Melodic Tale (BL)

Chapter 18

Chapter 18
Athena, who was sitting beside him, was as startled as her fellow servants. He walked across the room towards the door...and slipped. He fell forwards, rolling into a ball the second his shoulder hit the floor in forward tumble to minimize the damage. Luckily for Tian Lan, he didn't hurt himself in the slightest. Even though he was an experienced martial artist, such a stunt could have hurt him badly. Both emperors looked up equally as surprised as Apollo and Athena. Gui Feng's emperor recovered his wits quicker than Fu Jian's emperor as it dawned on him that was no mere chance that Tian Lan fell. He had merely created a distraction for him to stop fighting with the Fu Jian emperor.

"Sorry about that, please do continue," Tian Lan hurriedly said.
He looked totally natural when he stood back up and bowed. The Gui Feng emperor didn't miss his chance.
"And...you are?" he asked.
Tian Lan kneeled, "Long live the emperor of Gui Feng. This one's name is am Tian Lan. I am the messenger sent by of Xi Nan to sign the five year peace treaty on behalf of my emperor."
Tian Lan picked his words very carefully, and only rose when he heard "rise" said by the emperor.

Similar to his guard's expressions, both emperors momentarily froze in shell-shocked silence when they saw the beauty. Neither of them had taken a straight on look at Tian Lan while they were bickering and thus hadn't seen his face, so when they saw it, they couldn't help but be shocked. There were very few beauties amongst the three thousand women in the imperial harems that could match Tian Lan eye-catching appearance.

"You came to sign the peace treaty? What of your emperor? Only an emperor can sign a peace treaty as a sign of good will. Only a son of heaven can bear the consequences of offending the will of heaven if a peace treaty is broken," Gui Feng's emperor scoffed

"Please rest aside your worries. The emperor of Xi Nan has passed onto me his will. This servant has been given an imperial edict to sign the peace agreement. The responsibilities are this lowly servant's to bear," Tian Lan reassured.

Even if Tian Lan were deaf and blind, he would still know that such as a statement was false. If he failed, the responsibility was no only his, but his country's to bear. Many people would die if he failed, so he had to give it his all.

"If that is so, how about we test you to see if you are worthy of wielding the will of heaven," smirked Fu Jian's emperor.

Tian Lan's fingers ground into his palm. "Very well, ask as you may, this servant shall attempt to answer any question you have for me."

"I assign you that task of finding a way to calculate 'time'. Recently, Fu Jian has discovered a new way of measuring time without using the traditional jos stick, we are currently investigating the method in which this works. Jos stick are unreliable, so this new method will soon be widespread as part of Fu Jian's miraculous deeds," the Fu Jian emperor smiled.

"Time! Do not jest, such as thing cannot be done. Time cannot be seen, so it can't be calculated. Only a jos stick is able to accurately measure out time," interrupted the Gui Feng emperor.

"On my name as Xu Fei, I proclaim there is a way other than watching the rising and setting of the sun."

Tian Lan thought about it for a minute.

Time...

Wasn't he basically asking Tian Lan to make a simple clock then? Even if he couldn't make a clock from scratch since he was lacking in materials, it was simple matter to make something similar.

Tian Lan pondered for a while.

"If this task is too difficult for you, perhaps you should resign yourself as the passer of the will of heaven."

Tian Lan rolled his eyes, this arrogant emperor.

"Emperor Xu Fei, I beg your pardon for making you wait so long, I have a solution."

Xu Fei widened his eyes in surprise. Who could have guessed that this beautiful messenger had intelligence on par with his appearance?

"Very well, show us."

"It will not work here, we must go into a sunny area of any sort."

The Gui Feng emperor looked confused. What could the time have anything to do with the sun?

Xu Fei was aghast. This person had thought about the answer for only a little while and had come up with a solution that seemed similar to the answer his own country had researched for the last two hundred years. He followed Tian Lan and the Gui Feng emperor out to the imperial inner garden.

"Now then, show us, how you will measure 'time'."

"Time is continuously moving and there is no actual way to calculate it right now. It is a fourth dimension you could say, but if it cannot be calculated than it can at least be used to find the period left in a day."

Tian Lan knelt down and watched his shadow. His shadow tilted to the left and was fairly elongated. The reason behind the shadow's odd shape was because it was quite early in the morning still. Tian Lan pulled out a brush he'd bought on the way to Gui Feng and placed it into a little whole he dug in the earthy ground. Then, in correspondence to the four major directions, north south east and west, he found an approximate of north and began writing numbers from one to twelve. The Gui Feng emperor was completely confused, but Xu Fei had a formed a faint understanding of Tian Lan's actions. Tian Lan completed his miniature sundial made with a brush, dirt and numbers. He stood up and announced him accomplishment of his task.

"What is this- this time measurer?" the Gui Feng emperor asked inquisitively.

"It's called a sundial, the sun always rises in the east and sets in the west, this much even basic scholars should know, this sundial is based around that theory. There aren't many people that know this, but there are twenty four hours in a day, one hour is sixty minutes, one minute is sixty seconds, and one second is the time it takes for this brush to hit the ground." he said demonstrating. Tian Lan raised the brush into the air, held it there and whispered one, then slammed it straight into the ground.

"That is how I measure time. The numbers written on this sundial will show every hour up to twelve. When afternoon arrives, the numbers will begin again from one for twelve hours until the sun rise. At exactly mid-day, the sun is directly above the brush, so there will be no shadow. This is relative to the sun's position and the angulation of the light rays. Before and after midday, the shadow of the pen moves with the time with the previously mentioned midday. In one day there are eighty six thousand and four hundred seconds, so you see, this is just a simple method of finding the time using shadows. If there are any other ways, please do share." said Tian Lan.

Naturally Tian Lan knew there were none other in this time. Even in the distant future with all its technological advances could not produce another way of measuring time that did not first rely on the sun, so how could historical people come up with a system. Just being able to come up with a sundial would be a hefty achievement.

Xu Fei was dumb struck. This person had just used his method to calculate time and explained it a whole lot better than he did. Perhaps Xi Nan's knowledge was getting stronger than even Fu Jian, the country famous for its knowledge. Would he have to extort knowledge out of this messenger? Xu Fei finally understood why Xi Nan had sent this particular messenger to sign the treaty. He had the capabilities to do so and would no doubt succeed after seeing the previous demonstration. There was some clapping in the background as Gui Feng's emperor, highly impressed by Tian Lan's demonstration, remained awed by the swiftness of his answer for a question that had remain unanswered for eons.

At that moment, both emperors thought, "If Xi Nan has achieved this level of research, it would be best not to offend them."

Tian Lan feigned ignorance as he lightly smiled with understanding. Gui Feng's emperor didn't waste any time as he immediately laid out the peace treaty for Tian Lan. Moments later, the peace contract was signed with elegant script and bloody fingerprint. A contract of blood.