Approaching the huge gates of the Chong Clan, Sage is greeted by the guards. Contrary to what he imagined they were kind and polite, asking of his identity before sending a messenger to announce his arrival. They didn’t ask him to leave or bully him while they waited, which was somewhat impressive.

The kind reputation of the Chong Clan in Golden Cricket Cove seems to not be fake, at least on the surface.

After being attacked by assassins in the past, Sage was not foolish enough to believe the Chong Clan’s reputation. He was pretty sure it was something they put great effort into to keep from being universally shunned and cursed. By basing their power upon using vicious insects, they would give off a sense of repulsion and if they wanted to be treated favorably they could only make themselves appear kind and caring.

At least that’s how I would do it. At least the mantis is seen as the bravest of bugs, just like the lion among animals.

Despite whether such sentiments were true or not, Sage had no idea. At the very least there were some among the Chong Clan that wanted him dead, even if others were kind to him. He was careful to stay on guard, but accepted the kindness of his reception with respect. If he did have enemies, it would be best not to give them any reasons to use against him. He would have to bite his tongue and hide any animosity he might feel until he had more information of his standing and also who his enemies were. As they say, for a gentleman to take revenge, even 10 years is not too long.

“Mister Lang, please come inside.”

After a few minutes an attendant arrived and escorted them through the gates. They were brought down wide paths, being treated to more of that unique architecture of Golden Cricket Cove. The natural world was thriving upon the rooftops of the buildings. Each of the buildings were somewhat close to the walls separating the different residences, and they all had covered walkways attaching the buildings to the walls, the top of the wide wall creating a continuous path to connect the little ecosystems on every roof. Sage realized how ingenious it was, creating a large area for raising more insects while also adding some charm to their city.

“Poisonous woman!”

“Vile witch”

“Wicked hag!”

As they walked down one of the main paths, they stumbled into an altercation. Sage could just make out the outline of a beautiful woman between the gaps in a crowd of men. The men were doing the talking and he couldn’t quite make out what was going on, but he caught a few of the insults being hurled. As they got closer the clamor died down when one of the men separated from the crowd. At this point, Sage could finally see the core of the conflict and was surprised to recognize one of the participants.

At this moment the most finely dressed of the men had separated from the crowd. He wore dark green robes with splashes of gold, mainly the sash around his waist and on the crest and pin placed through his long hair that had been tied up into a bun. The other men seemed to wear similar outfits, but this fellow had more bits of actual gold accessories hanging from his clothing. He also had a decidedly young and handsome looking face which looked at the woman with a sneer. Yet, the most striking feature about not just this man, but the group of men, was that they all had an iguana-like lizard sitting on their shoulder.

The lizards were dark green with bright light green stripes and purple rings spotting their backs. They had comb-like protrusions along their spines and feathered manes around their necks, down the sides of their tails, and coating their arms. They clung to the men’s shoulders with long toed clawed fingers on all four of their limbs, but from the size of their feathers Sage guessed they could do at least a little gliding. Their most striking feature was the large sac under their chins, hanging loosely from their throats and sometimes starting to inflate when their owners were getting riled up.

The handsome man that had stepped forward sneered at the woman, “You Xie are vile and bring our Chong Clan down. You should all just get rid of those ugly little land crabs and submit to my Xiyi and restore harmony to the Clan.”

At that point, the woman couldn’t stand the bullying any longer and a black leather whip appeared in her hands. She held a bit in either hand and pulled them apart to create a loud snapping sound, “This Xiezi is no weakling. Who wants to feel my whip? I don’t have a problem forming enmities, who wishes to taste some poison?”

After making her declaration, she released one hand on her whip and let it fall down to her side. Her free hand slowly pulled open the front of her robes with a seductive gesture. It was an alluring match to her beautiful smile, but for the men around her they did not seem pleased. The crowd immediately started to back up. As her robe pulled open, there was no tantalizing view of snowy mountains, only smooth black leather from the neck down. Worse still, a bright red scorpion came into view, its eyes were much larger than other scorpions and it had a pair of dragonfly wings on its back. The men seemed to know that she kept the scorpion upon her chest and they all backed up like they had just learned the woman had contracted the plague.

“Che-He-Hehe! As I thought, just a bunch of little boys that can’t satisfy Xiezi’s cravings!” She laughed that creepy laugh of hers that Sage still remembered to this day, and walked off without giving the men another glance. The little red scorpion climbed up onto her shoulder and seemed to be glaring at the little lizards. It said quite a bit about her strength when not a single one of the men dared to chase after her, instead just talking amongst themselves and then slowly dispersing.

Sage had been too far away to get involved, especially since he was still following behind an attendant. He also didn’t want to get in trouble for going to interfere, especially since he had no idea if that woman would even remember him. The woman, Chong Xiezi, was someone from his past. One of the young talents that had won the Thunder Mountain Bridge tournament and entered that lightning filled Hidden Domain. Along with befriending Song Lu Tian, Sage had also helped save Chong Xiezi when she was battling a member of the Fu Clan. She tried to pay him back later on, but he was still murdered by the Fu Clan in the end. That had been a major setback for him, and he found it surprising to meet the woman here again today. He watched her go, her red dress covered in pink and purple flowers swaying along with the wind.

Sage and Tujiu were brought to a smaller courtyard, opening a gate like door and following a covered walkway to a small building.

“Please stay here for the time being. The Elders are busy at the moment, but they are eager to meet with you. In a few days time they will likely summon you. Servants shall be tending to your daily needs, feel free to ask them if you require anything else.”

The attendant was kind, but didn’t seem to be taking any questions. After a brief explanation, the attendant left the two of them alone. Sage took the time to examine their surroundings. In this world it was common practice for a ‘home’ to be called a courtyard, mainly because each of them would be surrounded by a tall and thick brick wall. It served the purpose of a fence, but the walls were usually a few feet thick and eight to ten feet tall with tiled roofs. That made each living place something of a walled compound. A great power like the Chong Clan would have dozens if not hundreds of these walled compounds with possibly many buildings inside each of the walled off areas, so many usually just called them ‘courtyards’.

The name also came from the most common design which consisted of the buildings arranged around the perimeter of a plot of land and the thick walls used to join them together and create a courtyard area between them. For the rich, the walls expanded to cover larger and larger areas, no longer just spanning between a few buildings to enclose them, yet they kept the common name to make it easier to refer to the many divisions within their properties. A favored wife might live in one courtyard with her servants and children, an esteemed servant might have one of their own, and another could be used to house a guard barracks and training ground.

Sage enjoyed the view and also couldn’t help but to use a few weak pheromones to collect samples of the many insects he saw moving about in the yard and atop the buildings.