Chapter Sixteen: Sun Ce's Challenge

In a desperate bid for time, the Little Conqueror proposes a rather unusual tournament.

Sun Ce gingerly leapt off his horse and came forward, painfully twisting his lips in an attempt at a smile. This only came off looking more like a crooked grimace than anything else, as he began to greet his guests.

"Welcome to the South Land, Lord Liu Bei," the first prince of Wu spoke up, and his equally pitiful crew echoed his words in varying degrees of mumbles.

Needless to say, their Shu counterparts couldn't help but stare, stupefied, at this bruised and battered gathering of officers. Liu Bei and Zhao Yun forced themselves to shake off their surprise first, and made polite replies of, "We're honored to be here," and the like. Zhuge Liang and Yue Ying offered similar gracious smiles—although the latter did look rather perturbed by the black-and-blue sight in front of her. Huang Zhong followed in the couple's example, while Wei Yan, who had his white-and-green mask to hide behind as always, made a small effort to seem courteous by grunting one incomprehensible thing or another.

Tall and proud Guan Yu, on the other hand, merely swept the Southern officers with a look that was at once dignified and somewhat contemptuous, while Zhang Fei actually chortled before scoffing loudly, "What, did the pretty boys of Wu get beat up by some bandits on the way here?"

Zhou Yu gritted his teeth, shooting the swarthy Tiger General a look of icy anger, as Liu Bei hastily turned to his youngest oath brother to reprove, "Yide, you mustn't talk to our hosts in this manner."

Sun Ce triumphantly stuck his tongue out at the substantially larger and more powerful Zhang Fei while Liu Bei was facing the opposite direction, then quickly retracted it as soon as the Shu leader turned back around.

"Ah…right," the prince mumbled. "Let's just go to the palace; Pop and my Little Sis—uh, I mean, Lord Sun Wentai and Lady Sun—are waiting."

The early-morning sunlight found Wu's tomboyish princess inside the palace grounds, practicing archery…

…On a pair of life-sized straw dummies that bore rather remarkable resemblances to certain Southern officers. One had scraggly hay pouring down its shoulders and the name Zhou Yu pasted across its heart. The other model's straw hair was pulled back into a high ponytail, and tacked across its front were simply two words: Eldest Brother.

Sun Shang Xiang made a picture of the perfect archer, standing tall and proud, her bow held expertly in her hands, a full quiver slung across her back. She appeared to be fully focused on the task at hand, and her concentration was obviously paying off: so far, not one of her arrows had missed its target.

At the same time, two silhouettes could be seen skulking and creeping amidst the vines and brambles, and making considerable noise despite their obvious attempts at being furtive.

"My lord, I don't feel it's in my place as a humble officer to…ah, ambush Lady Sun like this," the smaller of the two whispered nervously.

His older counterpart gave an impatient huff, replying in a clipped tone, "We don't have any other choice. My sister refuses to this marriage alliance, and won't even meet Lord Liu Bei. Unless we, ah, subdue her and bring her to the banquet, Shu will more likely than not get offended at her snub. Only Heaven knows what that could lead to!"

Sun Quan stepped into view, a few twigs and leaves sticking out of his thick beard, his right hand holding on to a coiled length of rope. Beside him stood the boyish and deceptively guileless-looking Lu Xun, wearing a rather uncomfortable expression on his face as he listened to his prince's argument.

The seventeen-year-old youth hesitated as he observed another arrow fly from Sun Shang Xiang's bow, and appeared to consider holding back. However, at the none-too-gentle prod from the princess's second brother, Lu Xun reluctantly began sneaking forward.

"Yahhhhhhhh!" With a daunting battle cry, he charged at Sun Shang Xiang, intending to hold her down while her brother bound her hands and feet like their half-baked plan called for.

His target, however, merely stepped aside so that the young strategist ran right past her. In a single swift motion, Sun Shang Xiang pulled Lu Xun's fancy scarlet hat over his eyes while he was in the process of diving back at her.

"Don't worry, Boyan! I'm coming!" Sun Quan now rushed out, bravely brandishing his rope…only to trip over his royal robes at the last minute, falling flat on his nose a good distance from his sister.

Sun Shang Xiang surveyed her two fallen foes, shaking her head and not even making the slightest effort to hide her wide smirk of triumph.

"Men!" she sighed contemptuously, before sidestepping both the dazedly spinning Lu Xun and the facedown Sun Quan, as she headed toward her own courts.

Outside the palace gates, Sun Ce was happily unaware of his younger brother's sad defeat. Instead, the first prince busied himself with playing host to Shu, as he and the rest of his little entourage led their honored guests to meet the latters' future queen.

As he passed beneath the arching red gates of the Wu palace, Sun Ce noticed out of the corner of his eyes a solitary black flag hung up as a signal, and realized to his dismay that his brother and Lu Xun must have failed.

Zhou Yu also saw the flag, and spurred his horse forward until he was neck-in-neck with his sworn brother.

Then, the strategist slowed down and whispered, "Now what?"

Sun Ce grumbled out some curses about Sun Quan and Lu Xun's incompetence, before hissing back, "Now we stall for time, until my Little Sis agrees to come out!"

"It will take a divine miracle," Zhou Yu predicted darkly.

Having done his dabbling in fortune-telling and the Heavens for the day, Zhou Yu then rode back to the Shu party.

"Gentlemen, it is a time-honored Southern tradition to put on a fan dance for all visitors to the palace," he announced graciously.

Liu Bei leaned back slightly on his saddle, a look of surprise flashing across his features. Before he could utter a single word, though, his youngest brother Zhang Fei had already demanded brusquely, "Since when?

Zhou Yu seethed in annoyance, but before he could ruin the Wu-Shu relations with an equally tart retort, Sun Ce hurried back to salvage the situation.

"Oh, it's a really long story," the dashing prince declared cheerfully.

Then, remembering that Wu's best interest right now was to stall, he improvised, "So allow me to give you the shortened version. It all started with the legend of the Moon Goddess, Chang'e(1), and her ascent to the Heavens…"

Meanwhile, Sun Quan and Lu Xun—the former having changed out of his fancy robes, the latter sans his ornamental hat—were heading toward Sun Shang Xiang's court. Each was carrying a lacquered black tray bearing a single silver goblet.

"My brother entrusted us to succeed at all costs," Sun Quan muttered darkly to himself, "so this plan had better work."

Lu Xun shrugged, nearly spilling half the contents of his goblet in the process.

"Well, it's the best I could come up with on such short notice, and being explicitly forbidden from using fire," he huffed in his own defense.

"We can't burn down my sister's courts and expect to catch her as she's fleeing from the flames!" Sun Quan almost screeched. "It'll set off a chain reaction and burn down the entire palace as well!"

Lu Xun hid a subtle look of annoyance.

"Fine. Then we'll just have to go to Lady Sun under the pretense of apologizing for the earlier, ah, incident," he finished delicately. "She'll have to accept the wine as a peace offering, but since she's not used to alcohol, she should mellow out after a few sips."

"Then, we can lead her out to welcome Shu, and when she meets her future husband for the first time, she'll actually be calm and demure for a change—well, sort of," Sun Quan finished.

"…And then, during the Spring and Autumn Period, when the ancient beauty Xi Shi(2) was on her way to the State of Wu, she stopped at a shrine to the…ah…Dumpling Fairy, and performed a fan dance asking for strength…" Sun Ce blissfully babbled on.

Sun Quan and Lu Xun walked across the palace grounds, agreeing that theirs was a good enough plan…until they arrived at Sun Shang Xiang's court, and found the way barred by twin rows of her spear-and-sword-toting bodyguards.

As per their mistress's command, these trained females immediately crossed their flashing steel weapons into menacing rows of X's upon sight of the two men.

"…And then, the lovely Han palace maid Wang Zhao Jun(3) dazzled the barbaric Xiong-nu king with the graceful and refined way she flapped her fans around…"

Sun Quan and Lu Xun gulped at the sight of all the flashing steel blocking their way, before wasting no time in turning around and heading back.

"…Now, it's a popular misconception that Lady Meng Jiang(4) shook the Great Wall with her tears, but we Southerners have traditionally believed that she really shook the Great Wall by performing an interpretive dance asking the Jade Emperor in the Heavens to unearth her dead husband…"

Two hours and several frantic consultations with a book of folklore later…

"…And so, in conclusion, here at Wu, we always put on a fan dance for palace visitors, to show that we bestow upon them the magic of Chang'e, the grace of Wang Zhao Jun, and the strength of the, ah, Dumpling Fairy," Sun Ce finally finished.

A universal—albeit quite well-concealed, for the most part—sigh of relief greeted those two magical words: "In conclusion."

Liu Bei and the majority of his officers pretended they hadn't noticed the mind-grating boredom of Sun Ce's wandering tall tale, and instead generously doled out looks of polite interest and declarations that they never knew Wu had such a rich and fascinating fan dance history.

Zhou Yu then proceeded to announce, "Ah, but we must have tired you with our trivial stories. I am certain you are all eager to proceed inside…"

Slowly, the blank looks of lethargy began to seep out of the Shu officer's features. These were replaced by some hints of life and interest again at the prospect of finally accomplishing their objective—solidifying their national relations with Wu.

Until Zhou Yu finished his sentence.

"I am certain you are all eager to proceed inside…and enjoy our traditional Wu fan dance," the handsome strategist proclaimed majestically.

Before Shu could recover from its surprise, Da Qiao and Xiao Qiao were hastily ushered into the main courtyard, where they began to perform a slow, elaborate fan dance that was, at first, quite beautiful to watch…

…Only after one solid hour of the two lovely sisters' performance, their dance had morphed from slow to tedious, and from elaborate to downright overdone.

Zhou Yu, seeing the irritability on Guan Yu's face, the mounting anger on Zhang Fei's face, and the politely veiled boredom on everybody else's faces, decided that he and Sun Ce couldn't use the fan dance excuse any longer—not without risking a Wu massacre.

The music was abruptly cut, the Qiao sisters interrupted in mid-step, and the Shu party was tactfully led inside the palace.

"Surely you're all anxious to meet Lady Sun," said young lady's brother spoke up, while at the same time searching the walls for that telltale flag from Sun Quan and Lu Xun.

Two little troopers were occupied in one corner with hanging up just that banner. Seeing the same black one of defeat being inevitably unfurled, Sun Ce cursed under his breath while simultaneously searching for yet another excuse to push back the meeting between the future groom and bride.

The prince paused and turned on his heels, effectively stopping the procession.

Striding over to Liu Bei, he proceeded to lie through his teeth, "My lord, here in Wu, it is also customary for the eldest brother of the bride-to-be to fight her fiancé before the two can meet."

Liu Bei was naturally taken aback by the abruptness of the declaration. He glanced around in confusion, and looked like he wanted to protest—but seeing that Sun Ce was already brandishing his tonfas, he eventually had no choice but to begin unsheathing the Gold Moon Dragon.

Zhou Yu stepped forward to announce the rules of the contest.

"The brother versus groom duel will consist of thr—five separate tournaments," he declared, causing all the members of Shu to nearly drop their weapons in surprise and frustration.

Pretending to not have noticed this noisy reaction, Zhou Yu calmly continued, "These five tournaments will be as follows: hand-to-hand combat, fighting with weaponry, strategic warfare, mounted dueling, and team fighting, in which both combatants are allowed to pick a partner of their choice. There is no time limit. The first tournament—hand-to-hand combat—will now begin."

1. The legend of Chang'e: The Chinese goddess of the Moon, and widely regarded as the loveliest fairy in Heaven. According to popular folklore, Chang'e was once the mortal wife of a young archer hero who shot down nine of the ten suns that were blazing in the sky and burning up the Earth below as a result. His reward from the celestial deities was an elixir of life. If he and his wife were to share it, they would both enjoy eternal happiness, but if only one takes the elixir, that one alone will become an immortal. Chang'e, for one reason or another, decides to take this elixir by herself, and as soon as she does, she begins rising through the air until she eventually floats to the Moon.

2. Xi Shi: A historical figure, she is said to be the prettiest of the Four Beauties of ancient China (these four being Xi Shi, Wang Zhao Jun, Diao Chan—yes, the same Dynasty Warriors Diao Chan—and Yang Guifei). Xi Shi lived in the State of Yue during the Spring and Autumn Period, when China was split into several warring kingdoms battling for control. Noticing her great beauty, the king of Yue presented her as a gift to his greatest enemy, the king of Wu. Once in Wu, Xi Shi seduced its king so that he completely abandoned affairs of state to be with her, and even waged futile wars against neighboring kingdoms and executed his most talented prime minister at her goading. Seeing the decline of Wu brought on by Xi Shi's clever manipulations, the king of Yue swept in and soundly defeated his rival.

3. Wang Zhao Jun: The second of the Four Beauties, Wang Zhao Jun is also an actual historical figure, who lived during the Han Dynasty. To build goodwill with the barbarian tribe of the Xiong-nu, the Emperor promised their king a Chinese princess for a bride. He instead picked from amongst his many consorts one whom he assumed was rather plain-looking to marry the barbarian leader. When sent for, this consort—Wang Zhao Jun—turned out to be the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen. Back then, emperors would select a consort to spend time with them by looking at a portrait of her, rather than looking at the actual girl. Yet the Han Emperor had never selected Wang Zhao Jun, because her portrait had depicted her as rather homely. It turned out that she had refused to bribe the artist painting the imperial consorts' pictures, and for revenge, he purposely portrayed her unflatteringly in his scroll. The Emperor was very upset at losing Wang Zhao Jun, yet he couldn't break his word, so he regretfully sent her to the Xiong-nu king as promised. To alleviate his distress, he executed the greedy artist.

There are paintings online of all four ancient beauties, in case anybody's curious to see a more traditional portrayal of Diao Chan, or wants to do some comparing between the four ladies. Since the admin at FF don't seem too thrilled about posting websites inside stories, I've instead put up the address in my profile, so anybody who's curious can check out the pictures there.

4. The legend of Lady Meng Jiang: Lady Meng Jiang was a virtuous and beautiful girl who lived during the reign of the First Emperor of China. She was in love with a handsome young scholar named Wan Xiliang, but on the day of their wedding, he was drafted by Qin officers to construct the Great Wall of China. Winter arrived, but still Wan Xiliang didn't return, so his wife decided to go to the Great Wall and bring him some warm clothes. When she finally got there, she found out that her husband had been worked to death during his first month of labor. For three days Lady Meng Jiang wept in grief, until a section of the Great Wall collapsed, spilling the bones of Wan Xiliang. This drew the attention of the Emperor, who, seeing the beauty of Lady Meng Jiang, sought to make her his consort. She agreed, provided that her first husband be given an honorable burial at sea. This was speedily arranged for, and once on the open waters, Lady Meng Jiang suddenly leapt off the ship and drowned herself to join her husband in death.