"At nineteen, it seems to me, one has a right to be arrogant; time has usually not begun its stealthy and rotten subtractions." - Stephen King
"All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream." - Edgar Allan Poe
Volume Two: Eyes of Hate
Chapter XIX
Outraged / Missing
"Excuse me, sir. How much is this pair of trousers?"
Tai Lung inspected the expensive clothing material that shone his dawning eyes. An indigo cotton silk trouser, lined with small and detailed hypnotic squares. Blends of cobalt and purple were his fashion since his birth, as his adoptive father, Master Shifu, told him that the cloth swathed over the clouded cub many moons ago. The Great Dragon stroked its soft fabric.
"About twenty yuans in each clothing," the gray pig with a left-patch black eye priced his customer. The garments owner was Grandmaster Oogway's professional fashion of martial arts that could adequately determine sizes for any individual learning Kung Fu, needing to have many students dress well for the teachers' conduct.
"Wonderful. I choose the indigo one and a gray robe."
A pig who indeed owned the property of garments next to Mrs. Chow's gift shop handed both Tai Lung's new clothes just as the leopard purchased. Without any changes, the Great Dragon thanked the garment's owner and walked toward the road. Children giggled and scurried across these sections where their parents hollered for their sons and daughters; strolling further on as Tai Lung observed the mountaintop where Jade Palace stood among misty clouds trailing over tall mountains to the west, he glanced at the antelope in soft green robes near the curving river bridge, widening the villager's horror look.
Was there a village that these people merely greeted him, by the time either Shifu or Grandmaster Oogway fetched their student to purchase some needs? Tai Lung had always appeared in this village. He never needed to be reminded of his group to guide him through groceries, patrol on multiple roads, and support every villager if every soul was having trouble. Those were his responsibilities as if he became one warrior who earned his integrity: admiring masters, defending the weak from immoralities, and loving one another.
There was a problem in which the issue was too late to witness this perplexity. If Tai Lung supposed to travel with his adoptive sister during his judgments that ripped every villager's heart, how could the garment owner not show his fear at the Great Dragon? How did Tai summon here?
The sun cast its shimmering rose that stroked across these mountains, appearing the vast glooming yellow clouds that matched Tai Lung's eyes. The antelope in a green robe glanced away and barged in the door shut. Children's laugher and joy died down once a few parents behind the leopard clenched their kids' limbs, withdrawing their presence away. Windows and doors shut once more across the emptiness paths; he eyed on his shoulders back, and moving crates tumbled forward, spilling rivers of fruit.
Tai Lung regarded his surroundings, whereas the Valley of Peace deafened the prosperity's public noises: boats creaking its wood and mast on the river, Mr. Ping's kitchen hissing the steam, winds streaming petals and trees. His heart endlessly hammered once the people appeared no more, his feet crushing on bricks. The sun now settled to a dying rose, shadows flooded elsewhere. He dropped his baskets before he trotted across the road, swimming his head for a moment. Children nor villagers appeared; the Great Dragon called anyone close by, even the Furious Five; they were supposed to patrol the Valley of Peace with his adoptive sister Tigress.
Steams from Mr. Ping's restaurant hissed once more, and Tai Lung noticed one who needed to befriend this snow leopard. While raced there to the corner of complex buildings, he barged into the restaurant that the scent enchanted its pasta noodles. "Mr. Ping?"
"Hello, my customer! I'll be right with you in a moment!"
"No, I'm not hungry. What's going on here? Where is Tigress?" the leopard demanded Mr. Ping anxiously. "She's supposed to be with me. Those people out there barged in their homes."
"Hey! Ease your posture, Tai Lung! Look at my meal!"
He turned to where the voice was, and the insect stood on the wooden table. Mantis, bearing a single spoon, opened his tiniest mouth to crocodile teeth, devouring the table and his noodle bowl as a whole. "BY THE GODS!" Tai Lung leaned back against a thick dash. The bug swallowed and burped, which shook the whole village, sighing in relief. Then, out of nowhere in the leopard's straining eyes, a golden snub appeared in front of his insect friend. Monkey swelled his oversized belly, who ravenously ate more than fifty cookies.
"I can't even see my toes!" Monkey clapped his bald head, frightened at the confused snow leopard, and the chair shattered two columns of its feet, crashing the monk to a boisterous laugh. What the hell is happening?! Tai Lung gasped.
Glancing at these structures, which appeared neither of Jade Palace masters, Tai Lung gripped his growling belly as Mr. Ping served the bowl behind him. The bowl landed hard like a piece of glass. "You like to serve some noodles with pork chops flavor?" Mr. Ping asked.
"What?" The leopard widened.
"Your noodles with this lovely pork meat, Tai Lung," the goose pointed his feather at Tai Lung's serving bowl. The food laid its dark gold soup with shredded brown flesh, wafted with unfamiliar scents that made Tai Lung's tongue saturate with saliva. Under the soup emerged one layer of the ripped sclera, spawning green iris, foams sparkling in blood clots.
"Why in every name of all the Gods did you murder—?"
"Everyone knows you ate Mr. Chow's heart, and you described the taste of juicy pork meat. Not just that, but a beef stew from the bull is tastier than radishes!"
Tai Lung unmasked his jaw to a threatening posture. "You murdered all the pigs and bovines?! You monster!"
"Do your paws remind you something?"
Tai Lung felt his limbs thoroughly sogged with warm flow dripping. The smell of decay was revolting as he brought his paws upfront, emerging the gore that mimicked his purr. A female's distorted cry behind him called her husband's name, shifting Tai Lung toward the middle of the Valley. His left side was the gift shop apartment that collapsed the debris and embers swarming with the fire above the ruptured tiles. Mrs. Chow on the road knelt and sobbed, stroking Mr. Chow's chest, which mauled with the shape of a leopard's paw.
Light charcoal smokes billowed amongst the Valley, embers of dying yellow and red swimming between Tai Lung's surroundings. Fires scorched petals, tiles shattering like a river's mist. The bell from the dark sky chimed, chronicling splashes of deafening water and people's screams. "I knew you put the medicine in your mouth, Tai Lung," one rasping voice swirled behind the leopard, and an injured boar in patched trousers and spike gauntlet limped his knee, crawling on the dirt. His lips and snout spilled with gore, chuckling with his tendering throat. He was one of Tai Lung's victims — a boar clan leader. "The boys will avenge me, kitty. Mark. . . my. . . wooords."
Pots and woods shattered, drawing Tai Lung flash his glance at the Tea Restaurant. For a moment, his paws still soaking with warm gore, fires engulfed the wooden dash, glossy pots, barrels, and the tile debris, which tumbled with dust next to the leopard. Outraged, Tai Lung laid waste to the Valley. His sister resonated her candid voice to his worthy opponent (formerly), which vibrated dancing blur fumes and structures squealing with slow zig-zags. Rattling tiles above him toppled.
"MOM!"
A shoji door slid opened as soon as the silhouette figure with flapping robes barged in the student's room. A pupil's cry wasn't his fruity voice —the young Tai Lung, clenching his crippled sheet, sobbed. The figure removed the cover and embraced the child.
"Shh. I'm right here, erzi. Mommy's here."
Warm embrace stroked little cub's silky clouded crown. Tai Lung curled his body inward while crossing his limbs, but one of the Masters of Jade Palace soothed him in hearted hums. "Mom!" the cub sobbed.
A mother figure, a striped feline in light blue hanfu robes, blessed his cheek. She gripped the edge of the patched cover and laid flat halfway on them. The chamber with shoji walls lit with only a jade candle beside Tai Lung's adoptive mother. "It's okay. You had a nightmare. You are safe now. No one will torture my baby."
The candle lid no more, suppressing its shadows, and brutal blows landed with stomach and uppercut.
No more the past cub, Tai Lung roared his cry while guarding his limbs against the void, which tumbled him and adrift. He was falling, now flying upward from tumbling, drifting away endlessly as shadows clobbered his ribcages and his whole head. His face forced against something cold, stirring with half dry and saturated dirt, and the other continued battering to shatter bones.
Violent blows overpowered, renting the leopard's fur that sliced deep in his cheek, his right black eye swelling. Dazed into near subconsciousness, Tai Lung coughed his rattling breath; his injured eye crept its soft pink tears. And finally, his void surroundings receded, its vibrant sheet slipping, revealing familiar objects and senses that the leopard had impacted before. Soils were uneven, floating, floating on this terrain, the leopard lay flat, floating with abandoned lands of ghastly temples across the sea of asteroids in both green and yellow.
I don't want to suffer anymore.
Small steps deafened but drew near as the soil crushed its particles. Tai Lung struggled to maintain his weak equilibrium, nearly tumbled half of his chest, but his forearm landed on the ground hard enough to strengthen his fall. Movements near him, now threatening to level its creaking pace, cast its imposing shadow on the leopard's body. Its silhouette stretched with thorns of its horns, flared enough to frighten the young and infants. Its chuckles were low and unfriendly. The spirit warrior reached for its large hands, and Tai Lung's body glittered with a rising sun.
Your chi deserves to be my collection, Little Whiskers. Did Oogway send you? He should have been the one to stop me.
Instead of the leopard's soul shrinking to an intense yellow orb and green amulet, Tai Lung left his soulless jade stone under his limbs, crawling its thick glass on his heart, silencing the feline's wail. Streaks of emerald diluted livid color to shrouds of charcoal gray. The spirit warrior's hooves expanded his ebony claws, his green cape billowing to depths of enormous scathe skin. Kai's face untwined to an inky beast, unveiling its bared silver teeth. It laughed with its gleaming violet eyes and snapped its mouth shut.
Tai Lung's bones and flesh crushed to a thousand pieces.
The whole Barrack shook the Earth, as Oogway would have been in there with Shifu and Po, hearing the snow leopard's roar that startled every pupil in their chambers. Tigress departed her room and raced toward Tai Lung's shoji door, and Tai's claw mauled its sheets, nearly ripped her muzzle. She leaned away freely, and the corridor filled with gasps; Tai Lung's door shattered apart. Tigress sidled against her shoji wall and sought her brother's flared-up fur puffing, his head swimming with his limbs that spread apart. The leopard screamed, sprinting all fours through the path where the Dragon Warrior and Shifu at the corner.
"MASTER, LOOK OUT!"
Po covered his body on his teacher as Tai Lung rattled his way, rupturing on structures and woods; the door burst its debris, and Tai Lung roared against the sky. He raced on into the dark road where lanterns shone. But the edge of the horizon raised its vivid orange.
Gone from the leopard good, as Po was dispersing Shifu's space, the Barrack filled some horrors and Lei Lei's cry. At the midst of the corridor, Shen appeared in sleeping robes, paled while glancing at his friend's room ahead of him, which shoji papers and wood floor elsewhere. What on Earth—?!
"By the Gods! What happened?" Viper down the hall craned her head. Sobs from Lei Lei inclined.
"Tai Lung woke up crazy. That's what happened!" Mantis hopped in grimacing composure.
"Tigress! Check with your brother. Make sure his rampage doesn't land on the village," Shifu commanded.
Studdered in a frightening glance, Tigress controlled her balance. "But, Lei Lei—"
"I'll soothe her. Go get Tai!" Po interfered and let Tigress run out toward the door.
"I will follow!" Crane flapped his wings and soared among trees. With no other intentions to make her adoptive brother calm his rage, Tigress could only obtain her most straightforward answer: knock him down, or trigger her pinky Wushi Fingerhold. At first, she saw him almost plow through their father and her panda partner.
Into the hillside trees, part of the Guilin mountains that towered along other steep terrains to face the sky, Tigress wandered through a thin mist, logs and bamboos mainly appearing edges. She browsed on soil layers blended with soft Earth, scenting earthy trails and flapping wings above trees.
Ignoring her avian friend as Crane was suggesting to do helping with any member of the Furious Five, Tigress inspected a pressed layer with the shape of a paw, nearly big enough of hers. Most paws of the trail ended into the vast but found shreds of wood; she went on to where her brother plowed.
Not for long, Tigress scanned for the avian who escalated above the cliff's edge, where the cloud surged over these mountains. And a close-quarter to her right, after sightseeing petals swimming something small that lay against the heart of the Peace Tree, was the Great Dragon crossing on his knees. Crane flew down and landed. "Tigress, he's over there."
"Tell the others. I'll stay with Tai Lung."
Crane snapped his wide eyes. "Are you mad?"
"He's my responsibility, Crane. I will not let him harm anyone if he attends to do so in his way."
The avian soared away to the Barrack but never wanted to risk any of his companions to be harmed, even whenever Tai Lung and former Lord Shen resided in Jade Palace, overthinking that they could conspire with themselves to plot against masters. But who were the worst ones to come in handy? Tai Lung to deliver bone cracks at many students? Lord Shen, to formulate the next project of his blueprints to enhance his weapons against Kung Fu? The next one could have been worse if only the beast had jade power and would devour souls.
Up upon the narrow of the moss cliff, Tigress dawdled close enough to reach for her adoptive brother, who continued to embrace his knees and curl his fluffy tail for dear life. Blossom scents wafted, and the morning dawned with a light tangerine. For a moment, she approached him and determined of his claws mauled with splinters and dim scrapes dry structures.
"Make it stop. . . Please." Tigress listened to Tai Lung's rattling chuff.
The morning bell chimed farther down of Jade Palace cliff, where pig servants heaved the latch. "Tai Lung?" Tigress called him sympathetically, reaching for her paw to him.
"Leave me. Don't make me sink my teeth in you," Tai Lung wept.
"You won't. It's only a dream. Let it all go."
Instead of departing from him, Tigress sat behind him between the roots and stroked his upper shoulder.
October 30, 1210
Today was the anticipation of the Kung Fu and Wing Chun challenge, including the anniversary of Chen Xing's parents, whose lives were sacrificed from their home's aftermath. Every year, Xing's grandmother strongly desired for her and her grandson to begin meditating in front of the striped feline monuments: Chen Shui, son of Chen Ming, and Chen Yingtao, Xing's mother. The Nine's Master and Leader had always planned this day before assembling with the Nine toward wherever they could go.
The fragrance was strong to sense in the Nine's Quarter, whereas within the Leader's chamber, Xing and Ming kindled the stick scents of cherry and tangerine wafting. Xing dressed in his black robe and white trousers, and Ming wore her white and gray dress. They wore their garments to pay respect to the passing of their family members.
The Nine had noticed their griefs ever since Ming and Xing recruited members and raised Lotus and Lao as family pupils with the peacock's mother, Lady Xia. They never spoke of their losses most of the time but shared their condolences to the Nine's Leader and Master. "I wish the fire never happened, Nana," Xing mourned, closing his feeble eyes that seared with tears. "I wish my parents were here."
"We always carry our legacy, sunzi. Right now, my son and daughter-in-law are watching us, blessing our hearts." Chen Ming extended her arms and surrounded her grandson's body, blessing his forehead. Behind the felines, which opened the gap of Chen Xing's shoji door, the Mighty in his light green cotton robe and patched shorts peeped them, including paintings of striped tigers smiling.
Are they grieving—?
"Psst. Come with me."
Kai's hoof was fiddling as his co-master Lotus murmured. She motioned her paw while the other pressed against her lips. They went for the Nine's Barrack's intricate door and out toward the rim of the Arena. Geese passing by watered flowers and plants, and Kong and his messengers assembled Wing Chun's tactics from the weaponry chamber.
"Who were the two on those paintings?" Kai asked the wolf.
Lotus cleared her throat. "What you saw those paintings, Kai, they were Xing's parents."
"What caused their deaths?" he pointed his thumb.
"Some say death that slept in the forest scorched his father's screams, and a harsh wind whispered in his mother's heart," she described the horrifying tale. "Years ago, many striped felines lived in Xinshi Senlin. A village where every tiger used to train both Kung Fu and Wing Chun under the marketing glances of school and habitual homes. It was the land of harmony and quite blunt if you asked Master Ming how she described her old home, including one of her kind, who had some delusional minds. They were there many moons, before one night, the fire came, and filled every soul's agony."
Her final verse struck into the bovine's thought that he could and never experience these struggles once more. Before a volley of arrows rained down to him, slashes and blotches of gore emerged, spat over his body as he swam his head throughout the battleground where neither of his soldiers can be impossibly saved. Only death plunged across the land of black smokes and banners billowing, filled every soul's agony.
"Who murdered the kitten's people?" Kai pondered.
"I wish I could say the murderer's name. It was a he who nearly scorched Gongmen City a few months ago," Lotus worded Kai, shaking in sympathy and guilt to never mention of Chen Xing's worthy opponent. "It's your teacher's anniversary of his parents' passing. From this day forth and coming days, don't disrespect his losses."
Neither does mine if you would have asked me about my wife and the best soldiers I've known.
"Listen."
A she-wolf clasped the bull's hoof, summoning Kai's glance at her gold ring eyes. "We start practicing," Lotus urged. "Around midday, the Nine meet Jade Palace masters and accept the challenge. You'll be able to witness the true conception of philosophy and tranquility of martial arts. And you'll be going to make my cookie the best day ever. Are we clear?"
"Hmm. I can't promise you on that, but I'll—"
"No try, Kai."
"We're clear enough."
The morning arose into a prosperous rustle of leaves, pouring its light of gold and orange. Kai maintained his glance on both of his teachers, who sparred against each other during his Chi Sao training. No longer dressed in grief clothing, now in cobalt robes and midnight trousers, Xing pivoted Lotus's rapid straight punches before countering her arms bridging on his, and he swiveled his left foot under her ankle. The Nine's Master had clasped paws behind her back while observing the fighting square next to Kai, whose arms crossed. While doing the same in front of Chen Xing's grandmother, the Mighty bridged his lofty arm against hers and motioned their exact measures. Ming's blows paced and struck Kai's chest.
Granny's fast. Faster than Little Kitten.
Wolf Boss, in a gray garment, clapped his paw once. "Ha! You gotta get good on that one, big fella!"
Kai snouted. "Stop supporting me."
"I'm just praising you, Kai. You'll get the hang of it," Zhong simpered.
An hour later, the mighty watched on his feline teacher wielding a straight katana sword, which beamed its blade with snow Mandarin words, slicing bamboo poles. The last bamboo towered still but nearly cut its whole. The next, as Xing proceeded for other targets to enhance his swift attacks, he leveled his weapon with two hands forward, his legs becoming a stone stance; without reflecting distractions, the tiger gashed all five bamboo sticks.
Too slow. But a good stroke. Kai blinked in good taste.
The next half-hour passed when the mighty determined the tiger's exquisite efficiency using the bow and arrows. Wolf Boss offered Xing a gift ever since they, including the Company, traveled far to the west of Tibet and into Mei Mei mountains to save the Dragon Warrior. The Nine's Leader loosened bolts on moving targets, and fletchings shrieked its air. Most dummies hit on chests only, as his grandmother advised him not to land deadly headshots.
I wish one of my soldiers were good, compared to Little Kitten. Who does he remind me of again?
The next thing Kai eyed on carefully was those widening eyes. Xing glared at something between these crocodile dummies they were standing but quite stroked by a stream of petals. He let his lips open after nocking his arrow.
What's wrong with this kitten? Was it a nighttime story about me chasing him in his dream? He should fear me.
Xing was not specifically annoyed by his student whose ambitions yet to be scarce, but Kai —
The tiger drew and released the bolt. The arrow penetrated the dummy's inner throat, which tissues of woods ripped a whole face, tumbling the rest of the model. He unleashed more arrows; each fletching whiffed the wind. Finally, destroying one crocodile and target marks hanging on the edge of upward tiles, Xing whirled his striped tail, undulating his pupils wide, and released his single arrow. A shiny tip plunged the pink petal in half and plunged the model's crotch. Kai's teacher grasped his bow to see his fingers tight, limbs relaxing toward his torso sides.
"My sunzi, have you been getting ready?" Kai saw the elder tigress appearing behind him; Ming came from her temple's door and approached her grandson. "Xing, come here, my precious." The next moment when the tiger stared at the dead model that had ripped into woods fleshing apart, Xing's ears chronicled the weeps, the debris collapsing with bricks and tiles.
"Sunzi?" Ming palmed his back, and her grandson flashed his shoulders, glimpsing at her. Kai surveyed the fractured models, reminiscing on the brink of battles, swimming through the deep where weapons hunt elsewhere; he dodged swift blades and poles, his hooves smashing wood and iron, breaking these opponents apart.
"Xing, what's wrong?"
The tiger sharply glanced at dummies that were destroyed, left with rends as Ming took notice of her grandson's lethal accuracy of his eyes. "Nothing. Let's head to Jade Palace." Xing removed his quill and tossed his training weapons at geese servants. The rest were concerned about their colleague's anxiety. "I'll be right out in a moment."
Ming watched her grandson walk in the Nine's Barrack, and she walked ahead of Xing's mightiest warrior student near the side of the quarter.
"Master Kitt— Ming," Kai bowed to her.
"You saw your teacher. Explain."
Almost confusingly underestimated her, Kai crossed his limbs in admiration. "He's been cutting those bamboo sticks and now did loose arrows. That boy is —"
"I read his expression, Kai. He was terrified."
Kai rolled his head. "Terrified? Many soldiers feared nothing but death. Has your kitten ever killed one before?"
"That's not what I meant," Ming gestured her paw. "He saw someone or something that's frightening your master."
The bull pressed his hoof on his heart. "Me?" he guessed.
"Have you ever scared my grandson?"
The fact was he had been watching Chen Xing dicing bamboo sticks with his straight katana sword and taking on wooden dummies with his bow and arrows. Not a single glance from the tiger that he would have started frightening in front of Kai. The Mighty glimpsed at the Arena to a recall and back to Ming's stone eyes. "No."
"Then Master Xing is not your problem. Let's march to Jade Palace," Ming beckoned her head, sauntering toward the Palace door. "Grandmaster Shifu expects the Nine's arrival there."
"To Oogway's tacky temple."
The Nine's Master snapped her head at him. "Choose your words wisely, General. You never know who has the poorest taste than yours."
The old cat and that puppy are right. . . I shouldn't be insulting.
The Nine mounted on the boatman's junk boat and trekked toward the calming river, in which insects chirped and trees rustling. The water ripped its stream of white traces as the boat creaked its mast and wood; Kai sat outside close to the entry while the Nine gathered inside. Chen Xing crouched in front of the bow, inspecting the water path and bamboo forest, grasping his straight katana's blue tsuka on his waist.
"Bao, Xing?" the gorilla motioned his hand ahead of Ming.
"Don't tell me my cookie's going through again," Lotus pondered anxiously as her father, Wolf Boss, was sitting next to the Nine. Kai scratched his mane behind his head as he flickered his floppy ears.
"I'm afraid he has, Lotus," Ming spoke matter-of-factly. "Whatever he has seen anything, let him go through his course. Until nothing bothers him."
"Bao, nightmare?"
"No nightmare, Bao. He'll be alright. You all have been regarding his nightmares before. And I hope 'fire' is not a big deal to my grandson, nor drawings he has planning to paint."
What makes the boy weaker? What are you afraid of? Kai slightly regarded the Nine's Leader who was crouching in front of the small junk's bow, nearly drawing his sword, which an ancient Mandarin word of Kai's beloved name glittered with a silver star, pulsing its sharp metal.
The Nine made their travel safely to the Valley of Peace; the boatman tossed the rope on the small pole and disembarked — neither of Xing's disturbances interfered furthermore. They thanked the boatman before the group strolled at the Valley's main road, which was slightly crowded with a few pandas and most villagers of pigs, antelopes, rabbits, and geese. Kai kept his lips shut at once a small group of pandas ahead of the Nine scattered with yelps. The next thing the Mighty caught attention to while sensing Mr. Ping's spiritual noodles wafting close, his feline teacher jogged toward the side of Noodle Restaurant's entry. Scrolls of missing people appeared on the moss structure.
Kai's favorite master Lotus followed the tiger, inspecting—
"Sunzi?" Ming called. "What is it?"
Starting these missing pictures from left to right, he scrutinized the names of warriors. "Praying Mantis Lily. Swan Dancer Amy. Wang, the Iron Antlers. Buffalo Striker Zhan. Lady Ka — KASI?"
Xing raised his anxious voice. The fourth picture unveiled the black panther in a crown jewel with a red heart and soft green hanfu robes. He gasped. "No."
"Who is she?" Wolf Boss craned his head next to Xing.
"Kasi is from the Righteous Seven, our Tai Chi colleagues from the Kong Bai tournament. The Nine fought them before," the tiger clarified Lotus's father. Xing stammered in front of his grandmother. "What is going on?"
"We should inform our friends after the event, Xing," Ming advised. "Let's move."
The Nine nearly arrived for the Jade Palace Arena as the group was in front of the intricate gate. The Nine's Master whispered to her grandson, her eyes meeting on his sword. Xing loosened his soft grip and nodded to her. Ming knocked on the gate, and the red panda opened. "Ming. You arrived on time," Shifu pardoned. Crane and Monkey were standing beside their master in firmness. "I'm afraid the Nine and Masters have to postpone our event until midday."
"What happened?" Ming inquired.
"Walk with me."
Author's Note:
— I feel bad for our leopard friend flipping the table, and I am guilty of mistreating him. Remind me to punch me in the face if I wrote too much violence in future chapters. Tai Lung's nightmare fits its drastic rampage. So that case, my original idea was for him accidentally murdered Mrs. Chow's husband. Now, only one accident including, he slaughtered a few. I'll have to change the story's rating to write brief brutalities like the bandit clan leader. PM or tag me on Discord if y'all like to consider.
— Nothing much to say, but we'll be moving on to the next chapter!