Chapter 30: Killing Intent (5)
Ma Caihong stared at Sen with a slightly stunned expression. It was like she either didn't know what to say or couldn't believe that he had spoken those words aloud. The stare persisted until Sen started to fidget.
"I don't mean to be troublesome," he said. "I just don't know how. If you show me, I'll do my best."
"You. Wait," said Ma Caihong. "What?"
"He can't," said Master Feng, appearing at the gate.
Sen turned to look and gaped at his master. In all the time Sen had known him, Master Feng had been a generally calm, collected man. The things that bothered him swiftly disappeared like a stone sinking into a pond. As Master Feng stalked into the courtyard, though, he looked almost mad. His clothes were torn, scorched, and soaked through in places. His hair looked like it had been through a terrible windstorm, hanging down around his face and shoulders. There was a wild, fey light burning in his eyes. Sen's eyes traveled down to Master Feng's clenched fists. They were coated in still-fresh blood, the thick liquid slowly dripping off of them onto the stone beneath his feet. Feng walked toward Ma Caihong, his steps deliberate, his gaze unwavering. She didn't back away, but Sen saw the uncertainty, the wariness on her face. Feng stopped mere inches from the woman.
"He can't show it to you," growled Feng. "He doesn't have it yet."
"H-, how can that be?"
"He's had all his training here. With us. Where it's safe. Before that, he was smart. He stayed out of situations where he'd need it."
Ma Caihong's eyes shifted from Feng to Sen and back again. "Then he has none at all?"
"None. We can't send him into the world like that. And we don't have decades to teach it to him slowly. As for your concerns about the mountain," said Feng, lifting one of his hands, "I've dealt with it. There's nothing left alive on this mountain that can just kill him out of hand, except you, me, and Jaw-Long."
Ma Caihong's eyes went wide. "You can't mean that you-."
Bloody spirit beast cores spilled into the courtyard from Master Feng's storage ring. Sen's eyes went wide as dozens of the cores appeared. Their impacts sounded like a stone rain.
"I pacified the mountain."
"Ming, I never meant-," started Ma Caihong.
Master Feng turned away from the woman like she didn't exist. He walked over to Sen, that frightening light in his eyes never dimming.
"Have you shown her your qi techniques?"
"No, master."
"Do that. Don't forget to show her how you hide."
"Yes, master," said Sen, offering the man a deep bow.
"Good," said Feng, his gaze boring through Sen to a place deep inside the core of the world. "That's good."
Then, the old cultivator walked away toward the bathhouse without looking back. Sen glanced back at Ma Caihong. She was staring after Feng, her expression sick again and terribly, terribly guilty. She looked down at all of the cores on the ground and shook her head. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and looked at Sen. She gestured to the cores.
"You should gather these up. They're worth a fortune out there in the kingdom."
Sen walked over to the cores and stared down at them. "Where should I put them?"
Ma Caihong put a hand to her face. "Right. No storage ring. Wait here."
Sen waited patiently for a few minutes, then went and fetched a bucket of water from a nearby spring. He rinsed the cores off in the water, setting the clean ones to a side. He was stunned by the variety. Some were no bigger than a plum and nearly the same color. There were others the size of small melons with striations of color running through them. He even came across one that was pure black. He crouched there with that one in his hand for a long time. He could almost hear it speaking. It felt like, if he could just concentrate a little harder, he'd be able to make sense of it. The spell was broken when Ma Caihong and Uncle Kho came out of the house speaking quietly to one another. They split apart with Uncle Kho walking toward the bathhouse and Ma Caihong walking to Sen. When she saw what he held in his hand, she lifted an eyebrow.
"May I see that?" She asked.
"Of course."
Sen handed it up to her. The woman peered at the core for a long moment. Then, she studied him, and he felt something other and slightly alien seep into him for a moment. He jerked away from the intrusion, but it vanished before he moved more than an inch. She nodded to herself.
"I'll hang on to this one," she said. "I can make something useful for you with it. As for the rest of those, put them in this."
She held out a plain ring made of a dark gray stone. Sen hesitantly took it and held it in his hand for a moment. He knew it had to be a storage ring. Sen felt conflicted about taking it, though. On the one hand, here was an object that he had wanted so badly. On the other hand, he realized that he was angry with this woman. The things she had said to his master had driven the man into what had to be a mass slaughter out on the mountain. Master Feng had not looked well after doing that, either. He wanted to demand answers from her. Why had she said those things? Why had she brought up that name, Cai Yumei? Sen reminded himself that this was her home, not his. It wasn't his place to demand answers from her. Gritting his teeth, he slipped the ring onto a finger. It took a few minutes and some coaching from Ma Caihong, but he finally managed to get the ring to work. One by one, the cores disappeared into the ring. He could save them for his master, he decided.
As angry as he was, Sen knew better than to not ask important questions. "How much can I fit in here?"
"Oh, it's not too big. There's enough room in there for basic camping gear, a couple of swords, and a couple of weeks' worth of food, if you're rationing a bit. You should also be able to fit some extra clothes in there."
Sen blinked. She'd just described more things than all of Sen's possessions. He gave her a bow.
"I thank you for the kind gift, Ma Caihong."
She waved it off. "Ming would have gotten around to giving you one eventually, but you needed one now. So, there you go."
Sen watched as her eyes drifted over toward the bathhouse. He contemplated saying something to get her attention, but he wasn't sure he wanted to do anything helpful for her. His master was clearly in pain right now, even if Sen didn't understand it. It was her fault. If she was suffering because of that, Sen felt that some little bit of justice was being served. Still, she managed to refocus her attention on him.
"So, Ming said something about your qi techniques. I suppose that is the last thing on the list."
Chapter 31: Killing Intent (6)
Sen gave her a nod and put some distance between them. He thought for a moment before he looked at her.
"When you're ready."
Ma Caihong gestured to him. Sen never would have considered attacking her unprovoked. He knew full well that she could crush him like an insect. On the other hand, he wasn't going to miss an opportunity to take a shot at her when she invited it. He started slow, cycling qi to activate the weakest qi affinity he had. His hand lashed forward and a compressed blade of wind shot across the distance. She broke the technique with a casual flick of her sword. She opened her mouth to say something, but he'd switched by then and used his earth qi to rip up a stone from the courtyard and drive it toward her head. He dropped the earth qi while the stone was still in the air and switched his cycling to shadow qi. He blanked the courtyard in darkness and started running toward her. He heard the stone shatter, but with his shadow touching everything he could feel her dodge it.
Sen adjusted his angle and prepared to switch his cycling again. He expected this would be the last big attack he could manage. His qi stores were strong. Those channels that ran through his body were another matter. The fast switch between cycling techniques put a tremendous amount of strain on them. They were already sending aching protests up and down his limbs. Yes, he thought, one last big move, then I have to slow down. He made the switch from shadow to fire and sent the qi into the sword. It wasn't the best fit. There was a natural resistance that cut down on the efficiency. Plus, while metal could hold fire qi for a while, the fire qi would erode the integrity of the metal before too long. Master Feng had had Sen test the process on cheap pieces of metal just to prove the point.
Of course, Sen didn't need the sword in his hand to hold up for a long time. He didn't even need to hold up to two minutes. He only needed it to hold up for the next few seconds. He brought the sword down in an overhead arc and a lash of pale orange fire that looked almost white around the edges leapt out from the end of it. The moment he'd let go of the shadow qi, the darkness in the courtyard had begun to recede back toward him. He'd managed to time it right, though. From Ma Caihong's perspective, it ought to look like that whip of flame exploded out of the shadow on a lethal arc to connect with her skull. The lash connected with a dome of something, something he couldn't even identify, and sputtered out. In his last few moments of clear thought, it occurred to him that he should have expected it. He'd just been so angry, so ready to lash out at someone who hurt his master, that he didn't think it all the way through.
Then, the pain hit. It wasn't entirely new. Master Feng had made sure that Sen knew what a broken technique felt like. His master had told him that it was an absolute certainty that people would break his techniques, so he had to prepare for the backlash that came with it. Sadly, that preparation had been a bit too lenient. The pain in those exercises had seemed severe to Sen, but that pain was nothing but a brief moment of discomfort compared to the torment that stabbed into Sen when Ma Caihong broke the fire technique. Sen's body convulsed and pure white flashed across his eyes as the agony set his nerves alight. When something like conscious thought returned, he became vaguely aware that he'd collapsed to the ground. A coppery taste let him know that he'd either spit up or vomited blood. He just lay there like that for a while before his body started talking to him again. Although, that was a mixed blessing.
While it was good that his body was on speaking terms with him in some way, it was bad because his body only wanted to let him know it hurt. He decided that he must not have been down for too long, because Ma Caihong was kneeling next to him a moment later. She tilted his head up and checked his eyes. It seemed like a lot of effort, but he figured he ought to say something.
"Ouch."
"Foolish. Very foolish," muttered Ma Caihong. "It won't kill you. Although, I expect you wish it did."
With the more experienced cultivator assuring him that he wasn't about to die, Sen opted to be wildly uncomfortable on his feet instead of wildly uncomfortable on the ground. The stone of the courtyard was an unforgiving surface at the best of times. He slowly pushed himself up until he was swaying on his feet. There was an awful pounding in his head. His muscles felt like they wanted to twitch out of his control at any moment. Even breathing felt like something he had to make himself do. Still, he managed to get upright. He considered that a minor victory in a day that seemed filled with failure.
Ma Caihong gave him a stern look. "Ming must have taught you about what happens when a technique breaks."
Sen nodded. "He did."
"Then why do something that you must have known would fail?"
To his credit, Sen did try to keep his expression neutral. In the end, though, he was simply too tired and in too much pain to mask his still simmering anger. At least a little of it bled through onto his face. Ma Caihong regarded him in silence before she looked over at the bathhouse. She sighed a little.
"Of course," she muttered. "Well, I've certainly seen enough to get a picture of your capabilities. You should go clean up and rest now."
She started to walk away, but Sen called after her.
"Wait."
She glanced over her shoulder. "Yes?"
"There's one more thing I'm supposed to show you."
She frowned, but said, "If you must."
Sen steadied himself. His body was slowly coming back under his control, but it still felt like it was ready to go into a full revolt at the drop of a hat. He took three deep breaths and thought back to all of those moments as a child when he'd really needed to not be found. He recalled the way it felt. Then, he hid. Ma Caihong's eyes went so wide that he could see white all the way around the edges. Her mouth opened and closed a few times without any sound coming out. Then, she walked right up to him. Then, as if she didn't trust the evidence of her own eyes, she slowly reached out a finger and poked his chest. Her head tilted to one side, and then the other. Then, she poked him again.
"Well," she said. "I certainly didn't see that coming."
Sen stopped hiding. Ma Caihong seemed to relax once he did. At least, he assumed that she relaxed. She did stop poking him in the chest, which he found a relief. Then, a look of deepest frustration rolled across her face.
"And Ming just found you, living on the streets, down there in that tiny town?"
"Yeah," said Sen, not able to muster much more than that.
"Unbelievable. Really, though, you should go rest. You look like you're going to collapse."
Sen took her advice that time.
Chapter 32: The Mountain (1)
Sen was only allowed to nap for a couple of hours before Uncle Kho came to retrieve him. Sen was relieved to discover it was primarily to make sure he got something to eat. On the bright side, Sen finally understood why Uncle Kho had said that his wife was the real cook in the family. There were great piles of deliciousness on the table. There were baozi, dumplings, fried rice, pancakes, moon cakes, and so much more. Sen ran out of appetite long before the food was even close to gone. Yet, as much as Sen enjoyed the food, he was very aware that Master Feng was not present. It wasn't something he did that often inside, but Sen spread his qi out into the house, sensing for the presence of others. Even that minor exertion of his qi made his channels ache. Still, he learned what he meant to learn. Master Feng wasn't just absent from the meal. He wasn't even in the house.
"Uncle Kho, where is Master Feng?" Sen asked.
Uncle Kho and Ma Caihong exchanged a look before the man answered. "Ming needed some time to collect himself. He's cultivating up at the peak of the mountain. He'll be back tomorrow."
Sen wanted to press the issue, but he'd learned to read Uncle Kho a bit over the last few years. He wasn't going to get anything more from the old man. If Master Feng wasn't back the next day, Sen would worry about it then. With a full stomach and a bit of lingering pain plaguing him, Sen decided more sleep was in order. That was when the bad news struck. Ma Caihong held up a hand to stop him. He watched with mounting horror as she poured some concoction into a cup and handed it to him. He stared down into the cup for a while, wincing at the medicinal smell that wafted up from the thick liquid.
"What is it?" He finally asked.
"It's to help with the effects of the backlash and a few other things," said Ma Caihong.
Sen's eyes snapped up to the woman. "What other things?"
Ma Caihong gave her husband a questioning look.
Uncle Kho sighed. "Sen has had, let's call it mixed experiences with cultivation resources. His first body-cleansing pill was apparently excruciating. It's made him a little leery."
"That's understandable, I suppose," said Ma Caihong. "This is nothing like that. It should help repair any damage to your channels. It might push your cultivation along a little. That's it."
Sen stared at her for a while before he worked up his nerve and downed the mystery liquid in the cup. He let out a little relieved breath.
"At least it didn't taste terrible," he said.
Ma Caihong smiled a little at that. "Cultivate for an hour and make sure you cycle through all of your channels before you go to sleep. That should be enough to get things moving in the right direction."
Sen nodded, suppressed a yawn, and excused himself. He was pretty sure he made it the whole hour before he fell asleep.
***
However uncertain he'd felt about the potion that Ma Caihong had given him the night before, he felt good about it when he woke up. He cycled qi through all of his channels and there wasn't even a hint of pain. The qi in his dantian felt thicker to him, and he thought there might even be a bit more of it. He was nowhere near ready to forgive Ma Caihong or forget what she did. But he thought he'd probably be less suspicious the next time she offered him some cultivator brew. He knew he'd had to get over this knee-jerk reaction he had. Pills, herbs, and alchemical brews were just part of the lifestyle. His aversion would ultimately just slow him down. He knew this. Master Feng and Uncle Kho had told him that. Yet, he couldn't shake that fear that he'd developed those years ago.
He shook those thoughts away and went to the kitchen. Master Feng and Ma Caihong were there and even Sen could sense the intense awkwardness. Both of the older cultivators avoided even looking at the other. For her part, Ma Caihong made sure that Sen had something to eat, asked about his channels, used her qi to look him over, and promptly vanished. Sen could almost touch the relief that washed over Master Feng when Ma Caihong was no longer there. Then, Master Feng looked at Sen. The man seemed like he was somehow less than he had been before yesterday. It wasn't anything physical. Master Feng looked the same as always. Yet, there was something a little off about him. A kind of brittleness or hollowness that Sen didn't know how to address.
"I'm sorry, Sen. Yesterday, I lost my temper. It's been a long time since I was angry like that. I'd honestly forgotten what I could be like in that state."
Sen saw an image in his mind's eye of Master Feng standing there in the courtyard with blood all over his hands and that look in his eye. He wished very much to never see that in person again. He offered Master Feng a small bow.
"You owe me no apologies, master."
Feng's lips moved a little into what might charitably be called a smile.
"Thank you, Sen. As for today, you'll be going out onto the mountain. There's a cave on the opposite side of the mountain from here. That's your destination. I'll be waiting for you there. Jaw-Long and," Feng took a shuddering breath, "his wife said they would provide the supplies you should need to get there."
"How long do I have?" Sen asked.
"The test isn't to get there in a certain amount of time. The test is simply to get there. By the time you do, I expect you'll have learned what you need to learn."
Sen considered those words for a while as he finished his food. Then, he snorted.
"Did I miss something?" Feng asked.
Sen shook his head. "No. It was just remembering that, when we first came up here, I thought you were going to sit in a cave for years. I should have known that there would be a cave involved somewhere along the line."
Master Feng let out a little chuckle and a Sen saw a tiny spark of his old master kindle in the back of the man's eyes. "Yes, I supposed you should have known. Caves aren't all bad, you know."
Sen smiled. "Well then, I look forward to seeing this cave of yours, when I get there."
Feng nodded and rose. "Good luck, Sen."
Sen listened as his master left the house.
***
Sen spent the next few hours being loaded down with various useful items. A tent, a bedroll, food, and some medicines that he suspected Ma Caihong had made either the night before or early this morning. He dutifully placed them all inside his storage ring. When neither Uncle Kho nor his wife could think of anything else to send with him, they all went out to the courtyard. He gave the two a bow.
"I will see you when I return," he offered.
"We'll see you then," said Uncle Kho.
Ma Caihong just nodded at him. Sen was relieved that she didn't offer him any sage advice or well wishes. He could still feel his anger at her bubbling away deep inside him. He didn't want that anger erupting now. He sincerely hoped that his time on the mountain would help him purge that anger. He didn't enjoy being angry, at anyone, or about anything. He'd just as soon leave this anger behind if he could figure out how.
With that brief goodbye out of the way, Sen turned, strode out of the gate, and stepped onto the mountain.
Chapter 33: The Mountain (2)
The reality of what was in front of him didn't really drive home for Sen until he walked out of the gate, considered his options, and started off in an eastern direction. Until then, there had been a haze of unreality about the whole idea. That haze of unreality hadn't been helped by the sudden arrival of Ma Caihong, Master Feng's abrupt culling of the local spirit beast population, or having his own technique broken so thoroughly. He'd mostly slept through the time when he would have worried about what came next. Then, there had been that flurry of preparation. Thinking back about it, Sen wondered if Uncle Kho and Ma Caihong had kept him busy and distracted to keep his mind occupied. If it had been a plan, it had worked.
He supposed that some of his casualness had stemmed from all those times when he and Uncle Kho went looking for herbs and plants. Sen had always felt safe enough on those trips, but he'd also had Uncle Kho there, no doubt scaring off anything that thought about attacking them. This time, though, Sen was alone. As the manor disappeared behind him, Sen became increasingly aware of how alone he was. Back in Orchard's Reach, he'd spent most of his time alone. It wasn't that he wanted to be alone. He just learned that it was a lot easier for one kid to hide. The trick he used to stay hidden, when he could do it at all, only worked for him.
When he'd started learning about cultivation, he'd halfway hoped that the hiding trick was something he could learn to extend to other people. The more he learned, the better he grasped how impossible that was. While Sen didn't fully understand what he was doing to hide, he knew it had to do with his energy and his aura specifically. Something about the way he pulled those things inside himself shielded him. While Master Feng had suggested Sen might be able to do something with similar results to other people, eventually, the trick would only work for him as it stood. As the semi-tamed forest around the manor gave way to untamed forest, Sen felt very glad that he had that trick at his disposal. He knew it wouldn't hide his scent, but Uncle Kho told him that a lot of spirit beasts tracked qi instead of scents. Sen recognized that it was a flimsy shield, but he'd rather have a flimsy shield than no shield at all.
Yet, for all his worrying, nothing happened all morning. The hours passed in rather uncomfortable silence as Sen covered miles of distance. If anything, the whole mountain felt like it was holding its breath. Of course, covering that distance also impressed on him that the trip was longer than he'd first thought. He'd always known that mountain was big. Yet, the true size of it was a bit hard to really keep in his head. He'd been far too distracted on the trip up the mountain to really pay attention. Since then, he hadn't given it much attention. As the cold certainty that this trip could well take days and days, the fear finally settled over Sen. He was out on the mountain, alone, until he reached that cave. He felt his hands shaking and clenched them in anger.
"No," he whispered. "Master Feng killed all of the most dangerous beasts already. I might have to fight, but this isn't suicide."
With that bit of self-reassurance, Sen found a comfortable rock to perch on and pulled a bit of food out of his storage ring. As if the food was a summoning charm, Falling Leaf was sitting next to him. She peered up at him with her hopeful, pleading eyes. Sen gaped at the ghost panther. Had she been following him this entire time? Then, relief flooded through him. He wasn't completely alone. He didn't really expect the big cat to do any fighting. He wasn't even sure if he'd want her to. While she was terrifyingly fast at chasing down the food that Sen threw her, he'd never actually seen her do anything even remotely violent. For all he knew, if she tried to intervene in a fight, it could get her killed. He didn't think he could live with that. He realized that he'd been lost in his own thoughts for a while when Falling Leaf nudged the hand with the food in it.
"Alright, alright," Sen mock grumbled. "You big mooch."
He passed her some of the food and watched in amusement as she flopped down to chew and lick at the meat. He settled in to eat his own lunch, feeling much better about being out on the mountain.
***
That good feeling lasted until late afternoon. That's when the first attack came. Sen was passing through a clearing when he heard a sound like metal on stone ahead. He stopped moving and looked around. On the far side of the clearing, he saw a beast that vaguely reminded him of a goat. Of course, he'd never seen a goat with shiny metal hooves and a lone metal horn protruding from its head before. Sen found himself wishing he'd asked a lot more questions about spirit beasts. He'd always meant to, but it had never felt like a priority. He resolved then and there, if he got back, he'd ask lots of questions or at least ask Uncle Kho if he had some scrolls about them. Unfortunately, that future knowledge couldn't help him know if this beast was naturally aggressive or just territorial. Sen wondered if he could avoid the problem by simply leaving.
Sen took one step backward and got his answer. The goat charged at him, lowering its head with the obvious intent to gore Sen. For one interminable second, Sen froze. Then, years of training took over. He cycled his qi through his channels, and it almost got him killed. Sen felt the qi rush out into his channels. Then, it ran out into other channels. He froze again. Sen's mind raced as he tried to figure out what was happening. New channels, he wondered. No, old channels. His mind went back to that second cleansing pill he'd taken. He remembered now that it burned through some kind of blockages in channels he hadn't known about. Since then, though, his qi hadn't gone into them. Why would it now? The sight of the goat almost at striking distance jarred him back to reality. He didn't have time to draw his sword or even to activate a technique.
Instead, Sen did what he liked the best. He redirected. He knew he had to wait until it was almost too late. Otherwise, the timing would be off. He forced a slow breath out, turned out of the way, planted a hand on the side of the goat's head, and pushed. He expected to knock the goat off course. Instead, he launched himself away from the goat. Since he hadn't expected it, Sen hadn't prepared for the sudden motion. His arms pinwheeled a few times, then his feet connected with the ground. Momentum carried him over onto the ground and into a painful, sprawling tumble. In the middle of that misery, he finally put two and two together. Ma Caihong's alchemical potion. It had to be that. She'd made some vague comments about it maybe improving his cultivation. He gritted his teeth as a large tree finally arrested his motion.
"You kind of undersold it," he muttered to the far distance Ma Caihong.
As much pain as he was in, he'd been drilled hard by Master Feng. He forced himself up to his feet. If you stayed down, your opponent would capitalize on it. Sen had no desire to find himself beneath those metal hooves. As Sen regained his feet, he was relieved to find that the tumble hadn't dislodged the sword on his hip. He looked across the clearing to where the goat had turned and was preparing to charge again. He tried to remember what he'd learned about qi aspects. The goat had an obvious metal attunement. What was metal weak to? He knew it was weak to fire, but Sen wasn't all that eager to start throwing fire around in a forest. With a sigh, Sen resigned himself to doing it the hard way. He drew his jian, cycled metal qi, and pressed that power into the blade. He just hoped that this extra strength would be enough to see him through.
As the goat bore down on him again, Sen's focus tightened. He let the distractions fall away. The forest noises quieted in his ears until all he heard were the hooves. The sky, the trees, the undergrowth, it all faded from his view. He let the thudding of his own panicked heartbeat drop away as well. In the end, the only things left in Sen's universe were himself, his jian, and the goat. Sen could see the tiny sparks the goat's hooves created as they hit small stones. He could see the rectangular pupils of its eyes. He could hear the air exploding from its nostrils. Then, Sen's body was sidestepping and the jian rose in a perfect arc. Sensory information crashed down on Sen. It dazed him for a brief moment. Then, he saw what he had done. The goat's body was on the ground. Its head lay several feet away.
Sen just stared at the dead spirit beast while his racing heart and labored breathing slowly returned to something more like normal. He didn't know how he felt about what he'd done. Given a choice, he'd have left the beast to its business. He shook that thought off. It hadn't given him that choice. It had only given him a choice between surviving and dying. Sen had chosen to live. Deep inside of Sen, far from his conscious mind, a tiny flame flickered to life.
Chapter 34: The Mountain (3)
Sen was still staring at the goat and trying to figure out what he should do next when Falling Leaf bounded into the clearing. She skidded to a stop when she saw him and then hurried over. She looked him up and down with the most intense look in her eyes that he'd ever seen. Once she seemed satisfied, the big cat went over and circled the goat's body. He watched as she sniffed it a few times, then went over to the goat's severed head. She looked over at Sen, then pawed a couple of times at the goat's horn. He frowned and walked over to her.
"Do you want that?" He asked.
She pawed at it again, then bumped her head against Sen.
"You want me to take it."
She bumped her head against him again and then sat down. Sen sighed, looked down at his bloody jian, and got started. It was easier than he thought it would be, but it was grisly work. When the ghost panther went over and pawed at the body, Sen didn't even ask. He knew what she wanted him to do. He cut the goat open and did his best not to gag as the still-warm organs spilled out. Even with that out of the way, he still had to root around inside the thing until he found the beast's core. It was about the size of an apple and had a faintly metallic, silver sheen to it.
"You should eat if you're hungry," Sen told the big cat, as he pulled out a water skin.
While Falling Leaf made a meal of the goat's remains, Sen rinsed the core, the horn, and his hands. He slipped the core and horn into his storage ring and then cleaned the sword's blade. He examined the edges closely, looking for any kind of damage. He was surprised that he didn't find any. He supposed that the goat must have been closer to him in cultivation than he'd thought. Otherwise, even with Sen's qi reinforcement, the blade should have shown some kind of damage. He waited for Falling Leaf to finish her impromptu meal. He debated about whether he should do something with the goat's remains, bury it maybe, but ultimately decided to leave it. Something or a lot of small somethings would eventually come along and dispose of it.
He turned away from the unpleasant sight and continued on his way. He would have preferred to stop sooner and set up camp, but he wanted a healthy distance between him and the goat remains. There was no good reason to put himself in the line of anything that went looking for an easy meal. He'd walked for maybe an hour when something inside him stirred with apprehension. He dove forward into a roll. It almost worked. The claw of a giant hawk raked across his calf and he shouted in pain. He could already feel blood pouring out of the wound. He forced himself back up, keeping as much weight off his wounded leg as he could. His eyes scanned overhead, now that he knew where the danger was coming from. Yet, the foliage and the dimming evening light obscured everything above the canopy.
He searched his mind for a solution. He didn't know how birds hunted, but he supposed that anything that swooped down from the sky must mostly depend on sight. He needed to take away that advantage. He almost used a shadow qi technique, but he didn't want to overdo things. He cycled his qi a different way and spread it out around him. To Sen's frantic mind, it seemed to take forever, but a thick mist started to form around him. Once it got started, though, it picked up speed, spreading out faster and faster, rising up around him. He didn't waste time. Instead, he crouched down and crawled away from the place that he had been, stupidly, he realized, just standing. It wasn't a very heroic move, but Sen didn't care about that. He heard the sound of wings flapping not too far overhead. He felt the downward wind pressure scattering his precious mist.
"Damn bird," he whispered to himself.
He couldn't fight the massive hawk as long as it stayed in the air. He needed to get it down to his level, where he could, maybe, have an advantage. He didn't have a lot of options to make that happen. Worse, anything he could think of would mean changing qi types, which would mean giving up the mist. He wished that he could use more than one kind of qi at a time. He paused then. He couldn't remember ever asking about that. Had Master Feng ever said you couldn't cycle two types of qi at the same time? Had Uncle Kho? Sen couldn't think of them ever saying that. Then again, they might have thought it was obvious. What if you could, though, he mused. He started moving again. The giant, stupid bird kept shifting position and blowing the mist away.
Sen decided that he didn't really have anything to lose by trying. If it wasn't going to work, he assumed he'd know it almost immediately. He relegated the mist cycling pattern to that part of his mind that he usually tasked with constant cultivation. Then, he focused inward. He'd need a second stream of qi coming from his dantian. When he tried to make that happen, Sen almost quit. It was such a mental effort to try to siphon off even a bit of qi for a second stream that it made his head start to pound. Either that, or he was losing so much blood from that leg wound it was giving him a headache. He just kept crawling away and focused harder. It was slow, so very slow, but he managed to bleed off some qi from his dantian. He felt himself sweating, felt the blood pounding in his temples, but it was working. He had to bend every last bit of concentration on it, but he sent a parallel stream of qi through his channels on a different pattern.
That hurt. It hurt enough that he had to stop moving and just breathe. He eased up on the amount of qi he was using for the mist technique. It didn't stop the pain, but it reduced it enough that he didn't want to scream anymore. More importantly, he could feel the fire qi building up. He waited until he heard the bird flapping again. It was closer than he would have liked, but that made things easier. He eased back toward it using one hand. The other hand was slowly accumulating fire qi, so he didn't dare put it down near the fallen branches, twigs, and dry evergreen needles. When he heard the bird flap again, directly overhead, he stood straight up and sent a fireball into one of the bird's wings. The fire scorched away the massive feathers and seared the skin beneath. The hawk shrieked out its agony with a sound so loud it left Sen all but deaf.
Then, the problem with his plan became apparent to Sen. Without the use of one of its wings, the bird fell out of the air, directly at him. Sen tried to stumble away but realized he'd never get far enough away for it to matter. Instead, he drew his jian, set the most stable stance he could on his injured leg, and committed to taking the damn bird with him into the next world. In the next instance, a semi-visible form hurtled out of the trees off to Sen's side. It leapt into the air and slammed against the bird's body. The form seemed to compress down and then leapt away. The combination of the impact and the leap away pushed the bird off course. It didn't miss Sen by much, but it was enough. If he'd felt a little better, he might have marveled at the sight of the bird's head a mere foot from him. As it was, Sen didn't let the moment pass him by. The bird was stunned by the impact, so Sen used the jian for what it did best. He thrust the blade straight into the bird's eye and kept thrusting forward.
The bird's whole body convulsed and nearly ripped the weapon out of Sen's hand, but then it went still. Sen jerked the blade free. He let go of his two cycling patterns to conserve some energy. His leg gave out immediately, and he crashed to the ground. He glared balefully at the bird's body. A flickering flame inside him grew steadier and brighter as a mist spread out around it.
Chapter 35: The Mountain (4)
Sen stared up at the forest canopy and just ignored the smoldering corpse of the giant hawk next to him. He was tired. He was hurt. Plus, he'd have to keep traveling, despite the fact that night was all but on top of him. Sen reasoned that he'd earned at least two minutes of just staring up at the sky. After five minutes, a huge cat face loomed over Sen.
"Thanks," he muttered. "Damn bird would have crushed the life out of me without you."
The big cat regarded him for a moment, then gently batted at his chest.
"Yeah, yeah. I'm getting up."
A minute later, she came back and batted him much less gently. He wanted to yell at Falling Leaf, but he couldn't keep laying there with his leg bleeding. Sen pushed himself up and did his best to get a look at his wounded calf. He couldn't really get an angle on it, but given that it was still dripping, he assumed that the bird had cut him pretty deep. He pulled out some of the medical supplies Ma Caihong had insisted that he bring along. He'd honestly thought she was overdoing it when she'd heaped the supplies on him. He didn't think so anymore. He'd been gone from the house for all of one afternoon and part of a morning and managed to get himself injured already.
He cleaned the wound as best he could with a wet cloth, and then slathered a thick ointment onto it that Ma Caihong had said was for cuts and punctures. That became an instant regret as the ointment felt like it was burning down into his flesh. Sen had to clench his jaw to keep from screaming. The sensation didn't really pass, but Sen got used to it enough that he could tie a bandage around the wound. That hurt so much that his vision went all dark and splotchy around the edges. Sen sank back to the ground, his chest heaving at the agony in his leg. Still, he knew he was forgetting about something. There was something else that Ma Caihong had said to do if he used any of the medicines that she gave him. The answer floated up out of the haze in his head.
"Cultivate. She told me to cultivate."
Wiping the sweat off his face, Sen gave himself another thirty seconds to not think. Then, he started cultivating again. The qi rushed in from all around him, into his dantian, and then out into his channels. The circulating qi must have activated something in the ointment because Sen's calf felt like he'd just shoved it into an inferno. There was no stopping it that time. Sen screamed. Then, he passed out.
***
"Damn bird. Damn Ma Caihong. Damn mountain," Sen growled under his breath as he trudged through the forest.
Where it had seemed green and alive during the day, it all just looked like shadowing hiding places for predators in the dark. When he'd finally come around, it was a mixed blessing. The ointment had healed his leg enough that he could stand and even walk on it, although he suspected that any kind of running was out of the question. On the downside, it had been dark out. Falling Leaf had insisted that he harvest the beast core from the bird, which had been a chore and a half in the nonexistent evening light. He had asked the big cat to go and find them somewhere safe to set up camp. He'd asked more out of hope than any belief that she'd do it. Yet, the ghost panther had surprised him by vanishing into the dark. By the time he'd finally managed to find the core inside the bird, the cat had been back for a while. He'd only taken enough time to clean the gore off the core, his hands, and his arms before he gestured for her to lead the way. They had to move at Sen's pace, which meant they'd been walking for most of an hour. Well, Falling Leaf had been walking. Sen had been tripping and stumbling over things for most of that hour.
When the cat finally sat down in a sheltered spot, Sen didn't even have the energy to be paranoid. He put up his tent in a stupor, crawled inside, and dropped off to sleep almost immediately. Yet, it only felt like a few minutes had passed before he jerked out of his dreamless sleep. Whatever sleep he'd gotten, Sen wouldn't have called it restful. His eyes burned. His body felt lethargic. Yet, he could see something that looked like light peeking through the flap of the tent. He dragged himself over to it and pulled the flap open. He found Falling Leaf laying on the ground right outside his tent, her eyes tracking back and forth over the surrounding area. She looked back at him and then yawned.
"I know. I know. It's your turn."
Sen hauled a bit of food out of the storage ring without even bothering to check what it was. He gave the cat some and then sat down on the ground next to her. They ate in silence, and then the cat went almost immediately to sleep. Sen tried to organize his thoughts. When that failed, he decided to pick three priorities and deal with those. The first thing he did was test his leg. It wasn't fully healed, but he thought he could probably run on it if a life-or-death situation cropped up. He just wished that he believed that he'd get through the day without that situation happening. The much more likely scenario to his mind was that he'd spend half time traveling and the rest having to kill more of the local spirit beasts.
"You'd think that Master Feng's rampage would have sent them all into hiding for a while," he said to no one.
Even the ghost panther didn't twitch at the noise.
The next priority he set for himself was cleaning up his gear. He rolled up his bedroll, which he didn't even remember taking out of the ring. The tent came down next. It took him a little while to get it folded back up. Then, those went back into the storage ring. He glanced over at Falling Leaf. She was breathing slowly and steadily. Sen had no intention whatsoever of moving out again until she was awake. Uncle Kho and Ma Caihong had been right. He wasn't ready for this. He wouldn't quit on it, but also wouldn't be stupid either. The big cat was clearly watching his back for him. He idly wondered how many beasts she'd scared off that he didn't even know about. Sen was honest enough with himself to admit that he wanted, maybe even needed, that safety net to convince himself not to turn around and go back.
Sen set himself one final task to do while he waited for the spirit beast to finish her nap. He cleared a spot, gathered some dead wood from nearby, and built a little fire. Then, he pulled out a metal kettle and settled in to make himself some tea. He reasoned that, if nothing else, it would help soothe his nerves.
Chapter 36: The Mountain (5)
As one day dragged into two, two into four, and four into eight, Sen found a kind of unpleasant routine. He'd sleep for a few hours at night while Falling Leaf guarded him. Then, he'd cultivate while she slept. After that, they'd walk. He did his best to avoid fights when he could. The old wariness and observation that he'd employed on the streets were amplified in the solitude of the forest. He became much more adept at spotting trouble before it spotted him. Sometimes, he hid. Other times he waited. Sometimes, he ran. For all the effort he put into avoiding conflicts, not a day went by without some beast forcing his hand. There were moments when he felt like there was some other power driving these things toward him on purpose. Yet, when he stretched his senses and his qi to their limits, there was never so much as a hint of another human presence. The spirit beasts were attacking him because he invaded their territory, or even just because he was there. As the endless killing stretched out, Sen observed changes in himself that he considered both good and bad.
He became much more proficient with those types of qi where he had a lesser affinity. Shadow qi techniques were of limited value, save to hide. Even then, it was only helpful if the beast wasn't tracking his qi. Despite his desperate use of fire to bring down the hawk, he hadn't used it since. Sen had a very healthy respect for fire and couldn't shake the image of himself burning to death in a forest fire he started. Without easy recourse to his strongest affinities, he'd been forced to use and hone the rest. The lone, fragile wind blade he could conjure when Ma Caihong arrived had become three blades that could shatter stone. He could summon an all-encompassing fog that covered hundreds of feet. With a ready source of water, he could form whips and even a compressed water spear that would pierce most hides. He could rip away enough earth and stone to drop a beast into an eight-foot-deep pit. Plants would entangle the limbs of beasts. With enough concentration, he could yank all the air away from where a beast stood.
In the back of his mind, Sen knew that this forced use of lesser affinities was a good thing. Master Feng had said that cultivators gave up their flexibility in favor of mastering a single affinity. After all the fighting and killing, Sen understood the pure practical value of retaining that flexibility in combat. Yet, Sen saw all of the practice as a secondary benefit. To him, the true prize was utilizing more than one kind of qi at the same time. Unless he was aiming for very small effects, he was still limited to two. He was pretty sure that the limit was his channels, rather than ability. The mental strain grew less intense with every use, which led him to think that some kind of reinforcement or expansion of his qi channels would let him use several different techniques at the same time.
Of course, as all progress does, it came at a cost. When he'd set out, Sen had mixed feelings about having to kill the beasts. He knew that the point of all of this was to create his killing intent, but he didn't think it was working. He didn't want to kill any more than he had the first day. All that had really happened was that he'd become numb to it all. When some beast caught him off guard, he didn't think about the fact that it was a living thing anymore. He didn't wonder if it had young nearby that it thought it was protecting. It just became one more obstacle to his weary, sleep-deprived mind. He'd even given some thought to not taking any more cores. His storage ring was starting to give him some resistance every time he tried to put something more inside of it.
"You know, I don't think I really need another core," Sen said to Falling Leaf.
He was staring down at a huge, bloody pile of meat and scales that had been a demon beast a few minutes earlier. It had been crafty and hidden up in the trees. Then, almost silently, it had tried to drop onto Sen. Unfortunately for this snake, it wasn't the first time that death had tried to come for Sen from above. He'd barely looked up before he sent a condensed pillar of air straight into the snake's open mouth and ripped it apart from the inside out. Sen had spent so much time washing blood from his hands that the idea of picking through the remains of the snake was just exhausting. He picked up a stick and idly nudged a piece of snake a little closer to the pile. The ghost panther gave him a flat look. She seemed to take it personally if he left behind things that she thought were useful or valuable.
"I don't really have any more room," he pleaded. "If I find the core, do you want it?"
While the big cat didn't talk, at least not that Sen had heard, she got her message across easily enough. She sort of tilted her head and blinked and did let him know that she found that acceptable. As she padded off a little way to stretch out and watch him, Sen found a bigger stick. Slowly but surely, he picked apart the bits and pieces. He found the core hiding beneath a small bush and pulled it out. He stood up and lifted the core.
"Found it!" He shouted to get her attention.
He turned to throw the core over to her, which gave him the perfect view of a pure white ape all but materializing next to Falling Leaf. Sen found himself transfixed as the ghost panther tried to attack the ape. Yet, for all her lethal speed, the ape was faster. Its arm was a blur as it batted at the big cat. Sen heard the massive hand connect with her head. The sound it made left him certain that it had been a deadly blow. As it had with that goat, Sen's universe condensed. Everything fell away except him and the ape. Except, he knew something was different. Something had changed inside him, deep in places where he couldn't look. All of those experiences, all of those seemingly senseless beast deaths, his own willingness to kill them, it all fused into something.
He felt it crystalizing, felt it becoming, and felt his own place in the world shift because of it. He could almost see it inside himself. It was a pure blue flame ringed in blades so sharp that they could sever fate. Around them was a citadel of shadow and mist. Hurricane winds howled through the halls of that citadel, even as raging torrents of water hurled themselves down around the flame from granite cliffs that stretched to the sky. The flame, though, burned pure and steady. Air did not move it. Water did not quench it. Earth could not touch it. Metal could only endure it. That flame did not warm. Those halls did not shelter. Those cliffs heralded only one thing.
In that moment, Sen found something he hadn't felt before. With all of those other beasts, he'd killed because it was the only way through. He hadn't considered anything beyond that. As absolutely everything inside him focused in on that ape, though, Sen understood that he wanted this thing dead. It had almost certainly killed Falling Leaf and not because the cat had been doing anything. She'd just been lying around. It had killed her because it could. Sen didn't remember drawing his jian. He didn't remember cycling fire qi. All he remembered was hurling his absolute commitment, his diamond-hard resolve, his killing intent at the ape. Sen watched as that intangible pressure that came from inside his soul crushed the ape to the ground. Sen saw the absolute terror in its eyes as he strode toward it. Then, Sen lifted his jian and brought it down. A finger-thick whip of white fire lashed down from the tip of the blade and split the doomed ape down the middle.
Chapter 37: The Mountain (6)
Sen took one brief moment to cycle water qi and drag enough moisture out of the air to douse the still-burning hair of the bisected ape. Then, he was running. He found Falling Leaf almost thirty feet away, half-buried beneath a pile of leaves, grass, moss, and sticks. He could see where she landed and how far she slid. Sen kept reminding himself that she wasn't dead for sure until he actually checked for himself. He dropped down onto the ground beside her and started shoveling away the detritus that obscured her body. When he managed to get her mostly uncovered, he just stared down at the big cat. She was so utterly still that Sen was sure that the damnable ape must have killed her. He couldn't believe that there had even been an ape up on the mountain. He'd never heard of apes this far north. They were supposed to dislike the cold. While those thoughts careened around inside his head, Sen watched Falling Leaf.
When he saw her breathe, he felt a lump in his throat so big that Sen thought he might stop breathing. He reached out and brushed away the last of the plant matter around her head. He didn't like what he saw at all. Half of the big cat's face was swollen so badly that it made her look deformed. When she breathed, there was a wheezing, almost wet sound to it. Sen knew little about medicine and even less about spirit beasts, but it didn't take an expert to know that those sounds didn't bode well. He felt a moment of panic because he did not know what to do. The idea that he'd lose his only real friend in the world overwhelmed everything else. He had to help her. He had to. How, though? He didn't dare leave her there. In her condition, some other spirit animal would come along and kill her. Sen knew he was a lot stronger than he had been, but he didn't think he could carry her all the way back to Ma Caihong.
Sen felt like lighting had erupted inside his brain. Despite his almost daily injuries, Sen had managed to avoid anything life-threatening. He still had the small box of pills that Ma Caihong had given him to take in an emergency. As far as Sen was concerned, this was an emergency. He pulled the box and a water skin out of his storage ring. He pulled one of the pills out. While the qi in the other medicines she'd given him had only been noticeable if he looked for it, he could feel the qi radiating off this pill. With a plan in mind, Sen confronted the next problem. How to get the unconscious Falling Leaf to take the pill? For one brief moment, Sen entertained the mad idea of simply putting the pill in her mouth. Then, sense reasserted itself. He imagined her coming around with his hand in her mouth and biting down. Instead, Sen cautiously reached out and touched her side.
"Can you hear me?" He asked.
It took forever to Sen's frantic perception, but the spirit beast eventually cracked open an eye wide enough to give him a bleary look. He quickly explained what the pill was and that she needed to swallow it. She closed her eye when he finished. Sen worried that she either hadn't understood or had fallen unconscious again. After a very long moment, though, she looked at him again and opened her mouth a little. Sen winced at the sight because it looked like it hurt her. He very carefully put the pill on her tongue and offered her some water. Her mouth closed for a moment and then opened again. The pill was gone, but he managed to get a bit of water into her mouth. That small bit of activity seemed to drain the big cat and she went still again, except for her breathing.
They spent three days in that spot, with Sen feeding her one of those pills each day. When he wasn't tending to the cat, Sen was standing guard over her. Spirit beasts came to the area, drawn by the smell of blood or death, only to flee when Sen unleashed his killing intent on them. He learned a lot about how to use it in those three days. At first, it was just a blanket that covered the entire area. Bit by bit, though, he learned how to focus it into an arrow of pure menace that he launched at anything stupid enough to get close. For the handful of beasts that didn't take Sen's very potent invitation to leave, the end came fast. Sen was done hesitating. He was done with that forest. Most of all, he was done with the vile, murderous spirit animals that haunted that damned mountain. The only good news was that the new kills meant that Falling Leaf always had fresh meat to eat.
Well, fresh meat and spirit beast cores. He'd left one sitting near her and turned around to see it disappear into her mouth. He'd been dumbfounded, but quickly dumped a pile of them onto the ground from his spirit ring. He never did figure out what made a core good or bad for her, but she carefully separated three that she ate over the course of her recovery. On the afternoon of that third day, the pair of them set off again. Sen didn't plan to cover much ground. He just wanted to get far enough away from all those dead spirit beasts that he could set up a relatively safe camp. While the ghost panther had wandered far and wide before, she kept close to Sen on that first walk. There was a gingerness to how the big cat moved, at least when Sen could keep her in sight. She often faded from view if he took his eyes off her for long.
Once he found a place that he considered good enough, Sen set up his tent. He'd kept himself awake for days by cycling qi through his channels, but the limit of that approach had become more apparent to him with every passing hour. He needed actual rest. He gave Falling Leaf a stern look.
"If anything comes around, make a noise or do something to wake me up."
When he got what he thought was agreement from the cat, Sen slipped into the tent and was all but dead to the world until morning. The next day, Sen let the cat sleep all morning. When they set out in the afternoon, she seemed fully recovered. Sen wasn't sure what those pills were that Ma Caihong had given him, but he made a mental note to ask her. With Falling Leaf moving fast again and seemingly as done with the adventure as Sen, they set a brutal pace. Sen's newly forged killing intent kept the path mostly clear. When that didn't work, he practiced qi techniques on them, or Falling Leaf dispatched them with merciless tooth and claw. It took them two more days to reach the far side of the mountain and find the cave. Feng was waiting at the cave mouth for them. He took one look at Sen's face, grimaced, and then nodded.
"It worked, I take it," said Master Feng.
Sen's first response was to send the arrow of killing intent he'd perfected on the path. He took a little satisfaction from the fact that Master Feng actually blinked when it struck home.
"Yes, master. It worked," said Sen.
"Well, do come into my cave."
Sen and Falling Leaf trailed the old cultivator in the cave, which turned out to be surprisingly warm and dry. Feng had a small fire burning in a neatly made firepit. A pot of something that smelled positively heavenly to Sen was held over the fire by an iron tripod. Sen ate three bowls of the stew and half a loaf of bread before he even started to feel human again. Master Feng even dished up some of the stew for the ghost panther, who also ate her fill. It was only when the meal was truly over that Master Feng asked Sen to tell him what happened. Master Feng listened with a calm expression as Sen spoke for nearly two hours. Sen laid out the sequence of events, the various injuries suffered, and how he treated them, then culminated with the forming of his killing intent. Sen glossed over a lot of what happened after that, ready to put the events and their retelling behind him.
Master Feng sat in thoughtful silence for most of five minutes before he spoke again. "What you're describing is very strange. It was inevitable that you would come under attack at some point, but it shouldn't have been anything like what you saw. Half the beasts you described aren't aggressive by nature. I'll have to look into this. See if I can find out why they behaved so oddly. Honestly, if I'd thought it was going to be that bad, I wouldn't have sent you."
Sen didn't quite know what to do with that last comment. He decided he'd deal with it some other day. Instead, he focused on what he cared about.
"Well, it's done now. Can we go back?"
"Tomorrow, Sen. For tonight, the two of you should rest. I'll keep watch."
With the stress of the last two weeks finally wearing off, the true depth of Sen's fatigue was hitting him. Without another word, he set up his bedroll and went to sleep.
Chapter 38: Walk and Talk
Much to Sen's simultaneous relief and annoyance, the trip back to Uncle Kho's home was a much less exciting time. While the beasts of the mountain didn't fear Sen or didn't fear him as much as he might have liked, they apparently lived in naked terror of Master Feng. Sen didn't so much as sense a spirit beast aside from Falling Leaf on the return trip. Not having to fend off daily attacks did a lot to improve their speed. When Sen asked if there wasn't a faster way, Master Feng gave him a knowing look.
"You know that there must be. How else could I have beaten you to that cave?"
Sen offered up a shrug. "I didn't want to put you on the spot if it was some kind of secret."
Master Feng mulled that over for a little while before he finally answered. "No, it's not a secret. Well, it's not exactly a secret. The fastest way to make a trip in this kind of environment is with qinggong techniques. They basically let you fly."
Sen's imagination lit itself on fire with speculation. "You mean those parts of the stories are true? How can I learn to fly?"
Master Feng held up a hand. "Easy, Sen. I personally know dozens of qinggong techniques. I suspect there are hundreds. You'll have to wait to learn them, though."
Sen's hopes of soaring down to town for a quick visit to see Grandmother Lu crumbled. "Oh. Why?"
"There are a lot of reasons, but the biggest reason is that you need a lot of qi available to use any of the techniques. It's a lot more than you have at your disposal, even with your recent improvements."
"Why is that, master?"
"Well, gravity is part of the natural order. If you want to fly, you have to violate that natural order. The world makes it very expensive for you to carry out those kinds of transgressions. It's part of the reason why the climb to immortality is so difficult. The closer you get, the more qi you need to accumulate. After all, it's the nature of living things to die. If you think about it, immortality is the ultimate transgression against nature. Honestly, I'm a little surprised that the universe allows for it at all. Then again, maybe not. So few people pull it off, maybe it's less of a problem than I imagine."
Sen let those ideas roll around in his head for the better part of a mile before he asked a question that had been on his mind for a long time. "Are you immortal?"
Master Feng gave him a rueful smile. "I suppose to someone so young that it must sound that way to hear me and Jaw-Long talk. You hear us old monsters talking about things that happened hundreds or even thousands of years ago. It probably seems like an impossibly long time. No, I'm not an immortal. At least, I'm not one yet.
"Will you be?"
Feng took another long break to consider that question. "I honestly haven't decided. I probably could become one. If we're talking about raw power, I have enough to make the leap. At least, I do if I survive the tribulation. Of course, I've also got more perspective on the whole idea than most people do. I'm not sure that immortality is all it's cracked up to be."
"Why not? Why wouldn't you want to live forever?"
Master Feng sighed a little at that. "For one, no one has a clear picture of what the heavens are actually like for ascending cultivators. There are stories, of course, but I don't think I've ever met anyone who knew. Immortals return from time to time, but I've never managed to meet one. In fact, they seemed to go out of their way to not meet me. Maybe they knew I'd ask them questions they didn't want to answer. So, there's that problem.
"You may struggle with this idea a bit, but long life isn't always a gift. The country I was born in doesn't exist anymore. It hasn't existed for a very long time. In fact, the country that my country became doesn't exist anymore, either. I don't recognize the holidays most people celebrate. I know the right customs, but they all seem foreign to me. I only know about five people who can still make the food I grew up eating. You've met three of them on this mountain. Living for a very long time means a lot of loss. You lose the people you love. You lose the places you love. Yet, ascending means an even more profound loss. You lose the world itself.
"There are a lot of things wrong in the world. It can be violent, cruel, and terribly unfair. You know that firsthand. Yet, the world can also be beautiful and surprising and utterly sublime. I've seen sights in this world that I can only hope you'll live to see, Sen. I've seen sunrises at sea. There's nothing but water in every direction and then the sun breaks the horizon. It turns the water into a sheet of gold. I've stood on the peaks of mountains in the desert that are so high in the sky that no mortal could survive there. You look out from those peaks. It's like you can glimpse the farthest reaches of the world and, if you're paying attention, you can touch eternity. They say that the heavens are filled with wonders, but I already know that this world contains wonders. To become immortal, I would have to knowingly surrender those wonders."
Sen was very quiet after that. He'd never heard his master speak about anything that way before. There were definitely things in there that he didn't understand. What was a tribulation? He also knew he only understood a little bit about what his master meant when he talked about loss. Yet, even Sen knew that there were wonders to be found if you were patient enough to look for them. Sen's wonders were smaller things than Master Feng's, but he wouldn't want to surrender them. Still, a stark reality remained beneath it all.
"If you don't ascend, that means you'll die," said Sen.
"It does. Don't look so morbid about it. It's not like it's going to happen next week or even next year. Cultivation has its pitfalls, but the higher you go, the longer you live. I don't know exactly how much longer I have, but I expect I'd have to measure it in centuries. Besides, that's what I'd be choosing if I decide not to become an immortal."
"I suppose so," Sen agreed, although without much conviction. "Can I ask you something else?"
"Go ahead."
"What's a tribulation?"
"Oh, right. That. I suppose now is as good a time to warn you as any. The heavens don't approve of cultivators trying to become immortal. So, they send down tribulations to try to stop it. It generally happens at key points of your cultivation journey, usually after you break through to a new level."
Sen frowned. "Okay. I think I understand that. But what are the actual tribulations? I mean, what happens?"
"Lighting," said Master Feng with an air of casual indifference. "It's usually lightning."
Sen's eyes went wide. "That sounds bad."
Master Feng snorted. "By the time Jaw-Long is done training you with a spear, I expect that you'll have a very solid grip on lightning."
It took another two days of walking, but Sen finally saw Uncle Kho's enormous house through the trees. Sen broke out into a grin until he saw that Master Feng had stopped walking. Sen shot him a questioning look.
"Go on," said Master Feng. "I'm sure they're expecting you."
"What about you?"
"I'll be around, so don't slack off on your practice. At this point, though, it's time to expand your knowledge base. There's more to being a cultivator than fighting. Jaw-Long and his wife have their own specialties. So, it's best to let them teach you about those things."
Sen hesitated, suddenly unsure if he wanted to go back. He liked Uncle Kho, but he wasn't thrilled with the prospect of learning from Ma Caihong. He didn't feel that simmering anger toward her anymore. He'd managed to vent those feelings on the tide of spirit beasts that he'd killed.
"I-," Sen started to say, but let the word just hang there.
Feng answered as if he could read Sen's mind. "You don't have to like someone to learn from them. Besides, you shouldn't let my grievances become yours without a good reason. I appreciate your loyalty. I truly do. But, you should make up your own mind about Ma Caihong."
Sen let those words sink in before he offered Master Feng a bow. "As you say, master."
Chapter 39: Making Peace
The first few minutes back at the house were surreal for Sen. Uncle Kho, who had been old and bald for as long as Sen had known him, had undergone a transformation. Now, he looked like he was only a bit older than Ma Caihong. The wrinkles on his face had been replaced with smooth skin. His head was completely covered with long, shiny black hair that had been pulled up into a topknot. While he still wore a beard, it wasn't long, white, and flowing anymore, but trimmed close to his face. The only thing that was truly the same were his eyes. All of the years that some cultivation trick had peeled away from the man's body were still plainly evident in the man's eyes. They looked out at the world with a burden of ancient knowledge and countless secrets.
For all of the changes, though, the man was clearly thrilled to see Sen. He beamed at the young man like Sen had stormed the heavens, robbed them blind, and gotten away with no one the wiser. Sen couldn't help it. He smiled back at the man. Uncle Kho's attention shifted away from Sen for a moment as he greeted Falling Leaf. The old cultivator produced an entire roasted duck from what had to be a storage treasure of some kind and lobbed it to the big cat. Falling Leaf deftly caught the bird in her jaws before trotting off to a corner of the courtyard to enjoy her meal.
For her part, Ma Caihong remained a little way back from Sen and Uncle Kho. Sen didn't think she meant to be rude, although he supposed it was possible. What little he could glean from her was more like caution. In a moment of insight, Sen realized that she was in almost as tricky a position as he was. Sen felt he had to tread with care around her because this was her home. If she ever told him to leave, he would have to do it. On the other hand, Uncle Kho had clearly formed an attachment to him. While Sen had no doubt that Uncle Kho would always choose his wife, she was family after all, it didn't mean that she wanted an open conflict with Sen either. Such a conflict would likely cause a rift between her and her husband. After being away for years, she no doubt wanted harmony at home.
A petty little part of Sen wanted to push the issue. Maybe he could get a little revenge on her for Master Feng. That would serve her right, wouldn't it? As Sen looked at that part of himself, he didn't like what he saw. Master Feng had been right about one thing. Sen didn't have a real quarrel with the woman. He hadn't been truly harmed by anything she'd done. In fact, he'd only benefitted from her presence. Doing things to harm her would be a particularly nasty kind of ingratitude. Master Feng said to make up your own mind about her, Sen reminded himself. Master Feng had survived for a very, very long time without someone like Sen getting into the middle of his fights. It wasn't easy, but Sen made a very conscious choice to set aside whatever leftover anger he felt toward Ma Caihong. He would wipe their slate clean and see what she did.
"Since you're here," said Uncle Kho, drawing Sen's attention, "I assume it worked."
"It did. Would you like a demonstration?"
Uncle Kho's expression turned amused. "Well, you can't blame an old man like me for being a bit curious."
"Old man? I don't see any old men here."
Uncle Kho looked baffled for a moment before he let out a little chuckle. "Oh, don't be fooled. I'm still an old man. I'm just a very handsome old man. Isn't that right, my dear?"
Ma Caihong gave her husband an indulgent smile. "Truly, you are the most handsome man I married."
"I'm the only man you married."
"Well, that does make your victory easier, doesn't it?"
Uncle Kho snorted. "You're not wrong. Now, Sen, show me what you've learned."
Sen nodded and unlocked that part of himself that killed the ape and all that had come after it. He fashioned his killing intent into the same kind of mental arrow he'd used with Master Feng. He'd considered just letting flow out across the courtyard, but he thought it would bother Falling Leaf. Ma Caihong hadn't asked for a demonstration. He unleashed his killing intent and, much as Master Feng had, Uncle Kho blinked in surprise when it reached him.
The cultivator frowned. "Well, we'll have to work on that."
"Did I do it wrong?"
"Wrong? Oh, no. Nothing of the sort. But we can't have you sending that out at just anyone. We'll have to work on toning it down so you send an appropriate amount at people closer to your cultivation level."
"Is that truly necessary?" Ma Caihong asked, suddenly much more interested in the conversation.
"Try for yourself. Sen, if you wouldn't mind."
Sen looked to Ma Caihong, who nodded at him. He sent her the same kind of focused killing intent he'd sent Uncle Kho. She actually blinked a few times.
"Well now," said Ma Caihong. "Won't that be a delightfully ghastly surprise for some foolish young master?"
Uncle Kho howled with laughter at the thought. "If only I could be there to see their expression when it happens."
"I would…," said Ma Ciahong before she hesitated. "I would help you learn to control it, Lu Sen. If you'll allow me."
There it was. It was the golden opportunity that Sen's pettier self had yearned for. If he declined, she wouldn't wonder why. She would know. That choice wouldn't come without cost, though. Uncle Kho would want to know why he'd rejected the offer. Then, Sen would have to explain. It might not destroy his relationship with the old cultivator, but it would almost certainly put a strain on it. It would create a wedge. Sen wondered if a choice as small and petty as this had laid the foundation for Master Feng and Ma Caihong's dispute. As much as it was an opportunity to strike at the woman, it was also the peace offering that he knew he should take. Sen considered the two paths in front of him for a moment. Before he could change his mind, Sen offered Ma Caihong a bow.
"I would be grateful for any help you could provide me."
Sen knew it wasn't much to build on. He expected Ma Caihong knew it, as well. But it was something. It was a tiny piece of common ground they could stand on. He wasn't sure if he hadn't kept his face as neutral as he meant to, or if Ma Caihong had simply intuited his thought process, but her expression said that she knew. There was a bit of relief and a bit of gratitude there as she inclined her head in his direction.
"Alright, enough of all this," said Uncle Kho. "I'm sure you're still tired, not to mention dirty, and probably hungry. So, let's get you a hot bath and a hot meal."
Sen didn't quite groan aloud at the mention of a bath and food, but it was a close thing.