Birthday

"Why don't you tell me first...?" At last, there was a response. The tone of the reply was calm. Yasen and Slog could even sense, straight from the voice, that the speaker was smiling. Unhurried footsteps trod upon the fallen leaves and twigs on the ground. Without the slightest attempt at concealment, the sound rose from down the hillside, drawing closer. "Tell me what gave you such a misconception... To think that for a young genius who has made such great contributions to the Huaxia Front, we would truly leave him entirely unattended before he has even had the chance to grow?" Even as an interrogation, it carried no harshness. A figure emerged from beneath the slope, walked over to stop a short distance in front of them, and gave a faint furrow of his brow. If memory served, Marshal Hua—Hua Bixuan of the Azure Huaxia Front—should have been in his late thirties, pushing forty. Yet the man before them looked barely twenty-eight or twenty-nine. He wore a simple military-issue white shirt, a Ninth-Generation device, and behind his back was a dead iron straight sword a size smaller than the standard Azure battleblade. There was an air about this man surnamed Hua reminiscent of a scholar from the 1910s or 1920s. He was even somewhat delicate-looking, his demeanor far from the fierce ferocity his reputation suggested. He seemed far more suited to sitting in a classroom at Cambridge or Oxford studying history than appearing here. So Slog thought, and desperately wished. And yet, Slog knew all too well that the man before him was a true slaughterer. Among Huaxia's four super combat powers, in terms of sheer body count, he was undeniably first. Because he was the commanding officer of the covert unit in the Azure Huaxia Front tasked with hunting down traitors and carrying out special missions. And though his name appeared on no roster, he was universally recognized as the number-one assassin of the Huaxia Front. The reason he was not on the rankings was simple: to call him an assassin directly felt like an insult. "The rules of the City of Iniquity..." Slog attempted to speak, searching for a way out, because on a certain level, the man across from him held a status tied to the City of Iniquity as well. "The rules from there do not apply in Huaxia." Hua Bixuan shook his head, then smiled faintly. "Otherwise, why has no one taken the highest bounty in history for over twenty years to come and try their luck at killing Chen Buer?" "Yes," Slog agreed, nodding. As long as Chen Buer was in Huaxia, Chen Buer was one of the rules of this underworld... including the City of Iniquity. Ten years ago, as Slog recalled, Chen Buer had stopped by the City of Iniquity on his way back from an Azure World Coalition conference. In the middle of the street, he had cleaved down an assassin who had previously crossed the border in an attempt to assassinate the speaker of the Huaxia Front. That Italian assassin, known as Night Owl, had been ranked third on the assassin rankings at the time. Yet he had failed to force Chen Buer to even draw his Slash-Red battleblade, let alone make him unleash that legendary, inevitably lethal strike. "I..." Slog considered his words, trying his best to sound sincere. "When I set out, he had not yet made such a great contribution. I..." "I despise quibbling." Hua Bixuan chuckled, suddenly speaking in a talkative, teasing manner. "Because personally, I happen to be very good at it." Slog felt not the slightest amusement. He said, "I did not know the consequences would be so severe." Blurting it out was the honest truth. Though deep down, what Slog truly wanted to say was: *I didn't know you would send someone of your caliber here.* Were it not for the man standing before him right now, Slog would have staked his life on a fight no matter what. A brief silence fell. "So, Marshal Hua..." "You may leave." A sentence that decided life and death was delivered with such breezy lightness. "..." An unbelievable wave of relief and surprise washed over him. He wanted to ask if it was real, but dared not—that would be too foolish. In the end, only two words came out: "Thank you." Slog bowed slightly, terrified that Hua Bixuan might change his mind, and hastily turned to leave. "Since you want to kill him, leave it to him to kill you himself. I'll pass word of this to him," Hua Bixuan said from behind, continuing, "Three years. It hasn't even been a year yet. Once he has spent three full years in Azure, if you're still willing to come, feel free. I won't interfere in the slightest. If you don't come, just wait for him to come find you." "...Understood." Slog dared not halt his stride. "Cross the border within three days, or die. And while you're at it, pass along a message on behalf of the Huaxia Front: before his three years are up, any of the top twenty on the City of Iniquity's assassin rankings... who step across the border will die." Those words made Slog's footsteps falter for a moment. *Does he mean assassins ranked below twenty are allowed to come?* *They're training him!* *Their confidence in that young man is that absolute?!* "What you're thinking right now is correct. Anyone ranked below twenty, come as you please." Hua Bixuan waited until Slog's silhouette vanished, then climbed up onto a mound and watched the departing jeep in the distance for a while. "Only three years? Old Man Chen has that much confidence in the kid?" "I'd really love to go take a swing at him and test him out, haha... What a pity." None of this, of course, could be told to Han Qingyu. Just as the protection they provided could never be comprehensive, nor was it ever meant to be. *** The return journey was uneventful. Han Qingyu and his companions took twists and detours all the way, not arriving back at the Squad 1777 station until past ten at night on the twentieth. Without much time for pleasantries, they immediately turned in to sleep. They took leave from the next day's training as well, sleeping until nearly noon. With the dormitory empty, Han Qingyu got out of bed to wash up. While brushing his teeth, his eyes casually caught the calendar. *May 21st.* "It's my birthday," he mumbled vaguely to himself. Once he finished washing up, Han Qingyu sat alone in the dorm for a while, then took out paper and pen to write a letter. *Mom, Dad, it's been a while since I last wrote to you.* *Today is my birthday. I know you'll definitely remember. Your son is twenty now. I'm craving a bowl of noodles with fried eggs.* *By the way, I earned another merit recently.* *Though I also got a little hurt—* (Several words were written and then crossed out, scratched over very carefully, but after hesitating for a moment, he wrote them again.) *I got hurt, and it hurts so bad... I took a tumble and scraped the skin right off my knees and palms.* *...* Probably no one could have imagined that Azure's Han Qingyu would actually whimper about pain to his parents in a letter. *Knock, knock.* A knock sounded at the door. Then, with no regard for manners at all, the door was pushed straight open. Han Qingyu hastily tucked the letter away and stood up. Lao Jian glanced at him, walked over, and set down a bowl of noodles topped with two fried eggs. "A twentieth birthday is pretty important—or let's treat it like it is, anyway... Had the kitchen make you a bowl of noodles." *So they knew? Did Wen Jifei tell them, or was it in my file?* Han Qingyu thought for a moment and said, "Thank you." Lao Jian waved a hand, looking somewhat unaccustomed to such things. Next, Shen Yixiu walked in, hands cupped in front of her like a little girl hiding a secret. She smiled and said, "Happy birthday, Qingzi. Guess what I got for you..." Han Qingyu chuckled and shook his head. "I can't guess." Her iron-clad palms extended, presenting a small, handmade hardcover notebook. "Last time I saw your little ledger, it looked almost full, so I made you a new one." Then, Wu Xu walked over silently. He reached out and set down a freshly woven katydid cage with a katydid inside. Glancing at Han Qingyu, an awkward look flickered in his eyes as he said, "Caught it this morning." This had likely been the only toy of his own childhood.