It took the greater part of TFW evening for Liu Han to finish with the greetings. Apparently he was in very good terms with pretty much every monk in the monastery, evident by the literal crowd that swarmed him as soon as word of his return spread. All the while though, Liling was content with standing on the sidelines and watching the whole thing unfold. If she were to be totally honest with herself,a part of her was a bit envious of the warm welcome her new guardian was receiving. Having lacked a normal upbringing available to most children, she had never had the opportunity to establish deeper familial connections with anybody. The gang that had taken her in did not count. That group had been full of thieves and criminals who did nothing but take advantage of her skills every chance they got. And besides, if she were to return to them now after all she'd done, there was no doubt that they would slit her throat immediately. Later that night, a small scale celebratory party was
By morning, life in the monastery had returned to normal. The cleanup had even occurred sometime during the night, leaving no evidence that any sort of celebration had ever happened. Everyone went about their usual activities, paying little attention to the newly arrived group. As it was, the group might have arrived recently but this was definitely not their first time here. By the time Liling moved to seek out the other members of their little party, Jiang and the others had already left to attend to their matters, inadvertently leaving Liling on her own in an extremely unfamiliar place. Deciding to make the most of her 'abandonment', Liling headed out to explore the rest of the the temple where the welcome-back party had been thrown. On her way she made several observations about the place, the most apparent being the shockingly large amount of affluence around her. There had been no chance to look around the previous night but now that she really paid attention, she was more t
Lightning ripped through the night sky, bringing with it the promise of an impending rainstorm. All over the village of Shèngsuo, farmers sat in their beds at home, hoping for the rain to fall and bring life to their crops in the field. The streets were mostly empty, the population of the village having retired for the night. Only a few night stalls are open and the traders hung hurricane lamps inside to shed light on their wares. A black wagon pulled by two horses rolled down a street, its wheels disturbing the silence of the night. As it passed, all the open stalls in its path quickly closed up as their owners recognized the wagon. It was over that had brought suffering on many of the traders in the village. When it went past them without stopping, many traders sighed in relief. It seemed that the heavens were lenient with them tonight despite what the weather might suggest. In front of the wagon, the rider gripped the reins tightly, his face set in a grimace. He was not suppo
The man carrying the chest trudged on hurriedly through a dark passage. The box in his hands seemed to increase in weight with each step and he adjusted his grip to carry it better. Maybe it was just his nervousness that was causing it but he constantly kept looking over his shoulder with the uneasy feeling that he was being followed. The darkness did not reveal and he continued on, holding his lamp in front of him to illuminate his path. He came across two guards who were standing sentry in front of a large wooden door. Their faces were grim and intimidating and they each held a flaming torch in one hand and a lance in the other. As soon as they saw him, they crossed their weapons in front of him. The man halted long enough to hold up the golden chest up for them to see. The guards inspected the bids and eyed the man warily before acquiescing and opening the door to let him pass. After he had gone through, they were about to shut the heavy door but a soft clanging noise made th
In the building west of the compound, the two shadowy figures moved quickly from one torchlit passageway to another in search of their target. They were fast, so fast that even stationed guards saw them as little more than shadowed blurs caused by the flickering lights. They stopped a few meters away from where seven guards say on benches laughing and drinking together. Behind them was a small dark and dreary cell built into the wall. Its sole occupant was a girl that looked to be about nineteen years who lay horizontally on a small bed in the corner of the cell. She had pretty features with an oval face and almond-shaped eyes that reflected the light from the passage's torches brightly. Snow white hair fell in a straight curtain around her head, slightly dirtied by the less than pristine surroundings. Her nose was small and pointed in a manner that that fit well with her soft looking pink lips. But her facial disposition was quite different from the way she looked. The gir
Streaks of lightning crisscrossed the dark sky as rainclouds gathered over Shèngsuo, the accompanying boom of thunder resounding throughout the village and its environs. Below the stormy sky two swordmasters clashed together repeatedly in a fiercely matched battle. Each has their own objective; one to defeat her rival and enemy, the other merely to keep her occupied until his colleagues finished their part of the mission. The assassin blocked an upward slash from the woman and shifted her blade to the left, leaving her open long enough for him nearly slice her back open. She placed her sword behind her to block the hit before spinning around to deliver several rapid blows at him, each aimed at debilitating him but he parried them away skillfully and leaked back to avoid one that should have split him in half. All the while he had an infuriating smirk on his face that sent rage coursing through his opponent. "You've gotten better, I'll admit. But that won't be enough to best m
Dreams were not unusual to her. In fact she was very familiar with them, considering the fact that she tended to have one nearly every night of the week. Sometimes they were strange and meaningless, other times just plain confusing. A few of them had actually helped her foresee some future events in the past but more often than not, she found it hard to decipher some meaning from her dreams. The last one had been a sort of premonition about her eventual capture by the people who had been hunting her for months now. Unfortunately she had chosen to ignore it, a terrible choice that had not failed to land her in captivity a few weeks ago. Since then she had decided to start paying a bit more attention to her dreams, just to be on the safe side. That was easier said than done with how much little sense her current dream was making. She had found herself lying on her back on the ground in the middle of a forest clearing. Looking around she found no sign of fauna despite the nature of
Jiang Shui had noticed her unease when he had mentioned her criminal past and acted to quell get fears of imprisonment again. It seemed to have worked albeit marginally as the girl looked a bit less tense than before despite her eyes still flickering to the nearest exits from the room. Her body sunk back into the bed and she drew the blanket covering her up to just below her chin. "Then again, I suppose it would be a bit difficult to maintain a low profile with hair like that." He offered her the steaming cup in his hands with a disarming smile. "Here, drink this. It'll help with your pain." Liling peered into the cup suspiciously, the black liquid swirling in a misty circle with a small amount of froth on the surface. It had a strong yet surprisingly pleasant scent. Logically she supposed accepting the drink would be a terrible idea, seeing as she knew next than nothing about the young man. But when she remembered the manner they had decimated her guards, Liling decided to