Appearance of a Weird Tattoo!

That night was the burial of the king.

Everyone was sad. All they could think was why a person so kind had to die.

Zhan-yu had gone blank, and instead of burying the king's body, he had decided to cremate him so that he could go straight to the afterlife instead of rotting slowly and his enemies having pleasure seeing him rot.

[The king's body was lying down on dry wood, ready to be cremated.]

[It suddenly started raining. Violent thrumming could be heard. It was bad. Everyone ran inside.]

"Father, why did you leave me? What did you mean that I'm not your son? What were you trying to say? What did you mean that you don't know what I am? Who am I, father?"

Zhan-yu, with his magic in that violent rain, set on fire the dry wood. Not even that rain was enough to stop the fire. No one could believe what they had seen just now. For all these years, everyone had thought Zhan-yu was just a bookworm and a cripple child who could not use magic, and who didn't have any talent for fighting. Now that they had seen him create fire from his hands, everything had changed.

That wasn't the only problem. The fire that he had created was a fire never seen before. It was dark blue, as dark as the ocean.

The blue flames surrounding the king started to rise higher and higher, almost touching the sky. Everyone got scared. It was as if that fire represented the blood and anger boiling inside Zhan-yu.

Slowly, everyone went inside. The only people left outside were Zhan-yu and General Lei-Tai. Lei-Tai asked Zhan-yu to meet him in a couple of days — after he had become stable — and left. As Zhan-yu went closer to the ashes left by his father's body, the ashes jumped and tried to stick themselves to his body. Zhan-yu started screaming and shouting in pain. Dry throat, no air, desperate for water. He thought someone was getting sucked into his body and trying to take control. It was as if he was about to die. No one could hear him screaming because of the violent rain. He kept crying and screaming for two hours straight, but nobody came, and he fell and passed out.

What is this place? Where am I? Am I dead? What happened? How did I get here? Why is it so dark in here? How did I get here?

Oh, I remember. Father's ashes. Something was in there, trying to get inside me. The last thing I remember was me dying. Did I really die? No, that cannot be. I have to find the people who killed my father and get my revenge upon them. I have to find a way out of this dark place.

[Suddenly, Zhan-yu hit his head on something.] Bam!

"Ouch, what is this?" He stopped and tried to feel his way around. "Oh, this feels like a concrete door. Let me try to open it and see what's on the other side."

"Aaah!!"

Zhan-yu used all his strength to try to open the door, but he couldn't. After wandering in there for long hours, he started to feel tired. "How can I get out of this place? Let's try opening the door once more."

[He tried to pour all his strength into another try.]

"Ahhhh!! Yes, almost there. Ahhhhh!!"

Suddenly, in that darkness, Zhan-yu felt a hand creeping upon his head. A low, creepy voice could be heard, "Master, you're not ready yet. Become strong."

Zhan-yu woke up and saw that he was still on the floor where he had fallen.

[No one had come to see him. Zhan-yu thought that it had been a couple of hours, but it had only been a couple of minutes since he had lost his consciousness.]

"What was that all about? I don't want to feel anything like that again. Who was he calling 'Master'? Just by his voice, I could tell that he — or whatever that thing was — was really strong."

[This was the first time Zhan-yu had ever thought to himself how someone could be so strong.]

He was shivering really badly. It was like he couldn't control his body. It wasn't because of the rain, but because of the feeling of gravity, he felt when that thing spoke.

But why did I feel close to it, like I knew that voice or feeling. There was warmth to that voice. Maybe I'm overthinking it. I was unconscious. It could all have been my imagination. Let's go inside.

[As it was late in the night already, he thought it would be better to sleep, and tomorrow with a clear mind, he would think about what should be done for the kingdom and its people. He also hadn't forgotten about revenge.]

Zhan-yu fell asleep as soon as he closed his eyes. The night went well. Early the next morning, Zhan-yu woke up to the sound of birds chirping. His mood had become better than before. It seemed him sleeping and all that crying had made him better and calmer.

Zhan-yu took his clothes off, and when he looked at the mirror, he saw that a tattoo had appeared on his body.

"What is this? How did I get this tattoo? What does this even say? I can't read it. Could it be from that time I fell down when father's ashes were moving on their own? Could this tattoo be a last farewell gift from father? Or something else."

What exactly is this tattoo?…