“Uh, what is this? I thought we were going to a town, not some broken down houses,” Alduin groans, taking in the main street of Fulian.

Actually, ‘main street’ is an exaggeration. The first thing you see entering through the gates of Fulian (which are low enough to be stepped over) is a row of ramshackle houses stretching down an empty street.

Empty is pretty much what you can sum up Fulian. Unlike Luoyang, there are no street vendors. People spend their days corralled inside their houses, and rarely interact with each other; even the beggars have gone inside. The only shops in Fulian are a hardware store that’s closed half of the time and a small store selling meat run by a grumpy old man. There’s a restaurant, belonging to a family that only serves soup made out of the household’s moldy food. Everyone calls it the diarrhea soup, because of what it induces when you eat it. Needless to say, not many people visit the restaurant. Farmers from the fringes of the border pull in vegetables and fruits once a month, but other than that, the residents of Fulian have to go to Luoyang to buy their supplies. I can’t really blame Alduin for dissing the town. 

“What Alduin means is that we’ve never seen a town so…broken down,” Lucien says. “We’ve been to many cities in the Jun Dynasty and they always seem so full of life.”

“Fulian is pretty much the end of the universe as far as the Jun Dynasty is concerned,” I reply. “It used to be a guard town against the Anglians, but we haven’t had a war for decades.”

“Lisu, you’re back!” a voice comes out from behind a crumbling wall. The person steps out, carefully walking around a pile of rotten vegetables. It’s Lisha, Lisu’s sister. “What kind of adventure did you have with your boyfriend?”

Lucien gives me an amused glance. Apparently, he understands Chinese. “Boyfriend?”

“What? No? I-” I splutter.

Lisu cheerfully waves at Lisha. “I saved some Anglians from a yao.”

Lisha gasps. “Wow, Lisu, you are so great!”

“I know! Oh, and I met Hu’s family. They’re very nice, and they all agree with me that we make the perfect couple together!”

“We are not dating!”

“Haha, Hu is so Àomàn (A/N: basically the word for tsundere in chinese), isn’t he?”

“Totally. He’s that type that’s tough on the outside but needs you to protect how fragile he is on the inside.”

“Why are you assuming things about me even though you barely know me?”

“Don’t talk bad about Lisu. She’s so good at placing down a person’s personality!”

“Can we just stop this conversation?”

Throughout this exchange, the Phoenix Guild has been watching us bemusedly. It seems that Lucien and Alduin are the only ones who can understand Chinese, and Lucien is furiously relaying the conversation to his guildmates. I glare at them. “Can you stop that?”

Lucien is laughing so hard he can barely speak. “Sorry, that conversation was just too funny.”

Alduin glares back at me. “You shouldn’t say such things about Lisu. You’ve underestimated how great she is!”

“And you’ve overestimated her talent,” I mutter under my breath. 

“What did you say?”

“Nothing. Never mind.”

“Anyways, we should go tell Father that I survived. I bet he’ll be so mad,” Lisu interjects.

She turns towards me and winks. “I’m going back to my house. I’m leaving our new friends in your care! I’ll be seeing you later at training, my handsome.”

“Don’t call me that! That’s creepy!” I call after Lisu and Lisha’s retreating forms, but they don’t seem to hear. Now that Lisu’s power is out of range, Alduin immediately turns towards me and scowls. “Why do we have to be with you? I want to be with Lisu!”

“Now, now,” Lucien mediates. “Can we set up camp next to wherever you live? Living in this empty town is sort of offsetting, and I don’t think there’s any taverns we can stay in anyway.” I nod in assent. “It’s quite a hike up the mountain, though.”

—-

After getting to my dormitory on the mountain, I leave the guild to set up their tents while I find Master Xia. After quickly flying around the mountain once, I find him, balancing on one leg near the edge of a cliff. 

“You’ll fall like that,” I tell him. He looks up, unsurprised.

“Hu, you’re back. Did Ma Lisu manifest any powers?”

“Actually, she did,” I say, before realizing something. “Wait. Did you send her with me to get her to unlock her cultivation powers?”

Master Xia grabs a bowl of peanuts balanced on a tree near him and stuffs a few in his mouth. “Well, I had to do something to get her to become my apprentice, after all. It’ll be so fun to teach a Mary Sue!”

I sigh. “Well, she one shotted a yao. So I guess your wish is fulfilled. And I don’t know why you think it will be fun to teach someone so smug.”

“Don’t look so glum, Hu. After all, you’re her future fiance!”

“Even you??”

Master Xia throws the bowl at me. “Think fast.”

I deftly grab it, keeping all the peanuts inside the bowl. “What was that for?”

“I thought it would be funny to do that while you were mad,” Master Xia admits. 

“That was not funny,” I grumble. “Anyways, we also picked up some Anglians on the way back. They want to stay on the mountain for a few weeks. Is that alright?”

“Yeah, they can go ahead,” Master Xia says dismissively. “By the way, is one of them named Lucien Basilicus?”

“How did you know?” I ask. Sometimes, it feels like Master Xia has the power of prophecy. 

“The Light Royal,” Master Xia muses. “How funny.”

“What?” I say, confused. 

“His name,” Master Xia repeats, slightly exasperated. “Means ‘Light Royal’ in a rough translation. It’s Latin, by the way.”

“Oh, I get it now,” I say, understanding. “The Light Royal defeated the Dark Royal.”

Honestly, having such a meaningful name like that makes me think that Lucien was also part of the original light novel I landed in, before it went out of canon. I wonder who else I’ve met was also part of the original canon. 

Master Xia suddenly leaps out of his one-legged position. “Hu, you’ve missed some training so you should go back to the cave and see what Qiao and Zhiqiang are doing. Lisu will join you in a few days. I’ll take care of Lisu’s father.”

With that, he jumps off the cliff, falling for a moment before flying back up and running away in the air, disappearing in the distance. Now I’m two for two for the number of times we’ve talked and he’s just randomly cut off our conversation to run away into who knows where.

I turn my back to the cliff, walking back to the dorm. I’ll have to train hard in order to defeat the Society and fulfill the computer’s ridiculous quest.