….Minutes before the end of the inauguration….

From below the stage, Jing Zhe and Yu Shu heard a tussle. They whipped their heads down in unison, watching as two suspicious black pebbles morphed up into the notorious troublemaking twin siblings of Heaven’s Law Sect.

The twins held frowns on their dopey faces, the brother pushing his square-framed glasses up his nose and the sister gritting her teeth as they stared daggers at Yuan Xia.

“We could have gotten such a big reward….” The brother sighed.

“I can’t believe we let him go.” The sister seethed.

Next to Yuan Xia, Shuang curled his hands into fists. He’d beaten these two imbeciles before; he could do it again.

But before a fight could break out, a wide indigo sleeve hid Yuan Xia from the twins’ sight.

“To the Disciplinary Hall.” Hua ChunMing spoke, his voice slow, every word accentuated for the twins to understand.

He scooped Yuan Xia into his arms, not sparing a single glance at the twins who tried to run after him. Within seconds, both the Righteous Leader and the target child had disappeared. Only the fragrance of osmanthus wine remained.

Stomping her foot, the twin sister swivelled to Shuang. The brother followed, crossing his arms, glancing Shuang up and down. This boy had humiliated them in front of an Elder. They had to settle their grudge today.

Compared to the rambunctious twins, Shuang had a much calmer temperament. He tossed the hem of his green robes back, and the crisp scent of ginkgo leaves fluttered across the stage. Glaring the twins head-on, Shuang took one step forward, then another….

And walked off the arena.

With a casual wave, he disappeared into the crowd, leaving the twins gaping in confusion.

Since both of their targets had disappeared to areas beyond their reaches, the twins had nowhere to release their boiling rage. Just then, the sister met eyes with a pale young Doctor, and the brother found a lion-like orange-haired child.

Easy targets.

A murderous glint flashed in their eyes, and they flew down to Jing Zhe and Yu Shui. Annoyed at having their target dragged away, the twins pointed their dual sword at the children.

“You’ve taken our target from us! We demand compensation!” The female twin sniffed.

The male twin tilted up his glasses. “Exactly! We’re angry now, you two fight us.”

Jing Zhe looked around. Everyone who’d watched the situation unfurl had long run off, leaving the four with an abundance of space to fight.

Even the guards slinked back, desperate to not be seen.

Whatever, this wasn’t their problem. At the very worst, they’d just have to renew the pavilion once these tykes tore it down.

Deadpanning, Jing Zhe turned to Yu Shui. How had they become the villains?

Yu Shui stared back, a hint of aggrievedness in his expression. Then, he turned to the twins, taking on a scolding tone.

“Do you find yourselves noble, bullying children? Are you not ashamed to contradict Heaven’s Law?”

His words had no effect on the twins. Instead, they grew more aggravated, taking out their dual weapons and aiming them at Yu Shui.

This was unacceptable. Jing Zhe stepped in front of his mentor, a Tibetan Singing Bowl in his hands.

His gaze had transformed from quizzical to infuriated. Raising his arms, he displayed his singing bowl, earning a scoff from the twins.

“What’s that going to do?” The brother smirked. “Make a nice sound?”

“Can you even use it properly? I bet I can make it sing better, hand it over!” The sister taunted, shaking her head.

Only Yu Shui understood Jing Zhe’s intentions. His cerulean-blue eyes widened in dread, and he dropped to the ground, covering his ears.

“Jing Zhe, I’ll be reporting this to your parents!”

“That’s fine with me!” In an instant, Jing Zhe’s eyes became fierce. He took a mallet from within the folds of his orange robes and placed it at the side of the bowl.

Compared to the two children, the older twins had mocking expressions. Seeing Yu Shui hunched over, the sister couldn’t help but tease:

“Hah, look at this short kid. What’s a small bowl supposed to—”

The sharp ring of a Tibetan Singing Bowl rang across the pavilion.

In an instant, everything ceased to matter. Both twins brought their palms to their ears, screaming as they flopped to the marble floor. A steady trickle of blood seeped from their ears, filling in the cracks of white marble.

Jing Zhe had a dissatisfied look in his eyes. Even though he was the closest to the frequencies of his Singing Bowl, he didn’t feel any of its sound waves. But he thought of his father who, with just one flick of his mallet, could make the evil people explode… and frowned at the disparity in strength.

Seeing the eager bloodthirst in the little boy’s eyes, Yu Shui gulped down his scolding words. Instead, he looked towards the spectators.

The guards had cast a barrier around the entire arena, blocking the innocent people from the vicious fight. However, the barrier had already formed small cracks from Jing Zhe’s attack.

Just then, the green ginkgo boy from earlier raised his hand and touched the barrier. The cracks doubled back on themselves, each line trailing upwards until it disappeared. Almost as if nothing had happened, or like the barrier had gone back in time.

Yu Shui sighed in relief. Turning back, he stood up, checking Jing Zhe for any injuries.

“Young Master Jing, don’t you think you’ve done enough?” Yu Shui’s voice softened, careful to avoid pressing any of Jing Zhe’s buttons.

The lion-like boy turned his fiery golden eyes to the young doctor. The glare in them eased, just enough to let Yu Shui know that he was in the right state of mind.

“Ok. But I want to beat this lesson into them a little bit more.” He grinned. “They’re not allowed to threaten my mentor.”

What lesson? While Yu Shui felt touched, he still shivered in fear.

 If the twin fools were normal humans, they would have never regained their hearing for the rest of their lives.

Before Yu Shui could dissuade his young student, the twins staggered up. They held their dual swords and charged straight at Jing Zhe.

“You b*tch!”

But just as the swords scratched past Jing Zhe’s cheek, a golden cudgel flipped them one-by-one into the air. The swords spun in wide arcs before crashing into the battered marble floor.

The twins froze, dumbfounded, staring at their empty hands.

“You really don’t feel guilty for bullying children….” Yu Shui mumbled, refusing to meet the twins’ eyes. The golden cudgel in his hands whirled, tapping the ground with a clink.

As the twins processed Yu Shui’s words, Jing Zhe appeared behind him with a flaming Ocean Drum.

Just how many strange instruments did this tyke own? Unwilling to expose themselves to damaging soundwaves again, the twins covered their ears.

This time, Yu Shui covered his eyes with his arm, blocking off his sight. The golden cudgel in his left hand fell to the floor in his panic.

But the twins didn’t see Yu Shui’s cue until too late.

The Ocean Drum spun, a pleasant sound ricocheting through its cylinder. The pattern on the front whirled, sometimes becoming waves of water, sometimes becoming splotches of flames.

Sucked into the illusion and surrounded by the hypnotic sound, the twins gasped for air, caught within the depths of an imagined sea. Creatures dragged them deeper, deeper….

But before the vast waters took them, they found themselves in a firescape. Flames licked at their clothes, smogging the air with charred ash.

Hearing their struggles, Yu Shui almost felt bad.

After a minute or so, Jing Zhe grew bored of this torture. The twins’ vision cleared, and they fell backwards off the stage, fear vivid in their eyes as they stared up at Jing Zhe.

“Have you learned your lesson?” Jing Zhe held his arms akimbo. No one knew when he packed his instruments into the folds of his robes.

Nodding like chicken, the twins panted as they seared the memory into their minds. They scampered to their feet, bowed, and took off in a flash.

The arena fell silent.

Yu Shui remained still. Jing Zhe tiptoed over, patting the terrified doctor’s arms. Only then did he look up.

“Satisfied?” The young doctor had a compliant gaze as he turned to the boy, looking not like a mentor but more like an exasperated friend.

He understood Jing Zhe’s strength—something many times more powerful than a simple medical practitioner like himself—and that he kept a silly act for people to lower their guard. Thinking back, Yu Shui shivered as he remembered how many times he’d toed this dangerous line.

“Very.” With a smug smile, Jing Zhe grabbed Yu Shui’s golden cudgel off the floor and held it to the other’s left hand.

Yu Shui flinched, earning a frown from the boy. As he forced himself to ease into Jing Zhe’s grip, the golden staff recognized its owner and shrunk into a ring—which Jing Zhe planted on his ring finger with a cheeky smile.

“There you go.” With that simple sentence, Jing Zhe released Yu Shui and stretched, becoming once again a child. “I’m hungry. Let’s get something to eat.”

—

A collective sigh flew through the air. The guards put their barrier down, then went to work to repair the marble pavilion. The mysterious chubby boy in green tapped on the pillars, reversing them to their original states.

On a normal day, Yu Shui would have stayed behind to help. But he felt that if he didn’t establish his dominance as a mentor, Jing Zhe would look down on him forever.

So, grabbing Jing Zhe’s wrist, Yu Shui pulled him towards the Intersection of New Greetings—the pathway between the four major Orthodox Sects. This would bring them home.

“You have a lot of explaining to do.”

Jing Zhe beamed, his voice sweet as he replied.

“Okay….”