Come Back to Gusu

5. One jar. No more.

A Lan junior entered the house, quietly, as they all did, with his lunch the following day. "Wei Gonzi? May I ask a question?"

Wei WuXian was lying on his bed, feet propped up against the wall, head hanging down the side of the bed. "Of course."

"Grandmaster Lan said you're a decent archer," the disciple spoke quickly.

"First: decent archer? What an insult! Second: what's your name? Third: what does your grandmaster want from me?"

"Lan DeLi." The disciple bowed properly. "Grandmaster Lan suggested you might be willing to assist the sect and teach archery."

"He did?" Wei WuXian swung his legs down and body around so he could look at the disciple right side up. "And what do you think of that suggestion, Lan DeLi?"

The disciple placed the lunch tray on the dining table. "I would very much like to have an archery teacher, Wei Gongzi. Our previous teacher did not survive the war."

"If I'm going to be your teacher..." Wei WuXian did his best to look stern. "You will call me Laoshi instead of Gongzi."

"Yes, Wei Laoshi!" The junior uncharacteristically looked so happy, a broad smile lighting up his face.

Wei WuXian ate his food quickly, and casually strolled to the gate. No guards. Is it really that easy? Am I really going to be allowed to simply leave this place? He snickered to himself. Is Grandmaster Lan so lacking in instructors that he'd allow me to influence his baby disciples? Or is he upset that I've been just sitting here for months doing nothing? He stepped through the gate. No alarms. I don't feel like I set off any wards? Can I still feel them without a Core? He mostly remembered the way to the archery butts... but from the guest disciples housing, not from here. Nor did he know how to get to the guest houses! The path ended at his house, though, so following it in the only direction it led seemed like the best option.

He didn't quite blend in with the rest of the men walking around. His robes were white, as were everyone else's. His inner roes, though, were black, which was not a color seen on any GusuLan disciple. In addition, they wore their white ribbons tightly around their foreheads and their hair tied in varying degrees of elaborate guans, while he simply had his hair pulled up into a ponytail held by a white ribbon. A helpful disciple gave him directions to the archery grounds, which were far easier to get to via the disciple housing than the guest housing.

Teaching little ones.... And some not so little ones.... He'd loved this part of being YunmengJiang's head disciple. He was a good teacher, if absurdly unconventional for GusuLan. There were elders who heard the shrieks of laughter coming from the mouths of the littlest ones and frowned. They'd see the older children running around chaotically in between archery stations and want to interrupt. The oldest junior disciples could be found nowhere near the archery butts, instead they'd be found learning how to make and fly kites near waterfalls.

"Did you want me to teach them or not?" Wei WuXian demanded when he was hauled before Lan QiRen and lectured at for over a sichen.

"I want you to teach them. Properly," the elder insisted.

"Properly!" Wei WuXian scoffed. "What part of my teaching is not proper? Do your archers merely stand in place when fighting a battle? Because Jiang archers shoot on the run. Or on horseback. But you don't have space to practice shooting from a running horse here."

Lan QiRen snorted. "Proper is proper. Flying kites is not archery."

"That's why your lot did so poorly in the Qishan competition last time," Wei WuXian snorted right back. "Kites move. Like real people. It takes an immense amount of skill to be able to feel the wind and predict where the kite will be, and then hit the kite. As the kite flies further out, the stronger the archer has to be to reach the target. YunmengJiang can boast of having the best archers because we train for real battles, not to stand in one place and hope the enemy doesn't move once the battle begins." He deliberately left off the benefit of being able to predict where an animal would head, as hunting for food was forbidden.