Everyone had their attention on both the boy and his mother, the soldiers were still on the ground each trembling, some of them had even fainted, their bodies unconscious on the ground.
"Ma, what are you doing here," Zhangsun Shan says aloud, trying to keep a neutral expression.
"The neighbor came again to our place but this time, he was stuck with his wife in an area I'd rather not speak of," his mother said, tears were still falling from his eyes, she was frustrated.
"Ma, you can't blame me" Zhangsun Shan began
"I needed a way to test my adhesive to see if it would work, besides, I heard his wife complaining to her friends that she wanted her husband to be closer to her so I did her a favor, I glued both their genitals, now, they will never be far apart from each other again, I think I should be commended on what I have done."
"Have you feel no shame, you are just like your father, always acting on your own, never caring how others think, putting yourself first."
"Why did you have to bring him up," Zhangsun Shan asks.
As he spoke to his mother, people were trying to help the soldiers and the captain up, since the soldiers still felt weak and some of them even unconscious, they couldn't stand properly and some of the people had to carry them on their shoulders.
The boys who were originally there for the ritual had recuperated even from Rui Hongcha's sword shockwaves demonstration a few minutes earlier.
"Why wouldn't I" Mrs. Shan cries aloud
"All you two know how to do is cause problems just to satisfy your selfish interests."
"The fact that it's my interests means it can't be subjected under selfishness," Zhangsun Shan tells her sharply.
Zhangsun Shan was an unusual kid, at age 10, he had an unnatural deep and booming voice, combined with his demonic wits, any of his enemies were unlucky.
"You and your arrogant talk, you are just ten years old for the gods' sake, how can you be so delusional?"
Gritting his teeth, Zhangsun Shan looked over at his mother who was still crying, she was fed up with all that was going on.
True, he was a terror to the village, he was feared even more than the monsters which lurked around the village.
No one knew how the village came to have monsters around as the other sects in the entire dynasty were void of monsters, due to what was happening, People from other towns and cities didn't visit the village, as a result, the village had to do whatever they could to survive without getting foreign trade or aid from others; there were several jobs such as blacksmithing, mining, and hunting. The blacksmiths were the second most respected amongst the people of the village as they were responsible for making the weapons which the warriors would use to fight, it was from the spoils of hunting that food, minerals, and even metal was gathered as the forest which surrounded the village lurked with monsters, whenever warriors went hunting, miners would accompany them in safeguarded areas to mine minerals and other various underground resources.
The reason why the warriors were also respected was that most of them were hunters as they protected the village severally from the monsters, even the emperor of the entire dynasty had ignored the problems of this village despite the many complaints and pleas that had been sent to him, he felt the sect was negligible as the monsters didn't seem to trouble other places causing people who lived away from the sect to just deem the village as cursed.
"Even though you carried me for nine months, it doesn't give you any right to disrespect one such as dignified as I am."
His mother wiped the tears off her face as she stood to her full height, putting her hands on her face
"You are a handful but yet you are my child, despite all the problems you cause..." For the first time, she smiled as she looked at him tenderly, joy in her eyes
"It's really funny and almost unbelievable that a ten-year-old would be such a terror but here you are, you have always been there to comfort me when I was down, several times when I was sick, you brought in doctors and got expensive medicine for me, you have done so much, usually, a child is reliant on his parent but you have always been like a parent to me, I am sure your dead father would be proud of you, though you are a problem child you are my problem child, I love you."
Zhangsun Shan looked over at his mom, internally, he felt overjoyed for hearing all these sweet words from his Mom but he didn't want to let it show, he looked behind, the men and women still looked at him, secretly, all of them hated him and harbored desires to kill him for his past actions so if he showed now that he cared about his mom, they could use this later on in the nearest future to get to him but if they see he also didn't care about her, they wouldn't bother with trying to kidnap her or using her to manipulate him.
Zhangsun Shan after thinking for a while let out a haughty smile as he looked over at his mother, he yawned loudly as he put his right arm to his mouth
"Were you saying something, I lost you at the part when you were at blah blah blah."
The mother's face was immediately downcast but trying her best to regain her composure, she smiles at him, that smile was the last thing Zhangsun Shan saw on his mother's face as immediately, a beast about the size of an average elephant with the face of a lion and two tusks sticking out of the sides of his cheeks, it had the body of a leopard; the bizarre-looking beast leaped at his mom as he gobbled her head off her body, the body falls backward blood spilling out of the neck.
He lands directly behind Zhangsun Shan as it begins to devour on the head munching and eating it merrily.
Zhangsun Shan couldn't move, for the first time since he could remember, he was terrified, this had never happened to him before, he had thought his mom would be together forever with him, he had no friends, no family as his Mom had no one, she was just an outcast, he wanted to care for her only till she grew old, that was why he was such a truant so he could show everyone his mom wasn't to be fucked with unless they wanted to be destroyed by the terrible problem child, he had deliberately defeated the strongest warrior in the entire dynasty who was rumored to be a fallen god as his skill and ability surpassed that of every human but yet the only person he had ever cared about was dead.
"Ma, I loved you so much" Zhangsun Shan wailed but his face was still blank
"Why did you have to go, I had so much to tell you, so many places I wanted to take you to, you always spoke about entering the palace, I was already making arrangements yet why did all this have to happen" he cried internally.
"AHHHHH AHHHHHH AHHHHHH" came shouts of the people present as they each ran away, they were terrified of the beast which had appeared.
The soldiers were still wobbly and not in full control of their bodies, even the strongest warrior in all of the dynasty still felt weak so they were useless against the beast which had just appeared.
Zhangsun Shan frowns as he looked over at the monster which was still eating his mother's head, the head had finished as it consumed all of its bones, the monster still feeling hungry moved over to the body and continued to devour it hungrily, Zhangsun Shan kept looking at it, he was fuming heavily, he was going to decimate this beast.
Zhangsun Shan looked over at the monster, it was still busy with his mom's body.
"Considering the amount of time I used to space out and the one I used to look at him, it took him approximately 21.1 seconds to gobble ma's head, the head is roughly one-eighth of the entire human body meaning it will take 7 times 21.1 seconds which is equal to 147.7 seconds, I have wasted about 7 seconds thinking meaning I have about 140 seconds to act before it goes for the next person in the area which is me" Zhangsun Shan ends as he looks over at the area, he spots a katana with a black hilt, it was about three feet long and Rui Hongcha's giant sword wasn't too far away.
"I bet with that sword, I can finish off the monster in one quick swoop," Zhangsun Shan thinks as he runs over to the sword, the monster stops eating the body as he looks over at him running, the monster leaps towards him.
"What's happening, when the people were terrified earlier on, it hadn't gone after them but yet when I am running now, it can sense me, why is that?" Zhangsun Shan thinks as he rolls over to his left side causing the beast to crash vehemently against the ground.
"GRRRRRRRR" it snarls at him.
"I never did think of why it attacked ma initially, why didn't he just go for anyone amongst the crowd or those folks who carried the helpless soldiers, what did they possess that Mom didn't," Zhangsun Shan thinks but the monster makes another dash at him, Zhangsun Shan runs towards it as fast as his little frail legs could carry him, the monster seeing him moving towards him jumps at him but Zhangsun Shan expected that usually when predators especially the carnivorous kind were about to grab their prey, they would leap at them.
Zhangsun Shan slid underneath the monster, now the katana he had seen earlier on was directly on the ground beside him but that wasn't his priority, the giant sword which was still ahead of him was his concern.
The beast lands on the ground, it turns towards Zhangsun Shan as it snarls, slobber dropping out from his tusks.
Zhangsun Shan turns his back, this creature was faster than him so if he tried to run towards the weapon, it would catch him and kill him before he could get to the sword.
Looking over at the monster, he had to come up with a way to distract the monster while he set out to do what he wanted but how?
It was then that he remembered the Katana which was directly at his side, the beast snarls again as it runs towards him, Zhangsun Shan charges too towards the beast as he had quickly picked up the sword.
The beast thinking Zhangsun Shan might expect to slide under him didn't jump, Zhangsun Shan expecting that leaps as high as he could.
He could feel his body becoming one with the wind, using his two small arms to hold the tilt of the weapon tightly.
The beast raises his right forelimb as if to slash him but Zhangsun Shan had anticipated that as he quickly changes his stance while in midair to knock it off with the hilt of the weapon he held, this causes the beast to growl loudly
"GRRRRRRRR" it shouts aloud.
While it growled, Zhangsun Shan plunged his sword into the mouth of the beast.
"It's working, I might not even need the big sword again" he smiles to himself but almost immediately before the sword could pierce through any innards of the creature, the beast shut his mouth breaking the sword into two.
Zhangsun Shan's facial expression changed into one of amazement, the beast taking the initiative slashes his other arm in his direction sending his right arm flying high in the air as his frail small body is flung back about ten feet backward.
Zhangsun Shan looked over at his arm, it had been cut off at the shoulder and he was losing a lot of blood, he could feel his body going dizzy and his vision blurry but yet, he wasn't going to show fear, not at the face of anyone or anything; even death as he felt all were below him.
"Wait, dear, it's fear, the people here have always been terrified of me, I disgraced the warriors, they must have been afraid of what the people would think of them now, I was scared that my mom would become a target after all the sweet things she said about me but my mom was the only one who wasn't afraid, she spoke from her heart, out of love, that's why the beast didn't attack her, it goes for anything that isn't terrified," Zhangsun Shan thought as fast as he could, the beast was dashing towards him but yet for some reason everything felt slower than normal.
"I AM NOT GOING TO DIE HERE" Zhangsun Shan shouts aloud as he looks around, he then spots Rui Hongcha's weapon which was directly beside him.
"I AM GREATER THAN A GOD, NOTHING SHALL STOP ME, NOT EVEN DEATH, I SHALL ATTAIN WHAT GODS ARE JEALOUS OF; IMMORTALITY" he shouts again, he was trying to keep himself conscious and alert as the blood he kept losing was making him lose consciousness, taking the sword by its hilt, he grasps it but he could feel his entire body burning and it was painful, the worst kind of pain he had ever experienced in his life.
"AHHRRRGGGHHHHHH" He screams aloud, suddenly some holograms in his field of vision appeared, it was words, they were;
YOU ARE NOT A PLAYER!
YOU ARE NOT A PLAYER!!
YOU ARE NOT A PLAYER!!!
"That's right," Zhangsun Shan says as he manages to lift it higher, the weapon was incredibly heavy, his body was beginning to burn off, his Chinese skin immediately turning tan
"I AM A BEING SURPASSING EVEN GODS."
The holograms in his field of vision changed, they now read;
ONLY PLAYERS ARE AUTHORIZED TO WIELD THIS, YOU ARE UNWORTHY!!!!
"No, it's the weapon that's unworthy of me" Zhangsun Shan grits his teeth as he points the weapon over at the beast who was nearly upon him, the beast leaps at him.
The weapon which Zhangsun Shan was holding instantly becomes fiery first at the hilt, before charging up and reaching to the tip of the weapon, he releases an outburst of fire instantly burning the beast to ashes along with 30 hectares of land which were directly behind.
Zhangsun Shan smiles to himself as he drops his weapon, blood still dripped from his shoulder.
"So, this is the end huh" he smiles
"At least, I proved my point to the very end, fuck with my mom and your life is over, I am a god and even death can't incite fear into me" with that, Zhangsun Shan closes his eyes still smiling as he falls into a state of rest.
He could feel nothing; no longer the grass beneath his body which was brushing lightly against his bare skin or the soft wind which was blowing his hair causing him to sway according to the rhythm of the wind.
He fell into a state of absolute nothingness!!!