Xiu'er dragged him by the arm and left the pharmacy in such a hurry that he didn't have time to say anything to the pharmacist. The stuff in his backpack jangled around in there.
After a few turns, Xiu'er dropped him off next to a store and told him to stay until she returned. Xiu'er ran down an alley and came back in less than five minutes with a wide wooden board. A'Li was behind her and he was carrying a bunch of knives in his hands, feet and tail. Before the young boy could say anything, A'Li dropped the knives by his feet. Xiu'er leaned the board against the wall and positioned him in front of the board.
He opened his mouth, about to ask why she was standing at a distance with the knives. Before he could speak a word, a knife came flying straight at him and landed an inch on the right side of his head.
"Ladies and gentlemen," Xiu'er opened her arms towards the street, walking around in a semicircle in front of the boy. "Straight from the northern Kingdom of Yanwei, I am Hahaha and this monkey is Hehehe, with our marvelous act of flying knives!"
She bowed once. With her head down, she saw that she didn't get much of an audience yet.
Let's begin, Xiu'er smiled.
When she got up, she threw another knife over her head back at the young boy behind her. His life flashed before his eyes as he screamed. With a loud thud of the knife, he fainted and didn't see the knife landing above his head. He slid down to a sitting position with his head dangled in front of him.
The crowd that had actually stopped their daily lives started to circle them more and more to watch whatever interesting act Xiu'er was going to perform. They clapped at her last knife throw while some pointed out that he already fainted.
Xiu'er asked to borrow a low value coin from one of the spectators, the kind with the hole in the middle. She asked the spectator to throw it in the air but towards the board leaning on the wall. As he did so, she threw a knife at it, pinning the coin right through its center and into the board with a loud thud. The crowd clapped and A'Li did his work of collecting coins from the audience.
"Xiu'er? Sher Tu!" A voice from behind the crowd called.
Kun Shang pushed his way through the thick mass. He didn't realize when he said to let her go cause trouble somewhere else, he didn't mean for her to make someone faint from sheer fright.
Sher Tu was Kun Shang's family errand boy. He ran to him and sat him up, lightly slapping him on the face until he was conscious. The boy was surprised to see his Young Master, and suddenly pointed to Xiu'er for attempting to kill him.
Xiu'er rolled her eyes.
Kun Shang was down on one knee and had a hand on Sher Tu's shoulder. He reassured the young boy that there must be some misunderstanding, Xiu'er was not someone who would hurt others. He quickly asked his errand boy what he was doing here.
"Young Master, Physician Shu sent me to buy medicine for your father. Where's my--where's the money?" He frantically searched his body for it. Releasing his arms from his wooden backpack and digging inside.
Kun Shang helped search the surrounding ground until Xiu'er handed them the bag from the side. Kun Shang quickly put the two together and found out that she probably had stolen the money earlier.
The money that was meant for buying medicine for his father! How could she continue to do her sinful deeds when he made it clear so many times to her? He couldn't forgive her this time. Why did she not change her personality as a thief? A beggar, sure. But a thief is lower than a beggar. They have no morals, no manners, no principles and no life. How could she do it?
Did she have any sympathy? Did she care for anyone? Did she ever learn?
Maybe it wasn't a good idea to teach a grown teenager new behaviors? Kun Shang thought.
He was furious, but he did try to hold much of his anger in. He scolded her. He scolded her for stealing, for not changing her hideous habits, and also for putting the errand boy's life at risk. What was she thinking? She doesn't even know martial arts, what made her think she could land those knives without harming him? There were more hurtful words he said to her including, "Does it make you happy to steal from innocent people?" and "Your disgusting habits will dishonor your uncle." But most of them were slurred in her head. Everything felt hazy.
As he spoke, she couldn't believe those words were spewing out of his mouth. He didn't even give her a chance to explain herself. Every time she opened her mouth, he shushed her off.
Does he think that lowly of me? She clenched her fists. I've suffered pain and torment in the past, but none of them were from you. And now?
She didn't wait for him to finish his lecture before taking off. She couldn't let him finish. A'Li ran after her and climbed to her shoulders. She ran as fast as she could. Faster than the carriages pulled by horses as she passed the travelers, the residents, the paved city roads, away from the bustling city and even the slums of the poor where she met Yaoyao and into the far outskirts of the capital.
She didn't stop running and she didn't know how to stop. It would make her think back to the hurtful words he said. She let her legs do the leading, continuous running without any real idea where she was going. For some reason, she arrived at the rocky shoreline of a river which was better than if she had ended up somewhere else. She braced herself at the bank with her hands clenching beside her, feeling the need to yell more than anything.
She threw her fists in the air as if she was punching it. "Jerk! Don't talk like you know me. A'Li, let's just forget him and go our separate ways. Away from that douche-bag." She paused to catch her breath. "Asshole!" She screamed into the river at the top of her lungs. She bit her bottom lip so hard she tasted blood.
"Xiu'er? Are you okay?" Xiu'er turned at the voice to see Xiaogua behind her. He was originally laying on his back but sat up when he heard her. "Did something happen?"
In tears, she suddenly ran to him and used his shoulders for support.