Not even an hour had passed since Wu Jian challenged Wu Yong, and he was already regretting it. What had he been thinking? Why did he challenge someone who was not only several years older than him but also so much stronger? Had his brain left him? Was he stupid? Wu Jian couldn’t stop trembling at the thought of fighting Wu Yong.
“That was very reckless,” Wu Meiying chided him with a sigh as she swept back midnight bangs from her eyes to glower at him.
“You think so too, huh?” Wu Jian gave her a tepid smile. He looked down at his hands, which were still shaking. Clenching them to make them stop just made his entire arm shake instead. “I know what I did was stupid. You don’t have to tell me. I already know.”
They were in the hospital wing again. It wasn’t his mother who was there today but an older man with a bald head, a long beard, and surprisingly no wrinkles, making him appear younger than he really was. The hanfu he wore was pure white and immaculate, not a speck of dust on it.
His name was Wu Shaolin. He was the clan’s healer who often worked with his mother and a Hunger Realm cultivator. Wu Jian didn’t know what subrealm he was at, but there was a rumor going around that he was close to breaking through to the Anima Realm.
That means he’s probably at… the ninth subrealm of the Hunger Realm, right?
Most Wu Clansmen were only at the Hunger Realm. Only a few like his father, mother, and his father’s second wife were at a higher realm.
Resources were scarce in the countryside. Alchemy pills and natural treasures were akin to unicorn horns and phoenix feathers, nearly impossible to find. When something was discovered, it always went to the clan head and elders, who needed to cultivate more than the others since it was their duty, to protect the interests of the clan. Unfortunately, since the Wu Clan did not have much in the way of resources or money, they were unable to afford such treasures often.
The Wu Clan did not have an alchemist, someone who possessed a natural affinity for the wood and fire elements and used those two affinities to refine alchemy pills. Alchemists were rare, especially in small countries like the Shang Kingdom, even more so when they lived out in the countryside like the Wu Clan did.
Wu Jian had been told about the Alchemist Association. They had several branches in the Shang Kingdom, but most of the alchemists were low-tier compared to other nations with more plentiful resources. Zahn City was located so far from everything else that it rarely appeared on any maps. There was no way an alchemist would ever come to such a place, not when they were in such high demand in larger, more prosperous cities. There was no money to be made here. Because they had no alchemist, they relied on healers like Wu Shaolin to help them mend injuries.
Wu Shaolin had just finished wrapping bandages smeared in a healing salve around Wu Jian’s torso. The salve was made from herbs that Wu Shaolin had crushed into a paste. It was dark green and smelled funny, and it itched when slathered on his skin, but it worked wonders to promote the body’s natural healing.
His ribs were indeed broken. That explained why the pain was so much more intense than anything he had ever felt before. Wu Jian was sitting on one of the beds, a worried Wu Meiying sat beside him on a chair.
“You aren’t normally the kind of person who would stand up to Wu Yong like that,” Wu Meiying spoke again, slowly, as if carefully choosing her words. “Is what I said the other day the reason why you put yourself in harm’s way?”
“You said it yourself, right? If I don’t get stronger… well… I probably won’t be around for long.” Wu Jian took a shuddering breath as he lowered his hands onto his knees and looked at her. His lips trembled, but he was still able to form a smile. “I don’t want to die, and I don’t want you to be taken from me. If the day you saw in your vision ever comes and someone tries to take you away, I want to be strong enough to protect you.”
“Wu Jian… thank you.” Wu Meiying’s voice was choked with emotion as she placed her hands over one of his. She didn’t cry, though moisture did gather in her eyes. There was joy in her smile. The warmth from her hands filled him. It told him that he had made the right choice to stand up to Wu Yong. If he could see her smile like this, he would gladly stand up to anyone—even his father.
Wu Jian was one of the only people who never doubted her words. While everyone else assumed she was just a strange child who spoke nonsense, and that the events she predicted were mere coincidence, he believed everything she said. It might have taken a little while before he began to truly believe her, but even when he hadn’t, he still supported her in front of everyone else. That alone meant the world to her.
“Ah, to be young and in love,” Wu Shaolin said with a wistful smile.
His words earned him a pair of bright grins from the two children.
“Of course! Mei and I are getting married when we grow up!”
“Mmmm! I can’t wait for our wedding.”
Wu Shaolin chuckled at the pair of unrepentantly beaming children.
Since the healing salve had been applied, there wasn’t any reason for the two of them to remain in the hospital wing. Wu Shaolin warned Wu Jian to take it easy for the next few days. He was not allowed to do anything that would put stress on his healing ribs. This would cut into his training, which they had only just started, but he supposed that was what he deserved for acting stupid. He could even call it karma.
“What should we do now?” asked Wu Jian as they made their way across the clan compound. There were a lot of people wandering about. The few they passed on the walkway stepped aside and bowed to Wu Jian, though it was more out of courtesy for his title than because they respected him. He was sure that, to many, he was just an undeserving child who happened to be the clan head’s son.
Will I one day earn the respect of these people?
Honor and respect were taken seriously. They were the cornerstones of their society. To earn respect, one had to honor their family, and the best way to do that was by becoming strong. Therefore, if you were strong, you were honoring your family, which would earn you respect. Right now, Wu Jian was weak, but if he became strong…
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“Right now, we should rest. You need to heal,” Wu Meiying chided him, interrupting Wu Jian’s thoughts.
“But after that, we need to begin training, right? Is there any way we can increase my training?” asked Wu Jian.
Wu Meiying tilted her head and tapped a pale finger against her lips, appearing thoughtful. “Hmm. There might be. Let’s go ask Grandpa Son if there are any books that can help us.”
They went over to the library. Unfortunately, when they arrived and explained what they wanted to Grandpa Son, what he told them brought nothing but disappointment.
“I am sorry to say this, but there are very few ways to increase your strength right now.” Seeing the desolate expressions on the pair’s faces, Grandpa Son explained. “Did you read the scroll I gave you on cultivation?” They nodded. “Right now, you and everyone else below the age of eighteen are at the Body Forging Realm. This isn’t a realm so much as the state before a realm. At this stage, your body is unable to hold any chi because your meridians have not yet formed and your dantian is still inactive. In order to reach the Hunger Realm, you must forge your body into a strong vessel. The stronger your body is, the more chi it can hold, and the better you will be at manipulating it. A strong vessel can hold more without breaking, after all. This means you must physically train your body until it is strong enough to generate its own chi.”
“So, what you’re saying is that all we can do is train like normal?” asked a dejected Wu Jian.
Grandpa Son nodded, his smile amiable just like his nickname. “Correct. Of course, there are medicinal herbs and alchemy pills that can help forge a young person’s body into a strong receptacle for chi, but there are not many herbs available locally and there are very few pills on the market in Zahn City. The only place where you might find some are the Twin Fang Mountains and its surrounding forest, but I don’t need to tell you how dangerous that place is.”
The Twin Fang Mountains was the name of the two mountains that Zahn City and the Wu Clan were nearby, so named because they looked like two monster fangs jutting from the earth to pierce the heavens. His mother and father had told him to never go there, that dangerous magical beasts lived in the area.
In other words, they couldn’t go out and find any natural treasures, and the chances of them being able to rely on alchemy pills to increase their strength was so small as to be non-existent.
Wu Meiying frowned. “Does Uncle Yōushì not have alchemy pills he can let his son use?”
“Young lady,” Grandpa Son said, his tone stern. “While the Wu Clan does indeed have some alchemy pills, they are not something that can be used on a whim—and certainly not for something as petty as a dispute between siblings.” Wu Jian furrowed his brow, which caused the old man to chuckle. “What? Did you think I wouldn’t know about what happened? Don’t look so surprised. I’m quite certain everyone has heard about how you challenged your half-brother to a duel during the bi-annual strength test.”
Wu Jian snapped his mouth closed. He knew it would only be a matter of time before people learned about the altercation between himself and Wu Yong, but he was not expecting everyone to have heard about it so soon.
Since Grandpa Son had nothing to offer them, the pair headed back to Wu Jian’s building dejected. They were forced to stop, however, when they saw someone standing before the door to his room.
Wu Jian gulped as the tall and intimidating form of his father loomed over him. His father had an inscrutable look on his face as he stared them down, arms crossed over his broad chest. His hanfu ruqun was red and black, intimidating colors that helped accentuate the roaring golden dragon embroidered on the fabric. He was holding something in his left hand, but Wu Jian was too busy focusing on how massive his father was to pay attention to it.
“Uncle Yōushì, it is a great pleasure to see you.” Wu Meiying pressed her right fist into her left hand and bowed respectfully. “To what do we owe the honor of your visit?”
His father raised an eyebrow at Wu Meiying, but she just smiled slyly at him, which caused him to snort before he turned his attention back to Wu Jian.
“I heard you challenged Wu Yong to a duel during the strength test in six months,” he said, voice a bass rumble, low and filled with indomitable strength. Wu Jian still shivered every time he heard it.
He was not asking Wu Jian a question.
Wu Jian was not sure what he should say now. Should he admit that he challenged his half-brother to a duel? Would his father be mad at him for doing so? He gulped in fear, but decided the best thing he could do was tell the truth. Nothing good ever came from lying. It was one of the few lessons he had learned from Wu Yong.
“That’s right. Um… I did challenge him…”
“Hmph. So it’s true. I am relieved.”
“Huh?”
While Wu Jian stared stupidly at his father as though he couldn’t believe what he had just heard, his father gave him a smile. It was small… and awkward. In fact, most people would probably think it was just his lips twitching in agitation, but Wu Jian had stared at his father’s face many times, so he could tell the difference. That said, it looked wrong on him. Unnatural. Maybe because the man almost never smiled.
“Until now, you have never stood up for yourself when Wu Yong bullied you. I was beginning to worry that you didn’t have a single masculine bone in your body, but it appears I was mistaken. You can be manly when given the correct motivation.”
Wu Jian didn’t know what to say. Even Wu Meiying appeared to be at a loss for words.
“Ahem. Anyway, take this.” His father pressed something into Wu Jian’s hands. “These ones are not ingested orally. Drop one of them into your bath tonight and the others every morning after you finish your physical exercises. They should help.” After speaking, his father turned and left, though he spoke over his shoulder once before disappearing. “I look forward to seeing the results of your training.”
Wu Jian and Wu Meiying didn’t do anything for several seconds. After looking at each other, they rushed into his compound, burst into his room, and locked the door. Wu Jian even closed the shutters over his window so no one could see inside. The room was cast in darkness until he lit the small lamp by his bedside. Then he and Wu Meiying stared at the box that now sat on the floor. It was a very pretty box painted with a sky-blue finish and swirling clouds dotting the wood grain.
“What do you think is inside?” asked Wu Jian.
“We won’t know unless we open it,” Wu Meiying said.
“Right. Gotta open it first.”
Wu Jian’s hands shook as he undid the strings keeping the box closed, then slowly pulled back the lid. A strong medicinal scent struck his nose, so thick and poignant that he almost gagged. Peering inside the box, he stared at the dozen green pills neatly sitting on a cushion. Each one glistened with a pearlescent shine.
“Aren’t these alchemy pills?” asked Wu Jian, blinking like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
“They are,” Wu Meiying said.
“But… wasn’t Grandpa Son just saying Father would never give me these over something petty like a dispute between siblings?”
Wu Meiying smiled even as she shrugged. “He did, but maybe Uncle Yōushì cares about you more than anyone realizes.”
Wu Jian looked back at the pills, his chest swelling with an emotion he had never felt before. He had always assumed his father didn’t approve of him. Wu Yōushì barely seemed to pay him any attention, especially recently, and when he did, it was to tell Wu Jian how disappointed he was in him. Having his father provide him with these alchemy pills caused his heart to soar. It was proof that his father did not hate him.
“I certainly hope you’re right,” he said in a soft voice.