Reunion with Youshin

The Emperor's procession was a relatively small platoon of soldiers and a wagon where Meng was kept comfortable and locked up. The bustling streets of Jeiwo were emptied as the Emperor left the city’s comfortable walls and into the rolling hills of Ji.

All the while, Meng was served cups of tea by a gruff looking soldier.

“Soooo, do you know where we’re going?” Meng asked awkwardly, kicking her legs in the mostly empty wagon. The soldier said nothing and just pointed at the stone. Meng groaned.

“Like, yeah I know but… where is that?” Meng asked insistantly.

“Somewhere east of the capital.” The guard replied bluntly.

“Oh this is going to be a long journey isn’t it?” Meng thought to herself as she grabbed her cup of tea.

Despite her poor company, the journey was at least a comfortable one. Compared to all the weeks she spent trekking through the Ji countryside on foot anyway.

Though, this was also a long journey and one she was not in control of. She was only let out to guide the Emperor whenever they were met with a fork in the path. For reasons unknown to Meng, she was the only one who could use this compass stone.

But eventually she heard the stirring of soldiers, the wagon suddenly stopped and nearly caused Meng to drop her lunch onto the guard sitting opposite her.

“What was that?!” Meng asked, worried that they’d encountered bandits again.

“We’ve found him.” The guard grinned as he quickly kicked the door to the wagon down, joining his comrades and leaving Meng unsupervised for the first time since this journey started.

Meng cautiously poked her head out of the wagon, seeing the soldiers were surrounding Emperor Taoyan as he gave a speech.

“... Where finally we can rectify this tragedy, and slay the demon that killed my brother and maimed your emperor!” Emperor Taoyan shouted, raising his decorated qiang spear into the air.

Meng looked left and saw the caravan behind her had been emptied of soldiers, and she looked to her right seeing the caravan in front of her had also been emptied of soldiers.

With a delicate step she hopped out of the caravan and onto the road, with a less delicate step she stumbled off the path and with a series of frantic steps she ran away as one of the soldiers shouted that Meng was running away.

“I can’t let them kill Youshin! Or me!” Meng thought as she frantically hit the compass stone against a tree as she ran into a large rice field. The stone pointed her towards a small hill where Meng prayed that Youshin was hiding behind.

“YOUSHIN! YOUSHIN HELP!” Meng shouted as she was chased by suddenly a lot of soldiers on horseback. Stirring to life, the sleepy dragon grumbled and groaned as he pulled himself up. Lazily he poked his head above the hill and with bleary eyes saw a familiar face running up to him. With a groan the dragon shook his long body away and grabbed a small cloud and began to fly towards the girl.

“YOUSHINNN!” Meng screamed as the horses buckled and tried to run away from the approaching dragon. Meng tripped, dropping the compass stone and fell into the water of the rice field as more soldiers came running towards Youshin, ignoring Meng entirely as they fired their bows.

With a growl Youshin blew out a thick cloudy breath that acted like a sticky wall, with all of the arrows, and soldiers, getting stuck inside as Youshin grabbed Meng, throwing her on his back haphazardly. Meng nearly slipped as she landed on Youshin's scaly back but quickly managed to find some leverage by grabbing one of his back spikes.

Meng steadied herself, only glancing to the ground where she saw a very angry looking Emperor Taoyan and his platoon helplessly stare as Youshin flew further into the sky.

“Woah, how’d you do that?” Meng asked as she stared at the solid wall of clouds slowly dissipating. Youshin used his long neck to turn around and glared at Meng.

“I could ask you the same question. How did you find me?” Youshin asked angrily as Meng awkwardly twiddled her fingers.

“I uh… used a rock.”

“A rock?”

“Maybe more of a stone? I uh… dropped it down there.”

“Great… That’s just fantastic.” Youshin groaned as he kept flying higher in the midday clouds, turning his head back to face forwards once again.

“I-I didn’t want to lead them here! They said they’d take me to the moon if I led them to you and he was all scary and so I said yes and-”

“You should’ve just said yes.”

“B-But they were gonna kill you!”

“They couldn’t, and besides even if they did the Emperor is a man of his word. He would’ve got you to the moon.”

“B-but… I wanna go with you now!” Meng retorted defiantly.

“I’m flattered but once again, I must refuse.”

“Hmpth! Well don’t take me back to Jeiwo… I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to go back there.” Meng anxiously requested. Youshin let out a laugh.

“I would have to concur, it would be quite dangerous for me as well. Will you tell me where your hometown is this time?”

“Fine… it’s Zhen. Near the northern border.”

“That’s quite far from here, and Mount Powzu.”

“I’ve been travelling for a while… Ooo, maybe the blacksmith will make you a saddle for when we go to the moon!”

“I’m not taking you to the moon…”

“I can be very convincing on long journeys.”

“I will make sure this is a short journey then.”