The sun, it kept coming and going, like some cruel taunt. Ripping Wu Yun from dreams of better times, then abandoning him to a dusk laden with nightmares.
How long had it been since he left this room, a week? Two? The Xuan front awaited him. A cultivator's wet dream, at least one with any stones… but a mortal's hellscape. They said ten-thousand men died a week on the Xuan front. For a cultivator it was a refinement of strength, a chance to pillage your rivals, to surmount the heavens. For Wu Yun… it was a chance for him to be piled in the mountain of corpses.
The princeling had taken flight a week back. Wu Yun had watched him through the window. Tianlong Su, the very thought of the man made Wu Yun want to vomit. The prince's arrogant smile as he trotted off into the horizon atop a red-maned mare.
Tianlong Su was proud, to be sure. Prouder than anyone Wu Yun had ever met, apart from myself, of course… or my former self. Wu Yun sighed, staring up at the ceiling. It, like everything in the Wu stronghold, was dark, foreboding, metal, and sharp.
As time pressed, the guards' gratuitous gossip leaked into the room. The court started to disassemble, returning to their strongholds to winter and prepare for the coming Xuan campaign.
The one I'll join.
Wu Yun sat up, wincing. His spine, mended by expensive herbs Fifth Brother brought him. Fifth Brother continued to be a stupid sack of shit, wasting a 500-year-old ginseng root on a cripple. The fool.
It did work a charm… or so it seemed. Wu Yun swung his legs over the side of the bed, rising to his feet. Jaw clenched. It felt like knives were twisting into his middle spine.
"Fucking father!" he spat, gnashing his teeth with a grind so loud it echoed in the high, high ceiling.
Stumbling to his window, he looked out.
Snow.
Deep snow.
His father's men assembled below, donning their war-plate. The armour thick as paper, but stronger than tree trunks. They drilled out there every day. Day in, day out. Units of fifty, led by two vice-captains and one captain. There were five units in each regiment; their leader was a 'Commander', or 'Regiment Commander'. Ten regiments comprised one battalion, led by a 'Battle-Master'. Finally, ten regiments per legion, led by a 'Legate'.
Father had six legions under his command.
"The fewest of any Duke," Wu Yun grumbled in a mocking annotation of his father.
Wu Kongzi was a utilitarian and originally a barbarian, a nomad from the far North. His folk warred on horseback, destroying all on their path. That was what Wu Kongzi brought the Empire, how he had secured power: 150,000 armoured horsemen, all taught cultivation and martial arts.
Where other dukes took peasants from the fields in the millions and fed them into the meat grinder like blades of red grass, father created a spear to stoke at his foes.
"A tiger amongst pigs," Wu Yun clicked his tongue, his eyes squinting angrily. "Or perhaps king of the pigs."
Chuckling, Wu Yun watched. The warriors trained for hours, the most efficient war machine on the continent, training for his amusement, until finally Wu Yun's ears flicked.
The gentle click of a heel, marching down the steel corridor outside.
Soft.
Dainty…
"Big bird," Wu Yun said calmly as the door swung open.
"Don't call me that!" Wu Feifeng protested, doing small stamps with her feet.
Wu Yun turned around, looking at his sister. "Adorable. Someday you'll make a man incredibly happy." A dry curve formed on his lips.
"I'm the heiress of the Holy Phoenix Temple, Wu Yun. I'll remain pure until the day I die." She chuffed, pointing with a look of scorn on her face.
"Perhaps. Or perhaps you'll one day find a man that causes your belly to flutter, and your legs to open."
Wu Yun pressed, his sister's cheeks going rosy-red, like a girl deluded with fantasy.
"Pig!" she screeched.
Her hands clasped at his collar, picking him up from the ground. With a thump, Wu Yun hit the wall, her pale fists turning red as they clenched at the ends of her scrawny arms.
Wu Yun grit his teeth and attempted a single chop at his sister's arm.
Utterly useless.
Wu Yun knew it. It did nothing.
His cultivation base lost, against a…
Wu Yun started madly chuckling.
"What is it?!" Wu Feifeng huffed.
"I…" Wu Yun giggled. "I can't even tell what cultivation level you are now."
Wu Yun's laugh turned manic, his head pulsing with pain, salty water forming at the edges of his eyes.
"Now put me down," Wu Yun said. The mania passed; his eyes turned cold and tired once again. "Or dash my head against the walls and be done with it, Big Bird."
"What the hell is wrong with you, Wu Yun? Have you got no shame, no self-preservation?" She looked at him, her eyes seeming almost sad.
Pitiful.
"I'll give you three seconds to make your choice, big bird." Wu Yun's eyes constricted like a viper.
"Or what?" she barked back.
"Two," Wu Yun replied.
Her face went bright red, unsure, slightly nervous. How could she know what Wu Yun had up his sleeve, even a cripple?
"One," Wu Yun warned.
But her grip held steady. Defiant. Like the poor woman always was.
"Fine."
Wu Yun reached out, groping her breasts.
"Huh?"
Wu Feifeng didn't react at first. Her lip quivered slightly, her cheeks going red. Then she shot back; arms crossed over her chest.
"You… you… you fiend," she screeched like a chicken, her face redder than a hen's comb.
Wu Yun dropped to the floor, knees buckling as pain shot up his back. His teeth ground.
With a grunt he stood up straight, flexing his hands.
They weren't half bad… not as good as her mother's, though.
"Get over it," Wu Yun shrugged. "You honey trapped me into being crippled with that divine virgin."
"If you weren't such a lecher, you'd have never fallen for it." Wu Feifeng cursed back, still covering herself. "I can't believe I came here to apologise!"
She shook with anger, her head sweating. The orange irises in her eyes began to vibrate.
Wu Yun knew it well.
Flame arts.
The Divine Phoenix Scripture, specifically.
Do it.
Wu Yun opened his arms, inviting it.
Oblivion.
Incineration.
Freedom from shame.
From the life of a cripple.
"Do it!" Wu Yun yelled, beating his chest. "Release me!"
"Come on!"
Wu Yun rushed at her, gripping her collar. Salty water poured down his cheeks.
"Do it, Fenger," he rasped. "End this miserable excuse for life."
Wu Feifeng looked him up and down, her eyes softening. The flickering in her eyes stopped, and her arms went around Wu Yun, hugging him.
Bringing him close.
Bringing him warmth.
"Don't hug me, bitch, or I'll grab your ass." Wu Yun spat, wiping the hot water from his eyes with the back of his arm.
Wu Feifeng's arms moved, tracing his back.
Then, with all the power of her cultivation base, she rammed her fingers beneath his collarbone.
"Ahhhhh!"
Wu Yun wheezed, struggling like a fish on a hook.
"How do you like it, little shit."
Wu Feifeng's eyes lit up like furnaces, flame crackling within. Big bird's cheeks blushed, and a smile crossed her lips.
"Don't forget," she murmured, "I know what you did to my mother."
She clamped down even harder. Wu Yun's lower body, down to his knee, started to cramp. The woman had a hand like a dragon's maw.
"How… how do you know about that?!" Wu Yun grunted, his hands beating against her chest.
Pathetic mortal fists!
His once-mighty weapons did less damage than a leaf.
"Women talk, you plum-eyed bastard." Wu Feifeng whispered, squeezing down again, sending shockwave through Wu Yun's entire body.
Looking at her brother with a smile, and dangerous eyes, Big Bird released him.
Wu Yun gasped, falling to the floor. Holding his back and shoulder, he grunted, teeth clenching. Eyes widening, breath hot in his lungs.
"Have you told father?" he rasped, looking up at Wu Feifeng standing over him haughtily.
"You're not being slowly tortured in the depths beneath us, so obviously no, Wu Yun. And here I thought your cultivation was crippled, not your intelligence."
Wu Feifeng crossed her arms, placing her fiery heel at the centre of Wu Yun's temple.
"Anyway…"
Wu Feifeng looked away from the mess of a younger sibling splayed on the floor. "I didn't just come to say goodbye."
She cleared her throat, opening her hand. With a quiet hum, and a flash of her interspatial ring, a necklace appeared within her palm.
It was an ugly thing, the colour of dull iron, with a pendant bereft of any jewel or beauty. Only a hollow engraving adorned it: ghostly chains.
Brushing her heel from his head, Wu Yun sat up. His back screamed as a red mark sat at the centre of his skull.
Looking at the pendant, Wu Yun put on a baffled smile. "You've come to tell me you're returning to your hidden paradise on the Phoenix Isle, and you're offering me a rusty necklace as penance for honey trapping me into being a cripple."
His eyes turned from the necklace to her fiery eyes. "Did you intend to torture me mentally as well, or is this some ill-conceived joke?"
Wu Feifeng's breath quivered. "It's a peace offering." She paused, puckering her lips. "It was your mother's… idiot." She said the last part softly.
Wu Yun rose to his feet with a grunt, his teeth clenched hard. Looking at his Elder Sister, her eyes were… sincere. Honest. Like a kitten.
Ugh.
Wu Yun's face scrunched as a disgusting feeling of, of, gratitude invaded his stomach and neck. A weary relief washed over him.
"Why… why do you have one of her pendants?" Wu Yun asked.
He'd heard little about his mother other than his father took her by force, and she died in childbirth.
"I stole it…" Wu Feifeng said, her cheeks turning pink. "I was only a girl, and I was jealous. Father spent so much time with her…"
Wu Feifeng paused, memories haunting her eyes. "I… I just took it."
"Father spent time with her?" Wu Yun raised an eyebrow, curious.
Wu Feifeng avoided her brother's eyes, his irises stripped of their violet hue after his cultivation was crippled.
"Not good time, Wu Yun. Not good time."
Her eyes went to the door. She closed it gently.
She got close, too close for Wu Yun's liking, especially with this warm feeling cutting at him like a traitor within. It made him want to cut out his own spleen.
Clasping Wu Yun's hands, Wu Feifeng put the pendant within them, the cold metal meeting his palm.
"You weren't the first of Gu Shenhua's children within this palace. The others were…"
She looked down in shame.
"At birth."
Wu Yun's heart raced, his neck hair twisted, refusing to stand down. Why had this sister of his waited until now to do this? What was Big Bird's game?
Others?
Gu Shenhua?
That was the first time he'd heard that name aloud in over a decade. It was strange, a stranger, yet selfishly burrowed in Wu Yun's heart… like a parasite.
"Others?" Wu Yun questioned, his heart smacking against his ribs.
"Girls…" Wu Feifeng paused. "The others were girls… father had them..."
She stopped herself, shaking her head. "I just thought you should have it. It was hers. Seeing as I probably won't see you again."