Berserk

 "Sister Meng Yue!" a lackey ran to Meng Yue who was cultivating under a tree in the front courtyard of the hatchery, "you can't believe what they've done now!!"

 Meng Yue opened her eyes. They were misty. She turned slowly towards the girl.

 "What?"

 "They-- they've taken all the foodstuffs in the store!! We have nothing to eat now! What do we do?!"

 "What?!" Meng Yue jumped up at once, "what did you say?!"

 "They've taken all the foodstuffs!" The girl replied angrily, "A lot of girls are threatening to join them now! And the girls are also asking what you'll do for Sister Chu Gumei. She needs medicine for her leg!"

 Meng Yue did not reply to the last statement. She stormed towards the main house immediately.

 "Su! Han! Lin!" She shouted as she involuntarily released her aura. A couple of the girls in the room scampered back in alarm. A hot mass of air was billowing around Meng Yue. She scanned the room impatiently and finally noticed Su Hanlin, who was seated on her bed. She strode towards her at once.

 "What is the meaning of what you did?! Why have you taken all the food in the kitchen?!" Meng Yue screamed. Su Hanlin looked quite unbothered on the surface.

 "Because I'm now in charge," she replied tonelessly.

 "Since when did I ever remove foodstuffs from the kitchen into my personal spatial space when I was Big Sister?!" Meng Yue demanded.

 "You're still our Big Sister, Sister Meng Yue!" Several girls rallied around her at once, although they weren't able to come close to her because of her billowing aura.

 "You never decided to," Su Hanlin replied Meng Yue's question, "and, by the way, not one grain of rice or salt or vegetable is in my spatial space,"

 "Then where is it?" A Meng Yue supporter, Gu Wenwen, shouted. Her status was high among the girls because she was the best friend of Yue Li, the girl they said was now Senior Red Monkey's disciple!

 Su Hanlin spread her hands and indicated her girls. Meng Yue ground her teeth and clenched her fists.

 "So," she poke through clenched teeth, "you want us to starve?"

 "Nope," Su Hanlin smiled, "kneel and accept me as your Big Sister and your portion of foodstuffs will be allocated to you,"

 "Sure," said her own girls.

 "Yeah, just go ahead and kneel,"

 "Yum, this food is delicious; you wouldn't like to starve, guys,"

 "Hurry!"

 "You--! Go to hell, Su Hanlin!" Unaware of what she herself was doing, Meng Yue used her cultivation prowess to drag down Si Hanlin from where she was seated, and slammed her head violently against the wall. Su Hanlin's girls screamed and ran to her aid, but some of them; Gu Yuwei, Ye Haobei, Feng Chusan and Li Beiyao, charged at Meng Yue instead. The scene turned bloody almost immediately, for Meng Yue's girls joined the free for all fight against Su Hanlin and her girls almost immediately. Blows flew just as cultivation battle auras zapped and sparkled and broke over the room. Screams echoed in several angles. It was like a full blown war. No one seemed to be stopping or retreating, and even though Su Hanlin's girls were in the minority, in terms of cultivation prowess, (most of the girls that could cultivate were on Meng Yue's side) they fought with all of their might against their enemies. 

 "Ahhh!"

 "My head!"

 "My stomach!"

 "Ahhhhhhh!"

 It was not until the assailants also felt the heat of the battle that things seemed to be slowly coming to a halt. Most of the girls were already seriously injured. Feng Chusan, who was still supposed to be recuperating, sported a swollen eye and a badly cut lip by the time she managed to stumble out of the fracas into Han Yuefeng's arms, whom she had pushed out of harm's way and protected at her back. Gu Yuwei, nearby, was engaged in a headlock with Gu Wenwen. Ye Haobei sat on the head of the tale bearing girl, almost suffocating her with her enormous weight. Li Beiyao, Su Hanlin, and another girl were dueling Meng Yue, whose powers seemed to have gone berserk, blasting out often without her control. Her hair, which had now reached her shoulders, had gone wild, and her eyes had turned a strange shade of red.

 "What do we do?!" Han Yuefeng cradled the bleeding Feng Chusan and shouted over the battle din, "Chusan, what do we do? Help! I wish a tutor would just come! Help!" Truly frightened, Han Yuefeng cried out the last word with conviction that a tutor would hear her and come running. There had to be a way to call for help; what if the hatchery had gone up in flames? She dearly wished she had the power to summon people just by calling their names, just like Senior Red Monkey had demonstrated that day she visited the hatchery.

 "Help!" Han Yuefeng stumbled outside just as Feng Chusan bolted out of her arms to go help Gu Yuwei, who had received a hard blow to the head from her opponent. Han Yuefeng ran to the fence with restrictive matrices placed on it that prevented the hatchlings from leaving. But Su Hanlin had left. Han Yuefeng vaulted over the fence and immediately found herself in another place. She didn't stop to think of where she was and instead, at the sight of a silhouette further ahead, ran up crying at the top of her voice.

 "Help! Help! In the hatcheries! They're fighting! Someone's going to die!"

 The person she was chasing stopped and turned around abruptly, clearly startled. Han Yuefeng didn't know the person and when she had run up to her dissolved into tears as she threw herself on her.

 "Please help! Please; my friends! They're in trouble! Quick, please!"

 "Calm down, will you!" The woman, first shocked at the appearance of an hatchling in her courtyard, then at the hatchling crying into her arms like she was her mother, shouted.

 "I can't calm down!" Han Yuefeng raised her head and sobbed, "one of those fighting seems to have gone crazy! Her eyes are red and she can't control her powers anymore!"

 "What?!" The woman exclaimed, clearly shocked, "is that true? Berserk powers? Is there really someone with berserk powers in the hatchery?!" She shook Han Yuefeng urgently.

 "Yes! Quick; let's go save my friends!!"

 "Luo Bai!" The woman called, and the man called Luo Bai appeared beside her immediately.

 "Senior Master," he went down on one knee. Han Yuefeng jumped back in alarm as she now took a good look at the woman whom she had soaked through with her tears and snot. Surely---!!!

 "Summon Nalan Yu back from the Jinhu Tower with the Return Tally at once!" She ordered, and grabbed Han Yuefeng's hand as she hurriedly drew a teleportation matric to the hatcheries in the air.

 They landed in the courtyard almost immediately. The noise coming from the main house convinced Xi Yun that something was really going on. She hurried in, Han Yuefeng in her wake. Xi Yun pushed the door open and a scorching hot breeze was the first thing that blew onto her face. She raised her arm to cover her face as she raised her head to look at the girl now suspended four feet in the air, who had repelled back all her opponents and from whom hot fumes and licking flames issues at odd intervals. Meng Yue's eyes were completely scarlet, and her hair billowed around her head. Xi Yun reacted immediately, drawing a complex restraining matrix the like of which she had used on Charming Leopard. The winding silver light emanating from the matrix traveled through the air to create a formation around the suspended Meng Yue, who swung around, enraged, and launched an attack at her assailant. Xi Yun repelled the attack with a shield, and increased the speed at which the restrictive matrix converged upon Meng Yue. Realising she couldn't fight the woman, Meng Yue began to hack at the curling silver light ropes of the restrictive matrix with a transparent sword coagulated from her cultivation essence. Xi Yun, however, did not let her achieve this. With her other hand she launched another matrix that numbed Meng Yue and knocked her unconscious. The girl went limp and started falling towards the floor. The restrictive matrix took shape and caged her in, and when she fell to the ground with a loud thud she wasn't physically hurt.

 Xi Yun strode forward and examined her. Meng Yue's eyes, wide open, purely scarlet. Xi Yun raised her head and glanced at the others in the room, injured, bleeding, unconscious. 

 "What in the name of the Grand Chief happened here?!" She couldn't help but exclaim. Nothing, nothing like this had ever happened in the hatcheries since the Grand Chief founded the Si Lak Mercenaries!! 

 None of the girls in the room was in any condition to talk; even Su Hanlin, who had been the recipient of many if Meng Yue's billowing heat attacks, was in a bad state. Therefore, Han Yuefeng timidly approached the Senior.

 "That-- um--"

 "Hatchery instructors!" Xi Yun ignored her and shouted instead. Han Yuefeng jumped back in alarm as all of the instructors of the hatchery started teleporting. The cultivation instructor, the etiquette and history instructor, the horsemanship and archery instructor, the sword and weapon instructor, some instructors Han Yuefeng had never seen, and, ahh, Ning Fulan.

 "Greetings to Senior!" All the instructors chorused loudly, even as, with almost popping eyes, surveyed the state of the hatchery.

 "I need some explanations!" Xi Yun shouted. They all flinched. Ning Fulan bit her lip, then went on one knee with a thud.

 "I'll take responsibility, Senior! This is my fault!"

 Xi Yun raised her eyebrows, surprised. 

 "Speak on!" She barked at Ning Fulan, who nodded and continued.

 "Ever since Senior Red Monkey selected one of the girls as her disciple, this one," she pointed at the immobilised Meng Yue, "the hatchlings Big Sister, has become dispirited and morose. The girls complained that she was not doing her duties so I have this one," she pointed at Su Hanlin, "who seemed capable, my approval to become the new Big Sister. However, a fight must have broken out between those still supportive to this one," she pointed at Meng Yue, "and those that accepted the new Big Sister,"

 Xi Yun glanced at Su Hanlin and waved a hand in her direction. Immediately, colour returned to Su Hanlin's pale cheeks, and some of her external injuries even disappeared! She blinked, and then pushed herself up, even though her legs were shaking. She glanced nervously at Xi Yun.

 "Gre-- greetings-- to Senior,"

 Xi Yun crossed her arms over her chest as she examined her. Su Hanlin crept away until she stood against a bed frame. However, she maintained eye contact with the Senior.

 "Who brought you into the Mercenaries," Xi Yun opened her mouth and asked at last. Su Hanlin paled slightly.

 "I-- I don't know their name-- "

 "Describe the person," Xi Yun snapped. Su Hanlin gulped. She wrung her hand together.

 "That-- the person wore purple and black; and -- and a yellow mask,"

 "What type of mask?" Xi Yun pressed.

 "That--" Su Hanlin lowered her head, "a beaver mask,"

 "Yellow beaver," Xi Yun frowned slightly, thinking, "Ahh," she finally seemed to have remembered something, "Crane Kill? Poison Wind?" She shook her head as she muttered to herself, "can't be," she looked at Su Hanlin again.

 "Would you like to be my disciple?" Xi Yun asked. Su Hanlin raised her head in shock. Again?

 "I'd -- I'd like to-- but--" she had wanted to say yes but she suddenly remembered ghost man/handsome man, "I -- I've been chosen by someone," she murmured.

 Xi Yun surprised yet again.

 "If you've been chosen, why are you still in the hatchery?"

 "The person said he'd come to pick me later," Su Hanlin blushed in spite of herself.

 "Who is that? Do you know their name this time?" Xi Yun asked.

 "Yes," Su Hanlin nodded, "Guardian Yi Hei,"

 "Yi Hei," Xi Yun called out without preamble. The air distorted as Yi Hei appeared, looking grumpy. He held an half eaten apple in his hand, and the some of its seeds had stuck to his robe. His hair, though held up by a gold headpiece, was rough and untidy.

 "Hello," Yi Hei waved at Xi Yun casually. Everyone gasped. He glanced around unconcernedly, "what? Do you all expect me to kowtow to her?" He laughed, picking one of the seeds stuck to his robe and flicking it towards the Senior, "what, Little Yun, you want me to kneel and greet you?"

 Xi Yun's face was unsightly, but she di d not respond. Instead she asked.

 "Is it true you chose this girl as your disciple?" And pointed at Su Hanlin. Yi Hei took a bite of his apple and looked over at where Xi Yun was pointing.

 "Oh, why, yes I did!" He smiled his charming disarming smile, but all Su Hanlin could see underneath was scary ghost man. Xi Yun frowned.

 "What, you want to haggle over a disciple with me?" Yi Hei drawled, "is she that good? Oh," he turned his head and surveyed the carnage done to the room, "did she do this? Ah," he sighed and crunched the rest of the apple in his mouth, "see, it's always you women. Back at the male hatcheries, ruckus like these don't happen. Everyone is chained to the wall. Tell me," he stroked his chin, "no, I can guess what started the fight." He laughed, "a piece of clothing. No, a fancy jewellery. No, no, a handsome man," he patted his own face vainly.

 "Get out," Xi Yun said through gritted teeth.

 "What, you called me here in the first place," Yi Hei yawned lazily, "I'm not leaving again."

 Xi Yun turned around.

 "I guess I'll be having you, then," she pointed at Han Yuefeng, and walked over to her, putting her arm over her shoulder, "clean up the mess," she said to the instructors, and strode out.

 "Chusan!" Han Yuefeng with teary eyes ran to her bunkmate and friend, "I have to go-- I'll miss you!"

 "I'll miss you too," Feng Chusan grumbled. This was the first real friend she had ever had in her life! Tears came to her other eye that was not swollen.

 "I'll make sure you join me soon," Han Yuefeng grabbed her hands and gripped them tightly in hers, "goodbye!" She then raced out of the hatchery after her new master.