Kunimi

"They used to write such lovely verses," the elder from the Panda Council sighed, watching Kunimi pass. "Now, they don't even look at the cherry blossoms." Kunimi was once the heart of The Great Panda City's quieter corners, a guardian whose poems about simple things were as revered as their vigilance. They composed odes to Shijin's flute songs, finding the same magic in a perfectly made piece of sushi. Then came the day they were entrusted to guard a newly found scroll of Shijin's music. A friend offered them jam on toast, a small, warm kindness. In the moment it took to savor it, a shadow slipped past. The scroll vanished. The simple joy Kunimi had cherished became the instrument of their failure. The poetry died that day, and the embarrassment in their eyes is for the art they can no longer create.