Chapter 81: Village Story
For the first time in over a week, Chún was awoken naturally from a deep sleep, by the triumphant morning celebration as the Planet-that-was-a-Mountain rang with the rise of the Golden Crow.
The young teen stretched, rolled out of his newly luxurious bedding and sauntered over to the hotspring, grabbing a handful of scented sand-soap from the small bag sitting by the side of the pool. He had brought some from the market, but even a cursory examination showed that it had been enhanced.
"Looks like the sprites like the idea of washing too," he chuckled, "They have made it smell better and it is glowing with Essence," he sighed in pleasure as he began rubbing it over his skin, "it definitely feels and cleans better on the skin as well."
"They improved it and took a portion as payment," agreed his locus in the link, "Which is pretty much what they do for everything. That is why they love new things as much as high Essence areas - new toys to play with. How are you feeling this morning, Chún?"
"I feel well, Tai. I will not ask you if you have eaten your rice…" Chún laughed as the mountain rumbled with good humor. "Yes - some of your human sayings do not make as much sense when applied to non-humans - but I am well also."
"What needs to be done today, Tai?" asked the young teen as he briskly scrubbed his alabaster body down with the sand.
"I am continuing to slowly lead your new flock towards the Heaven and Earth vine clearing, while monitoring them for adverse Essence effects," recited Tai in a business-like tone, "the village has resolved to send a delegation up to the Grotto this morning to directly ask for protection and assistance." There was a pause and Chún looked up sharply as Tai continued, "this may have been hastened in part by a number of traders arriving in the village inquiring about Essence Herbs and plants - apparently there are rumors spreading of Essence herbs of better than the usual poor quality available in the region."
Chún frowned as he rinsed off, the water trickling down firmly defined musculature. "Suggestions on how to proceed? We do not wish to reveal ourselves, still, correct?"
"The traders are mostly smaller peddlers willing to risk traveling out to the wilds for a lucky chance," explained the Mountain thoughtfully, "if we can come to an arrangement with the village, they can act as a buffer - they will naturally be reluctant to expose their source of good fortune."
Chún clicked his tongue excitedly, "I just had an idea...en, en, listen friend, we will do it this way..."
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"Do you think that will work?" asked the mountain skeptically, once the teen had finished explaining.
"I think so," replied Chún in the link, dunking his long platinum hair in the hot spring, "as long as you introduce me as your agent, the villagers should be happy to accept a 'wandering relic hunter' as the person to talk to for goods and trades. Most people would not want to talk to a powerful Spirit anyway, a human Consumer - or Cultivator - is much more understandable and less frightening." Chún shrugged as he soaped his hair, washing out the tangles, "This way they are less likely to reveal the secret, since they do not actually know it and I can keep trading without anyone wondering who I am and poking around."
"And if they keep praying?" asked Tai quietly, "It is beneficial for me, but I do not wish to disappoint anyone."
"They will even if we tell them not to. Better to have it in the open where we can make sure it does not get misused by anyone for their own ends. We will help if we can. If we cannot, we… I guess we try to find a way - or I tell them you say it is not within your power…?" answered Chún equally quietly as he finished washing and sat down in the hot water to relax.
"This... " A wind gusted through the cave, making Chún shiver even as he sat in the hot spring. He sank down until the steaming water reached his chin and closed his eyes, long lashes beading with the moisture.
"I know…" Chún bit his lip, then offered, "I could just tell them it was me. That there is no Mountain to pray to."
"They would not believe you - and technically, there is a Mountain Spirit… I am just not able to fix everything yet," replied Tai after a moment, "Chances are that short of bringing back loved ones after death - between the two of us we can probably meet any request that peasant villagers could make. Medicine, wealth, weapons… And speaking of which - the Cauldron wishes for you to let it absorb Celestial Essence - so you have something to convince it to cooperate with you when you are learning to make medicine."
"Wait… what?" The teen True Cultivator sat up in alarm, sending sheets of water off of his body and the contents of the hot spring sloshing over the edges of the pool to drain back in in streams of streaming water, "I can make one medicine - and you said it is not even a real medicinal pill. I know nothing about weapons… what happened to the Blacksmith anyway?"
"He was part of that gang," Tai reminded him, "and with the Cauldron's help and my knowledge, you can learn to make even better medicine. Not that you would need to," the mountain pointed out smugly, "the wound heal paste is practically a miracle for a non-consumer - it will heal everything short of terminal illness and amputation if they receive it quickly enough."
"Eventually they will want Cultivation medicine, Cultivation Methods and Techniques" pointed out Chún, pulling back his long hair to wring it out, "I would have, last month."
"Not a bad idea," answered Tai thoughtfully, "if they can defend themselves it is better for us." The mountain gave the impression of shrugging, "as for helping the villagers Cultivate, opportunistic Consumers will get wind of the stories sooner or later and come searching. We have discussed recruiting defenders before - and now that we have cleaned out the bad elements out of the village, raising up the villagers is a viable option."
"We could end up creating our own mad set of Consumers," argued Chún, narrowing his eyes "this feels like a very bad idea."
"We could provide complete Cultivation Methods suitable for each person," pointed out Tai, "not those broken atrocities the Consumers use. It is not as if the villagers would know that what we provide them is any different than what the average Consumer has."
"Something tells me… this is precisely how the first Consumers got started," shot back Chún, "a well meaning True Cultivator, for what seemed like very good reasons at the time, started some mortals Cultivating - and then it all goes wrong."
"I have examined the land's memory of everyone in the village over the last week," responded Tai matter-of-factly, "anyone I found having a history of gaining advantage or pleasure at the expense or pain of another have had their actions coincidentally exposed, leading to the Village Head sending them to local magistrate for judgment over the past week. I believe the remaining villagers are trustworthy."
"That…" The teen frowned, "that is another thing no one else must know about. Anyone with power would seek to control you to be able to do the same to their enemies." Chún sighed, rubbing his brows, "I wish you had consulted with me first. The delegation from the village and their praying makes sense now; even if there is no direct evidence, the Mayor at the least has to suspect your involvement."
"This is my kingdom now," the Mountain rumbled implacably, "my power, my responsibility and my law. Even so, I merely exposed their actions to their fellow villagers, who then judged them according to their own laws."
"Rules are imposed by the strong, of course," answered Chún as he stood up and began to walk out of the pool, "but even ants can kill an elephant. Be careful you do not sow your own destruction. I doubt the Lotus Emperor would agree with your assumption of authority, for instance - and if the villagers grew to fear and hate you, I doubt we could survive short of killing them all before they alerted the rest of the Empire - and that itself would inevitably attract attention that we do not want."
There was no reply from Tai and Chún was silent as he sent a weave of Essence outward to divest himself and his hair of water. Dry, he began dressing, thinking. Eventually he sighed. "There is another issue with agreeing to help the villagers to cultivate. I am a True Cultivator. What works for me will not work for mortals. And you are struggling to help me, even with all our advantages and even though I Cultivate almost by instinct. Even if we gave them techniques, we could not guide them effectively. We need teachers. Hells, I need a teacher - even if it is to see what is usually done and give us a basis to adapt off it."
There was rumbling that Chún had come to associate with Tai being in deep thought.
"You are correct," allowed Tai reluctantly, "best we avoid such things for now. It is not something most peasants would ask about anyway - they would never think it an option. If someone asks, I suppose you can admit to having no talent in teaching, which is why you wander jianghu looking for relics. But we really need to find a way to build up a defense…"
"Keep an eye out for Jianghu Wanderers?" suggested Chún tentatively, "they cannot all be opportunistic bastards? If we find righteous ones we can offer them support in return for acting as watchers and fighters…?"
"There are so many ways that could go wrong…" grumbled Tai, "it would be better if we found some Consumers that felt indebted to us - even then we would need to conceal the extent of our abilities and resources."
"That is obvious," agreed Chún as he finished dressing in his simple clothing and tied his hair back with a basic leather strap, "for now we will hope that we have not made enough waves to attract more dangerous Consumers. We will keep looking for opportunities to strengthen the village without attracting attention - for that matter, if everyone in the village suddenly started Cultivating, it would get noticed."
"I feel we are forgetting something," rumbled Tai discontentedly.
"Most likely," admitted the teen, "we are both young and lacking in experience. I really wish that crazy old man had stuck around. Times like this we could really use advice."
"Maybe you could discreetly ask that high level Consumer who traded with you for advice? He seemed interested…" Tai trailed off, clearly reflecting on his words.
Chún sighed and walked back to his bed, reached for the cloak and staff which shimmered and vanished as his hand reached towards them, "well, I suppose we just have to keep it all in mind. It will take a couple of shi before the delegation from the village gets to the grotto?"
"Yes. There are some ignition points and defense patterns you can be completed before they arrive," advised his locus, "we have been falling behind on your practice lately."
The Young teen nodded and left the cave briskly, reaching up to catch a falling Vine Fruit, "My thanks your Highness," he called out to a friendly rustling of half seen leaves and vines and a chorus of happy chirps from the tending Essence sprites, "and good morning to everyone else too!"
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Wang Dai walked with as much dignity as he could manage at the head of the procession as it wound up mountain path. Behind him came the village elders, newly resuming their duties after the events of the last Market - some village wit had taken to calling it the Bloody Night and the name had stuck.
Despite the warm morning light from the slowly rising Crow, Dai shivered at his thoughts. In the last few years his village had been beset with one calamity after another.
He had been proud of what he and his childhood friends and their parents - who made up most of the village Elders - had accomplished over the last decade, in successfully building a simple farming village into a Market Village.
Ten years ago when he had succeeded his father as Village Head, the village had finally accumulated enough resources and recruited enough skilled craftspeople to be permitted to petition Huijan prefecture to raise their village's ranking to a Market Village.
One of the strongest arguments in their favour had been that raising the Village's Rank would allow wandering gatherers, hunters, peddlers and other 'rougher' types to have a more convenient location closer to the edge of the Fusou Wilderness to trade their bounty, rather than having to travel an additional three days to Hujian itself.
At the time, Dai had suspected the nobles of the city had rather approved of the idea of reducing the number of peasantry coming into the city each month to trade their produce and had approved the village's advancement with only a token of gifts.
Unfortunately, it was soon after the first successful Market Day that things started to go wrong. First it was the offers to purchase the newly constructed village business, then the threats. Complaints to the Prefecture Lord received no response - knowing what he knew now, Dai doubted they ever reached their intended destination - and then there were the beatings that convinced several craftsmen to give up their businesses to coincidently arrived replacements. Within half a year of the village becoming a Market, it was entirely owned and run by the thugs who had moved in.
The crime gang seemed content to provide 'protection' and retain the best of the produce and Essence items brought in from the wilderness. They levied small market day fees and other such things, always just short of pushing people to raise complaint, once a few earlier braver traders were 'banned' for 'illegal activities' and such.
Instead of the funds raised going to improve the village into the town he had planned for, the Village Head and the Elders were forced to watch as their village was systematically shorn with great efficiency each month, the vast majority of the benefits disappearing, with only enough retained by the village to keep it running.
Oddly enough, the gang seemed uninterested in overtly running the town. The Elders and Dai remained in their positions as long as they did as they were told. If they did not, someone from their families had an 'accident'.
In this sort of environment, the village spirit withered and became bitter. Dai was ashamed to admit that in the last few years, even the villagers not directly involved with the gang had become hardened and grudging, a far cry from their once generous nature.
Dai had harbored hope at first, that someone from Huijan - merchants or even a noble - might notice that the harvests from the market did not meet expectations. However, the occasional visits from officials revealed that the market village had gained a reputation for regular, modest, average produce and Essence items or plants - and no one seemed particularly surprised by this.
Dai knew then that the Gang was keeping the cream of the crop for itself and letting the rest through - and not having anything to compare it to, people in the rest of the prefecture thought everything was normal - or, perhaps the Gang had bribed people not to notice.
Whatever the reason, Dai lost hope along with his village.
Then, in the last few months, there had been changes. At first, they were all negative. The criminal gang which for years had been acting covertly, quietly, sustainably and steadily started to demand, violently, a much larger portion of everything. Enough so that after the last several Market Days, rumors of the Village not being a good place to trade had started to circulate among the farmers and traders outside of the village, causing a slow but definite decrease in traders coming in.
The criminals behind everything no longer seemed to worry about killing the hen to get the eggs. Careful questioning made Dai and the other Elders realise that for whatever reason, the gang was uninterested in maintaining the operation for much longer and the village would likely suffer greatly once they decided to move on, if it survived at all.
One of the presumed casualties of this change had been an orphan boy - one of a mother and son pair that had drifted into the village on the run from something a few years before with the mother dying soon after the child had become mostly self-sufficient.
The villagers had done their best to help without being too obvious by giving the street rat odd jobs and buying the occasional furs and herbs he brought in. No one dared to treat him too kindly for fear the gang might use it against them or him somehow - and no one had much to spare anyway, but the extra hand for chores had been sorely needed by many and he was missed when he vanished. The villagers assumed that the often defiant kid had come crossways of a thug in the Gang's recent heavy handedness.
A few villagers swore that the boy had told them that he was going to seek his fortune, but most of the village thought that that was precisely the sort of thing the gang looked to discourage.
Adding to the village's woes, local travellers coming through the village - and a few villagers hunting and gathering - witnessed strange lights and noises coming from the area of the very Mountain he was now reluctantly climbing with a group of Elders (and other curious and fervent villagers) following him. Tales of strange Essence Beasts and other frightening stories started to circulate, leaving Dai to wonder if the Heavens had completely abandoned his town.
Oddly enough, these stories led to a small increase in treasure seekers and sketchy 'relic hunters' coming through the town to try their luck in the Fusou Wilderness. A few did come back with some good pelts and herbs, which again were almost entirely gathered by the criminal group.
The next change was almost a month ago; gossip about a mysterious Cultivator coming through the village and selling off high quality Essence herbs, pelts and other items set the villager's speculating wildly. Of particular interest to everyone was the reaction of the Gang, who made a point of spreading and exaggerating the rumors themselves - especially after one of the better known traders bought up nearly everything this Cultivator had sold, for unbelievable amounts of Essence Stones - at least to Dai and the other villagers.
Unusually, the Gang released funds to improve the village for the first time in years after this - and promoted the next Market Day to be something special. Fervently, the villagers hoped that perhaps this signaled a turn in their fortunes - and prayed that the Cultivator would return, no one dared imagine how the gang would react if he did not.
When he did appear, it was cause for quiet celebration. Wild stories flew around the village faster than hunting eagles - he looked different, he was a fairy, or an immortal - he was very wealthy.
The last was not a story. The Cultivator bought or traded something from almost every person in the market - and sold or traded treasures for almost nothing. The whole village broke into spontaneous celebration, daring to hope that the enormous wealth would be enough even after the Gang took their cut, for the village to regain its future.
This was reinforced by several villagers noticing that there seemed to be a lot less of the gang around the town as night fell, especially the strongest and most notorious members - the apothecary and the blacksmith - both who had co-opted businesses as part of the criminal's Gang's take over in the early years - among them.
And then all the Hells broke loose in the middle of the biggest celebration the villagers had held for years.
When the dust settled, several disturbing things were discovered. Firstly, everyone involved with the criminals was dead. Secondly, there was a crater where one of the houses had stood on the outskirts of the village. Investigation proved it had belonged to the leader of the criminals - there was enough surviving Essence treasures, weapons, Essence Stones, taels of gold, silver and bronze - as well as ordinary golds, silvers and bronzes and various Essence protected records to prove it without a shadow of a doubt.
The old village storyteller swore up and down he had seen the spirit of the mountain appear and kill all the criminals just prior to the house exploding; it would have been dismissed as more of his usual drunken ramblings if another Elder had not swore on his ancestors that he had seen something like a fountain of mist fly towards the mountain around the same time.
Then one of the traders came limping in, showing signs of having fought off bandits. Recognising him as the trader who had started all of the fuss by coming through a couple of weeks previous and buying all of the items sold by the Cultivator, Dai had asked him what happened, only to find out that he had fought off members of the same gang - as proven by the odd tattoos of grass that all the bodies bore, something that was obvious once the trader pointed it out.
The trader identified the symbol as belonging to an Evil Cultivation Sect; when pressed as to the source of his knowledge he admitted to having some Cultivation and contacts in Jianghu. He left a few hours after his wounds were bound - proving he had more than a little Cultivation - strongly suggesting the village keep the events of the night quiet as the village would undoubtedly face reprisal if the Evil Sect found out about it.
No one in the village slept that night; there was evidence to be disposed of for everyone's safety; everyone was fearful that someone would appear from the Evil Sect demanding vengeance.
Days passed without anything happening. Dai was unable to relax, however, as odd events kept occurring.
A number of old unsolved crimes and even a murder from before Dai became village head were solved during the villages work to cover the evidence of all the gang's bodies. A number of others confessed to petty cruelties and other unpleasant behaviour over the next week as actions old and recent came to light.
Dai had to call in the local circuit magistrate - successfully, for the first time since he became Village Head - to hand over the various individuals involved in serious crimes. He made a point of confessing the whole messy business regarding the Evil Sect and ask that he be punished and the rest of the villagers spared - he did not think the new criminals would keep quiet, so it was best not to hide it.
To his complete shock - he was expecting to be beheaded out of hand - the magistrate agreed with the Cultivator Trader's advice; apparently the Evil Sect was a thorn in the side of the Empire and rather than being considered a criminal act the village was permitted to retain the treasures as reward for performing an honorable act against the enemies of the empire and compensation for the robbery that had been committed against the villagers over the last decade.
The magistrate did warn him not to trust every official with this information; not everyone was upright - for this reason the magistrate would not report the events beyond trusted superiors and the village could not be officially rewarded. The magistrate executed all the criminals, in large part to prevent them from spreading the information, before leaving.
At this point Dai thought himself numb to further shocks; but the news that a few younger villagers had braved the mountain trail behind the village and had returned with tales of an amazingly changed and vastly improved landscape - with some low ranked Essence Herbs apparently plucked from the side of the trail as proof - shook his understanding of the world again.
A few of the village hunters organised an expedition; they returned within a couple shi with several slain Essence Beasts and descriptions of a Mountain mysteriously wreathed in mists and abundant in game, wild vegetables and fruit. They all insisted that the Essence levels were high enough to ease pain from old injuries and spoke of a mysterious shrine that the group had made prayers and offerings of thanks before returning.
The village was at a loss. If they had been plundered before for meagre gleanings, how much more if they suddenly had a treasure in their backyard. They had to keep it secret.
The Storyteller pointed out this had all started with that mysterious Jianghu Relic Hunter. Clearly he had discovered something that had changed the Mountain - and now the Mountain protected the village. Rather than being afraid, they should give thanks to it for it interceding.
After much debate, the village decided to send a delegation to do their best to stay on the good side of the new god that had suddenly appeared in their midst - and do everything they could to influence it to keep protecting them.
So, Dai thought with a growing sense of fatalism, here he was, walking into a dangerous place in the hope he would not get eaten, in the faint hope he could convince it to eat someone else.
Looking back at the others behind him who looked as if this was a great adventure - with the exception of a few of his fellow elders who looked as grim as he felt - he wondered how it had all gone wrong.
"All I wanted was to be a good Village Head," he muttered, "is that so much to ask for?"
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
WheeledWriter
WheeledWriter Larger than usual chapter, but it was more important not to interrupt the flow of the setup than stop at some arbitrary length
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