[Young Master Xian]—❈—65:: Amazon

Stand straighter. Sit straighter. Walk slower. Don’t fidget.

With every new lesson Mother’s etiquette instructor , one Geng Zemin, drills into me, the more my long-held belief is reaffirmed; being a proper cultivator is all about how big a stick you can act like you have shoved up your backside.

Meng Yi and Xiuying aren’t spared either.

As my retainers, especially ones who are themselves being honoured, they are expected to attend to me the entire time. Which basically means standing three steps behind and one step to either side of me, pretending that they have even bigger sticks shoved up their butts than I do.

Meng Yi had inhaled four percent deeper than normal one time, and Geng Zemin had looked at her like she kicked his puppy or something.

Xiuying, on the other hand, was excelling at this.

She hadn’t at first. In fact, at first she’d been the second worst of us, the first of course, being yours truly, but as soon as she’d realised that all that was required of her was to be as still and robot-like as possible (not that she knows what a robot is), she’d gone into full military mode.

Back straight, face blank, gaze trained unerringly forward, and somehow constantly maintaining a perfect distance from me regardless of how I moved.

This turn of events had pleased Geng Zemin greatly, and he’d given Xiuying what I suspect might be the greatest display of approval he is capable of: a microscopic nod.

With Xiuying excelling at it, and Meng Yi practised at it from her years of service already, I become the lumbering oaf holding the class back.

In my defence though, there are so many things to learn.

Way too many.

How low to bow to who. Who is who. How to recognize someone’s social class from the available context clues. Which conversation topics are acceptable for such an event. Which aren’t. How to spot an insult. How to spot a proposition. How and when to deflect or accept them. When to stand your ground firmly. When it is okay to challenge someone to a duel over a slight. How to challenge them to a duel.

At that point, I just give up and turn to Meng Yi.

She nods, telling me that she’s picking up everything.

Perfect. I’m taking her everywhere henceforth.

Not that I don’t already do that anyway.

The lessons don’t all happen in one day. Thankfully.

On the first day, Geng Zemin looked like he would much prefer to hold me hostage until I absorb everything he has to teach, but thankfully, he’s not the boss of me. That’s my Mother, and she could likely tell that I was close to challenging Geng Zemin to a duel if the lessons ran any longer.

Yes, I would undoubtedly lose to the Qi Realm cultivator, but some things are worth doing even if you fail.

Consequently, we fall into a pattern of holding lessons for several hours from the early morning to about mid-afternoon, after which we’re free to go about our day.

Over the next few days, Meng Yi gets two more classes with Mother to practice more safely entering her soul.

When I ask why I’m not also invited to these classes, seeing as that’s also something I need to learn, Mother tells me no one likes a nosy person.

Meng Yi maintains that nothing untoward happens during the lessons. All she’s said when I pressed is that my mother has noted that I favour her greatly. Perhaps, too greatly. And that there’s an implicit understanding between them that Meng Yi will need to be worth this much favour.

When I tell her that she already is, she gives me that look she sometimes does, like she appreciates that I feel that way, but she’s fully aware that I’m wrong.

I let the matter go.

When Meng Yi isn’t taking etiquette lessons with Xiuying and I under Geng Zemin’s questionable tutelage, or doing who knows what in her lessons with Mother, she’s usually familiarizing herself with my estate and affairs as they now are.

Getting to know the new staff, working alongside the former manager, Wu Yazhu, and other such mysterious (to me) duties as she has.

I, meanwhile, spend most of my time reading.

While not quite as bad as in Silver Springs, my presence still makes most people uncomfortable.

At first, I thought it was because of my history as a piece of shit, but Meng Yi and Xiuying soon make me aware that it’s in fact because of my new position as the genius Young Master with powerful and mysterious abilities.

Between the Wild Qi storm, the domain I have no business being able to summon, even if only in its nascent stages, and the whole mess with resisting The Empress’ subjugation that literally everyone apparently knows about, I have become something of a unicorn.

The staff lock up around me, becoming overly formal and deferential, and seeing as I’m not much of an extrovert myself, and do actually need to increase my knowledge base, I take to spending time in the library.

Xiuying tried to stay with me at first, but I could see that the simple act of spending hours sitting quietly was difficult for her, especially after etiquette lessons where she pretty much spends hours doing the same.

I freed her from her burden then, telling her that I would be fine on my own for a few hours. If I had known then what that would lead to, I probably would have let her stay with me in the library.

“You’re going to do what?” I ask the woman.

“Wrestle a tiger,” she repeats, smile on her face.

“And by tiger you mean the blue, horse-sized ones the family uses to pull carriages?” I ask just to be sure.

Xiuying nods. “They’re called azure tigers,” she says.

“I don’t care what they’re…” I stop and suck in a deep, calming breath. I exhale and turn to Meng Yi. “Talk her out of it,” I say.

Meng Yi turns to Xiuying. “Don’t do it,” she says in the blandest tone possible.

“No,” Xiuying says.

Meng Yi turns back to me. “Sorry, Qigang, she won’t listen to reason,” she says.

I pinch the bridge of my nose, restraining from strangling both women.

“Relax, Qigang,” Xiuying says. “It’s perfectly safe.”

“Perfectly safe? So you’re telling me there’s zero chance that you’ll die or be permanently maimed?”

Xiuying’s eyes do that shifty thing that bad liars’ do. “Of course,” she says.

Okay, I’m definitely going to strangle this idiot.

Meng Yi sighs. “Qigang, just let the idiot do what she wants. Besides, if you’re there then you can save her life when she gets her throat ripped open,” she says.

“Hey,” Xiuying says affronted. “That tiger should be afraid of me. If anyone’s ripping anybody’s throat open it’s me.”

Meng Yi shoots the other woman a most unconvinced look. “Uh-huh.”

I sigh at their by-play. “Okay, just… how exactly are you wrestling a tiger?” I ask. “Please don’t tell me there’s an underground tiger wrestling ring in the estate.”

“What? No,” Xiuying says, looking at me like I’m being ridiculous. “It’s to tame them.”

“Tame them? The tigers?”

“Yeah, that’s how azure tigers work,” she says. “You need to fight them one on one. No weapons, no techniques, no armour. Just a pure contest of physical ability.” She says that last part with both fists raised excitedly, a near manic glint in her eyes.

Oh Heaven, this meathead is looking forward to this.

I sigh again, seeing my inevitable capitulation approaching, but still feeling the need to put up a fight. “And why don’t we just get a Qi Realm cultivator to fight it?”

“Cause that won’t work,” she says. “It has to be someone close in cultivation to the tiger or it won’t break.”

So, in other words, it has to be someone the tiger has a real chance of killing in a fight. Great.

There are other questions I could and would honestly like to ask. Like, why, for one, the tigers don’t come to us already tamed? But who am I kidding? I’ll probably get an answer like: ‘so the Xian servants can test themselves’ or something equally silly.

I sigh again.

No doubt sensing my weakening resolve, Xiuying asks, “So, can I do it?”

The anticipation on her face is so honest it hurts.

“Fine,” I say. “Sure. Let’s go.”

Thank Heaven for my healing technique.

Ironically enough, the trip to where the match will be taking place involves riding a carriage being pulled by one of the azure tigers, and I can’t help but stare at the magnificent and absolutely terrifying beast for several long seconds.

Meng Yi taps me on the shoulder.

“She’ll be fine,” she says softly.

I watch Xiuying board the carriage excitedly.

“Of course she’ll be,” I say to Meng Yi.

Xiuying is a capable fighter. A very capable one. She should be fine doing this.

And well, if she isn’t, that’s what I’m there for.

It doesn’t look like they get new, untamed tigers very often, because there seems to be a bit of ceremony around the whole thing, with dozens of employees from across the estate present.

A sizable dirt ring sits in the middle of the crowd, its borders marked out by nothing more than a line on the ground, and the fierce, massive beast Xiuying will be fighting paces aggressively in a sturdy cage of beast rank metal on one end of the ring, its cultivation solidly at the peak of Core Condensing (the first cultivation realm for qi beasts).

Seeing as azure tigers are peasant rank qi beasts, this puts its cultivation firmly above Xiuying’s.

I say nothing.

There’s some awkwardness at my presence, but Xiuying rushes up to talk to the people present, many of whom hail and slap her on the back.

“We’ve barely been here a week, how does she know so many people already?” I wonder aloud to Meng Yi where we stand in a pocket of solitude.

Meng Yi shrugs. “People actually seem to like her for some reason,” she says, though her smile takes any bite from the words.

Someone unfamiliar comes up to offer me a seat and I politely decline.

The man begins to look like he wants to hang around to attend to me, but Meng Yi tells him she’ll see to my needs.

He hurries off relieved.

I notice a beefy guy that Xiuying seems particularly jovial with in the crowd. There’s some teasing going on between them as he says things along the lines of her not standing a chance.

“Who’s that guy?” I ask Meng Yi.

“I don’t know his name, but I think that’s who was supposed to fight the tiger,” she says. “Xiuying challenged him to an arm-wrestling match for the spot.”

My eyebrows climb. That’s impressive. The man looks three times her weight, and he’s a peasant rank with a layer of cultivation on her too.

Wait.

I turn to Meng Yi. “How long have you known about this tiger wrestling plan?” I ask her.

Meng Yi stills. “I only found out yesterday,” she says, avoiding my eyes.

I consider saying something, but then I just shake my head and ignore her.

Xiuying extricates herself from the group and returns to us.

I’m about to ask her if there’ll be like a referee or something for this event when she begins to take off her shoes.

“Um… what are you doing?” I ask calmly.

She looks at me funny. “I told you, no armour,” she says.

“Shoes aren’t armour,” I point out reasonably.

“The tiger doesn’t know that,” she says.

“So what, you’re going to get naked before you fight it?” I ask as her shirt comes off, exposing a lean, muscular physique with a set of abs worthy of a sonnet or two.

Oh. Okay.

Xiuying rolls her eyes. “I just need to show enough skin,” she says, and her trousers go next, leaving her in a pair of boxer like shorts that barely reach the middle of her pale, slim thighs.

Her weight shifts as she hands her clothes to Meng Yi, and prior hidden cords of muscles shift and ripple along her thighs.

“Here, hold these,” Xiuying says to Meng Yi.

Obligingly, Meng Yi accepts the clothes, then as soon as Xiuying let’s go, drops them on the floor.

Xiuying scowls at her.

Unbothered by the stare, Meng Yi asks, “What will you do if the tiger rips your breast wrap off?”

Xiuying looks down at the blue cloth wrapped around her chest, then back at Meng Yi. “Well, you’re the one who keeps saying I have no breasts to show, so I think I’ll be fine.”

“I don’t know about that,” Meng Yi says. “Qigang doesn’t seem to mind your tiny breasts one bit.”

“Uh, what?” I ask as Xiuying’s eyes turn to me.

The expression on my face must present to her an opportunity to tease, because she smirks fiendishly and flexes a bicep. “Like what you see, Young Master?”

I almost roll my eyes and dismiss her as silly, but instead, almost without realizing it, I let myself appreciate all of her; lean, tall, strong… beautiful. On earth the only appropriate term for her would be Amazon.

“I do actually like what I see,” I say honestly. “You are beautiful.”

Xiuying blinks, looking totally unsure of herself now. “Um…” she flounders, cheeks growing red, then she just gives up, turns around, and walks off as fast as her legs will carry her.

Okay?

“Do you really think her beautiful?” Meng Yi asks.

I turn to her.

She’s staring at me, placidly and patiently awaiting an answer.

I hesitate.

Meng Yi and I have an unspoken thing going. I’m not sure what it will become in time, hell, I’m not even sure what it is right now, so I can’t help but feel some trepidation at this question.

In the end though, I simply decide to trust that she’s a reasonable human being, and that honesty will always be the best policy, so I say, “Yes, I do. She is.”

“Many men don’t,” Meng Yi says. “They say she looks mannish.”

“Many men are idiots,” I say simply.

Meng Yi smiles, then her gaze drifts from mine to some vague thing off in the distance.

“Do you prefer women like her then?” she asks. “Women with muscles.”

Her gaze returns to mine, something like forced nonchalance in them.

“No,” I say slowly. “I don’t really have a preference, to be honest.” Which is true. “I just try to appreciate beauty as it is.”

She opens her mouth to say something else, but then her focus shifts. “It’s starting,” she says.

I follow her gaze and find Xiuying in the ring facing the caged tiger.

She raises an arm to signal, and the rope attached to the cage’s deadbolt is pulled, opening the door. The tiger, already tense, immediately pounces at her, and Xiuying grabs it and slams it onto the ground.

“Holy shit,” I say.

After all my worry, the fight ends up being a little anticlimactic.

Well, no, anticlimactic isn’t the right word, because barely thirty seconds in and I’m cheering Xiuying on at the top of my lungs like most of the others gathered.

She is amazing. A machine of precision and grace. Strength and ferocity. She is more tiger than the tiger itself.

The beast gets in a few hits. Some good ones too. And I almost jump into the ring the one time its claws come a little too close to her throat for comfort. But overall, Xiuying is fine. She dominates the fight. Overpowers the tiger in strength, matches it in speed, leaves it in the dust in skill and wit.

By the end of it, the tiger is a bruised, collapsed mess on the dirt, while Xiuying, panting and scratched, walks over to it and offers it her hand.

Begrudgingly, the tiger licks it and then rolls over onto its back.

Xiuying laughs and scratches its belly.

We cheer.

Many of the people watching rush onto the ring, and I lose sight of her for a time.

After a few minutes though, she separates from the crowd and comes to us, wide grin damn near splitting her face.

“That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen,” I say, reaching out to touch her shoulder.

Her wounds aren’t bad, and already seem to be healing, but better safe than sorry in my book.

Glory of The Sun

Xiuying sighs, closing her eyes with a relieved smile as the technique takes effect.

I cut off the technique after her wounds heal, and she opens her eyes to look at me, face flushed from the recent exertion, skin glistening with sweat.

“Truly,” I say, “you were amazing out there.”

Her smile takes a mischievous twist, and she asks, “Really? Did I look beautiful?”

I roll my eyes, a laugh escaping me. “Yes,” I say honestly. “You were beautiful.”

Something bright and openly happy shines in her eyes then, and before I can figure it out, she hugs me.

Her temperature is warmer than normal, and I feel her heart pounding away in her chest.

I hug her back. She smells like nature. A jungle after a rain.

Over her shoulder, I see Meng Yi watching us, a small, inscrutable smile on her face.

—❈——❈——❈——❈—

—❈——❈——❈——❈—

Thank you all for reading. I know I say it a lot, but truly, thank you all for the support and love.

This story would not exist without you.