*thunk* *thunk*

The quiet, nearly soundless whistling of an arrow followed by the sound of something tougher than steel striking wood. It is repeated again and again and again, hundreds of times, thousands even, over the course of several hours.

It is broken only by the sound of footsteps, the jogging of a young boy as they go retrieve the arrows shot. About half of them embedded in the wooden target dummy while the other half could be found several meters behind it, sticking out of the earth.

Returning back to his original position Kenki takes aim once more, placing the notch etched on the arrows back against the bowstring and pulling. He tries to ignore the sudden scorching spike of pain the glowing arrow transmits as best as he can.

'You know, I expected the pain to have faded away by now. Not because I would have gotten used to handling the energies released by them or something like that…'

He fires the arrow, the spike of pain reaching its highest point, a satisfying thunk is heard as the glowing projectile strikes true.

He moves his fingers around, shaking away the phantom sensation of pain.

'...but because I expected them to have fried out the pain receptors in my hands, to the point where I wouldn't feel a thing. Of course, that's not how it turned out, it stings just as bad as it did in the morning.'

He reaches for one of the arrows he'd dropped at his feet as he feels a faint pressure on his back - The gaze of the cultivator woman.

'Hai… I wish she'd stop doing that. Though I suppose my fire rate could use some improvement. At least she's not beating my sorry ass black and blue for taking too long.'

In quick succession, Ken fires off all nine of the remaining arrows, barely a few seconds of downtime in between each shot. The pain reaches a point where he can't help but drop down on his knees.

Nevertheless, after a short rest he stands up, jogging over once more and picking up the devilish objects for what must have been the hundredth time.

Dropping them on the ground near his shooting position he takes one more moment to rest, wiping away the sweat from his forehead. He once more laments not bringing his straw hat along with him.

He is forced out of his train of thought when he hears the voice of the cultivator, the first time she's spoken in over an hour.

"Tell me more about the one that you killed, they were a friend of yours, were they not?" Ken starts at the directness of her question, the arrow he'd been midway through nocking slipping from his grasp.

He stays still for a bit, thinking over his next course of action, before kneeling to pick it up again.

"Um, there's a lot of things that I can say about them. Where do I start?" This time he nocks it on properly, the pain that he feels from the cursed projections suddenly forgotten as he focuses intently on her words.

"What was their name, their age. Describe their appearance, under what moon were they born."

'She doesn't know his name? That's odd, I had it figured out that she came to know of the incident just by asking around the village before she revealed herself… or maybe she just didn't care enough to remember? No, from the way she's wording her question she doesn't even know if Ren was a lad or a lass.'

"His name was Ren, he lived on the farm directly adjacent to the one my family lives in. I was as old as him though I don't know when exactly he was born… he also had brown hair like mine and grass green eyes."

Ken misses by a wide margin as he takes a shot at the dummy. Suppressing a wince at the spike of searing hot pain, he clenches his fist.

'Well, I can't do two things at the same time that's for sure'

"He was kind of… energetic? Liked to talk a lot, had trouble keeping secrets and didn't think much before he acted."

He fires another arrow, not talking and taking his time to concentrate on the shot.

*thunk*

The shot rings true.

"The words you speak now do not align with what you had said in the morning. You said that you killed a creature, not a human like what you're describing to me now." Again, he feels a pressure on his body, this one stronger and more focused than the ones used to push him into firing faster.

"Are you trying to wriggle out of your pit through the use of lies? Trying to mislead me and place less blame on yourself for your crime?" The woman's tone drips with a heavy accusatory tone as she approaches.

Feeling his spine turn into ice, Kenki turns around in a panic, waving his hands in denial.

"Wait, wait! It's nothing lik–"

He is cut off as the woman's long muscular tail wraps around him, the appendage's thickness greater than that of his thigh.

It grips him painfully as the cultivator leans over him, to the point where her face is just an inch or two from his.

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Locking her inhuman predatory eyes with his she says "You will tell me everything from start to end, Truthfully." She places a lot of extra weight on her final word, making it sink in.

"I can tolerate any reason you might have had. You could have killed because he'd tried to kill you first, you could have killed by accident, even if you killed him only to sate a desire for blood and murder. I can tolerate it." She tightens the coil she has wrapped over his body to the point of making his bones creak

"What I will not tolerate is lies. Either tell me the truth or make your peace."

The flexible appendage is loosened, allowing Kenki to move once more. The boy weakly drops to the ground after a tiny wobble in his knees.

Ken opens his mouth to speak, although not a sound manages to come out, such is the fear that he is experiencing.

Her harsh expression, the glare in her slit azure eyes, they all make for a terrifying scene.

'I'm in some deep shit'

=========================

Ultimately, fearing that she has some sort of a supernatural method to discern lies from truth, he tells her everything that he knows of that day.

The creature that had woken him up with its odd otherworldly chanting, its rotten greyish skin and sickly yellow eyes.

How he'd spent the morning collecting fruit with his mother and younger brother, and his search for his lost lockpicks. The oddities at the farm, what he'd seen when he'd climbed that tree.

And, of course, how he'd ended up stabbing Ren in the neck.

"After that I just ran home. I lied to my parents, simply telling them that I'd seen my friends going to the forbidden farm..." Ken clutches at his robes, his eyes looking straight down. "They gathered some of our neighbors and went to discipline them. They were attacked, of course, but suffered no permanent injuries. They told the village head about it and the village head contacted the previous village guardian. The farm was burned to the ground that same night."

Ken holds his pose, kneeling with his head held down, for some time. A drop of sweat drops from his forehead down onto the dirt.

'I hope that this was a satisfactory tale. The invisible pressure went away the moment I mentioned the creature that woke me up, but I don't know if that's a good sign or not.

He doesn't dare to look up.

'I really don't want to die. I don't want to experience that coldness, that dread.. but my fate isn't up to me any more.'

"M-Master Dongmei." He stammers out.

"If I am to die… can I at least go and see Mum before it happens?"

He hears her snort dismissively as her tail whacks him on the head. Gently, he notes.

"Why in the Emperor's name would I even think of killing you, stupid."

'What?'

Ken raises his head to look at the cultivator, she still has her gaze on him, but her eyes convey emotions counter to the ones just minutes prior.

Her hostility is gone, the scowl on her face replaced what Ken could only interpret as compassion.

The closes her eyes as she sighs. Her lips part as she speaks, her language foreign and unintelligible to the boy at her feet.

"Thug on'tares li kann. Al'kashini uns de noiren, al'kashinai uns de nasandi."

She opens her eyes once more, the steely determination in them silent but perceivable.

"That formation you mentioned cut into the grass." She looks at Kenki once more "A circle with a star in its center, can you recreate it?"

"Un.." Ken dumbly nods in affirmation, stabbing his finger into the dirt. In barely three seconds he traces out a pentagram.

"It was something like this." he words out as he raises his head. "However, it was only half complete when I saw it. That is what I assume it would have looked like in the end."

A small nod is her only reply to the boy's words.

"You're skilled with the pen, can you draw a sketch of the monster that had woken you up?"

"Yes I can, Master Dongmei."

She nods once more, waving her hand as an indication for him to continue.

Ken instantly stands up, a hurried step apparent as he heads for the mansion.

'I'll have to wash off the paint with a wet cloth. That's fine, I shouldn't have drawn anything resembling my old world anyways. Who knows, maybe I wasn't the only person that got isekai'd into Xianxia land.'

Opening the front door and crossing the black room, Ken enters his assigned room.

He locates the plank of wood he'd used as a canvas easily enough, still placed on the table. From the sack filled with his belongings he pulls out his pen and paint filled gourd.

It doesn't take him long to wash off his previous day's work. The paint is a poorly made water based one so it easily dissolves the moment he presses the wet cloth over it.

Idly he notes the entry of the cultivator, she walks slowly, her gaze unfocused and her mind elsewhere.

She seats herself on one of the free chairs and places an elbow on the table, using her hand to prop her head up.

The drawing process takes up a fair chunk of time as Ken favors accuracy and details over speed. He makes sure to draw the creature's rotten lips, its missing nose and wicked grin, the misshapen eyes and veiny wrinkled skin. All of them as realistic as he possibly can.

Finally finishing up, he hands the plank of wood over to his supposed master.

She takes it in hand as she focuses back on the real world, ending whatever deep thought she'd been in. Her eyes slowly move up and down, left and right, zeroing in on certain parts of the drawing before moving on to the next.

She places the plank of wood back onto the table with a deep sigh.

"And it disappeared the moment you punched it, fading into smoke?"

"That is correct, master Dongmei."

Ken freezes up as, out of nowhere, she pats him on the head.

"No need to call me master Dongmei anymore kid, or at least - not as much. Usually it's a method meant to instill obedience in those undisciplined and the unruly, but it appears that I have made a severe lapse in my judgment." She shakes her head as she stands up.

"But we'll get to that… tomorrow." A plate of food manifests in her hand as she places it on the table with a satisfying clink.

"Not that you should have any trouble with it, considering you have not been punished even once for indiscretion."

She turns to leave, light steps resounding as she passes through the door.

=======================

Kenki unceremoniously slumps into his chair as the door to the room is closed.

'Unruly? Undisciplined!? Where the fuck did she get that goddamn impression from me? I'm an honest and upstanding member of this village, I had a job that people happily paid silvers for. What the fuck have I ever done to make her think that I'm some unruly delinquent huh!?'

He does his best to resist the temptation to throw the plate of food out the window.

*growl*

…his stomach has other matters planned.

'Urgh, I haven't had anything to eat since yesterday night. Not to mention that I've been running and sweating under the boiling hot heat of the sun until now, no chance to rest, not even given a chance to sit.'

He picks up the metal chopsticks, stabbing a piece of meat and bringing it to his mouth.

A small moan passes through his lips as the taste of crispy fried bacon hits him.

'I proceed with yesterday's plan then, grit my teeth and do as I'm told. Don't be impulsive, the chance to leave will present itself to me naturally. For now, just like prisoners did in my old world, I should keep my head low, think my options through and devise a couple of escape plans'

'She wishes to train me for some military purpose, obviously. I don't know if it involves me becoming a cultivator or not, though it would be awfully weird if it didn't considering the arrows she had me train with.'

Mentally Ken shakes his head. A small cluster of greed being set ablaze in his heart.

'Then again, it might be an optimal strategy to stay, if only for giving me the chance to start my cultivation journey while I'm still a child.'

Standing from his spot he goes for the door, lightly creaking it open and taking a glance down the hallway. He shuffles silently along its wall, stealing a quick glance at the black room once he is close enough.

There his gaze lands on the towering cat-woman, her back turned to him and working on some sort of potion by the looks of things.

'She's acting like she hasn't noticed me… well, not that it matters.' He turns back, returning to his room.

'Matters are turbulent at the moment, my story seems to have unsettled her.

'For now… I can only wait. For now.'