I'm really not the Saviour! (我唔係救主囖!) [danmei/BL xuanhuan]

29 - End of an arc

A/N: Apologies to anyone who had been expecting a chapter release on Friday. I'm moving house. Again. What a fantastic time of year to do it.

With that said, I'm about to take a two week break from posting. I'm really not the Saviour! will be back on 12 January. In the meantime, feel free to check out the other Tales of the Jade Road. In them, you'll find stories from a later time in the same literary universe, and perhaps find out the fate of some of the characters in this story...

***

Gaam Juk Jing woke before the sun rose the next day, still in his clothes, with Gou Zing curled up to him. He gently extracted himself from Gou Zing's embrace, tucking the other man back into the covers.

Gou Zing murmured unintelligibly and burrowed further through the covers, as if trying to find the other human that had been there a moment ago. Gaam Juk Jing observed this behaviour for a minute or so. When at last, Gou Zing seemed on the point of waking up, Gaam Juk Jing brushed the back of his hand across his boyfriend's cheek, and dropped a light kiss on the corner of his eyebrow.

Gou Zing quietened, a little smile curling his lips, but his breathing remained slow and even.

With a departing look, Gaam Juk Jing slipped from the room.

After wandering a little, he found himself standing on an outdoor balcony, looking out across the misty Ming Jyut pre-dawn. Where the buildings in Juk-hoi had been made of grey timber slabs and brick, two storeys high at most, with only the few government structures three storeys tall, and the buildings at Mount Faa were single storey, made of polished, carved and richly brown wood panels, the spires and towers of Ming Jyut were made of pale stone and dark wood, disappearing into the misty air, their invisible summits each indicated by a glowing light.

Staring into this aerial sea of fog, glowing white lights floating amongst it, Gaam Juk Jing frowned, very slightly.

"What are you thinking so hard about, Little Gaam?" The Grandmaster appeared on the balcony beside him, her gaze drawn by the floating lights too. She gestured with her pipe. "They're luminescent pearls. One of my daughters, the Empress-Under-the-Sea, developed an industry of growing them. Her people trade them to those on land. Pretty, right?"

"Yes."

"And useful?"

"Very."

"What's wrong, Little Gaam? Talk."

Gaam Juk Jing's silvery eyes were full of the mists around him.

"Little Gou?"

"Yes."

"Are you worried about him?"

"Yes." Gaam Juk Jing's eyes dropped. "Too gentle."

"Are you concerned I will still push him to be a warrior, despite understanding his temperament?"

"No. He... himself..."

The Grandmaster nodded gently. "Little Gou grew up in a warrior family. When I took him as my disciple, the expectation was that I would teach him the martial arts of the Fool's Way of the Mountain. And I did, he needs to know how to defend and protect, but every Way has different faces. The creative arts of the Clear Sight School, for example, focus on realism and critique. The diplomatic arts of Gales of Battle teach a hot and cold method of negotiation, constantly changing tack to unbalance an opponent. The healing arts of Fool's Way of the Mountain centre around the bodily experience, physical therapy, the need for a patient to be calm and centred for their well-being."

Something moved in the fog, just beyond the distant, hazy Hak Dzau. An enormous shape, bronze scales flashing and subsiding into the mist.

"That's not the only thing, is it?"