Dragon Tiger Daoist leaned against the stone wall, his gaze resting on the headless ghosts still wandering in the distance.
In an unhurried voice, he recounted his family's past.
"After this ancestor was struck by lightning, he came out unharmed too. He lay unconscious on the ground for most of the day. When he woke up, lightning patterns covered his body, and from then on, he was just like his father."
"Lightning would steer clear of him."
"It was downright uncanny."
"My hometown had frequent lightning disasters, so people soon noticed what was unusual about him."
"Father and son."
"Neither feared lightning."
"The villagers started spreading rumors that the Thunder God had chosen our family, and that someone great would come from our line." Dragon Tiger Daoist shook his head gently, an indefinable emotion crossing his face.
"What they didn't know was that this wasn't a blessing at all."
"It was a curse."
Jiang Qiao frowned slightly. "A curse?"
"Yes." Dragon Tiger Daoist nodded. "From then on, people in every generation of my family would be struck by lightning."
"Some were working in the fields."
"Some were sleeping at home."
"Whatever they were doing, they were prone to getting struck, and it wasn't just one person."
"And..."
"And what?" Jiang Qiao pressed.
Dragon Tiger Daoist's voice grew heavy. "Apart from the two ancestors I just mentioned, every generation afterward lost people to lightning strikes. In my great-grandfather's generation, for example, there were three brothers."
"The eldest was struck dead."
"In my grandfather's generation, there were five brothers. Four were struck, and two died."
"In my father's generation..."
"There were six brothers. Aside from the two uncles who died young, all four of the others were struck, and three died."
"Only my father was left."
By the time he spoke that