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Mu'en collects people the way targets collect bullets.
Quickly, precisely, jaggedly, delicately. There isn't much room for error when a bullet leaves a gun, and there is no damage Mu'en wishes to take from a person if he does not know what damage to expect.
Bullets, deadly though they are, are maddeningly predictable, if only you know their caliber. Their trajectory is calculable by sight, the bullet by the type of gun and the destruction by all that leads up to the hole torn through paper at the end of the line. Bullets are everything the shooter needs them to be, and people, at their core, are very much the same.
Mu'en finds people to be exhaustive, draining creatures, and if he must have them in his life, then he wants those who will deal him the least suffering. He wants those whose faults he can predict.
Over the years, he adds them one by one to the libraries of his life, each perfected, molded, chosen to be one of his many things.
He collects people like a bank does money, like an artist does paper, like a student does dreams. Something to use, something to study, something to cherish, but never to keep.
He doesn't expect to love one.
When Shiyuan walks into his life and refuses to leave, when he doesn't fit in it the way he should, when he somehow makes himself worth something to Mu'en, he does not have a place to put him.
Mu'en collects people the way he does books on a shelf.
But Shiyuan, he holds like a vice.
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It is fascinating to see what parts of a person you can take and break and piece back together again.
It is devastating to see what pieces no longer fit.
Mu'en does this every day of his life, with people, with systems, with society as a whole. He takes the components which comprise existence and fit them together in ways that the world despises.
It is how he became Longtou. Crime master.
His masked face adorns the back pages of newspapers, the walls of alleyways, the doors of crime scenes, the windows of the coffee shop he owns. It startles him to see it. Everywhere he goes, his own legacy follows him, and even the darkest corners of the emptiest rooms bear witness to the laws he's rendered worthless.
Today, heavy silence blankets the warehouse at the edge of town. It always does. There is something about this warehouse, something removed, that simply makes it a touch too untouchable to the residents of Luoxia. They see it, photograph it, wonder about it, but they do not near it. They do not dare to.
Mu'en sits in his wheelchair at the steps of this warehouse and waits, rolling the corner of his arrest warrant between his fingers. The police, the jingcha, do not have a name or a face to match to his crimes, and that is how he wishes to keep it. The price on his head is high and there are many who would have it for money alone. Crime does not come without a price, after all.
Mu'en expected death the moment he stood on that platform before his men and took the title of Longtou from a dead man. He expected to be hunted like a deer in the woods, to be sought after and hated, to have those who would wish his head served on a platter and his heart cast into fire. He is guilty of treating his men like pawns in a game, but he never expected them to be stolen from the board. Not like this.
Wentao is the most recent, taken yesterday by a shot to his head. It was precise, this shot, perfect in every sense of the word. Too perfect. Just as every death of his men in the last year has been. Mu'en can't help but wonder which of the gods is responsible. No mortal could achieve such a feat. No mortal would dare.
Mu'en folds the warrant and tucks it away as his xianfeng, Zihao, comes into view. He does not expect good news. His men are dying and he has learned to expect nothing less than the worse whenever Zihao returns.
But despite his cynicism, Mu'en can't fight the small laugh that escapes his lips as Zihao approaches. Mu'en's second in command can only be described with the phrase stoic ridiculousness, and the cheap, tourist's panda hat that sits atop his head is the epitome of it.
"Is there a reason you always wear this stupid thing?" Mu'en reaches up and flicks the ear of the hat when Zihao comes within reach. "Really. I can't remember the last time I saw your hair."
Zihao smiles that crooked, foolish smile of his. "If I wear this, the locals think I'm a tourist."
Mu'en raises an eyebrow. "I'm fairly sure they think you're an idiot."
"An idiot tourist, then."
"If that's what you'd like to believe." Mu'en's lips curl up at the corners. "You have news?"
Zihao's eyes flick down the street and across the valley which holds the city before falling back to his master. "I'll tell you inside."
Mu'en studies him, noting his restlessness. "Not good news, then."
Zihao tugs on the tassels of the panda hat. His smile vanishes and his laughter sobers. "The Wall . . . needs to be updated."
Though Mu'en's heard those words time and time again, this time it feels different. Zihao turns away before Mu'en can read his expression.
The Wall bears the names of all those lost to this unnamed killer. Mu'en loses men in many ways, but something about this one is distinct. No two deaths are the same under their hand, but Mu'en always knows when it is them. Their kills are not simply precise; they are thorough. They take everything that is human about a person and remove it. They don't leave a body. They leave a shell.
Mu'en takes his cane and pushes himself up to stand from his wheelchair. He does not need it on his better days. The faint whisper of dark intuition hugs his shoulders as he follows Zihao inside. "Who is it this time?"
Zihao allows him a faint smile, but doesn't answer.
Vines and old flora envelop the inside of the warehouse, leaving patches of stone here and there, but otherwise encroaching on the space humans once took for their own. White chalk mars the bare portions of the walls, inventories and strategies scribbled anywhere there is room. Mu'en has his men use the walls as chalkboards, everything from notes to smuggling plans written upon them.
Chalk, after all, is easily washed away.
Mu'en follows Zihao to the north wall, where a foreign boy called Manuel stands. He studies a list on the wall before him, light chalk dusting his fingers and several stubs lying about his feet. Fresh powder flakes from the last name on the list, having been added just moments before.
"Zihao says that Wentao is dead," Manuel voices softly, his light accent adding a lilt to Wentao's name.
"Yes."
"He was my first friend here, you know."
Manuel meets Mu'en's gaze. There is brokenness in it but no surprise. Manuel knows their world is cruel.
Mu'en's expression softens. "Manuel, you—"
"Manuel," Zihao interrupts, tone harsh. "Pick up the chalk. There is a new name."
Mu'en shoots him a glare despite his growing apprehension. Zihao, for all his flaws, is nothing if not respectful, and he does not interrupt. Ever.
Zihao lets out a breath and refuses to look Mu'en in the eye.
"Li Shiyuan."
The gentle touch of dread that'd whispered at Mu'en's ears now grips him tight and doesn't let go. Mu'en reaches up and touches his neck, feeling his heartbeat there. His pulse pounds and his mind spins, and somehow the only word he can find is, "What?"
"Li Shiyuan," Zihao finally meets Mu'en's gaze, "is dead."
"You're lying," he whispers.
"Master, I have not lied to you since I pledged loyalty to you," Zihao states calmly, though Mu'en sees how tight he is wound. "And I will not lie to you now. Li Shiyuan is dead."
In his peripheral vision, his men slow in their tasks, eyes turning towards Mu'en and away again. Their hands freeze in their motions, their footsteps fade to ash, their voices are nothing but muted static in the background, and for Mu'en, time crawls to a standstill.
He sees Manuel add Shiyuan's name to the list on the Wall out of the corner of his eye.
"Let me see him," he says, voice barely audible beneath the blood rushing to his ears.
Zihao blanches. "Master, he is in the burial grounds of Qinglong."
"Why?" Mu'en faces him, sudden fire in his eyes. "He was not born under Qinglong."
"No," Zihao agrees. "He was killed there."
Mu'en covers his face with his hand, nails digging into his forehead and cheeks hard enough to bruise. He doesn't need those he leads to see the despair encroaching on him. He doesn't need them to see the way his eyes are clenched shut or the way he's biting his lip so hard that it bleeds.
He tightens his jaw, takes a breath and says through his fingers, "Show me."
There's the sound of shoes against gravel as Zihao pauses, doubtlessly debating the benefit of showing Mu'en the scene of this murder. Mu'en has seen countless deaths before and Zihao knows this.
But he also knows that Shiyuan is different.
Mu'en's men do not know the precise nature of their relationship, but they know enough. They know it doesn't belong in such a filthy world as the one they live in.
His eyes flash and he whips around to glare at Zihao. "I said show me," he hisses.
Mu'en's men are not tailored for the art of delicacy, and Zihao is no exception. He pulls the photographs from a pocket in his coat, the papers half wrinkled from mishandling, and hastily thrusts it towards his master.
Mu'en takes it with careful hands, fearful perhaps that further wear to it will render its contents meaningless. It is easier than he expects to look at the image and harder than he imagines to look away.
"Zihao, tell me about it."
Mu'en utters the command firmly, his tone steady and assured, but his voice is distant in his ears. He looks through a tunnel at the photograph, and it is black and white in his eyes, even though he knows it is drenched in red.
Zihao lowers his head in deference, hands pressed together before him as he speaks, but Mu'en does not hear a thing. Only clips of his narrative reach him. 'At sunrise' . . . 'too late' . . . '. . . and crows' . . . 'gone'.
Gone.
Mu'en closes his eyes.
Gone.
When he opens his eyes once more, the colors in the picture blind him with false vibrant mirth. Shiyuan's body lays in tatters across the tombstones, ribbons of his favorite coat scattered among the daisies, the green grass at vivid contrast with his dark hair, dark eyes, pale skin.
Whoever did this did not want him dead.
They wanted him reduced to nothing. They wanted him gone.
Mu'en bows his head and through his unshed tears, he begs the southern god, Zhuque, for reprieve from the damning, bitter torment that ravages his soul. Black tugs at the edges of his vision, rendering his words slow and his thoughts thick, but through it all, one stands out in stark clarity from the rest.
Though Mu'en is ruthless, he is not cruel.
But now, he thinks he should be.
He unsheathes his knife and slices his forearm clean open. He does not have much on him, only a pill bottle, and that is what he uses to collect his blood. It is messy, red blood spilling over the edge, dribbling down his wrist to the floor.
When there is enough, he caps it and hands it, white knuckled, to Zihao, who is not willing to meet his gaze.
"Call the crows," he whispers.
This time, Zihao does not need to be asked twice. He turns and all but sprints into the forest which swallows the warehouse.
Mu'en's men give him a wide berth, except Manuel, who stares blankly at the list of names on the Wall, a tally of those lost. The names of the dead, those killed by a nameless, faceless killer. The Angel of Death they call them.
"Why do they keep taking our loved ones away?" Manuel asks, voice broken.
Mu'en has never said aloud that he loves Shiyuan, but he does not correct Manuel. He can't.
Because that is the world we live in, he wants to answer. We were foolish to think we could dare to love something and get away with it. To be so bold is all but begging to have it destroyed.
But all he says is, "Because they can't get their own back."
Slowly, he unfolds the photograph in his hands. Traces a finger down the page like an oath.
He shouldn't keep looking at this picture of Shiyuan, dead. But he finds that he can't look away. Every time he sees it, he sees something new. That tomb behind him is just a little too dirty. The flower in the corner is orange and black. A button is missing from his coat.
But all of it, all of it, is drenched in rage.
It is vulnerable, unbridled fury that tears across the edges of the photograph, searing violence that adorns every splatter of blood against the tombstones. It is anguish, raw and throbbing, that blankets Shiyuan's death.
This is not murder.
This is revenge.
The killer is not a criminal. It is someone whose pain is laid bare to the world, someone who's lost something they will never retrieve.
Mu'en sees the agony in their gaze, feels the fury in their heart, tastes the vile, sweet revenge that carved this path of hatred, and he knows exactly what thoughts run through their head.
He knows because it is how he feels when he looks at that photograph.
He does not feel sorrow for the murderer, but he now understands them. A hatred this strong can only come from the loss of a love even stronger.
He crumples the photograph in his hand and bows his head, his shoulders shaking not from sorrow, but from anger. From hatred.
Mu'en has a hateful relationship with love. He hates the relentless grip it has over his soul and his mind, the way it guides his actions the way he wishes his head would.
He hates the way he loves Shiyuan.
His love for Shiyuan is something soft and unspoken, gentle the way the world he lives in is not. It is every bad thing dressed up as something good and it is everything Mu'en can't relinquish because he doesn't understand a world without suffering and Shiyuan is the last torment he finds solace in.
But Shiyuan's name on that list, his picture on the Wall, his voice now in naught but memories is nothing like that.
It's having all of this in your hands and losing it in the blink of an eye.
Floods dry, storms clear, ashes fade to dust.
But memories, memories, they don't ever leave.
And it's the memory of Shiyuan looking over his shoulder at Mu'en just last night, that slight, sly twinkle in his eye, when he says, "Xiangxin wo ba."
Trust me.
It's this memory that makes Mu'en hate him.
His hatred for Shiyuan is everything his love is, but darker, crueler, sadder.
It is all the happiest moments wrapped up in the darkness, the terror, the viciousness of the world and somehow knowing, "It is okay". But it's not. It never is. It's everything that's broken and vile and misplaced discarded in an abandoned room, the place where dreams go to die and spirits to wither.
These are the places Mu'en calls home.
In a warehouse on the edge of town, usually dead silence prevails.
But tonight. Tonight someone is screaming like they've lost everything they've ever lived for.
And perhaps, this time, they truly have.
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longtou (龍頭) - literally 'dragon head' - refers to the leader of a gang
xianfeng (先鋒) - 'vanguard' - head of operations in a gang
jingcha (警察) - police
xiangxin wo ba (相信我吧) - trust me
Zhuque (朱雀) - the Vermillion Bird - one of the five heavenly creatures in Chinese mythology - represents the south and the element fire - directly opposes the Black Tortoise