"An'an. An'an!"
Jiang Chen stayed crouched where he was, and gathered An'an into his arms.
He held her little head and stroked it again and again. "Don't be so good. I don't need you to be this good."
His voice came out strangely hoarse: "Be willful. Be childish. Do whatever you like. Just don't be... so grown-up."
He regretted not hiding it when he asked Zhao Yan for money. He kept telling himself his sister was shy and sensitive, and still he had overlooked her.
He and Zhao Yan were closer than brothers — they shared even top-grade techniques without a second thought, let alone gold and silver. But he had forgotten: An'an didn't know that.
An'an only saw that her brother was in debt to someone else to give her a home. That she was a burden.
"God." Since their father's death, Jiang Chen had almost never cried. But now, hidden behind An'an's little head, the tears fell like rain.
"Brother... what's wrong?" After a long while, An'an asked.
"Ah. Nothing, nothing." Jiang Chen steadied himself, still holding her. "From now on, don't call Zhao Yan 'pale-face.' He'll be upset."
"But he really is pale."
"'Pale-face' doesn't mean his face is pale... forget it. Call him whatever you want. Don't worry about whether he likes it."
"Mmm!"
When he was sure no more tears would fall, and none could be seen, Jiang Chen drew An'an back and looked at her seriously. "Big brother needs to apologize. I shouldn't have lost my temper. Big brother... this is my first time being a brother. I'm not good at it."
An'an twisted the hem of her clothes, embarrassed: "It's my first time being a sister too. I'm not good at it. I shouldn't have cheated, shouldn't have made Teacher angry..."
"Is that so?" Jiang Chen wiped An'an's cheeks with his thumbs, brushing away the tears. "So this is your first time being a sister?"
An'an nodded.
Jiang Chen moved his thumb in front of her face and raised it. "Then you have real talent! I've never seen a better sister than you."
"Hehe..."
An'an smiled, shy.
Winter had set in, and the tear tracks still shone on her small face. But in that smile, all the spring in the world bloomed.
* * *
Every man has his fate, and every fate is different. Half of that saying was nonsense.
Sun Xiaoyan thought he was a fool. A real fool. How could he have believed that so-called sisterly affection? How could he have believed the words of that little demon?
"There's lots of good food out there — stuff you can't get in Three Mountain City!"
"I promise I won't bully him. I'll set a perfect example. Let me lead the group!"
"Think of it as me taking my little brother on a trip. We'll be so happy!"
The words still rang in his ears. Oh, they rang.
Sun Xiaoyan — thirteen years old, blessed with a name that sounded almost delicate — was in fact very, very round.
Huff! Huff!
He ran, wheezing, every breath a fire in his gut, sweat pouring down. His fine bright clothes were long past recognition: wrinkled, filthy.
He wanted to collapse right there, melt into a lump of mud, a pig, anything that could just lie down. But he didn't dare.
He wanted to cry. He should have clung to his mother's leg and never let go. What had possessed him to trust his lifelong nemesis?
He ran, and ran.
From a distance, you could hardly see his legs. He looked like a gaudy ball rolling down the road.
He didn't want to roll!
Unless he could roll home.
Sun Xiaoyan! Son of the lord of Three Mountain City, the only male heir of the Sun clan in this generation — in Three Mountain City he was a prince among princes. "One below none above" was his title!
Why had he been so foolish as to travel alone with that "one"? Weren't the good days in Three Mountain City good enough? Wasn't bullying the other kids fun? With the tiger gone, couldn't he be king of the mountain?
Sun Xiaoyan stopped.
Not because rage rose in his heart and courage grew in his gut. He had no such thing as a gut for courage.
No — he had simply reached his limit. He wasn't refusing to run. He genuinely couldn't run anymore.
Then he heard that all-too-familiar voice, closing on him at terrifying speed.
"Sun! Little! Fatty!"
Sun Xiaoyan had no time to react. A delicate, fair, almost beautiful little foot — applied in a way that was anything but beautiful — planted itself on his backside.
This time, he truly rolled.
He hurtled down the highway, rolling for glory.
When he finally stopped, he was bruised and swollen all over.
He sat swaying on the ground, the whole world spinning.
The first thing that swam into his squinting eyes was a pair of jade-carved bare feet, bare legs running up past the knee, and a pair of six-part fighting culottes. The feet belonged to a girl in a slant-collared short jacket, with a small, pretty, adorable face to match her small, pretty, adorable frame.
Beside her, the fat Sun Xiaoyan was practically a mountain. But his mouth crumpled, and he looked about to bawl: "Sis, I can't run anymore. I really can't!"
"It's not about what you feel. It's about what I feel." Sun Xiaoman crouched down, beaming at him. "I feel like you can."
That cooperative, reasonable tone gave Sun Xiaoyan courage.
He flopped flat on his back and howled: "Ow, ow, ow — I'm dying, I can't move..."
A dead pig afraid of nothing. Hit me, then. See if I care.
"He's a lump standing up and a lump lying down." Sun Xiaoman said. "His proportions are very consistent."
"Lose some weight. Is it really that hard?" Sun Xiaoman asked.
To make him slim down, she had forced him to run the whole road on nothing but his body's strength. Everyone else got to use travel talismans, walk when they wanted, rest when they wanted.
Sun Xiaoyan was indignant: "My fat is natural!"
"There's no such thing as a natural fatty. Only lazy ones!"
That almost sounded inspiring...
But Sun Xiaoyan was unmoved. He even shut his already small eyes: I'm not listening, not listening, not listening!
"Look at you, round as a ball. When you get on that stage, aren't you going to embarrass Three Mountain City?"
"Everyone calls us mountain barbarians. What face does Three Mountain City have to lose!"
Sun Xiaoman pressed her lips together and said nothing.
Sun Xiaoyan's heart skipped a beat. He opened his eyes at once, looking up at his sister with a pitiful face: "You're my own sister! What sister treats her brother so cruelly? And I'm so young! I'm still a child!
"Besides, a grown sister is a mother's shadow. Mother is kind, son is filial. You be good to me, I'll be good to you, and we'll all be happy together. Isn't that lovely?"
His reasoning was airtight.
"Everyone says you should raise a child with a stick in one hand and a date in the other." Sun Xiaoyan grew more aggrieved by the moment. "All I ever see is the stick. I haven't even seen the pit of the date!"
In the end, he burst into real tears.
"Ah." Sun Xiaoman looked at him, helpless, and patted his chest gently, almost tenderly. "Sister is new at this. She's not good at it..."
She grabbed Sun Xiaoyan by the collar and lifted his whole body off the ground. "Then get up and hit me!!!"
She hurled him away with a punch and roared: "Act like a man, will you? All this blubbering!"
The rest of the Three Mountain City escort watched in silence, necks tucked in. No one dared say a word.
Sun Xiaoyan spun through the air, landed, and without a word took off running again — it wouldn't kill him, but it hurt!
No choice. Run.
Ahead... was that Maple City? How much further... how much further!
Waaah...