“Alright, draw your sword and let’s begin.” Tao impatiently said.

“I’m sorry, I don’t have a sword.” Nick answered and the small crowd was in shock. Most of them even didn’t go to bed without their swords, therefore until now they didn’t even notice him not having one on his back. It was simply unimaginable.

“Oh? You left it on the ship? Don’t worry, we will lend you one.” Tao scratched his head and quickly found a way out.

“No need.” Nick shook his head, “I have no idea how to fight with a sword anyway.”

If the lack of the sword was unimaginable, then the last sentence stupefied everyone to their bones. Even the queen didn’t know what to say. There was no way Tao could attack an unarmed man in a ‘casual’ duel, moreover this boy was not a Qi master. He obviously was pretending to not know any sword techniques because he wanted to avoid the duel! That is why he left the sword on the ship!

All the people around the small arena quickly understood this and looked at Nick with contempt. This was beyond embarrassing. Of course, Tao would hurt him a bit, but he wouldn’t loose his life. Anyway, there was no way for him to marry in to this family now – this shame could never be washed away.

Tao also ‘understood’ Nick’s intentions and got angry. This was the highest level of disrespect someone could show in this palace that had centuries of sword traditions.

“Alright!” He thought of a way out, “What weapon you want want to use?”

“Do you want me to kill you?” Nick calmly asked.

Everyone was shocked again. Where did this come from? Was he now threatening Tao without sword in hope the duel won’t happen? Nick also understood his mistake and quickly corrected himself.

“I mean, do you want me to kill you or you want to kill me? Obviously people use weapons when they intend to kill each other, or you don’t understand a simple thing like this?”

“Hmpf!” Tao snorted, this pussy obviously was afraid and wanted to try talk his way out of the fight, “Fine! Let’s fight without weapons!”

Tao sheathed his sword angrily. He was going to beat this kind until he begs for forgiveness.

“Mom, you can’t allow them to fight!” YunYun still tried to stop this nonsense, “Nick, he …”

But queen was angered as much as the rest of the people around, “Stop wasting our time! Go, fight!”

Tao lowered himself and commanded, “Come boy!”

Nick looked at him, then at YunYun and shrugged with apologetic look on his face. Then turned back to Tao, slowly inhaled … and in the next moment everyone heard a cracking sound while YunYun ran in the ring shouting.

“No, don’t!”

Only queen and a couple more people discerned how Nick took two steps forward and kicked Tao in the chest and after that the big fellow flew three meters and landed on his back already passed out.

“Why did you kill him! He is not a bad person, he just …” YunYun was in panic. She was the only one who knew Nick’s true speed. If it was a fight without weapons, there were not many Qi masters who could catch him and her brother in law was strong, but his strength lied in sword techniques, not hand to hand combat.

Only now queen realized that all this time YunYun was trying to protect Tao and not this blond boy.

‘I should’ve known! She is Li Yun, my daughter! How could she choose a weakling!’ Queen smiled in her heart.

“Don’t worry, I held back a little. I think only his chest bone is broken. He should be fine in a month, may be two.” Nick tried to calm YunYun down and explain, “I thought he was prepared …”

But YunYun started punching his shoulder in despair, “As if you don’t know your own strength! I just introduced you to my family and you start beating everyone up! How can they like you now?”

People around gaped at them … these two … from very the start they were never worried about Nick! They boy was trying to get out of the fight not because he was afraid to get hurt, but he wanted to leave a good impression and not hurt anyone. A fourteen year old Qi practitioner simply knocked out a Qi master with a random kick!

“YunYun, stop, let me look at him. Let’s treat him so he feels less pain when he wakes up.” Nick tried to evade her kicks and punches and to help Tao.

“No need! This is Li family! We can take care of our own.” Princess Min angrily said and went to take a look at her husband. While this looked impressive from Nick’s perspective, it was equally embarrassing for her.

“Come here!” Suddenly queen Hu commanded.

Nick and YunYun obediently stopped the ruckus and came over. YunYun was still blushed from the previous anxiousness and following anger, while Nick was calm as always.

“Show me your hand!” Queen issued another command and without waiting for reply she grabbed Nicks right hand and pulled up his sleeve.

“Is this …” She tried to say something, but the words didn’t come out from shock. King Alexander informed her that some kid killed emperor Osman and saved her daughter, but she was reluctant to believe until just a moment ago she noticed the wristband on his hand while he was trying to defend from YunYun’s attacks.

“Of course! Both of them!” YunYun could finally proudly brag about the boy she brought back home.

“What?!” Queen Hu looked at Nick’s left arm in even bigger shock, but Nick just shrugged.

Few others from the crowd were her close people and understood what queen meant. Their shock was not less, may be even bigger.

“Good! You are accepted in our Li family!” Queen Li plainly stated and smile on YunYun’s face bloomed, while others froze. Wasn’t such change too sudden?

“I’m sorry, that won’t do.” Nick smiled at her and shook his head.

Queen had just gotten in a good mood, when she heard something like this. There were not many people who allowed themselves to argue with her.

“What?” She angrily barked.

“No need to be angry queen Hu, but I have no intention to join your Li family.” Nick was still smiling and looked in her eyes. Of course, because of his previous experience with queen Hua, he was ready to dodge or retreat at any moment.

“So you think YunYun is not good enough for you?”

“You misunderstood me, I meant, that our relationship has not much to do with the Li family. The only connection is that she is your daughter.”

“So you mean that you will bring her away like that Alex bastard took away my sister?” Queen got more and more agitated. She respected king Alexander for his strength, but still felt robbed when her sister had to live on another continent and with few other wives as well.

“No, I mean that when the time comes, we will decide together on how our relationship will develop and that has nothing to do with Eastern or Mainland continents or anyone else in the word.” Nick tried to reason, but the more he spoke the more he understood that a discussion in 21st century values was an idiot’s dream.

“So you are just a smelly kid with a glib tongue who wants to sully my daughter and then leave when you get tired of her?” Nick almost felt how steam was coming out of queen’s nostrils while she was already reaching for the sword on her back.

“Mom! Stop!” YunYun suddenly stepped between them and explained with a beet red face, “Nick … he refuses to even touch me until I turn eighteen in case I change my mind.”

The crowd suddenly felt earth swaying beneath their feet. What the hell was wrong with this kid? Thousands, may be tens of thousands would give up their hand or a leg to be with a beauty like YunYun, but he refused?

Queen was shocked once again as well, but did her best to calm down, “Explain, you don’t like my daughter?”

“No, your majesty. YunYun is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen and has incredible talents. She is extremely smart and we really understand each other well.” Nick did his best to let her know that he didn’t have any ‘bad’ intentions.

“Then why … what is your problem?” Queen finally asked the question that was on everyone’s mind.

“Both of us are very young and don’t understand the world. The most we can know is told by other people or from reading books. Thus, it is possible that the heart of a young maiden might suddenly change. I don’t want to make her suffer for her whole life in case she suddenly realizes that I am not the one she wants to be with.”

“It’s not a big deal, she will just take another husband! I have … I had three.” Queen snorted.

Nick knew the tradition here was for the powerful women to take several husbands and when YunYun’s father died, her mother ‘grabbed’ a couple more.

“That is not acceptable!” He shook his head while the crowd around them gasped in shock once again, “I know you have your traditions and there are different traditions in the Sun kingdom where men could take several wives. But while I accept other people who support those traditions, they are unacceptable for me personally. You might not like it, but that is just my opinion.” Nick shrugged and seeing that queen’s hand instinctively was reaching for her sword, continued, “You can, of course kill a person for a harmless opinion that differs from yours, but in that case you can prepare yourself to kill a half of the world or may be even the most of it.”

“Mom, I agree with him. Even though I wanted to rush our marriage at first, the more time we spend together, the more I like this idea. I think it even brings us closer in some ways …” YunYun spoke and with every next word her voice got quieter until it couldn’t be heard.

“Hmpf!” Queen snorted and turned to go back inside, “At least you are not disrespecting my daughter. Let’s finally have a meal. YunYun! Tell us in detail what exactly happened in the Nestri empire.”

Queen took YunYun by hand and proceeded inside with the most people following while few of them stayed back and introduced themselves to Nick. Finally he wasn’t a total outsider and everyone present actually realized that for some reason queen Hu liked him, she just had a weird way of expressing that.

Nick met queen’s husbands Ning and Shen, prime minister that was an old lady named Mei Zhen and several others. Judging that most of the people who wanted to introduce themselves were males, he understood that he still had some way to go until the ‘important’ people in family or in the country accepted him.

“Min, use this, it will help him greatly.” When everyone left, Nick squatted next to Tao who was still unconscious and tried to pass a healing paste to princess Min.

She glanced at him and snorted angrily.

“Sigh, I didn’t mean to hurt him and we both know that. He was careless and didn’t defend with Qi properly because he underestimated me.” Nick tried to explain.

“Of course!” She hissed, “That is unforgivable shame to us! How can I even look other people in the eyes now? And he will have to be queen’s husband one day!”

“What the hell is wrong with you people? Wasn’t that just a spar? In a real life and death battle no one could predict the outcome anyway and what is more important – all of you are Qi sword masters and most of you have no idea how to fight without sword, but I, on the other hand, have never fought with a sword. Understand? This was not his fault at all.”

“Loss is a loss and we still have to bear the shame for this.” Nick suddenly understood that she was more sad than angry.

“What if I told you that there was a way for everyone to forget about it and even be happy this happened?” Nick grinned.

“How?”

“Well, he will feel quite a bit of pain for a couple of hours, but …”

“Let him feel the pain! It’ll be a good lesson.” Min interrupted Nick.

‘Sigh, the women of this family are all too brutal. Will YunYun grow up to be just like them?’ Nick pondered and then explained his simple plan.