Yue Fan was at first surprised by the strength he felt in the hand Shen Yao used to catch his wrist but more than that he was angry after seeing the series of actions performed after Shen Yao released his wrist.
Shen Yao who had finished cleaning the dirt off his wrist after all this Yue Fan guy actually came the whole way from the training grounds without cleaning even a bit so feeling that dirt on his palm Shen Yao felt a bit uncomfortable so after cleaning, he felt a bit comfortable and sighed in relief instinctively but he didn't notice in someone else his actions were a show mockery to him
Shen Yao glanced at him.
Young, he thought. Angry
Shen Yao was shocked internally then without changing his expression he glanced at him though he was a man his face appeared to be a bit feminine don't tell him this is the famous woman dresses as a man to join the army he blinked then glanced at Yue Fan whose body had become sturdy and well defined figure from training year round he shook his head he was thinking too much.
Soon the commotion here brought footsteps — fast ones, the particular rhythm of someone who had been moving quickly trying to get to their destination faster than normal
Xi Shu arrived quickly heaving as he took deep breathes in looking like he just ran a 1000m marathon. He moved between them and with quick pulled the young soldier back with both hands.
"Little Yue." His voice carried the specific exasperation of someone addressing a person who had done something really impulsive and worry "What do you think you're doing."
The young man — Yue Fan — stepped back. Not because he'd been moved but because he'd chosen to, which was a different thing entirely. He scoffed. His teeth were gritted and his eyes were fierce in the way of someone who had decided on something and hadn't been talked out of it yet. The scar that ran from the outer corner of his left eye down through his brow caught the light — an old one a reminder of the turmoil he had survived
Three years with the Shen army, Shen Yao thought, assembling the information from the original's memories. Joined at sixteen against his parents' wishes. Spent real time at the border. he knew the Shen couple before they died after all they were his idols
And has opinions about their son. A fan boy
He smiled — not warmly a bit cold with a look of watching a show
"Is this how you're trained to behave?" he asked pleasantly. "Going around throwing punches at anyone?"
"Depends on who," Yue Fan replied.
Direct, Shen Yao laughed out loud as he turned around him as if surveying something interesting "Depends on who? " He repeated as if severing the taste in his mouth then stopped right in front of Yue Fan but before he could say anything
"That's enough Little Yue." The voice came from the edge of the gathered crowd — measured, carrying the natural authority of someone who had been giving orders long enough that the habit had settled into the tone itself.
The man who stepped forward was middle-aged he limped that looked his leg still bandaged other parts of his body were also injured but the most severe one seemed to be the one on his leg. He moved through the assembled soldiers with the ease of someone they automatically made space for — not because of rank exactly but because of something that preceded rank respect. He positioned himself between Shen Yao and Yue Fan with the unhurried confidence of a man who had stood between larger problems than this one and come out intact.
He turned to Shen Yao.
Old Lei, the recognition arrived faster than Shen Yao could control it memories of the original owner standing in the main hall waiting in excitement and his disappointment every time they left it was unbearable. Right hand to the Shen couple. The only one who had survived the ambush a month ago.
One of the few people in this world, Shen Yao narrowed his eyes slightly in scrutiny, who actually knows what happened at the border.
"I'm sorry, Little Yao." Old Lei's voice carried the particular weight of an elder talking to a child he watched grow up "He's just angry. There have been... additions to the army recently. People placing their own before you arrived. It's made things tense."
Additions, Shen Yao tilted his head slightly glancing at the army a bit far behind especially at the ones who lowered their heads. Interesting word for it.
He nodded.
Yue Fan's jaw tightened. His eyes stayed on Shen Yao with the fixed quality of someone who wasn't finished yet
"I challenge you. He yelled pointing at Shen Yao regardless of how old lei glared at him clearing not planning on back down.
The words landed in the space between them and the surrounding soldiers went quiet all their eye directed at Shen Yao who was being challenged. Though they all had opinions about Shen Yao since they had been with the Shen couple, they weren't foolish enough to challenge him first of all he was his parent's precious son and if anything happened, they were sure the Shen couple will surely turn in their graves and though there was a punishment too for disrespect but they greatly respected General Shen and his wife Luo Wanyun.
Xi Shu was the first to react
"No." He stepped forward with the energy of a man prepared to fight then glanced at the Shen Yao "Young Master, you're still injured. You cannot accept any challenge." He turned to Yue Fan with narrowed eyes resembling the look of a mother hen protecting their young "And you — just because you've trained with the army doesn't mean you can go around bullying everyone."
Shen Yao had been opening his mouth to respond to the challenge.
He stopped.
He turned to Xi Shu.
Bullying, he thought. Who is bullying whom, exactly.
The expression on his face was enough to tell everyone at the scene what exactly his was thinking.
The assembled soldiers looked at Xi Shu with the unified expression of horror what was the vice commander saying they turned their attention to Shen Yao whose face was slowly turning dark. Several of them exchanged glances. Yue Fan blinked. Old Lei's cleared his throat though it suspiciously sounded like someone trying to hold down a laugh.
In the corner of his sight Shen Yao caught the sound a chair scraping off its legs he turned to find Pei Shu standing the look of shock one Shen Yao found enjoyable after all he almost slipped off his seat — if it wasn't for the fact that he was currently nursing a minor headache he would have laughed. The very deliberate quality of silence that followed helped him collect himself.
Shen Yao pressed two fingers to his brow and applied gentle pressure.
"Xi Shu."
"Young Master."
He held his hand up signifying that it was enough for the moment. Then he turned back to Yue Fan.
"What kind of challenge?"
Xi Shu couldn't stop his young master from doing what he wanted so he glared at Yue Fan feeling that his current training schedule was too free Yue Fan didn't know that because of his impulsive action he had rewritten his schedule for the rest of the year he sneezed once who the heck is thinking bad about him. as they did that Shen Yao listened to the explanation of the game Yue Fan was talking about and he was surprised that it was not what Shen Yao had expected.
He listened to the explanation apparently it was just like trap shooting in modern times. Unlike in modern times were a clay disc is launched into the air and the shooter tries to hit it with a shot gun before it lands on the ground, this version actually differed because they used eight fist sized clay figurines which they shoot in the air and instead of a shot gun they used bows and arrows which is actually a bit harder — it seems he really underestimated the creativity the ancients had.
The ancients, he thought, were smarter than I gave them credit for.
This was obviously strategic — accuracy training disguised as entertainment, competitive enough to motivate genuine improvement, designed by people who understood that soldiers practice harder when they're playing than when they're working. His parents had introduced this. His parents who had spent years at a border fort writing him letters about weather and daily meals and the funny thing that happened at drills his mind suddenly remembered those letters the original didn't bother opening and sighed.
After thinking about it he realized that the target was small. The window was brief. The margin for error was essentially nothing.
All right, he thought. Let's see what this body can actually do. he followed Old Lei to the where the game will be held
The open space filled quickly.
Word traveled through an army camp the way word travels anywhere people are bored and interested — immediately and completely. Soldiers arranged themselves at the edges with the anticipation of people preparing to watch a good show they discussed about who would win since they placed bets using alcohol and some even bet that if they lose, they will take on the others guard shifts for the next week. Old Lei didn't stop them after all it was hard to find any real entertainment in the army, so he let them place their bets with peace of mind.
Xi Shu stood to the side wearing feeling both worried and anxious because the young master might injure himself if any of them happened, he wouldn't spare Yue Fan. Yue Fan on the other side of the open field preparing sneezed again is it just me or is it getting really called he asked old lei who glanced at him as if he was seeing an idiot with the way Xi Shu was glancing at their direction with such tension of course it's cold.
Pei Shu positioned himself where he had a clear view of both competitors and settled in with the focused attention of someone who had cleared his afternoon for exactly this.
Watching, Shen Yao glanced at Pei Shu who was seated way to comfortably for his liking. Not helping. Not interfering. Just watching.
He turned back to the front picked up the bow and waited
The first figurine arced upward.
He released.
The clay burst once the arrow hit it
Then the second. The third — all hit as if he had been playing this game since he was a child. actually, after the first shot everyone was already shocked and once, he hit the second and third they snapped out of their daze
The fourth he missed.
he sighed he knew this was going to happen though he knew how to play the game but that was only using a shot gun he had never used a bow and arrow before at least not before he came to this world.
Yue Fan shot with the unconscious fluency of someone who had internalized the game to the point where thinking about it would make it worse. His accuracy was real — earned through genuine repetition, the kind that lived in muscle rather than memory.
The last two figurines flew.
But maybe Yue Fan was too confident because by the time he reached the last two he missed.
The silence that followed was deafening everyone turned to Shen Yao in shock though some people lost and some won but right now their eyes were glued to the thin young man
A tiger father doesn't raise a dog son.
The thought moved through the assembled soldiers like a current — visible not in what anyone said but in the subtle collective recalibration of every face in the crowd. The thing they had believed about Shen Yao — or been told, or assumed, or inherited from the original's reputation — bumped against the evidence in front of them and produced uncertainty.
Xi Shu, who had been bracing for disaster, blinked several times. Then he did the rapid internal recalculation of someone who has just discovered their catastrophizing was unnecessary and isn't sure whether to be relieved or embarrassed.
I was just being silly, he thought.
He was still relieved.
Pei Shu lowered the hand he'd unconsciously raised to his chin and looked at Shen Yao with the expression that Shen Yao had concluded as found something interesting and was beginning to understand was Pei Shu's version of a very significant reaction.
Next time, Pei Shu thought, I'll challenge him myself.
If Shen Yao knew what this man was thinking, he wouldn't have participated to begin with.
But unfortunately, Shen Yao didn't know what Pei Shu was thinking.
He looked at the broken clay on the ground and thought about how the original's parents introduced this game to soldiers who needed to pass the time between battles, and about a girl at a border fort who had learned about it years before her brother ever saw it, and about the particular word introduced when Old Lei said it and resolved tothink about it and bring some things himself. Eventually.
For now he handed the bow back and turned toward the general's tent.
later that day as the sun set the tent was quieter than the camp around it.
Shen Yao sat at the general's desk — the original's desk, his parents' desk before that, the wood worn smooth at the edges from years of hands and documents and decisions — and worked through it with the efficiency of a man who had been handlings such for years.
Xi Shu had announced he was going to check on the drills.
The speed at which he had left the tent communicated everything about his actual motivations but after all after the challenge Shen Yao had been giving him a strange mid read as he glanced at him every time, he placed a letter down that if he didn't read wrong was suggesting he would deal with him once he was done.
Which left Shen Yao alone.
Except for the man seated across the desk from him, who had apparently decided that leaving was not something he was interested in doing.
Shen Yao put down the letter he was reading.
He looked at Pei Shu a flicker of irritation flashing in his eyes
Pei Shu looked back at him with the expression of a man perfectly comfortable with the current situation.
"Why are you still here."
It wasn't precisely a question. It was closer to a flat acknowledgment that what was happening shouldn't be possible
"I have nothing else to do," Pei Shu said.
The vein, Shen Yao thought, feeling the familiar throb at his temple, is going to become permanent.
He returned to the letter. Pei Shu continued to exist across the desk from him with every indication of being entirely at peace with himself.
I have negotiated with ministers who controlled billion-dollar contracts, Shen Yao thought. as went back to reading the remaining letters I have sat across from men who tried to use silence as leverage and outlasted every one of them. I have attended meetings that lasted twelve hours without breaking expression. He hyped himself up trying his best not to show any unnecessary emotions.
He didn't want to react. Asking would acknowledge that it was working that his getting under his skin.
Instead, he kept his face arranged correctly and his internal state firmly his own business and read the letter in his hands with the focused attention of someone who was absolutely not aware of being watched.
Pei Shu smiled.
He didn't say anything. He didn't need to.
Outside the tent the camp continued its business. Inside, the two heirs of the Ming Kingdom's great military families sat across a desk from each other in a silence with tension enough to have a physical body — not hostile exactly, not comfortable exactly, something in between that neither of them knew precisely why
Xi Shu, standing just outside the tent entrance and catching fragments of the silence through the canvas, felt the familiar chill move across his skin.
These two, he thought despairingly if he could he wanted to cry tears why was he always in the middle of their crossfire.
Far from the northern camp, in dimly lit room one figure sat listening to a report his fingers lightly tapping on the arm rest of his chair while another in black knelt.
His report was brief. Precise. The kind delivered by someone trained to give only what was important.
The man in the shadows listened without moving.
When the report ended the silence enveloped the air as neither of the two talked.
"Keep an eye on him." the seated man said then waved his arm as if to dismiss the other
The figure in black bowed once blended into the shadows then he was gone.