QingYu: A Wuxia Tale (Going Through Reediting)

The Accomplice

(Dayu's POV)

The sound of angrily clashing swords surround me and my cousin as we attack each other with an intention to draw blood.

This is how we trained from the start. Uncle Shu started training us when I was only ten years old and my cousin thirteen.

"If you are holding a sword, use it to hurt your opponent. You are not holding them to look pretty. It is called a weapon for a reason. Use it as such. Remember, be wise while attacking you opponent. The weapon is not the enemy, it's the hand wielding it,"

Faster and faster, my cousin and I moved to find each other's opening. In our training, attacking is defending.

"When you attack, you force your opponent to defend himself. If your opponent is defending, he doesn't concentrate on taking the offense. That's a way of defending yourself from the enemy. Never give them a chance to attack, put them in the defensive side. Find that opening fast, kill him with one stroke and end the battle swiftly,"

I raised my hand over and over again to attack my cousin who won't back down and kept on meeting my attack with an attack of his own. We are both offensive fighter. My sword arm felt tireless and I wield it to meet my cousin's sword in the air.

Swish, clink, clank, slash...our movements grew faster and faster until I know we moved like a blur if an expectator is watching us.

I dug my right foot on the ground, jump to slash my sword downward fast. My cousin countered by going low and push my sword away with his sword then flick his wrist to twist his blade and stab my middle.

I twisted to avoid that then swirl my sword around to slash his head. My cousin bend his body to avoid the blade and slash his sword arc wide to get me. I stepped backward to avoid that, dug my foot again and jump to fly to him.

Again and again, we attacked each other. Until he found an opening to swing his sword downward to slash my torso but I twist my wrist, swish my sword upward to meet his sword in the middle with enough force to cut his blade in half and for my cousin to stepped back in three paces.

The cut blade cartwheeled in the air and buried itself in the ground on our left.

My cousin laughed, "I'm dead then?"

I grin, breathing heavily, "Yes you are."

We dropped our swords and lay together on the damp forest floor. "Stop worrying Dayu, your skill is unmatched. You are the best in handling all kinds of weapon. Even I, who trained with you from the start, you can defeat in under fifteen minutes, what are the others chances against you? Practically nothing."

"But a defensive technique..."

"So what? Even if General Wang has the ability to defend himself, it will still go down to how much you want to kill him and to your skills. We can always drug him before fighting him in combat."

I nodded, my cousin had a point there. "I just don't want to defend on drugging him. That method can still be tricky. What if he died even if we give him the smallest dosage? I don't want the General to die in poisoning. I want his blood trailing away from his body, like how my father died. But before that, I want him lucid enough to see how I will break him, like how my mother got broken,"

I look at the darkening sky. Poison, knife, sword, rope, string, needles. I know a thousand ways to kill an enemy. But I don't want General Wang to just die. I want him begging for me to kill him because he can't take the suffering anymore. Like how my broken mother begged me...