“And that’s another win for me.”
Twirling a staff taller than herself with a casual flick of her wrist, Yang Yiyi made her declaration. It wasn’t a boast; it was simply a statement of fact.
She was a girl with lithe, slender limbs and long, charcoal-black hair tied high atop her head in a ponytail. While her features were well-defined, it was her eyes—a lustrous reddish-bronze—that commanded the most attention.
Though she lacked a certain conventional femininity, her youthful, vibrant physique throbbed with an almost restless vitality.
The boy lying in the dirt, looking up at Yiyi, swallowed hard against the lump in his throat.
“I knew it! She’s terrifying, that Little Monkey!”
“Run for it! She’ll kill us all!”
The boys Yiyi had flattened scrambled to their feet, shouting as they bolted down the alley. As they looked back, a chorus of nasty nicknames trailed in their wake...
“...Honestly, you lot...”
Yiyi pressed a hand to her temple, wondering what kind of way that was to speak to a maiden who had just turned sixteen. She shot them a sharp, piercing glare.
“Get back here! I’m going to be nice and snap all your spines in half!”
She brandished her staff and gave chase, sending the brats into even louder fits of screaming. The local adults watched over the scene with looks of exasperation or mild amusement. The few travelers passing through stared wide-eyed, wondering what on earth was happening.
This was a common sight in this small frontier village—a piece of their everyday routine.
The land Yiyi lived in was called the Xiang Kingdom.
It was a nation celebrated for its splendor, said to be so magnificent it practically radiated fragrance. However, living in the countryside, Yiyi had never given the name of her country much thought.
She lived in a desolate land far to the north of the capital, a place with neither bountiful harvests nor scenic landmarks. There, she lived with Ruoqing, a woman who served as her surrogate mother.
Every day, Yiyi worked the fields and occasionally took on work as a day-hire bodyguard. Ruoqing sold the vegetables they grew or decocted medicinal herbs they’d raised. While their individual earnings were meager, it was enough for two women to live on, even if it wasn’t exactly a life of luxury.
Yiyi pondered these things as she chewed a mouthful of food from a bowl with a chipped rim. Today’s dinner menu consisted of barley rice and a soup of simmered wild boar meat, vegetable scraps, and minced ginger. There was also some pickled radish a neighbor had shared with them.
The pickled radish was strongly flavored, making the barley rice go down easy. However, if she were to indulge in a bit of wishful thinking, she would have loved to eat white rice for the first time in ages. To pile a mountain of pure white, fragrant, glorious rice into her bowl, inhale the hot steam, and open her mouth so wide her jaw might unhinge—
Ugh... now I’m actually getting hungry.
She chewed her barley rice thoroughly to appease her growling stomach.
Across from her, Ruoqing narrowed her eyes. The old woman was covered in wrinkles, yet she sat with her spine as straight as if it were reinforced by a board, casting a stern gaze across the table. Under that look, Yiyi reflexively corrected her own posture.
“I heard about it, Yiyi. I heard you were chasing children around with a staff again.”
“They said they wanted me to train them.”
It sounded like an excuse, but it was the absolute truth. However, Yiyi was completely oblivious to the fact that, by the end, the scene had devolved into something quite pathetic: a group of children rolling on the ground, dripping with tears and snot, being hunted by a girl with the face of a demon.
Ruoqing let out a heavy sigh, as if to say, Good grief.
“How on earth did you grow up to be such a tomboy?”
“What are you talking about? You’re the one who beat martial arts into me, Ruoqing.”
Yiyi stopped her chopsticks to fire back, and Ruoqing fell silent, maintaining her sullen stare.
Yes, the woman sitting before her was the very person who had drilled martial arts into Yiyi. On the surface, she was just an old woman. Ruoqing’s appearance hadn’t changed much in over a decade, but she was terrifyingly well-versed in weaponry and combat.
Looking back, Yiyi felt like she’d been forced to grip a wooden sword even before she’d mastered chopsticks.
Ruoqing’s education had been nothing short of brutal. In the dim light before dawn, Yiyi would run around the village and through the forest. She swung a wooden sword hundreds of times. At times, she stood under freezing waterfalls, secluded herself in the mountains, and even fought ferocious beasts.
Yiyi continued these training sessions on her own to this day. In fact, the salted meat gracing their table today had originally been a boar that Yiyi herself had hunted.
And yet, Yiyi had never once defeated Ruoqing in a real fight—the kind of no-holds-barred brawl where anything goes. Ruoqing had injured her leg a few years ago and they hadn't fought since, but Yiyi was still unsure if she could win even now.
Beyond martial arts, Ruoqing had also taught Yiyi how to read and write. The list went on—how to grow vegetables, how to brew medicinal herbs—Ruoqing had taught her many things, both essential for survival and otherwise.
Despite this multifaceted education, the result was a girl who possessed zero qualities of a typical village maiden. Thanks to her light-footed, breezy air, the villagers had even saddled her with the disrespectful nickname “Little Monkey.”
However, Yiyi herself quite liked the person Ruoqing had forged her into. Among those living in this village, Yiyi had no equals, even among the men. She was particularly skilled in staff techniques that utilized her long reach, but she had grown capable of wielding almost any weapon: swords, bows, spears, sickles, axes, and even hoes.
Though I mostly use them for farm work...
Occasionally, she would be asked to serve as a short-term bodyguard for travelers who seemed to be in some kind of trouble. This meant facing off against suspicious pursuers or bandits, so in that sense, her skills were valuable. However, lately, she couldn't help but feel she might have put on a bit too much muscle.
Compared to the other village girls her age, Yiyi was undeniably sharp. Not just in terms of personality or intuition, but her physique as well.
The fact that she hadn’t had a single romantic prospect despite having turned sixteen was likely due, in no small part, to that. Yes, that had to be the reason. It wasn't because of her complete lack of femininity or her boisterous nature. ...Probably.
Well, whatever.
She thought this as she and Ruoqing happened to tilt their bowls at the same time, slurping down the last of their soup.
She expected to continue living like this, peacefully in a corner of a small country village with Ruoqing. Emotions like romance and love were far beyond Yiyi’s understanding. She didn’t particularly care to understand them, so it was fine.
She didn’t know much about her family, either. When she was young, Ruoqing had told her they weren't related by blood. So, who was her real family? Where were they now?
She had wanted to ask, but because Ruoqing had looked so somber, Yiyi had decided against pushing further. If she asked, Ruoqing would likely have to explain her own past to Yiyi as well.
Why was Ruoqing so skilled in martial arts? Why was she the only person in the village who could read and write?
It doesn't matter who Ruoqing really is.
To Yiyi, Ruoqing was her only parent, her only family.
That was why every night before bed, she would press her palms together and direct her thoughts toward Ruoqing’s back, praying for her longevity—and every time, the old woman would sense her and look back with a terrifying glare, forcing Yiyi to laugh it off.
However, the simple future Yiyi had envisioned crumbled just a few days later. Ruoqing was struck by illness and collapsed.
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