The Rules

On the Third Battalion's training ground, Li Jinshui led Squad Jia through its fifth round of saber-slash drills for the day.

Five military sabers fell at once, their blades whooshing through the air in perfect unison.

Er Gou's saber had steadied considerably over the past half month, and even the smallest of them, Zhang Shuan'er, could finally chop his blade into the charcoal circle around the straw dummy's neck. Li Jinshui had insisted the circle be no bigger than a fist.

"Sabers away."

All five blades slid back into their scabbards with a crisp sound.

Li Jinshui looked over the young faces. Squad Jia was filled to its full strength of five, but only these four had made it back alive with him from Eagle Beak Ravine.

He hadn't accepted a single one of the new recruits assigned afterward. He'd rather drill these four old soldiers every day.

Er Gou wiped his sweat and came over. "Squad Leader, about today's jerky—"

"Eat after training."

Er Gou wilted, but didn't dare say another word.

Zhang Shuan'er swallowed and tightened his grip on his saber.

Li Jinshui ignored them. He drew his military saber and began breaking down the force behind the Army-Breaking Saber Technique in slow motion against the straw dummy.

Now that he'd perfected the technique, it had returned to simplicity in his hands. Every strike looked ordinary, and every strike landed just right. The arc of an Upward Slash would drag if it dipped an inch lower, and fall short if it rose an inch higher; a horizontal slash would float if timed a moment too early, and grow sluggish if timed a moment too late.

He polished these tiny differences again and again, like he used to pore over code in his previous life, wrestling with a unit test that refused to pass.

Back then, he'd thought that was patience.

Now he knew that true patience meant drilling the saber into your bones, burying hatred in your blood, and then waiting.

Waiting for an opportunity.

"Well, well, Squad Leader Li is practicing?"

A voice came from behind him, off to one side. It sounded friendly, but there was a chill beneath the warmth.

Li Jinshui sheathed his saber and turned.

Three men stood at the edge of the training ground.

The one in front was in his early thirties, fair-skinned, with a regulation military saber at his waist. Its guard, however, had been replaced with a fine piece of green jade. He was Squad Leader Wang De.

Two familiar faces stood behind him, one surnamed Zhao and the other Sun. Both were old hands who had been transferred to the Third Battalion just last month.

Wang De approached with a beaming smile, as though greeting an old friend. "Squad Leader Li made a name for himself in the Battle of Eagle Beak Ravine. I should've come to pay my respects long ago, but I never found the time. What a lucky coincidence today."

Li Jinshui didn't respond. He only watched Wang De's eyes.

His smile stiffened under the gaze. Wang De gave a light cough. "Here's the thing. There's an unwritten rule in our Third Battalion. For their first month, new squad leaders have to take a few patrol shifts for the old hands. It's a little welcoming gift, and a chance to get acquainted. You see, Squad Leader Zhao covered three shifts for you last month, and Squad Leader Sun covered two—"

He paused, his smile deepening. "You've been here nearly twenty days now, haven't you?"

The five men of Squad Jia stopped what they were doing. Er Gou's face flushed red, and he opened his mouth to speak.

"Keep practicing your sabers." Li Jinshui's voice was even.

Er Gou swallowed his words. The veins on the hand gripping his saber stood out, but he didn't move.

Li Jinshui turned back to Wang De.

"I've taken all my patrol shifts myself."

Wang De's smile didn't change. "We know. But that's not what the rule means. It means the newcomers have to help the old hands out, instead of always leaving them to do the work. Isn't that right?"

He pronounced the words "old hands" with pointed clarity.

Li Jinshui looked at his face, filing away both the name and the man in a corner of his mind. Several names were already stored there, each in its proper place.

"I don't cover other people's shifts."

Wang De's smile froze.

The man surnamed Zhao stepped forward. "Squad Leader Li, that's not how you should put it. We all risk our lives for the battalion. Helping each other out is only natural."

"I don't owe you any favors."

Zhao's face turned liver-red, while Sun let out a cold laugh. "Squad Leader Li, you came from the Death Squad Camp. Sure are tough. But toughness belongs on the city wall. Get tough with your own battalion, and you might throw your back out."

Wang De raised a hand to stop the two men. Most of his smile faded, and a cold glint showed in his eyes.

"Squad Leader Li," he said, no longer smiling. "I'll ask one more time. Are you going to follow this rule or not?"

Li Jinshui didn't answer.

He simply watched Wang De, his gaze as still as a winter lake, with something slow and heavy churning beneath the surface.

Wang De felt inexplicably uneasy under that stare. Then embarrassment and anger surged up in him.

He'd been in the Third Battalion for four years. His Body Forging was at the peak of the fifth layer. He might not be a top fighter, but he'd never had a newcomer humiliate him like this.

He stepped forward and lowered his voice.

"Li Jinshui, don't mistake my courtesy for weakness. Blades and swords don't have eyes on the battlefield. You're a new recruit. One day, you might charge too far and get trapped in the enemy ranks, with no way out. It happens."

His voice was soft as fluff, his words venomous as snake spit. "And even if you don't die in enemy territory, one of your own might mistake you for someone else and stab you in the back. Then you'd be dead with no one to answer for it. I've seen that kind of thing plenty of times."

Er Gou sprang to his feet, his military saber half out of its scabbard.

Li Jinshui didn't turn around.

"Sabers away."

Er Gou's teeth ground together, but he slid the blade back into its scabbard.

Li Jinshui looked at Wang De.

He watched him for a long time, until the smugness on Wang De's face slowly gave way to unease, until Zhao and Sun began edging backward without realizing it.

Then he spoke, his voice faint.

"Understood."

Wang De froze for a moment, then smiled as though he'd expected this all along. "That's more like it. If you'd done that from the start, Squad Leader Li—"

"I'll take my own patrol shifts," Li Jinshui cut in. "I won't cover anyone else's."

He turned away without another glance at those three stiff faces.

"Squad Jia, formation. We're heading out on patrol."

"Yes, sir!"

Five military sabers slid into their scabbards in perfect unison. Their footsteps fell in a steady rhythm as they followed Li Jinshui toward the camp gates.

Wang De stood where he was, his face flushing red, then paling. Zhao came over and muttered, "Brother Wang, that kid—"

"Let's go." Wang De stared at Li Jinshui's retreating figure, his gaze as dark as the sky before a storm. "There's plenty of time."

The sun sank behind the ridgeline west of North-Rejecting City, stretching the shadow of its walls long and flat.

Eagle Beak Ravine.

Li Jinshui led his squad across the familiar stony riverbank. Er Gou opened his mouth several times, then held back, until his face turned red.

"What do you want to ask?"

Er Gou choked on his words, then ventured carefully, "Squad Leader, Wang De, that bastard, talked to you like that, and you... you just put up with it?"

Li Jinshui didn't answer.

He bent down, picked up a stone from beside the stream, and weighed it in his hand. The stones in Eagle Beak Ravine were all like this, smoothed and rounded by hundreds and thousands of years of running water, their sharp edges worn away.

He handed the stone to Er Gou.

"Hit me with it."

Er Gou stared at him. "What?"

"Hit me."

Er Gou gritted his teeth, picked up the stone, and lightly tapped Li Jinshui on the back.

Li Jinshui didn't move.

"Use all your strength."

Er Gou's face flushed. He stepped back two paces, swung his arm around, and hurled the stone.

"Thump!"

The stone hit the back protected by the sixth layer of Iron Shirt, bounced off, and rolled into the stream.

Li Jinshui looked back at him.

Er Gou suddenly understood something, though not quite. All he knew was that a chill ran down his spine.

Li Jinshui looked away and continued walking.

He remembered a fragment from the original owner's memories: his cousin, Li Jinbao, had once smiled just like that as he patted his shoulder and said, "Little brother, your big brother will look after you from now on."

Then he'd stolen ten taels of silver from him and sold him to the Death Squad Camp.

Some people were just like that. When they smiled, you never knew when they'd offer you the knife; by the time they stopped smiling, the knife was already in your back.

He'd learned his lesson.

From now on, he wouldn't let anyone see when he offered his knife, either.

Patrol complete. No abnormalities in Squad Jia.

By the time they returned to camp, night had fallen. Li Jinshui sat alone in the empty space behind the barracks, taking apart and wiping down his military saber again and again.

Under the moonlight, the edge gleamed coldly.

He wiped it slowly and carefully, leaving no inch untouched.

The panel glowed faintly in the corner of his vision:

[Cultivation: Iron Shirt (Layer 6, 5/30), Army-Breaking Saber Technique (Perfected)]

[Points: 0]

He was still a long way from earning enough points.

But he had plenty of patience.

He was sure that man surnamed Wang would come after him again. On the battlefield, there were plenty of chances for "blades and swords to have no eyes." Wang De was a clever man, and clever men always waited for the safest moment to strike.

He was waiting for that moment, too.

On the panel, the words Army-Breaking Saber Technique (Perfected) glowed quietly.

He wanted to know whether the flesh and skin of Wang De, at the peak of the fifth layer of Body Forging, could withstand a full-force Upward Slash from a perfected saber technique.