Side Chapter: Xuan Shen and Deng Shi (2). A Game.

Recently when Xuan Shen would look for Deng Ah for tea. He would find himself joined by Deng Shi. But even though she was joining them. She did not often interact and so more often then not it was as if there were in two different worlds.

It tended to play out, Xuan Shen laughing and talking with Deng Ah as they drank tea. While Deng Shi sat quietly reading.

However, today it was just Xuan Shen and Deng Shi. Deng Ah was Lord Ruo after all and was called away shortly after sitting down. So, for the first time in a while, it was just them.

Having stopped at a suitable place, Deng Shi, closed her book and left. Xuan watched her go calmly. A helpless smile on his face as he decided to finish off his tea and then leave.

Before he finished, Deng Shi returned with a parcel and unwrapped its crisp golden paper. Revealing a deep red wooden box on four legs with elegant golden carvings on its side. On its surface were several grid lines.

Qi gathered at the tip of Deng Shi's fingertip and she pressed it on the board. With a light smile, Xuan Shen did the same.

The top of the board came alive. An illusionary landscape emerged on it. Mountains at the top right and lower left. A river separating the map as it rang diagonally. A variety of meadows, forests, and plains filled out the rest of the map.

The two were about to play a strategy game.

Qi gathered into Deng Shi's hand and she closed it. Xuan Shi's attention on her hand he thought for a moment and then guessed.

"Cat."

Opening her hand, the spell was completed, and a "cat" did form. It let out a cry and then leaped into the wind quickly fading away.

Winning the guess, Xuan Shen won the right to go first, to invade. Placing a finger on the box he made his move. A tiny camp filled with soldiers rose up by the lake.

Sitting opposite of Xuan Shen, Deng Shi placed her own camp in the mountains near her.

The war started at the base of the Deng mountain. The two forces battled fiercely. The Xuan quick and powerful strikes against the Deng resolute and cunning defense.

The battle razed the land around them and the blood of soldiers replaced the burnt-out grass. The Deng soldiers drew the battle from the mountain. To the center where the Xuan's soldiers found themselves facing a massive stronghold.

As the Deng soldiers prepared to butcher the Xuan from the safety of their stronghold. Xuan soldiers appeared over the horizon. Descending in waves from different directions.

Deng did not back down, and the bodies piled high within and outside the stronghold.

Though the battle at the center was the fiercest there were many other battles going on.

The Deng revived camps that the Xuan abandoned, leveraging them to attack the backs of the Xuan. Enclosed the Xuan in traps and butchering them. All while utilizing every resource that the Xuans threw away.

The Xuan assassinated the Deng's officers. Invaded Deng encampments butchering those within. And pillaged the resources of Deng.

Xuan nor Deng yielded using every resource they could. Never compromising, never conceding, they fought each battle till they were the victors or they all lied dead.

The battlefield stilled. No longer changing rapidly, the war had slowed down. The battlefields remained the same and though the fighting was fierce. No new warfronts opened. Now it all held a steady rhythm. The beating of a heart. Constant, steady.

Deng had drawn the Xuan into a beat of their design. The war would progress steadily, and the Xuan would be ground into dust. Their tyrannical rampage slowed, the Xuan could do little but curl up and die to the tune.

While the war on the board game progressed. Xuan Shen and Deng Shi were silent. Their eyes were fixed toward the box. Turn by turn they moved a single finger to the board. Other than this they were still. Their breathing deep and heavy.

Their battle had gone on longer than the game was intended to be played. Though they had started during the morning, the dazzling sunset rays were on the two.

Into the night the two played. No, words said to the other. Only the soft tapping of their finger on the board.

The amethyst moonlight and the flames of war from the board the only illumination.

Soon even that left the two as the light of dawn began to peak over the battlefield.

The Deng forces had lost their fortress, shattered burning remains were all that remained. In turn, the Xuan who had a fortress deep in the forests were now the defenders. A myriad of tricks and tactics would ensure that it was no different from the Deng fortress, in time.

Across the rest of the battlefield. The lands that were not burning or barren and filled with corpse held the Deng and Xuan forces intermingled. In fights intense enough one would wonder if the valor of mortals could match.

A drizzle, then rain. However, the two did not budge they ignored the elements and were drenched in turn. The song of rain further drowning out all things but them and the game.

The game that Deng Shi proposed as a way to test the famed Xuan Shen and pass the time. Had long transformed into something else, something much more.

The two were not playing just to win. But not to disappoint, themselves or the other. To not sully this time, this moment with errors or failures. But instead, give their all and have their all matched.

In a way, the game had become a question of, "Are you my equal?" And so, they gave their all, looking for the answer in each other.

Soon the pair slowed, in tune with the cold rain that pelted them. Their movement lethargic as water dripped from them.

Then they held their breaths. The rain stopping in sync. The match was over.

A lone, Xuan soldier stood in the center of the map. All the land around him was burning, burnt or barren from having all its resources drained. With even the lake dried up, there was nothing to tell what the land once looks like. All that remained was blood, ruins, bodies, the flame, and that lone Xuan soldier.

Xuan Shen and Deng Shi finally turned to each other. Their eyes settled firmly within the others.

Tentatively, timidly she reached out and touched Xuan Shen's hand. The finger he had been using to play rested against her own. The common action felt unique to them both. In a way that neither could describe.

Slowly, they withdrew their hands. And Deng Shi looked at her hand curiously and then looked back at him.

"Qing Ruo Xuan Shen."

Deng Shi said the name slowly, eloquently as if she was testing each word. Searching for an explanation to that unique feeling.

"Deng Shi, your voice is truly like music."

"Oh, then is everything I say a song?"

Xuan Shen laughed softly. In the light of the setting sun, Deng Shi could see why he was considered to be the most handsome man in Qing Ruo.

"After hearing you, I have no need for music."

Deng Shi smiled noticeably at the compliment and Xuan Shen was as charmed with her as she had been when he laughed.

"Ah, but you'll never get to hear my voice at your leisure."