卧虎藏龙 (wò hǔ cáng lóng ) – crouching tiger, hidden dragon; a Master hiding their abilities.

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Zéyì was speechless.

She should say something, but what? Every thought had escaped her brain as she stared at the woman now rising from the water. Even the usually garrulous demon prince seemed to be lost for words. The pair stared mutely as Miss Fén stepped smoothly from the water, at once completely dry.

Her cool grey-brown eyes fixed Zéyì where she stood. In that moment, it seemed as though she could devour her whole, without blinking.

"I just... wanted to see..." The words came out as a pathetic croak, Zéyì desperately forcing the words from her seized-up throat. A sudden cascade of tears followed, unexpected. In fact, everyone seemed a bit shocked. Miss Fén looked dumbfounded rather than murderous, while the prince patted her shoulder awkwardly with a shaking hand.

But the tears wouldn't stop, and now Zéyì felt a rush of heat through her neck, her hands balled into fists, her teeth suddenly clenched. Was it so much to ask, for someone to understand a little, to comfort her a little? After all these years...

She lowered her head.

"I was wrong about you," she said hollowly. There was a pressure building in her head and her heart and her stomach. The demon prince's hand froze, before it could pat her again. Miss Fén shifted her weight, slightly, slightly, left foot back, pressure on the right foot...

The former princess made a strange little shiver, and giggled. White light flickered in her left eye.

"Uh... dàjiě? GAH!"

Dark energy poured out of Zéyì, knocking Prince Fàn Bì'ān flat and enveloping him completely. In two steps, she had left him behind. As though they were claws, Zéyì had driven her fingers through the collar of Miss Fén's robes, pulling the other woman towards her with these shreds of fabric. In that moment, the demon hunter had forgotten how to breathe. Their faces were mere centimetres away, Zéyì's distorted by a manic grin and eyes blackened to voids, Miss Fén's frozen in surprise.

"WAS IT SO MUCH TO ASK?" Zéyì shrieked, the dark energy pouring off her to invade Miss Fén's hair, wrapping around her throat.

"... What do you need, Meí Guī?"

"DON'T CALL ME THAT!" Zéyì shook her captive back and forth with astonishing strength. "YOU CAN'T... You... You..."

Claws of dark energy scraped around Miss Fén's eyes. With one lithe movement, she twisted free of Zéyì, then dodged a ball of dark energy that rocketed towards her. It slammed into a dead tree and broke it to tiny shreds.

"What... what's going on, Zéyì?"

CRASH! The boulder before them blew to pieces, sharp shards slicing the air around them. Miss Fén dodged and weaved in a ring around the furious Zéyì, who was now wildly striking out without any strategy.

"Tell me!" Zéyì couldn't move, as Miss Fén had closed the distance between them and seized her wrists tightly. She snarled and whimpered, her eyes rolling back to show the whites, unseeing but still overflowing with tears. The dark energy around her wavered. A little cloud was creeping in around them, somehow rising from somewhere in that parched land.

"Meí Guī, I think... you're sick."

Zéyì laughed horribly, and cried, and trembled.

"What do you need me to do for you?"

"DIE! DIE DIE DI-" Zéyì choked and coughed, and a little of her left eye cleared. "... kill me..."

"Is that what you want?"

"... I'm... I'm so... so tired. I can't... Miss Fén..."

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Your Highness."

Zéyì wailed. The strength in her legs left her and she dangled in Miss Fén's hands, head bowed in exhausted despair. "LET ME DIE!"

Miss Fén had swept her up, one hand pressed against the side of her neck. It felt pleasantly cool against her fevered skin, she thought. Then she sank into unconsciousness.

She woke, groggy, in the dark.

Alone.

At first, she remained motionless, crushed flat by the realisation of her solitude. Her body no longer belonged to her. In a moment, she was certain, her heart would simply give up and let her finally be at peace.

But it didn't, it kept beating and she kept breathing and began to shake uncontrollably.

It was then that her dimmed senses realised that she as covered by something, and that her wrists felt heavy, as though... She winced, pulse hammering in her head. What had happened just before she passed out?

She gingerly felt at the thing covering her, and at the objects around her wrists. The covering appeared to be some kind of silken fabric, extraordinary light and smooth. Around her wrists were heavy bracelets of some kind of stone, and she couldn't remove them. As she felt them over and over in the dark, she heard the slightest of sounds beside her.

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"... awake yet?"

".. Fàn Bì'ān?"

"Yep!"

"Where's... Miss Fén?"

"No idea."

Zéyì found herself shaking again. She should get up... run... before Miss Fén came back...

It was too late. She heard the soft swish of something approaching smoothly and rapidly, then a small light flared up suddenly. Zéyì shrank back as Miss Fén approached, apparently carrying a tiny but continuously flaring and crackling ball of bright blue light in one hand. She was dressed once more in her adventurer's attire, long hair mostly pulled into a high ponytail, but the cheerful smile that Zéyì had remembered was no longer there.

Zéyì turned away. The thing covering her fell down and in the light she now saw it was one of Miss Fén's outer robes, a rich fabric of an unusual brown shade with a proud dragon embroidered in gold thread on the back. The objects on her wrists were a pair of large obsidian bracelets.

Miss Fén gracefully crouched down beside her. "Zéyì?" Her voice was oddly careful. "How are you feeling?"

No response. Zéyì didn't dare to look at her. She held her stomach anxiously.

"Your Highness, I... please accept my apologies."

Zéyì didn't turn, but she frowned.

"I need to tell you some things. I... don't really know if they will help. Your Highness, may I speak with you?"

Zéyì took a deep breath, tidied her hair, then turned, her eyes cast to the ground so that she would not have to look at Miss Fén. Prince Fàn Bì'ān seemed to be watching eagerly, his dark eyes gleaming with the light that Miss Fén carried. Zéyì had no energy to even glare at him.

Miss Fén had let the crackling ball of light go, and now it hung above them, spinning and spitting. She bowed slightly to Zeyi.

"Your Highness Chūn Zéyì, please allow me to reintroduce myself. My name is Gong Lau Jan(1), the Second Lady of the Zyu Gong Palace(2)."

Zéyì bowed politely in response. "I suppose I should re-introduce myself. I am Zéyì. I have no titles."

"So you're dropping the family name then?" the demon prince interrupted.

"I suppose we've mutually disowned each other."

"Fair enough, fair enough. Well, I'm His Highness Fàn Bì'ān, Crown Prince of the Eastern Demonic Kingdom, Terror of-"

"I am... a loong(3)."

"..."

The trio stared at each other.

Eventually, the demon prince sighed and flopped backwards. "Damn, I was hoping you would keep avoiding the topic and cause a bunch of misunderstandings."

Zéyì wanted to hit him, but pinched the bridge of her nose instead. "Could you clarify, Miss Fé- Miss Gong? Do you mean to say you are a literal loong?"

There was a shiver, and a pair of loong's antlers emerged from amongst Gong Lau Jan's hair shimmering bronze. Green-brown scales began to ripple across her face.

Zéyì's heart stuttered. "Have we... have we met before?"

"I don't think that pick-up line is going to work h-"

"Probably."

Gong Lau Yan's words cut the prince short and brought another awkward silence. Zéyì stared and stared, some old memory stirring in the dusty corridors of her mind. The demon prince sniggered, so she addressed him instead. "What is it, Your Highness?"

"You two are ridiculous."

"He's the problem here," Gong Lau Jan remarked darkly, without even looking at him.

"You're the one who's weaponised that smile of yours. I bet someone told you it was charming once."

"A little nun in the Zyu Kingdom." Her strong brows were drawn together, as if she were as anxious as Zéyì felt.

"See!"

"Please stop arguing," Zéyì groaned.

Gong Lau Jan held up her hands as if she were trying to placate a wild animal. "I'm sorry about this. You've got so much going on already, and now I throw this piece of information at you. I'm sorry. Please..."

"No, no, not at all. There's really nothing going on for me." Zéyì awkwardly scratched the side of her face. "I'm just kind of... floating through life right now."

A strangely complicated look passed over Gong Lau Jan's face. Zéyì could swear she saw her eyes dart over to the demon prince but she said nothing.

"So... a loong? How... can I address you as Miss Gong? Is that right?"

"You can call me whatever you like." Gong Lau Jan's familiar sharp grin flashed across her face.

"Do you, perhaps, have a title? Would it be more appropriate to address you with that?"

"My main title was the Tributary of the River Zyu. I had others, none of which have any meaning anymore."

"If I may, what would that mean, in human terms?"

"My ze ze(4) was the Main Channel of the River Zyu. In human terms, she was the spirit of the river, and a Queen. I was her second in charge."

As the words washed over her, several revelations slammed into Zéyì at the same time. "Then, Your Highness-"

Gong Lau Jan sighed. "Zyu, and its rivers, have been destroyed. There is no meaning to that title any more."

"Then why do you still refer to me as Your Highness? I am no longer a member of the Chūn Family."

"Can we just drop all this back scratching?" Fàn Bì'ān interrupted irritably. "We're all royals here, let's just be casual."

"Then... Miss Gong?"

"Yes, Zéyì?"

"You would know about... the curse over Zhū, and how it spread to Chūn? And I'm sure I remember you saying, when you lifted my own curse 'it wasn't that woman'? What... what happened?"

Gong Lau Jan blinked slowly. At last, she said, "I can only tell you what I saw, and what I heard. I wasn't there when it happened."

"How long will this take?" Fàn Bì'ān interrupted. "I'm keen for some drama but I'd also like a comfy bed and some snacks while I listen."

"Where are you proposing to find such things, Your Highness?"

"Didn't I say not to call me that? Come back to my palace. We'll talk there."

Gong Lau Jan raised an eyebrow, a strange look on her face. "Are you proposing we go to the demon realm?"

"It's not like they could do anything to you anyway. You could flatten them all with just one look."

"Lián, you-"

"Chūn dàjiě, you need to step up your game, you don't even have a single cute name for your wife."

Zéyì looked like she was about to pass out. "What wife? Your Highness, stop making trouble!"

Gong Lau Jan was eyeing Zéyì thoughtfully.

"Y-yes?"

"I'm curious what... Let's go. It should be fine."

"Miss Gong -"

Gong Lau Jan shrugged. "I'll be there too."

"Then let's go!" As if they were on an afternoon outing, Fàn Bì'ān excitedly summoned his cloud. Zéyì breathed deep, and brought out her lotus. Gong Lau Jan jumped up behind her, unexpectedly. Zéyì's tongue and brain wrapped themselves in knots as she thought of Fàn Bì'ān's teasing about pet names.

"Miss Gong... Gong z-ze, you're riding with me?"

"Gong ze~" Fàn Bì'ān repeated in the background, with a huge grin.

"I thought it would be more discrete if I stayed in humanoid form. Was I wrong?" Gong Lau Jan leaned over Zéyì's shoulder to make eye contact. Too close!

"No, no! That's fine. Please sit."

"If you're done flirting, I have one requirement before we go." Fàn Bì'ān floated lazily around them on his cloud.

"That is...?"

"Miss Zyu needs to come along too. I'm not going to third-wheel."

To Zéyì's surprise, Gong Lau Jan shrugged. She didn't look at Fàn Bì'ān once, her cool eyes watching Zéyì. "I suppose she should hear this too. Whether she wants to is up to her."

"Do you know where she is?"

"Yes."

"Then..." Fàn Bì'ān bowed deeply, and also without a trace of respect. "Please lead the way."