Lean on Me

Ch. 31

Xiao Ying was sitting on the bed in his shared tent with Wangji. He just wanted this war to be over. Seeing that all his parents tails were accounted for, the Wen Sect had a different motive for killing his parents...meaning keeping their fur. Xiao Ying has been helping with the frontlines now as the sects thought Xiao Ying was a great fighter. After two weeks of fighting, and it's been two weeks since his capture by Jin Guangyao and then returned, Xiao Ying was exhausted.

"Xiao Ying?" Wangji called out at he entered the tent.

He looked at Wangji, "Zhan-Ge, how are you not exhausted from all this fighting?" Xiao Ying asked, "I don't want this anymore."

"I know, but we are just about ready to head to Nightless City. Baoshan wrote saying she will arrive in two days with reinforcements," Wangji said, "until then, you can take the time to rest. You went through a big ordeal and have yet to recover from."

"None of them touched me...if that is what you are worried about," Xiao Ying said, "I broke free before they could really do anything...all I remember before that was feeling a prick in the back of my neck and I passed out. I woke up in chains. They knew what I was...taunting me about my parents being dead...showing me the tails."

Wangji sat down with Xiao Ying and pulled him to his lap, "what matters now is they cannot get to you ever again. They are gone. You did what you needed to survive. I am proud of you."

"I did something terribly wrong and stupid though. I was so clouded by anger, and I couldn't think properly. I thought I would go feral, and if I did, there was no way back for me..." Xiao Ying explained.

"You are safe now, it will be okay," Wangji said.

"You don't understand, even though my mind was clouded, I remember what I did. I killed every guard in that dungeon and set everyone free, whether they were criminals or not. They are all loose and I know I did terrible damage by doing that," Xiao Ying said feeling very guilty.

Wangji nodded as he now understood. He didn't like that his little fox felt guilty but he was proud of him for coming forward with this matter, "we will fix this. It is brave to tell about a mistake you made and it takes a lot of courage to do that. There are people who may be upset about it but we will do what we can to get those people and check them for their crimes. Jin Zixuan is the new sect leader so all we need to do is talk with him," Wangji explained, "let's talk to my brother first okay."

"Am I going to be punished?" Xiao Ying asked.

Wangji knew that Xiao Ying did it unconsciously but his guilt was punishment enough especially if all those people were real criminals.

"We will talk to my brother first, your guilt is punishment enough but if you feel like you need a bigger punishment then we can talk about it," Wangji said.

Xiao Ying nodded. Wangji and Xiao Ying freshened up and dressed into clean robes before heading out. Wangji then took Xiao Ying to Xichen's tent.

"Hello you two," Xichen greeted, but he couldn't feel that something was wrong with Xiao Ying.

"Xiongzhang, before we talk, can you place a privacy ward over the tent?" Wangji asked as he and Xiao Ying sat down.

Xichen waved his hand and placed a barrier, "what's wrong?"

"I did something bad and I need to fix it...as a sect leader, I asked for a punishment too," Xiao Ying told him and put his head down.

"What happened? Why would you be punished?" Xichen asked. Xiao Ying was quite and didn't look at either of them. So Xichen tried again more calmly, "Xiao Ying, will you look at me?" It took a moment but Xiao Ying looked up at Xichen, "what is wrong? Why would I punish you?"