Winds raged and howled as lightning split the night sky above the two men clashing in the pelting rain. Their figures blurred as they flew at each other, exchanging blows high above the mountains and sea as they fought in the shadow of a massive tree that towered above all.
One man appeared valiant and brave, but a slight frown in his brows betrayed the stress he was under. His long robes fluttered in the wind as they fought, shining white and pristine, untouched by the rain pouring down around them.
Wielding a spear he danced through the raging storm, flowing through dizzying movements as he thrust at his foe repeatedly, each strike quick, accurate and deadly.
His opponent, on the other hand, was breathing heavily and appeared hard pressed. His clothes were tattered rags that plastered to his body, and he fought weaponless, using only his bare hands to keep the spear away from his flesh. Despite his opponents' confounding movements, he managed to turn away blow after blow. However, his body bled from countless cuts and the veins beneath his skin pulsed a sickly black color.
“Surrender, and I will make your end quick.” The valiant man declared, flourishing his spear as a lull appeared in their fight. “Your time is running out and there is no escape for you.” He nodded towards the distance as he spoke.
The other man didn’t need to look; he had sensed them long ago, and from much further away. Allies had arrived, and they weren’t on his side. There were just under twenty of them and they had already encircled him. Maintaining an equal distance between each other, they approached, cutting off any possibility of escape.
“Long Sha,” The battered man said mockingly. “It seems your legend is overblown if you must rely on poison and traps.” Despite his haggard appearance the man stood tall, shoulders back and chest forward. He stared disdainfully at his foe, showing no sign of weakness even as the sickly black veins under his skin pulsed with every breath.
Despite having the upper hand, Long Sha clutched his spear tighter under the bloody man’s imperious glare. Instead of attacking, he chose to watch warily, waiting impatiently for the arrival of his friends. He felt threatened beneath that gaze, as though he were prey caught in the eyes of a predator.
“You think yourself worthy?” The man roared as the others drew near. “Frogs dreaming of swan meat! Do you think to make a cloak of my mane or armor from my scales? Do you plan to bathe in my blood and use my Essence for elixirs?” Rage filled his voice, and all who heard it shivered.
“You will have nothing!” The bloody man shouted in fury. “You are not worthy of a single whisker from my beard, Long Sha!”
As the man finished speaking, he drew in a breath so deep the earth shook and the air vibrated, causing even the lofty branches of the great tree above to tremble. Qi surged towards the man from all directions, fast and violent enough to make even the waters that lay far below them froth and roil. The qi pouring towards the man was denser than anything Long Sha had ever seen, so thick it condensed in the air, causing droplets of liquid qi to mix with the rainwater that stormed around them.
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The valiant man turned pale at the sight, terrified and awestruck at the display of power. Alarmed, he turned and called out to his closest ally, a beautiful woman who soared towards them with a golden net in her hands.
“Quickly, Qiu Hua, the net! He means to overflow his Dantian; we must stop him!” His attention had wavered for only a split second, but the roar of triumph behind him made his heart freeze. He turned, his spear twisting in his hands, but he already knew it was too late.
It happened in the space of a heartbeat. A crack of lightning split the sky, and for a moment the world turned white. A roar that seemed to split the heavens shook the earth, and a massive dragon writhed in the sky where the battered man had once floated.
Long Sha could only watch helplessly as the dragon lifted a single claw. The movement was neither fast nor slow, nor was it complex or intricate. It was simply inexorable, descending like the setting sun, and he had no time to curse or cry as it split the night sky.
His hands uselessly turned on the shaft of his spear as he watched the dragon’s claw cleave apart space, sending an invisible wave of force that tore through reality itself to split Qiu Hua in half. She died with a look of surprise forever frozen on her flawless face.
Long Sha watched as the net, his last hope of capturing the dragon alive, and then the love of his life, slowly fell into the ocean far below.
He turned and made to drive his spear into the dragon, his cries of despair drowned out by the dragon’s roars of triumph as qi ceaselessly rushed towards the beast. Long Sha trembled. He wanted to rip the dragon apart, to make it suffer, but it was too late, and he stilled his blow. The dragon had chosen suicide, and if he remained here any longer he would only die with it.
Long Sha flew away as fast as he could, cursing as the dragon’s mocking laughter chased after him. There was no time for remorse as he overtook his allies one by one, knowing they were doomed as they fled in different directions. A final roar of pain mixed with triumph filled the air, and he knew it was the last sound they would ever hear.
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A tiny dot of red shot through the air, moving at a speed imperceptible to the naked eye. Its origin and destination were unknown to all, save perhaps for fate itself.
Countless miles away, a baby lay in its crib, sound asleep, occasionally caressed by the cool night air drifting in through the open window. The weather was pleasant, and after laying him in bed his mother had rolled up the waxed paper that served as a poor substitute for a glass windowpane.
She’d retired to the common room afterwards, from where the faint murmur of voices and the occasional sound of laughter broke the otherwise silent night.
A chance gust carried a single drop of bright red liquid, which had slowly descended from the sky, through this open window. Its power expended, it was pushed by the wind and landed directly at the crease of the sleeping boy’s mouth.
Disturbed, the baby opened his mouth to cry, causing the red liquid to slip through his lips and down his throat. The boy didn’t have time to do more than whimper before his throat seized up and he began convulsing. His little body shivered and strained, his mouth twisting into a rictus of pain from which no noise escaped.
The moment seemed to stretch on forever, but eventually, his little heart could take no more. His muscles relaxed as his heart gave out, and his face once contorted with pain now seemed peaceful under the moonlight.
Time passed, and his little body grew colder while his parents sat in the other room talking and laughing, unaware that their baby boy's lips had turned blue in his crib.
Badum.
Suddenly, the boy’s heartbeat again, forceful enough to move his tiny body. It beat again and again, visibly shifting beneath the skin, striking like a hammer and far stronger than any child's heart had a right to be.
As life returned to the boy’s body, air came flooding back into his lungs with a gasp. He breathed in and out a time or two before unleashing hearty screams that continued until long after his mother had rushed in to comfort him.