Zachary Ying and the Dragon Emperor

He died taking mercury pills that he thought would make him immortal," Tang Taizong said. "So did you!" Qin Sho Haung yelped without looking at him. "Allegedly! Sources differ!" "You know what you did!

You cling so hard to morality out of a desperation for others to like you. You think they'd stop treating you like an outsider if you were a good boy who did everything they wanted. This is your greatest weakness. If you want any true power over your life, you must stop caring so much about what others think.

Superheroes are just American myth. They haven’t been passed down long enough to take spiritual form, but if they last another few centuries, I reckon I’ll be playing mahjong with Bruce Wayne on the same ethereal table as George Washington.” “What?” Zack shot to a new level of disbelief. “But superheroes aren’t actually worshiped as real.” “Then what’s Comic-Con, huh?

Zack cracked a smile, but an unexpected pit twisted open his gut. Teasing was a natural part of friendships, so much he'd laughed along when his friends had done it to him, but it wasn't until now that he realized how strange it was that he never felt comfortable doing the same to them. He'd always been too afraid of upsetting them or losing them. It was never equal, like Simon and Melissa were.

You think they'd stop treating you like an outsider if you were a good boy who did everything they wanted. This is your greatest weakness. If you want any true power over your life, you must stop caring so much about what others think.

Listen, kid, you are always going to be different. Accept that. Accept that right now. Now matter how you try to fit in, the people around you will never truly see you as one of them. Because you are not. You have your own background, your own heritage, your own story. You cannot earn true respect by pretending to be somebody else. Deep down you know this, or you wouldn't be hungering for the power to stand up for yourself and not pretend anymore.

Tuōmèng,” Zack repeated in a murmur, the syllables foreign in his mouth. A language that was supposed to have been his mother tongue but wasn’t. His mom never spoke it with him because she didn’t want him to have an accent when speaking English. He never learned because he never wanted to.

Zack hadn’t expected to like much about China, but as they passed a street vendor plopping batter onto a sizzling grill behind the greasy glass of her cart, his stomach grumbled with a certainty that whatever it was would be delicious to try. And the general atmosphere of the street . . . it was undeniably chaotic, yet there was something comforting about the hustle and bustle, like it was proof of how vibrant life can be.

Zack repeated in a murmur, the syllables foreign in his mouth. A language that was supposed to have been his mother tongue but wasn't. His mom never spoke it with him because she didn't want him to have an accent when speaking English. He never learned because he never wanted to.

A wave of hot shame rolled through Zack as he remembered how he had pleaded and begged for a portal-lens before his ninth birthday, then how his mom had burst into tears the night before it, saying how sorry she was that she couldn't get it for him without worrying if they could make rent, and that she wasn't even sure they could afford to stay in New York. That had been the night Zack had realized he couldn't be like other kids anymore, that he had to get straight As and stay out of trouble and never add more to his mom's worries.

He'd been so much happier when he was little, when he hadn't realized his mom had been lying on those nights when she would make him dinner but not eat anything herself because she had "already eaten." Other kids had been simpler back then too, not noticing or caring that Zack's clothes and shoes were never new, or that he watched free documentaries on YouTube instead of the newest Netflix shows, or that he and his mom never went on any vacations or ate at any fancy restaurants. When she had free time and the sun was shining, she would pack some food and take him for a picnic in Central Park, and that had been enough for him.