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Title: The Most Important Thing
Author: marcicat
Fandom: Douluo Continent (TV, 2021)
Rating: T
Summary: A snippet for each episode; somewhat AU from somewhere around episode 12.
1 - Tang San
He was five, and his dad was holding him up to touch the windchimes. Home was sunlight and a warm embrace, and he had never doubted he was loved.
He was ten, and watching over the younger kids by the river. Home was the sounds of the hammer and forge, and he knew the adults in the village shook their heads and talked behind their hands, but he could still pretend he didn’t know why.
He was fifteen, and the forest greeted him like an old friend. Home was tools and trails and the rhythm of life as one season turned to the next, as it always had, as it always would.
He was sixteen, and dreaming, and dreaming, and dreaming.
He was seventeen, and he was leaving.
2 - Xiao Wu
The rabbits were following her. She loved them all already, and it had been so long since she’d had a fluffle of her own. And her bed was huge! They could easily all fit on top of it, or under it, which would be so much safer, really.
She dropped onto the grass and sighed loudly. No one was around, anyway. Maybe the announcement about curfew hadn’t been a joke? But night was just as good as day for learning!
One of the rabbits flopped next to her. “It’s no use,” she said. “Can you imagine what Er Ming would say?”
She let the rabbits ponder that while her thoughts drifted like the clouds in front of the stars. Tang San’s words echoed in her memory.
Her ears had nearly come out when he declared that he wouldn’t hurt a Soul Beast that wasn’t harming humans. Did he really mean that? He thought he did, she could tell that much. But born-humans were unnervingly good at deceiving even themselves.
Another rabbit nudged into her lap. “Although,” she said, poking the rabbit’s nose gently. “It’s not like Er Ming would have to know.”
Between her and Tang San, they could definitely keep the rabbits safe! After all, he said the duty of the strong was to protect the weak.
A Jade Rabbit appeared at the edge of the field, and the rabbits all around her perked up their ears and looked back and forth between them. She closed her eyes. “You choose,” she said.
She didn’t open her eyes for a long time, and when she did she lay back in the grass and pretended it was the brightness of the stars that was making them water. Her bed seemed very far away, and very empty.
She thought of Tang San again. He was the first born human she’d met who made her think maybe she wasn’t on such a hopeless quest after all. He should take responsibility! That was fair, right?
3 - Yu Xiao Gang
There had been a time when he would have pushed. A time before -- well, before. Still, it was a mystery that his thoughts drifted back to again and again.
Why would someone deny having twin martial souls? He could hardly judge anyone for embracing the benefits of obscurity, but Tang San seemed perfectly willing to draw attention to himself for other reasons. It was only the second martial soul he was hiding.
There were, unfortunately, plenty of other potential reasons, but they all required an understanding of Soul Master history and current politics that Tang San lacked. Therefore: someone else knew about his second martial soul, and something in their reaction to it had convinced Tang San to keep it hidden.
Not Su Yun Tao, he didn’t think. Martial Soul Hall wouldn’t be so careless as to let twin martial souls escape their grip. And not the village elder who’d accompanied Tang San to the school, either. Someone else, then.
He would find out, or he wouldn’t. Either way, it was far too late to avoid getting involved.
4 - Xiao Wu
Liking cats was a totally normal human thing, right? Lots of born humans liked cats. She’d overheard students in the girls dorm talking about it, so it had to be true.
And it wasn’t even a lie! She liked cats. She liked all animals. She wrinkled her nose. Maybe not snakes. She was pretty sure it was a snake that had attacked the Spotted Cat -- it was probably nearby, still, waiting for them all to leave.
There was no reason to go after it. Da Ming would be angry that a Soul Beast had fought a nursing parent, and he would find out, one way or another. Their numbers were decreasing too fast; any Soul Beast with young was supposed to be off-limits.
But she could still save the cat, probably. Hopefully.
It was nice, she decided, that Tang San didn’t act like it was strange when she could do things he couldn’t. Such an unsuspicious person! It was a good thing she was there, to make sure no one took advantage of him.
5 - Yu Xiao Gang
The thing about being poisoned, captured, and tied to a chair, was that it gave a person plenty of time to think. Mostly about how to avoid those situations in the future. A little about the times he’d been in those situations in the past.
He genuinely hadn’t expected them to come back for him. (He was certain they hadn’t expected him to throw himself in front of a giant venomous snake for them, so maybe that made them even.)
But he had, and they did, and if all of them survived the day, he should probably think about that too.
6 - Tang San
It turned out that learning an enormous deadly plant had been hidden under his house for his whole life wasn’t the biggest shock of the day. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
He was used to taking responsibility. It was just part of life, like respecting your elders and keeping your promises. He wasn’t used to other people stepping up to take it with him.
He was the one accused of killing Xiao Chen Yu; it was his village that was threatened. His responsibility. But Xiao Wu stood next to him in front of the village head, and dove into the fight against the Soul Honour to help him.
He was the one who’d damaged his Martial Soul, who needed to absorb another soul ring to heal the Blue Silver Plant that was his only connection to his mother. But Da Shi deflected the Hunted Vine’s final attack, and trusted him to save his life from the plant’s parasitizing effect.
He had never felt lonely, as a child. Why would he? But facing the day’s events with Xiao Wu and Da Shi, he felt -- the opposite of lonely.
If strength could sometimes mean using your fists instead of your mind, maybe it could also sometimes mean standing together, instead of alone.
Interlude - Liu Long
After he heard the news -- the governor! dead! -- he hid for an entire day and night. It wasn’t until the second day that he realized no one was looking for him. He’d been forgotten, as if without Xiao Chen Yu, Liu Long had also ceased to exist.
He felt indignant, and then, all at once, relieved. If he was nobody, then he was beholden to no one.
Almost no one. Xiao Wu -- if that was really her name -- had let him go, back in the village. She hadn’t needed to do that, and she hadn’t asked for anything in return. And there was something strange about her.
It was easy enough to sneak into the archives while the school was closed. He burned all of Xiao Wu’s records, starting with the proof that she’d used someone else’s recommendation letter to get into the school. Whatever she was hiding, no one would find it in Nuoding School.
And then he adjusted the records to show Tang San as graduated, and himself as withdrawn, and he walked away.
He had never wanted to be a Soul Master anyway; he had just been following Xiao Chen Yu, like always. He could go anywhere, as nobody. Just disappear into the world, and find a place where no one had ever heard of Nuoding City. He could start over.
7 - Xiao Wu
Did siblings not keep secrets from each other? For a long time she hadn’t had any secrets, and then for a longer time she hadn’t had any siblings, so maybe she’d forgotten.
Tang San had given her his secret about the Xuan Tian Records. It would be fair to give him her secret too. Right?
It was just -- it was hard to figure out how to say it. And she was in a disadvantageous position, in the middle of an unfamiliar city. It would be easier to get away in a forest, if things went badly.
Not that she thought things would go badly!
She scrunched up her nose. She just wasn’t sure they’d go well, either. She’d never actually told anyone that she’d been a Soul Beast before she was a human.
Besides, she reasoned, Tang San hadn’t blurted out his secret out of nowhere! He told her the truth when she asked about it. Maybe she could wait until he asked?
8 - Tang San
Xuan Tian Strike and Blue Silver Plant repelled each other. But he’d felt it combining with and supporting his Martial Soul during the fight.
With one of his Martial Souls, he realized. Could it be like a magnet? One side attracted; one side repelled? But he hadn’t felt any difficulty using his other Xuan Tian skills when he was fighting the Thorn Apple Snake.
He shook his head. It didn’t make sense.
“What’s wrong?” Xiao Wu asked.
“It’s nothing,” he answered quickly, and Xiao Wu made a face and poked his arm. He tried again. “I need to think about it more.”
That time she nodded. “You could… think about it while you braid my hair!”
“Now?” he said, not bothering to hide his smile. “It’s still night time; we should get some sleep.”
She nodded again, more enthusiastically. “What if someone else shows up for another test? We might have to fight them, and it would definitely help if you redid my braid first.”
Xiao Wu cheered when he agreed, which would have made it worth it even if he couldn’t braid and think at the same time. He thought he could probably braid in his sleep; it was so deep in his muscle memory -- and he wondered, suddenly, if that was the answer.
In the fight, after Xiao Wu went down, he’d lost control -- everything had been by instinct. And he’d spent years learning the hammer and forge, and the Xuan Tian Records alongside them. Of course it would take the same kind of practice to incorporate them with his Blue Silver Plant.
He paused long enough for Xiao Wu to tilt her head back and look at him, and he laughed. “I’m braiding, I’m braiding.”
It had never seemed strange that their house didn’t have a garden, even when the village aunties had shaken their heads over it. But looking back -- well, better to think of the present, anyway. Maybe Shi Lan Ke would give him some ideas.
9 - Yu Xiao Gang
He was three for three on unexpected reunions not going terribly, and he really hoped the fates would just -- let him be. Just for a while. Was that too much to ask?
Tang Hao had been the biggest surprise. They could barely have been called acquaintances, but back then everyone knew of the Hao Tian Hammer Soul Master, and he must have done his research in the time he’d been secretly following Tang San around Nuoding. It was probably lucky he hadn’t taken offense about his son attaching himself to a no-name teacher with only two soul rings.
(On the other hand, if he hadn’t been uncomfortably aware that Tang Hao could flatten him like a bug and not even break his stride, he wouldn’t have minded offending him a little. It was hard to reconcile what he knew about the legendary Soul Master of the Hao Tian Hammer with the stories Tang San had shared about his father, but it was clear he’d filled one role more gracefully than the other.)
Su Yun Tao had been the biggest mystery. He actually should have recognized him, outside the Rose Inn. If he hadn’t, that was -- mildly insulting, if he was honest, but not a bad outcome. If he had recognized him but pretended not to -- the potential implications were complex enough to make him remember why he’d been so glad to leave Martial Soul Hall in the first place.
Lan De had been -- could words describe it? The reunion he feared the most, and the one that had, somehow, turned out the best. For all that was still left unsaid between them, time had dulled the pain and given the good parts a chance to shine through.
10 - Xiao Wu
She was so tired of trying to sleep alone. And she could hardly believe that it was this -- this one thing! -- that was tripping her up. Not hearing too well or seeing too far; not knowing too much about some things and too little about others. Not the writing. Not even her temper! (Not yet, she admitted to herself.)
In all their plans, and all the practice, it had somehow never occurred to her that she wouldn’t be able to sleep. At least Shi Lan Ke didn’t have a curfew, so there were still interesting things happening at night. But she didn’t understand why it was fine for all of them to be close enough to touch while they were awake, but not allowed when they were asleep.
She was going to have to figure it out, somehow. Either a way to get rid of the rules, or a way to get around them. She couldn’t manage without sleep forever.
11 - Yu Xiao Gang
It was hard to avoid the only other person in a two-person camp, but Lan De had been determinedly ignoring him and pretending not to ever since they’d been left alone.
After his years at Nuoding School, Xiao Gang considered himself somewhat of an expert at determinedly ignoring other people. He was willing to let it go. At least until he found out what Lan De’s concern was. Or rather, until he found out which of the many potential concerns were bothering him most.
And then Lan De -- clearly fretting over the situation in the village, and who would have guessed he would be so watchful over his students, said, “They can’t stay in their room forever.”
They both froze at the words, and the ignoring suddenly became both more nervous and more two-sided.
It was too reminiscent of another time, another place. Another mystery solved by the Golden Iron Triangle, another morning after waking up to sunshine and laughter and warmth -- he had always been warm, back then.
And it had always been Lan De who was the voice of reason, who said things like, ‘We can’t stay in this room forever,’ and, ‘If you want to leave, no one’s stopping you.’
It was Lan De who left, this time, to check on the students. Xiao Gang breathed out a careful sigh once he was gone, and started packing up the camp. Anything to keep from thinking too much.
12 - Tang San
It was a clever trick, with the chickens. He was still trying to figure out if he could make it work with Blue Silver Plant.
“Are you training?” Xiao Wu popped up next to him. “Do you want to fight?”
He held out his hand so she could see what he was looking at. “I want to come up with a way to use Blue Silver Plant for monitoring.”
“Didn’t you already do that? At your house, you knew when your dad was there.”
He shook his head. “I could only tell that someone was there, not who. It wouldn’t be very useful here in the village. It’s too big, and there’s too many people coming and going.”
“What if you…” Xiao Wu trailed off in thought, and then brightened. “Just monitor the people, and not the space!”
“I don’t want to spy on anyone,” he protested, and Xiao Wu frowned.
“That’s true. But if it’s not a secret, it’s not spying, right?” She bounced closer. “I volunteer! You give me a seed, and we’ll test it!”
He tried to look serious, even as he was calling up a seed in his hand. “Is this just a way to get me to play hide and seek all afternoon and call it training?”
She plucked the seed out of his fingers and dove out the window, laughing. “Bye!”
13 - Yu Xiao Gang
“I can see you biting your tongue over there,” Lan De said casually. “You might as well say it; you haven’t read a single page since you sat down.”
“It’s none of my business,” he said, and Lan De raised his eyebrows.
“When has that ever stopped you?”
More times than he could count, and only some of them had become regrets. He set the book aside anyway, and leaned forward. “Your students,” he said.
Lan De held up his hand. “Your students,” he corrected.
He pretended surprise. “Oh, am I getting paid now? Am I the headmaster?”
“It’s my school, so I make the rules, and I say they’re your students. And that you have to tell me what you were thinking about so studiously, because you’ve avoided it twice now.”
“It’s really nothing,” he said.
“If it’s nothing, there’s no reason not to say it.” Lan De gave him a blandly innocent look. “Right?”
He sighed, but didn’t bother to hide that he was smiling. “Your students,” he said again, just to heckle. “Dai Mu Bai and Ou Si Ke. I know Shi Lan Ke doesn’t have a uniform, but -- is there a reason? With the --” He gestured at his own robes and trailed off, unable to find the words to describe their recent outfits. He thought netting might have been involved?
Lan De laughed, and then shook his finger at him. “You’re lucky -- you have seven students! I only had two! And they can’t fight each other!”
He frowned. “What does one have to do with the other?”
“Consider this,” Lan De said. “There are a limited number of ways that two students can compete that don’t involve hitting each other, when it comes to the improvement of Soul Master skills. Strategy is one one of those ways! Calculating odds, devising plans, understanding the consequences of one’s actions -- these things sharpen the mind!”
Generally, the more words Lan De used, the more he was trying to hide something. He ran the words back over in his head and could only come up with one conclusion. “Are you saying one of them lost a bet?”
“I’m saying they both did.” Lan De waved broadly towards the student dorms. “And now they’ve learned something! You’re welcome!”
14 - Xiao Wu
“Was it Tang San?”
The question took her by surprise -- she hadn’t expected anyone to still be awake. “What?”
Zhu Zhu Qing frowned. “You two got back late, and then immediately went into a secret meeting with Da Shi and the headmaster.”
“And you don’t look so good.” Ning Rong Rong tugged her towards Zhu Zhu Qing’s bed, and she dropped down between them.
“Did someone hurt you?” Zhu Zhu Qing asked. “Was it Tang San? I’ll kill him if he did.”
She shook her head quickly. “No, no, of course not!” Ning Rong Rong started rubbing her back, and she sighed happily. “We got to fight people, and we met Bu Le, and then I was poisoned,” she explained. Da Shi hadn’t said anything about not sharing that part, right? “That’s why we had to meet with the headmaster.”
“What?”
She held up her wrist so they could see the green lines. “It’s fine,” she said. “I’m just tired.”
Zhu Zhu Qing’s expression immediately softened. “You should rest. Stay still.”
She quickly snuggled her way into Qing-jie’s blankets, just in case she was about to suggest that separate beds would be more comfortable. But Ning Rong Rong tugged the top quilt around them both, and Qing-jie patted both their heads. She could hardly believe her luck. She should have gotten poisoned ages ago!
15 - Tang San
It felt wrong. It felt like being back at Nuoding School, watching students get ready to kill rabbits trapped in cages. He understood hunting for survival. He didn’t feel guilty about fighting back against the Human Faced Demon Spider when it had attacked him back home.
And yet -- weren’t they the ones intruding this time? Hunting in a group for a creature that simply had the bad luck to fly in their direction?
Everyone said Soul Beasts were dangerous, but their group was less wary in the forest than they’d been in town. And still, the first thing to seriously threaten them was no beast, but another Soul Master.
His dad said there were good Soul Beasts and bad Soul Beasts, just like there were good and bad people. Xiao Wu said she wanted to find a way to advance a person’s martial soul without killing.
(And he did feel guilty about the Hunted Vine. He dreamed of it at night, sometimes.)
Could there be another way?
16 - Yu Xiao Gang
“Did you know?”
He shook his head, confident that Lan De would be able to see it even in the dark. “I wasn’t sure. Not until today.” Something in the tone of the question made him frown. “Did you know?”
Lan De shifted next to him, probably waving a hand. “Knowing, not knowing -- she’s not the first one I’ve met, that’s all.”
“Not the --” He couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud, no matter how private their rooms were supposed to be. “Really?”
“Not all of us spent the last twenty years hiding in a library,” Lan De said. “Does Tang San know?”
He shook his head again. “I don’t think so.” He wouldn’t have been so worried in the forest if he did, probably. Or he would have been worried about different things, at least.
“They’re both as reckless as each other,” Lan De said. “Soul power transference at that level --”
“Is impossible.”
Lan De scoffed. “Is it? We saw it with our own eyes, unless you weren’t just pretending to pass out.”
He hadn’t entirely been pretending. “It’s said to be impossible, then.”
“Mm. And who benefits from that being the truth?”
He didn’t have any answers to that.
17 - Tang San
The first hints of dawn were starting to show, but it was still dark enough that he heard the headmaster’s sigh before he could see him. It wasn’t a surprise; the plants had alerted him as soon as he crossed the circle.
“Do any of you ever sleep?” the headmaster asked.
He kept his eyes on the trees. “Ou Si Ke is sleeping.”
“Ah. Well, that’s good. I taught him well.” The headmaster sat down with another sigh. And then nothing.
Finally, the question grew too loud to keep contained in his own head. “Was it just me, that he didn’t want?”
The pause was long enough that he’d started to regret asking, and then the headmaster said, “What makes you say that?”
“You knew him,” he said. Guessed, really.
The headmaster shrugged. “I knew of him. We never met.”
“And my mother?”
“Ah -- no. I’m sorry.” The headmaster’s voice was hesitant.
“He said she died when I was a baby. That was all he ever told me.” He held up his palm and let the Blue Silver Plant shimmer into existence. “He didn’t want me to learn my martial soul. But Su Yun Tao said it would come from one of my parents, and I wanted to know more about her.”
He was angry that his father might be involved in a plot that was hurting so many people, but the more he’d thought about it, the more he’d realized that wasn’t the only thing he was angry about.
“Everyone knew him. No one knew her.” He let the plant twine around his hand and up his arm.
He didn’t say ‘doesn’t that seem strange to you?’ or ‘my father spent the last ten years acting like his life was over, and as soon as I left he miraculously recovered.’
“I thought he was sad that she was gone,” he said instead, and the vine disappeared in a shower of sparks. “But maybe he was sad that I was there.”
“Tang San,” the headmaster said. For once, he sounded entirely serious. “Love is the easiest thing in the world to feel, and the hardest thing in the world to share.”
There was a pause, like the headmaster got distracted by something, but then he added, “Whatever you find out, Shi Lan Ke’s doors will always be open to you.”
18 - Xiao Wu
There were three things she could say with confidence that she had learned since her last report. (There were more, but Da Ming was busy, and birds could usually only remember three things at a time anyway.)
One: teleporting was an exceptionally great power. And fun! Two: Ning Rong Rong wasn’t as good at braiding as Tang San, but it was still very nice.
And three: Ou Si Ke was definitely covering for her.
She wasn’t sure what to think about the last one. She couldn’t tell how much he was doing it on purpose, and how much was just his natural inclination towards peacemaking. She couldn’t even tell if he knew what he was helping to obscure.
But if he did know, it didn’t seem fair that she still hadn’t told Tang San. She made a face. Even if he didn’t know, it didn’t seem fair. But not telling him for so long hadn’t made it any easier to say out loud.
19 - Tang San
‘Don’t make the same mistake twice.’ Like most good advice, it was easy to agree with, and hard to put into practice.
“Xiao Wu,” he said carefully.
She beamed at him. “That’s me!”
It had been worth being interrogated by Zhu Zhu Qing and Ning Rong Rong to win their cooperation. They would make sure no one tried to eavesdrop or interrupt -- at least for a while.
“I’ve been thinking. In Star Forest, I was worried about you.”
Xiao Wu nodded, and then poked him in the shoulder. “I was worried about you too! You almost died!”
He didn’t bother reminding her that she had also almost died -- because of him. “You know that when I first woke up, I didn’t remember anything that happened. But lately I’ve started to remember more.”
“Oh.” Xiao Wu bit her lip. “Just a little more?”
She looked so hopeful; he couldn’t help smiling. “Xiao Wu, I won’t ask if you don’t want to tell me.” More quietly, he added, “I promised to protect you; to stand between you and anyone who would threaten you. I just want to make sure I’m obstructing your enemies, and not your allies.”
She threw her arms around him and whispered the truth he’d already guessed into his ear. He hugged her back, and then laughed when she tugged on his hair. “Something else?” he said.
Xiao Wu nodded again. “I don’t want you to stand between me and any enemies. I promised to protect you too, remember?”
She spun so they were side by side. “You can stand next to me, and I’ll stand next to you.”
20 - Yu Xiao Gang
“Zhao Wu Ji was a student of Shi Lan Ke?”
It wasn’t subtle, and Lan De would definitely be laughing at him if his thoughts weren’t so far away.
“Yes.” Lan De shook his head, visibly pulling himself back to the present. “He won’t tell anyone, if that’s what you’re hinting at.”
It was too late to pretend ignorance, but that wasn’t going to stop him from trying. If nothing else, it would break the tension. “Tell anyone?” he repeated.
Lan De waved his hand dismissively. “It’s a good thing you’ve taken over their education. This younger generation doesn’t even recognize something as famous as the Hao Tian Hammer martial soul!” He gave a short laugh. “I might have made it harder to see. Just a little.”
Which would explain Dai Mu Bai’s objection to ‘strange tricks.’ He sighed. “You knew the whole time.” No wonder he hadn’t pushed for more information on Tang San’s father.
Lan De gave him a bland look. “I didn’t know I was harboring a fugitive.”
He broke eye contact first. “It was a misunderstanding.”
“Oh?” Such a simple question, but it contained multitudes.
He made a face. “It wasn’t us,” he offered.
“Us?” Lan De tsk’d at him. “Xiao Gang, you’ve been holding out on me.” He quickly poured tea for both of them, and then leaned back against a stack of books. “Now. Tell me everything.”
21 - Xiao Wu
It probably wasn’t the best idea to vent her frustration with the one person who knew her secret by sharing that secret with more people. But they had waited up for her, and tucked her into their nest of blankets, and she liked them so much!
And they were going to leave, and she was going to stay, and the words just came out. Besides, it turned out they knew anyway.
“You knew? How?”
Zhu Zhu Qing shrugged. “Rong Rong told me.”
Ning Rong Rong blushed. “I only realized when we were traveling.” She leaned back and gave an abbreviated bow. “Qibao Amber Tribe offers our support and protection.”
Xiao Wu blinked. She knew what all those words meant, but she couldn’t make them make sense together. “What?”
“Qibao Amber Tribe is almost entirely Support Branch Soul Masters. We don’t fight. How do you think we still have so many Soul Saints with seven soul rings?”
She tipped her head to one side, considering. “You’re all very cute?”
Ning Rong Rong laughed. “Xi Si City isn’t the only place where people live cooperatively with Soul Beasts. Both of my soul rings were freely given. It’s not something we share outside the Tribe.”
Zhu Zhu Qing patted her hand. “Keep breathing, meimei. Even in the Xing Luo Empire, there are ancient stories of human Soul Beasts, working alongside Soul Masters for a common goal.”
She was so confused. “But -- if people know. Then why?” Soul Beasts and Soul Masters didn’t have to be enemies! Wouldn’t that be better?
“Why are Tian Dou and Xing Luo considered enemies?” Zhu Zhu Qing said. “Why do the Seven Tribes fight amongst themselves? There will always be conflict.”
“One stone can’t change the course of a river.” Ning Rong Rong draped another blanket around them. “Not even seven stones. But we can still help.”
22 - Yu Xiao Gang
“It’s fate, Xiao Gang.” Lan De put his feet up on the crate in front of him, and tucked his hands behind his head. “You can’t argue with fate.”
He made sure Lan De was watching him before he rolled his eyes. “It’s a sandstorm.”
“The whole time we were crossing the desert, we didn’t see a single sign of bad weather. And yet as soon as we tried to separate, we were forced back together. That’s fate, my friend, whether you agree or not. Clearly we’re not meant to be apart.”
He wanted it to be true. He wanted a lot of things. He changed the subject. “Aren’t you worried about them?”
“The students?” Lan De shook his head. “No, they’ll be fine. All of them are far too self-sacrificing on their own, but when they have each other to look out for, they’ll find a way.”
“Even against everything they’re going to face?”
Lan De waved off the question. “We just need to come up with a way to keep all of them together.”
He rolled his eyes again, but he couldn’t help smiling. “And by we, you mean me.”
“Of course! I leave the strategy in your more-than capable hands.”
23 - Tang San
He let himself take a breath. To let their trust and acceptance shore up what his doubts had been eroding away. But he couldn’t let them fight without knowing the full truth.
“There’s more,” he said.
No one looked surprised.
Xiao Wu jumped in while he was still searching for words. “Tang San can use Blue Silver Plant seeds to track everyone’s position when we fight,” she said. She pointed at one of the pins in her hair, then pulled it out and passed it around the table.
“Well?” Dai Mu Bai asked impatiently. “Is that it?”
It wasn’t, but that also wasn’t the reaction he’d been expecting. “You’re not upset?” he said.
Dai Mu Bai looked at Zhu Zhu Qing, who shrugged. “Xing Luo has -- ways of tracking people too,” he answered. “Strategically, it’s a good idea.”
Well, that was one thing covered, at least. “There’s more,” he said.
“Is it about the Hao Tian Hammer Soul Master being your dad?” Ning Rong Rong asked. “We know.”
“We’re following you, not your family,” Zhu Zhu Qing said.
Ou Si Ke was frowning at his notebook. “If he was with you until… but Nightfire Village was… I don’t think the timing matches up,” he muttered. As soon as he looked up and realized everyone was looking at him, he waved it off. “It’s nothing, it’s nothing. That was it, right?”
Tang San hesitated, and Ou Si Ke groaned. “There’s more?” He shook the notebook. “This is an unrealistic number of secrets! Brother San, leave some for the rest of us!”
It broke through the tension that had been thrumming in his chest. He held up his right hand, and let the Blue Silver Plant unfurl in his palm. And then he held up his left hand, and unclenched his fingers. The Hao Tian Hammer shimmered into view.
Chapter 24 - Xiao Wu
“Do you regret telling us?”
Tang San startled out of whatever thoughts he’d been lost in. “What? No, of course not!”
He’d been distracted ever since they left Xi Si City, but he kept insisting he was fine. It was obviously her responsibility as his sister to pester him until he talked. “Are you… hungry? Thirsty? Are you bored?”
He gave her a look that said he knew what she was doing. “How could I be bored when you’re here?”
She beamed. “That’s right!” She poked his shoulder. “So, what’s wrong?”
Tang San sighed. “I’m worried,” he said finally.
She nodded, as if that hadn’t been perfectly obvious. “Are you worried that we’re not strong enough to help you?”
He looked genuinely surprised, so she tried again. “Are you worried that you’re not strong enough to help us?”
That seemed closer, since Tang San looked upset. “What if you get hurt because of me?”
“You should give us more credit,” she said. “And yourself.” She leaned closer. “We all chose to help Dai Mu Bai when he fought his brother, and we all chose to help you in Xi Si City. Because it was the right thing to do.”
If anything, Tang San looked more conflicted, rather than less. It seemed simple to her, but she wasn’t an only child, and Qing-jie said that made a difference.
Tang San said, “What if -- what if I’m not sure what the right thing is? What if I’m not sure I want to know the answers we’ll find?”
“Then that’s even more reason to stay together, so we can keep reminding you!”
Chapter 25 - Yu Xiao Gang
Not talking about it had worked with Lan De, but he had the feeling his reprieve had come to an end. So he talked about the students -- their skills, how they worked together, what he still wanted each of them to accomplish before the competition. He had more to say than he expected.
Liu Er Long nodded attentively the whole time, but as soon as he paused, she said, “Are the two of you sleeping together?”
He choked. “No!” His face must have given him away, because she just raised her eyebrows. “Yes. Not like that, though!”
The eyebrows went higher.
“We hardly sleep at all!” No, that made it sound much worse. “I mean, we’ve been traveling.” He tried again. “Someone has to stay on watch.”
She frowned. “Isn’t that one of the duties of the students?”
“They’re the ones we’re keeping watch for,” he said, exasperation bleeding into his tone.
“Oh?” Er Long suddenly looked delighted. “Are your students in the habit of getting into trouble at night?”
He sighed. If only they restricted it to nighttime. “They get in trouble at all times of day.”
If anything, she only looked more intrigued. “I think I’m looking forward to meeting them, in that case.”
Interlude - Lan De and Er Long
He knew as soon as she stepped out of her room, but he waited until she was on the balcony with him to nod a greeting.
Er Long leaned on the railing, and stared out at the grounds. “I looked for him, after.”
“Mm. So did I.”
“At first I thought he was avoiding us on purpose, because he knew Martial Soul Hall was watching us. And then I thought -- maybe he really did it. Just picked a direction and kept walking, like we always talked about. But Nuoding?” She made a face. “We should have been able to find him in Nuoding.”
He shrugged. He didn’t disagree.
“Someone was hiding him.”
“Or someone was hiding something else, and he benefited by being nearby.” He risked a glance in her direction, only to find her already staring at him.
“You know who it was,” she said.
He hadn’t actually planned out what to tell her, and when. But he was increasingly convinced that they were all in well over their heads, and could use all the help they could get. “I have a guess,” he said. “Let’s talk inside.”
26 - Tang San
There was something about the Venom Soul Master. It kept teasing at the edges of his awareness, and then disappearing whenever he tried to focus on it.
(He hoped Xiao Wu had gotten her rabbits. He hoped no one was too worried about him. He hoped they didn’t get into trouble trying to rescue him.)
He should have been frightened. Alarmed, at the very least. He’d been snatched off a busy street and poisoned, then woke up alone in a strange place, only to be threatened and then poisoned (again).
Instead he felt -- like he wasn’t entirely sure he needed to be rescued. Maybe it was just recognition of the man’s determination to save Du Gu Yan. Hadn’t he felt the same, when it was Xiao Wu who was in danger?
But the more he thought about it, the more he was sure there was more to it than that. The valley, the voice he’d heard -- the Venom Soul Master was important. And somehow, impossibly, familiar.
27 - Yu Xiao Gang
Theoretically, martial soul fusion between three people with unequal soul power should have been possible. It was nice to have that theory validated. Seventy percent chance of success; thirty percent chance of a quick and painful death by soul power overload. Wouldn’t that have surprised the old Grand Soul Land Master!
“What are you mumbling about?” Lan De said. “You’re the one who said we should leave them there.”
The rush of not dying had kept him on his feet long enough to exit the caves, but his vision kept tunneling. He wasn’t sure how much further they had to go. (He wasn’t sure how much further he could go.)
“Tang San tested one of my theories,” he tried to explain. “He could have died then. This was fair.”
“You’re not making any sense,” Er Long said, from much closer than he expected, and he swayed backwards to focus on her face. “Who could have died?”
“It’s like the tide.” He tried to wave his hand to demonstrate. “Don’t tell Lan De,” he said.
Her eyes went wide. “You could have died? Are you dying now?”
That was a hard question. “It’s the tide,” he repeated. “It came in, and now it’s gone out again.”
“Xiao Gang,” she said, and her voice sounded urgent. “Focus. Dying, or not dying?”
He sighed, and closed his eyes. That was nice. Restful. “Not dying.”
Somehow, Er Long’s voice was even closer the next time she spoke. “Are you about to pass out? Because I volunteer to carry you if you are.”
“You’re very strong,” he agreed, and then the ground tilted, and he was falling.
28 - Xiao Wu
How did you say, ‘I think I knew your mom,’ to someone who never had the chance to meet her?
The interspace had felt familiar as soon as they entered, but she hadn’t been sure -- she’d grown up in a forest, after all. Soul-power infused plants had been her refuge for hundreds of years.
It wasn’t uncommon for Soul Plants to reach the ten thousand year mark. Almost no one with a plant martial soul pursued Soul Mastery, so they had fewer threats to avoid, and they tended towards cooperation rather than competition. But it was extremely uncommon for any of them to decide to become human.
Ah Yin had been the last.
When her soul rings were returned to her, she knew. Everyone’s soul power felt different, and she’d known Ah Yin’s ever since she was tiny.
“Xiao Wu?” Tang San reached for her hand, and she realized she was crying. “What’s wrong?”
Did he realize? “Your mother,” she said, not bothering to wipe away the tears. “Ah Yin.”
Tang San was still looking at her. “She left this place for me,” he said quietly. “She was a Soul Beast, wasn’t she? A Soul Plant.”
“I knew her,” she said. “Before either of us were human. She’s the reason I wanted to become a Soul Master.”
Tang San smiled -- it was a small one, but genuine. “Me too.”
29 - Xiao Wu
How hard could it be to kiss someone? Lots of people must have figured it out.
Did she even want to kiss Tang San? She hadn’t considered it until Rong Rong said she could try it. Couldn’t they just bump noses, and she could tuck her head under his chin, and he could put his arms around her?
But now that she’d started thinking about it, the thought wouldn’t go away.
Er Ming always said that if you wanted something to happen, you couldn’t just think about it. Besides, they had plenty of time before the auction started, and no one was around to interrupt them.
She took a deep breath. “Tang San.” She tugged him out of the main walking path and into a small alcove. “I want to try kissing you. What do you think?”
He froze. “You -- I --” He cleared his throat. “Are you sure?” She nodded, and he reached out to link their fingers together. “Then yes, I would also like to try -- that. Kissing. With you.”
It turned out kissing wasn’t hard at all. And when she tucked her head under his chin afterwards, and they put their arms around each other, it was even better than she’d imagined.
30 - Tang San
Sunset Forest made his skin crawl. He was on edge as soon as they stepped inside -- splitting up made sense, but it felt wrong. Xiao Wu kept frowning at the trees. “What is it?” he asked.
“Have you seen any Blue Silver Plants?” she said.
He shook his head, and had to remind himself not to step even closer to her. Something in his head was screaming a warning, and it was making it hard to think of anything except getting out of the forest as quickly as possible.
“There is no Blue Silver Plant in Sunset Forest,” Da Shi said, like it was just another interesting piece of information he’d learned during his research.
“Why?” He was clutching Xiao Wu’s wrist like a lifeline.
Da Shi shrugged. “No one knows. Let’s keep moving.”
Right. Deeper into the forest. He shivered, and tried to hide it with a cough.
Teacher Liu patted his shoulder. “Trust your instincts. There are plenty of things that can kill you that have never been written down in a book.”
It shouldn’t have been reassuring, but somehow he felt a little better as they continued on.
31 - Yu Xiao Gang
“Your students are so much trouble,” Er Long said admiringly.
It was true. “I did warn you,” he muttered.
“Mm, I remember.” She leaned into his shoulder. “Lan De told me you were exaggerating.”
He was fairly sure she was laughing at him. He was definitely sure he deserved it. He couldn’t even claim that he hadn’t realized they were trouble when he first met them.
“Didn’t you say you were going to get more tea?” he asked instead.
Er Long waved her hand. “I sent Dai Mu Bai to bring it. He’s a prince; it will be good for him. Networking.”
He stared. “Dai Mu Bai is a prince of Xing Luo. Du Gu Bo is the secret weapon of the Tian Dou Empire! How is that a good idea?”
“The Tian Dou Empire just tried to have your student murdered,” Er Long retorted. “And one Soul Master in their debt changed his mind, while another rushed here to defend him. How is it not a good idea?”
She leaned back, suddenly serious. “The students are trouble because they won’t, or can’t, follow the traditional paths. You can’t count on them making traditional allies.”
That was also true. “So you’ll surround them with non-traditional ones instead?”
“Isn’t that why you sent them to Shi Lan Ke to begin with? It’s your plan, A-Gang, I’m just saying I agree.”
32 - Xiao Wu
It was nice to not have to pretend she couldn’t see in the dark. Rong Rong followed her without hesitation as they snuck into Zhu Zhu Qing’s room.
“Qing-jie!” she whispered loudly. “Are you awake?”
A tiny light started glowing from the bed. “I slept all afternoon; of course I’m awake. Where have you been?”
“We had to wait for Brother Dai to leave! He was here for so long!” Rong Rong gave a dramatic sigh, and climbed up on the bed without asking.
That left her with Zhu Zhu Qing’s injured side, and she carefully tucked herself as close as she could without jostling her shoulder. “How does it feel? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Better now.” There was a pause, and then she added, “Rong Rong, how did you get away? I thought Teacher Liu was watching you.”
“They’re all busy with Tang San,” Rong Rong said easily. “Someone came to kill him. He’s fine, though.”
Zhu Zhu Qing startled. “Again?”
Xiao Wu giggled, and then bit her lip. “Sorry. It’s not funny.”
“It’s a little funny,” Rong Rong countered, and she leaned over Zhu Zhu Qing to poke her. “So? You were there, right? Tell us everything!”
33 - Tang San
Chief Ning was definitely underestimating Ou Si Ke.
He loved theater, and he loved being a Soul Master. He just had to decide if he could hold them both in his heart at the same time.
If he could, he would join them in the arena, fully committed and without any doubts. If not, he would surely be supporting them from the sidelines. He would still be their friend, their teammate, their brother -- just happier, knowing that it had been fully his own choice.
And wasn’t that better? Wasn’t that why they were there? Being a team wasn’t about winning the competition or fighting together; it was about choosing to support each other. And they had all chosen to support Ou Si Ke.
One way or another, he was one of the Seven Devils of Shi Lan Ke, and he was stuck with them.
34 - Yu Xiao Gang
After everything, Lan De had the nerve to show up while he was preparing breakfast, like it was any other morning. “Everything settled?” he asked.
Xiao Gang threw the spoon at his head. As expected, Lan De caught it easily, but it still spattered him with food. Petty, but satisfying. “I can’t believe you left me! All night! Where were you? You were not ‘training’ that whole time.”
“Of course not.” Lan De waved the hand not holding the spoon. “I was napping. I’m not as young as I used to be, you know.”
He rolled his eyes, and Lan De gave him an innocent look. “What was I supposed to do? You said you wanted to sort things out with her. She said she wanted to sort things out with you.”
“I --” He hesitated. “She said that?”
Lan De sighed. “You’re each as bad as the other.”
“What about the two of you?” It was the Golden Iron Triangle, after all -- it took all three of them to make it work, and it had taken all three of them to make it stop working.
But Lan De just looked at him. “We had fewer things to sort out,” he said finally.
He grabbed the spoon back and stirred furiously. He hated not knowing why they were doing this. (He hated that he couldn’t make himself believe them when they told him.)
“Xiao Gang,” Lan De said gently. “You know I have the greatest respect for your abilities as a scholar and a teacher. But it might help to look at this from a different perspective.”
“I can’t be more than I am.” No matter how much he wanted to be.
“And you shouldn’t try to be any less than you are either.” Lan De watched him stir for a while, then nodded and turned away.
He stared after him. “Now where are you going?”
“To wake the students!” Lan De waved over his shoulder. “It’s a beautiful morning, Xiao Gang! A beautiful day for learning!”
35 - Xiao Wu
There was something wrong with the city. Or maybe with Martial Soul Hall itself; and it was seeping out into the city like a poison. It was different than the fear, although that was there too -- the sense that something nearby thought she was prey, and was hunting her.
They were related, she thought, but they weren’t from exactly the same source.
She knew her easy acceptance of staying with the group had surprised the others. Rong Rong kept sending her worried glances, and they’d all shifted into a more defensive formation. Even Teacher Liu seemed tense.
She wondered if the teachers knew. If that was why the Headmaster had arrived on time alone, and the rest of them took the slowest possible route.
“Are you all right?” Rong Rong asked quietly. “Da Shi won’t let anything happen to Tang San.”
Rong Rong’s family had been in the city for weeks. She shook her head. “Let’s talk later.”
36 - Tang San
“If things go wrong, we’ll rescue them.”
The words were out of his mouth before he had time to think it through. But even when the Headmaster shook his head, he couldn’t regret saying them.
He wasn’t worried about Dai Mu Bai fighting his brother. He and Zhu Zhu Qing were more than capable -- their Martial Soul Fusion made them Dai Wei Shi’s equal in strength and power, and their teamwork would give them a significant advantage.
Besides, the Xing Luo battle team would obey the rules of the contest; he was sure of it. He was considerably less sure that Martial Soul Hall would do the same.
The air itself felt oppressive. The Chief of Martial Soul Hall had them all trapped in her web, and Xiao Wu was gripping his wrist tight enough to bruise. The death match in the arena felt like the least dangerous part of the day.
Not for the first time, he wondered if they were ready for what was coming.
37 - Yu Xiao Gang
It was easy to forget, watching the students exchange courtesies after a perfectly fair match. He could almost pretend it was exactly what Martial Soul Hall claimed -- a school contest, a chance for the younger generation to share knowledge. A competition that might not be friendly, but one that every school had agreed would adhere to the rules of Soul Master combat.
Except that he’d watched one member of Martial Soul Hall’s battle team attempt an attack after their opponent surrendered, and another interfere from outside the arena, and the referee had turned a blind eye to both.
Except that he was watching the continent’s strongest schools display their top fighters and reveal their best strategies to an audience of one, and it didn’t feel like a competition. It felt like a trap.
They had no way of knowing who was behind the assassination plot. It could even be Bi Bi Dong herself. After all, what better excuse to eliminate multiple powerful enemies at once than to have them attack first?
For the moment, all they could do was let things play out. Er Long was keeping their allies informed with what little they knew, and reaching out with Chief Ning to all of the tribes with a presence in Martial Soul City. It probably wasn’t safe, and it definitely wasn’t subtle. He only hoped it would be enough.
38 - Xiao Wu
They gathered in Teacher Liu’s room. (“I’m not using it,” she’d told them, and no one had dared ask for more information.) It was the only place in the city where they could relax -- the one place they didn’t have to assume they were being spied on and speak accordingly.
She turned into Tang San’s arms as soon as they stepped over the threshold, and hid her tears in his shoulder. So many Soul Beasts killed -- so much family lost, and for what? Power? Did the reason even matter?
Tang San kissed the top of her head. She closed her eyes, and let him lead her to the others. She could hear them talking -- their voices blending into a comforting hum as the words washed over her. A nest of blankets and her favorite people all around her -- she cried harder, for everyone who would never get to experience such joy.
She wasn’t sure how long they were there, but eventually she managed to push her tears aside and sit up. Ma Hong Jun passed her a cup of water, and Rong Rong squeezed her free hand. “Aren’t we supposed to be talking about the plan?” she asked.
“Later,” Dai Mu Bai said firmly.
Zhu Zhu Qing patted her hair. “You’re more important than plans, meimei.”
39 - Tang San
If it really was just a school competition, it didn’t matter if they lost -- the point was to compete; the outcome was secondary. You could learn as much from a loss as a win, after all.
And if it wasn’t a school competition (it definitely wasn’t), it also didn’t matter if they lost. It had been rigged from the start, influenced by far too many plots and secrets and conflicting agendas. Walking away would likely be as dangerous as continuing.
Even if they won the match, there was still a chance they’d lose their lives in whatever happened afterwards. Their list of allies was alarmingly short compared to their list of people who might show up but refused to commit to any particular goal or action.
But Xiao Wu was right -- being a Soul Master was about facing challenges, even when you weren’t sure you could overcome them. This was a fight they’d inherited, and it was a fight they’d all chosen, to defend the people they loved.
Sometimes you fought because to do otherwise would go against everything your heart cried out for in the dark. Win or lose, they would keep the fight going as long as they could. The rest would be up to the others.
40 - Yu Xiao Gang
“What are you doing?” he hissed.
Er Long patted his arm and leaned even closer, but didn’t take her eyes off the arena. “Why, is she glaring at me again?”
“Mm.” Lan De edged closer on her other side. “Like she’s imagining your corpse.”
“Better me than the students,” Er Long said. “She was looking a little twitchy up there.” She squeezed his arm gently. “Relax. It’ll be our turn soon enough.”
He sighed. “I hate this plan.”
They all hated it. Unfortunately, they hadn’t been able to come up with anything better. It felt wrong to stand around while everyone else was taking action, but someone had to be the decoy, and they were the most logical choice.
“Start thinking about your lesson plans instead,” Lan De said, nodding at the arena. “You need to be able to teach the next class to do that too, or people will say it’s just Tang San.”
He made a face. “It’s not just Tang San. They’re a team; that’s why they can do it.” The words came easily for once, and he added, “We could do it.”
He could feel Lan De practically radiating smugness, and Er Long beamed. “Yes, we could.”
Epilogue - Xiao Wu
“Actually, she’s already strong.”
She hadn’t heard them arrive, but she felt it when Zhu Zhu Qing dropped onto the ground next to her and put her arm around her shoulders.
Rong Rong’s voice came from her other side. “And fearless.” They must have finished relocating the students, then.
Da Shi stepped between her and Tang Hao. He looked taller than usual. “And she’s saved Tang San’s life at least seven times.”
In her lap, Tang San stirred. “More like ten,” he said. “Xiao Wu --” He coughed, but his gaze was strong when he met her eyes. “Please don’t go.”
She didn’t want to. She wanted to stay with Tang San, like they had promised. Weren’t they stronger together than apart?
Tang San linked their fingers together, and looked at his father. “What you’re talking about -- sharing power; Xiao Wu has already done it.” He gave her an exasperated glance. “She’s doing it right now.”
She guiltily pulled her hand back. She didn’t think he’d noticed.
Da Shi turned his back on Tang Hao, and nodded at her. “Tang San once asked me, what’s the point of being strong, if it means abandoning the friends you’ve gone through life and death with.”
“The most important thing isn’t strength,” Zhu Zhu Qing said quietly.
She wanted to laugh, and jump, and hug them all -- of course it was Ou Si Ke who had been right from the very beginning. “It’s kindness.” She looked at Tang San. “Where you go, I go,” she said.
He smiled. “And where you go, I go.”
Author: marcicat
Fandom: Douluo Continent (TV, 2021)
Rating: T
Summary: A snippet for each episode; somewhat AU from somewhere around episode 12.
1 - Tang San
He was five, and his dad was holding him up to touch the windchimes. Home was sunlight and a warm embrace, and he had never doubted he was loved.
He was ten, and watching over the younger kids by the river. Home was the sounds of the hammer and forge, and he knew the adults in the village shook their heads and talked behind their hands, but he could still pretend he didn’t know why.
He was fifteen, and the forest greeted him like an old friend. Home was tools and trails and the rhythm of life as one season turned to the next, as it always had, as it always would.
He was sixteen, and dreaming, and dreaming, and dreaming.
He was seventeen, and he was leaving.
2 - Xiao Wu
The rabbits were following her. She loved them all already, and it had been so long since she’d had a fluffle of her own. And her bed was huge! They could easily all fit on top of it, or under it, which would be so much safer, really.
She dropped onto the grass and sighed loudly. No one was around, anyway. Maybe the announcement about curfew hadn’t been a joke? But night was just as good as day for learning!
One of the rabbits flopped next to her. “It’s no use,” she said. “Can you imagine what Er Ming would say?”
She let the rabbits ponder that while her thoughts drifted like the clouds in front of the stars. Tang San’s words echoed in her memory.
Her ears had nearly come out when he declared that he wouldn’t hurt a Soul Beast that wasn’t harming humans. Did he really mean that? He thought he did, she could tell that much. But born-humans were unnervingly good at deceiving even themselves.
Another rabbit nudged into her lap. “Although,” she said, poking the rabbit’s nose gently. “It’s not like Er Ming would have to know.”
Between her and Tang San, they could definitely keep the rabbits safe! After all, he said the duty of the strong was to protect the weak.
A Jade Rabbit appeared at the edge of the field, and the rabbits all around her perked up their ears and looked back and forth between them. She closed her eyes. “You choose,” she said.
She didn’t open her eyes for a long time, and when she did she lay back in the grass and pretended it was the brightness of the stars that was making them water. Her bed seemed very far away, and very empty.
She thought of Tang San again. He was the first born human she’d met who made her think maybe she wasn’t on such a hopeless quest after all. He should take responsibility! That was fair, right?
3 - Yu Xiao Gang
There had been a time when he would have pushed. A time before -- well, before. Still, it was a mystery that his thoughts drifted back to again and again.
Why would someone deny having twin martial souls? He could hardly judge anyone for embracing the benefits of obscurity, but Tang San seemed perfectly willing to draw attention to himself for other reasons. It was only the second martial soul he was hiding.
There were, unfortunately, plenty of other potential reasons, but they all required an understanding of Soul Master history and current politics that Tang San lacked. Therefore: someone else knew about his second martial soul, and something in their reaction to it had convinced Tang San to keep it hidden.
Not Su Yun Tao, he didn’t think. Martial Soul Hall wouldn’t be so careless as to let twin martial souls escape their grip. And not the village elder who’d accompanied Tang San to the school, either. Someone else, then.
He would find out, or he wouldn’t. Either way, it was far too late to avoid getting involved.
4 - Xiao Wu
Liking cats was a totally normal human thing, right? Lots of born humans liked cats. She’d overheard students in the girls dorm talking about it, so it had to be true.
And it wasn’t even a lie! She liked cats. She liked all animals. She wrinkled her nose. Maybe not snakes. She was pretty sure it was a snake that had attacked the Spotted Cat -- it was probably nearby, still, waiting for them all to leave.
There was no reason to go after it. Da Ming would be angry that a Soul Beast had fought a nursing parent, and he would find out, one way or another. Their numbers were decreasing too fast; any Soul Beast with young was supposed to be off-limits.
But she could still save the cat, probably. Hopefully.
It was nice, she decided, that Tang San didn’t act like it was strange when she could do things he couldn’t. Such an unsuspicious person! It was a good thing she was there, to make sure no one took advantage of him.
5 - Yu Xiao Gang
The thing about being poisoned, captured, and tied to a chair, was that it gave a person plenty of time to think. Mostly about how to avoid those situations in the future. A little about the times he’d been in those situations in the past.
He genuinely hadn’t expected them to come back for him. (He was certain they hadn’t expected him to throw himself in front of a giant venomous snake for them, so maybe that made them even.)
But he had, and they did, and if all of them survived the day, he should probably think about that too.
6 - Tang San
It turned out that learning an enormous deadly plant had been hidden under his house for his whole life wasn’t the biggest shock of the day. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
He was used to taking responsibility. It was just part of life, like respecting your elders and keeping your promises. He wasn’t used to other people stepping up to take it with him.
He was the one accused of killing Xiao Chen Yu; it was his village that was threatened. His responsibility. But Xiao Wu stood next to him in front of the village head, and dove into the fight against the Soul Honour to help him.
He was the one who’d damaged his Martial Soul, who needed to absorb another soul ring to heal the Blue Silver Plant that was his only connection to his mother. But Da Shi deflected the Hunted Vine’s final attack, and trusted him to save his life from the plant’s parasitizing effect.
He had never felt lonely, as a child. Why would he? But facing the day’s events with Xiao Wu and Da Shi, he felt -- the opposite of lonely.
If strength could sometimes mean using your fists instead of your mind, maybe it could also sometimes mean standing together, instead of alone.
Interlude - Liu Long
After he heard the news -- the governor! dead! -- he hid for an entire day and night. It wasn’t until the second day that he realized no one was looking for him. He’d been forgotten, as if without Xiao Chen Yu, Liu Long had also ceased to exist.
He felt indignant, and then, all at once, relieved. If he was nobody, then he was beholden to no one.
Almost no one. Xiao Wu -- if that was really her name -- had let him go, back in the village. She hadn’t needed to do that, and she hadn’t asked for anything in return. And there was something strange about her.
It was easy enough to sneak into the archives while the school was closed. He burned all of Xiao Wu’s records, starting with the proof that she’d used someone else’s recommendation letter to get into the school. Whatever she was hiding, no one would find it in Nuoding School.
And then he adjusted the records to show Tang San as graduated, and himself as withdrawn, and he walked away.
He had never wanted to be a Soul Master anyway; he had just been following Xiao Chen Yu, like always. He could go anywhere, as nobody. Just disappear into the world, and find a place where no one had ever heard of Nuoding City. He could start over.
7 - Xiao Wu
Did siblings not keep secrets from each other? For a long time she hadn’t had any secrets, and then for a longer time she hadn’t had any siblings, so maybe she’d forgotten.
Tang San had given her his secret about the Xuan Tian Records. It would be fair to give him her secret too. Right?
It was just -- it was hard to figure out how to say it. And she was in a disadvantageous position, in the middle of an unfamiliar city. It would be easier to get away in a forest, if things went badly.
Not that she thought things would go badly!
She scrunched up her nose. She just wasn’t sure they’d go well, either. She’d never actually told anyone that she’d been a Soul Beast before she was a human.
Besides, she reasoned, Tang San hadn’t blurted out his secret out of nowhere! He told her the truth when she asked about it. Maybe she could wait until he asked?
8 - Tang San
Xuan Tian Strike and Blue Silver Plant repelled each other. But he’d felt it combining with and supporting his Martial Soul during the fight.
With one of his Martial Souls, he realized. Could it be like a magnet? One side attracted; one side repelled? But he hadn’t felt any difficulty using his other Xuan Tian skills when he was fighting the Thorn Apple Snake.
He shook his head. It didn’t make sense.
“What’s wrong?” Xiao Wu asked.
“It’s nothing,” he answered quickly, and Xiao Wu made a face and poked his arm. He tried again. “I need to think about it more.”
That time she nodded. “You could… think about it while you braid my hair!”
“Now?” he said, not bothering to hide his smile. “It’s still night time; we should get some sleep.”
She nodded again, more enthusiastically. “What if someone else shows up for another test? We might have to fight them, and it would definitely help if you redid my braid first.”
Xiao Wu cheered when he agreed, which would have made it worth it even if he couldn’t braid and think at the same time. He thought he could probably braid in his sleep; it was so deep in his muscle memory -- and he wondered, suddenly, if that was the answer.
In the fight, after Xiao Wu went down, he’d lost control -- everything had been by instinct. And he’d spent years learning the hammer and forge, and the Xuan Tian Records alongside them. Of course it would take the same kind of practice to incorporate them with his Blue Silver Plant.
He paused long enough for Xiao Wu to tilt her head back and look at him, and he laughed. “I’m braiding, I’m braiding.”
It had never seemed strange that their house didn’t have a garden, even when the village aunties had shaken their heads over it. But looking back -- well, better to think of the present, anyway. Maybe Shi Lan Ke would give him some ideas.
9 - Yu Xiao Gang
He was three for three on unexpected reunions not going terribly, and he really hoped the fates would just -- let him be. Just for a while. Was that too much to ask?
Tang Hao had been the biggest surprise. They could barely have been called acquaintances, but back then everyone knew of the Hao Tian Hammer Soul Master, and he must have done his research in the time he’d been secretly following Tang San around Nuoding. It was probably lucky he hadn’t taken offense about his son attaching himself to a no-name teacher with only two soul rings.
(On the other hand, if he hadn’t been uncomfortably aware that Tang Hao could flatten him like a bug and not even break his stride, he wouldn’t have minded offending him a little. It was hard to reconcile what he knew about the legendary Soul Master of the Hao Tian Hammer with the stories Tang San had shared about his father, but it was clear he’d filled one role more gracefully than the other.)
Su Yun Tao had been the biggest mystery. He actually should have recognized him, outside the Rose Inn. If he hadn’t, that was -- mildly insulting, if he was honest, but not a bad outcome. If he had recognized him but pretended not to -- the potential implications were complex enough to make him remember why he’d been so glad to leave Martial Soul Hall in the first place.
Lan De had been -- could words describe it? The reunion he feared the most, and the one that had, somehow, turned out the best. For all that was still left unsaid between them, time had dulled the pain and given the good parts a chance to shine through.
10 - Xiao Wu
She was so tired of trying to sleep alone. And she could hardly believe that it was this -- this one thing! -- that was tripping her up. Not hearing too well or seeing too far; not knowing too much about some things and too little about others. Not the writing. Not even her temper! (Not yet, she admitted to herself.)
In all their plans, and all the practice, it had somehow never occurred to her that she wouldn’t be able to sleep. At least Shi Lan Ke didn’t have a curfew, so there were still interesting things happening at night. But she didn’t understand why it was fine for all of them to be close enough to touch while they were awake, but not allowed when they were asleep.
She was going to have to figure it out, somehow. Either a way to get rid of the rules, or a way to get around them. She couldn’t manage without sleep forever.
11 - Yu Xiao Gang
It was hard to avoid the only other person in a two-person camp, but Lan De had been determinedly ignoring him and pretending not to ever since they’d been left alone.
After his years at Nuoding School, Xiao Gang considered himself somewhat of an expert at determinedly ignoring other people. He was willing to let it go. At least until he found out what Lan De’s concern was. Or rather, until he found out which of the many potential concerns were bothering him most.
And then Lan De -- clearly fretting over the situation in the village, and who would have guessed he would be so watchful over his students, said, “They can’t stay in their room forever.”
They both froze at the words, and the ignoring suddenly became both more nervous and more two-sided.
It was too reminiscent of another time, another place. Another mystery solved by the Golden Iron Triangle, another morning after waking up to sunshine and laughter and warmth -- he had always been warm, back then.
And it had always been Lan De who was the voice of reason, who said things like, ‘We can’t stay in this room forever,’ and, ‘If you want to leave, no one’s stopping you.’
It was Lan De who left, this time, to check on the students. Xiao Gang breathed out a careful sigh once he was gone, and started packing up the camp. Anything to keep from thinking too much.
12 - Tang San
It was a clever trick, with the chickens. He was still trying to figure out if he could make it work with Blue Silver Plant.
“Are you training?” Xiao Wu popped up next to him. “Do you want to fight?”
He held out his hand so she could see what he was looking at. “I want to come up with a way to use Blue Silver Plant for monitoring.”
“Didn’t you already do that? At your house, you knew when your dad was there.”
He shook his head. “I could only tell that someone was there, not who. It wouldn’t be very useful here in the village. It’s too big, and there’s too many people coming and going.”
“What if you…” Xiao Wu trailed off in thought, and then brightened. “Just monitor the people, and not the space!”
“I don’t want to spy on anyone,” he protested, and Xiao Wu frowned.
“That’s true. But if it’s not a secret, it’s not spying, right?” She bounced closer. “I volunteer! You give me a seed, and we’ll test it!”
He tried to look serious, even as he was calling up a seed in his hand. “Is this just a way to get me to play hide and seek all afternoon and call it training?”
She plucked the seed out of his fingers and dove out the window, laughing. “Bye!”
13 - Yu Xiao Gang
“I can see you biting your tongue over there,” Lan De said casually. “You might as well say it; you haven’t read a single page since you sat down.”
“It’s none of my business,” he said, and Lan De raised his eyebrows.
“When has that ever stopped you?”
More times than he could count, and only some of them had become regrets. He set the book aside anyway, and leaned forward. “Your students,” he said.
Lan De held up his hand. “Your students,” he corrected.
He pretended surprise. “Oh, am I getting paid now? Am I the headmaster?”
“It’s my school, so I make the rules, and I say they’re your students. And that you have to tell me what you were thinking about so studiously, because you’ve avoided it twice now.”
“It’s really nothing,” he said.
“If it’s nothing, there’s no reason not to say it.” Lan De gave him a blandly innocent look. “Right?”
He sighed, but didn’t bother to hide that he was smiling. “Your students,” he said again, just to heckle. “Dai Mu Bai and Ou Si Ke. I know Shi Lan Ke doesn’t have a uniform, but -- is there a reason? With the --” He gestured at his own robes and trailed off, unable to find the words to describe their recent outfits. He thought netting might have been involved?
Lan De laughed, and then shook his finger at him. “You’re lucky -- you have seven students! I only had two! And they can’t fight each other!”
He frowned. “What does one have to do with the other?”
“Consider this,” Lan De said. “There are a limited number of ways that two students can compete that don’t involve hitting each other, when it comes to the improvement of Soul Master skills. Strategy is one one of those ways! Calculating odds, devising plans, understanding the consequences of one’s actions -- these things sharpen the mind!”
Generally, the more words Lan De used, the more he was trying to hide something. He ran the words back over in his head and could only come up with one conclusion. “Are you saying one of them lost a bet?”
“I’m saying they both did.” Lan De waved broadly towards the student dorms. “And now they’ve learned something! You’re welcome!”
14 - Xiao Wu
“Was it Tang San?”
The question took her by surprise -- she hadn’t expected anyone to still be awake. “What?”
Zhu Zhu Qing frowned. “You two got back late, and then immediately went into a secret meeting with Da Shi and the headmaster.”
“And you don’t look so good.” Ning Rong Rong tugged her towards Zhu Zhu Qing’s bed, and she dropped down between them.
“Did someone hurt you?” Zhu Zhu Qing asked. “Was it Tang San? I’ll kill him if he did.”
She shook her head quickly. “No, no, of course not!” Ning Rong Rong started rubbing her back, and she sighed happily. “We got to fight people, and we met Bu Le, and then I was poisoned,” she explained. Da Shi hadn’t said anything about not sharing that part, right? “That’s why we had to meet with the headmaster.”
“What?”
She held up her wrist so they could see the green lines. “It’s fine,” she said. “I’m just tired.”
Zhu Zhu Qing’s expression immediately softened. “You should rest. Stay still.”
She quickly snuggled her way into Qing-jie’s blankets, just in case she was about to suggest that separate beds would be more comfortable. But Ning Rong Rong tugged the top quilt around them both, and Qing-jie patted both their heads. She could hardly believe her luck. She should have gotten poisoned ages ago!
15 - Tang San
It felt wrong. It felt like being back at Nuoding School, watching students get ready to kill rabbits trapped in cages. He understood hunting for survival. He didn’t feel guilty about fighting back against the Human Faced Demon Spider when it had attacked him back home.
And yet -- weren’t they the ones intruding this time? Hunting in a group for a creature that simply had the bad luck to fly in their direction?
Everyone said Soul Beasts were dangerous, but their group was less wary in the forest than they’d been in town. And still, the first thing to seriously threaten them was no beast, but another Soul Master.
His dad said there were good Soul Beasts and bad Soul Beasts, just like there were good and bad people. Xiao Wu said she wanted to find a way to advance a person’s martial soul without killing.
(And he did feel guilty about the Hunted Vine. He dreamed of it at night, sometimes.)
Could there be another way?
16 - Yu Xiao Gang
“Did you know?”
He shook his head, confident that Lan De would be able to see it even in the dark. “I wasn’t sure. Not until today.” Something in the tone of the question made him frown. “Did you know?”
Lan De shifted next to him, probably waving a hand. “Knowing, not knowing -- she’s not the first one I’ve met, that’s all.”
“Not the --” He couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud, no matter how private their rooms were supposed to be. “Really?”
“Not all of us spent the last twenty years hiding in a library,” Lan De said. “Does Tang San know?”
He shook his head again. “I don’t think so.” He wouldn’t have been so worried in the forest if he did, probably. Or he would have been worried about different things, at least.
“They’re both as reckless as each other,” Lan De said. “Soul power transference at that level --”
“Is impossible.”
Lan De scoffed. “Is it? We saw it with our own eyes, unless you weren’t just pretending to pass out.”
He hadn’t entirely been pretending. “It’s said to be impossible, then.”
“Mm. And who benefits from that being the truth?”
He didn’t have any answers to that.
17 - Tang San
The first hints of dawn were starting to show, but it was still dark enough that he heard the headmaster’s sigh before he could see him. It wasn’t a surprise; the plants had alerted him as soon as he crossed the circle.
“Do any of you ever sleep?” the headmaster asked.
He kept his eyes on the trees. “Ou Si Ke is sleeping.”
“Ah. Well, that’s good. I taught him well.” The headmaster sat down with another sigh. And then nothing.
Finally, the question grew too loud to keep contained in his own head. “Was it just me, that he didn’t want?”
The pause was long enough that he’d started to regret asking, and then the headmaster said, “What makes you say that?”
“You knew him,” he said. Guessed, really.
The headmaster shrugged. “I knew of him. We never met.”
“And my mother?”
“Ah -- no. I’m sorry.” The headmaster’s voice was hesitant.
“He said she died when I was a baby. That was all he ever told me.” He held up his palm and let the Blue Silver Plant shimmer into existence. “He didn’t want me to learn my martial soul. But Su Yun Tao said it would come from one of my parents, and I wanted to know more about her.”
He was angry that his father might be involved in a plot that was hurting so many people, but the more he’d thought about it, the more he’d realized that wasn’t the only thing he was angry about.
“Everyone knew him. No one knew her.” He let the plant twine around his hand and up his arm.
He didn’t say ‘doesn’t that seem strange to you?’ or ‘my father spent the last ten years acting like his life was over, and as soon as I left he miraculously recovered.’
“I thought he was sad that she was gone,” he said instead, and the vine disappeared in a shower of sparks. “But maybe he was sad that I was there.”
“Tang San,” the headmaster said. For once, he sounded entirely serious. “Love is the easiest thing in the world to feel, and the hardest thing in the world to share.”
There was a pause, like the headmaster got distracted by something, but then he added, “Whatever you find out, Shi Lan Ke’s doors will always be open to you.”
18 - Xiao Wu
There were three things she could say with confidence that she had learned since her last report. (There were more, but Da Ming was busy, and birds could usually only remember three things at a time anyway.)
One: teleporting was an exceptionally great power. And fun! Two: Ning Rong Rong wasn’t as good at braiding as Tang San, but it was still very nice.
And three: Ou Si Ke was definitely covering for her.
She wasn’t sure what to think about the last one. She couldn’t tell how much he was doing it on purpose, and how much was just his natural inclination towards peacemaking. She couldn’t even tell if he knew what he was helping to obscure.
But if he did know, it didn’t seem fair that she still hadn’t told Tang San. She made a face. Even if he didn’t know, it didn’t seem fair. But not telling him for so long hadn’t made it any easier to say out loud.
19 - Tang San
‘Don’t make the same mistake twice.’ Like most good advice, it was easy to agree with, and hard to put into practice.
“Xiao Wu,” he said carefully.
She beamed at him. “That’s me!”
It had been worth being interrogated by Zhu Zhu Qing and Ning Rong Rong to win their cooperation. They would make sure no one tried to eavesdrop or interrupt -- at least for a while.
“I’ve been thinking. In Star Forest, I was worried about you.”
Xiao Wu nodded, and then poked him in the shoulder. “I was worried about you too! You almost died!”
He didn’t bother reminding her that she had also almost died -- because of him. “You know that when I first woke up, I didn’t remember anything that happened. But lately I’ve started to remember more.”
“Oh.” Xiao Wu bit her lip. “Just a little more?”
She looked so hopeful; he couldn’t help smiling. “Xiao Wu, I won’t ask if you don’t want to tell me.” More quietly, he added, “I promised to protect you; to stand between you and anyone who would threaten you. I just want to make sure I’m obstructing your enemies, and not your allies.”
She threw her arms around him and whispered the truth he’d already guessed into his ear. He hugged her back, and then laughed when she tugged on his hair. “Something else?” he said.
Xiao Wu nodded again. “I don’t want you to stand between me and any enemies. I promised to protect you too, remember?”
She spun so they were side by side. “You can stand next to me, and I’ll stand next to you.”
20 - Yu Xiao Gang
“Zhao Wu Ji was a student of Shi Lan Ke?”
It wasn’t subtle, and Lan De would definitely be laughing at him if his thoughts weren’t so far away.
“Yes.” Lan De shook his head, visibly pulling himself back to the present. “He won’t tell anyone, if that’s what you’re hinting at.”
It was too late to pretend ignorance, but that wasn’t going to stop him from trying. If nothing else, it would break the tension. “Tell anyone?” he repeated.
Lan De waved his hand dismissively. “It’s a good thing you’ve taken over their education. This younger generation doesn’t even recognize something as famous as the Hao Tian Hammer martial soul!” He gave a short laugh. “I might have made it harder to see. Just a little.”
Which would explain Dai Mu Bai’s objection to ‘strange tricks.’ He sighed. “You knew the whole time.” No wonder he hadn’t pushed for more information on Tang San’s father.
Lan De gave him a bland look. “I didn’t know I was harboring a fugitive.”
He broke eye contact first. “It was a misunderstanding.”
“Oh?” Such a simple question, but it contained multitudes.
He made a face. “It wasn’t us,” he offered.
“Us?” Lan De tsk’d at him. “Xiao Gang, you’ve been holding out on me.” He quickly poured tea for both of them, and then leaned back against a stack of books. “Now. Tell me everything.”
21 - Xiao Wu
It probably wasn’t the best idea to vent her frustration with the one person who knew her secret by sharing that secret with more people. But they had waited up for her, and tucked her into their nest of blankets, and she liked them so much!
And they were going to leave, and she was going to stay, and the words just came out. Besides, it turned out they knew anyway.
“You knew? How?”
Zhu Zhu Qing shrugged. “Rong Rong told me.”
Ning Rong Rong blushed. “I only realized when we were traveling.” She leaned back and gave an abbreviated bow. “Qibao Amber Tribe offers our support and protection.”
Xiao Wu blinked. She knew what all those words meant, but she couldn’t make them make sense together. “What?”
“Qibao Amber Tribe is almost entirely Support Branch Soul Masters. We don’t fight. How do you think we still have so many Soul Saints with seven soul rings?”
She tipped her head to one side, considering. “You’re all very cute?”
Ning Rong Rong laughed. “Xi Si City isn’t the only place where people live cooperatively with Soul Beasts. Both of my soul rings were freely given. It’s not something we share outside the Tribe.”
Zhu Zhu Qing patted her hand. “Keep breathing, meimei. Even in the Xing Luo Empire, there are ancient stories of human Soul Beasts, working alongside Soul Masters for a common goal.”
She was so confused. “But -- if people know. Then why?” Soul Beasts and Soul Masters didn’t have to be enemies! Wouldn’t that be better?
“Why are Tian Dou and Xing Luo considered enemies?” Zhu Zhu Qing said. “Why do the Seven Tribes fight amongst themselves? There will always be conflict.”
“One stone can’t change the course of a river.” Ning Rong Rong draped another blanket around them. “Not even seven stones. But we can still help.”
22 - Yu Xiao Gang
“It’s fate, Xiao Gang.” Lan De put his feet up on the crate in front of him, and tucked his hands behind his head. “You can’t argue with fate.”
He made sure Lan De was watching him before he rolled his eyes. “It’s a sandstorm.”
“The whole time we were crossing the desert, we didn’t see a single sign of bad weather. And yet as soon as we tried to separate, we were forced back together. That’s fate, my friend, whether you agree or not. Clearly we’re not meant to be apart.”
He wanted it to be true. He wanted a lot of things. He changed the subject. “Aren’t you worried about them?”
“The students?” Lan De shook his head. “No, they’ll be fine. All of them are far too self-sacrificing on their own, but when they have each other to look out for, they’ll find a way.”
“Even against everything they’re going to face?”
Lan De waved off the question. “We just need to come up with a way to keep all of them together.”
He rolled his eyes again, but he couldn’t help smiling. “And by we, you mean me.”
“Of course! I leave the strategy in your more-than capable hands.”
23 - Tang San
He let himself take a breath. To let their trust and acceptance shore up what his doubts had been eroding away. But he couldn’t let them fight without knowing the full truth.
“There’s more,” he said.
No one looked surprised.
Xiao Wu jumped in while he was still searching for words. “Tang San can use Blue Silver Plant seeds to track everyone’s position when we fight,” she said. She pointed at one of the pins in her hair, then pulled it out and passed it around the table.
“Well?” Dai Mu Bai asked impatiently. “Is that it?”
It wasn’t, but that also wasn’t the reaction he’d been expecting. “You’re not upset?” he said.
Dai Mu Bai looked at Zhu Zhu Qing, who shrugged. “Xing Luo has -- ways of tracking people too,” he answered. “Strategically, it’s a good idea.”
Well, that was one thing covered, at least. “There’s more,” he said.
“Is it about the Hao Tian Hammer Soul Master being your dad?” Ning Rong Rong asked. “We know.”
“We’re following you, not your family,” Zhu Zhu Qing said.
Ou Si Ke was frowning at his notebook. “If he was with you until… but Nightfire Village was… I don’t think the timing matches up,” he muttered. As soon as he looked up and realized everyone was looking at him, he waved it off. “It’s nothing, it’s nothing. That was it, right?”
Tang San hesitated, and Ou Si Ke groaned. “There’s more?” He shook the notebook. “This is an unrealistic number of secrets! Brother San, leave some for the rest of us!”
It broke through the tension that had been thrumming in his chest. He held up his right hand, and let the Blue Silver Plant unfurl in his palm. And then he held up his left hand, and unclenched his fingers. The Hao Tian Hammer shimmered into view.
Chapter 24 - Xiao Wu
“Do you regret telling us?”
Tang San startled out of whatever thoughts he’d been lost in. “What? No, of course not!”
He’d been distracted ever since they left Xi Si City, but he kept insisting he was fine. It was obviously her responsibility as his sister to pester him until he talked. “Are you… hungry? Thirsty? Are you bored?”
He gave her a look that said he knew what she was doing. “How could I be bored when you’re here?”
She beamed. “That’s right!” She poked his shoulder. “So, what’s wrong?”
Tang San sighed. “I’m worried,” he said finally.
She nodded, as if that hadn’t been perfectly obvious. “Are you worried that we’re not strong enough to help you?”
He looked genuinely surprised, so she tried again. “Are you worried that you’re not strong enough to help us?”
That seemed closer, since Tang San looked upset. “What if you get hurt because of me?”
“You should give us more credit,” she said. “And yourself.” She leaned closer. “We all chose to help Dai Mu Bai when he fought his brother, and we all chose to help you in Xi Si City. Because it was the right thing to do.”
If anything, Tang San looked more conflicted, rather than less. It seemed simple to her, but she wasn’t an only child, and Qing-jie said that made a difference.
Tang San said, “What if -- what if I’m not sure what the right thing is? What if I’m not sure I want to know the answers we’ll find?”
“Then that’s even more reason to stay together, so we can keep reminding you!”
Chapter 25 - Yu Xiao Gang
Not talking about it had worked with Lan De, but he had the feeling his reprieve had come to an end. So he talked about the students -- their skills, how they worked together, what he still wanted each of them to accomplish before the competition. He had more to say than he expected.
Liu Er Long nodded attentively the whole time, but as soon as he paused, she said, “Are the two of you sleeping together?”
He choked. “No!” His face must have given him away, because she just raised her eyebrows. “Yes. Not like that, though!”
The eyebrows went higher.
“We hardly sleep at all!” No, that made it sound much worse. “I mean, we’ve been traveling.” He tried again. “Someone has to stay on watch.”
She frowned. “Isn’t that one of the duties of the students?”
“They’re the ones we’re keeping watch for,” he said, exasperation bleeding into his tone.
“Oh?” Er Long suddenly looked delighted. “Are your students in the habit of getting into trouble at night?”
He sighed. If only they restricted it to nighttime. “They get in trouble at all times of day.”
If anything, she only looked more intrigued. “I think I’m looking forward to meeting them, in that case.”
Interlude - Lan De and Er Long
He knew as soon as she stepped out of her room, but he waited until she was on the balcony with him to nod a greeting.
Er Long leaned on the railing, and stared out at the grounds. “I looked for him, after.”
“Mm. So did I.”
“At first I thought he was avoiding us on purpose, because he knew Martial Soul Hall was watching us. And then I thought -- maybe he really did it. Just picked a direction and kept walking, like we always talked about. But Nuoding?” She made a face. “We should have been able to find him in Nuoding.”
He shrugged. He didn’t disagree.
“Someone was hiding him.”
“Or someone was hiding something else, and he benefited by being nearby.” He risked a glance in her direction, only to find her already staring at him.
“You know who it was,” she said.
He hadn’t actually planned out what to tell her, and when. But he was increasingly convinced that they were all in well over their heads, and could use all the help they could get. “I have a guess,” he said. “Let’s talk inside.”
26 - Tang San
There was something about the Venom Soul Master. It kept teasing at the edges of his awareness, and then disappearing whenever he tried to focus on it.
(He hoped Xiao Wu had gotten her rabbits. He hoped no one was too worried about him. He hoped they didn’t get into trouble trying to rescue him.)
He should have been frightened. Alarmed, at the very least. He’d been snatched off a busy street and poisoned, then woke up alone in a strange place, only to be threatened and then poisoned (again).
Instead he felt -- like he wasn’t entirely sure he needed to be rescued. Maybe it was just recognition of the man’s determination to save Du Gu Yan. Hadn’t he felt the same, when it was Xiao Wu who was in danger?
But the more he thought about it, the more he was sure there was more to it than that. The valley, the voice he’d heard -- the Venom Soul Master was important. And somehow, impossibly, familiar.
27 - Yu Xiao Gang
Theoretically, martial soul fusion between three people with unequal soul power should have been possible. It was nice to have that theory validated. Seventy percent chance of success; thirty percent chance of a quick and painful death by soul power overload. Wouldn’t that have surprised the old Grand Soul Land Master!
“What are you mumbling about?” Lan De said. “You’re the one who said we should leave them there.”
The rush of not dying had kept him on his feet long enough to exit the caves, but his vision kept tunneling. He wasn’t sure how much further they had to go. (He wasn’t sure how much further he could go.)
“Tang San tested one of my theories,” he tried to explain. “He could have died then. This was fair.”
“You’re not making any sense,” Er Long said, from much closer than he expected, and he swayed backwards to focus on her face. “Who could have died?”
“It’s like the tide.” He tried to wave his hand to demonstrate. “Don’t tell Lan De,” he said.
Her eyes went wide. “You could have died? Are you dying now?”
That was a hard question. “It’s the tide,” he repeated. “It came in, and now it’s gone out again.”
“Xiao Gang,” she said, and her voice sounded urgent. “Focus. Dying, or not dying?”
He sighed, and closed his eyes. That was nice. Restful. “Not dying.”
Somehow, Er Long’s voice was even closer the next time she spoke. “Are you about to pass out? Because I volunteer to carry you if you are.”
“You’re very strong,” he agreed, and then the ground tilted, and he was falling.
28 - Xiao Wu
How did you say, ‘I think I knew your mom,’ to someone who never had the chance to meet her?
The interspace had felt familiar as soon as they entered, but she hadn’t been sure -- she’d grown up in a forest, after all. Soul-power infused plants had been her refuge for hundreds of years.
It wasn’t uncommon for Soul Plants to reach the ten thousand year mark. Almost no one with a plant martial soul pursued Soul Mastery, so they had fewer threats to avoid, and they tended towards cooperation rather than competition. But it was extremely uncommon for any of them to decide to become human.
Ah Yin had been the last.
When her soul rings were returned to her, she knew. Everyone’s soul power felt different, and she’d known Ah Yin’s ever since she was tiny.
“Xiao Wu?” Tang San reached for her hand, and she realized she was crying. “What’s wrong?”
Did he realize? “Your mother,” she said, not bothering to wipe away the tears. “Ah Yin.”
Tang San was still looking at her. “She left this place for me,” he said quietly. “She was a Soul Beast, wasn’t she? A Soul Plant.”
“I knew her,” she said. “Before either of us were human. She’s the reason I wanted to become a Soul Master.”
Tang San smiled -- it was a small one, but genuine. “Me too.”
29 - Xiao Wu
How hard could it be to kiss someone? Lots of people must have figured it out.
Did she even want to kiss Tang San? She hadn’t considered it until Rong Rong said she could try it. Couldn’t they just bump noses, and she could tuck her head under his chin, and he could put his arms around her?
But now that she’d started thinking about it, the thought wouldn’t go away.
Er Ming always said that if you wanted something to happen, you couldn’t just think about it. Besides, they had plenty of time before the auction started, and no one was around to interrupt them.
She took a deep breath. “Tang San.” She tugged him out of the main walking path and into a small alcove. “I want to try kissing you. What do you think?”
He froze. “You -- I --” He cleared his throat. “Are you sure?” She nodded, and he reached out to link their fingers together. “Then yes, I would also like to try -- that. Kissing. With you.”
It turned out kissing wasn’t hard at all. And when she tucked her head under his chin afterwards, and they put their arms around each other, it was even better than she’d imagined.
30 - Tang San
Sunset Forest made his skin crawl. He was on edge as soon as they stepped inside -- splitting up made sense, but it felt wrong. Xiao Wu kept frowning at the trees. “What is it?” he asked.
“Have you seen any Blue Silver Plants?” she said.
He shook his head, and had to remind himself not to step even closer to her. Something in his head was screaming a warning, and it was making it hard to think of anything except getting out of the forest as quickly as possible.
“There is no Blue Silver Plant in Sunset Forest,” Da Shi said, like it was just another interesting piece of information he’d learned during his research.
“Why?” He was clutching Xiao Wu’s wrist like a lifeline.
Da Shi shrugged. “No one knows. Let’s keep moving.”
Right. Deeper into the forest. He shivered, and tried to hide it with a cough.
Teacher Liu patted his shoulder. “Trust your instincts. There are plenty of things that can kill you that have never been written down in a book.”
It shouldn’t have been reassuring, but somehow he felt a little better as they continued on.
31 - Yu Xiao Gang
“Your students are so much trouble,” Er Long said admiringly.
It was true. “I did warn you,” he muttered.
“Mm, I remember.” She leaned into his shoulder. “Lan De told me you were exaggerating.”
He was fairly sure she was laughing at him. He was definitely sure he deserved it. He couldn’t even claim that he hadn’t realized they were trouble when he first met them.
“Didn’t you say you were going to get more tea?” he asked instead.
Er Long waved her hand. “I sent Dai Mu Bai to bring it. He’s a prince; it will be good for him. Networking.”
He stared. “Dai Mu Bai is a prince of Xing Luo. Du Gu Bo is the secret weapon of the Tian Dou Empire! How is that a good idea?”
“The Tian Dou Empire just tried to have your student murdered,” Er Long retorted. “And one Soul Master in their debt changed his mind, while another rushed here to defend him. How is it not a good idea?”
She leaned back, suddenly serious. “The students are trouble because they won’t, or can’t, follow the traditional paths. You can’t count on them making traditional allies.”
That was also true. “So you’ll surround them with non-traditional ones instead?”
“Isn’t that why you sent them to Shi Lan Ke to begin with? It’s your plan, A-Gang, I’m just saying I agree.”
32 - Xiao Wu
It was nice to not have to pretend she couldn’t see in the dark. Rong Rong followed her without hesitation as they snuck into Zhu Zhu Qing’s room.
“Qing-jie!” she whispered loudly. “Are you awake?”
A tiny light started glowing from the bed. “I slept all afternoon; of course I’m awake. Where have you been?”
“We had to wait for Brother Dai to leave! He was here for so long!” Rong Rong gave a dramatic sigh, and climbed up on the bed without asking.
That left her with Zhu Zhu Qing’s injured side, and she carefully tucked herself as close as she could without jostling her shoulder. “How does it feel? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Better now.” There was a pause, and then she added, “Rong Rong, how did you get away? I thought Teacher Liu was watching you.”
“They’re all busy with Tang San,” Rong Rong said easily. “Someone came to kill him. He’s fine, though.”
Zhu Zhu Qing startled. “Again?”
Xiao Wu giggled, and then bit her lip. “Sorry. It’s not funny.”
“It’s a little funny,” Rong Rong countered, and she leaned over Zhu Zhu Qing to poke her. “So? You were there, right? Tell us everything!”
33 - Tang San
Chief Ning was definitely underestimating Ou Si Ke.
He loved theater, and he loved being a Soul Master. He just had to decide if he could hold them both in his heart at the same time.
If he could, he would join them in the arena, fully committed and without any doubts. If not, he would surely be supporting them from the sidelines. He would still be their friend, their teammate, their brother -- just happier, knowing that it had been fully his own choice.
And wasn’t that better? Wasn’t that why they were there? Being a team wasn’t about winning the competition or fighting together; it was about choosing to support each other. And they had all chosen to support Ou Si Ke.
One way or another, he was one of the Seven Devils of Shi Lan Ke, and he was stuck with them.
34 - Yu Xiao Gang
After everything, Lan De had the nerve to show up while he was preparing breakfast, like it was any other morning. “Everything settled?” he asked.
Xiao Gang threw the spoon at his head. As expected, Lan De caught it easily, but it still spattered him with food. Petty, but satisfying. “I can’t believe you left me! All night! Where were you? You were not ‘training’ that whole time.”
“Of course not.” Lan De waved the hand not holding the spoon. “I was napping. I’m not as young as I used to be, you know.”
He rolled his eyes, and Lan De gave him an innocent look. “What was I supposed to do? You said you wanted to sort things out with her. She said she wanted to sort things out with you.”
“I --” He hesitated. “She said that?”
Lan De sighed. “You’re each as bad as the other.”
“What about the two of you?” It was the Golden Iron Triangle, after all -- it took all three of them to make it work, and it had taken all three of them to make it stop working.
But Lan De just looked at him. “We had fewer things to sort out,” he said finally.
He grabbed the spoon back and stirred furiously. He hated not knowing why they were doing this. (He hated that he couldn’t make himself believe them when they told him.)
“Xiao Gang,” Lan De said gently. “You know I have the greatest respect for your abilities as a scholar and a teacher. But it might help to look at this from a different perspective.”
“I can’t be more than I am.” No matter how much he wanted to be.
“And you shouldn’t try to be any less than you are either.” Lan De watched him stir for a while, then nodded and turned away.
He stared after him. “Now where are you going?”
“To wake the students!” Lan De waved over his shoulder. “It’s a beautiful morning, Xiao Gang! A beautiful day for learning!”
35 - Xiao Wu
There was something wrong with the city. Or maybe with Martial Soul Hall itself; and it was seeping out into the city like a poison. It was different than the fear, although that was there too -- the sense that something nearby thought she was prey, and was hunting her.
They were related, she thought, but they weren’t from exactly the same source.
She knew her easy acceptance of staying with the group had surprised the others. Rong Rong kept sending her worried glances, and they’d all shifted into a more defensive formation. Even Teacher Liu seemed tense.
She wondered if the teachers knew. If that was why the Headmaster had arrived on time alone, and the rest of them took the slowest possible route.
“Are you all right?” Rong Rong asked quietly. “Da Shi won’t let anything happen to Tang San.”
Rong Rong’s family had been in the city for weeks. She shook her head. “Let’s talk later.”
36 - Tang San
“If things go wrong, we’ll rescue them.”
The words were out of his mouth before he had time to think it through. But even when the Headmaster shook his head, he couldn’t regret saying them.
He wasn’t worried about Dai Mu Bai fighting his brother. He and Zhu Zhu Qing were more than capable -- their Martial Soul Fusion made them Dai Wei Shi’s equal in strength and power, and their teamwork would give them a significant advantage.
Besides, the Xing Luo battle team would obey the rules of the contest; he was sure of it. He was considerably less sure that Martial Soul Hall would do the same.
The air itself felt oppressive. The Chief of Martial Soul Hall had them all trapped in her web, and Xiao Wu was gripping his wrist tight enough to bruise. The death match in the arena felt like the least dangerous part of the day.
Not for the first time, he wondered if they were ready for what was coming.
37 - Yu Xiao Gang
It was easy to forget, watching the students exchange courtesies after a perfectly fair match. He could almost pretend it was exactly what Martial Soul Hall claimed -- a school contest, a chance for the younger generation to share knowledge. A competition that might not be friendly, but one that every school had agreed would adhere to the rules of Soul Master combat.
Except that he’d watched one member of Martial Soul Hall’s battle team attempt an attack after their opponent surrendered, and another interfere from outside the arena, and the referee had turned a blind eye to both.
Except that he was watching the continent’s strongest schools display their top fighters and reveal their best strategies to an audience of one, and it didn’t feel like a competition. It felt like a trap.
They had no way of knowing who was behind the assassination plot. It could even be Bi Bi Dong herself. After all, what better excuse to eliminate multiple powerful enemies at once than to have them attack first?
For the moment, all they could do was let things play out. Er Long was keeping their allies informed with what little they knew, and reaching out with Chief Ning to all of the tribes with a presence in Martial Soul City. It probably wasn’t safe, and it definitely wasn’t subtle. He only hoped it would be enough.
38 - Xiao Wu
They gathered in Teacher Liu’s room. (“I’m not using it,” she’d told them, and no one had dared ask for more information.) It was the only place in the city where they could relax -- the one place they didn’t have to assume they were being spied on and speak accordingly.
She turned into Tang San’s arms as soon as they stepped over the threshold, and hid her tears in his shoulder. So many Soul Beasts killed -- so much family lost, and for what? Power? Did the reason even matter?
Tang San kissed the top of her head. She closed her eyes, and let him lead her to the others. She could hear them talking -- their voices blending into a comforting hum as the words washed over her. A nest of blankets and her favorite people all around her -- she cried harder, for everyone who would never get to experience such joy.
She wasn’t sure how long they were there, but eventually she managed to push her tears aside and sit up. Ma Hong Jun passed her a cup of water, and Rong Rong squeezed her free hand. “Aren’t we supposed to be talking about the plan?” she asked.
“Later,” Dai Mu Bai said firmly.
Zhu Zhu Qing patted her hair. “You’re more important than plans, meimei.”
39 - Tang San
If it really was just a school competition, it didn’t matter if they lost -- the point was to compete; the outcome was secondary. You could learn as much from a loss as a win, after all.
And if it wasn’t a school competition (it definitely wasn’t), it also didn’t matter if they lost. It had been rigged from the start, influenced by far too many plots and secrets and conflicting agendas. Walking away would likely be as dangerous as continuing.
Even if they won the match, there was still a chance they’d lose their lives in whatever happened afterwards. Their list of allies was alarmingly short compared to their list of people who might show up but refused to commit to any particular goal or action.
But Xiao Wu was right -- being a Soul Master was about facing challenges, even when you weren’t sure you could overcome them. This was a fight they’d inherited, and it was a fight they’d all chosen, to defend the people they loved.
Sometimes you fought because to do otherwise would go against everything your heart cried out for in the dark. Win or lose, they would keep the fight going as long as they could. The rest would be up to the others.
40 - Yu Xiao Gang
“What are you doing?” he hissed.
Er Long patted his arm and leaned even closer, but didn’t take her eyes off the arena. “Why, is she glaring at me again?”
“Mm.” Lan De edged closer on her other side. “Like she’s imagining your corpse.”
“Better me than the students,” Er Long said. “She was looking a little twitchy up there.” She squeezed his arm gently. “Relax. It’ll be our turn soon enough.”
He sighed. “I hate this plan.”
They all hated it. Unfortunately, they hadn’t been able to come up with anything better. It felt wrong to stand around while everyone else was taking action, but someone had to be the decoy, and they were the most logical choice.
“Start thinking about your lesson plans instead,” Lan De said, nodding at the arena. “You need to be able to teach the next class to do that too, or people will say it’s just Tang San.”
He made a face. “It’s not just Tang San. They’re a team; that’s why they can do it.” The words came easily for once, and he added, “We could do it.”
He could feel Lan De practically radiating smugness, and Er Long beamed. “Yes, we could.”
Epilogue - Xiao Wu
“Actually, she’s already strong.”
She hadn’t heard them arrive, but she felt it when Zhu Zhu Qing dropped onto the ground next to her and put her arm around her shoulders.
Rong Rong’s voice came from her other side. “And fearless.” They must have finished relocating the students, then.
Da Shi stepped between her and Tang Hao. He looked taller than usual. “And she’s saved Tang San’s life at least seven times.”
In her lap, Tang San stirred. “More like ten,” he said. “Xiao Wu --” He coughed, but his gaze was strong when he met her eyes. “Please don’t go.”
She didn’t want to. She wanted to stay with Tang San, like they had promised. Weren’t they stronger together than apart?
Tang San linked their fingers together, and looked at his father. “What you’re talking about -- sharing power; Xiao Wu has already done it.” He gave her an exasperated glance. “She’s doing it right now.”
She guiltily pulled her hand back. She didn’t think he’d noticed.
Da Shi turned his back on Tang Hao, and nodded at her. “Tang San once asked me, what’s the point of being strong, if it means abandoning the friends you’ve gone through life and death with.”
“The most important thing isn’t strength,” Zhu Zhu Qing said quietly.
She wanted to laugh, and jump, and hug them all -- of course it was Ou Si Ke who had been right from the very beginning. “It’s kindness.” She looked at Tang San. “Where you go, I go,” she said.
He smiled. “And where you go, I go.”
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