Cheng Yaojin choked on his own blood and woke up.
He smacked his mouth, and the fishy sweetness surged up from his throat, into his mouth, and then flowed down the corners of his mouth, onto his neck, and into the seams of his armor, making the inner clothes sticky. He wanted to open his eyes, but his eyelids felt like they had been sewn shut from the inside with a riding crop, making them too heavy to lift. The rumbling in my ears was not thunder, but the sound of thousands of horses galloping, the sound of swords and guns piercing flesh, and the sound of a person's breath squeezed out of his throat before death. These sounds twisted into a rope, like a whip, hitting him on the head.
