Chapter 57: Resonance

When Wu Yue-Ling awoke, it was already noon the next day.

She sat up, rubbed her forehead, and glanced at Xiao Chun, who was sleeping soundly at the bedside. She opened her palm and sighed, suddenly realizing that this was the first time since arriving here that she truly felt exhausted. She gathered her hair that hung over her shoulder. Women, she thought, are troublesome creatures, but she herself was not quite a woman, which made things even more complicated.

“Exhausted in body and spirit…”

Of course, so much had happened lately; fatigue was inevitable.

Hearing the princess’s murmured lament, Xiao Chun woke up, stood quickly, and wiped the corners of her eyes with her sleeve. “Princess, you’re awake. I didn’t mean to sleep by your bedside. Princess, you must be hungry, I…”

“It’s all right. You don’t have to keep watching over me, nor need you apologize. Be at ease before me; it would please me greatly.” With that, she threw back the quilt to rise, but the winter chill made her laugh at herself as she wrapped the quilt back around. So much for bravery—she couldn’t even leave the comfort of her bed.

Xiao Chun responded softly, seeing a smile on the princess’s face that she had never seen before, and smiled herself. Only now did she fully realize how peculiar the princess was.

“Xiao Chun, fetch me a bowl of noodles. I want noodles.” After dressing, she finally left the warmth of her bed, but still felt cold.

“Of course.”

Waiting for Xiao Chun to leave, Wu Yue-Ling changed into a black military fleece, which felt much more comfortable. She layered her outer garments, stood before the bronze mirror, and saw herself bundled up like a giant rice dumpling.

It wasn’t elegant, but it was warm. She wrapped a scarf as well. Good—now in the mirror, she was a complete dumpling. Putting on her hat, she became a dumpling with no filling showing.

The door opened; Xiao Chun entered carrying noodles, setting them on the round table. Seeing the princess’s bulky figure, she thought she’d encountered a monster and screamed. The shriek startled Hua Chu-Er, who was hiding in the rafters, causing her to jump down, thinking an enemy had arrived.

Wu Yue-Ling took off her hat and calmed both Xiao Chun and Chu-Er. Don’t be surprised; I haven’t disappeared, nor been kidnapped, and certainly haven’t turned into a monster.

She approached the bowl of noodles and inhaled its aroma. Such fragrance. She asked if the two had eaten. Hua Chu-Er replied that she’d already stolen several pieces of stir-fried meat from the kitchen and was quite full.

When asked how, Hua Chu-Er said she’d used her jade chopsticks to sneak meat from the pot and bowl, letting it cool in her own bowl before eating.

Wu Yue-Ling took a mouthful of noodles and told Xiao Chun to go eat in the kitchen too, since she was the only one who hadn’t eaten.

A small lynx, lured by the smell, waddled in and circled its mistress’s legs. She was astonished by how stout the little lynx had grown—any fatter and it would be a stubby-tailed Garfield cat.

She continued eating, glancing at the plump lynx, then at Hua Chu-Er. She recalled she hadn’t fed meat to the little creature lately, and seeing Chu-Er grinning with her tongue out, realized the truth. She pointed her chopsticks at Hua Chu-Er—so, when you sneak food, you bring these little ones along as well?

Hua Chu-Er saw the princess had discovered she’d fed meat to the lynx and tiptoed toward the window. As a professional thief, her first escape route would never be the front door.

Wu Yue-Ling couldn’t be bothered to scold her. After finishing the noodles, she met with the brewers in the main hall, exchanging the method for brewing beer with them. She wasn’t exactly an expert, but she could talk up a storm. It involved sprouted barley and hops, filtered to make a frothy drink—perfect for summer.

The brewers didn’t fully understand, but followed the princess’s instructions, motivated by the promise of a reward for successful brewing.

She sent them back to the brewery to experiment, handed three distillation apparatus blueprints to Yu Chao-En, instructing him to take them to the smithy for fabrication. Success depended on the blacksmiths’ skills; if they failed… a beating would come first.

She called Wan-Er, took a bag of supplies, and had Hua Chu-Er lead the way. They avoided the servants bustling about the estate and headed to the back mountain.

The mountain was neither high nor low. The three of them stepped through unmelted snow, arriving at a snowy grove at the foot, finding a sheltered slope with a small clearing ahead.

Wu Yue-Ling pulled a small bamboo tube from the bag and took out flint, calling Wan-Er and Chu-Er to watch her demonstration and warning them that there would be a loud bang. She aimed the tube at a tree trunk, struck the flint, lit the fuse; with a crisp pop, the front of the bamboo tube exploded, knocking snow from the branches and sending a soft rustle through the woods.

Suddenly, a wild hen burst from the distant undergrowth, flapping its wings to escape these dangerous humans, desperate to flee.

No chance of escape—Wu Yue-Ling, through two layers of clothing, tried to draw her revolver but couldn’t. Seeing the bird about to vanish, she quickly switched to her submachine gun. At this range, she was sure of a hit. A burst of fire, and the wild hen fell.

The lynx tried to chase the bird, but its bulk made it slip and tumble in the hard snow, face down and covered in frost. The little white tiger, startled too, ran out, then circled back and forth, finally dragging the shot hen back.

“What weapon is this, young lady?” Wan-Er, hands released from her ears, looked curiously at the strange black object and bamboo tube in Wu Yue-Ling’s hands.

She put away the submachine gun, discarded the spent bamboo tube, and took two more bamboo tubes from the bag, handing them to Wan-Er and Chu-Er.

“This device, for now, I’ll call it the manually ignited flintlock bamboo tube round, or perhaps a one-shot savage pistol,” Wu Yue-Ling carefully named the peculiar weapon.

Wan-Er looked bewildered; Chu-Er seemed thoughtful.

“Let’s just call it a bamboo round,” Chu-Er suggested, glancing at the iron pellet embedded in the tree.

“Fine, that works. Anyway, once ignited, it fires directly and can harm opponents. The maximum effective range is about a hundred paces.”

“Oh,” Wan-Er nodded, half understanding.

“Wan-Er, use it for self-defense; Chu-Er, you can use it as a hidden weapon.”

Wu Yue-Ling taught them hand-in-hand until they grasped the principle: the direction the arrowhead points is where the bullet comes out; remember this to avoid accidental injury.

After instruction, Wu Yue-Ling took out another small bamboo tube—a miniature bomb, with limited power, only effective within a pace, injuring anyone within two.

She lit it, tossed it, and it blasted up earth. Wan-Er merely familiarized herself with this weapon, but it was mainly for Chu-Er’s use, in case of unavoidable conflict—a surprise attack suited to a thief.

Wu Yue-Ling dubbed it the Super Invincible Cosmic Mini Bomb, or… she was interrupted by Chu-Er, who declared, “Just call it bamboo thunder; it splits the earth like a bolt from the blue.”

The lynx and white tiger hid far away, thoroughly frightened by these terrifying devices.

Wu Yue-Ling quietly tested weapons on the back mountain, and the noise had already reached the ears of servants nearby. When they arrived, they found the princess and asked what was happening—why did it sound like thunder? Wu Yue-Ling bluffed, saying they had just arrived themselves and caught a wild old hen…

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