A Daily Life of a Fire Dragon

4.General Shang

(about 6 thousand years ago)

“Are there no fish in this river?” Shi Lang grumbles. He’s been here for hours and not a single catch. The water is clear, the sky is blue, there is hardly a breeze, but not a single fish. He tried the human way with a fishing pole and bait, he tried with his magic net, he even implored the gods. Is this stretch of the river cursed or damned? This has never happened before. He might be a lot of things, but incompetent is not one of them. Is it not a good day to fish? He takes another look around to find nothing has changed. All the signs are still the same. It’s an auspicious day. There should be no problems at all.

“You won’t catch anything. The army blocked the river a little bit upstream,” a deep voice sounds from the trees.

“They must be desperate, then. I never heard of soldiers eating fish before,” Shi Lang chuckles. The man is half hidden in the trees, but he can see he’s wearing a military uniform. A high ranking officer as it seems.

“We’re cut off from our supply route,” the man answers.

“Volunteering information? Aren’t you worried I might be a spy?” Shi Lang inquires. This man is interesting. He wonders what else he’ll tell him if they talk more.

“Your robes look the same as mine when I’m off duty, and you don’t look like the Wens. They can’t mask their facial features this well,” the man says.

“Too trusting,” Shi Lang shakes his head. “I’m neither. I live up the mountain.”

“Now you’re volunteering information,” the man chuckles. He comes a bit closer, and into the light. This man is tall, well groomed, poised like an aristocrat. The uniform shines with gold inlay on the breast plates, confirming his first guess. Feathers on the helmet suggest he’s a general.

“Oh, I just thought I have to give you something in return,” he smiles.

The man takes a few steps back, and stumbles over the riverbank rocks. He catches his bearing right before he would have fallen. Shi Lang forgot himself again. He’s not to smile at mortals. It always brings more trouble than ease. The feelings he gets from this man are a mix of wonder, angst, and lust. Is he afraid of him or of his own feelings? Reading mortals is a skill only acquired by interacting with them. Shi Lang likes his solitary life on the mountain too much to bother with it. It might come handy if he doesn’t want to scare everyone off in the future. He has to think about it. But first, he has to calm this mortal’s heart before he kills him by mistake.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you off,” Shi Lang bows slightly. He doesn’t make any other move towards the man.

“What are you?” The words were barely a whisper, but he heard them clearly. Since he hasn’t run off, there might be a chance to get to know this man. It all depends on how he takes the truth. Shi Lang never learned how to lie. But straight out saying it doesn’t sit well with him, either. Twisting the truth has never benefited anyone, telling him that he’s a dragon might scare him off, though.

“Not human,” he tries with an evasive answer.

“A demon?” The man blanches. The smell of fear is even more prominent now.

“Why do you humans always ask that? How many demons have you seen? They don’t just roam around for you to plainly see. There is hardly any in this realm, as it is,” Shi Lang shakes his head. He really doesn’t like being called a demon.

“A cultivator? Did I just offend you?” The man bows in a way to apologise.

“Yes,” Shi Lang nods. Telling him just enough to give an answer will have to suffice.

“I’m General Shang,” the man introduces himself. “We pleaded with the prominent clans to provide some help in fighting the Wens off, but none wants to get involved in this war.”

“The prominent clans only deal with spirits and other calamities. They won’t get involved in such a mundane thing as a war,” he tells him. The General had the right idea, he just doesn’t understand the minds of cultivators.

“Are you telling me the immortals don’t care for the state of the common folk? Then they are worse than the emperor who only sits in his golden palace and gives out orders,” General Shang scoffs.

“Hush!” Shi Lang warns him. “Aren’t you afraid of being accused of treason?”

“Why do you care? Everyone in my army has heard me say that many times. I’m sure the emperor knows it as well, he just won’t take action as long as I’m useful to him,” the General says. Sarcasm flows with every word. So does disappointment with the emperor.

“Come with me. Let me treat you to a good meal,” Shi Lang steps towards the General. He has a small cottage hidden in these woods. The spell prevents anyone from seeing it, but something tells him that he can trust this man. He takes the jade dragon pendant from his sash. It’s infused with magic to allow the General to call on him. It will also let him find the cottage if he needs to.

“Why are you giving me this?” The General inquires.

“I feel like I can trust you. The pendant has a bit of my magic. If you ever need me, I can find you and come to your aid,” Shi Lang answers. He can’t say what exactly makes him trust this man. Is it the way he speaks? Or that impeccable look that is almost ethereal? But the man is definitely a human.

The cottage comes to sight. Shi Lang never minded that it’s small and kind of shabby looking. It doesn't go with his clothes at all. He knows that the aristocrats and even cultivators would call it nothing more than a poor man’s hut. It doesn’t even have a yard. But it has a bed and a roof. His outside kitchen has a fire going and a pot of stew is simmering slowly away, just as he left it a few hours ago. It should be done by now. The small table has only two seats, and even his cups are mismatched. He wonders what the General thinks about it. Looking at it from a stranger’s viewpoint, Shi Lang silently curses himself. He shouldn’t have invited the General back.

“Are you sure this is yours?” The General asks. There is no contempt in his voice. No judgement on the shabby looking cottage. A simple question with no hidden agenda.

“Yes. I don’t come here often. It’s just a place to store my fishing pole,” Shi Lang shrugs.

“I see,” the General nods. “I would never have guessed that you even know of a place like this.”

“You judged me by the way I’m dressed?” Shi Lang laughs. This human is amusing.

“And I offended you again,” the General bows.

“No. Not this time,” Shi Lang shakes his head. He ladles two bowls of stew and brings them over to the table. “I don’t have any wine here, so water will have to do.”

“Do you always feed any stranger you meet?” The General wants to know.

“No. I mostly avoid people,” he tells the truth.

“This is really good. I can’t even remember when I last had a warm meal,” the General smiles sadly. It must be hard for the army to be cut off from their supplies.

“I’ll stay here for a few days,” Shi Lang decides in the spur of the moment. “You are welcome to join me again.”

“I feel guilty for sneaking out of the camp already. I just can’t watch my men starve,” he tells him quietly.

“I can’t provide food for a whole army, I can just take your mind off of it for an hour or two,” Shi Lang sighs. He can feel the pain if he lets himself look at the man. He’s one of those humans who are just too pretty for the hard life they are forced to live.

“I can’t go back just yet,” the General says much later. They have been sitting here quietly after the meal. There was nothing to say that would make the situation any better, so Shi Lang refrained from talking. General Shang must have enjoyed the silence, or he would have said something sooner.

“Then, don’t go. It’s easy,” Shi Lang smiles again. “There is a hot spring behind the cottage. That is one of the reasons I’m here.”

“A hot spring? Hot water to bathe in? That would be heaven,” the General smiles back. He didn’t get caught in Shi Lang’s charm this time. The man can still speak.

Shi Lang built this cottage to hide the entrance to the hot spring. It’s nestled into a gorge behind the cottage. It’s private and well hidden. Impossible to see even from the air. The wooden steps he constructed to get over the rocks are worn, but sturdy. The path is only a few metres long. He has seen bigger bathrooms in his life, but none that comes with natural hot water. He helps the General out of his armour. The buckles are quite impossible to reach on his own. A lithe, but muscular body is revealed. Shi Lang can see every contour through the thin shirt. This man must turn a lot of heads when he goes out dressed casually.