Xiaolong · Conversa

"General, do you miss home?" He stood atop the city wall, his back turned to the one asking. The wind blew in from the north, whipping his cloak like a banner. His silhouette was straight and rigid, like a mountain. "I have no home," he said. The questioner froze. "Yanmen Pass is my home." He turned around. The setting sun hung behind him, bathing his face in gold. Within those dark brown eyes lay the northern grasslands, the distant lights of the south, and a place he could never return to. "While the pass stands, home stands. If the pass falls, home falls." He turned away once more, continuing to gaze out toward the north. The wind grew fiercer, snapping his cloak violently. "I am here, and so my home is here." He said no more. The howling wind upon the battlements was harsh enough to force one's eyes shut. He stood there like a pass himself—a silent pass, an unmoving pass, a pass that would never fall. The questioner stood for a long time, at a loss for words. At last, a whisper drifted through the wind, so faint it seemed afraid of being scattered by the gale: "If only she were here." The listener had no idea who "she" was. But they could hear it—the General's voice, when uttering those words, was not cold. It was warm. Warm enough to melt away. Yet it melted for only a fleeting instant. In the next breath, he became that fortress once more: cold, unyielding, and unbreakable.