“Ugh!” “C’mon!” “How!?”

  I grin at the groans coming from the trio recovering nearby, limbs and torsos bandaged.

  “Thank you for your kind donation to your dear brother Hu Lang’s stomach once again.” The young man, a little older than me, gives a fox-like grin at the three he beat at dice and pulls in the pieces of meat and cheese they put into the pot.

  Thankfully Cool Spirit Grass is abundant outside the walls, so the apothecary had a plentiful stock to make the paste to fix up the holes in my leg after stitching it up. Though the Long clan hoard the finest medicine for themselves and their men, the paste is far better than what I could’ve done myself. They said I should be able to walk without opening the wound in a few days, which is when they’ll kick me out, and should be fully healed by the end of next week.

  Hu Lang came in the same day as me, though from what I saw he had only some scrapes on his face that bled a lot and looked fine the next day. Yet he ended up swaddled in bandages and given a bed. Considering I’ve seen him talking to Doctor Feng, I can guess the deal they got going. I respect it and keep quiet.

  The three playing with the young man grumble as they limp away, leaving him to gleefully chow down on his food.

  With my entertainment for the evening over, not much to do when you can’t walk and I’m definitely not going to try and bet with Hu Lang, I close my eyes to take a quick nap when I hear heavy footsteps and every conversation goes silent.

  Opening my eyes, I see the familiar Imperial armour on the half-dozen that walk in, and in the center is a face I barely recognize as the Long cultivator from a week ago.

  The handsome young man, gazes across the various injured around him with eyes of contempt that none meet and I quickly jostle to sit up in my bed before his eyes pass over me.

  Never give a cultivator a reason to think you disrespected them, that’s how you end up dead.

  “Pathetic peasants. You managed the bare minimum to not to die outright. For that, the Long clan shall graciously bestow upon you a few crumbs, an additional pittance for risking your lives for the clan,” he smiles, thin and mocking.

  Ignoring his words, a wave of relief passes through the room, through me as well at the thought of getting injured for at least something.

  “Do not mistake this for charity.” The words hush us instantly. “You are tools, and tools must be used. The beasts will return, fiercer than before, and you will ferry weapons, haul supplies until either the beast wave or your backs break. Only then, when the tide of monsters has been crushed beneath the might of the Long clan, will you receive the payment you so desperately grovel for,” he proclaims with a theatrical flourish of his arms.

  He tilts his chin skyward, eyes half-lidded in mock serenity. “Consider this a blessing. To serve the Long clan is to bask in heaven’s light. Refuse, and you shall be cast out to feed the beasts. Obey, and perhaps, your pitiful names will be remembered for half a breath in the annals of our greatness.”

  With a dramatic sweep of his sleeve, he turns on his heel, soldiers falling in behind him like shadows. At the doorway he pauses, smirking as he gestures lazily and two of the armored men remain behind, spears planted firmly, their eyes cold and watchful. The young master departs in a swirl of purple silk, leaving the room under the gaze of his men.

  A minute after the cultivator left, hushed murmurs spread amongst everyone, those like me there at the fourth or fifth stage tense and pale. Sighing, I flop down onto my bed. There’s no way I’d be able to leave with the two soldiers posted at the only exit out, and I know the soldiers are at least the seventh stage, far ahead of me and more than enough to pick me off before I could take even a step out the walls.

  Almost halfway into winter, so the beasts should be getting desperate now and will attack ferally with all their number once or twice more before breaking and dispersing for the last two months and going for weaker targets. Typically themselves. Usually, I hide in my room at Old Feng’s around this time, but I guess the good with being at the fourth stage comes with some bads.

  Glancing over, I can see Hu Lang, paler than usual as he wrings the edge of his blanket in his hands and murmuring under his breath.

  I ignore him and although the anxiety makes me feel sick, I close my eyes and try to get back to sleep.

  ---

  I’ve always been a light sleeper, have to be when you always need to be aware of any sticky fingers looking to lighten your person.

  It’s how I jolt awake to the sound of armoured boots pounding down the aisle, the dark making me barely catch a blur come to a stop by the foot of my bed and flash its spear down.

  Steel bites flesh with a wet tear, a blood-curdling scream erupting as the soldier , wrenches his weapon back, dragging the skewered body across the ground.

  My heart hammers in my chance as the room erupts, everyone wide awake and watching in horror as the soldier cuts Hu Lang’s cries off with a slash, making him gurgle as he tries to hold his blood in.

  “What’s going on!” Doctor Feng comes bursting from his room, robe half-tied but pales and freezes at the sight before him.

  My eyes meet Hu Lang’s as his struggles slow, blood seeping through fingers that soon go slack, and his eyes go dull before his struggles cease entirely.

  “Do not try to escape,” the soldier flatly says, spear covered in but a single drop of blood that trails down his shining blade.

  Seizing Hu Lang’s leg, he drags the corpse down the aisle, leaving a dark trail before tossing it out the door and going flying with but a hand before posting by the door once more, his partner having not moved the entire time.

  Shakily looking to the side where Hu Lang was dragged from, the blood leading to a small hole in the wall, a few planks broken by the base and barely big enough for anyone not Hu Lang. A small table that was there, hiding the hole, pushed to the side.

  Looking up, I pale as I meet the cold gaze of the soldier, features hidden behind the shadows of his helmet leaving me only his eyes to see.

  Shrinking back, unwilling to test his patience, I slip back down under my blanket, forcing myself to lie still and sleep again. Somehow.

  None during my remaining time at the apothecary do anything to test the soldiers. Group by group we get discharged, every morning with a guard there to take them away to wherever they’re needed.

  ---

  A week passes too soon before I’m being escorted myself with a few others, Doctor Feng giving a farewell with a pat on my shoulder at my last checkup, the man being kind enough to keep me back until I was fully recovered.

  The streets lie empty with citizens in their homes to escape the heavy snowfall, thankfully none falling right now, and hoping the wood and stone will protect them from the beasts if the defenders falter.

  Its not long before we’re at the wall, the same I was repairing two weeks ago. At the bottom of the tower built into the wall, is the last person I wanted to see.

  “Great, more peasants to carry the supplies,” the Long young master says, standing on a crate as pristine as he was as the last we saw him.

  He looks out of place compared to the soldiers and other conscripted peasants moving in and out the tower with their armour and clothing stained and dirtied from the residuals of combat.

  “You three,” he points at me and two others, “cover yourselves with the trash over there and head to the western side of the tower. The remaining of you to the east. You shall listen to your betters and ferry what is needed to the walls and stay out of their way, less you stain the walls of our city with your blood,” he orders, gesturing at a pile of battered armour pushed to the side, most broken and covered in dirt with some with what looks like blood.

  Keeping my eyes low and away from the preening peacock’s figure, I speedwalk to the pile and rummage through it.

  Quickly grabbing the best pieces of armour, I can see, I pull back as the others arrive and a small bit of chaos erupts as they compete for the best pieces.

  I grabbed a breastplate that’s battered and covered in scratches but at least free of blood and relatively whole but struggle to put it on. It slides down after a minute but wince at how snug it is.

  Guess gaining all those muscles that cultivators somehow don’t makes it harder to fit in their armour.

  The gauntlets and helmet are both chipped in places and unfortunately covered in blood, but I ignore the crusty sensation as I put them on, thankfully both having straps to loosen them up.

  Walking over to the tower, I see a soldier with half his face bandaged with an eye covered, ordering other conscripts to carry supplies.

  Approaching him, I get handed a large pack of javelins and sent to march up the stairs to the top, sticking to the wall as I trudge up the wooden stairs circling the tower.

  I let out a breath reaching the top, thanking the heavens but put down a bit considering I’ll need to do the same trip countless times.

  Past the rush of soldiers moving every which way, I get a glimpse of a few captains, actual ones with proper armour and looking as if they’ve seen combat, coordinating amongst themselves. Listening to reports and sending a constant flow of messengers to the walls they’re in charge of.

  ‘Guess they sent away the peacock to get some actual work done,’ I think amusedly, trying to distance my mind from the doorway leading to the chaos of the walls.

  Taking a deep breath, I square my shoulders and march on to the wall.

  It’s like another world.

  Soldiers line the walls, either shooting arrow after arrow or throwing javelins over the parapet, and I flinch when I see one fall back, a feather of all things piercing through his armour, before he’s quickly dragged away and replaced.

  Further down, I see some forced to forgo the ranged option and instead are uniformly lined up with spears, poking any beast that peak over the wall to death and stand firm.

  I feel a shove from behind that gets me moving and I jog down the wall, passing the mass of men and weaponry and watch the flags spaced between the walls, coloured to differentiate squads.

  ‘Green, blue, red- there.’

  I come to a stop at the rear of a squad lined up with spears and as soon as the pack I’m carrying is in my hands, a captain rips it away and easily carries it with one hand.

  His men part seamlessly as he blurs to the parapet and throws each javelin, ones as tall as me, with his arm blurring. The thrown weapons whistle as they fly through the air but just as quick, he runs out.

  Though it seems it was enough as the soldiers snatch bundles of arrows another two conscripts bring and join their captain in rapidly firing their large bows.

  Turning to head back, I barely take a step before shouts of alarm erupt from around me and then, an explosion of force.

  I get tossed head over heels, getting dragged meters back on the ground from the force as the wall rumbles with dust and debris raining down.

  Coughing, I push myself up, ears ringing and vision swimming. A roar forces my eyes to focus on the massive crimson ape, one towering a half a dozen meters tall, standing on the wall and beating its chest in triumph.

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  I catch sight of the bodies crushed under the weight of the beast, those that weren’t under, launched in all directions with some unfortunately flying over the wall and down to the beast wave.

  Soldiers near it gather and prepare to charge, between its legs I can see the veteran captains running out the tower, swords and spears in hand but the beast responds.

  It rears back, chest swelling far beyond what it should be able to expand to, and I swear I can feel the air being sucked into it like a void before it releases. The air itself vibrates as it unleashes its roar, not mere sound, no, it’s something more.

  I watch in awe and horror as the attack tears outwards, a rippling distortion of condensed force that slams into the guard tower I just came from.

  Stone shatters, the tower wall collapsing like brittle clay. The last I see of the captains caught in the crossfire is them tossed like leaves in the wind as they’re hurled back where they came.

  Ears no longer working, I hold onto the ground with dear life as the wall continues to rumble as the realization sinks in. This isn’t just a mere monstrous beast, one dedicated to physical strength no. It used a qi attack. It’s a Qi Condensation monstrous beast.

  I see the few that gathered to confront it by its back falter as they see the results of its attack, taking hesitant steps back as the beast turns, eyes burning with mad intelligence.

  Its arm blurs and I only see the result of its heavy palm slamming to the wall, crushing four soldiers into a bloody paste.

  I force the bile down and try to get up on trembling legs as the ape straightens and I watch in horror as its chest swells once more.

  Feet pound on the ground as a few unshaken soldiers desperately try to run but I know its no use, none of us can evade its attack.

  The beast unhinges its jaw, the world holding still for a moment as I watch and wait for death to erupt-

  A flash of glittering green spots my vision. With a blink, I watch as a line of red sears diagonally across the frozen beast’s frame.

  The air trembles and a deafening crack tears through the night, a force I cannot name of pure sound.

  The ape doesn’t get to unleash its attack. The breath it drew in erupts outward in a torrent of gore, its torso exploding in a spray of viscera. All that’s remaining of the terrible beast is but its titanic legs that stagger for a moment, before toppling over the wall.

  A figure stands past where the beast was a moment before, on top of the rubble of the guard tower in ornate green armour and a flowing hanfu, pristine from the gore coating the rubble around him. A golden badge wrapped around his arm marks him as the commander of the wall. The cultivator somehow travelling half a kilometer from the wall’s fortress to here.

  Jian in hand, shimmering with the same green I saw a moment ago, he calmly surveys the destruction wrought by the ape before his head snaps back, and in a blink, he disappears.

  A thunderous crack follows his wake, the same force ripping the air apart. It’s the signal for the remaining soldiers to erupt in cheers, my own joining it as I feel my voice go raw with relief and awe.

  The moment of relief that the Qi Condensation commander gives soon disappears though, as the monstrous beasts take the opening the ape provided to scale the wall.

  From every part of the wall the beasts climb, claws scraping stone as they swarm up with renewed effort and the few soldiers remaining rush to meet them. But the line stretches too thin, gaps opening where men fall or falter from the sheer numbers, or the flying beasts now swooping down unchecked, too few archers to bring them all down.

  A gap opens right in front of my eyes, a soldier pulling away to cover his reeling comrade from a slash. A head pokes up the wall; feline eyes filled with rage and madness locking onto mine as the leopard covered with too many horns puts its paws up to pull itself up.

  My hands move before thought, seizing a discarded spear that’s still whole and I feel it slot in my hands and point it towards the beast now bracing, muscles coiling for a lunge, and with a yell of rage, I charge.

  It yowls and lunges to meet me, claws and teeth gleaming.

  The impact is brutal and hundreds of pounds of meat and bone slams into the spearhead, my boots barely holding on as I skid back on stone, and surprisingly that’s the worst of it. The point drives deep, tearing through its chest and keeping its flailing limbs far beyond my flesh and its roar dies in a wet gurgle.

  I stagger from the deadweight pulling the spear down with it, but I wrench it free with a ragged breath.

  I’m still standing.

  Around me, the beasts push through the gaps, forcing the line to give up parts of the wall to protect their flanks.

  There’s no escape from this. My heart hammers in my chest as I know there’s only one option. Only one way out. And I feel my gut agree as anticipation pools within.

  Battle cries meet the roars, my own joining as I join the line.

  Shoulder to shoulder with those fighting for their lives as well, I yell as I join my spear in the forest pointing towards those that wish to kill and feast on our corpses.

  My blade pierces into the scales of a large centipede, just one not doing it but the others join in the push and run the chittering beast into the ground even as a bladed leg takes the one on my left down with it.

  A snake spits poison at a soldier and even as his armour and flesh smokes and corrodes, he still charges and pierces it to hold it down, my spear finding its jewel like eye as the man crumples to the ground.

  The beasts seem never ending. My body takes deep breaths but somehow pushes on with strength and energy unknown and I don’t stop.

  An hour or a few minutes go by before I’m broken from my fugue with a piercing screech battering straight to my mind, forcing me to drop my spear from piercing a monkey with too many limbs to cover my ears.

  I can see the monkey lunge at me, four hands reaching towards me as it grotesquely opens its mouth, but I can’t move, my body locked in trying to keep out the sound before it suddenly stops.

  The monkey splits apart mid-leap before a figure drops in front of me. Armour cracked and caked with blood but posture still firm is a captain, one I vaguely recognize from the tower, who lunges forward and his sword flashes. A single slash ends a life, as he single-handedly cuts through the beasts that we fought and bled to hold back.

  Round corpses drop from the sky next to me, bats with heads far larger than their size should be. Likely sending the piercing screech at us.

  I watch in awe for a moment at the man, no, the cultivator mows down the beasts, stained white cape flaring in his wake.

  “MEN! The beasts are on their last legs, push them off the wall!” He booms as he grabs the head of a lizard and crushes it in one hand.

  I rush forward down the path the captain cleared and slam my spear into a beetle trying to skitter over the wall, blade scraping over its armour but the force of my blow surprisingly enough to push it off and down below.

  I feel others flow around me to the edge, putting their all into one last push to end it for good.

  As the minutes wear on, my thrusts get weaker and weaker even as the beasts slowly dies down until I’m forced to lower my spear, arms unable to hold it up any longer and let those on either side of me continue on with their higher endurance.

  I breathe heavily, barely feeling anything but the burning sensation throughout my body and the salt from the river of sweat pouring down my face.

  Gazing across the wide-open plains outside the city, I see the beast wave once massive and full of great and powerful beasts, now scattering to the forests and mountains far beyond.

  Glittering green flashes in the far distance with a figure leaping around the back of the wave, the commander apparently cleaning up the stronger beasts that tried cutting their losses.

  Stumbling back as the last of the beasts run with their tails between their legs, I slump against the wall and heavily drop to the ground, letting my aching body rest as cheers erupt from around me.

  I grin at the roars in victory, soldiers hugging those beside them as they let out their joy of surviving another winter.

  The next is a bit of a blur, with my mind no longer clouded with battle, it gives itself up to lethargy and I feel people pull me up and gently walk me off the wall and to what I recognize as the base of the guard tower that was wrecked initially.

  I’m slumped against the wall, this time on solid ground and surrounded by a few relieved looking peasants that survived the beast wave, much fewer than what we started with and from what I can tell, these are the few that were on the ground when the ape attacked.

  That’s where I am when the Long captain comes around, armour as pristine as I last saw and not a hint of battle on his person.

  With a hidden groan, I clamber to my feet, using my spear, something that no one took from my hands, to help me stand.

  That was a bad idea as the peacock cuts off whatever nonsense he was about to say as he notices the weapon in my hands and a glint appears in his eyes.

  “You dog! You dare place your hands on weaponry meant for the Long clan!?” He says, stomping towards me.

  I can’t find the energy to outwardly act scared as he rips the battered and chipped spear from my hand and tosses it away, a conscript needing to duck to not get impaled.

  “Do you think ferrying supplies allows you to help yourself to items belonging to me!” I feel my nose flare in a now familiar flash of pain, and I grunt as I drop to the ground from the force of his punch.

  Although a cowardly peacock, a Meridian Creation cultivator is still one far beyond my strength.

  “Or did you perhaps think that in the chaos of our righteous battle against the monstrous beasts that you can sneak away with whatever you please?” A sadistic smirk cuts across his face, “Even after I fought in the glorious battle, justice must be meted out even if it darkens my heart to do so at the eve of such a victory.”

  Glancing around, I can see nearby soldiers watching on, some I vaguely recognize on the wall that I fought with, but I don’t expect them to do anything, not with a young master from the Long clan wanting to put a show to prove he fought, in some convoluted way. I slump as he slowly pulls his sword out its scabbard, again shining and without imperfection.

  “I, Long Qiu, find this peasant guilty of stealing Imperial weaponry during a beast wave, and per Long and Vermillion Blaze Empire law, the punishment is death,” he declares, raising his sword in one hand.

  I fear death, as all no doubt do, but after facing the beast wave? After watching countless stronger than me torn apart like parchment? I don’t find myself flinching as the sword cuts through the air to my thr-

  Metal shrieks as a flash beats away the sword and my vision gets encompassed by fluttering white.

  “Long Haoran! You dare stay my blade from meting out righteous justice!?”

  “Long Qiu,” the veteran captain from the wall speaks coldly, “This man is a conscript, one that fought honourably through the battle and helped hold back the beasts; hence he is under Imperial ruling and last I checked, you are not a military justiciar.”

  Peering aeound him, I see the young man’s face turning red in anger, “I am the son of the patriarch! I am the young master of the Long clan and you shall stand aside!”

  Captain Haoran snorts, “You may be his son, but he has not yet declared you the heir, so you are not the young master, just young and immature as you are proving yourself to be. Now I believe you should head back to the tea house you came from, it is time to recover, and we have no need of distractions.”

  Long Qiu’s grip trembles on his sword and for a second it seems like he’s going to take a shot at his relative but storms off with an angry huff, everyone moving out the man’s path.

  I let out a shuddering breath once the peacock leaves and tense when the captain turns towards me.

  His stern face, light stubble covering him and looking a decade older than me, wipes away to a smile as he offers his hand.

  I stare at it for a moment before hesitatingly reach out and he grips it a solid grip and easily pulls me to my feet, making me stumble.

  “Good job out there,” he says, voice steady. “You held your ground well out there, stood out from the others still fighting with such poor armour.”

  He studies me for a moment, “What is your name boy?”

  Staring uncomprehendingly, it takes a moment before his request processes, “Umm, its Zhan. Sir,” I add on.

  “Zhan then, walk with me,” he starts walking to the guard tower, and although still tired, I trudge along a respectful distance behind him.

  “Forget for a moment about my cousin Zhan, you are with me now and he will not dare do anything.”

  We step into the tower; the inner area covered in dust and rubble from the ape’s attack with most pushed to the side to make room for those injured.

  “Tell me Zhan, how old are you?” He asks as we step between soldiers laid out on mats, physicians and nurses working between the groaning men.

  “Around 16 sir.”

  “Oh?” Surprise colours his words as he stops and turns to face me, brows raised, “Then I must congratulate you, reaching the fifth stage is no small feat. Most peasants who manage it are worn labourers or those granted plentiful resources. For one so young and without such aid, given you are a conscript, it is quite a rarity.”

  “H-huh? Are- are you sure? I mean- I don’t wish to doubt your words sir,” I stammer out. “But I reached the fourth stage just a few months ago! And I don’t feel any stronger?”

  “I am quite sure boy,” he amusedly huffs, “I am at Meridian Creation, it is not difficult to determine your strength for me. And in order of your questions, it is quite simple why you broke through so quickly, you have never put your life on the line as you just did today. All that combat and with the pressure of death? It would be surprising if you did not break through.”

  We step close to a man in robes who hovers by a pile of supplies, distributing jugs, jars and pots of medicine to the stream of nurses.

  “It is also not surprising you do not feel stronger. When you broke through you regained some of your endurance, fighting far longer than you should have but I can tell you are barely standing now,” he says, putting a hand out and the robed man drops three dull green pills pulled from a ceramic pill bottle with a slight bow.

  The pills release the smell of spring, overcoming the dust and blood in the air and becomes stronger when the captain drops one into my hands.

  “Eat, you are at too low of a stage to truly take advantage of the Refreshing Spring pill, but it will still be beneficial in your recovery,” he says and pops the last two pills into his mouth.

  I stare at the pill in my hands with wide eyes.

  I’ve seen them all the time, merchants showing them off everywhere in the merchant’s district whenever I go there for jobs, and I know that it’s far beyond what I can ever afford. So, with trembling hands, I plop the pill into my mouth.

  It quickly dissolves before there’s but a fraction of it remaining as a chewy clump that I swallow with some distaste from the texture, leaving a fresh cool taste in my mouth.

  I can immediately feel its effects, a chilling sensation spreading through my muscles and blunting the burn of my muscles and I can feel my mind lose some of the haze from fatigue.

  Processing the refreshing feeling in awe, I notice that Captain Haoran who took two pills looks only slightly more alert than before.

  “Zhan, take this token and come find me at the eastern fortress in a week from today,” he tosses something at me.

  Catching it with a fumble, I see it’s a small wooden disc twice the size of a coin. A token with the Vermillion Blaze dynasty’s symbol on one side, of course a vermillion-coloured flame, and some letters I cannot read on the other.

  “Show the guards stationed at the gate and they will escort you to me and I will personally grant you a reward for your service, willing or not,” he says casually, as something as a personal reward from a cultivator from the Long clan is nothing.

  Clenching the token in my hands I gratefully bow towards him, “This Zhan thanks you for your generosity Captain Haoran.”

  “It is nothing, now you and your conscripts are free from your duty so go on home and I shall see you in a week.” He waves me off as he steps towards a soldier silently waiting on the outskirts of our conversation and walks away.

  Pulling out of my bow, I gaze at the token once more before tucking it tight into my clothing, needing to toss off the breastplate and gauntlets that are scrap with my helmet long missing, to put it away and finally leave.

  It’s a clean escape back to Old Feng’s, everyone still hiding within their homes, and I’m able to clamber onto the crates stacked at the back and silently slip into my room.

  Peeling my ruined clothing off, I can feel the energy from the pill starting to wear off, but not the coolness spreading through my body. I toss on a thicker robe before tucking myself in and I’m out.