Chapter 221: To remember…
A few days back.
‘So…this [Possession] thing will work on basically anybody? And it will give them a power up the same way it affects me?’
‘Overlap?’
=However, milord, the [Possession] works best when applied to someone with a strong desire similar to the kaijin doing the possession. Granted at that point, the possessed must make a choice.=
‘A choice?’
Unfortunately, Logos and Pathos completely forgot.
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‘Did…did my own grandson just shoot me with an energy blast?!,’ Zhen Shi thought as the ball of energy impacted his chest, ‘Wait…that didn’t hurt. Was it a healing art? And why is everything going…slow…er…’
As the ball of energy merged into his chest, Zhen Shi’s perception of reality began to slow… down…and…warp…
Wasn’t I…fighting…someone…
…
…
…
Z.. Sh…
“Huh…?”
Zh.n Shi…
“Who’s voice is-”
Zhen Shi!
“Bwah!,” Zhen Shi woke with a start. He wasn’t entirely sure how or why, but right now he was surrounded an empty void of some kind, chained to a floating plarform of ice. However, when he turned his gaze upwards, he realized that the void wasn’t completely empty, for he could see strangely familiar streaks of lights decorating the space of above him, four in total, but one looked for a lack of a better word, broken. Understandably he was freaking out, although the chains felt weirdly comfortable to him.
“Huh?! What’s going on? Where am I? What are these chains on my arms?!”
Zhen Shi tried to call up his aether to strengthen his arms break through the chains in order to feee himself, however, his aether began to strengthen the chains instead. It almost felt natural to him, too natural. As he attempted to ascertain the natur of these chains, a booming voice suddenly filled the void.
“ZHEN…SHI!,” a booming voice like crashing glaciers called out, “WHY HAVE YOU LET YOURSELF BE CHAINED?”
“I-What?!,” Zhen Shi called out in confusion. Zhen Shi was normally considered himself a calm person, but you’d be hard pressed to find someone who wouldn’t freak out when a booming voice suddenly shows up and asks you an existential question out of nowhere.
Rising from the empty void in front of him, a giant that radiated ice and fury, stood up and began to stare down at Zhen Shi. A moment later, the giant bent down and stared at Zhen Shi directly in his eyes. This was the third instance of deja vu Zhen Shi had in the past few minutes, and it was driving him nuts at this point.
“I’ll ask again,” the giant said in a significantly scaled down voice, “why have you let yourself be chained?”
Zhen Shi was confused as hell at the giant’s question. He just showed up in this weird ass void in these chains, he wasn’t the one who locked himself up like this…right?
The giant didn’t inquire further, nor did he allow Zhen Shi to answer the question. Instead, he exhaled a huge cloud of icy mist that floated until suddenly stopping right between the two of them, condensing into a thick, almost circular looking cloud.
“Look and see,” the giant instructed.
“Look and see…what the…?”
{Come on Zhen Shi, we gotta go!}
{Yeah, yeah, hang on Bai Hua!}
Zhen Shi was ready to curse out the giant, but when he actually looked into the mist he began to see himself…well… himself when he was younger that is…
“Huh…I almost forgot… that’s how we met…”
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Once upon a time, in a land where the rivers ran wild, the swamps were deep and full of mysteries, and the tide would rise and fall by the whims of the Tidal Kings, there was a prosperous and glorious group of warriors known as the Zhen Clan.
Now the Zhen Clan had been around for over seven centuries, thanks in part to their association with the royal family of their homeland, the Bai family, but also due to their tight structure and perchance for producing talented and powerful heroes, and not just from their own bloodline either. The Zhen Clan had a reputation for being able to train even the most talentless individuals and turn them to warriors of renown.
It was among this clan of would-be champions and champion trainers, that the main character of our little tale was born, Zhen Shi.
Now Zhen Shi wasn’t the most talented of warriors, nor was he the most clever, but he was…tenacious.
He would be training while his clanmates played. When others would cower before a challenge, he would be the first to volunteer. When he got knocked down, he got back up again, and again and again.
But now, one must question, why was he so tenacious?
Was he born different?
Was he inspired by the dying words of a close relative?
Did he have grand aspirations to stand atop the world and make it bow to his whims?
The answer to all of these would be…no. In fact, he used to be the type who would just put in the minimum and be done with it.
His reason for being so tenacious, or at least becoming so tenacious, was so simple, so silly and straightforward that one would have to see it to believe it: he fell in love with someone he shouldn’t have.
“Bai Hua! Today is the day I will land a hit on you and you’ll have to accept my proposal!”
“In your dreams, my little eel, but I’ll humor you for a bit.”
Whether it was a twist of fate, the machinations of a higher power, or pure coincidence, but the princess of the royal Bai family, Bai Hua, had come under the tutelage of the Zhen Clan.
Bai Hua was Zhen Shi’s opposite when it came to martial prowess. She was talented, smart, powerful and could make anyone kneel before her with the strength of her gaze alone.
Zhen Shi had known that Bai Hua was studying under the masters of the Zhen Clan, a lot of scions from other families did, but he didn’t think much of it until one faithful spring afternoon, back when he was a tad more lackadaisical.
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“And…ten! Cool, now I can go get a pork bun!,” Zhen Shi happily declared after finishing ten push-ups.
With his training now done, Zhen Shi left the training hall and made his merry way to the clan’s kitchens, hoping to snag an early snack before lunch, until something out of the corner of his eye grabbed his attention.
‘Huh? Ain’t that the Bai family princess? Is she practicing her forms or something?’
In a courtyard, next to the path Zhen Shi was taking, Bai Hua was standing on a platform in the middle of a pond, a sheathed sword in one hand, surrounded by lotus flowers that had yet to bloom.
Zhen Shi wasn’t sure why, but in this moment, he felt as if he needed to watch what would happen next.
