Chapter 7 - The Ruckus

….

It was night, and windy, a strong wind coming off of the sharp ridges rising above the mountain peak, slithering down the robes, making Lei shiver. But even against the wind, there was a spring in his step as he strolled toward the log cabin, hands clasped behind his back.

Fatty Lou, on the other hand, trudged before him like a defeated man, shoulders hunched and lips pressed. His robe had streaks of dried blood, ink-like patches, and many other stains. Even without uttering a word he painted the picture of his own day, which was as dark and stormy as the clouds above them.

When they stepped inside the log cabin, Fatty Lou clutched the book in his right hand and started pacing around.

"All that trouble, all that effort… for what? Cutting wriggling worms, watering some lightning grass to feed the half-baked, sickly eggs, and this!" Fatty Lou said as he slapped the guidebook with the back of his hand, waving it before Lei's face. "A book! I'd come here to become something more than a mere butcher, yet this man is trying to force me to become an educated one! What's the difference?!"

Lei sighed as he reached out and took the book from Fatty Lou's hand, afraid the man would tear it down from the middle. It was easily over a thousand pages, all filled with different drawings with walls of text under them, explaining the ingredients to the most intricate details.

"Let's take a deep breath. Together," Lei said after he put down the book in his drawer. Then he stretched his arms out, and closed his eyes, trying to remember that one yoga class he took a couple of years prior. "From the chest," he said, pushing his nostrils open, and then he blew out a long breath. "And breathe out while imagining all the worries, and doubts clouding our mind flowing out from within us just like that puff of air."

When he opened his eyes a crack to see if Fatty Lou's doing the same, he found the fatty staring at him eyes wide, and mouth open with disbelief.

"How could you?" Fatty Lou said, raising his fist. "You should know how painful this is for me, yet you still mock me like it was nothing. Take your damn breaths! I need manuals, elixirs, pills!"

Lei scowled at him, then took another breath. "Look, fatty," he said, making his way toward the bed. He sat down and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I'm beginning to think you've yet to understand our circumstances. These people won't just let us get those manuals without doing the work. Five or six years, Elder Brother Bai had said. Did you forget?"

Fatty Lou shook his head unwillingly.

"Then I suggest you take that anger out of your chest, push it down with those thick fingers, and throw it under that rug so as not to mess with our future. We're already treading a fine line here, and we want to keep that line from breaking, am I correct?"

Fatty Lou nodded as he raised his chin high, and glowered up at the ceiling.

"Good!" Lei said with a little smile. "Now, Elder Brother Bai said you're to devour that book like there's no tomorrow, and that's what you're going to do. Not in one week, but you'll memorize all these ingredients in a day or two to make sure you'll impress Elder Brother Bai."

"Easy for you to talk," Fatty Lou mumbled as he turned his back against him, peering out from the windows to the night sky beyond.

The stars and the moon had their work cut out for them today, hiding behind the thick clouds brimming with lightning. They carried the promise of a storm amongst them, but when, and how this storm would unleash itself upon the lands was a big question.

"What do you mean?" Lei said, knitting his brows. "Say it if you have something to say."

"You're the golden pup," Fatty Lou said under his breath. "You cooked that soup all day, and people liked it. But me… I've done nothing but sniffing, licking, eating those greasy, filthy things! You have to taste it, that vile man kept saying to me, have to taste it to understand what sort of a thing you're dealing with!"

"Well, he's not wrong," Lei said but raised both hands in the air when Fatty Lou swept him a fierce look. "Alright, I was kidding. But it's too early for us to do anything other than follow the orders. I'm sure if we keep our diligence, eventually, we'll get rewarded in some way."

Fatty Lou didn't seem that sure. "I don't think being rewarded is a trait for good people in this world. I did what I was told my whole life, never said a word over my old man's word, even when he pushed me, every day, to that bloody butcher shop, I'd kept nodding my head. And what do I get in return? Nothing!"

Lei tried to think of something to quench this burning anger, but he found himself lacking any meaningful things to say other than the words he'd already said. Sometimes, he thought, people have to pour their miseries out into the open, without a need for anyone to lend a helping hand to them.

We all have our demons.

The silence stretched between them until Fatty Lou's shook his head, and drew silently back to his room, closing the door after him.

Lei lay heavy as a sack over his bed, clutching the soft pillow with both hands as he turned his head to gaze out from the windows. Thunder crackled, and then came the first drops of the rain.

……..

A chef's mornings were never simple. There was the urgency coursing through the veins, that sinking feeling in the stomach as if they forgot to do something crucial like leaving the meat to marinate for the night. In Lei's case, it was the screams and the shouts drilling through his ears before he had to force his eyes open.

He raised himself painfully up his feet and groaned, and winced as he wobbled a couple of steps. There was hardly a bone in his body that didn't ache from the hard use, but the pressure on his forehead was what made him wheeze through clenched teeth. It was as though someone had slammed a hammer on his head while he was asleep, and kept slamming the damn thing without somehow managing to wake him up.

"What the hell is happening?" Fatty Lou said before pushing the door open, bloodshot eyes staring wide round him. They exchanged a glance with Lei and then made their way toward the entrance.

Once outside, they saw the cause of the ruckus. It seemed dozens of people had gathered around near their log cabin while they were asleep, and were now hot arguing over a matter. The different colored robes made it easier to understand the sides. White-robed Outer Sect disciples stood on the right side, waving arms, poking with fingers, shouting and screaming at the pitiful-looking group of brown-robed kitchen folk.

"Best we get inside," Lei said and was about to turn when Wang Fei, that bush-browed oak of a man waved a hand at them, making both the groups turn their heads toward the two honest, and unfortunately, brown-robed men.

Lei and Fatty Lou had to drag themselves near their fellow brothers when faced with their demanding looks. The other looks they got from the white-robed disciples were a mix of contempt and suspicion.

"Call all the fools you want, but nothing's going to save you today!" said a man, a tall and wide-shouldered man who stood before the white-robed disciples with a disdainful smile. He had long hair wrapped into a tight bun over his head, and a sword sheath dangling from his belt.

"What do you want, Elder Brother Cui?" said a skinny man when his fellowmen pushed him out in front to do the talking. He seemed like an overworked kitchen slave, but slaves didn't have the luxury of donning these brown robes. "We work with what we got, there's nothing we can do to change that!"

"The sect pours hundreds of imperial gold, and spirit stones into the Kitchens every month, yet you still insist you've not the funds to cook something other than that tasteless, filthy porridge?" Elder Brother Cui said with a frown as sharp as a sword. "We're sick and tired of your excuses!"

"B-But—"

"There are no buts! This ends today," Elder Brother Cui said as he drew his sword from the sheath, quality silver glistening bright under the morning sky. It had a dozen or so different characters engraved upon it, making it seem more than a mere sword. "I gave my word to my fellow brothers and sisters. Don't think I won't cut that lying, vile tongue of yours!"

Lei and Fatty Lou joined the throng under angry gazes, keeping their heads low and mouths shut. Wang Fei beckoned them to his side, his face wrinkled in fear. It didn't slip past Lei's notice that the man inched slowly away from his group, taking the steps as small as possible.

"It doesn't look good," Lei said under his breath, craning his head just enough to see Elder Brother Cui's wrathful eyes. "What's the deal with these people?"

"You mean the real Outer Sect disciples?" Wang Fei said as he sighed tiredly. "It's the same thing over and over again. We cook with what we've got, but you can never make these people happy with just porridge alone. They want us to cook them sealed beasts, spiritual herbs, and magical fruits, but it's not easy when there are thousands of mouths to feed."

"True," Lei said with a small nod. "But we have our own people here with us, no? I think they can deal with this… little problem."

"This?" Wang Fei rolled his eyes. "You call Elder Brother Cui a little problem? He's the genius of the famed Cui Clan which governs three cities and carries the three-clawed dragon token they got from the Eastern Wind Emperor three thousand years ago. Oh, not to mention he's a Six-Sealed disciple who'll be stepping into the ranks of the Inner Sect a month from now."

"That's some information." Lei had to nod his head when Wang Fei looked him in the eye. It seemed the man thought his explanation deserved at least some praise.

Though Lei had no idea what a Sealed disciple was, he thought it must be something like a cultivation rank. And from the look of things, a Six-Sealed man wasn't a simple man even in the Outer Sect.

On the other hand, Fatty Lou frowned out across the white-robed disciples while holding his chin in thought. His eyes almost glinted at the sight of Elder Brother Cui, no doubt dreaming himself in his shoes.

Lei wasn't impressed, to say the least. He had other worries inside his mind. So he asked, "He can't just cut people with that sword, right?"

Wang Fei shook his head. "Killing is forbidden in the sect, but there are no rules for a friendly spar. And being friendly can mean a lot of things."

Lei sighed out a long breath. The rows of people standing before him made him feel at ease, but there was no guarantee what would happen when hell broke loose. That was why he and Fatty Lou joined in with Wang Fei as they all took another step away from the pack.

"Elder Brother Bai would not be pleased with your actions," that skinny man said when Elder Brother Cui raised his sword. "Think carefully, or else you will regret your—"

"You can't be serious." Elder Brother Cui lowered his sword, smiling mockingly at him. "You're not counting on some washed-up Inner Sect disciple who lost his mind in those cauldrons, are you? They even kicked him out of the Inner Sect!"

That earned a loud laugh from the white-robed disciples who, by each passing second, started to seem more like hungry wolves to Lei's eyes than simple disciples.

"If you want to call big shots, then what about I call my Big Brother?" Elder Brother Cui said as he swiped a finger across his sword, producing a ringing sound that shut all the mouths. "I'm sure he'll be happy to help his Little Brother out."

"Not good." Wang Fei scowled. "Elder Brother Cui's Older Brother is Inner Sect's—"

"You don't need to tell us everything, we can tell it's bad," Lei said and stifled another sigh. Then he racked his brains to think of a solution, anything that could save them from a bloody fight. "Can't we do anything?"

"Like what?" Fatty Lou asked.

"I don't know, these people told us that they didn't like this porridge, right? Can't we cook them a different thing?" Lei said. "I mean even a chicken soup or some stew would do the trick, right?"

"Its…" Wang Fei puffed his cheeks as his eyes narrowed down to slits. "Not easy."

"Why?" Lei asked. "We certainly have enough ingredients. I'd seen pigs, chickens, and a bunch of other animals the day before. In fact, I'm wondering how you guys had managed to cook something so awful to make these people angry."

Wang Fei stayed silent at the question, massaging his temples as if he was suffering from a bad headache. But under the lids, his eyes squirmed anxiously as he took another step back.

Lei gave Fatty Lou a look before both of them nodded. This man… There was something he purposely kept from them, right when there was a maddened man who was threatening to cut all of them with a sword.

"Wang Fei, can you tell me the reason?" Lei tried a different approach, assuming a gentle expression. "Why over a hundred cooks can't make these people a good meal?"

"Er…" Wang Fei averted his gaze, staring down his hands.

Fatty Lou's shadow engulfed Wang Fei as he took a step in, towering over him like a mountain. When the man tried to get away, he yanked him from the arm, tight.

"Speak."

"You'll never get tired of bullying these kids, will you?" said a voice, a thick voice coming from the chest, making all heads turn at a plump-looking, wide-shouldered man. He seemed calm as a lake, but the side of his cheek twitched with annoyance.

"Speak of the devil," Elder Brother Cui muttered as he frowned deeply, taking a step back.

Elder Brother Bai strolled from between the crowd of white-robed disciples, holding his chin high. His arms were crossed before his chest as he regarded Elder Brother Cui with a doubtful expression. "You'll never get tired, will you? Can't you leave these kids alone? They had suffered enough already."

"What?" Elder Brother Cui said, eyes growing wide. "What suffering? It is us who suffered for months now eating that garbage! It is us who had to endure the pain of eating the same thing, over and over again!"

"He has enough magical beasts to feed all these people, trust me," Wang Fei whispered to Lei and Fatty Lou, seemingly more than happy to see Elder Brother Bai, and no doubt, to change the topic of their conversation. "But he likes to play the hero."

"Yes." Lei nodded while gazing at Elder Brother Cui. "He seems like the type."

"Scram, all of you," Elder Brother Bai said as he stopped between both groups, turning grimly to face all the white-robed disciples. "I don't have time for your nonsense."

"You!" Elder Brother Cui raised a trembling finger into his face. "You're courting death, Elder Brother Bai!"

"Oh, you can't be a cultivator and not court death with each word, now, can you?" Elder Brother Bai waved his hand before him as if he heard a bad joke. "And if you're thinking of calling your precious big brother here, then send my regards to him. Tell him that if he ever dares to step into the Outer Sect, then I, Gang Bai, will surely return the favor, visiting the Inner Sect to tell all those Elders and Inner Sect disciples about what happened in that one autumn night when he tried my famous Northern Wine!"

"What?" Elder Brother Cui's face wrinkled in confusion. "What wine?"

"He'll know." Elder Brother Bai smiled wickedly. "Just tell him that."

The white-robed, angry-looking mob of disciples sent burning looks to Elder Brother Cui's side, and yet it seemed Elder Brother Bai alone proved a mighty enough challenge that he couldn't help but take a step back, blending into the crowd.

"I'll remember this!" his voice echoed under the morning sun. "I'll remember this!"

"Good!" Elder Brother Bai called after him. "I was beginning to think you had a melon over those shoulders instead of a brain. But turns out you're quite good at memorizing things!"

The angry mob trudged fuming after Elder Brother Cui, muttering amongst themselves. Elder Brother Bai made sure he had sent them their way before turning, with a gentle smile, to his fellow cooks.

"I think we're all awake and ready for another day's work, now, aren't we?" Elder Brother Bai clapped his hands. "Come on, let us move. That porridge isn't going to cook itself."
....