Love or Law

An Arrow in a Post

Hello everyone! This is my very first fanfiction ever! Some of you may recognize it from Fanfiction.net. Not to worry, I will still be updating there as well. My hope is to completely finish this fanfic by September 30th to enter it in the Watty's. Yay! However, I will be using WattPad as a chance to really fine tune this story. I've combined shorter chapters, edited content, fixed typos and research errors etc. etc. etc. Basically I have taken my original content and taken it up a notch. Hope you enjoy the new and improved chapter one of this story. Just a reminder, I do not own Mulan or any of the characters; just my own silly ideas. Thank you everyone for your continued support!

Li Shang ran a hand over his face, exhausted. It had been another long day. Shang had decided to try and train the men using staffs. Ping had apparently recognized the weapon and had either gotten a little over exuberant or had decided to show off his nonexistent skill. Somehow, he single-handedly managed to knock every single man down to the ground, even having the gall to whack his Captain. Shang had momentarily had the breath knocked out of him before he was able to seize the staff from Ping. He had just come back from assigning Ping his disciplinary action. He was to sand down all the staffs and rid them of any dents and marks they had acquired during the day's training.

Looking back, Shang remembered the very first day of training; if you could call it training. His men had gotten into a brawl before he had even gotten a chance to meet them. Well, he had at least gotten to know Ping. That boy's first impression had not been a pretty one to his Captain. Smaller in build than any other man there, they had all pointed at Ping and blamed him for starting the brawl. In order to prove himself Ping had put on a very false bravado of manliness, even trying to spit vulgarly. It had taken all of Shang's iron self-control not to burst out laughing at the ridiculous show. Instead he had ordered that their first day of training be spent picking up every single grain of rice that had been spilt in their petty fight.

Shang had sat outside his tent, carefully sharpening his sword to a razor edge, and watched as the men scrambled about on their hands and knees with baskets, searching the dirt and grass for rice. He had noted those men who acted bitterly and those who took it in stride. He had kept a very close eye on Ping and his reactions.

Ping had humbly accepted the punishment and had worked twice as fast with his small, nimble fingers but the other men had taken their revenge in small ways. They would trip the boy as he stood to run his basket to where the rice was all being gathered. If he came too close to one of the men he would get an elbow in the ribs or a cuff over the head. One gangly, young man named Ling had a nasty habit of subtly tipping Ping's basket of rice the moment the boy turned his back so the grains would spill back onto the ground and give Ping more work.

Shang had decided that he would not put up with that sort of bullying in his camp and he hadn't. He smiled to remember the almost impossible task he had come up with for the second day. To reach an arrow at the top of a 40 foot post carrying two weights. Shang rolled over in his tent, chuckling as he remembered the many failed attempts on that day and the ensuing annoyance that they had all felt, making them comrades against a common enemy. An arrow in a post.

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A month later found the Captain sitting on a hilltop near camp. He eyed the silhouette of the arrow in the post with distaste. It seemed to represent all the progress that he had made with his men, which was none. Shang didn't know what to think. He had done his absolute best with these men, gone through all the steps that his father had gone through with his training, but they weren't responding favorably. Chien-Po still couldn't swim, Yao still could not make it through the flaming arrows, Ling was still at the extreme basics of martial arts and the list just kept going. It seemed that all of the men had at least one thing that they failed miserably at and were barely above mediocre with everything else Shang tried to teach them.