Prison

Quietly walking in the prison halls, Bai Shuixian looked through in search of Bai Deming. He had stopped calling the old man, 'grandfather' or 'Grandmaster Bai' a long time ago.

Whenever Bai Shuixian had to call the old man those names, he would feel uncomfortable. He did not feel that Bai Deming deserved to be called a grandfather.

As Bai Shuixian paid attention to the sounds nearby, he heard the grumbling of the Bai clansmen.

"Fucking hell! Which bastard exposed us?" one man said with grieving anger.

"It doesn't matter who. What matters now is how much they know," another man coldly retorted at the angry man.

That was indeed a great question. How much did Bai Shuixian know?

The depth at which he knew was uncalculated. Even Bai Shuixian himself did not know how much he knew. Perhaps what he knew was barely the tip of the iceberg, or maybe the opposite, the roots of the tree.

"Grandmaster Bai, would you happen to know who snitched on us?" a man with a sinister eye asked.

Hearing the arguments and scuffles of the men, Bai Deming answered, "I have no knowledge of it. Magistrate Chen did not tell me."

"You mean, he stayed in your hall for thirty minutes not talking about anything important?" the one who cursed earlier asked with a frustrated voice.

"It was important. Of course, it was important," Bai Deming said. "But, how important, I do not know. The man had gone back and forth with his words. All he did was speak thousands of sentences and yet only one came out to be understandable."

"Grandmaster Bai, your words are not that different from Magistrate Chen's," the man with a cold voice stated.

Sighing, Bai Deming told them, "This old man can not remember the conversation. I can only remember his last sentence."

Even if they were prepared for death, all the clansmen still wanted to know who was the person that brought the clan to flames.

Seeing the eagerness in the men's faces, Bai Deming repeated slowly what Chen Shi said to him, "Even mountains can hide in plain sights."

Confused, the man with a sinister eye asked, "Grandmaster Bai, this does not explain anything. Are you sure the magistrate is not messing around with you?"

The angry man was sure that Chen Shi was just messing with the clan. He was more sure than anyone that all their deeds were hidden. No records were lost and yet they got caught. He could not believe that there was someone more clever than him.

Bai Deming only sighed at the man's question. His ego was greatly hurt and he did not want to talk anymore. Thinking about the downfall of his clan would only hurt him more.

Throughout this conversation, Bai Shuixian was listening. He caught himself wanting to laugh too many times during their discussion. He thought those men were too spoiled and did not understand the world as well as him.

Even if he was in a child's body, his age was twenty-one. The clansmen had prided and regarded themselves too much. When one's ego has reached beyond one's abilities, it would eventually bring upon one's downfall.

Tired of hearing of their bickering, Bai Shuixian finally stepped out from his hiding spot and grandly called, "Grandmaster Bai."

When everyone heard the soft voice of Bai Shuixian in the prison, they all froze. Bai Deming became shocked and his face went pale. All the people behind the bars turned their heads towards the place where they heard the voice and a few elderly men fainted.

Seeing the weak hearts of the elders, Bai Shuixian stated, "Grandmaster Bai has quite a strong heart."

Hearing his name being called out again, Bai Deming got out of his eventual shock and asked, "What are you doing here?"

"Didn't you ask for it?" Bai Shuixian asked back with a broad and impudent smile.

As soon as everyone heard that, they all went silent. This little boy, they thought, is he implying to them that he was the person who caused the clan to fall? How could they believe it?

The same angry man who was talking earlier broke the deafening silence and shouted, "You little brat! What the hell did you do? We are your own family are we not! You ungrateful white eyed wolf! We fed food to an ingrate!"

Bai Shuixian scoffed, "Fed me? The amount of food I ate is less than the amount of fertilizers given to the plants in the garden."

Being retorted, the man shut his mouth. The man felt that if he spoke too much, he might lose the little bit of confidence he had left in him.

Then, the man with a cold face spoke, "Little boy, what did you tell the warrens?"

Bai Shuixian gave the man an evil laugh before saying, "You do not need to know."

Bai Shixian already knew what the man was thinking. His small size had deterred the danger in him and thus, the people thought that perhaps he merely filed a small, but important complaint to an insignificant warren. Important enough to throw them all in the cells. No one thought at all that he directly went to the magistrate and gave him the whole story.

Turning back to Bai Deming, Bai Shuixian asked, "Aren't you curious? Curious about how much I know?"

Remaining ignorant of Bai Shuixian's question, Bai Deming kept silent. He refused to listen. In his mind, was one thing, 'I must live strong, until the hanging day.'

As though seeing his will, Bai Shuixian laughed, "Old man, your stubbornness is truly strong."

"Have you no respect for your father?" Bai Huang said with the tone of a lecture.

With his attention taken from Bai Deming, Bai Shuixian coldly retorted, "Father? I have none."

"Y-you," Bai Huang stuttered while pointing his finger at Bai Shuixian.

"Old man, didn't you want to make me a slave of the Bai clan?" Bai Shuixian chuckled with a cold glint. "A foolish puppet at your every command? If I remember correctly, did you not say, 'To make me the toughest metal that would only bend under the will of mother nature?'"

After Bai Deming had finished torturing him, Bai Shuixian had hid in a corner and listened in on the conversations of the old man. From there, he had learned about how every generation, there was one illegitimate child that was trained to become a brainless puppet for the family. The puppet did not listen to anyone's command other than the patriarch and committed frightful sins in the deathly nights of a way.

It was in this way that the Bai family had been able to retain their famous name as an undefeated house of generals. There was no one in the empire that knew about how it was all because of the sacrifice of one child who was forced to undergo many strengthening and torturous training. Had the child actually been Bai Shuixian who was trained, their puppet would have already been created.

However, it was another person with a stronger mentality than Bai Shuixian and someone who was used to pain. He was experienced in the ways of the sword and wars was his favorite thing. Only, nobody knew that while assuming that it was but a tiny child with no protector that could be exploited.

Bai Deming's face went extremely pale. His original calm façade, gone.

With a trembling voice, Bai Deming asked, "Where did you get those words?"