Legend of The Young Master

Chapter 167: Return

Wuyi touched the wall of the chamber and the statue of Valor placed its hand on Wuyi's shoulder. The walls of the sacred chamber started to take on a red hue, and then some arcane symbols lit up on the wall.

"He will feel the heat," Wuyi heard from the statue of Harmony. He was surprised his statues could joke too.

"Do you still possess the consciousness of the goddess?" Wuyi asked.

"Not the time for you to know," the statue replied.

In the real world, the charred piece of cloth Wuyi was holding caught fire and burned red-hot.

On the bank, all boats that had been filled with inflammable materials by Wuyi's archers burst into flames with one simultaneous roar. With all the boats Burned Wuyi had directed fire towards escaping demonics and it did not take much time for them to burn crisp..

Wuyi and group had cleared the path when they returned back to fort. But they had paid a price. Only Wuyi emerged without any harm from the archery. The other men fared worse. Lei was dead, despite Ni's best efforts at rescue. Another warrior had a Tallon's arrow right through the joint in his Qi armor—through his gut.

Two other warriors had arrows in their limbs and were screaming in pain, mortally afraid of the poisoned Qi in the arrows.

As it was, the skill and power of the Statue of Light seemed to ensure that any man who wasn't killed outright would be healed. If they hadn't had Wuyi's statue of light, all of them might have died from their wounds. But Wuyi had limited energy.

This is where the pavilion ladies came in. Wuyi, who was just coming to terms with the idea of a pavilion of powerful women, was staggered by the healing power they poured into his men—Meiying had six badly wounded men, including Yinhai Hu—one of their best men in every respect. These warriors and archers had fought valiantly.

But the barrage of Wuyi's flames was more effective than the barrage of arrows had been. He had to give credit to specter for letting him come up with his own flame technique.

Wuyi walked through the wards for the injured in his Qi armor itself. The wounded were cheerful—as any man or woman might be, waking to find an ugly wound completely healed. One of woman warriors of Wuyi's group whose dark wood-colored skin and heavy muscles had earned her the name Lady Pine, lay laughing helplessly at one of the warriors' stories.

Xueqin Yang was already healed gone; Wuyi had seen him playing the flute. Yinhai Hu lay watching Lady Pine laugh.

"Thought I was a goner," he admitted when Wuyi sat near him. He showed Wuyi where a shaft had gone into his chest.

"I coughed up blood," he said. "I know what that means." He raised himself, coughed, and looked at the attendant in the corner. "Pretty attendant says if it'd been a finger's width lower, I'd have been dead." He shrugged. "I owe her."

Wuyi squeezed Yinhai Hu's shoulder. "How do you feel?" he asked. He knew it was a foolish question, but it was part of the job of being a leader.

Yinhai Hu looked at him for a moment. "Well," he said, "I feel like I was dead, and now I'm not. It's not all bad—not all good." He smiled, but it wasn't one of the archer's usual smiles. "Ever ask yourself what we're here for, Young Master?"

All the time, he thought, but he replied, "Sometimes."

"Never been that close to being dead before," Yinhai Hu said. He lay back. "I reckon I'll be right as rain in a day," he said. He smiled, a little more like himself. "Or two."

The pretty novice attendant was, of course, Liwei. She was slumped at a low table at the end of the ward. When he saw her, Wuyi realized this was to be expected—she might be the best healer of the bunch.

Initially, he had thought perhaps she was not aware of her powers—as the statue had not given him any sign that she thought about her bloodline or that if she knew she was special, but now he understood she knew she had the bloodline power to heal; it was just that she did not find it special. If he had dug deep enough, he would have found out.

He did not have to read her mind to know that she was aware of her bloodline when he saw her after every battle going in and out of the building that housed the injured, adjoining the dormitory .

She was resting, eyes closed, which did not invite conversation, so he walked past her and up the steps to see Lianzhi Zhu, another of the injured. Lianzhi was not a noble born man; he was not a warrior from the start. Rumor was he'd started life as a seamster. Wuyi found him propped up with pillows, looking very pale and reading.

The parchment cover with its weird writing didn't offer Wuyi a title, but closer to him, he saw the man was reading "Zenith of Righteousness."

Wuyi shook his head.

"Nice to see you, Young Master," Lianzhi Zhu said. "I'm malingering."

Wuyi smiled. Lianzhi Zhu was forty—maybe older. He was multi-talented for a warrior. He could start a fire, trim meat, make strong leather armors, help horses. On the road, Wuyi had seen him teach a young girl to make leather shoes for her. He was not the best Qi warrior in the group, but he was a vital man.

The kind of man you trusted to get things done. If you asked him to make sure dinner got cooked, it got cooked.

He was not the sort of man who malingered.

"Me, too. You've lost a lot of blood," Wuyi sat near him.

"Your woman—the pretty one—"

Wuyi sighed. "Not my woman—"

Lianzhi Zhu smiled like a schoolteacher. "As you say, of course."

It was odd—Wuyi had remarked it before. The commonly born Qi warriors had prettier manners than the noble born. Lianzhi Zhu had especially good manners. On the other hand, warriors like Baijian, who were supposed to be of noble descent, did not know any manners, but in their defense, he was more like a force of nature than like a man, anyway.

"At any rate, the lovely young novice who gives orders so well," Lianzhi Zhu smiled. "She healed me. I felt her—" He smiled again. "That is what goodness feels like, I reckon. And she brought me this to read, so I am reading." He made a face. "Perhaps I'll finish up and become a monk in the temple.

"Greetings, Baijian."

Baijian towered over them. He nodded to his friend. When they had started, Lianzhi Zhu was from the old faction and Baijian was from the people Wuyi had rescued in the dungeon. But over time, as it passed, they had become good friends at some point.

"If that arrow had struck you a hand's breadth lower, you could have been a pavilion lady," then he leered at Wuyi. "Your woman is awake, and stretching like a cat. I stopped to watch." He laughed his great laugh. "What a body she has, eh?"

Wuyi turned to glare, but it was nearly impossible to glare at Baijian. Having sat down,

Wuyi could feel every tired muscle. He had used the power of the chamber itself to test it; it had worked very well, but the price was always exhaustion without end.

"We all saw you charge those archers," Baijian said, as he turned away.

Wuyi paused.

"You should've died," Baijian went on. "You almost got hit what—eight times? Ten? By war-bows? With demonic Qi-infused arrows?"

Wuyi paused.

"I'm just saying, Young Master. Don't be foolish. You have the devil's own luck. What if it runs out?" he asked.

"Then I'll be dead," Wuyi said. He shrugged. "Someone had to do it."

"Yun Ming did it, and he did it right," Baijian said. "Next time, raise your sword and tell someone to ride at the archers. Someone else."

Wuyi shrugged again. For once, he looked every heartbeat the Young Man he was in this world—the shrug was a rebellious refusal to accept the reality of what an adult was trying to teach him, and in that moment, Wuyi was a very young man caught out being a fool. And he knew there was no way he was going to die but he did not mind the concerns of his subordinates.

"Young Master," Baijian said, and suddenly he was a big, dangerous man. "If you die I much misdoubt we will ride through this. So here's my suggestion: don't die."

"As you wish, Baijian," said Wuyi.

"The pretty novice will be far more compliant with a living man than a dead one," Baijian said.

"That based on experience, Baijian?" Lianzhi Zhu said. "Leave the boy alone. Leave Young Master alone. Sorry, my lord."

Wuyi shook his head. On balance, it was difficult to be annoyed when you discover that men like you and desire your continued health.

Lianzhi Zhu laughed aloud. Baijian leaned over him, and whispered something, and Lianzhi Zhu doubled up—first laughing, and then in obvious pain.

Wuyi paused to look back, and Baijian was taking Mahpai tiles and dice out of a bag, and Lianzhi Zhu was holding his side and grinning.

Wuyi went down the steps. He wanted a cup of wine, but he was sure he'd go to sleep. Which he needed.

But then recruitment work was not done yet. He went to the Plum tree that she had mentioned in her note.

And there she was, sitting in the new starlight, singing softly to herself.