Jinlin Tai - the Jin Sect's residence in Lanling

shixiong - older martial brother

xiao shushu - uncle (father's youngest brother). Jin Ling calls Jin Guangyao xiao shushu.

Though Mo Xuanyu was Jin Zixuan's youngest (known) brother, Jin Ling would not have called him xiao shushu because he was never given the Jin surname to validate that status.

You niang sheng mei niang yang.

Jin Ling's blood was boiling as he descended the steps of Jinlin Tai. He didn't want to give Jin Chan the satisfaction of watching him run away, but what else could he do? Fight him like a child in front of the seniors who already didn't respect his status as Sect Leader? Stay there and let him insult him over his lack of a mother?

Woof! Woof! The familiar bark interrupted his fuming internal monologue. He turned to see Fairy bounding down the steps towards him. He bent down to open his arms for his furry friend. The sight of the glistening black fur always brought him comfort.

When Jinlin Tai faded into the distance behind them, his steps slowed.

Where was he going?

Into town? He wasn't deaf to the way townspeople loudly whispered about him as he walked by, the incompetent child under whose rule the LanlingJin Sect was declining day by day.

Go north? The last thing he wanted to do was bump into anyone from the LaolingQin Sect. Now that the truth of his xiao shushu's marriage to Qin Su was exposed to the world, the relationship between their sects were far less than friendly. He had no idea how he could fix it if it was fixable at all.

Go southeast? To Gusu? He really liked the GusuLan boys; some of his favourite evenings were spent night-hunting with them. But he couldn't visit them uninvited. He was still an outsider. He wasn't sure some of them liked him, and he knew from his childhood that forcing kids to play with him only made them like him less. He couldn't bear the thought of the GusuLan boys never inviting him out night-hunting again. Besides, he was still a tad unsettled by Hanguang-Jun.

Go southwest? Yunmeng was pretty far. But in Yunmeng was a boy he'd gotten to know pretty well over the past half a year or so. He was bullied like he was, knew loneliness like he did. With him, he never had to feel like an unwanted outsider to a group. Perhaps he'd welcome his company.

Taking Fairy into his arms, he mounted his sword and flew towards Lotus Pier.

-x-

He knocked on Master Hu's door.

No answer.

He knocked again, 'Master Hu, it's me.' He hoped Master Hu could recognise his voice after training with him for almost half a year.

The door opened. 'Sect Leader Jin,' Master Hu saluted him in a small voice.

'Master Hu,' Jin Ling saluted back. Being Sect Leader Jiang's nephew made it hard to make friends; Master Hu insisted on the formalities despite telling him multiple times he didn't care for them.

On Master Hu's table was a stack of paper, a pot of ink and a calligraphy brush.

'All of the other juniors are out there playing dice or whatever, why are you buried in work?' Jin Ling asked.

Master Hu looked miserable. 'Master Jia burned my essay, so I am rewriting it…'

'He burned your essay?' Jin Ling knew Master Jia and his lot taunted juniors like Master Hu as a sickening hobby, but he was shocked he would go as far as setting things on fire. 'Have you spoken to any of the seniors, or my uncle about it?'

Master Hu shook his head. 'No one would believe me over Senior Jia's son and his friends.'

'I'll speak to my uncle when he comes out of his meeting,' Jin Ling offered.

Master Hu looked up. 'Really? Thank you so much, Sect Leader Jin.'

'It's really no problem. Master Jia and that lot needs to be set straight.' Jin Ling was furious just thinking about them. 'Do you want walk around town for a while?'

The two boys stepped out of Lotus Pier, Fairy falling into step by Jin Ling's side.

Master Hu asked, 'Sect Leader Jin, what brought you to Yunmeng?'

'One of the kids keeps making fun of me because I don't have parents,' Jin Ling got it off his chest, 'I just felt the need to get away.'

Master Hu looked shocked. 'But you're the Sect Leader.'

'It doesn't mean anything,' Jin Ling sighed, 'no one cares if I'm the Sect Leader. No one liked me growing up, and Jin Chan always had kids following him around like lost puppies.'

All these years, Master Hu wished he was born to a family of higher status. He always thought he would have been safe from the bullies if he had a father like Senior Jia. But here he was, talking to a Sect Leader who flew 800 kilometres away from home to get away from his bullies.

'I'm sorry to hear that,' Master Hu offered. 'Are you happier here in Yunmeng?'

Jin Ling smiled sadly. 'Here, they call me Sect Leader Jin which is better than the names I hear at Jinlin Tai. But that's only because everyone's scared of my uncle. No one likes me. I never had friends here growing up.'

'I will be your friend, Sect Leader Jin.' He added, 'if you want me to be, that is.'

'Of course you can be my friend,' Jin Ling smiled. 'Will you call me Master Jin? It's what my friends in Gusu call me.'

Master Hu smiled. 'Master Jin.'

Jin Ling bought two sticks of sugared haws from a street vendor and handed one to Master Hu.

Jin Ling bit off a haw. 'I still can't believe Master Jia actually set fire to your essay. What the hell got into his head?'

'It's a long story,' Master Hu began talking about the training session he had with Wei Wuxian earlier this week that ended in him fighting Master Jia. Master Jia must have run home nursing his wounded ego, plotting petty revenge with his flock of sheep.

'Over dinner, he still wouldn't tell me his name, but I finally got him to tell me about his family.' Master Hu looked proud of himself.

'Really? What did he tell you?' Jin Ling did want to know what Wei Wuxian might have told Master Hu.

'He has an older sister and a younger brother,' Master Hu began.

Jin Ling didn't think Wei Wuxian had siblings. Wasn't he adopted into the YunmengJiang Sect on his own?

'When they were young, he and his brother used to float on the water pretending to be water corpses. They'd argue over who was the better corpse, and because his brother had a terrible temper, they often ended up wrestling in the water.'

So he's talking about Uncle and… Jin Ling realised with a start, my mother.

'You can tell how much he loves and admires his sister from the way he talks about her. She really spoiled him, making him soup and peeling lotus seeds for him. She would try to break up fights between the brothers by bringing them food, but then they would fight over the food.'

Jin Ling felt a lump in his throat. His uncle, consumed by anger and grief at her death, never told him anything about what she was like when she was alive. He wanted to find Wei Wuxian to ask more about her.

'When she got older, she fell in love with a man well below her league.'

Jin Ling almost choked on the haw in his mouth, 'What?'

'Yeah, Senior says the man was so arrogant, he and his brother called him 'peacock'.'

'Really?' Jin Ling knew nothing about the relationship between his uncle and his father. He only knew his uncle fervently hated Wei Wuxian and Wen Ning for his father's death.

'Yeah. Anyway,' Master Hu paid no attention to Jin Ling's expression as he continued to retell the story. He must have been very excited having learned something about the life of the mysterious man. 'They got married. They had a son who grew up to have the temper of a princess, much like his uncle and nothing like his mother.'

'WHAT?' If a picture book illustrator was to draw this scene, he would have drawn flames of indignance bursting from Jin Ling's head. He wanted to find Wei Wuxian, slap him, then ask about his mother.

Master Hu finally noticed Jin Ling's reaction to the story. 'Master Jin, why are you reacting like that? I'm just—'

Before Master Hu could finish his sentence, a voice came from behind the boys.

'Congratulations, sixteen years and the little brat finally found himself a single friend!'

It was Jin Chan, flanked by the three boys who always followed him like lost puppies. Either they followed him here after he left Jinlin Tai, or they guessed he'd come to the place he'd grown up in.

Jin Chan's gaze landed on the sword at Master Hu's waist. He laughed, 'imagine being what, sixteen, and still carrying a low-level sword like that. Your Sect Leader doesn't think very highly of you, does he?'

'Shut up!' Jin Ling roared. He had taken Master Hu out of Lotus Pier to take his mind off the YunmengJiang assholes, now he was watching his face fall as this LanlingJin asshole threw at him insults of the same vein. 'Do you really have nothing to do with your life than insulting people?'

'You scurried down the steps of Jinlin Tai rushing here to cry to your uncle, of course we had to come watch the show!'

He roared, 'You came looking for a fight? Let's fight!'

Surprise came over Jin Chan's face. Ever since Jin Ling became Sect Leader, he had been quietly tolerating their insults without so much as insulting them back. But now that they had followed him to out of Lanling just to rile him up, he would teach them a good lesson.

'Fight?' Jin Chan's gaze landed on Fairy. 'You're just a coward who uses your son-of-a-whore shushu's dog to fight for you!'

You're just a coward who uses other kids to fight for you! His mind yelled.

'I can beat you all up without Fairy!' He roared, 'who is my dog!' He had spent the past year and a half trying to forget the association between Fairy and his xiao shushu whose crimes were now known to the world.

Biting off the last haw, he gave the finished bamboo stick to Fairy. 'Throw this away for me.'

With an indignant glare, Fairy took the stick and trotted towards Lotus Pier.

Jin Ling led the LanlingJin boys away from the street vendors towards an abandoned pier. He drew his sword, 'any last words?'

Jin Chan laughed. 'I was about to ask the same thing. Do you have any last words?' The four boys drew their swords.

Sword collided against sword. Jin Ling backed onto the narrow pier as he'd seen Hanguang-Jun demonstrate in Gusu, forcing the boys to approach him two at a time. As Wei Wuxian had guessed, these guys were nowhere near as skilled as the Lan boys. Their attacks were not only weaker but far more predictable.

Soon enough, he found an opportunity to follow a parry with an attack, shoving one of them off the pier into the lake. Suihua swiftly sliced through the air in its golden brilliance, blocking the attacks of the two advancing towards him.

One by one, the LanlingJin boys found themselves thrown into the lake. Jin Ling didn't even spare them a glance as they climbed back onto the pier, robes dripping with equal parts water and humiliation. He walked off the pier and stepped back onto the land, head held high.

When he saw the familiar violet-robed figure staring right at him, his triumph evaporated. He should have known Fairy would have alerted his uncle to his presence.

He stammered, 'Uncle! I didn't pick a fight with them! They followed me here, they were looking for a fight, I could only…'

Unlike Jin Ling's shushu Jin Guangyao who always taught Jin Ling to be nice and get along with the other LanlingJin boys, Jiang Cheng couldn't care less if he beat up those undisciplined idiots. He only asked, 'Where did you learn that?'

'Where did I learn what?'

Jiang Cheng's brows furrowed. 'Don't play dumb. Where did you learn to fight like that?'

'I learned from you, Uncle. You taught me YunmengJiang sword techniques well.' He didn't think his uncle still hated Wei Wuxian. His uncle knew he often went night-hunting with the GusuLan juniors accompanied by Wei Wuxian, and never seemed to have a problem with it. He was more worried his highly competitive uncle would take personal offence at his choosing to learn swordplay from his former shixiong of all people. The conversation could go in any direction, so he chose to flatter his uncle instead.

He decided to add in a good word for Master Hu. 'And I've been practising with Master Hu. He's a very talented fighter.'

Master Hu, who had been standing there wordlessly, looked up in surprise.

His uncle looked at Master Hu, expression full of surprise. 'Is that true?'

Jin Ling winced as he saw the look on Master Hu's face. His uncle was so blunt, so blind to the way his words impacted people.

'It's true! You haven't noticed because Master Jia and his group keep undermining him. Earlier, I heard them talking about how they set fire to Master Hu's essay. Master Jia thinks he makes the rules at Lotus Pier because he's Senior Jia's son.'

His uncle never paid attention to kids being bullied, but he was certainly sensitive to his authority being challenged. His expression darkened immediately. 'I will have a good chat with those brats.'

Jin Ling smiled as his eyes met Master Hu's. It wouldn't solve the bullying, but at least Master Hu would know he had people on his side.