NaNo day 21
...i took the day off writing yesterday and used my free time to read, whoops. it seems my brain doesn't want to do the writing thing anymore, so i moved back to the time loop story!
short update, but i think i just missed dfs even if he sure didn't miss me and the frustration i like to put him through.
“Here,” Di Feisheng indicated on the map Wuyan brought. “Cross out all the places above. And one more thing.”
Wuyan didn’t dare object, and bowed before he left.
—
“Where is everyone?” Fang Duobing asked as they walked through the village. He was peering around, craning his neck around corners as if the townsfolk were merely playing a game that he might win should he find them. It was strange mostly because there were stalls already out, and some food gone cold yet no people to eat or man the area.
On an otherwise brisk but beautiful day, the entire village was silent.
“Who knows?” Di Feisheng offered casually, looking away specifically. He didn’t have to look back to know that Li Lianhua was giving him a suspicious stare, but by the time he glanced back at the others, the physician was already studying one of the empty tables with interest.
Li Lianhua ran a finger down the wooden grain of the table, and then lifted it up to check, rubbing his fingers together.
“There’s ash,” he said with surprise, bringing his hand up to sniff delicately. “Trace amounts, but something was burnt here earlier. Not too long ago. The people might have evacuated thinking there was a fire.”
“Very effective.” Di Feisheng observed.
Li Lianhua gave him another look, but didn’t comment further on the words. “I suppose we’ll have to investigate the area for today and wait until the people come back to ask about the missing travellers.”
“Tomorrow?” Fang Duobing’s voice was dismayed, but he merely scowled as he crossed his arms. “I’d rather take care of it today.”
Li Lianhua flicked his fingers. “There’s no rush.”
They searched through the village with far less hassle this time around, but also coming up with far less clues as to what happened to the travellers.
“Let’s head down this path,” Di Feisheng suggested after the other two refused to rummage through the abandoned homes of the villagers. It meant they hadn’t found key items, but at the same time it meant they weren’t hassled by aggressive strangers.
“Why?” Li Lianhua asked suspiciously from where he was resting next to a lopsided wooden fence. “You’ve been behaving strange all day, A-Fei.”
Luckily, it seemed Fang Duobing was a little too preoccupied poking through a fire pit a little too large and close to the village centre. Di Feisheng had seen the pit enough times to know that it was there normally and therefore not the source of whatever fire Fang Duobing was looking for.
“A hunch,” Di Feisheng responded, and turned to leave, knowing the other two would eventually follow him.
He leads them (suspiciously) to the well and the cavern where the dungeon was, and then (suspiciously) refuses to say how he knew that would be there. For all the times Di Feisheng had quietly attempted to get them to believe that he was repeating the same day over and over, he didn’t want to have that conversation today.
He generally didn’t want to be called upon to explain how the previous iteration of ‘today’ ended. He just wanted to finish searching through the dungeon to see if they could find something particular or strange, and then perhaps take the next several iterations of ‘today’ away from this place.
He wasn’t even looking to end the repeats. There were still things he wanted to accomplish if given the extra time. The distant sense of urgency to find a solution to the repeats from the previous day had already faded, but Di Feisheng’s irritation concerning this village had yet to do so.
“Don’t,” he warned as they searched, “go into the cells. There’s an incendiary trap in there.”
Now it was Fang Duobing frowning at him. “How do you know that?”
Di Feisheng thought for a moment, and then replied, “Ask me this tomorrow.”
They found nothing of use, and when they returned to Lotus Tower for the night, Wuyan reported in the negative and Di Feisheng crossed out another section of the map.
He spent the late evening practising his sword forms, an uneasy feeling building within as he took his frustrations and uncertainty out on the trees surrounding him. Even as the candle light of Lotus Tower was blown out, he stayed out under the moonlight until he fell asleep resting against the roots of a tree.
—
Di Feisheng opened his eyes to an unoccupied bed the next day, and frowned. The birds were still chirping, but there was the smell of rice cooking and the distinct sounds of murmuring and footsteps below him.
He wasn’t… he was still staring up at the roof of Lotus Tower, but was it the next day?
He lifted an arm. He was back in his sleep clothes, although he was certain he fell asleep outdoors in full wear the previous night. He brought the sleeve to his arm and sniffed. No. Unless someone managed to wash him of the sweat accumulated from his training last night, it was just another loop.
Yet this time, he overslept.
Judging from the sounds, the two downstairs were trying not to wake him up in a surprisingly thoughtful turn. Di Feisheng moved out of bed slowly, taking stock of his own body as he moved. Nothing seemed amiss, and he certainly wasn’t feeling the exertion from the day previous. He felt as he had each morning for each repeat, and as the bed creaked and his feet hit the floor, he could hear the noises below him change.
After dressing and strapping his sword to his back, Di Feisheng made his way down the stairs to Fang Duobing attempting to not so subtly push Li Lianhua away from the kitchen area with a spatula as he held onto the pan over the flames and Li Lianhua stirring a pot on a burner with a frown.
“A-Fei!” Fang Duobing called out cheerfully as he pushed through the door. “You sure slept in this morning. Just in time for breakfast, though.”
With bowls of watery congee and a plate of stir-fried vegetables, they sat and discussed the disappearances of several travellers in the village they were heading toward. Di Feisheng stayed quiet during their discussion, watching them for cues. Luckily, that was not unusual of him, although they gave him confused glances from time to time.
“We probably could have been on our way already,” Fang Duobing bluffed (they never left this early, not in all the iterations) with a sly smile, leaning over the table. “If someone hadn’t overslept!”
Di Feisheng gave him a flat look and set down his empty bowl.
“I’ll join you tomorrow.” He said. “Something came up today.”
Immediately, Fang Duobing’s smug expression melted into concern instead. It was unfortunate that his emotions were always so clear on his face, as Di Feisheng couldn’t understand how the young man could be a detective when he couldn’t bluff his way out of a wet paper bag.
Li Lianhua, sitting opposite him, merely took the statement in stride.
“Good luck on your endeavours,” the man told him, his bowl still more than half full. Half because he ate so slowly, and half because Fang Duobing kept piling more vegetables into it.
“Wait, wait,” Fang Duobing waved his arms as Di Feisheng stood from the bench, catching their attention. He looked between Li Lianhua and Di Feisheng with concern. “Did something happen? I thought we agreed yesterday to do this together? We spent a week getting here!”
“Something came up,” Di Feisheng repeated, but then amended with a thought, “Go tomorrow. I’ll join you. Do something else today.”
“Like what?” Fang Duobing asked, bewildered.
“There’s a leak in the corner upstairs. Fix that.”
At that, Fang Duobing’s concern slid toward irritation. “Why me? It’s your room, too! You should help!”
“A-Fei,” Li Lianhua interjected smoothly, and Di Feisheng looked down toward him as he set his bowl down to pick up a cup of tea. “You’ll be back tomorrow, then?”
Underneath the cool nonchalance were sharp eyes turned his direction, and Di Feisheng didn’t bother to acknowledge or deny it.
“Or today.” He said, because it was true. Should the day pass over to the next, he would be back. Should it not pass to the next day, then he would wake in Lotus Tower regardless.
He called for Wuyan once he was a good distance away, and when the man appeared, Di Feisheng told him, “Today, I will join the search.”
That day, he directed his people around and up a stream, and that night he slept in an unfamiliar inn at an unfamiliar town, surrounded by those of the Jinyuan Alliance in the adjacent rooms, yet his heart continued to be uneasy over the difference in how he woke that day.
—
Di Feisheng wakes in Lotus Tower to the sound of early morning birds chirping and sunlight just starting to peek through the horizon through the blinds of the room. Fang Duobing’s elbow was jabbing him in the side, and the sense of relief he felt was so acute it was nearly a physical sensation.
He goes downstairs in his night clothes and once more stares until Li Lianhua drags himself out of bed with sleepy complaints.
“I have been living this day again and again.” Di Feisheng told him quietly as they waited for the water to boil for tea. “I have found different ways to predict events, and different secrets you have told me to help me in the next repeat, but I don’t believe you need to know any of that to believe me.”
“So you’re not going to tell me if a lightning strike suddenly breaks through the clouds?” Li Lianhua asked, a hand holding his sleeve back as he scooped tea leaves. The gesture was elegant, sure, and Di Feisheng watched as he carefully poured the near boiling water into the teapot, and then lifted the teapot to swirl the liquid around before emptying the first pour into a bowl to be dumped later.
As he refilled the teapot, Di Feisheng responded, “That doesn’t happen. I thought I would need proof for you to believe me, but now I realise you’ve never disbelieved me.”
“You’re not the type to lie,” Li Lianhua said. “Especially not about strange events.”
It was true, but not merely in the sense that Di Feisheng didn’t waste time bothering with petty lies and made up stories. Every single time he revealed the repeat of days, Li Lianhua and Fang Duobing went along with whatever he said. If he claimed he was living the same day over and over and they needed to go elsewhere, then the three of them went elsewhere. If he claimed to know what happened and that they should delay a day, then they delayed a day.
It was a heady feeling, knowing that he could say something and they would go along with it, no matter how strange.
Or perhaps, because of how strange his explanation was.
Li Lianhua directed the second pour into two small teacups, and then set the teapot back down, releasing his sleeve and flicking his wrists to smooth out the cloth, actions so perfunctory he likely never noticed just how fussy he looked.
Di Feisheng smiled at the action, picking up a teacup to savour the warmth and smell of it.
Li Lianhua narrowed his eyes. “What?”
“Nothing.” Di Feisheng told him, still smiling. He imitated Li Lianhua’s movement to draw attention to the superfluousness of it. It looked even more ridiculous when he did it, with his sleeves coiled up under his bracers. “You’re exceptionally vain.”
The other man looked affronted. “Is it vain to keep a clean appearance? I think you’re not using that word correctly, Lao Di.”
Di Feisheng downed the tea in one swallow like wine, savouring the burn on this tongue. It was a warmth that spread down his throat and through his chest, and he savoured it.
Setting the cup back on the table with a click, he said, “Come with me today. We’ll untether the horses and ride out.”
Li Lianhua raised a brow, hands cradling the warmth of his own teacup without drinking it. “You want me to leave my house?”
“We’ll be back tomorrow,” Di Feisheng stated. One way or another, it would be true. We’ll go now.”
“We should wake Xiaobao up if—”
“He’ll find us.” Di Feisheng interjected. He hadn’t planned on keeping their tracks secret, and if Fang Duobing couldn’t find them, then… well, that would be a lesson to the young man to learn better tracking skills. Already, he pushed himself up from the bench and reached out a hand. “Another thing to teach that disciple of yours.”
Li Lianhua gave him a strange look at the extended hand, but then allowed Di Feisheng to pull him up off the seat.
Di Feisheng was smiling again, with the cool, calloused hand within his own.
Li Lianhua sighed. “At least let me leave a message before he accuses us of leaving him behind again.”
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