Post by manzai on May 6, 2012 0:12:38 GMT -5
Wow, no new stories posted on this forum in 7 months! I'm looking to get more readers for my fic. Maybe new posts will help generate some activity. I definitely hope you guys will read and review it!
Actually, I was posting this story here a few years ago, but I stopped writing it regularly while I was at school. However, I kept making notes and writing chapter outlines, so now I have the whole story planned out and I'm more prepared to post it regularly. I'm planning to post a new part every 2 weeks.
I hope it's not a problem that I'm starting a second thread with the same story, but I've made several revisions to the chapters I originally posted. I guess it must be okay since there hasn't been any activity here in so long. I think it's safe to assume most people here must not have read the original one.
Anyway, this is a multi-chapter all-OC or "elsewhere" fic about an Avatar who lived long before Aang. Here's the summary i wrote for fanfiction.net:
Set 950 years before the show, it's the story of Avatar Zhengyi, who would rather try to reclaim his birthright as heir to a crime family than save the world. He says he wants justice, but on his journey he's going to have to decide what that means.
For rating purposes, this is a PG-13 or T story for violence, character death, and alcohol/drug depictions.
Here it is:
Fire. Air. Water. Earth. My aunt used to tell me stories about the old days, when the Avatar was a paragon of righteousness and order for all the nations. I used to think that, somehow, the universe always chose a good, moral person to be the Avatar, but recently… I’ve started to think that maybe the world has just been lucky so far.
Fifteen years ago the previous Avatar died, just as the Earth Kingdom erupted into civil war between a confederation of eastern cities lead by Ba Sing Se and a confederation of western cities lead by Omashu, a development encouraged by the sanctimonious and tyrannical Earth King. Everyone thought a new Avatar would appear soon, to stop the war, depose the king, and return balance to the world with barely a wave of his hand. But the circumstances of this new Avatar’s life have lead him to forsake the Avatar’s duties for a selfish life dedicated to what he calls “justice,” and most would call “revenge.”
First, you have to understand the Hei Chaoliu, the Black Current of the Earth Kingdom, because that was the Avatar’s world for the first fifteen years of his life. The clans of the Hei Chaoliu claimed to be mutual protection societies for the poor citizens of the Lower Ring, but that was the farthest thing from the truth. The Hei Chaoliu was the collective name for dozens and dozens of clan-based gangs, competing for illegal commodities and territory. By the time the war broke out, one clan, the Ban, was on the verge of becoming the most powerful in the city. A son—Zhengyi—was born to the head of the Ban clan. I can’t help but think how much simpler the course of my life—even the course of history—would have been, if the Heir of Ban had not also been the Avatar.
Ban Ti Xi’s foot stamped the ground, ejecting a rock from its resting place. He shot his fist out from his hip, sending the rock at one of his sparring partners. The other man quickly erected a wedge of earth and the rock shattered on its edge. The wedge sped toward Ti Xi, but he strongly thrust both his forearms at it, raising a rock wall. His open pao fluttered from the sharpness of his movements.
Two other sparring partners swung their fists upward like weights on a chain, lifting a massive boulder into the air and positioning it above Ti Xi’s head. With a crane’s beak hand technique, Ti Xi broke a core out of the rock for his body to occupy. Alone for a moment in the core of the boulder, he smiled at how staunchly his retainers obeyed his order to not hold back in practice. With barely enough room to move his muscular arms at the elbows, he struck the rock’s interior in several places, producing radial hairline fractures. He sent a barrage of rock sections at his sparring partners. This unexpected move neutralized nearly all of them. Ti Xi exhaled with a bridge hand. Only one of his retainers could still present any real challenge to him, and he wanted a challenge today.
Ti Xi called out to this man, who was leaning against a tree at the edge of Ban Ti Xi’s training courtyard, mostly hidden by the tree’s shadow, and audibly crunching on an apple. “Hey, Wu! You wanna fight? I need to practice against someone who can actually throw a rock!” Ti Xi said, charismatic as always, playfully clapping one of his exhausted sparring partners on the shoulder. Ti Xi traded a playful smile with his retainer.
Er Shi Wu’s only acknowledgement of his boss’s request was to step out from the shadow of the tree and toss his apple to the ground. The shadow seemed to lift off him like a curtain, exposing his green shirt on his wiry frame, his bright green left eye, and an eye-patch covering the right one. The patch bore the pygmy puma that was Ti Xi’s clan insignia, and it had also prompted Er Shi Wu’s nickname: “One-Eyed Wu.”
Wu casually strode on to the training ground with a chuckle. “You always win, Ti Xi,” he smiled.
“Not true,” Ti Xi acknowledged the abilities of this man, one of his top three lieutenants. “Up until a few years ago you used to beat me all the time, remember?”
Wu nodded in assent, taking a horse stance. “Seems like a long time,” he said. Ti Xi took a stance in kind.
Wu whipped his fists diagonally across his body, flinging stones at Ti Xi. Ti Xi pecked them all out of the air with his crane’s beak hand. They both knew this was just a warm-up.
Ti Xi then dropped to a lower stance, and a wave of earth shot from his foot straight at Wu. Wu anticipated this. He lifted a large chunk of earth out of the ground. As Ti Xi’s wave came at him, Wu spun to the side and took a drop stance. His chunk of earth spun with him and he fired it at Ti Xi. Ti Xi sprang backwards and rolled as the chunk flew over his head and shattered on the courtyard wall behind him. He got back to his feet and swung his hand in a circle behind him, raising an arc of earth aimed for Wu. Wu had already created a similar structure and was sending it toward Ti Xi.
“Mountain Master! Mountain Master!” came the winded voice of another of Ti Xi’s top men, Xin Kao. He was waving a parchment clasped in the three digits of his right hand. A rival clan had cut off his right pinky and ring finger many years ago when they once captured him. They had hoped to disgrace him, as amputated fingers were the mark of a traitor among the Hei Chaoliu clans. Ti Xi had too much trust in Kao for the tactic to work, but that was how he had earned his nickname, “Kao the Claw.” However, the name hardly fit Kao’s avuncular appearance, with his long white beard, deep brown eyes, bald head and big gut.
Wu and Ti Xi broke off the match, allowing their earthen projectiles to melt back into the ground. “Kao, you can call me by my name,” Ti Xi said. Kao had originally worked for Ti Xi’s father, and Ti Xi always felt strange being addressed so respectfully by a man ten years his senior.
“Apologies, Mou—Ti Xi. But we just got news from Bian Se Long.”
“Bian Se Long?” Ti Xi replied. Wu perked up his ears. Bian Se Long was a small port town near Chameleon Bay. Ti Xi had sent one of his mistresses there, ostensibly to keep her safe from rival clans. Everyone in the clan knew Ti Xi’s reputation as something of a skirt-chaser, and this particular woman Wu had never met. But he and Kao were the only one’s who knew the real reason Ti Xi had sent her away from the city: she was pregnant.
“Yes. I need to speak with you privately,” Kao said, still sounding urgent. Wu watched the two move off together into the main house of the Ban compound as he helped the other sparring partners up. The afternoon sun blazed over the Agrarian District of Ba Sing Se and the Ban family compound, and Wu felt it despite the meager shade provided by some of the trees at the edge of the training courtyard.
A couple of the pygmy pumas which were kept around the compound as pets— mascots of sorts for the clan—skittered out of the way as Kao and Ti Xi slid open the shoji and entered the house. Ti Xi nervously ran a hand over his shaven head. “How are they?” he asked. “Are they safe?” Ti Xi looked a little pale.
“Yes,” Kao smiled. “Both of them.”
Ti Xi huffed in relief. Cao, already twice a father himself, chuckled at Ti Xi’s reaction. “The Ban Clan will finally have an heir,” Ti Xi breathed.
“Kao, I want you to go there right away in my place,” Ti Xi told him. “Make sure everything goes smoothly,” he said in an exited fluster. Then he remembered Kao’s young daughter, only eighteen months old. “Will Fung be all right without you?”
“Her aunt at the abbey can look after her,” Kao smiled at his friend. “Don’t worry, Ti Xi. This is important; I want to go.”
Ti Xi placed his hand on Kao’s shoulder. “You’re my top man. I wouldn’t trust anyone else with something this important.”
Kao gave an assuring nod and walked up the imposing staircase toward his suite in the massive main house of the Ban clan’s compound. In order to motivate his men, Ti Xi allowed several dozens of his most senior lieutenants to live in his rather posh compound. The compound was officially a farm in the Agrarian District, but Ti Xi ran it more like a hotel or an army camp. Its several houses, especially the palatial main house, were generally much nicer than anything your average poor Hei Chaoliu gang member had ever seen. Ti Xi even allowed members to keep spouses and children with them at the compound, provided they didn’t enter the city-proper. The younger clan members heard stories of it, although they were not allowed to know its location, and the prospect of such a nice living arrangement encouraged them to work up to a rank when they might finally be invited to live there.
Ti Xi stood alone in the foyer, grinning to himself for a moment. “Dà gē…?” came Wu’s voice, snapping Ti Xi back to the present. “About the raid on the Du clan’s slum tonight: the briefing will be held in the grand dining room in a few minutes.”
“Thanks, Wu. I’m prepared,” Ti Xi said. “Did you make the maps I asked for?”
“They’re ready, Ti Xi. But I don’t understand why we need to go to battle over such an insignificant piece of turf. I don’t think the men will like it, Ti Xi…” Wu walked past Ti Xi, casually pausing to brush some dust off a table. “We’re going to lose people we don’t need to waste on something like this,” he said casually, not looking up.
“I’ve seen that place for myself,” Ti Xi said, gravely. “The people living there are poorest of the poor, and the Du clan still gouges their rents and charges them protection. If we take it over we’ll get the income from all those renters, and just by charging a fair price we’ll have their loyalty too. They’ll pay the Ban Clan, and be glad to do it.” He took a betel nut out of a bowl on the table and popped it in his mouth. “Besides, exploiting civilians—poor civilians—like that…it dishonors the Hei Chaoliu.”
“Right, and the chance to play the rescuer to a few impressionable peasant girls has nothing to do with it?” Wu smirked. Ti Xi shot him a mischievous look.
Ti Xi closed his eyes and began stroking his doorknocker beard. “It’s just unfortunate we have to do this without Ying Su here. I’m a little worried.” Ti Xi closed his eyes and began stroking his doorknocker beard. “I’ll never have another lieutenant with the tactical skill she has. She could have been in the army, you know… That’s what she should be, not a crime lord’s lieutenant.” He sighed.
Wu clenched his jaw at the mention of Ying Su’s name. She had only joined the clan two years ago after he and Ti Xi had rescued her from the Du clan, but Ti Xi had already made her a lieutenant on the same level as Wu himself. It was true she had a masterful affinity for strategy and planning, but Wu knew the same was true of him, and he hadn’t been promoted so fast. He resented her as a newcomer who didn’t know her place, and he chafed at the fact that Ti Xi allowed this situation to continue just for the sake of Su’s abilities. She was his rival, and Wu was a talented man unused to having rivals. But they were both loyal to the Mountain Master, and neither would want to offend him by bad-mouthing the other. So, Wu bit his tongue and dissembled in front of the boss.
“You were the one who sent Su to Omashu to look for ways to expand the clan. I think you’re overestimating her anyway,” Wu replied. “I mean, she’s is good—probably the best—but you and I don’t need her just to take a patch of turf from trash like the Du.”
Ti Xi laughed. “True! Go set up and make sure the men are in there.”
Wu went off and Ti Xi took a few minutes to collect himself and finish chewing his betel nut before entering his dining room with his men. The betel nuts helped keep him calm. Ying Su said he chewed them too often, but it wasn't as though they were doing any damage.
The briefing went well, and the men retired for a few hours sleep. Just before dawn the Ban clan assembled to carry out the plan. Ti Xi left his compound in the Agrarian District early to meet his men in the Lower Ring and march at their head. Ti Xi was, in all things, a leader. He, Wu, and his other officers bent their way through the inner wall and met his men. They struck out from their own territory in the dim light of the half moon and the odd candle or street lamp.
Knowing of the plan in advance, Ban members of all ranks appeared out of alleys and side streets, forming up behind Ti Xi and Wu. Like a small army, the Ban members of every rank strode down the streets of Ba Sing Se’s poor Lower Ring. Hei Chaoliu clans fought over sections of the city like generals in war. The Hei Chaoliu, the Black Current of Ba Sing Se, was the city’s criminal underworld. All illegal dealings in the city went through at least one Hei Chaoliu clan, and usually several dozen. However, a clan could only conduct its illegal dealings in areas of the city that it kept the other clans out of. Therefore, the clans were constantly locked in brutal gang warfare. Any Hei Chaoliu member could be murdered at any time, but still their numbers swelled, especially in this era. Violent as their lifestyle was, the citizens of the Lower Ring were so desperately poor that illegal dealings were virtually the only way for them to make a half-decent living.
Ti Xi would cross though his own clan’s territory, but when they entered the streets controlled by the Du clan it would be like invading a hostile nation in wartime. Anyone Ti Xi’s men ran into might kill them. Gang members wore no uniforms or colors to distinguish them from “civilians”—what Hei Chaoliu members called non-members—although different gangs did often have preferred weapons, unique tattoos, or kept certain animals as mascots.
As Ti Xi marched his men through the streets of his territory, the few civilians awake and about at that time waved or saluted in some way. Some even bowed. Unlike the Du clan and many other Hei Chaoliu clans, Ti Xi did show concern for the people living in his territory. He did not bully them, charge them protection money, or charge them unreasonable rates for loans. The people in a clan’s territory were the people with whom the clan did business, and as they say, you catch more beetle-flies with honey than with vinegar. Ti Xi made sure his customers trusted him with their business, and this policy had allowed him to make his clan among the most profitable in the city, though that was a position for which he constantly struggled. He was always fighting other clans as he was tonight.
Ti Xi and his men crossed a single city street and were suddenly in hostile territory. They hit the Du hard, and the raid went mostly according to plan. The Ban had the advantage of numbers. They kept the fights short and quiet. It was brutal fighting, but nothing new to these men. A knife thrust in the dark. A block and counter, then on to the next opponent. That was how the Hei Chaoliu had been for four hundred years.
Ti Xi and his men made it to the Du clan’s main office in that area, a bar attached to an inn. The door busted in as Ti Xi bent a rock into it. He confidently strode into the room. Two of the Du fighters in the room rushed him with their kris knives. Ti Xi quickly dispatched them with nothing but his hands and announced himself to the others. “Bring me to the officer in charge here. I have a deal for him.” Ti Xi’s men flooded the room and One-Eyed Wu took a protective stance at his boss’s right hand. Tense moments passed as Ban members and Du members eyed each other with drawn knives. Finally the Du boss—the head Du boss—emerged from a back room.
“Du Jungshi,” Ti Xi acknowledged.
The men had met a few times before. Jungshi tended to be a bit more formal than Ti Xi, cutting a trimmer figure in a black changshan. “Ban Ti Xi,” he replied. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t offer you any tea.”
“You’re as hilarious as ever,” Ti Xi said sarcastically. “But that’s not why we’re here. I have an offer for you. If you agree, I can make you rich.”
Ti Xi had not expected the head of the whole Du clan to show up in this small border district. The Du must have detected their approach. Ti Xi intended to simply push a few Du soldiers out of this neighborhood. Now the plan would have to change. He did not move a muscle, not even his eyes, though they seemed to absorb the whole room. Better to show strength now, he reasoned. He laid out an ultimatum.
“I don’t like the way the Du clan does business. I will let you and your clan survive if you agree to do things my way from now on. No more protection fees for merchants. You will set the rents and loan rates I give you. You can run the operations and keep a percentage of the money, but everything gets my approval first,” Ti Xi told Jungshi.
Jungshi stood up and began to pace the floor quite calmly. Ti Xi reached behind his back to grasp the kukri knife that rested in the sash at his waist, but he did not remove it. Jungshi’s sleeves hung down past his hands, and he folded his arms into them.
“Well…I will have to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of your offer.” He was speaking slowly, belaboring words unnecessarily. “Although it is said to be dishonorable for a clan to keep its name if ruled by another family… it is also said that profit is the true goal of every clan.” Very gradually, he was getting closer to Ti Xi. “My men would not like it…but then, as a leader, it is up to me to make the decisions and keep them in line.” He paused. Ti Xi wondered why Jungshi was being so verbose.
Jungshi removed is hands from their opposite sleeves, but the long garment still concealed them. “Oh well. It doesn’t matter anyway,” Jungshi smiled devilishly.
And then Wu put a blade in his neck.
Actually, I was posting this story here a few years ago, but I stopped writing it regularly while I was at school. However, I kept making notes and writing chapter outlines, so now I have the whole story planned out and I'm more prepared to post it regularly. I'm planning to post a new part every 2 weeks.
I hope it's not a problem that I'm starting a second thread with the same story, but I've made several revisions to the chapters I originally posted. I guess it must be okay since there hasn't been any activity here in so long. I think it's safe to assume most people here must not have read the original one.
Anyway, this is a multi-chapter all-OC or "elsewhere" fic about an Avatar who lived long before Aang. Here's the summary i wrote for fanfiction.net:
Set 950 years before the show, it's the story of Avatar Zhengyi, who would rather try to reclaim his birthright as heir to a crime family than save the world. He says he wants justice, but on his journey he's going to have to decide what that means.
For rating purposes, this is a PG-13 or T story for violence, character death, and alcohol/drug depictions.
Here it is:
Avatar: The Heir of Ban
[shadow=blue,left,300]By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third, by experience, which is bitterest.-- Kǒng Fū-zǐ (Confucious)
[/shadow]
Fire. Air. Water. Earth. My aunt used to tell me stories about the old days, when the Avatar was a paragon of righteousness and order for all the nations. I used to think that, somehow, the universe always chose a good, moral person to be the Avatar, but recently… I’ve started to think that maybe the world has just been lucky so far.
Fifteen years ago the previous Avatar died, just as the Earth Kingdom erupted into civil war between a confederation of eastern cities lead by Ba Sing Se and a confederation of western cities lead by Omashu, a development encouraged by the sanctimonious and tyrannical Earth King. Everyone thought a new Avatar would appear soon, to stop the war, depose the king, and return balance to the world with barely a wave of his hand. But the circumstances of this new Avatar’s life have lead him to forsake the Avatar’s duties for a selfish life dedicated to what he calls “justice,” and most would call “revenge.”
First, you have to understand the Hei Chaoliu, the Black Current of the Earth Kingdom, because that was the Avatar’s world for the first fifteen years of his life. The clans of the Hei Chaoliu claimed to be mutual protection societies for the poor citizens of the Lower Ring, but that was the farthest thing from the truth. The Hei Chaoliu was the collective name for dozens and dozens of clan-based gangs, competing for illegal commodities and territory. By the time the war broke out, one clan, the Ban, was on the verge of becoming the most powerful in the city. A son—Zhengyi—was born to the head of the Ban clan. I can’t help but think how much simpler the course of my life—even the course of history—would have been, if the Heir of Ban had not also been the Avatar.
Chapter 1: The Mountain Master’s Son
Part 1
Part 1
Ban Ti Xi’s foot stamped the ground, ejecting a rock from its resting place. He shot his fist out from his hip, sending the rock at one of his sparring partners. The other man quickly erected a wedge of earth and the rock shattered on its edge. The wedge sped toward Ti Xi, but he strongly thrust both his forearms at it, raising a rock wall. His open pao fluttered from the sharpness of his movements.
Two other sparring partners swung their fists upward like weights on a chain, lifting a massive boulder into the air and positioning it above Ti Xi’s head. With a crane’s beak hand technique, Ti Xi broke a core out of the rock for his body to occupy. Alone for a moment in the core of the boulder, he smiled at how staunchly his retainers obeyed his order to not hold back in practice. With barely enough room to move his muscular arms at the elbows, he struck the rock’s interior in several places, producing radial hairline fractures. He sent a barrage of rock sections at his sparring partners. This unexpected move neutralized nearly all of them. Ti Xi exhaled with a bridge hand. Only one of his retainers could still present any real challenge to him, and he wanted a challenge today.
Ti Xi called out to this man, who was leaning against a tree at the edge of Ban Ti Xi’s training courtyard, mostly hidden by the tree’s shadow, and audibly crunching on an apple. “Hey, Wu! You wanna fight? I need to practice against someone who can actually throw a rock!” Ti Xi said, charismatic as always, playfully clapping one of his exhausted sparring partners on the shoulder. Ti Xi traded a playful smile with his retainer.
Er Shi Wu’s only acknowledgement of his boss’s request was to step out from the shadow of the tree and toss his apple to the ground. The shadow seemed to lift off him like a curtain, exposing his green shirt on his wiry frame, his bright green left eye, and an eye-patch covering the right one. The patch bore the pygmy puma that was Ti Xi’s clan insignia, and it had also prompted Er Shi Wu’s nickname: “One-Eyed Wu.”
Wu casually strode on to the training ground with a chuckle. “You always win, Ti Xi,” he smiled.
“Not true,” Ti Xi acknowledged the abilities of this man, one of his top three lieutenants. “Up until a few years ago you used to beat me all the time, remember?”
Wu nodded in assent, taking a horse stance. “Seems like a long time,” he said. Ti Xi took a stance in kind.
Wu whipped his fists diagonally across his body, flinging stones at Ti Xi. Ti Xi pecked them all out of the air with his crane’s beak hand. They both knew this was just a warm-up.
Ti Xi then dropped to a lower stance, and a wave of earth shot from his foot straight at Wu. Wu anticipated this. He lifted a large chunk of earth out of the ground. As Ti Xi’s wave came at him, Wu spun to the side and took a drop stance. His chunk of earth spun with him and he fired it at Ti Xi. Ti Xi sprang backwards and rolled as the chunk flew over his head and shattered on the courtyard wall behind him. He got back to his feet and swung his hand in a circle behind him, raising an arc of earth aimed for Wu. Wu had already created a similar structure and was sending it toward Ti Xi.
“Mountain Master! Mountain Master!” came the winded voice of another of Ti Xi’s top men, Xin Kao. He was waving a parchment clasped in the three digits of his right hand. A rival clan had cut off his right pinky and ring finger many years ago when they once captured him. They had hoped to disgrace him, as amputated fingers were the mark of a traitor among the Hei Chaoliu clans. Ti Xi had too much trust in Kao for the tactic to work, but that was how he had earned his nickname, “Kao the Claw.” However, the name hardly fit Kao’s avuncular appearance, with his long white beard, deep brown eyes, bald head and big gut.
Wu and Ti Xi broke off the match, allowing their earthen projectiles to melt back into the ground. “Kao, you can call me by my name,” Ti Xi said. Kao had originally worked for Ti Xi’s father, and Ti Xi always felt strange being addressed so respectfully by a man ten years his senior.
“Apologies, Mou—Ti Xi. But we just got news from Bian Se Long.”
“Bian Se Long?” Ti Xi replied. Wu perked up his ears. Bian Se Long was a small port town near Chameleon Bay. Ti Xi had sent one of his mistresses there, ostensibly to keep her safe from rival clans. Everyone in the clan knew Ti Xi’s reputation as something of a skirt-chaser, and this particular woman Wu had never met. But he and Kao were the only one’s who knew the real reason Ti Xi had sent her away from the city: she was pregnant.
“Yes. I need to speak with you privately,” Kao said, still sounding urgent. Wu watched the two move off together into the main house of the Ban compound as he helped the other sparring partners up. The afternoon sun blazed over the Agrarian District of Ba Sing Se and the Ban family compound, and Wu felt it despite the meager shade provided by some of the trees at the edge of the training courtyard.
A couple of the pygmy pumas which were kept around the compound as pets— mascots of sorts for the clan—skittered out of the way as Kao and Ti Xi slid open the shoji and entered the house. Ti Xi nervously ran a hand over his shaven head. “How are they?” he asked. “Are they safe?” Ti Xi looked a little pale.
“Yes,” Kao smiled. “Both of them.”
Ti Xi huffed in relief. Cao, already twice a father himself, chuckled at Ti Xi’s reaction. “The Ban Clan will finally have an heir,” Ti Xi breathed.
“Kao, I want you to go there right away in my place,” Ti Xi told him. “Make sure everything goes smoothly,” he said in an exited fluster. Then he remembered Kao’s young daughter, only eighteen months old. “Will Fung be all right without you?”
“Her aunt at the abbey can look after her,” Kao smiled at his friend. “Don’t worry, Ti Xi. This is important; I want to go.”
Ti Xi placed his hand on Kao’s shoulder. “You’re my top man. I wouldn’t trust anyone else with something this important.”
Kao gave an assuring nod and walked up the imposing staircase toward his suite in the massive main house of the Ban clan’s compound. In order to motivate his men, Ti Xi allowed several dozens of his most senior lieutenants to live in his rather posh compound. The compound was officially a farm in the Agrarian District, but Ti Xi ran it more like a hotel or an army camp. Its several houses, especially the palatial main house, were generally much nicer than anything your average poor Hei Chaoliu gang member had ever seen. Ti Xi even allowed members to keep spouses and children with them at the compound, provided they didn’t enter the city-proper. The younger clan members heard stories of it, although they were not allowed to know its location, and the prospect of such a nice living arrangement encouraged them to work up to a rank when they might finally be invited to live there.
Ti Xi stood alone in the foyer, grinning to himself for a moment. “Dà gē…?” came Wu’s voice, snapping Ti Xi back to the present. “About the raid on the Du clan’s slum tonight: the briefing will be held in the grand dining room in a few minutes.”
“Thanks, Wu. I’m prepared,” Ti Xi said. “Did you make the maps I asked for?”
“They’re ready, Ti Xi. But I don’t understand why we need to go to battle over such an insignificant piece of turf. I don’t think the men will like it, Ti Xi…” Wu walked past Ti Xi, casually pausing to brush some dust off a table. “We’re going to lose people we don’t need to waste on something like this,” he said casually, not looking up.
“I’ve seen that place for myself,” Ti Xi said, gravely. “The people living there are poorest of the poor, and the Du clan still gouges their rents and charges them protection. If we take it over we’ll get the income from all those renters, and just by charging a fair price we’ll have their loyalty too. They’ll pay the Ban Clan, and be glad to do it.” He took a betel nut out of a bowl on the table and popped it in his mouth. “Besides, exploiting civilians—poor civilians—like that…it dishonors the Hei Chaoliu.”
“Right, and the chance to play the rescuer to a few impressionable peasant girls has nothing to do with it?” Wu smirked. Ti Xi shot him a mischievous look.
Ti Xi closed his eyes and began stroking his doorknocker beard. “It’s just unfortunate we have to do this without Ying Su here. I’m a little worried.” Ti Xi closed his eyes and began stroking his doorknocker beard. “I’ll never have another lieutenant with the tactical skill she has. She could have been in the army, you know… That’s what she should be, not a crime lord’s lieutenant.” He sighed.
Wu clenched his jaw at the mention of Ying Su’s name. She had only joined the clan two years ago after he and Ti Xi had rescued her from the Du clan, but Ti Xi had already made her a lieutenant on the same level as Wu himself. It was true she had a masterful affinity for strategy and planning, but Wu knew the same was true of him, and he hadn’t been promoted so fast. He resented her as a newcomer who didn’t know her place, and he chafed at the fact that Ti Xi allowed this situation to continue just for the sake of Su’s abilities. She was his rival, and Wu was a talented man unused to having rivals. But they were both loyal to the Mountain Master, and neither would want to offend him by bad-mouthing the other. So, Wu bit his tongue and dissembled in front of the boss.
“You were the one who sent Su to Omashu to look for ways to expand the clan. I think you’re overestimating her anyway,” Wu replied. “I mean, she’s is good—probably the best—but you and I don’t need her just to take a patch of turf from trash like the Du.”
Ti Xi laughed. “True! Go set up and make sure the men are in there.”
Wu went off and Ti Xi took a few minutes to collect himself and finish chewing his betel nut before entering his dining room with his men. The betel nuts helped keep him calm. Ying Su said he chewed them too often, but it wasn't as though they were doing any damage.
***
The briefing went well, and the men retired for a few hours sleep. Just before dawn the Ban clan assembled to carry out the plan. Ti Xi left his compound in the Agrarian District early to meet his men in the Lower Ring and march at their head. Ti Xi was, in all things, a leader. He, Wu, and his other officers bent their way through the inner wall and met his men. They struck out from their own territory in the dim light of the half moon and the odd candle or street lamp.
Knowing of the plan in advance, Ban members of all ranks appeared out of alleys and side streets, forming up behind Ti Xi and Wu. Like a small army, the Ban members of every rank strode down the streets of Ba Sing Se’s poor Lower Ring. Hei Chaoliu clans fought over sections of the city like generals in war. The Hei Chaoliu, the Black Current of Ba Sing Se, was the city’s criminal underworld. All illegal dealings in the city went through at least one Hei Chaoliu clan, and usually several dozen. However, a clan could only conduct its illegal dealings in areas of the city that it kept the other clans out of. Therefore, the clans were constantly locked in brutal gang warfare. Any Hei Chaoliu member could be murdered at any time, but still their numbers swelled, especially in this era. Violent as their lifestyle was, the citizens of the Lower Ring were so desperately poor that illegal dealings were virtually the only way for them to make a half-decent living.
Ti Xi would cross though his own clan’s territory, but when they entered the streets controlled by the Du clan it would be like invading a hostile nation in wartime. Anyone Ti Xi’s men ran into might kill them. Gang members wore no uniforms or colors to distinguish them from “civilians”—what Hei Chaoliu members called non-members—although different gangs did often have preferred weapons, unique tattoos, or kept certain animals as mascots.
As Ti Xi marched his men through the streets of his territory, the few civilians awake and about at that time waved or saluted in some way. Some even bowed. Unlike the Du clan and many other Hei Chaoliu clans, Ti Xi did show concern for the people living in his territory. He did not bully them, charge them protection money, or charge them unreasonable rates for loans. The people in a clan’s territory were the people with whom the clan did business, and as they say, you catch more beetle-flies with honey than with vinegar. Ti Xi made sure his customers trusted him with their business, and this policy had allowed him to make his clan among the most profitable in the city, though that was a position for which he constantly struggled. He was always fighting other clans as he was tonight.
Ti Xi and his men crossed a single city street and were suddenly in hostile territory. They hit the Du hard, and the raid went mostly according to plan. The Ban had the advantage of numbers. They kept the fights short and quiet. It was brutal fighting, but nothing new to these men. A knife thrust in the dark. A block and counter, then on to the next opponent. That was how the Hei Chaoliu had been for four hundred years.
Ti Xi and his men made it to the Du clan’s main office in that area, a bar attached to an inn. The door busted in as Ti Xi bent a rock into it. He confidently strode into the room. Two of the Du fighters in the room rushed him with their kris knives. Ti Xi quickly dispatched them with nothing but his hands and announced himself to the others. “Bring me to the officer in charge here. I have a deal for him.” Ti Xi’s men flooded the room and One-Eyed Wu took a protective stance at his boss’s right hand. Tense moments passed as Ban members and Du members eyed each other with drawn knives. Finally the Du boss—the head Du boss—emerged from a back room.
“Du Jungshi,” Ti Xi acknowledged.
The men had met a few times before. Jungshi tended to be a bit more formal than Ti Xi, cutting a trimmer figure in a black changshan. “Ban Ti Xi,” he replied. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t offer you any tea.”
“You’re as hilarious as ever,” Ti Xi said sarcastically. “But that’s not why we’re here. I have an offer for you. If you agree, I can make you rich.”
Ti Xi had not expected the head of the whole Du clan to show up in this small border district. The Du must have detected their approach. Ti Xi intended to simply push a few Du soldiers out of this neighborhood. Now the plan would have to change. He did not move a muscle, not even his eyes, though they seemed to absorb the whole room. Better to show strength now, he reasoned. He laid out an ultimatum.
“I don’t like the way the Du clan does business. I will let you and your clan survive if you agree to do things my way from now on. No more protection fees for merchants. You will set the rents and loan rates I give you. You can run the operations and keep a percentage of the money, but everything gets my approval first,” Ti Xi told Jungshi.
Jungshi stood up and began to pace the floor quite calmly. Ti Xi reached behind his back to grasp the kukri knife that rested in the sash at his waist, but he did not remove it. Jungshi’s sleeves hung down past his hands, and he folded his arms into them.
“Well…I will have to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of your offer.” He was speaking slowly, belaboring words unnecessarily. “Although it is said to be dishonorable for a clan to keep its name if ruled by another family… it is also said that profit is the true goal of every clan.” Very gradually, he was getting closer to Ti Xi. “My men would not like it…but then, as a leader, it is up to me to make the decisions and keep them in line.” He paused. Ti Xi wondered why Jungshi was being so verbose.
Jungshi removed is hands from their opposite sleeves, but the long garment still concealed them. “Oh well. It doesn’t matter anyway,” Jungshi smiled devilishly.
And then Wu put a blade in his neck.