Part 3
Old Friend

"He's poisoned!" Pung said, showing that he wanted to make that moment as painful as possible.

Oh the cruel irony of that moment. All of my life spent dealing pain and now I was the one that received it. Yu's expression filled with complete fear and his entire body shook.

Pung let out a maniacal laughter and simply tightened his grip on my son. Yu bellowed out in pain.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

My eye scanned the immediate area around me to see that the three sounds came from the impact of three bodies hitting the ground. All three of them were knocked unconscious.

With no second thoughts, my first action was to charge Pung full speed. Pung, who anticipated my movements, dropped my son and jumped out of sight.

Turning my attention immediately to Yu, I scooped him into my arms. He gripped onto me tightly and tears streamed down his eyes.

My eye directly viewed ahead of me to see that Pung jumped down from the trees and stood only seven feet away from Yu and me.

He had a smug smirk across his face. For me, scared is the only word that described what I felt.

"The only way you will save your son is if you find the location where the Dragon holds the ancient paper of the secrets of the sacred warrior."

"What does that mean!?" my question rang back at him. The last thing I at that second I wanted was a riddle to figure out. Yu's life was at risk here and that tiger wanted me to solve a damn riddle!

"You will have to find out for yourself. That is if you survive this next fight," Pung taunted me.
He stood there readying himself for a fight, around and then suddenly dropped his guard.

"I'll see you again down the road wolfie," he said. The tiger then turned, running off into the forest out of eyesight.

Yu perked his head up at me with me looking back at him. "Why did he run away daddy?" he asked me.

"That is a good question son. I would like to know that as well," I answered.

"You really have changed since the last time I saw you Zhong," a voice stated from behind.

Turning behind me to see who it was, nothing prepared me for I witnessed next.

"Hello there. It has been a very long time hasn't it. I guess you were thinking that I was dead weren't you?"

"Mafa?" I asked. The mystery man approached me slowly. That guy's voice was so familiar that I swear somewhere down the road I had met the individual. He pulled off his hood revealing that he was a wolf like me. Unlike Yu and I, he had white fur and was an Artic canine.

He walked towards me slowly.

"It is you Zhong. And you haven't aged much since I last saw you," he said, stopping in front of me.

I gave no response to him for some time. Shock locked me in place to my spot.

"We should take the time to catch up later. The boy's condition concerns me," he stated.

Despite the fact that a child's life was on the line, my mind had forgotten all about it in that one second.

"He was injected with some kind of poison," I stated.

"I got that much from what I heard in the distance. Plus I know all about this band of villains. They are all about scare tactics, torture, and painful murders. The leader of them has a thing for prolonging the pain of his victims as long as possible. He would even say as to call it an art form," he explained to me.

My ears flicked. Yu whimpered at the mention of the tiger.

"It's okay," I cooed him and rubbed his back to calm him. His grip tightened onto me as he shook all over.

"The poor kid," Mafa said to Yu.

He stood before the pup and got down on one knee.

"It's okay," I reassured Yu for a second time."This guy can be trusted. He is just going to check to see what's wrong with you."

Yu gave me an understanding look. I nodded to Mafa to tell him that Yu was ready.

Watching Mafa inspect Yu was like watching a professional medic do the job. He was very thorough on his examination.

After a few minutes, he looked back up at me with an expression that instantly made my heart sink.

"The poison is spreading fast and Yu might not have much time left. There is only one thing we can do," he stated to me.

"Dad," Yu whimpered, about to cry. It wasn't hard to blame him for that either.

A little kid was through another traumatic incident right after just losing his family. I bent forward and snatched the pup into my arms, holding him very closely.

"Shh... Shh... Everything will be just fine Yu."

Mafa looked back at me comforting my son. No one could be more enthusiastic than he could have been with what he was about to reveal.

"So what is that we must do?" I asked.

He took a deep breath and sighed a little. Looking right at me with a straight face, he said "We must head to the Valley of Peace. The answer to that riddle must be the Dragon's Scroll."

"Wha... What?"

Of all places it had to be. It had to have been there! That place! The one place where even my ex-master, Shen, wouldn't have dared to tread.

"You have got to be kidding me?!"

Mafa shook his head. He was in all definitions of the term serious. No joke about it at all.

Letting out a hefty sigh, I agreed to it. As Mafa had already said before, we were to travel the Valley of Peace no matter how much I did or didn't like it.

"Daddy?"

Yu spoke up to me. Looking back down at my son, his eyes were so cute as he stared back up at me. It just pained me even more to see him scared.

"Am I gonna die?" he asked. The fear in his voice felt like a strike to my heart.

I shook my head.

"No," my words came back, reassuring him softly. "You won't die. We are going to be taking a little trip so we can give some medicine to make you get better. And then afterwards we will go home and go on that camping trip for real. It will be just the two of us."

"Promise?" he asked, as I saw excitement flourishing inside those cutely puppy eyes. Not able to say no to a face like that, at least most of the time, I chuckled saying yes in reply.

"Yay!" Yu cheered. "Now let's get on with this!"

Mafa and I both laughed at Yu's sudden enthusiasm. The three of us returned back to the campsite and began packing up. Mafa and I talked, catching up on lost time while we were putting everything away.

Yu just sat there on a stump quietly. The whole time he just stared at Mafa.

"What are you looking at son?" I stopped and asked him. He jumped and snapped out of his trance.

He looked back to me and smiled. "I wish I had white fur like that," he commented. Mafa had apparently heard him say that as well because he looked back over at us.

Yu walked over to him saying something. Mafa laughed.

"Zhong. Your son wants to sleep with me," Mafa said.

Thirty minutes later, everything was put up and we were on our way. With Mafa having offered to carry half of our things, it made it a lot easier on me.

"How long should it take us to get there?" I asked Mafa.

"If we go onwards until sunset and wake up early before dawn, We should make it there by midday tomorrow," he answered.

"We have to walk all day?!" Yu groaned.

I heard Mafa slightly chuckle, causing me to roll my eye. Despite the fact that Yu was my son, there were will still those rare times when he would annoy me.

"Yes son. We do. Now stop complaining because it will only make the trip go by that much slower."

Yu groaned and didn't say a word back to me. Thank god too, because if he had I would have given him a good outright spanking. Out of all the things that this father was not above, it was light corporal punishment.

Yu looked back to Mafa.

"So Yu. How do you like living with Zhong?" Mafa asked.

"Oh. It's great. Dad can be bit annoying at times don't get me wrong. But I love him," Yu replied.

I grunted, shooting a glare back at my son. Yeah. He sure was one to say that. That little ball of fur was the one whom pestered me on a regular basis for the past few weeks ever since I adopted him.

"Excuse me. But I am not the one that complained every five minutes about being tired or my feet hurting when we were walking to the campsite."

Yu had a smirk plastered across his face. He knew he was guilty.

"Well, at least I'm not old," he teased at me.

I looked to him and returned his same smirk. Easily, I now saw how him and I were alike.

"You know if I hadn't known that Yu was adopted, I would have sworn he is your actual blood son." Mafa commented.

"You really think so?"

Had he been serious in the remark? I did not have any idea.

"Hey Yu," Mafa said. I was about to say something, but stopped when he winked at me.

"How about we make a bet," he suggested.

Yu's face lit up. I saw that he instantly became interested. Mafa had the kid playing in the palms of his hands.

"What kind of a bet?" he asked, giving Mafa a suspicious look.

Mafa looked back down at Yu. He nudged him on the shoulder. The pup looked back toward me.

"If you can go the rest of the day without complaining, then you can stay with me tonight," he said, apparently knowing the entire time about Yu staring at his fur.

"Deal!" my son answered, taking off ahead of us. I stared back at Mafa to see him smirking back at me.

"How did you know?"

The silver wolf lightly chuckled.

"You just have to look at it as a game. Kids love competition," he replied.

It never occurred to me to look at it that way. After we traveled several hours and setup camp, not a single complaint came from Yu. The three of us sat on a log by a campfire with darkness upon the entire forest.

Growl.

"I'm starting to get hungry," Yu said.

I looked over to him. His head down and it was easy to see how miserably impatient he was.

"Well. Just you wait son. It's almost ready," The sound of my voice reassured him. Mafa placed a hand on his shoulder and Yu licked his lips.

My attention shifted to the stew. The preparation contained mostly elk meat with a few yams and roots for spice. It wasn't a premium dish, but anything is better than starving. I stirred it lightly a little bit before letting it set so it could bubble over.

"Ok! It's ready!" My announcement rang. I glanced back to Yu. The pup panted profusely.

"Yu. You are such a melodramatic pup. Do you know that?"

Yu shook his head and he looked back to me. He was rather ticked that his act had been easily seen through.

"I almost died of starvation just now! This is a serious deal!" he exclaimed.

"Oh yeah. We stopped for a late break and you had a snack about three hours ago."

Yu grinned to me sheepishly. He was incapable of hiding it anymore.

"Guilty as charged," Mafa commented, still sitting on the log behind Yu. "And your punishment is that you will be the last one to eat tonight."

I turned to Yu. He appeared to be wanting to say something, but held his tongue.

"Well then," Mafa said to the two of us. "Why don't we eat?"

The three us sat down and ate, literally devouring the meal. The taste was rather bland, but past experiences with starvation beat any spoilage out of me. It also surprised me that Yu liked the dinner. On the fourth day after he started living with me at the cabin, he became more and more picky about his food. All he liked was vegetables and fruits, which easily made him the first wolf that I ever met that liked plants more than meat.

"That was refreshing," Mafa said.

"Yeah," I agreed. "What did you think about it Yu?"

He remained quiet. I saw him looking down at the ground slumped forward on the log. It was confusing as he normally never had been one to act in that way.

"Yu?" Mafa snapped his fingers in front of his face.

"Son!" I called to Yu.

No response.

"The poison's first effects must be hitting him," Mafa said.

I looked up to him. What were the stages of that poison?

"Tell me what is gonna happen to my son!"

Mafa didn't flinch from me yelling and kept his same calm composure, which surprised me.

"Pung's poison is designed to be a paralyzer. It attacks the body in short burst. Each one successfully more powerful in its effects than the last until the body eventually shuts down. While also making the victim weaker, it also amplifies his skin's sensitivity to pain. To put it simply, one regular scrape or bruise will feel like a bone breaking to Yu," Mafa explained.

Smash!

I looked down to my right, my paw leaving a solid indention on the log. There were so many things I really wanted to say. So many things to do. It wouldn't had changed a thing just sitting here. We had to get that antidote.