The Reincarnation of Shen Mu

Silently cursing in two different languages, I bowed to the six of them. “I am under your care.” Let’s hope that would prevent them from trying to kill me.I faced one student first. He was stronger than me, and taller too. Good thing I was a good student.He rushed to punch me, but I used his impetus against him, making him land face-first into the hard ground. He got up with a red face and tried rushing me again. I was about to use the same movement when I sensed someone behind me.I bent low and kicked the feet of the guy in front and he landed hard on top of the one that had wanted to surprise me.I didn’t want to have to fight four people at the same time, so I quickly approached the students that were beginning to get on their feet and silently knocked them out with a couple of well-placed hits behind their necks.Unfortunately, that left me open for another of the students, who came at me with a flying kick.It

I’m unsure of how much time has passed since then, but now, at least, I know what’s going on: I was reborn. No idea how or why it happened. Well, I mean, in my past life I had read about it. There was a whole genre of fiction dedicated to people being reborn into different cultures or eras and, of course there were also those ‘self-help’ books about past lives and the continuation of life after death, but I never sincerely gave it much credit. But now… now I sincerely don’t know what to think. I was reborn into the past: somewhere in ancient Asia, but I still can’t figure out where or when.  I never really studied the language, history, or culture, so I’m unsure as to where I truly am… not that it really matters, because I doubt I can go back to the future. The fastest thing in this world seems to be horses, so no chance of achieving the needed 88 miles per hour, and no DeLorean either.   As I ponder this, I sit on my current

What I didn’t know was that only father, mother and I would be going to the palace while the rest of the family waited at our house at the capital. Both my siblings are too young for such gatherings, which told me just how boring it would be. Fortunately, I planned to use this gathering to find out more about noble society. Hopefully, that would help my future novels. Oh yes! I was already planning some of them: I wanted to write an action-packed thriller for men, and maybe an epic romance for girls. I had already created the main characters, but I needed to know how much was appropriate and what I could get hanged for, before publishing them. I was hoping the royal family would have a library I could raid.   The travel from our house to the capital took over two days by horse, but since mother was traveling in a palanquin with my siblings, those became four days instead. Fortunately, I could choose to ride in the palanquin or a h

We spent a whole month at the capital, and each day, the youngest prince would come over to speak and play with me. He also called mother ‘Aunt’, and the whole family was invited to dine at the palace the day before we were to return north. Mother spoke at length with the empress, and together they fussed over my youngest brother. Zhi kept looking at the empress with adoration, but barely spoke at all. Father spent the time conversing with the Emperor, while I spent mine talking with the young prince. “I envy you Shen” he said after we had wandered away from the adults and rest of the family. With the amount of time we spent together, we had begun to forget the formalities and just spoke plainly between us. I raised an eyebrow at him, this wasn’t the first time he had said that to me, but it would be the first time I got an answer to my question: “Why?” He smiled bitterly “You have a nice family.” I rolled my eyes, making him chuckle “

I kept my promise to the prince over the course of the following six years. Every three months I would take a week to visit the capital. And each time I would stay at our home there, being served by Ling, who only grew more beautiful and amiable with each season than passed. I always tried not being a burden to her, and she in turn dedicated herself to me. If we were older, it would have been said that we were courting each other, but truth was much stranger than that: we were friends. At the age of 13, when my family received the Emperor’s invite to participate in that year’s Spring Competition and the Flower Viewing festival sponsored by the empress, we made our way to the capital. This time around, father asked Master Fa to accompany us, stating that it would be good for my future to be seen with my master in the competition. Master Fa had no reason to deny his request, and he accompanied us on our way. My sister and two younger siblings were already study