Beware Of Chicken

A wise turtle once spoke to a red of the illusion of control, using the metaphor of a peach pit. Both, honestly, had fair points. The red had declared that he could direct where the tree grew; that he could control it through sunlight and water.

The turtle replied that he could, but no matter what he did, he could not force the peach tree to be anything but a peach tree.

The answer, I had always thought, lay somewhere in between, even if actually living that advice was the hard part. To account for the things you could control, and accept and respect the things you couldn’t.

Some things just were. And right now… I, realistically, couldn’t do anything to change what was about to happen.

So I took a breath, and let it all go.

I stared at my wife frozen for a moment. My heart was still beating a thousand miles a minute in my chest, yet a strange sort of calm came over me. Meiling stood there nervously staring back, standing in a small puddle of liquid. She had walked out of our home because she didn’t want to make a mess. Her water had broken.

Father. I was going to be a father very, very soon.

I took a breath.

She looked a bit unsteady. Her eyes were wide, fear welling up in her features … until her eyes met mine.

I smiled at her as I walked forward. I held out my arms and hugged her as we stood together in shin-deep slush.

Her tense shoulders relaxed a bit.

“You’re right, it would have gotten the floors dirty. The whole thing will. So obviously, you’d best stay outside.” I said, my voice full of sarcasm.

Meimei choked out a laugh.

“Sorry. Didn’t know what else to do… and cleaning the floors kind of sucks.” She muttered.

I snorted. She was right. Even with cultivation, cleaning the floors was annoying. What I wouldn’t give for a vacuum cleaner that wasn’t named Washy or Peppa.

“Tell you what. You don’t have to do any cleaning at all for a while after this. We got a deal?” I asked her.

“...deal.” She agreed. I pulled back from her and the odd expression on her face was gone.

“C’mon, let’s get your cute butt back inside.” I nudged, and she giggled.

“I have a cute butt, huh?” She asked, like she didn’t know how much I liked her butt.

I just stared at her and slung one arm around her shoulder as I led her back to the house.

Back to Pops and Rizzo, who had swung into motion immediately as soon as they realised what was going on.

I stayed with her, leaning against my side, as we walked to the room that had been set up for this day. She seemed a bit shellshocked, but was coming down from the panic, breathing deep

“Just like all those other times… but my turn.” She muttered under her breath.

She was awaited by Pops and Rizzo, Meihua, Hu Li, and Xiulan. With one last touch…. I let her go.

I had accounted for and controlled everything I could; now, it was time for me to sit back and let the experts and nature do their thing.

Now, all I had left to do was wait.

Wait, as my wife entered her own battlefield.

“I raise this cup to you—heroes and martyrs all! We shall drive back the darkness, and remove this filth from the land!” Brother Ge’s voice rang out, reaching every soldier in the encirclement. He did not have to raise his voice, for it sounded to cultivators and mortals alike that he was right beside them, speaking personally to each and every man. That his eyes were upon them. And one of the Elders of the Cloudy Sword Sect was judging them worthy.

Shen Yu stood slightly behind his sworn brother. He did so out of respect for the Cloudy Sword Sect, and these pitiful men who would soon have the wrath of hell coming down upon their heads as mere mortals.

The mortals stood in their gleaming ranks, their eyes blazing with determination.

They were all ready for what was to come, even if they were woefully equipped to face it.

In that, Shen Yu could agree with the ideals of his old sect. There was some value here. These mortals… he could respect their bravery, if nothing else. Without the might of cultivation they yet stood, ready to fight.

“Now, drink with me! For our Ancestors! For our descendants! For the Empire!”

Three sips from the vessels that each man held. Three sips of a mix of alcohol, and a potion that would render them more resistant against the demons’ corruptive Qi.

“For our Ancestors! For our descendants! For the Empire!” the men roared as one, a thunderous rumble that matched Ge’s own voice.

Ge always had been good at these speeches. Better than Shen Yu at least. There was a certain amount of nobility about the man… always had been, even centuries ago, when he was still wet behind the ears as they stormed a demonic sect.

It had been a long, long time since those days. Although the scale had certainly increased. This was one of the largest operations Shen Yu had ever taken part in. For hundreds of Li the fortifications stretched; ditches, ramparts, and killing fields, all surrounding what looked like a red crack that was floating in midair. Normally, it would be near invisible—but now, it was engorged, pulsing like an infected wound.

Some demons would spill out when the cultivators pierced the wound. They always did.

When they ripped open the world and pressed into the Demons’ home… other demons would pour out in a flood. Lesser creatures, coming by the thousands, while the cultivators were busy within.

And these men would be the only thing there to blunt the charge into the heartlands.

They would die by the thousands… but they would do their jobs well.

Shen Yu took a breath as the speech ended, and General Tou Le sent the men to their positions.

It was time.

The ambient Qi in the air rose as the formation finished charging.

A lance of light speared through the air and rammed into the red, pulsating gash in the world.

The world broke open like a rotten and infected boil. Black liquid gushed out as a portal formed in the air, leading to a twisting, corrupted realm where no light shone other than the dull red of some baleful star. The ground was black and twisted, and the world itself seemed to rebel against the demonic presence.

For a brief instant, one could see the ravening demonic hordes as they surged forwards.

Then the ballista on the Divine Wind fired, the massive ship shuddering. Explosions that could consume entire villages ripped holes in demonic ranks and broke open the bridgehead.

“Brave sons of the Phoenix! Advance!” General Tou Le roared.

Meiling had been expecting a lot of things when it came to this point. She knew she was small and slim, and birth was likely to be hard on her, no matter Hu Li’s jokes that Meiling had “birthing hips”. It was nothing like she had expected. Oh, it hurt a bit… but that was it. It was mostly pressure.

Her mind was clear as she took deep breaths. Her father, Ri Zu, Meihua, Xiulan, and Hu Li were with her. Everybody else was just outside. The door was open and they could poke their heads in if they wanted to.

Meiling wished that Jin was right beside her… but it was bad luck to have the father too close by during the birth.

It was kind of embarrassing to have her legs hiked up and people that weren’t her husband between them poking around… but it was necessary.

Ri Zu was as calm and professional as Meiling’s father as they did their work.

“You’re dilating well, if a bit quickly.” Xian stated. “Contractions are normal.”

“Look at this, Meimei. You called me a weed… but you’re going just as quickly as I did.” Meihua joked as she dabbed a cloth along Meiling’s sweaty forehead.

Meiling smiled at the jab.

“It's damn unfair is what this is!” Hu Li grumbled and leveled a glare at her sons through the walls. “Couldn’t they have been more considerate?!”

Hu Li’s labours had lasted a full day each for her sons.

Gou and Yun had last seen her when she entered the room, her brothers in all but blood each wrapping her in a hug as tight as they could muster.

Yun Ren had tried to look aloof, but his eyes had given him away, as did the slight tremor in his hand.

Gou Ren hadn’t even tried to hide his own anxiety. It was easy to forget that he had just turned eighteen some days past… or at least it was until his hardened, refined features melted into that of the boy she had patched up on far, far too many occasions.

It had made Meiling misty-eyed that both of them were that concerned for her. They may have had their little fights, but when everything was on the line… the Xong Brothers would have come with her to hell.

Bitching and moaning all the way, but they would be there.

Meiling felt her body tense slightly and she let the contraction happen. She got the feeling that she could stop them, or at least control them better… but she just let them flow naturally.

One slightly more painful one hit and her hand clenched. Xiulan, her silent sentinel, made no noise as Meiling’s fingers tightened on her own. She just kept up the circles she was rubbing on Meiling’s back.

She was there and just staying mostly out of everybody else’s way, a silent pillar of support.

And so things continued for two hours more. Honestly, it was a bit boring, if Meiling was honest. She laid back, took breaths, and waited.

Part of her was waiting for the complications or for something bad to happen.

But nothing came.

‘Dilation is complete. Everything looks good. Master… you can start to push.’

Meiling took another breath. This was it. A son or a daughter. The worry of every woman was the sex of their first born. A son was lucky… a daughter always led to tension, pressure, to secure the family line.

All sorts of nastiness could arise from that… but Meiling knew it wouldn't apply in her case.

Jin didn’t care. He had told her he was fine if all his children were daughters.

She turned to look at the open door and caught her husband’s eyes as he looked in.

He smiled at her and nodded.

‘You got this’ he mouthed. Absolute confidence in his eyes.

A battle with so many cultivators was necessarily chaotic. Even this twisted realm heaved under the force of their Qi.

Swords flashed. Thunder rumbled. Techniques and the roars of warriors matched the howls of the demons in their intensity. The Divine Wind fired as fast as it could reload. The fairies of the Soaring Heaven’s Isle turned into fierce falcons, their mistress, Minyan, the foremost among them. Everything that flew was an offense to them; and the demons died in droves under cutting winds and freezing shards of ice.

Minyan’s eyes flashed, and a section of ground ten Li across was simply pulped from air pressure alone.

It was home to Shen Yu. The struggle. The will to survive. His sword split a Demonic Warform in two, the building sized creature falling in half… as did twelve of its brothers. Brother Ge kept pace, the two of them watching each other's backs. The sky turned black and descended upon the demons. The Raging Cloudy Sword Formation surrounded and enveloped everything in its path. The weak simply perished, the clouds filled with such powerful sword intent that they turned to dust, cut into a hundred-thousand pieces.

The strong fared little better. The sky was Ge’s domain. He was one with the thunderous stormcloud. Present within every inch of space. He was simply there, his sword descending like an executioner’s judgment, within the whole length and breadth of the black cloud.

Nothing could even make a sound before he ended them, dead the instant they touched the billowing black clouds.

The shock of their brutal assault had shattered the leading edges of the demonic horde, but it was only the beginning. Their true prize lay further in, in the center of the hidden realm, where the most powerful demon would reside.

The lesser beasts started to panic as the advance ripped through them like a scythe through a rice stalk. Little portals started to open up as they sought to flee into the real world… only to run into the defensive emplacements.

The cultivators let them go, their efforts focused on getting to the center.

Their eyes were peeled for tricks and traps. Shen Yu noted the Demons’ own emplacements, half built, seven as he destroyed them.

Then… the world rumbled.

A hill in the distance shuddered… and started to grow. Baleful eyes opened and a sword that could split mountains in two stabbed into the ground as the monster started to rise.

Shen Yu slowed in his advance as the air grew so thick it was like breathing in sludge.

A Hellforged Demonic Warform.

“...It appears that heaven has intervened on our behalf.” Brother Ge stated from beside Shen Yu.

Indeed. The horrific beast, the same one that the Founders of the Cloudy Sword Sect found difficult to contend with, was half-finished. Its armor was missing in places, and one of its eyes flickered and spluttered.

Shen Yu was reluctantly forced to admit that the Emperor had been right to call him. This… this was worrying. It was the largest buildup of demons in thousands of years… and they had caught the bastards with their metaphorical pants down.

If it had been a few years later, the enormous construct of blood and hate would have been complete… Shen Yu frowned as he ascended into the sky. His frown deepened as he saw the construction pits.

As would have its brothers.

The ballista from the ship hammered into the massive monster, and it staggered… but remained standing.

It roared. A physical thing that sent some of the lesser cultivators flying.

Then, there was a surge of Qi. A black form landed on the Warform’s shoulder. It was almost human looking and carrying an enormous axe.

Another landed on its head, covered in slavering maws, each dripping lava.

A third rose into the sky on ebony wings, like a twisted butterfly.

Not one, but three demonic commanders.

“How polite. One for each of us.” She Yu mused. Brother Ge snorted.

“The heavens will record this battle for generations.” The man said.

Shen Yu’s sword shuddered as his Qi ran through it.

[The Unconquered Blade of The Soul]

“Push! Push, that’s it!”

There were no dramatic last minute reveals or enemies.

“I can see the head! Good Job Meimei, you’re doing great!” Meihua encouraged her. I clenched my fist as Meiling groaned, a bit of pain in her voice.

There were no massive blasts of Qi or strange formations.

‘Everything looks good!’ Rizzo squeaked.

Preparation and planning carried the day.

“Seriously? It doesn’t hurt?” Hu Li demanded, staring at Meiling with no small amount of envy.

I simply sat and waited, with a Big D on my shoulder and Tigu in my lap.

It was all I had to do, because it was out of my hands… and in theirs. And no amount of being able to punch good would change that.

“The head is almost out!”

Outside the great rift was a battle that would be immortalized for generations. Tiny holes ripped in reality as demons poured out of them, trying to escape the wrath of the cultivators, and met a wall of stalwart spirit and Imperial steel.

Halberds rose and fell with desperation fueled strength, some shattering on black carapace; Bows and crossbows fired so many arrows it may as well have been rain. Jade Armors waded into the worst of it, the golems never resting. Their pilots roared oaths and battle-songs, chanting the names of the Jade Armor’s previous pilots to lend them strength.

Choking fog and impossible biology rose to meet them. Poisoned blades and maddened fury met grim resolve. The demons funneled into choke points and scrabbled at defensive emplacements.

It was a battle that looked like it was the end of days. Human blood and corrupted ichor coated the ground, mixing and turning into rivers. Cultivator officers and defensive formations slowed the superhuman beasts just enough that mere men could land fatal blows.

It was merely the dregs of the other battle raging within the rift.

The air shuddered as the elements came to life, ravening lightning and blazing fire combating blasts of black tinged light. Heroes who had lived for hundreds of years and thought themselves to be the pinnacle fought and died much the same as the mortals outside.

A bald cultivator wearing the robes of a penitant fought with suicidal bravery against the war construct, ripping open futher the holes that had been made by the great ship that was still bombarding it.

A formation of Raging Clouds formed a safe zone, an impenetrable bastion that was both attack and defense, as the disciples of the Cloudy Sword Sect funneled the majority of the demons into their blades.

The blackened sky had been painted with swathes of beautiful blue as the power of Soaring Heaven’s Isle cut through the darkness, and imposed its will upon the world. A falcon battled a twisted butterfly that spewed poison and beams of light.

Further away, a silent cloud compressed into a single point, all of its power brought to bear on a monster spewing flames so hot the stone around it evaporated; a hellscape of lava and toxic fumes surrounding the combatants.

The last was a duel of blazing light and twisting shadow. New valleys were carved into the earth, and the world itself cried out in pain under the two titans.

The unconquerable sword met an axe made of darkness and chitin with city-shattering force.

There was a scream of pain and then a groan of effort.

There was a gasp and then a moment of silence.

And then… there was a great breath taken and the wails of a baby.

Everything in that moment froze. I stopped being able to hear properly. I stopped being able to really think.

Xiulan came out of the room with a beaming smile on her face and said something that I didn't parse. All I could hear was the crying of a child.

I rose to my feet, my limbs slightly unsteady, and took a step forwards to the room.

Xiulan’s smile just got wider as I staggered up to and past her.

The room had a peculiar smell to it. Blood and bodily fluids.

But I ignored that. My senses condensed to a single point, to a single person.

I looked at Meiling. She was exhausted, and sweat dotted her face and ran down her cheeks. Her hair was stuck to her face. She was disheveled and exhausted.

She had a baby against her bare chest and tears in her eyes. She turned to look at me and she smiled.

She was the most beautiful I had ever seen her.

The roars of victory resounded as mortals cheered. The great rift in the world wobbled and started to destabilize.

Shen Yu limped out of the rift with Brother Ge and Minyan. Minyan’s arm was a corrupted, ruined mess, hidden in her sleeve; Brother Ge was breathing harshly through burned lungs, his body a patchwork of burn scars.

Shen Yu touched the wound in his side as he stared at all the mud and blood.

Another battle. Another victory. One he had not expected. This was the most brutal demon assault in what had to be a thousand years.

He was tired. So tired…. But also satisfied.

A victory for the ages.

He sighed and nodded to General Tou Le, the man on a horse for his legs were missing at the knees.

His duty was finally done.

He looked at the mortals, some who were sobbing. Others who were cheering, heroes who had defended their home and family.

For the first time in a long time, he felt a kinship with those little men who could not touch the heavens.

Defend home and family.

How mortal a drive… yet how human it was too.

She held the swaddled babe out to me. Our child wailed, a little tuft of brown hair on the top of their head. I took them gently into my arms.

Amethyst eyes opened as the crying calmed for a moment.

I held my child… and all was right with the world.