Have You Learned to Behave?

Sun Wu flipped through the account book beneath the oil lamp, and the more he read, the more delighted he became.

"This scholar surnamed Chen really does have some skill. This storybook he wrote... heavens, ten taels, thirty taels, fifty taels..."

But as his delight grew, his expression gradually darkened. "Such a huge sum of silver! A ten-percent share is worth more than ten months of my wages. What gives that poor scholar Chen the right?

"I worked myself to the bone planning for this book. I put in good words for him before the proprietor, racked my brains to promote it in the Prefectural City, and yet he gets to sit back and reap the harvest. He only wrote a few words and thinks he can take away so much silver.

"That Chen is simply shameless!"

At that thought, Sun Wu slammed the account book down hard. Then he picked it back up and stuffed it into the very bottom of the bookshelf beside him.

Afterward, Sun Wu took out a blank ledger, raised his brush, and began writing in a sweeping torrent.

"Thirteenth day: one thousand copies printed, one hundred copies sold, the rest unsold."

"Twenty-first day: the bookshop in the Prefectural City suffered damp damage. All books were ruined by moisture. One thousand copies reprinted..."

"Estimated losses: three hundred and twelve taels..."

The more Sun Wu wrote, the happier he became, and the more the stifled resentment in his heart flowed away.

"A pedantic scholar like him should be grateful for three taels in writing fees. Hmph! Not making him repay three hundred taels is already the proprietor's mercy.

"I refuse to believe he would dare complain to the proprietor.

"Not only would he not dare complain, with these three taels in writing fees, he would have to obediently write me a sequel later!"

As his crisp words fell, Sun Wu chuckled beneath the candlelight.

Rain fell in sheets at midnight. From afar came what seemed to be the watchman's clapper, as though it were saying, "Beware of leaks in the roof."

Sun Wu thought disdainfully, How could his house possibly leak? Leaking roofs are things only those poor wretches in the southern district experience.

Just as he thought this, a fierce gust suddenly blew in from outside the window, carrying a spray of fine raindrops that lashed him full in the face.

Sun Wu was dumbfounded. What was going on? He remembered shutting the doors and windows tight.

He hurriedly turned to see what was wrong with the window, but before he could, the oil lamp on the desk went out with a whoosh in the wind.

The tiny study was plunged into darkness, and Sun Wu cried out, "Oh, my lamp!"

He was actually worried that rainwater had gotten into the oil lamp and would affect its use.

Sun Wu hurried over to feel for the lamp, but for some reason, his foot suddenly kicked something. His entire body pitched forward with a bang.

"Oh, my lamp oil!"

Sun Wu cried out in terror for the second time.

With a clatter, the oil lamp was knocked over by his fall.

Sun Wu's heart clenched in pain. He hurriedly scrambled to his feet, trying to save the lamp, when an icy iron pincer reached out from somewhere at an angle and clamped down on both his cheeks.

"Ah—" Sun Wu's scream was pinched off in his throat by that pincer-like thing.

The next moment, something fine and granular, like powder, was poured into his mouth.

"Mm, mm, mm..." Sun Wu had no idea what it was. He struggled and shook his head, desperately trying to spit it out.

Without warning, another iron pincer reached over and smashed heavily into his back.

No, that was no iron pincer. It was clearly an iron hammer!

The pain made Sun Wu bend forward, but his mouth was still tightly covered.

Panicked and choking, he coughed several muffled times behind the hand over his mouth, until he finally swallowed that mouthful of strange powder.

The instant it went down, a piercing pain suddenly stabbed through his head.

Sun Wu groaned in agony, clutching his head and crying out miserably several times, but it felt as if something both heavy and sharp were relentlessly stirring and battering inside his skull.

Everything before his eyes was black. He could see nothing. Outside, the rain fell thick and sticky against the window, his head hurt as though it were about to split apart, and waves of cold ran through his body.

This succession of blows had come far too suddenly, without the slightest warning.

Sun Wu wanted to call for his wife, who slept in the side room on the other side, but the cry for help stuck in his throat and came out no louder than a mosquito's hum.

Normally, he feared his wife entering his study and discovering the silver he had hidden away. He only wished she would stay as far from him as possible.

Yet now that he wanted to call for help, he hated that she was too far away to notice anything wrong here at once.

"Ah... ah... ah... wh-who is it?" he forced out in a faint voice.

"Who is harming me?"

"Help... help—"

"Ah!"

No one answered him. By Sun Wu's ears, there was only the bleak whistle of the wind and the ceaseless patter of the rain.

In that pitch-black world, the pain in his head felt like a cold, damp hand reaching through his brow into his brain and clutching his soul.

"Ah!"

Sun Wu finally broke down and shouted, "Miao Chao, is that you? Did you come to take revenge on me?"

"Let me go! I didn't mean to harm you! I didn't mean to..."

"It was you—you blocked my path to becoming head shopkeeper. I had no choice! If I didn't kill you, the proprietor would never have seen me!"

"No, I didn't kill you either! You insisted on taking the risk of going to that temple. It wasn't my fault, it wasn't my fault! Help!"

In his collapse, Sun Wu wept until tears and snot ran down his face.

Until, at one point, his bladder gave out.

Only then did a soft voice finally sound in the darkness, filled with disgust. "Ew."

Sun Wu was kicked hard, falling facedown into his own filth.

A voice spoke by his ear again. "Do you want the pain to stop? If you do, shut up first. Unless I tell you to speak, you are not allowed to make the slightest sound."

Sun Wu shuddered all over. The voice by his ear was eerie and terrifyingly cold.

After what he had just gone through, he did not dare resist in the slightest. Trembling, he could only answer, "Yes."

But the instant he spoke, the pain in his brain surged again like rivers overturning and seas churning.

How could Sun Wu possibly endure that?

He cried out twice before finally realizing that he had to clamp his mouth shut.

This time, Sun Wu took the initiative to cover his mouth tightly with both hands, afraid that even the faintest sound would bring more torment from this mysterious person who had appeared from nowhere.

Only then did the mysterious person say with satisfaction, "Good."

Sun Wu let out a breath of relief.

The next moment, he heard a faint crackle, like flames burning.

Then the overturned oil lamp on the table was righted, and its dim light flickered back to life.

With the oil lamp lit, Sun Wu, lying on the ground in trembling terror, finally regained some ability to see.

Enduring the lingering pain in his head, he cautiously raised his head and opened his eyes wide. Beside the table stood a person.

A slender figure, handsome features under the lamplight—it was someone he knew.

"Chen... Chen..." Sun Wu pointed at Chen Xu, about to cry out his name in shock and fury.

But the moment he made a sound, another wave of excruciating pain struck him.

Sun Wu shuddered violently. Only then did he truly realize that the person before him controlled his pain. If he disobeyed even slightly, utter destruction would surely descend in an instant.

Sun Wu panted, staring at Chen Xu in terror.

The young man stood beside the lamp, firelight outlining half his face while shadows rose and fell across the other half. He seemed to be smiling as he asked, "Have you learned to behave?"