowsills of the homes above the shops, with their residents taking in the night sky above.
A boy of seven poked his head out from his shelter of large boxes in an alleyway, ready to begin his evening routine. This tanned boy was rather unique for his age, already towering above most of his kin at four and a half feet. His long black hair was held in a ponytail by a piece of twine; he was unable to recall when or if it had ever been cut. He typically wore a cheerful expression on his countenance, despite his current living situation on the streets. He walked to a busier part of the district, where people were out on evening strolls, playing instruments, or socializing over dinner. Even better, he saw the occasional tacky-dressed tourist. It looked like the perfect place to advertise. He pulled an empty styrofoam cup from a nearby garbage pile and placed it in front of him.
"BEHOLD ALDEBARAN, THE WORLD'S STRONGEST BOY!" he shouted as he pointed to himself, beckoning people to come over and see. He would pick up whatever the spectators asked of him over his head with ease: benches, souvenir-stuffed luggage, stone tiles from the sidewalks and even the audience members themselves. His crowd would gasp in awe as they beheld his natural-born superhuman strength, throwing coins or bills into the cup.
His night was so busy, he hadn't noticed a large man analyzing him from across the way, draped in a long brown poncho.
As the crowds died down, Aldebaran walked away with his filled cup. He eagerly counted the money he had collected. He bounced on his heels as he awaited to buy guavas or papayas- really anything, as he hadn't been able to pay for food in days. While many others like him opted for stealing their meals, the strong youth tried his best to do so only when desperate. When he turned the corner to where his makeshift shelter was, a policeman was there to meet him.
"You again! You're not getting away this time!" the policeman said, approaching him with a club in his hand.
Aldebaran turned to run, but instead ran smack into a metallic chest plate. The boy fell back on his rear, holding his nose and yelling a muffled curse into his hand. The same man who had been watching him was there, donned in metallic armor. The armored stranger had short brown hair and bright green eyes, with a strong square chin. He picked the urchin up as if he were light as a feather. Aldebaran dropped the cup filled with his hard earned cash as he struggled to break free from the man's grip. Never had he seen someone with this much strength before.
"He's mine officer, I'll make certain he's not ripping off the tourists again," the metallic man said.
The cop scowled, "Well keep a better eye on him! God knows we have enough of them to lock up every night!" The patrolman turned and left.
"LET ME GO!" Aldebaran wriggled, trying to punch the man's metallic armguard with his fist. His punch only made the metal hum, and he withdrew his hand in shock and pain. He had never hit metal he couldn't bend before. He swore again at the throbbing of his knuckles.
The armored man laughed at the child's tenacity as he put him down. "I want to help you, Aldebaran. I'm Gustavo. I've been observing you, and you seem to be rather strong. How would you like to be stronger?"
Aldebaran squinted at the man suspiciously through his dark eyes, scratching his hair. After some thought, he smiled at Gustavo, figuring the he was probably friendly- he did save him from another night in jail, after all, and something in his demeanor told the child that he didn't have malintent.
"If it means no more cops, I'm in!" he said with a grin.
[2 YEARS LATER]
At high noon in the Sanctuary, the trainees and saints gathered to eat and rest their weary bones from training. They ate their meals with their groups, separating by their members' rank, nationality or the cloth they were pursuing. Passing through the ancient columns and the collections of people, Aldebaran wasn't quite sure which-if any-assembly he belonged to.
He had done well in his initial training in Brazil, having learned the basics of channeling his cosmos and for what purpose his fellows in arms fought for. His level of growth was so impressive, his master-the silver saint who spotted him two years back- sent him to the hallowed grounds of Athens to train further. The now five-foot-tall nine-year-old moved forward awkwardly as he tried to navigate this new social structure- back in Rio, it didn't matter if he fit in with the droves of strangers who passed by, and there were no fellow pupils under his master's training. He still held his hair in a ponytail, although it was now shorter since Gustavo would make sure it was regularly cut.
"There's the Pope's boy over by the back," one trainee said to his peer, within earshot of Aldebaran. He turned to see two boys his age pointing to a spot in the distance, away from the crowd. "He never talks to anyone. I hear he doesn't even look people in the eye! Who does the think he is?!"
"He's probably thinks he's better than everyone, just working with his stupid tools. He doesn't even have to train like us!" the other trainee replied, the two scoffing as they continued their lunch.
Aldebaran, curious, scanned the direction they gestured towards to see if he could spot who it was they were talking about. After a moment of scanning the area, he laid his eyes on their conversation subject.
Mu was sitting alone, several yards away from everyone else. He was clothed in simple brown robes; they were nothing that would indicate his apprenticeship to the great leader of all the Saints. His eyebrows had been shaved off and replaced with two red markings, similar in fashion to those of the man who found him two years ago. To his side there appeared to be a golden hammer-like tool, sitting atop a rag.
Seeming lost in thought as he looked at the ground, he took small bites from a loaf of bread. He turned his head as he heard the soft chirping of a bird beside him. Staring at the creature for a few seconds, he picked off a small piece of his bread and threw it in his little visitor's direction. The bird pecked lightly at it, while Mu observed calmly. Once the animal had its fill and flew away, the child turned his head back to its original positon, biting into his bread as he stared down.
Aldebaran smiled as he observed this small gesture from afar. Knowing the value of having any kind of food, he knew that anyone willing to share it couldn't be that bad. He approached the boy.
Mu stopped chewing when he felt the tall boy's presence. He continued to stare at the ground. "You're pretty big for your age," he said to the stranger.
Aldebaran, now five feet tall, sat in front of him. "How can you tell? You haven't even looked at me!"
"Your shadow made it obvious." His gaze remained fixed on the earth. He was very soft-spoken in his responses, barely showing inflection. He bit again into his bread.
"I-I guess you're pretty smart like they say!" the taller boy said, laughing nervously. "C-can I sit with you?" he asked, feeling a little intimidated by the smaller boy's cooler nature.
Mu paused chewing. Someone hadn't asked to sit with him in a while. The boy was probably new, he figured. Let's see if the giant would stick around after this request.
"Sure, but…can you do me a favor?" the pale child asked the tanned one, looking up at him. He laid his eyes on Aldebaran's chin.
The newbie nodded eagerly, happy to have this "Pope's boy" acknowledging him. Although he wondered if there was a bug on his chin or something based on where the other was staring. He figured this was the "quirk" the two gossipers were mentioning earlier.
Mu lifted his arm and pointed down with his hand to the spot beside him to his left. "Can you sit here?"
Aldebaran complied. "Why do you want me here?" he said as he shifted to Mu's left.
"It's easier for me to talk and listen to you when you're sitting there."
"Without having to look at me?"
The other boy cautiously nodded. Most of the other trainees took offense to his explanation and left at that point. He expected the same now and waited for this newcomer to leave.
"Okay, you got it!" Aldebaran smiled, taking a bite into his turkey leg. It was an odd request, sure, but he didn't mind. He had a pretty great view of the Sanctuary from that spot anyway.
Mu turned to his left where his eyes met Aldebaran's arm. He was still here. Surprising. Taking some small comfort in this, the shorter boy turned back to his bread and ate.
For a few minutes they chewed in silence.
"I'm Aldebaran," the South American said to his colleague. "What's your name?"
"Mu," the youth replied, putting down his bread on his lap and reaching for the rag and golden hammer beside him. He eyed the device carefully before deciding where to begin his polishing.
"Moo?" Aldebaran asked, raising his eyebrow. He had never heard of such a strange name.
"Mu."
"That's what I said, Moo!"
"It's a little shorter than the cow sound." Mu explained calmly, polishing the hammer with care as he spoke.
The other laughed. "Vaca(2)! You're a vaca!"
(2- Portugese word for cow)
The quieter child sighed as he shrugged his shoulders. "Sure," he relented with an eye roll. He had never heard the word before, but at least he wasn't getting hurled the usual string of insults he was used to.
"What's that for?" Aldebaran asked, pointing to the device that the other boy was tending to.
"Connecting joint plates on cloths," the newly christened 'Vaca' replied.
"Wow! You work on making cloths?"
"Fixing them. I'm learning."
"And the Pope is teaching you?"
Mu nodded. The device looked cleaner now thanks to his polishing efforts.
"That's pretty neat! I just punch and lift stuff, but fixing cloths sounds way more impressive!" Aldebaran laughed.
A horn blared in the distance, signaling that everyone had to return to their training. The newbie turned to his dining partner. "Well, I'll see you tomorrow?"
Mu turned to his left and stared at the taller boy's shoulder. "If you want to."
"Do you want me to?"
Vaca paused to think for a moment, then replied with a firm "Yes". Company was nice, he decided. He hadn't had that from someone other than his master for a long time.
Aldebaran stood up, pleased at the possibility of a new friend. His shadow covered his lunch buddy, who also rose as he brushed the crumbs off his clothing.
The young brute's stomach rumbled, which caused him to sigh. The turkey wasn't enough to satiate him, not surprising due to his large stature. He was used to it though, from both his training and his time on the streets.
He felt a nudge on his arm, turning to see Vaca pushing the rest of his loaf towards him. His eyes were on the half-eaten loaf.
"You're going to need it more than I am," he reasoned to his acquaintance.
The trainee's eyes gleamed at the offer of more food and took it, wolfing it down in two bites.
"THANKS! TCHAU(3) VACA!" he said with a stuffed mouth, almost ready to burst with happiness as it topped off his stomach. He ran back down to the other trainees, turning back to wave at his friend.
(3-"Bye" in Portugese. Pronounced similarly to the word "ciao" in Italian or the word "Chow" in English)
The other boy raised his hand in response, a small smile forming on his lips. Having someone else around for lunch really was nice.
For the following weeks, Aldebaran and Mu would sit for lunch together, enjoying each other's company. Sometimes they ate in entire silence if Mu wasn't in the mood for talking, or they would engage in small talk about their day. The tall boy would brag about what he had lifted or who he had wrestled with. The shorter would talk about the cloths he had fixed or try his best to explain how repairing them worked to his less academic pal.
One day they were talking about their hometowns.
"Brazil? You must have had really bad jetlag the first day you got here," the blacksmith said to his friend bluntly.
"It was ok I guess, I'm used to lack of sleep from jails back in Rio." Aldebaran replied, chomping into his cornish hen.
"You were in jail?" Mu asked as he ate some rice.
"Yup, whenever the bastard cops found us kids on the street, they'd throw us in for the night. I usually found my own way out of there though."
"How?"
"I bent the bars and made a break for it! They hated it whenever I did that. Kept them off my back for a bit." Aldebaran laughed, remembering his shenanigans back home.
The Pope's apprentice began to grow curious. "What were you doing on the street?"
"I left home. Mom didn't have enough food to feed me and my brothers every night, so I decided to leave." He shrugged with a smug look on his face, "I was pretty big, and so I figured had less of a chance of dying on the first night!"
Mu put down his rice and picked up a book he brought on cloth repair, absorbing what his friend had told him. "You could have starved just as easily as anyone else. Size doesn't come into it."
"H-hey!" the Aldebaran exclaimed. Mu was right of course, as he usually was, so he deflated a little. "Well, whatever. I wasn't that crazy about being home anyway."
"Why?" the other asked as he turned to the page he was last reading.
The athlete's voice took on more of a grave tone as he recalled memories he'd rather forget. "W-well, lots of men would come home each night to see my mom. Whatever they did, it would make her yell a lot. Sometimes, when I saw her the next morning, it looked like she had been hurt too. Whenever I offered to fight back, she would tell me I couldn't-that it was her job to do what the men wanted. My being there couldn't change anything."
"Oh." Mu mumbled, feeling awkward about dragging something out that seemed to be a sore spot for his friend.
"What about you?" Aldebaran asked, hoping to shift the subject off of him.
Vaca's eyes shifted on the ground. "…I had a mom and dad, but they didn't know what to do with me."
"What do you mean?"
"I worked in their forge all the time. They wanted me to play outside more like the other boys, but I didn't want to. I was never interested."
"So you went with the Pope?"
Vaca nodded. "He came one day and said he was going to train me. He said he had been looking for me for a long time."
Aldebaran whistled. "I guess you really were some kind of special kid. Do you miss your parents?"
Mu turned the page in silence before replying. "They're happier without me," he said, his eyes on his book. "That's all that matters."
On another day, they discussed their training before they came to the Sanctuary.
"So what did you do in Tibet, wherever the hell that is?" Aldebaran inquired.
"Trained in the mountains with master. A place called Jamir," Mu replied, polishing a cracked armguard and tapping it lightly with a golden hammer and chisel. "He says that's where my bloodline is from and where cloth blacksmiths used to live. So he took me there to train." He occasionally sprinkled a fine powder on his project- stardust sand it was called, identifying it for Aldebaran when he asked what it was.
"What did you do? Besides, like, learn how to fix cloths?"
"Trained in psychic powers."
"Like when you can make stuff float or read people's minds?" Aldebaran asked. He thought psychic powers were just tricks street performers did with strings or manipulations. He had no idea it was a legitimate skill that could be honed.
Vaca nodded. "He would train me in moving things with my mind- we started small, with pebbles or bowls, but it wasn't long before he'd make me move things like boulders. He'd have me try to read his thoughts, or communicate with him by thinking only. We worked on other things too, until he said I had learned as much as I could for now." he recalled, putting down his tools for a moment to check his work on the armguard. "A lot of the other trainees don't think it's hard though." His voice fell as he stated the opinion others had of his talent.
"Forget what they say! Until they can do it as well as you can, they can't talk crap to you," Aldebaran encouraged his friend, giving him a strong pat on the back.
Mu chuckled through his nose at his friend's colorful language. "I'm glad you think that."
Aldebaran leaned back as he looked up at the sky, remembering his master and their days of training back home. "I remember with my master, we didn't stay in one place."
"No?"
The trainee shook his head.
"Who was he?" Mu asked, wondering just how someone from so far away was able to have been trained and summoned to the Sanctuary.
"Gustavo was his name," his friend explained, "he was the silver saint of Canis Major. He trained me in the mountains at first, where I had to climb up huge cliffs and lift giant boulders with my bare hands," he bragged, looking down at them. "Then he took me to the jungles where I had to break tree trunks, or wrestle with jaguars or gators in the river," he continued, getting more and more nostalgic as he recalled those dangerous regimes. "It would be freezing cold or really hot, and no matter how hard I worked or how well I did, he left it up to me to figure out where to get food. 'Your little show in Rio won't impress the animals or the rocks,' he'd always tell me!" the trainee laughed as he recalled his master's personality, having bragged to Mu before about his street performances in Brazil.
"It was hard, but he said that all of it would help me be able to stand up to anything!" Aldebaran grinned as he flexed his arm muscles to an invisible audience.
The smith nodded as he kept his eyes on his work. "Sounds like you can. In theory at least."
On a cloudier afternoon than usual, Mu had brought another cracked piece of cloth to work on. It was more ornate than the typical parts he brought to lunch. He had several tools with him and a chunk of glittering silvery metal. Aldebaran was surprised to see so many tools around his friend, who looked more focused than usual.
"What's that, Vaca?" he asked, sitting down to eat his usual meal.
"It's a piece of gold cloth." Mu replied, turning it in his small hands.
"G-GOLD?! You've never worked on that before!" Aldebaran exclaimed, having been told of the all-powerful cloths by his master.
"I know," Vaca acknowledged, feeling a little intimidated himself by the cloth. "And I've never worked on one this badly damaged."
"Who does it belong to?"
The young blacksmith shrugged. "The Pope won't tell me."
"Well, do you know how to fix it?"
Mu's ponytail moved side to side on his cloak as he shook his head. "He won't say. He says it's my final challenge. If I figure this out, I'm a master cloth blacksmith."
"That explains all the stuff," Aldebaran thought out loud. He clapped his hands together as an idea formed in his head. "I know! How about I visit your workshop to help?"
Mu looked up to his friend's nose. "You can barely keep up when I explain what gammanium is." He said, pointing holding up the silvery metal.
Aldebaran scratched his head. "Ga-wha?"
"Exactly."
"Oh come on! I have nothing to do anyway at night besides sleep and stare down the other trainees. Am I too stupid to hang out with you besides at lunch or something?!" he asked exasperated as he plopped to lay back and stared up at the sky.
Mu's stomach turned. "N-no," he said with a touch of concern, not wanting his friend to believe he thought less of him. "I just thought you might find it boring." He said softly, hoping Aldabaran wasn't offended.
"Vaca, if I thought it was boring I wouldn't have offered," the larger boy said, sitting back up and looking at his companion with a small frown.
Vaca looked back at Aldebaran again. After a pause to think, he agreed. "Come after dinner. It's over that way," he said, pointing to the direction of the workshop. He was excited to have someone besides the Pope visit him there.
He wondered to himself, as he often did, why his face wasn't expressing it.
The tall boy grinned. "I'll see you then!" he exclaimed, slapping hands to the dirt. His palms buried themselves a few inches into the ground from his strength, as the boy had begun to bulk from all of his training the past few months. He rose to leave just as the horn was blowing.
"By the way Alde," Mu said his friend's nickname, who turned to see what he had to say. "If I thought you were stupid, I wouldn't have told you the right way to go," he said with a tiny smile.
Alde laughed at his friend's sense of humor before continuing back to the training grounds.
The night sky above was clear as Aldebaran made the trek up the slopes of the sanctuary to see Mu. He arrived at a white stone hut in the shape of an octagon, with a reddish glow emanating from the windows.
Aldebaran stepped inside and saw Mu hard at work, banging away with a hammer at a gold armor plate from a large pile of the pieces.
Sensing his presence, the young blacksmith looked up to his friend's nose. "Well, I just think you proved to yourself that you're not stupid; you can follow directions," he said, turning back to his work.
Alde rolled his eyes with a smirk, entering the forge of the cloth blacksmiths.
All across the walls were several sizes and varieties of tools, both familiar and foreign to the newcomer. Pieces of brightly colored cloth were laid out on one side of the room, organized by their state of repair. Tibetan religious pieces, prayer scrolls and wheels were displayed on one particular wall by a window, perhaps there because the cloth blacksmith had been from that region for three generations now.
Melded into one wall was a burning hot oven, with golden tongs beside it. Despite their heavy use, all of the pieces were neatly polished by the Pope's apprentice- he had a fixation on clean tools and organization in his workplace.
In the center of the room Mu worked on the Gold cloth, his eyebrows furrowed in thought as he tried banging it with one hammer and chisel or another, sprinkling stardust sand at various times. However, after a few moments the cracks would return.
While he worked his guest sat beside him, handing him the tools he asked for. His height was beneficial in this manner, he figured.
"What's Tibet like?" Aldebaran asked at one point, staring at the eastern décor.
"Nice…cold." Mu replied, taking a curved piece that looked like a horn to the forge. "The temples are colorful. I used to like going to them. You'd like them too."
"Is everyone as quiet as you?"
Vaca blinked as he thought of an answer. "If you mean compared to you, then yes."
Alde handed him a chunk of gammanium per request. "I wouldn't be able to stand it then."
"Probably," his friend replied as he hammered metal onto the white hot horn. "But you'd probably like the festivals. They happen all through the year. There's one where we go to the monasteries to pray to the Buddha, and they light lots of lanterns and incense. Later we see the ones that the people in town made, in all shapes and sizes. I enjoyed seeing them with my parents." The warm glow of the cloth reminded him briefly of the butter lamps (4) he spoke of.
(4- Butter lamps are often made with Yak Butter or Vegetable oil. Used and displayed during the Tibetan Butter lantern festival)
"Well, it can't be as great as Carnival!" Aldebaran said with pride.
"Carnival?" Mu looked up to his friend with curiosity.
"Yeah! It's a huge party that goes on all over the city!" the Brazilian said, getting excited as he recalled the festival. "There are big parades with huge floats and people in costumes. They play it on TV since not everyone can get in to see it. There are also smaller street parties, and people play lots of loud music and dance all through the day and night!" Alde began to hum a tune that played on the radio during carnival, his hands and feet tapping out the rhythm.
"Sounds noisy." Vaca confessed frankly, cutting him off.
"Why did I have a feeling you'd say that?"
Mu and Aldebaran continued trading stories through the night of their homelands. The forge's visitor would occasionally point to the various foreign décor on the wall, with his friend explaining what each thing's purpose or meaning was. The young blacksmith would ask his friend more about Brazil, startled to see how excited he got when talking about "futebol"(5).
(5 - Portuguese word for soccer)
They operated on the cloth as they talked, with Alde handing his friend anything he needed, and Vaca continuing his work. Despite the focused look on Mu's face the entire time, he was taking in what his friend was telling him- fascinated by his stories of home. It was great fun to share his own memories too, especially to such an eager listener.
Aldebaran noticed that, while in the workshop, his friend seemed to be a little more talkative than usual; his motions were freer and he seemed-if ever so slightly- more engaged with his surroundings.
Sometime past midnight, Shion slipped into the forge to check on his pupil, still dressed in his ornate robes from the day's proceedings. The Pope was surprised to see his small apprentice sleeping soundly on the ground, gripping a cracked piece of gold cloth. He was even more surprised to see that he had company, the trainee with great potential from Brazil. The two were leaning on each other as they slept, sitting by the oven for warmth. The pope smiled to see his pupil with someone else other than him.
It made him recall an old friend he had himself, now far away in China.
