This chapter is a replacement of the old one. This is the direction that I had originally intended the story to take. For those who liked the old chapter, I did save it and may use it in another story. However this is how it was supposed to go.

I do not own any of the DW characters; they belong to Koei or whoever. I do own the OC and some minor characters that might pop up.

The warmth was intense, but the light was bearable. As I laid on the ground in the dream world, I could open my eyes fully. The figure that always met me there was several feet from me, kneeling over another figure. I strained my eyes in an attempt to focus as the scene became clear. She knelt over Zhao Yun with a frown on her face. Slowly she straightened and turned to face me as I stood. In her angelic face, I could read the anger.

"I tried! He was too far from me. I couldn't reach him!" I cried. The figure was taken aback by my words. In a blink of an eye, she appeared next to me.

Her face still held her anger as she leered over me. "Your failure is my fault. I should not have trusted a human with such an important task. Return to your world now. I will fix this on my own." She raised her hand to me and my body erupted in fire.

Again, I felt cold, freezing really. A horrible taste in my mouth made me cough. My body ached as I moved to sit up. I spit several times trying to get the dirt from my mouth. As I did so, I began to look around. Wood floors covered in dirt, wooden walls, and a calico cat sitting next to me. I was back in my barn. Bay stood in his stall with his head craned to see me. Outside was the total darkness of the valley night. Was all of that just a dream?

Light flooded the area and I turned to the source. A car had pulled in to the driveway. My father had returned home. He parked the car, jumped out and rushed to my side. I still sat on the ground, my head pounded and I was confused. His hand on my shoulder pulled me from my thoughts. When my eyes met his, I could see the worry his mind held.

"Koa, are you alright? What are you doing on the ground?"

I heard him but my mind was still trying to sort out what was going on. I staggered to my feet with my father's help. I stared at him. I could not find ability to form the millions of questions swirling in my mind into any intelligible words. My father placed his arm around my shoulders and led me in our home. He took to my room and helped me into my bed. His features still etched with worry. He stood at my bedside for several minutes before he turned to leave. On his way out of the door, he told me that if I was not well by morning he was taking me to the hospital.

As I lay in my bed, my mind ran through everything that had occurred. Did it really happen? Had I really been in the past? Was my time with Zhao Yun real at all? Maybe I had passed out and simply dreamt the entire thing up. My thoughts went to the books my brother had. The history of that period, maybe something in them would help me understand. Gently, I stood from the bed and slipped down the hall to my brother's vacant room.

My father had asked me to pack away his belongings days before. I had to move a number of the boxes before I could reach the one marked, 'books'. Quickly I dug into it. Finding one that might help I sat on the floor and began flipping the pages. I found the chapter on the battle that I remembered taking part in. I could vaguely remember what the book had said when I had scanned it years ago. However, this time it seemed to be completely different. The book said that even though the strategy that Zhuge Liang and a man named Zhou Yu had been successful, the death of the Shu general Zhao Yun had crippled the allied forces. Shu and their allies, Wu, had lost the battle. I skipped to the next chapter and scanned it. It was completely different from before. Shu was not mentioned at all. I skipped to the next. Again, it said nothing about Shu. It was as though the entire Shu kingdom was erased after the battle. I dropped the book and searched for another. I found one that I knew went into detail about each of the forces that were involved in the wars of that time. I flipped to the section on Shu and read, only a short paragraph on a single page was written.

'Though the kingdom of Shu was a great force with powerful generals and the strategist Zhuge Liang, the loss at Chi Bi decimated the army. The Lord Liu Bei lost his will to fight when both Zhang Fei and Guan Yu were slain on the battlefield along with many others. Shu disassembled after the battle and the few remaining generals joined in with the other kingdoms or retired from warfare completely. Lui Bei's dream of a land of benevolence ended in full with his death of illness within a year of the loss of his campaign.'

As I finished reading, I noticed dark dots on the pages. I brushed my fingers over them and realized they were wet. I was crying. The story was not right at all. When I failed to save Zhao Yun, I had set this story in motion. I felt something deep inside my heart begin to burn with desire. I had to fix this. But how?

I spent the rest of the night pouring over all of the books my brother had; grateful he had been so obsessed with China. He had books on its history, its customs, and a book on some of the mystic beliefs that were prevalent over the past few millennia. Sunlight was over powering the harsh light that the ceiling fixture gave when I found a particularly interesting entry in the mystic book. My eyes flew over the printed words, my mind consuming ever word with vigor. It was the story of a way to change the events of the past. The entry however, stopped short in explaining how it was done. I let out a deep, agitated growl as I snapped the book shut and threw it to the floor.

My father's voice caught my attention as I moved to retrieve another book in my search for an answer. I turned my head to see him standing in the door. He had clearly just woken up. His short hair was in a mess on his head and his robe clung loosely over his cloth pants. A quizzical expression on his, still tired, face asked his question for his voice. I smiled at him and stood. My sleeping legs protested immensely at the movement but I pushed past the discomfort. I carefully walked over to my father and gave him a hug. He returned the embrace with a sigh.

He placed a kiss on the top of my head and groggily spoke, "Let's go downstairs and get some breakfast. I need coffee anyways. We have to talk." I gave him a nod and started down the hall. He flipped the light off in my brother's room and followed me. We sat at the kitchen table in silence for almost half an hour while I ate and he drank his coffee. He started to ask what had happened the night before but seemed it would be better to leave it alone. Finally, he sighed, signaling he was ready to talk to me. I set down the toast I had been nibbling on and gave him my full attention.

"I am sorry I was so late coming home last night. As I was leaving work the realtor called me." My heart sank, knowing what he was going to say next, "There was an offer on the house. It isn't what I was asking but enough for me to accept." He paused to meet my eyes; he knew I was not happy about the news. With a groan, he looked back to his cup. "I went to sign the papers. They want to move in by the end of next week. Therefore, I am going into the city today and see about renting a townhouse I have been looking at."

I stared at him, my jaw was set solid and I felt like I was about to bite my tongue in half. He finished his cup of coffee and stood, moving to refill the ceramic one more time. As he did, I heard him ask if I wanted to join him. I did not answer. I simply stormed up to my room and slammed the door. I sat on the edge of my bed and fought a war in my mind. Should I take the time to be angry with my father or should I be using the time trying to find a way back to Zhao Yun. A knock on my door pulled away from the argument. I waited for it to open but only my father's voice followed through the wood. He told me he was heading out. I did not answer.

A minute later, I heard his car leave the driveway. I stood and stretched. I would continue my argument after a shower. Once I was clean and my clothes were fresh I decided that I would ignore the situation with my father and see if I could find any more information on what the mystic book had said. I went into my father's office and turned on his computer. My internet search was for the most part fruitless. That was until I found a link to the site for some sort of shop. I clicked on it and it took me to an informational page about the owner of this shop. 'Thousands of years of mystical knowledge has be collected by and passed through the Tháng family. Huan is a seventy-sixth generation mystic of the family line. He has spent he life studying the text that his ancestors have kept and opened the shop to help those in need.' My eyes went wide and I smiled. Maybe this man could help me. Quickly I looked around on the site to find where the store was, hoping that it was near. I nearly fell out of the chair when I read the city name. The same city my father intended us to move into; I grabbed a pen and scrap of paper and jotted down the address and store hours. If father wanted us to live there then that was fine with me.

Still I would miss the old house. I turned off the computer and decided to wander around our home for a few hours. I took in every detail of the structure, committing it all to my memory so that I would never forget. I made my way back upstairs to my brother's room. I picked up the book on mysticism and found the entry I had read earlier; I placed the scrap of paper as a bookmark and set it off to the side. I then went about returning the other books to the box I had nearly emptied that night. I was beginning to feel my weariness as I picked up the last book. Holding it, I stared at the cover for a moment. With a sigh, I flipped it open and reread the paragraph on the Shu kingdom. I turned and set it on top of the mystic book before I closed up the box. I then gathered the books and went to my room.

Placing the two tomes on my nightstand, I looked around my room. I had been fighting packing anything, hoping my father would change his mind. However, that was a complete loss now. The house was sold and I had to leave. I moved over to grab one of the many boxes my father had been placing in my room over the last few months. I unfolded the first one and began to wander around the room, dumping random things into the container. My eyelids were heavy and if felt as though my feet were boulders. I finally dropped the box on the floor and fell onto my bed. A blink turned in to sleep.

I dreamt about the day on the battlefield. I was racing for Zhao Yun. His beautiful face twisted in fear and agony. He yelled for me to run away but I charged on. The man that stood above him laughed manically. Just as my fingers brushed his hand, I shot up in my bed with a scream. I was panting and my skin covered in sweat from the intensity of the dream. My eyes shot to my window. The red in the sky told me that I had slept most of the day. A moment later, I heard rushing footsteps and my door swung open. Concern was again etched into my father's features. He stared at me for what seemed like an hour before shook my head.

"Sorry dad. I had a nightmare."

I saw his body relax. He straightened himself and leaned against my doorframe. His eyes, which had not moved off me for a moment, made a quick scan of the room. They fell back on me as he gave me a pathetic smile, "I know you don't like it, but we are moving. Would you like some help packing your room? We are in the townhouse so we will start taking things over there tomorrow." I looked over my room, I did have a lot to pack; his help would make it much faster. I turned back to him and gave him a nod. He gave me a large smile and opened up one of the boxes. As we put my entire life in to the cardboard cubes, we rarely spoke. He told me that he had tended to Bay earlier in the day and that he had found a ranch just outside of the city that would board him for me. I was grateful that I would not lose my friend as well as my home.

We paused the packing not long after we started, long enough to eat dinner. It was almost midnight when we decided to call it a night. I gave my father a hug goodnight and went to lie in my bed. I knew I probably would not sleep but I let my mind run away with whatever thought crossed it. It did not take long for it take hold of the image of Zhao Yun's face the moment before we had been pulled from the battlefield. I tossed and turned on the bed trying to force the picture from my mind. I tried to pull up another memory of him. The day in his garden, after we fell in the pond or his even his angry glare at Ning during their spats, anything but that horrible look of terror that plagued me.

PS- Please R&R the reviews would help me greatly in writing, I would like to know what you think of the story so far.

Thanks

-Alwayshappytohelp