Chapter 49 - First Thunder, Second Wind

"It's your move."

Lixue stares at the battlefield before her with intense eyes. Her finger taps rhythmically against the stone tabletop as she tries to find a path towards victory. After a long moment of intense focus, the tapping stops.

"I can't see it." She slouches her head towards the table and buries it into her arms. "I give up. You win again, father."

Her father smiles as he gazes at the inevitable defeat before him. He glances over at his daughter as she tries to hide her frustration. Despite not being able to see her face, he could hear the disappointment in her voice.

"Lixue. Your move."

"What's the point?" Lixue pushes her palms against the table and lifts her head. "I lost. You win in five moves."

"Lixue." Her father repeats, this time with a firm tone. "Your move."

"Urggg! Father! If I take your Chariot, I open up my General to your Soldier and Horse after you take my Elephant! If I don't take your Chariot, I lose my Elephant. Either way, four turns after that, I lose."

Her father smiles, reaching his hand out and brushing her hair from before her eyes. After tucking the hair behind her ears, Lixue's father places his hand on her shoulder.

"Lixue, sometimes it's good to take a step back." He says as he pushes her out of her slouch and away from the battlefield. "Look again."

Lixue looks up at her father's smile, still unsure what the point is. She knows that her father sees his path to assured victory in five turns. She also knows that he won't go easy on her just because she's frustrated. Swallowing her frustration, Lixue turns her eyes down to the hopeless state of the board. As she observes the battlefield from afar, her scrunched brows begin to relax. After a short moment of evaluation, Lixue's eyes widen.

"...I lose in five." She raises her eyes to meet her father's doting smile. "...but you lose in four."

"You learn nothing if you surrender." Lixue's father reaches out again, patting her lightly on the head. "Congratulations, Lixue, on your first victory."

 ***

A resounding crack reverberates through the air, drowning out a muffled, blood-curdling scream. The sudden change in air pressure, to which Dan had reluctantly surrendered his fate, disappears as a stronger wave explodes outward in all directions. The shockwave stops Dan in mid-flight, sending him tumbling backwards, while another thunderous clap renders him momentarily deaf as it sends dirt and rubble into the sky. Dan's eyes snap open as he tumbles onto the ground. He raises his gaze, fixating on the blurred figure within the cloud of dust and debris. As the haze recedes, Dan spots a petite silhouette flanked by two fluttering ribbons.

"Dan! G-g-get up!" The silhouette calls out to him with desperation. "You can't g-give up! We need you!"

Recognizing Anning's voice through her heavy breathing, Dan watches as the air begins to clear around the small crater. Though it may be difficult for others to recognize, Dan knows that the ribbons were not originally this color. He picks himself off the ground, keeping his focus on her tiny frame. A stream of blood trickles down her trembling fist and onto her knuckles, falling through the air and into the puddle of blood beneath her feet. Seeing the lifeless body, with a hole through the chest, causes Dan to snap his attention towards the pivotal figure in this conflict. Their only hope- Sun.

The masked man struggles to regain his composure after enduring the intense recoil. He grabs his sword arm by the wrist, trying to support it as it trembles violently in response to the quivering blade. His smirking gaze has vanished entirely, replaced by widened eyes filled with disbelief. The man stares at the unconscious body before him, unable to make sense of what just happened. Despite putting all his might into the strike, all he managed to do was slice through the robe.

As the humming of the blade subsides, the man begins to doubt whether he had just imagined everything. He wonders if this is just a dream. He glances at the stream of blood flowing from the tear between his thumb and index finger, tracing its path down toward the blade's tip. The numbness from the vibration had dulled his senses temporarily, but now, as it wanes, pain courses up his arms, making him realize that this is no dream.

Dan's gaze pierces through the fading haze, trying to make sense of what he just witnessed. Despite the darkness, he manages to track the path of the blood, following it from the blade's tip upwards, past the crossguard, and onto the tear on the man's hand. He shifts his attention to the cut in Sun's robe, realizing it remains unstained by blood.

I see it… a path forwards!

With a deep breath, he clears his head. Upon releasing his breath, he calms his heart. Everything around him slows to a creeping movement as he scans the situation before him. He watches as a single tear escapes Anning's eye as she struggles to choke down the pain in her arms. Her trembling knees look to be a few breaths away from buckling.

Three breaths… I need three breaths.

Dan sweeps his left foot back, kicking up dirt as it draws an arc on the ground. Planting the foot down behind him, he uses it as a pivot point to twist his entire body. As his head whips around, he scans the situation behind him.

A drop of sweat, mixed with the blood of the man he had just slain, falls off of Wei's brow, dancing in the air as it falls onto the ground. The shivering from his surge of adrenaline passes from his hand onto Chunhua's blade.

Aside from their hair, swaying lightly in the wind, Maoyi and Xi stand motionless in front of the elm tree, still trying to recover from witnessing Wei's gruesome act.

Masked men approach them from all directions with extended palms. Their blades rest snuggly inside its sheaths, swinging back and forth as they close the distance towards their targets.

One…

With a stomp from his right foot, Dan halts the momentum of his spin as he faces back towards Anning. Registering instantly that her knees had given up, Dan wastes no time lifting the heels of his feet. With bent knees, he digs his toes deep into the dirt. A flash of lightning descends from the sky, illuminating the battlefield for a split moment. And as the crackling shockwave radiates through the air, Dan explodes forth with a calculated force. Dirt and rubble float towards the sky as the deafening thunder fills the battlefield.

Dan soars through the air, crashing through droplets of rain head first, reaching out towards Anning as she falls forwards. With only a few steps between him and Anning, Dan pulls his knees to his chest before stomping down. His heels rip through the ground as he slides before coming to a complete stop beside Anning. Catching her in one arm, Dan sweeps the other arm at the mangled body beneath them. His fingers clamp down on the sword and sheath by the body's waist, ripping it from the sash.

Two…

Lifting the sword and sheath behind him, Dan extends his gaze towards Xi and Maoyi. He pulls his arm and body back as he lifts his front foot before smashing it down. His body snaps forward from the hips. As the whiplike movement travels up his body and through his arms, arriving at his fingers, Dan releases the blade.

The blade tears through the air, soaring past Xi and Maoyi. Their hair flutters behind them as the sheath embeds itself into the elm tree with a resounding crack. Dan sweeps Anning up from behind her buckling knees before disappearing into a blur. His figure reappears in the sky for a split moment as he reaches the apex of his leap. His eyes lock onto one of the masked men approaching the defenseless Wei. Tossing Anning higher into the air, he uses the recoil to hasten his descent. With an explosive crash, Dan lands between Wei and the masked man.

Three!

Dan watches as the masked man's palm smashes forth, breaking through the rain, moving even slower than he had anticipated. His eyes shift to look past the palm, analyzing the masked man. As the palm slowly creeps towards his face, Dan clenches his fists, leaving his thumbs extended. His fists blurs as he raises one fist above the palm, pointing his thumb downwards, and the other fist below the palm, pointing his thumb upwards.

Just before the palm connects, Dan smashes his thumbs into the man's wrist. Without pause his fingers open to form two claws, spiraling up the man's forearm. Pausing for a split second at the elbow, Dan digs his claw-like fingers together before ripping away at the tendon between the joints. As he tears away the tendon, he folds his fingers again, leaving his index fingers straight, targeting the man's bicep and shoulder. Moving past the arm, Dan pulls back before jabbing forth. His fingers pierce through the air towards the man's neck and trapezius, between his neck and shoulder. In rapid succession, Dan had targeted every key muscle on the right half of the man's upper body, stimulating them to either contract or relax.

With his eyes locked on the center of the man's torso, he pulls both arms back. Dan exhales whatever remains from his single breath as his fists explode forth, jamming one finger into the space on each side of the man's upper abdominal muscles.

Upon landing the final strike, an agonizing scream sweeps across the valley. The combination of forcefully contracted and relaxed muscles causes the masked man's arm to bend and twist, rippling up towards the right side of his body and breaking every bone along the way. The man's head tilts towards his right side as his neck, trapezius, and shoulder contracts, yanking his shoulder out of its socket with an eerie pop.

The screaming ends as blood rushes up the masked man's throat. His body tries to cough in response to the blocked airway, but it can't. The final strike to the diaphragm forced it into a state of perpetual contraction. Without being able to first relax it, he can't cough. As the blood chokes the life from him, the masked man begins to foam at the mouth, drowning in his own blood as he collapses onto the ground.

Without watching the eerie scene unfold, Dan bends his knees before kicking off straight into the sky. He catches Anning in his arms, breaking her fall on the way down before landing in the same spot. As the rain and wind washes away the cloud of dust from the initial impact, Dan glances over his shoulders at Wei.

"On your feet, coward." He intentionally mocks Wei, trying to invoke a second wind out of the young Zhou prince by attacking his pride. "Chunhua told you to protect me. So why am I the one protecting you?"