At the outskirts of Imperial City, the sky was akin to a masterpiece on the easel of a creator. The night was like those curtains of the theatre that falls after the scene ends. And on the next day, this curtain will be raised again and we'd see a bright new day with a whole new scene filled with new characters.
The tranquil black sky sang a beautiful choir with the twinkling stars. And the accompanying crescent moon sent a steady rhythm to the earth in the form of its soft light.
In a bamboo house's small room, a figure laid still on the cold floor looking at the sky through the glass roof above with green eyes. Like a lifeless person, she didn't move an inch of her body.
The silent night's tranquility was broken by the sound of crickets and buzzes from other insects in the forest. But what Ru heard was the poetry from the starry night. A whisper only meant for her.
'She walks in the dark night,
with no hope of light in sight.
She likes flaunting her dark heart,
hiding her soul that was falling apart.
She loves her dark clothes
like people love a rose.
This queen was called a ghost,
but she was a shadow that wasn't just a hoax.'
Her eyes were still blinking when the curtain of darkness started to be lifted slowly and the sunlight cascaded down on the earth with its orange pearl like rays. When her cloak of darkness lifted, she pushed herself off the cold hard ground and trudged out to the open courtyard after wearing her training suit and running shoes.
As per her routine of the day, she ran for an hour in the woods. After that, she stood still in the middle of the courtyard and took deep breaths. After calming her mind and making her spirit a bit free, she moved her body to shift to a stable stance.
Ru raised her hands in front of her as if defending herself from an imaginary attack while her elbows protecting her ribs. She stepped forward with her non-dominant leg keeping her knees slightly bent and threw a punch straight into the air.
On the far end, the members of Black Mist was looking at her practicing her favorite martial arts style; Krav Maga.[1] Krav Maga was said to be the most effective style but when they watched the way Ru's nimble body moved with her sharp senses, they could only stay frozen at their spot.
In Krav Maga, speed and flow of attacks mattered a lot since it had root techniques from Muay Thai and Jui-Juitsu. And Ru had trained in a way that her speed was hard to follow. People hardly could catch the way she delivered her punches or kicks although, she did both of those scarcely.
Out of the younger generation of her own clan, she was considered the fastest one and yet her grandmasters always scolded her for being slow. Perhaps, it was their cruel remarks that pushed her to keep striving for best even after leaving her clan behind. Her hunger for being the best was the reason that today, this most challenging martial arts style looked like a piece of cake for her.
"Are you guys just going to stand there?" Ru's deep voice rang in the courtyard making the tandem of five to feel flustered.
They came up to her in an orderly manner with their heads lowered in respect. "Don't tell me that you couldn't open the mouth of two small flies in the past 8 hours." Ru's tone held a dangerous touch to it making them sweat buckets.
"Master, they opened their mouths," Adia started.
"And?" Ru urged her to continue as she stared her down. Even though Adia wasn't looking at Ru's eyes, she still could feel the cold shudder running up her spine.
"They are of no use. They don't know much." Another member of Black Mist, Connor spoke up respectfully.
"That I already knew. Tell me something that I don't know," Ru shifted her body closer to them as her voice turned lower.
"Well, they did tell us that the weapons been coming through Hong Kong. But whoever is calling the shots in Hong Kong isn't the mastermind." Adia added in to help Connor.
Ru pondered for a while before saying, "You have one week. I want all the details of things happening in Hong Kong." She looked at the group of five standing still without any intention to leave and spoke sarcastically, "What? Want to stay for breakfast?"
"Ah? No, no... We're going!" All of them ran out in a frenzy. Although they respected their master the most in this world, they were scared of their master the most as well.
"Wu Dishi!" Ru called out and Wu Dishi came up to her side. "I heard there is a very famous ramen shop named, Ramen for Life."
"Yes, I've heard of it. Does master want me to order some ramen from there?" He inquired.
"Nope. Just drop me off to that shop after I go through the files you brought." Wu Dishi nodded his head and passed all the documents to her.
While she was reading the files in her hand, Wu Dishi kept staring at her with a complicated expression.
"Do you have something to ask?" Ru's sudden question surprised Wu Dishi.
He cleared his throat awkwardly as he tried to speak, "Master, do you mind me asking something?"
"Just ask. I can guarantee that I won't bite you," she said that with a smirk which was too hard for Wu Dishi to handle.
'Gosh! Master, why are you so handsome?' Wu Dishi shook his mind to get rid of his own ridiculous thoughts. "Master, why did you personally come to China and that too just because of two assassins?" This thing had been bothering him from the time Ru came to China. He didn't think that those assassins were such a threat for his master to leave Europe and come back to China all of a sudden.
"Hmmm..." Ru sighed heavily as she answered, "You're right! Those assassins or arms smuggling has no concern with me. But that mute girl who came to kill me and her way of looking at me, I can't get it over my head."
Wu Dishi frowned by her side as he added, "What do you mean, master?"
"She was like a puppet whose strings were being pulled. Assassins are emotionless and I know that better than anyone but she didn't even have the right to think for herself." As Ru spoke, Wu Dishi's heart shook a bit.
"Do you mean that she's a part of those human puppets experiments?" Ru nodded her head making Wu Dishi's fear come true. He couldn't possibly imagine that kind of inhumane thing.
But he didn't know the fact that his own master had been a victim of that experiment once. Her mind might have made her forget that nightmare but her body was still living that nightmare. And the pain in her body reminded her of that nightmare every single day. And to retrieve those missing pieces of her memory, she had to get to the mastermind behind those experiments.
It was her only lead in the past decade and she wasn't willing to lose it at any cost!
It took her four hours to go through all the documents and after that, Wu Dishi dropped her off at the famous ramen shop in the school district.
The ramen shop was rather designed in a simple style with wooden interior. Ru walked inside and heard a polite, "Welcome customer! Take a seat!" Ru was surprised by the smile she was receiving from the cute girl at the door.
The cute girl showed her to a table and took her order. "Give me the most amazing bowl of ramen."
"Which flavor would you like?" The cute girl asked smiling brightly at Ru.
Ru looked at the cute girl with her green eyes and propping her chin on her palm said, "Which one would you order?"
The cute teenage girl lost herself in Ru's beautiful eyes and that handsome face. "I'd order a Nagasaki Champon. It's the best one here."
"Oh, then I'll take what this cutie is suggesting," Ru passed her most amazing smile making the cute girl feel like floating in the air. She blushed and ran back to the kitchen.
"Why did she run away? Was I scary just now?" Ru asked herself as she saw the cute girl's odd reaction.
"You weren't scary rather you were quite good at flirting," Ru lifted her eyes to see Xiao Zhi-Yuan standing closer to her seat.
Ru frowned as she said, "But I wasn't flirting."
Xiao Zhi-Yuan took a seat opposite of Ru without asking and said, "Then you're really clueless about your charms." Ru decided not to answer to that. It wasn't worth it. She didn't like making small talk anyway. But Xiao Zhi-Yuan spoke up again, "What are you doing here all alone? And why is it that you're always alone?"
When Xiao Zhi-Yuan ditched school just now, he didn't expect to find Ru in the ramen shop near his school. He was surprised and mostly, happy to have found her without even looking.
"Am I the only person alone in this world?" Ru's words made Xiao Zhi-Yuan scowl as she added, "We all come alone to this world and leave alone as well. Death will be black, lonely and dark. So, isn't it better to make peace with your solitude beforehand?"
Xiao Zhi-Yuan stared at her face for a long while before speaking, "Death is black and dark only because we have no-one to share it with. But as for life, isn't it better to make life a bit brighter since we have no control over death? Because once you die, you're gone."
'Some people defy death as well but they have to live their life like living through hell.' Ru thought with a hand over her chest. Her body reminded her of the pain when the bullet pierced through the left side of her chest. Who knew it was her luck or misfortune that her heart was slight to the right side.
Some nightmares simply don't end even after you wake up from your sleep.
[1] "Krav Maga": Also known as contact combat.