This first half of the chapter had been translated and sitting around for a while…I wanted to update thurs but couldn’t finish the whole thing on time. So I decided to just separate the chapter into two and get this part out first. Isn’t a long chapter but this weekend’s been bleh x.x
Expect the next part within the next 48 hours or so. I think this might become a routine =P
3.A
credits to Xiaoxinart on deviantart~~~ so pretty 😀Everyone believed it a miracle when Chang An's sixth birthday rolled around. He did not look like the kind of child who can survive long in good health. Do not talk about beasts, even the children of sub-beasts' were bigger than him, suffice to say, even girls appeared healthier and more robust standing beside him.
It wasn't privy to say what kind of life-threatening disease he contracted, but the small wooden cottage he reside would always smelled of herbal medicine; the boy himself expelling phlegm more than words every time he opened his mouth.
Children are known to be hot blooded, energetic, and vitalic creatures: he was simply sickly in comparison. His skin was oft pale and his lips lacked color, taking on an unhealthy white, and on his face, the lines demarcating his eyes and lips would always be flushed red.
He was brought into the tribe by the foreign sub-beast, Zhe Yan, when he was one-year-old. The two had roamed the wilderness for a more than a year before they found a tribe willing to accept them.
At first, when people saw Chang An, they would always question whether such a sickly babe could survive.
Once Chang An was old enough, whenever he heard people saying things like this, doubt would always surface in his chest.
But later on, these conversations ceased because Zhe Yan once overheard and went crazy like a mad dog.
Despite having only one arm, Zhe Yan was pretty and delicate. He would always remind others that Chang An was not his biological own, as if afraid they would forget this.
When Chang An was three, he heard a child call his father "die," and became a little envious. He learned this was how children addressed their fathers and began calling Zhe Yan the same.
*die- 阿爹, dad; father.
Zhe Yan's response was a slap to the face.
According to the rattan-picking woman who happened to be nearby at that day, Zhe Yan was shouting at the little fellow.
"What did you call me? If you call me that one more time, I'm going to slap your mouth mush! Say it again, who is your die? The tribe's most courageous and strongest warrior is your die! That year, the venerated elder personally gave you his bone plate and named you Chang An himself! Now look at what you've done!" The one-armed sub-beast howled, "how can you…how can you call a person like me die…. you are simply degrading yourself! Do you still have any honor left?!"
Despite being scolded, the woman did not hear the child cry, not even one whit or evidence of a whimper.
When he finally surfaced from the small hut a few hours later, his small face was swollen to the point the entire bottom half throbbed red and bulging.
It lasted a whole ten days.
Recounting this incident, her tone had been riddled with sympathy.
Perhaps those days of constant turmoil, constant unease, roaming the jungle in relative fear, had made Zhe Yan hysterical, made him think he was undeserving of being addressed father.
But Chang An too was an extremely peculiar child.
Nobody ever saw him cry or play with other children. No one knew where he would disappear to during the day; and where he returned from by dusk during dinner.
He did not like to talk. People would pat him teasingly on the head but he would only stand there silently, mirthlessly; patiently waiting for them to retract their hand and finish their words; and then leave with either a nod or shake in response to any question they may offer. Only occasionally when someone pities him and gives him something to eat would he look at them profoundly with his slate black eyes, as to entrench them into memory, and then bow gratuitously in return.
So it turns out, he had grown into a child who knows how to repay kindness.
Returning home, Chang An noticed the entrance to the hut was barricaded by a few blades of tall grass and stopped.
He knows the implication of this.
Zhe Yan was telling him to go away, not to come in.
There were heavy gasps and sticky moans/chants coming from the hut.
Chang An didn’t really understand what Zhe Yan was doing, but could vaguely infer from other people's despising attitudes it wasn't anything honorable. As he grew older, he became conscientious of the fact he would be driven away everytime a 'guest' visits. He later came to understand this was likely their only source of livelihood.
Zhe Yan's health was unwell. Even if he magically regrows an arm, he cannot go hunting like other the fathers. Sub-beasts are born naturally weak, so many compensate by venturing into trades like craftsman, handicraft, or workmanship. They can even establish a reputation for themselves if they excel in their respective trades. Of course, if one is neither good at hunting nor craftsmanship, then menial labor is all they can do. Slave labor – that is. And despite the small income from that train of work, one can at least maintain a decent life.
However even rough work was out of question for the current Zhe Yan. And most certainly, neither was craftsmanship a possibility.
To put it bluntly, Zhe Yan is now in every sense, a crippled.