Through the trees, through the night, summer wind beneath their wings, the duo made their way. The Tian Lei sect had been a fair bit of a day's journey from Xinmeijin; Xiao Fan hardly expected to get back quickly. In the meantime, she turned to something she had often turned to recently: a little bit of healthy introspection. Of course, in her case, 'healthy introspection' was more akin to picking herself apart within the theatre of her own mind. She tried not to be so harsh on herself this time - and frankly, none of her thoughts were new. The concepts presented therein had been knocking about in her brain for a while.
Or at least as far as 'a while' could be considered when one had recently begun a new state of living, a new form of existence? The day she had died was only... What... Two? Three days ago? And yet it felt like an eternity; it felt as though every waking moment since then were dragged through thick, heavy mud. She blamed her lack of sleep - or rather, her inability to sleep. Being awake for every moment of every hour of every day? It wore away at you. It was wearing at her pretty steadily, or so she felt. The sleeplessness, among other things, was something she was going to need to deal with. Somehow.
Whatever! That was something she could deal with later. Much later, hopefully. Later, once she had trained more... Once she had really figured out what was going on with herself, and how she was going to find her wife. Her thoughts went, then, to Chen Mengyao. He seemed friendly enough... But was he really going to help them? What kind of connections did the governor of Xinmeijin actually have? She snapped herself back to reality before she spiraled too far down this rabbit hole - there was nothing for her down there but frustration and doubt.
In front of her, Zhichao Tingfeng had begun to whistle, something soft and sweet but a bit sad; a lullaby for a dying child, or a lament for dreamlike youth. His face didn't seem nearly so sad as the tune upon his lips... but when he whistled, the forest seemed to go quiet. Everything around them faded away audibly; even the breeze in the leaves and the underbrush drew quiet. It was beautiful, yes... Beautiful and disconcerting. She nearly wondered aloud how he managed to wipe the world away like that, to silence nature itself...
...and then he finished whistling, only a handful of minutes into the song. They stood now at the entrance to the clearing where the Tian Lei sect was nestled; the rumble of the waterfall gradually drew into its normal volume, the wind and birds coming along with. Xiao Fan hadn't realized they had been walking for so long... nor had she really been paying attention to her surroundings. She had been so focused on Zhichao Tingfeng's burst of song that she had let the world around her blur.
Zhichao Tingfeng said nothing on it; he simply headed for the bunkhouse where he seemed to sleep, saying nothing. He didn't seem particularly uptight or bothered by anything, so Xiao Fan saw no reason to pursue him - she had more pressing matters, anyways. Her first and only stop was the grand hall of the sect; the door was shut, just as they had left it, and the dust on the floorboards was undisturbed. Good. She remembered having the same thoughts of potential robbers or squatters the first time they had arrived... It was nice to see that those fears were unfounded. Hopefully.
She slid the door aside and walked in, immediately engulfed in the dark and still of the hall; a dead womb to birth a dead warrior, ravaged and lifeless but not as vacant as it may seem. This time, she strode forth without fear - nothing within this place could match her save her sifu, and he didn't seem ready to kill or anything like that. It didn't take long for her to stand before the incense tree - for the first time, she stood and really studied it.
Tigers and dragons mingled and fought, with birds swooping in and out of their midst. Looking deeper, however, it became clear that there was more to the incense tree: here and there, following the birds and striking between the others, was lightning. The bolts were thin, easily missed; one could pass them off as filigree or other decorative framework, rather than an actual part of the composition. But even closer, upon these bolts of lightning? Every so often, a piece of paper was wrapped tightly around it and bound with a thin string. They had browned with age, now almost blending flush with the wood itself.
There was a tap on her shoulder, the fingers cold. Xiao Fan turned, expecting Zhichao Tingfeng; instead, she was greeted by the too-wide smile of Hao Ning. "Hello, simei! Yes, simei now; I see that you're wearing new clothes, and that you've got some new holes. That means you're officially part of Tian Lei, right? Meimei simply won't do anymore! Oh, but here, come, sit down - tell me all about it!" She showed off a mouth full of pearly whites before running forward, going straight through Xiao Fan's form and appearing on the other side.
Xiao Fan barely had time to react, but when she did, it was with wry laughter. She couldn't muster up much more than that... Dry, cynical mirth would need to be enough. Hao Ning wasn't even paying attention to Xiao Fan's reaction - she was already down at the kneel-pillows, pulling that black wooden needle out of her gullet. There was something humorous about it now, seeing it after being at least a little more used to the concept of Hao Ning existing. A ghost girl with a mouth like a puppet, leaning her head back and opening her mouth altogether too wide? And she pulls a knitting needle from it? It was worth some appreciation in that sense, Xiao Fan decided.
The dead woman approached the dead girl; Xiao Fan padded over to her sect-sister. She stopped at a kneel-pillow near Hao Ning and dropped to a squat, disregarding the kneeling part of a kneel-pillow to just sit herself atop it. She held out her right arm without thinking, seeing Hao Ning getting ready with the needle already - she knew what came next, having already been more than acquainted with it a day or so ago. She scowled as that thought crossed her mind. A day or so? She was sure it was two days ago... But the fact that she hadn't known immediately set her to pout.
Hao Ning began her task, holding her junior sister's arm by the wrist and inserting her needle, firmly but carefully. The warmth died now as it had died then - slowly and steadily, without struggle or pain. Hao Ning looked to Xiao Fan after a breath had passed; her face was expectant, and while her wide smile was present, it held a bit of hesitance. Xiao Fan realized that she was supposed to be regaling Hao Ning with a story about her exploits in Xinmeijin... Gah. At least those were recent enough she felt confident in her recollection...
"So, Xinmeijin was being attacked by bandits. Awful ruffians, though none too well trained or equipped... They were hidden in the town when we arrived, but we didn't know that, so we went to fight the ones near the outskirts. Zhichou Tingfeng made his way to their camp at the treeline; I went to go check out a house that they were looting." Hao Ning's eyes were wide with wonder and delight as Xiao Fan continued her story - describing how she had broken one man's jaw, how she had been stabbed by another, how she had crushed yet another's lower dantian so badly he voided his bladder...
The ghostly girl with the needle and teeth was overjoyed to hear this, wiggling as she worked like a gleeful child. She looked now to her junior sister with admiration, drawing in a deep breath and letting it out in a dreamy sigh. "Ohhhh, wow, Xiao Fannn~ You're so cool... Truly, your arrival at Tian Lei has been nothing short of auspicious. Please, continue to kill with power and grace, and when you get your revenge? Take it firmly, and without mercyyy~" Hao Ning giggled, though it wasn't mocking; it was excited. She was enjoying the idea of Xiao Fan butchering evildoers with her bare hands.
The thought made Xiao Fan a bit ill at ease. Sure, she had loved doing it when she was in the middle of it - loved crushing bones, rupturing organs, breaking spirits. But the black rage, that scarlet hunger... It had been too much, far too much. It was uncontrollable. Even now, locked away behind the veil of emotional detachment, she felt a tiny pinion of fear lodge itself in her chest. She had no clue how to control that, nor how to even bring it up with Zhichao Tingfeng. What if she couldn't control herself the next time she was near innocents? What then?
A leaden ball of dread formed in her gut and dropped it out through her pelvis. Oh, no. What if she was still so incensed when she found Zhang Daiyu? She didn't even want to ask herself the questions that followed, but her own uncertainty was more than enough of an answer. She was a danger to her wife. She was a danger to the only woman she had ever loved. She was closer to an animal than a woman now; just some base, frenzied beast, that became feral in the heat of combat... Lost her sanity at the sight of fresh blood...
Hao Ning must have noticed the frown on Xiao Fan's face. She let her implacable smile be placated, staying her needle and cocking her head to the side. She peered up at Xiao Fan with those big doe eyes, brows furrowed in genuine worry and concern. "Ahh? Simei, I'm... I'm sorry if I said something weird. I'm, uh, sorry if I offended you. I didn't know if you liked killing... You seemed like you had fun, from how vividly you described it... I just wanted to encourage you. Fighting evildoers is wayyy better than killing innocents, right?"
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Something about the emphasis with which she said that final sentence was so uncanny that it dragged Xiao Fan out of her misery, if only to ponder what that meant. Yes, she thought, fighting evildoers is way better than killing innocents. The phrasing seems odd... but Hao Ning was an odd girl, so she supposed it made sense. Enough sense, anyways. Xiao Fan cleared her throat for her own benefit, to center herself in her own mind. "Ah, yes, I suppose it is. And, yeah... At the time, I was... I was really into it. I was almost obsessed with it. I've, uh, never killed anyone before."
Hao Ning nodded solemnly, shutting her eyes, taking in Xiao Fan's words. She pressed the tip of her wooden needle to Xiao Fan's chest, the ethereal nature of it letting it glide past her cheongsam but not her flesh. Once the needle was deep within the martial artist, though, Hao Ning smiled anew. "So... Your first time, eh? First times are so special, after all... And it sounds like you got a little blood-drunk. Don't... Don't tell sishu Tingfeng. He's... He wouldn't understand. He'd probably be mad at you. But... I can help you learn, if you'd like~" She winked with one eye, and then waited a few seconds before winking with the other.
Xiao Fan had no idea how to respond, both to the bizarre double-wink and to what Hao Ning was telling her. Blood-drunk? Zhichao Tingfeng would be mad about it? She sounded like she had dealt with similar things before... Like she had had similar problems herself, and needed to deal with them on her own. She might've been through the exact same sort of shit that Xiao Fan was going through right now. The dead woman started, mouth snapping open to speak, the words not even fully formed within her brain.
"Ah-! Hao Ning, do you know what's happening to me?! I've been so worried... I'm in such a terrible state... I'm having trouble remembering things, time feels like its passing so slowly, and I felt like I could keep killing until the end of time. I-It was... It was awful. It's all awful. I feel like I'm losing my mind and myself at the same time, becoming something new and worse..." Despite the emotional nature of her words, her tone stayed towards neutrality; she played up her own distress for Hao Ning's sake, though in truth, she felt none of it.
Hao Ning nodded rapidly, head bobbling in a way very reminiscent of how Xiao Fan's own head did. The girl with the needle twisted it inside of her patient, and Xiao Fan gasped - there was, ever so slightly, a tinge of pain. A brief, fleeting sting of it, before returning to numbness and warmth. She looked to Hao Ning with concern gripping her by the throat - was her ability to feel pain simply locked away, like her emotions? Would it return like they did?
Hao Ning twisted the needle again the other direction, and rather than pain, an intense feeling of pleasure rippled from Xiao Fan's chest like a pond in heavy rain. It was only momentary, but every part of her felt positively euphoric. With the fact that she had been devoid of most feeling in general for the last few days, ever since she died? This was nearly maddening; it was certainly overwhelming, at the least. She fell back, head thankfully landing upon another pillow - her body felt like it was laid beneath a great, immovable weight, like an ant holding up a boulder. She laid there for a few moments, eyes unfocused but gazing skyward, mouth agape.
Hao Ning giggled, reaching out and twisting the needle again - and almost as quickly as it came, the ecstasy stopped. The weight on Xiao Fan's body was seemingly lifted; she could move, could think, could breathe. She pushed herself back to a sit, arms shaky, speechless despite everything she wanted to say. Hao Ning laughed at her for some time, watching the way Xiao Fan adjusted herself in the absence of sensation.
"Sorry~! Just making sure of something. You're like me, in a way - I mean, of course you are, we're both dead. We're both ghosts! I wanted to see if you're still in touch with your meridians, or if you were a bit degraded. I've noticed that when ghosts age, they start to lose access to their meridians if they don't actively keep them in use. Scary stuff, if you ask me..." She opened her mouth to continue, but shook her head and shut her eyes, starting anew. The needle was drawn back and set on the ground; she wouldn't be tempted to mess with it that way.
"Ah, I'm probably not making a lot of sense. Point is, you're still in touch with a lot of yourself that bridges the gap between the physical and spiritual. That's why I could do that. It's good to know, too, cause it means I know how to help you. Sorta." She allowed herself to smile once more, though this one was neither too-wide nor mocking; if anything, it was sympathetic. Xiao Fan nodded, still a bit groggy from the acupuncture, not yet compete enough to speak.
Hao Ning nodded, crossing her arms and leaning back against the incense tree. She looked off to the side, down the eastern hallway, before looking back to Xiao Fan. "So. I'll be brief, cause I don't like flowery speech. Your body is full of resentful energy. Its what binds you here. When you kill, it starts to make cracks in your psyche, and slowly drives you mad." She took the needle again, raising it up and prodding it into Xiao Fan's chest. She let go of it once it was settled firmly within the now-cooling line of warmth in Xiao Fan's sternum.
The woman in the cheongsam nodded again, gaze more lucid, spirit more steeled. "Okay, so, when I kill it drives me to kill more. That's just something that happens to all ghosts, I guess? Well, fine then; I'll just have to fight them without killing them. Or, ah... That might be hard..." Speech trailed away from her like a winding brushstroke, the calligraphy of her words tapering to its silent end. Hao Ning filled the silence after a second.
"Eyup. Its hard to fight without killing, once you're able to kill. You need to be more deliberate in where you strike, and how... And how to ensure you don't strike too hard, even if its somewhere that normally wouldn't kill. But... There is a way to circumvent all this. A 'cheat', if you will. From your story, it seems like you've already figured it out... But I wanna tell you, hehehe~" Hao Ning winked and grinned, drawing the needle free then placing it within the other lady's stomach.
"Food. A ton of food. Everything you can eat; some things you can't, even. I don't really know where it goes... It just disappears into our stomachs, I guess. But the more food you eat? The better you'll feel. Eating staves off that resentment; resentment makes you hungry. Hunger is one of the only things we keep when we die; it's one of the only things that makes us human, and that we have a right to. Everyone gets hungry." Hao Ning let a sparkle of laughter cascade from her lips, though she stopped it off after only a moment.
"Even us dead girls. Hungry ghosts will forever be hungry, right? Unless we get the food we need... Speaking of which, help a girl out?" Hao Ning's face turned to an expression of mocking pleading and desperation, the smile in her eyes hinting at the one that was absent from her lips. Xiao Fan rolled her eyes, trying to be nonchalant despite what she had just been told. Food, huh? All it took was food? And Hao Ning was willing to help her... To teach her what her unlife was going to be like.
Two masters, then. Sifu Tingfeng, and sifu Ning. One to teach about the physical world... the other, to consult upon the spiritual. In the back of her mind, Xiao Fan wondered if Zhichao Tingfeng had known that this would happen. She had told him she had met Hao Ning, after all... But was he truly so sneaky? She was starting to think he might be... Though a lot of her reasoning came from things which were still ambiguous. Earlier suspicions fed into later suspicions without any proof... She'd keep a lookout, then.
But that was a matter for a different time. Xiao Fan put palm to fist, inclining her head and torso - Hao Ning seemed shocked by the sudden formality, but rushed to respond in kind. A new sort of smile brightened Hao Ning's face now, the barest wisps of pride wrapped around the edges of her lips. This may have been her first time being someone's sifu, Xiao Fan thought. They would both try their best not to disappoint eachother, hopefully... And if they did? At least they'd both survive the ordeal.
"Yes, sifu! I will go prepare a burnt offering for you, and find some incense and food. This is my thanks for healing me... I'm not sure how you're doing it, but I'm eternaly grateful. Stay here; I'll be back with something for you!" Xiao Fan's voice carried the inflection of mock-discipline, a parody of authority and dedication to her new sifu. Hao Ning couldn't help but giggle and play along, giving Xiao Fan one final salute before dismissing her to her task.
Xiao Fan strode off through the southern hallway, out the main door, practically bouncing on her feet as she did. The interaction had put a new spring in her step: someone who could help her with her questions about ghosthood was invaluable. The fact that it was cheery, mischievous little Hao Ning, instead of someone unpalatable? Xiao Fan thanked the heavens for such luck.
She opened the door to the storehouse, and took a step inside. She was less than fully prepared for the sight of a charred corpse on the floor.