Volume 2 Chapter 32

  Tan sat at the table with his friends. Pao remained silent and would not speak. The twins shifted uncomfortably when Tan looked at them. Kora stared at the table with a distant expression on her face.

  “What do I do?” Tan asked. “I don’t understand what it is that I’m supposed to do. I can sit on the throne, but I can’t do anything. I tried today, but I can sense that if I try to fight some of the people protecting me they’ll win. I’d just humiliate myself. Why is everyone here so stupidly strong?”

  “You can sense how strong they are just by looking at them?” Kora asked.

  “If I want to, yeah,” Tan admitted. “I just open my third eye and it’s easy.”

  Kora stared at him blankly. “Tan, do you realize how incredible what you just said was?”

  “What?”

  “You’ve opened your third eye? How old are you again, thirteen? That’s incredible! I wish I were as talented as you,” she declared.

  Tan frowned. “What good is being able to see something if I can’t touch it?” he said. “I don’t get what game it is that I’m supposed to be playing. Renton just talks in riddles when he eats his breakfast, and then spends all day sleeping.”

  “Tan, your family is amazing,” Won said. “Put me on the throne tomorrow, and I’ll see if I can figure out how to help.”

  “What do you mean?” Tan asked.

  “He’s asking you to appoint him as your right hand, Tan,” Kora said. She shifted uncomfortably. “It might work, actually. If you put Won on the throne, but we announce that his name is Tanshen Shenlong, then when he appears and we announce that the right hand of Tanshen Shenlong sits on the throne, I mean, that’s the tradition, isn’t it?”

  “What tradition?” Tan said.

  “Oh, that’s right,” Kora said, covering his face. “Tan, come to the throne room tomorrow and I’ll explain how your uncle’s court used to work before he put the throne outside the palace.”

  “Okay,” Tan said.

  “Although, well, the thing is,” Kora said sheepishly, “I’m mostly guessing. I never saw your uncle at court, you know? I met him that day, but I thought he was someone else.”

  That night, Renton was awoken by his servants before he was scheduled to stand guard at the gate. They bade him eat, they bade him drink, they dressed him, and they gave him the report on the movements of the child of heaven. He grinned, for his nephew was learning quickly.

  He asked his servants where the child of heaven could be found, and he found the child of heaven in the children’s court, his head in his hands as he tried to understand exactly what it was he was supposed to learn.

  “What did you learn today, Tan?” Renton asked.

  “I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing?” Tan replied.

  “Good. You are learning how to be an emperor after all,” Renton said. “Would you like my help?”

  “ Now you offer to help me? After making me look like a fool all week?”

  “I made you the child of heaven, Tan. Do you know how I know you’re the child of heaven?” Renton asked.

  “Because I can fly?”

  “Because nobody has once tried to prove that you are not. They aren’t afraid of looking foolish, they’re afraid of heaven’s retribution if they touch you. The people who aren’t afraid of you are in awe of you, and the people who would depose you cannot reach you. Would you like to stop being the child of heaven?”

  “Yes,” Tan said. “Tell me how.”

  “No. Figure it out yourself. In the mean time, I heard you held court today. When you hold court tomorrow, would you like to receive petitioners?” Renton asked

  “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “It’s very simple. Tomorrow, when you hold court, I shall allow five petitioners to petition the children’s court. If the emperor of tomorrow ratifies the edicts of today and the emperor of yesterday, then the emperor of night shall ratify the mandate of heaven, and it shall become law in the Blue Dragon Empire,” Renton explained.

  Tan looked at him. “What?”

  Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Who is the emperor of today, Tan? Let’s say his name at the same time.”

  Tan said one name, and Renton said another.

  Tan frowned at his uncle. “You just said your own name.”

  “Who is the emperor of tomorrow, Tan,” Renton questioned. “Let’s say his name together.”

  Again, they said a name, and Renton said his own name once more.

  Tan frowned at him. “I’m not following what you’re getting at.”

  “Who is the emperor of the night, Tan?” Renton asked.

  “You are.”

  “Who made me the emperor of the night?”

  Tan stared at him. “What?”

  “Who made the emperor of the night the emperor of the night? Let’s say his name together.”

  They spoke a name, and Renton said the name Tanshen Shenlong.

  Tan just blinked. “What does this all mean?”

  “How many voices does it take to proclaim an emperor, Tan?” Renton asked.

  “I have no idea.”

  “One. His own. An emperor rules by the right of his voice. He governs by the strength of his right hand, and his left hand, and his will, and his reach. When he encounters a problem that he cannot fix, then he must find a way to overcome it or he loses the mandate of heaven,” Renton explained. “Think about it for a while. I’ll send you five orphans tomorrow, and you can do whatever you want with them, okay?”

  “What am I supposed to do with orphans?” Tan asked.

  “I don’t know. Why don’t you proclaim them emperor?”

  “That didn’t work out so well the last time,” Tan said.

  “Yes, well, change the future. If you want to be emperor somehow, then start acting like one.”

  “How am I supposed to do that?” Tan asked.

  “How did I become emperor, Tan?” Renton asked.

  “You inherited it from—”

  “Wrong!” Renton said. He smiled and took a bite of a peach. “I proclaimed myself emperor. I challenged anyone to prove that I wasn’t. Three days passed, and nobody appeared. Three weeks passed, and nobody appeared. Seven years passed, and nobody appeared. But the palace of the Blue Dragon Empire continued to function. Finally, I got bored, so I went to the front gate and ordered that it be opened. I proclaimed that anyone who could get past me would see the emperor of the blue dragon empire and could petition them for redress.”

  He took a bite of a peach.

  “I don’t get it,” Tan said.

  “Who stands guard at the front gate, Tan?” Renton asked.

  “You do.”

  “Yes, but who stands guard at the front gate while I’m asleep?” Renton asked. “Who is stopping the crowd outside from swarming the palace and deposing me? Who is stopping them from appearing before the throne and desecrating it?”

  “There is no throne inside the palace.” Tan said. “You moved it outside.”

  “Yes. How did I do that?” Renton asked.

  Tan looked at him. “I don’t know.”

  “I asked a friend to do it for me,” Renton said. “And he said that he’d take care of it. That was it. A simple request, and I never thought about it again. Now then, let’s go find you a throne for the children’s court. We have about an hour before I need to guard the gate.”

  They searched for a while, but then Renton needed to leave to guard the gate. While he stood vigil under the watchful eyes of the nobility, six men did approach him.

  He was not overheard.

  Lightning did not strike the guardhouse that day.

  Despite that, in the morning, there was a crowd before the gate. The emperor of the night stood there, menacingly, in his full regalia. He was dressed in the humble robes of a cultivator, but seventeen times he had been seen to burn down someone who tried to get past him while he was on duty.

  He was the man who made the lightning strike. He was feared all throughout the empire. He was the most fearsome guard of the emperor, and he was known as the will of the emperor.

  Only those who went to court often knew the truth.

  Only those who were in court every day were certain of the identity of the emperor, because they were the ones who stood while the emperor kowtowed to the throne.

  Of all the guards of the palace of the blue dragon empire, only this man had never been seen to kowtow to the throne. Save for one occasion. And thousands of people had seen him do it.

  Nobody knew his name, because everyone was afraid to ask. The servants would not speak of him, the guards pretended their ignorance. Yet when he opened the gate, the gate stayed open until he closed it.

  Save for when the right hand of the child of heaven did burn it down.

  ?