The air on Waifei Peninsula carried the usual saline chill. Against the railings, a figure stood with the stillness of a monument, his broad back turned to the world. It was Banyue, his silhouette a dark cutout against the silvered glow of the moon over the water. But he wasn't gazing at the moon.

His focus, unwavering and absolute, was fixed downward upon a single, perfectly spherical concrete bollard. Or perhaps it was cast through it, towards a distant bubble of a Hollow. An hour had bled into the evening with him like this, unmoving, his stone-lion presence so profound that even the ambient noises of the region seemed to hush in a wide radius around him. The prayer beads in his hand were still, clutched tight. Meditation? A systems freeze? There was no way to tell.

Then, a shift. Almost imperceptible. The line of his shoulders altered by a degree. He did not turn, but his voice rolled out, low and resonant, carrying the weight of carved granite.

"You're… here."

A pause, long enough for the two words to sink into the quiet. When he spoke again, the tone were measured, steeped in a quiet, profound surprise that seemed to bypass his usual emotional filters entirely.

"I didn't expect it."

As the final word faded, he turned. The movement was fluid, yet carried the deliberate weight of his form. Your arrival had broken his static trance; the prayer beads began their slow circuit once more in his grasp.

Banyue considered you for a long moment, his amber optics holding a steady, assessing light. "Your timing," he stated, the words deliberate and clear, "is optimal as always." After a brief silence, with a tone that suggested he was testing a newly acquired and not entirely trusted piece of vocabulary, he added,

"It slaps."