The Rise of Phoenixes

After a moment of bewilderment, Feng Hao recognized Feng Zhiwei and yelled out in surprise, “sister?”

“Borrowing money?¹I have none!” Feng Zhiwei cut him off and bowed to Yan Hong. “Yan Hong Sister, he is my fellow townsman…”

“Country bumpkin…” Yan Hong muttered, but she waved them away. Feng Hao still wanted to argue, but Feng Zhiwei dragged him away.

Feng Hao was still angry as he left the yard, cursing loudly. “Thief! Only knowing silver!”

Feng Zhiwei no longer had the heart to deal with his nonsense; their mother had protected him all these years, and nothing would change now even if she did something.

She didn’t want to argue with Feng Hao but he wouldn’t let her go. He was still upset and everyone was unpleasant to his eyes; he examined Feng Zhi disdainfully, “Sister, why are you in this dirty place? A clean daughter from a big family – how can you be so shameless? Are you not afraid of staining our family’s reputation?”

Feng Zhiwei turned and examined Feng Hao with astonishment. She had thought that it was bad for Feng Hao to be spoiled so much, but she had never expected that he would become such a shameless fool. At this point, you couldn’t even speak about moral character; he already had no conscience left.

Her black iris was bright even in the dusk, cold and profound as an abyss. Feng Hao shrunk back under her gaze as her kind and gentle sister spoke, each of her words sharp and brutal, cutting gold and smashing jade.

“No matter how shameless I am, I would never spend our mother’s hard earned savings in a brothel. No matter how much I stain our family’s reputation, I will always be better than the son of our Feng Family, a fourteen year old who tricks his mother for money to get prostitutes.”

“Who tricked!” Feng Hao jumped as if his tail had been stepped, his pretty young face twisting in anger. “You lie and frame me! Shameless! Slanderer!”

Feng Zhiwei smiled coldly, “You are the expert on these things.”

Feng Hao choked on his words and thought about Feng Zhiwei’s situation with some guilt, but just as he was about to say something, a large crowd of snickering boys neared. The person in the lead shouted out to Feng Hao, “A Hao, did you have fun?”

“A rich man with one tael silver in hand – all the girls must have been fighting over him!” A young boy in gorgeous clothes winked, gesturing to the others playfully.

“Of course! Young Master Hao could have even reserved her if he wanted. One tael of silver! More than enough!”

The crowd laughed uproariously.

Feng Hao’s face paled as Feng Zhiwei watched indifferently. She knew these people were the “noble friends” that Feng Hao had mentioned to their mother. Feng Hao rarely left the mansion and had no money. He had no opportunities to visit other mansions, so how did he meet these people?

Feng Hao was still immature and couldn’t swallow the humiliation. He snapped angrily, “You really think that I don’t have anything valuable? Just wait!”

He turned around and rushed away. Feng Zhiwei immediately guessed that the idiot would go back and search through their mother’s personal savings, and so she caught him and pulled him back, whispering to him, “Don’t do something stupid!”

Feng Hao struggled, shouting, “Let go! Let go! A gentleman prefers death to humiliation!”

Feng Zhiwei was angry and amused at the same time, and she dragged him to a corner. After these days of chores for the robed figure, her strength had already grown a lot, and Feng Hao couldn’t get away from her. When the two were in the corner, Feng Zhiwei pressed her brother against the wall and demanded angrily, “What are you doing! Have you not already done enough?”

Feng Hao straightened and shouted as if he were some rich young master, “No one can humiliate me!”

Feng Zhiwei glared at Feng Hao, but half of her mind was going over the events of the day. Feng Hao had somehow met this group of people and had been convinced to come out to hire prostitutes, and was now pushed into this situation. She couldn’t help but feel that there was something strange about this seemingly ordinary circumstance, and her heart was uneasy.

In her moment of distraction, a golden handled fan was pushed between the two siblings. The young boy in the lead had come over and smiled at the pair. “What are you two planning so sneakily over here?

He looked at Feng Hao’s pretty face and smiled mysteriously. “You only got kicked out because you don’t have money; don’t worry Brother Hao, you have such a pretty face. I can recommend you and have you spend a night in some of the royal mansion. You’ll have enough money to reserve ten prostitutes to play with for a year!”

“Pa!”

Before the last word had been fully uttered, a spurt of blood blossomed like a flower in the air, bright warm blood spraying everywhere. The young boy’s eyes deadened, and with a short, sharp breath, he fell to the ground.

Part of the bloodied brick broke off and fell to the ground.

Young Master Feng had broken the boy’s head with a brick.

“Murder!”

The shout of the brick had startled the boys on the other side of the wall and one of them had looked over and saw the bleeding boy on the ground.

The sharp shout woke Feng Hao and his sister from their dazed state. Feng Zhiwei knew instantly that the situation would not end well, and she reached out to pull Feng Hao with her as she turned to run. Just as she reached out her hand, Feng Hao thrust the remaining brick into her hand.

Then, in a swift motion, he turned and climbed up the short wall behind him. With a small “peng” sound, he landed on the other side and dashed away.

Feng Zhiwei’s first reaction was to throw aside the brick, but it was already too late. The group of young masters had rushed over and they all yelled loudly.

“Catch that man! Murderer!”

Blood covered the ground, and a still figure lay in the growing puddle. As the crowd rushed over in alarm, the little brother who had framed her again was nowhere to be seen.

Everything had happened in a flash, too quickly for people to react, and even the perpetually calm Feng Zhiwei was stunned for a moment.

She stood still, glaring in the direction that Feng Hao disappeared from, and her body flushed with rage. A light “cha” sound came from her hand.

With the soft crack, dust spread and drifted downwards and the charging crowd stopped short in its tracks.

Feng Zhiwei looked down. The remaining brick piece had shattered into countless pieces and other then the sad pieces clutched in her fist, all other signs of the hard rock were falling gently downwards.

The scene shocked the group of young masters, and it also shocked her. Feng Zhiwei lifted her hand and stared at it disbelievingly, but even after a long moment she could only conclude that her hand was perfectly fine.

She reached for the feeling of gushing rage and tightened her fist, but the brick pieces in her hand didn’t react at all.

The gathering people looked at Feng Zhiwei with eyes filled with shock and terror. She ignored them, turning her hand and letting the final few piece fall to the ground, and in a passing movement of her foot, ground the final shards into the dusty ground.

And then she looked up and smiled, “Ai yah, why did this brother fall to the ground so suddenly? Someone go call a doctor!”

“…”