Thanks for clicking on my Shang-Chi fanfiction: It Is Your Birthright To Bleed! Let me tell you a little bit about the book.

Synopsis:

Shang-Chi has returned home per Wong's recommendation. But just as he starts to settle back into life again...the Rings start speaking to him. And he experiences phantom pain when not wearing them. His reputation is growing, and people start coming for the ones he loves to steal his power. And maybe he should stop deleting Bruce Banner's calls... Rated T.

Excerpts:

Unavailable at this time.

Foreword: I've seen Shang-Chi three times so far and every time, I love it so much more than the last! I FRIKIN LOVE THIS MOVIE TO DEATH! One of my favorite MCU movies in all departments: humor, action, cinematography, characters, writing, plot, EVERYTHING. EVERYTHING IS FRIKIN AMAZING! Of course I can't let Shang-Chi chill in peace for too long, I have to torture him. He has become my cinnamon roll and I love him so much 3

So I just opened up a document, thought of a title, and started writing. I have no idea where this story is going to go. Bear with me. :P

doesn't have a category for Shang Chi yet, so I just put it under Marvel comics.

Onward!

I love reviews also! And not because I'm bragging and I want y'all to tell me how great I am. Do you come across a chapter that you think could be improved upon? Some error you notice? Tell me! I strive to improve. :D But if you really like a chapter or something, again, let me know!

So, I think that's it! I hope you will stick around, review, favorite, follow, all that cool stuff. :D

Without further ado, please enjoy this little story!

Enjoy!

Disclaimer:

I do not own Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the Marvel franchise, or any of the characters. That all belongs to their original makers. Everything to them. Any added dialogue, plots, or characters are mine, but nothing else. I don't own it.

Chapter One - Already Spoken For

The buttery winter moonlight slices through the curtains as I perch on the edge of my bed, sucking up what remains of my afternoon boba. Letting out a sigh of satisfaction as the last of the milky heaven floods my tongue, I toss the cup into the trash can and flop back onto the mattress. The springs squeak under my weight and adjust my position so the metal barbs aren't jutting into my shoulder blades. I pull the scratchy blankets up over my shirtless body and deflate into the pillows.

But as soon as I drift off to sleep, the nightmares take shape and surge to life behind my eyelids, locking me in a feverish dance of swords.

I see my father. I see myself reflected in a pool of blood. In my hand is a dagger. Beside me is a body of a man, the man I'd been sent from my homeland to kill. The still-beating heart pumps blood from the jugular wounds with a sickening glug, glug sound. Sloshing at my feet, lapping at my boots like a ravenous beast groping for food, the blood sticks to me like syrup and no matter how hard I scratch at my skin, it doesn't peel. Blood surfaces on my hands and drools off my fingers like stringy saliva. More and more and more blood drenches me as if I'd gone crawling in body cavities and slept amid the beating organs and torn my way out of the corpses like a zombie clambering from its slippery grave. Across from me stands my father, his smile ripping halfway across his face. The Ten Rings spin around him. In his hands is a soul. The glowing, writhing ball of rainbow glory that had once sustained a life sits heavy in my father's palms. He turns his sightless, bone-white eyes toward me and places the soul into my hands.

As soon as the icy warmth of the soul touches my skin, my father's face sags to one side and melts. Liquid flesh drips down his clothes and pools at his feet in a thick, steaming puddle of sludge. The rest of his body follows. He collapses in a pile of his own slime and the warm carnage sucks ravenously at my shoes. It travels upward, engulfing every inch of me. First my legs, then my waist and up to my stomach and chest and shoulders and it runs up my neck and chin and I can smell it– tangy, putrid, sour– it rises up over my head and eyes and it's black, I can't see anything and it's in my mouth and I can't breathe, I can't breathe–

I jerk awake– I can't breathe– and fall immediately into a coughing fit. Ripping the blankets off me– I can't breathe– I scramble for the edge of the bed, gagging at the sour taste in my mouth. My father's– Wenwu's– dripping face flashes behind my eyelids and I double over, dry-heaving off the side of my bed.

When my stomach stops rebelling from the power of night terrors alone, I flop back on the rickety mattress. My sweaty chest heaves with breath and my head spins with the reek of blood. I shut my eyes, but the image of my father just…melting…in front of me flickers to life in the conscious darkness. My heart thumps viciously against my ribcage.

"Even if you could bring her back…what makes you think she'd want anything to do with you?"

Tears prickle like thorns in my eyes. I swing my legs over the side of the bed and haul myself to my feet. The moonlight glances off the floors of my garage-apartment and my rigid shadow casts a cold shadow along the concrete. I pad on sore feet to the chest from Ta Lo, the material peppered with dragon scales. Within it rests the legendary Ten Rings.

I flip the lock and creak open the chest. The silver moonlight floods into the chest where the rings are nestled between blocks of velvet. The circlets of gold glow with a soft, yellow pulse as I draw near and as I reach my hand toward them, they start humming like a car engine. I can feel the heat flowing from them, and the rhythm matches that of my heartbeat. Running my fingers along the curves, a great rush of power surges through me like the heave of an ocean wave. It rises through my head and heart and chest and arms and fingers and my entire body bristles and seizes and a shudder of delight tickles my skin as I move to put the rings on– it's an empowering swell of emotions. The Ten Rings slip over my hands and secure themselves around my forearms, the loops tucked perfectly into place. Like finding that perfect puzzle piece, or slipping on a perfect pair of shoes that completes the outfit, that completes you, and it's beautiful and powerful and it just feels right.

YOU feel right.

Like it was always meant to be this way.

Like wearing them is what you were meant to do, what you were meant to be.

The overbearing power, that roar of authority, of satisfaction, of beastly dominance sizzling through your veins, and it feels like you.

It feels right.

It feels–

"We can be together again."

Mom?

"Come back and save us."

Dad?

I look around. No one.

And yet I can feel a hand on my shoulder…

Two hands…

Oh, and a–

A gentle kiss on my cheek…

"We love you, Shang-Chi."

A shadow of an embrace around me…

"Come back to us…"

What the hell?

I stare down at the Ten Rings on my arms, the veins underneath them radiating yellow.

A flash of dizziness liquifies the ground beneath me.

The room tilts to the side, my eyes roll back and–

I wake up on the ground twenty minutes later with a splitting headache. Shuffling to a sitting position, I massage my temples and a glint of gold catches my eye:

Still wearing the Rings.

I stagger to my feet, sending the Rings back into the chest. In their places are deep, red indents in my skin that are sore to the touch. The redness fades into purple, ring-shaped bruises.

Katy's definitely gonna ask about that later.

Shit!

I shut the chest and perch on my bed.

What the hell was that?

A vision? A panic attack? Some sort of dark possession?

I heard my parents, and…felt them.

Just like Wenwu had.

Am I going crazy?

Why did wearing the Rings hurt?

Why do I feel some sort of…phantom pain from wearing them?

And yet…why did it feel good?

Author's Notes: Not sure if that quote from the movie is correct because there's no transcript out from the movie yet, but what did you think? I'm very new to writing this character, so I'm excited to delve into this new part of the MCU!

Read and review!