Capítulo 11: 5-9 Forge of Destiny
Chapter 5-First Steps 5
Ling Qi's next few days were marred by long periods of exhausting meditation interspersed with frightening brushes with mortality when control of her qi slipped and sent her heart beating erratically. Carving open a channel for her qi was a painstaking task.
Completing it meant that she could begin learning to attune it to an element and practice the simplest arts. Time spent in lessons and in private cultivation blurred together as she focused on her goal.
Her breakthrough finally came during the last of Elder Su's lessons that week. With the lecture over, the class was allowed to cultivate under the Elder's watchful eye. In her seat at the back of the room, Ling Qi slowed her breathing and continued to push her qi through the slowly opening spiritual channel.
At first, things proceeded as normal, her qi pulsing in time with her heartbeat. Suddenly, her breathing hitched as she felt something within her crumble. With no more spiritual detritus blocking its way, her qi gushed outward. Engrossed in the sudden feeling of soaring freedom, she was only vaguely aware of startled gasps and the sound of rushing wind from around her.
Ling Qi opened her eyes, blinking in wonder at the new feelings. She suddenly felt so… aware. She could feel the smooth material of her uniform on her skin and the tiny motions of the air around her. She could hear the sound of rustling cloth as the person on her right side shifted away from her and her own clothes flapping in an invisible breeze.
"Please settle yourself, Disciple Qi."
She was startled from her contemplation by the sudden presence of Elder Su in the aisle to her left. Even with her new awareness, she hadn't been able to feel the Elder approaching. Her cheeks coloring slightly at the mild reprimand, she did her best to follow the instruction, trying to reign in the flow of her qi. The phantom breeze weakened but did not die as she worked to regain control.
The Elder continued up the steps of the aisle, stopping as she came to stand beside Ling Qi's seat.
"It seems your natural qi has a tinge of wind to it," the older woman said quietly. In the silence of the room, her words rang out clearly. "Do you require a moment outside to compose yourself?"
Ling Qi felt uncomfortable as she felt the attention of the other disciples settle on her. At the same time, she felt pride from the fact that Elder Su was addressing her directly and unprompted at that.
"No, Elder Su."
The matronly woman fixed Ling Qi with a gaze that seemed to peer through her.
"I see. You have been doing quite well so far." The older woman flicked her sleeve, and Ling Qi blinked as an odd jade token appeared on the desk in front of her.
"Take this to the archive. The supervisor there will allow you to take a copy of one of the arts from the first floor."
Archive? She had no idea where that was. She had no idea there even was an archive, but Elder Su was already moving away. She didn't want to make herself appear foolish by having to ask so she remained silent. As pleased as she was to be given this, she was well aware that any chance she had of muddling along beneath notice had just vanished.
"Thank you Elder," she managed to say, lowering her head in respect, even as she carefully hid away the jade token she had been given. It looked mundane, but she wasn't about to risk losing it.
The rest of lesson proceeded normally. Ling Qi used her remaining time to practice getting used to the feeling of qi flowing through her open meridian. As Ling Qi hurried to disappear into the crowd of disciples leaving the lessons, she was brought up short.
"Ah… Miss Ling! Miss Ling, can you please wait a moment?" An out of breath female voice called from behind her.
Ling Qi glanced behind herself warily and slowed down. She had made it out to the plaza and there were many people around so it was unlikely that someone was going to try something. What she saw when she turned her head was a girl she recognized from her lessons with Elder Su. Li Suyin, if she recalled correctly.
Li Suyin had long, light blue hair and the sort of slim, petite figure that most of the female disciples did. She was rather plain though, much like Ling Qi herself. The girl lacked the obvious cosmetics or accessories that the wealthier girls used to show off, but Li Suyin was still too pale and unblemished to be a commoner.
She was also red faced from exertion. It looked like she had run to catch up with Ling Qi, and she didn't seem very fit physically.
"What do you need?" Ling Qi asked. The other girl had never been rude to her or jostled her in the halls so she could afford to be polite.
The other girl seemed relieved that Ling Qi had stopped. "I am glad I caught you today. You always disappear so quickly after lessons," Li Suyin said between breaths, smoothing her gown nervously with her hands. "I… well. I was hoping you might consider helping me?"
Ling Qi stared at her. What could Li Suyin want help with? The other girl had awakened earlier this week so Ling Qi wasn't exactly far ahead of her.
"I don't see how I could help," Ling Qi replied bluntly.
Li Suyin fidgeted under her gaze. "W-well... You have advanced so quickly. It took me a month to reach this point. I was hoping that we could discuss the differences in our methods, and that I could observe your cultivation in private." Her voice seemed to get smaller and smaller as she went on. By the end, Li Suyin wasn't even looking her in the eye anymore.
"...I'm sorry. I'm aware that that is a very rude request."
Ling Qi felt awkward about being asked for help. She was also more than a little suspicious. She couldn't imagine that she would be much help to the other girl either.
"I'll think about it," she said. "Give me a few days to consider."
"Of course," the other girl said hurriedly. "Um - well, if you want to, we can meet after lessons." She glanced back up at Ling Qi's skeptical face for a moment before her shoulders slumped a little. "I will… stop bothering you. It's obvious that you are very busy."
Li Suyin began to hurry away, leaving Ling Qi to wonder if the girl's nerves were truly genuine. It didn't feel like a deception. She couldn't see herself benefitting from the discussions either, but… her thoughts returned to Han Jian, where the situation was reversed.
"Li Suyin," she called out. "I'll make some time in a few days, alright?"
The nervous girl, having stopped at her call, beamed at her, offering a hasty but grateful bow. "Thank you very much!"
When Ling Qi returned home, she was surprised to see the light of a lit hearth in the window. Bai Meizhen kept erratic hours. Sometimes, Ling Qi would never even see her arrive at their shared home in the evening.
Bai Meizhen also had strange habits. Ling Qi had never once seen the girl eat a single grain of rice or so much as sip from a bowl of soup for example. Even when Ling Qi offered to share her meals, they were refused.
...She had seen the other girl with a trickle of blood on her chin on one late morning, but Bai Meizhen had wiped it away moments after meeting Ling Qi's stare. Ling Qi had not felt brave enough to ask about it given the other girl's frosty expression.
Oddities aside, Bai Meizhen was… helpful in her taciturn and condescending way. As Ling Qi settled in for the evening and finished her simple dinner, she ended up speaking with the girl, resuming their 'lessons' on the boring minutiae of noble etiquette.
"I'm still not really sure I understand, but… are you saying all noble families have a 'Sublime Ancestor'? Is that some kind of tradition? That someone has to… marry a spirit to make their line noble?" Ling Qi's expression was strange as she tried to parse Bai Meizhen's explanation on how ranking and position among noble clans worked.
"All of the truly well-established families have or had such a non-human ancestor. Only an exalted few can claim to have a Sublime Ancestor," the pale girl explained with a hint of impatience.
"I do not understand why you have such trouble with the idea," Bai Meizhen added irritably. "A few Sublime Ancestors have died or disappeared, but this should still be common knowledge. The relationship between a powerful cultivator and their bound spirits has always been close."
Ling Qi had found that Bai Meizhen had strange ideas on what constituted common knowledge.
"What do you mean by bound spirits?" Ling Qi asked, eyeing the green scales visible just under the neckline of Bai Meizhen's gown. "Is that why Cui seems like she shares your qi?" She still wasn't very good at feeling other people's energy but she was around the two of them often enough to feel the oddity.
"When a cultivator reaches the second stratum… the Yellow realm, it becomes possible to bond with a spirit whether beast or pure. This serves to strengthen both parties, allowing them to cultivate together and share growth to a degree. It also serves to humanize the spirit, making it easier for the spirit to interact with and understand us."
Ling Qi nodded thoughtfully, reaching out to warm her hands at the hearth. It was beginning to get cold in the evenings. She didn't follow everything Bai Meizhen had just said, but the gist was simple.
"Oh. So he's at that point…" she murmured to herself, thinking about Han Jian. She hadn't thought he was that advanced.
"That boy is not yet bonded with his familial partner," Bai Meizhen's voice shook her out of her contemplation. "He yet remains at the peak of the Red realm."
Ling Qi blinked, turning back to Meizhen. "How did you know who I was thinking of?"
The other girl's unsettling gaze slipped to the side. The silence quickly became awkward.
"... I have observed you with him once. It seemed obvious who you were thinking of," Bai Meizhen replied eventually.
Well, it wasn't like she had cause to complain. She had done some shadowing too.
"Right… Anyway, you were telling me about how noble families rank against each other? Is it just who has the strongest ancestors or is it determined by Heavenly Mandate like the Imperial Seat?" She might be an uneducated peasant but even she was aware of some things.
Bai Meizhen's lips curled in disdain. "I forget sometimes the prevalence of imperial propaganda," she muttered more to herself than Ling Qi.
"The clan holding the Imperial Seat is chosen by who can hold it against their rivals. The current dynasty's hold is maintained by their control of the supply of spirit stones in the great mines of Mount Tai, as well as the web of alliances the mines have given them."
Ling Qi's eyes widened at the casual and disdainful description. It was uncomfortable to hear someone speak of the Imperial throne that way. It just… wasn't done.
"But… doesn't the Dragon Throne incinerate false claimants?" There were all sorts of stories of wicked schemers destroyed for daring to touch the throne.
"Certainly," Bai Meizhen responded, her irritation showing in the sibilant undertone that colored her words. "However, the first emperor and creator of the throne was a very promiscuous man. Almost every noble family of any pedigree is descended from him."
Feeling rather uncomfortable with the subject matter, Ling Qi soon changed it, but she now felt she had an inkling of why Meizhen might be isolated. Was her family out of favor with the Imperial Court?
The thought was unsettling enough to cut into her sleep that night.
This was very unhelpful the next day as she trudged toward the training grounds before sunrise for another lesson with Elder Zhou. If she were honest, these lessons were probably her least favorite times on the mountain. The man was a merciless taskmaster and every time she attended, she went home exhausted, sore, and filthy with sweat and dirt. She wasn't afraid of getting dirty, but Ling Qi had never imagined she could be that tired.
She felt some pride in that she was one of only a score or so of the girls who regularly showed up and kept up. She saw Meizhen once or twice, as well as Sun Liling, both of whom were irritating in different ways. Meizhen because the snow white girl never seemed to tire properly and never sweated at all, no matter how hard she worked Sun Liling because whenever she showed up, she got the instructor's personal attention.
There were no more incidents like the first day. No student spoke back or interrupted Instructor Zhou again, not even the boy still nursing a bruise from last week.
Their instructor spoke little. When he did, Zhou's lectures were oddly mundane, in that he spoke little of cultivation matters but more on fitness. Actual exercise was needed alongside meditation to allow qi to properly seep into the muscles and bones, and he constantly reminded them that keeping their bodies in the peak of mundane health was necessary for laying the foundation of their physical cultivation.
A cultivator's body degraded slower than a mortal's, much slower as they grew stronger. Once she reached the peak, it wouldn't be difficult to stay there, but here, at the beginning, she could not afford to slack at all.
Not that she intended to.
Ling Qi was all too aware of how much she would benefit from having an Immortal's body. Sickness, disease, starvation. All the ugly things she had spent her life worrying about could be cast aside and forgotten if she just exercised hard enough. How could she not put her full effort into it?
So despite her difficulties, Ling Qi stubbornly pushed on with her cultivation, doing her utmost to focus her qi into her exhausted muscles during her periods of meditation. Today, despite its miserable beginnings, her cultivation paid off.
It happened as she was in the midst of a set of push ups, a cool down from the more intense exercises. It was as if she had been straining against a great weight tied to her back, only for it to suddenly vanish. Vitality flooded her tired limbs, banishing her fatigue and lingering tiredness like morning mist before the sun. Her body felt lighter than it ever had before, and aches she had forgotten she even had faded away.
"Good. Get up and join the third group," Ling Qi's gaze snapped up as she found herself staring at the veritable mountain of muscle that was Instructor Zhou. How did Elders do that?
Hastily nodding, she stood, not trusting herself to respond without stuttering something embarrassing. No matter how harsh he was, the older man was very… distracting up close.
Moving toward the group of students who had reached the Early Gold stage, she paused as Elder Zhou spoke again.
"Do not slow down. You are still far behind your peers."
His words stung but… they were true. Gritting her teeth in determination, Ling Qi set herself to driving her body to exhaustion once again.
After Elder Zhou's lesson, Ling Qi dragged her tired body up the narrow path which lead to the archive. She had learned its location by listening in on the other groups of disciples coming and going. Although her muscles ached and her lungs burned with exertion, she did not want to put this off any longer.
She wished the location was more convenient. The archive was a rounded tower rising from the top of a cliff, and the path she walked was a narrow switchback carved into the face of it, steep and dangerous. Even as tired as she was though, Ling Qi felt no concern. Though her limbs dragged, her balance was more perfect than ever.
Reaching the top, she took a moment to catch her breath and then proceeded forward. It took a moment for her to figure out the door. Apparently, she needed to slot the token Elder Su had given her into it, but once slotted, the door swung open, opening the archive to her.
Soon, she would have an art of her own.
Chapter 6-Exam Prep 1
Ling Qi rubbed her eyes, trying to banish the blur of exhaustion. Scattered on the table before her were a half dozen opened scrolls, dense with text and diagrams. The archive supervisor had been able to explain the Archive's organization, but even limiting her search to arts which only needed a single heart meridian for the initial level, the number she had to sift through had been vast.
There were no windows in the archive, only hanging lanterns that burned without flame, but Ling Qi suspected that it was nearing sunrise. There were simply so many options, and she could only take a single one. Each art would allow her to perform feats that she could not have imagined a scarce few weeks ago.
The Burning Heart Art would allow her to inspire courage and banish fear, as well as project blazing heat in the wake of her movements. The Earthroot Art would fill her limbs with strength and slow enemies with the weighty energies of the earth. The Crimson Flowing Art would allow her to sense the flow of blood in things around her and staunch her own wounds with a thought.
And these were only a few of the available arts!
Ling Qi's gaze drifted to another scroll on the table. Zephyr's Breath Art was a set of techniques for manipulating the currents of air around the user to speed allies and impede foes. It was an art for making projectiles fly true and for avoiding direct confrontation.
In other words, it fit her well. But did she want it? She was a cultivator now, she could… should do whatever she wanted. Did she want to keep running away?
Ling Qi let out an explosive sigh. She was being silly; looking at her peers, she had no business being able to simply do as she pleased. Elder Su had mentioned that her qi had a natural wind nature so Zephyr's Breath really was her best choice for being able to quickly defend herself.
It was only a first choice after all, and meridians could be re-attuned. Ling Qi decisively snatched up the scroll. She wavered as she stood up but shook her head, took control of her breathing, and cycled her qi to push the exhaustion back for the moment.
Once she cleaned up and traded the scroll for the jade slip encoded with its contents, she could get some sleep. She just hoped that she didn't end up missing Elder Su's lesson by oversleeping.
Days passed, and Ling Qi found limited success in getting her new art to work. The finesse required to create more than directionless bursts of wind eluded her yet, and channeling the flows of qi left her feeling exhausted, her single meridian burning with discomfort. It seemed that her body needed more tempering yet.
She was not yet ready to make use of her art, but that day would come soon if she kept working hard. She was sure of it. Elder Su's lessons were slowly improving her ability to cycle and manipulate qi. Mastering the next stage of Argent Soul also promised great improvements to her stamina, and in a few days, she was going to be meeting that girl, Li Suyin, to share cultivation ideas.
As for Elder Zhou... Well, his lessons continued to be both blessing and trial.
Ling Qi's limbs trembled with exhaustion, her muscles burning from the strain of holding herself in the difficult pose Instructor Zhou had forced them to take up for meditation this week. The meditation had begun with simple stretches but had quickly progressed to difficult and highly uncomfortable exercises.
Muscles she didn't even know she had were sore, and the sweat trickling down her forehead despite the mountain chill kept stinging her eyes. Ling Qi doggedly kept her attention on Instructor Zhou as he paced between the rows of disciples, muscular arms clasped behind his back.
"As a cultivator, you cannot afford to neglect any part of your body. Physical cultivation is, at its core, an endless exercise in balance and unity. Lose that balance or cultivate some part out of sync and you will tear your own body apart," the elder lectured, pausing now and then to not so gently nudge a disciple back into proper position.
"At this low stage of cultivation, you may suffer torn muscles, broken bones, and other minor injuries."
One of the boys on the elder's left collapsed mid-movement, his leg giving out beneath him. The elder waved the boy off to cool down.
"The repercussions for failure only grow with your cultivation. You do not wish to make such mistakes when you begin reinforcement of the major organs."
Ling Qi gritted her teeth as the muscles in her back cried out from being extended for so long.
"One's foundation of understanding is vital to cultivation. This is the sole reason that Elders such as I are spending our time teaching you.
"The key to physical cultivation is Unity!" His voice boomed out over the field, and another person collapsed in a heap.
"The body requires Unity and Balance." Even in her current state, Ling Qi could hear the odd emphasis that he put on those words.
"Flesh, bone, muscle, blood, the organs major and minor. No part of the body functions well without the others supporting it! And so all must be cultivated to achieve true strength."
He rounded the end of the row and began to walk down the one occupied by Ling Qi.
"The same can be said for the Sect and the Empire. No province would find the same prosperity or the same safety on its own." Ling Qi's breath hitched as she felt her body begging to be allowed to collapse.
"No soldier survives a battle on his own. He survives with the support of his squad, which survives with the support of its battalion. A General without his men is no better than a head without a body. An army without a general is no better than a body without a head!
"But all the same, cultivation is also about removing the impurities from the body. It is about ejecting weakness." He stopped a scant dozen steps from Ling Qi's position to survey the field, towering over the hunched and bent students.
"I have said it before; I am not here to train court cultivators, who sit in their clan homes and play the games of politics. I train the soldiers who will stand as the bulwark of the Empire. This is your warning. In two weeks, the lessons I give freely will end."
Murmurs of alarm sounded at that, but none dared anything more.
"The week after next, I will oversee a test. It will not be one that solely tests personal strength. You will be organized into squads and set against one another in various tasks. I intend to accept no more than thirty disciples into the remaining lessons."
He resumed walking then, and Ling Qi bit her lip as she concentrated on not falling. Not now. She didn't want to fail just as the Elder walked by…
As the Elder moved toward her, she let out a breath and closed her eyes.
No. She would not let herself fail.
She felt her qi blaze in her dantian and resonate with the Argent Soul Art, the steady outward flow dispersing into her bones and muscles briefly increased and dulled the ache of exhaustion. When she opened her eyes, she found herself meeting the instructor's eyes, if only for a second, as he swept his gaze over her.
"We will see which of you has the potential to be worth more of my time then.
"At ease, disciples," Elder Zhou said as he reached the end of the line.
"Perform your cooldowns and go. Prepare yourselves well."
The tension in the air as he left the field was palpable. Ling Qi eyed her fellow disciples with new wariness. Their competition was no longer implicit. In two weeks time, they would be enemies.
Ling Qi left the day's lessons in a daze. With this new deadline hanging over her head, all of her progress seemed paltry. It wasn't fair. How was she supposed to compete in something like this when she had only just begun?
She reminded herself that life was not fair and had never been fair. She would just have to find a way to succeed.
It was a group exercise at least, and Elder Zhou had never said that it would be direct combat. Perhaps she could group with Meizhen? It felt unpleasant to have to rely on someone else's strength, but pride was a luxury of the strong.
In the wake of Instructor Zhou's announcement, Ling Qi had been tempted to discard her current plans for cultivating the Argent Soul Art in favor of spending more time on the Zephyr's Breath Art. In the end, she decided against it. Had the instructor not said that the foundation was the most important? Right now, the Argent Soul was her foundation so she would improve it no matter what.
She did come much closer to canceling her meeting with Li Suyin. However, she had already set the date, and there was no point in alienating one of her tiny handful of friendly contacts. Certainly not for a few hours of fumbling solo cultivation.
So unlike most days, instead of ducking out the moment Elder Su opened the door, she hung back. She watched Li Suyin carefully pack up the various writing tools the girl always brought to the lessons.
Ling Qi had started paying attention to the other girl since the day Li Suyin had approached her. The girl never seemed to be without her implements and carried them in an expensive looking case at her side. It was the only real proof that the girl had any wealth.
Ling Qi could see the appeal of taking notes. More than once, she had wished she could better recall Elder Su's instruction even with her improved memory. Sadly, such things were laughably out of her reach financially. And while she could read, her writing ability was far too slow to keep up with the Elder's lecture.
When Li Suyin finally noticed her looking, her eyes widened momentarily before she hurried up, the shiny wooden case holding her notes and implements clutched against her chest.
"I'm sorry! Were you waiting for me? It's just - I needed to blot the ink and -"
"It's fine," Ling Qi cut her off a bit rudely. There was already attention being directed at the two of them, and this wasn't the place for idle chatter.
"Let's walk while we talk," she added, turning away to head for the door.
She heard Li Suyin murmur a response and hurry to catch up with her. Apologizing as she moved around and between other students.
"W-why are you always in such a hurry to leave class?" the blue-haired girl asked as she finally fell in beside Ling Qi. Li Suyin was even shorter than Bai Meizhen, the other girl's head barely came up to Ling Qi's chest. Just another reason to feel awkward and out of place.
"I like staying in practice," Ling Qi responded. "The truce the Elders put down will only last less than two and a half months longer, and I am not popular." Left unsaid was that Ling Qi didn't have any family reputation to act as a buffer either.
"Oh, well, um…" The answer seemed to have surprised Li Suyin.
"I… surely no one will do anything excessive, right?" At Ling Qi's incredulous look, the shorter girl hurried on. "I mean, there will be… duels and such obviously, but we are all disciples of the same sect."
"... Maybe," Ling Qi allowed, but she doubted it would be so civilized. If one dumped a few scraps of meat into a pen of starving dogs, they wouldn't nicely share it either, and in her view, that was a pretty close approximation of the trickle of resources supplied to the outer disciples.
"What's the plan?"
Li Suyin blinked at the sudden change in subject as the two of them hurried out of the lecture building.
"I was thinking that you could come to my home, and I could ask you a few questions before observing you while you cultivate," Li Suyin responded nervously. "I… I have been told my senses are quite good. It is hard to discern anything in the lecture hall when there is so much interference," she said while gesturing vaguely to the other disciples around the two of them.
Was Ling Qi getting set up for a trap? Even if Li Suyin seemed genuine, she didn't like putting herself in the other girl's space.
"Why don't we do it at my place instead?" Ling Qi asked challengingly to see how the other girl would respond.
The blue-haired girl's eyes widened almost comically, and Li Suyin hunched her shoulders. "I… I'm not sure…. Would your housemate really allow that?" she asked, reminding Ling Qi of a frightened rabbit.
"It's my home too," Ling Qi responded stubbornly. She honestly wasn't sure how Meizhen would react to someone else in their home.
"Besides, why is everyone so afraid or disdainful of Bai Meizhen?"
Now Li Suyin was the one looking at her incredulously. "She… does her aura not affect you?" Li Suyin asked before frowning.
"No, it must not. How else would you live in the same home," Li Suyin mumbled to herself. "Is it just acclimation though or…"
Ling Qi shifted uncomfortably. Her heart still sped up sometimes when she was startled by Bai Meizhen's presence, but it was mostly something that she had almost forgotten about given her constant proximity to the girl.
"It can't just be that," Ling Qi said, cutting off the other girl's inquisitive mumbling. "I mean- it's a little unnerving, but we're all cultivators here."
Li Suyin grimaced slightly, turning her attention back to Ling Qi.
"I do not fully understand the matter myself… Father is only a regional minister of finance and was elevated in the exams. I'm not - not really a noble," Li Suyin admitted uncomfortably.
"The Bai family is… They frighten people and upset things with their disagreements with the Imperial Court. There are only a handful of ancient bloodlines left in the Empire, you know?"
Ling Qi didn't know, but she supposed she would have to take the other girl's word for it.
"...We'll do this at your place then," she decided. In the end, her instincts told her Li Suyin wasn't leading her on. She supposed it was a poor idea to invite someone over without asking Bai Meizhen. Her housemate could be prickly at the best of times.
Ling Qi followed Li Suyin to her home, a tiny stone hut on the edge of the residential area. It was… cramped. A single room with a hearth in the center and thin pallets laid out on either side.
One side clearly belonged to Li Suyin. It was neatly made and surrounded by paper and books. The other side was a mess of balled up blankets and discarded clothing, as well as a few other random knick knacks: a battered belt knife, a few stone dishes, and implements for grinding and mixing herbs. There were also fine, silky strands of hair on everything. Did the girl Li Suyin was rooming with have a cat or a dog?
In any case, Li Suyin mumbled apologies for the mess her housemate left and ushered Ling Qi into the only other room, which was essentially the equivalent of the meditation room at Ling Qi's home but… downsized.
Once the two were seated in the dim and cramped room, things started off simple enough. Li Suyin asked various questions about Ling Qi's cultivation and how Ling Qi felt while performing different exercises. Li Suyin scribbled down the answers on the paper spread across the wooden board she had laid out across her lap.
Ling Qi found herself relaxing as time passed and nothing untoward happened even as the other girl's questions grew increasingly difficult. Things like the number of qi circulations in each 'push' on her meridian or the exact number of breaths she took per minute when meditating… Ling Qi couldn't answer many of them since she didn't really pay attention to such issues herself. It was frustrating to be unable to answer again and again.
"Does any of this actually matter?" Ling Qi finally asked, cutting off Li Suyin's latest inquiry about whether Ling Qi circulated her qi clockwise or counterclockwise or some mix of both when clearing her meridian.
The other girl paused in writing and shifted uncomfortably where she was seated only a short distance away.
"I… don't know," Li Suyin admitted.
"I ask questions in the lessons, but there is never enough time for everything I want to ask," she added with a hint of frustration. "There is just so much that I do not know."
"Why ask me then?" Ling Qi asked, leaning back against the wall. "There are probably other girls who actually know these answers."
Li Suyin looked aside, twiddling nervously with her ink brush. "But would they answer me?" she asked, expression bitter.
"At least you are willing to sit down and answer questions instead of calling me foolish."
"That's… fair," Ling Qi admitted.
"I don't know that I'll be able to do this often. I need to cultivate, and the Argent Soul isn't going to master itself." Ling Qi didn't dislike the other girl, but she was also finding it difficult to think of reasons why she should continue.
Li Suyin's face fell, but then her expression settled into one of determination. "Would - would you care for a look at my notes? I've done a fair amount of work on studying how the Argent Soul art works, as well as deciphering the meanings behind the koans and more opaque instructions."
Ling Qi frowned but eventually nodded. She was already here, and it couldn't hurt.
Li Suyin's notes were densely packed, but at the same time… they were pretty insightful. Li Suyin had ideas for achieving the improved qi generation of the second stage of the Argent Soul art that Ling Qi hadn't even considered.
Now that Ling Qi had been presented with them, it made all too much sense. With the new insight in mind, she barely gave Li Suyin a thought before closing her eyes to cultivate. If Li Suyin was right about the last step of the second stage, then it was more than worth a little observation from Li Suyin.
When Ling Qi opened her eyes, the sun had fallen beneath the the horizon. She felt incredibly refreshed. She could not yet maintain the second stage with any stability, but she had advanced in leaps and bounds compared to the muddled attempts she had made previously on her own.
She still jerked back in shock at the first sight she saw. Li Suyin had leaned in far closer than Ling Qi was comfortable with, hands hovering a hair's breadth over Ling Qi's stomach. Just how out of touch was Ling Qi when cultivating?
"Back up," Ling Qi commanded in a voice that was definitely not an embarrassed yelp.
Li Suyin startled at the sound of Ling Qi's voice and flushed a deep red when she met Ling Qi's eyes. Li Suyin hastily jerked back with wide eyes as her hands flew up to cover her mouth.
"I - I'm sorry!" Li Suyin squeaked out. "I just lost track of things while observing your qi and I think I've nearly managed to open the meridian in my arm and I got better results when I was closer and..." she rambled defensively.
"Just - just don't do that again," Ling Qi interrupted shakily. She didn't care for having her personal space invaded.
"... I don't mind coming by again sometime," Ling Qi said in the awkward silence that followed. "As long as you keep sharing your notes," she added hastily.
Ling Qi couldn't but feel a little pleased at the bright smile that overtook the mousy girl's expression. How long had it been since someone had been genuinely happy to see her?
Chapter 7-Exam Prep 2
The qi that now thrummed through Ling Qi's dantian filled her body with energy. Her muscles tingled and her heartbeat thundered in her ears, making it difficult to remain still. The qi washed away the fatigue and thinly stretched feeling that followed a day spent in intensive effort.
She had mastered the second stage of the Argent Soul Art and the depth of her well of qi had grown by nearly half. Letting out a breath, she performed another cycling of her energy and felt wonder at how smoothly it flowed and how swiftly it responded to her thoughts.
This… This had been worth it. She would need to dedicate herself to training hard, but she could instinctively feel that she now had enough qi to put into practice Elder Su's lessons on using qi to reduce the need for sleep. It would leave her drained of energy, but she could train longer and harder if need be. With her increased stamina, she might even be able to begin seriously mastering the first techniques of the Zephyr's Breath Art.
With her success buoying her, Ling Qi left the meditation room feeling ready to take a well-earned break. When she found that her oft absent roommate had returned home during her cultivation, she was even more pleased. She hadn't had a chance to speak to Bai Meizhen in a couple of days, and she wanted to discuss the possibility of teaming up for Elder Zhou's test.
"What do you mean you don't intend to participate?" Ling Qi asked in distress as she looked across the fire at Bai Meizhen.
The pale girl sipped quietly from a steaming cup of tea as Cui lazily slithered up from the collar of her gown, coiling around her neck in a loose loop.
"Just as I said. I have no intention of joining the Sect military beyond training exercises. Elder Zhou's instruction is valuable, but in the end, it is not the path I wish to take. My own physical cultivation is sufficient for my needs."
Ling Qi grimaced. So much for the hope that she could succeed by relying on Bai Meizhen. There was still the possibility of trying to join Han Jian… but she felt less sure of her chances of successfully doing so. The boy had quite a few other friends from her observations.
"Do you at least have an idea of what the Elder's test will be?" Surely Bai Meizhen knew more of the various elders' reputations than Ling Qi did.
Bai Meizhen's thoughtful hum had a slightly unnerving hissing quality to it, but Ling Qi was used to it by now.
"Guan Zhou is a man dedicated to the Empire through and through. It is likely he will test for cooperation, coordination, and ability to synergize one's skills with others. I expect the test will take the form of achieving various military objectives. Other elders may have input into the test however, which may change the form the test takes."
Ling Qi clutched her knees in worry as her thoughts spun through the possibilities. She might not have much combat ability… but she was fairly good at sneaking and survival. Scouting was an important part of army operations, right? She hoped so. Her only experience with soldiering was listening to drunk city guards bemoan their superior officers.
"Ugh. I wish I had more time and resources to cultivate with," Ling Qi lamented. "There are so many things to do, and I'm still so far behind. I can't afford to lose out on an Elder's lessons."
Bai Meizhen regarded her emotionlessly over the rim of her tea cup as Ling Qi spoke to herself. Cui was staring at her too, tongue flickering in and out.
"I had noticed that your cultivation has stopped progressing. Have you reached a block?"
Ling Qi shook her head. "No, I've been cultivating the Argent Soul Art instead. It's my… foundation, right? If I strengthen it, everything that comes after will be stronger." The explanation sounded better in her head, especially now that she was regretting the lack of immediate combat gains.
Bai Meizhen nodded, a hint of approval flickering in her golden eyes. "That is a good way to think, but I can understand why you are distressed. Building a foundation is important, but it lacks immediate returns." She glanced downward thoughtfully, meeting the eyes of her 'cousin', who merely flicked her tongue lazily in response as far as Ling Qi could tell.
"Would you like some tea?" The question was bizarre and made Ling Qi blink in surprise as Bai Meizhen looked back up to meet her gaze.
"… Sure?" Ling Qi responded a bit awkwardly. Was the other girl trying to comfort her?
"What does that have to do with what we were talking about?"
Bai Meizhen pursed her lips. "I am no herbalist, but I do have some small supply of spirit herbs. Several of the herbs are no longer useful to me." She said this as if it explained everything. Bai Meizhen frowned at Ling Qi's lack of understanding and expanded on her previous statement.
"The tea will allow you to cultivate longer and more efficiently. It cannot be used too often though. Once a month at most, lest you risk poisoning."
Ling Qi's eyes widened. Even with the limitation, the tea would be an amazing boon. She hurriedly ducked her head thankfully to the other girl.
"Oh! Then yes, please. Thank you very much."
Bai Meizhen waved her hand dismissively. "It is nothing. As I said, the herbs in question are not useful to one above the Red Soul realm." She sounded pleased at Ling Qi's acceptance.
Later that night, Ling Qi was not regretting her choice even if the tea had been so bitter she had nearly spat it out. As horrible as it had tasted, it had left her qi practically crackling within her dantian, straining at its confines as if to expand her capacity by itself. In a single night, she felt as if she had made up for at least a few of the days lost struggling with art cultivation.
When the tea's effect faded and exhaustion set in, Ling Qi found herself toying with her flute for the first time since she had come to the Sect.
Everything was changing so quickly. Ling Qi might not have true strength yet, but she was achieving something. It hadn't really sunk in how different things were now. She had friends, if tentative and eccentric ones. She knew things that she could never have imagined having the time or energy to care about. She was seriously considering competing in a military exercise!
As she brought the flute to her lips and closed her eyes, she could only think of one thing. She wouldn't fail. She wouldn't fall behind… and she wouldn't be a burden on her housemate forever.
The other girl had helped her greatly tonight and in the past weeks. Their conversations had given her the basic understanding she would need to get by among the other disciples.
She would pay Bai Meizhen back for her kindness.
She played until tiredness finally stole her skill and laid down to sleep.
Days passed. Ling Qi found herself spending more and more time on cultivation and using her qi to avoid the need to sleep. Every time she found her eyes drooping or her thoughts becoming clouded with exhaustion, she would breathe deep and cycle the qi in her dantian. The tiredness would fade, and she would resume cultivating.
She could feel that she would not be able to keep this up forever. Every day that passed without sleep increased the slight feeling of strain and emptiness that she had begun to feel behind her navel as her efforts sapped the internal well of energy she was carefully cultivating. But for now, it would have to be enough.
Not all of her time could be spent in solitary meditation. She still had lessons to attend and… meetings with her friends for one reason or another.
Things were also beginning to change in the lessons. Instructor Zhou grew harsher and more demanding, and the class began to slowly shrink as individual disciples gave up in the face of his harsh criticisms.
Elder Su did not allow things to remain routine either.
"I am glad to see there are none left who remain unawakened at the end of our first month together." The matron opened the class on the second day of the week with an unusual statement. With the exception of her speech on the first day, she had always moved directly into her lecture the moment the the door closed.
"It would have been unfortunate to have to expel such layabouts from my course," she continued pleasantly, eyes scanning the room.
Ling Qi noticed several of her classmates shifting uncomfortably, likely those who had only recently reached their awakening. She wasn't sure; she had been so focused on her cultivation that she hadn't paid them much mind. The only ones whose names she knew in Elder Su's lessons were Li Suyin and Han Jian.
"Going forward, I will have to be somewhat more strict in my requirements." Ling Qi's attention snapped back to the Elder, who handed out her ultimatum with a pleasant expression.
"First, after this week, if you do not have at least one of your meridians cleared, you will not be welcome in this class. The exercises we will be performing next week require that you be able to affect the world around you."
Ling Qi caught Li Suyin shooting her a look of gratitude to which she responded with a weak smile. She was glad she had focused on clearing a meridian so early.
"Similarly," the Elder continued, unperturbed by the unhappy looks on a few disciples' faces, "if you have not achieved the mid-Red Soul stage by the end of the next month, I will ask that you not return." She paused to give a moment for that requirement to sink in.
"I am confident that there are no slackers who will fail to achieve such a simple thing." Ling Qi's spirits sank a bit at that. It was something else she also had to worry over. At least this task seemed doable. With her meridian open and her Argent Soul Art improved to the second stage, she could now focus on raising her cultivation base.
"Demands are not all I have for you," the Elder continued.
"Beginning next week, I intend to reward those who I feel are working the hardest and improving the most." That drew an excited murmur.
"Each week, I will provide those five students with a medicinal pill from my department." She flicked her sleeve and held up a softly glowing blue sphere the size of a thumbnail between her fingers.
"This is the Qi Foundation pill. For cultivators of the Red Soul realm, it provides a significant boon toward cultivation, greatly increasing the rate and efficiency of your qi absorption and meridian opening."
Ling Qi fixed her eyes on the pill before it disappeared back up the Elder's sleeve. She… didn't really know how impressive her growth rate was. Li Suyin had seemed to imply that it was high, but the other girl was likely flattering her so that she would continue with their study sessions. Ling Qi would have to think about how she could acquire one of those pills; she needed every advantage she could get.
For now, she needed to pay attention to Elder Su's lecture. The Elder had moved on to outlining the day's topic. The class would be studying the various effects environment could have on qi and how to identify sites which had a strong energy and were thus helpful for cultivation.
Apparently, this entire mountain was selected as a training ground for this reason. The spirit stones it had once contained were long mined out, but the lingering energy still provided an ideal environment for new cultivators.
Ling Qi made a note to look into the mines at some point. Even if the mines had been stripped bare, they might still hold something of value. Finding even just a handful of extra spirit stones could be really useful.
It was doubtful that she was the only one with that thought.
... A darkened mineshaft was also almost as good as a cluttered alley for the purposes of getting the jump on someone. Perhaps seeking out more trouble wasn't the best idea with Elder Zhou's upcoming test, but it was something to consider.
Chapter 8-Exam Prep 3
After the lecture ended, she walked back to the residential area with Li Suyin. Ling Qi brought up the idea of trying for the pills when they became available, but so far, she was having trouble convincing the other girl that it was even a real possibility.
"I don't see what the problem is," Ling Qi said with a frown as they entered the narrow valley where the first year disciples lived.
"I'm just saying we should at least try to find a better cultivation spot. Your notes were pretty helpful, and I'm pretty sure your cultivation speed has gotten better too. You have a second meridian open now, don't you?"
Ling Qi kept her voice down and an eye on their fellow disciples. She still didn't trust them not to try anything, and the relative peace of her first month here was only feeding her paranoia.
"If we can actually find a a qi locus…"
Li Suyin fidgeted with the hems of her sleeves, hunching her shoulders nervously.
"It is not too difficult to open another once you manage your first," Li Suyin mumbled evasively.
"I do not compare to the other disciples though. You... um- might manage it. I think." She offered Ling Qi a weak smile.
"I… I am going to put my full effort into cultivation, but I am not sure going out looking for something potentially dangerous is a good idea."
Ling Qi held back on rolling her eyes at the other girl's self-deprecation as they turned into the 'street' leading to the scholarly girl's home. From what she had observed Li Suyin was actually a pretty hard worker, and her talent wasn't awful. Li Suyin just got hung up on the details of… everything and tended to second guess herself too much.
Well, Li Suyin was apparently awful at physical cultivation, and Instructor Zhou had scared her off in a matter of days. Ling Qi supposed everyone had their weak points.
Ling Qi paused as she noticed that Li Suyin's door was open already. "Is your housemate home today?" she asked carefully.
Li Suyin glanced at her house and paled slightly, clutching her writing case to her chest.
"Oh! I… Maybe? She doesn't come back very often, but…" Li Suyin seemed nervous.
"I… Will you give me a moment please? I haven't actually told her that I've been bringing someone over. I haven't seen her since last week…"
Ling Qi was about to respond when a voice from just behind her nearly made her jump.
"Damn right you didn't. I was wondering why the house smelled like a stranger."
Ling Qi instinctively spun on her heel to face the speaker, her hands balling into loose fists. She found herself face to face with another disciple. It was alarming that someone had managed to get so close without her notice.
The girl's features were narrow and a bit gaunt with a slight feral cast to them. The impression was not helped by the way her her lips were drawn back, exposing sharp teeth. Sticking out of of her bushy, tangled mass of shoulder length dark brown hair were a pair of large vulpine ears, fuzzy and twitching in agitation. Even more bizarrely, the girl appeared to have a tail the same color as her hair with a white tip wrapped loosely around her waist. Ling Qi would have thought it a weird accessory if it hadn't been moving.
"You better not have touched any of my shit," the girl added threateningly, poking Ling Qi in the chest with one bony, sharp nailed finger.
Ling Qi barely noticed Li Suyin wringing her hands and stammering out an apology out of the corner of her eyes as she met the new girl's intense green eyes unflinchingly. She wasn't going to back down from this girl.
Ling Qi could see what she was dealing with, inhuman features or no. The other girl was skinny to the point of unhealthiness and more than a bit dirty besides. The girl also had twigs in her hair and dirt smudged on her gown. Given the way she held herself… Ling Qi wasn't dealing with some noble girl trying to throw her weight around but a fellow citizen of the gutter. She was sure of it.
Ling Qi brushed the feral girl's finger away from her chest.
"If you're that worried about it, then don't leave things you care about lying around, but I'm not that poor a guest," Ling Qi responded coldly.
"It's Li Suyin's place too. If she wants to invite me over, she can. It's not her fault that you apparently sleep outside."
The other girl scowled at Ling Qi, holding her gaze, but at least the girl wasn't exposing her weirdly sharp teeth anymore.
"I have too much to do to coop myself up in some tiny hut." The other girl huffed irritably, but she did take a step back, her fuzzy ears still twitching on either side of her head.
"Whatever. I guess it doesn't really matter. If I find something missing, I'll take it out of your hide."
"You can try," Ling Qi responded with a snort, crossing her arms. It was almost a relief to deal with someone simple again. She could never tell what Bai Meizhen was thinking and even Han Jian and Li Suyin could be more complicated than she liked. This girl's actions were pretty clear… if overly confrontational.
Ling Qi glanced over at Li Suyin, who was looking back and forth between Ling Qi and the other girl as if half expecting them to come to blows.
"Anyway, we going to study or what?"
Li Suyin glanced at her housemate nervously. "Ah, yes. If you don't need the meditation room, Su Ling?"
The other girl shook her head.
"Go ahead. I only came back because I needed my tools. My skinning knife broke." Su Ling bared a bit of fang in irritation. "Fucking rabbits shouldn't have hides that tough, spirit or no," she added with a grumble.
Li Suyin smiled in a slightly strained manner. "Oh… you were hunting again. I… You didn't leave it out again, did you?"
"No, it's bagged, you big baby," the vulpine girl said, rolling her eyes as she brushed past Ling Qi with one last suspicious glance.
Ling Qi raised an eyebrow and glanced at Li Suyin, who flushed and mumbled an apology before ushering her into the house for their study session.
By the time the two had finished dissecting the day's spiritual cultivation lesson and putting it into practice, Su Ling had disappeared again. She left behind some recently cleaned processing tools and a silver furred rabbit hide being stretched and dried on a makeshift rack.
Li Suyin had begun to come around to the idea of searching out a better cultivation spot with Ling Qi. Li Suyin's sensitivity to qi would likely make finding such a place much easier than Ling Qi searching on her own. Hopefully, they could start searching after Elder Zhou's test.
After returning home, Ling Qi set about beginning the last major preparation for Elder Zhou's test: mastering the first level of Zephyr's Breath. Sitting down in the meditation room, she held the jade slip encoded with the art in her hands. Channeling a trickle of qi into the carved jade, words and diagrams bloomed in her thoughts, laying out the exercises needed to use the art's first two techniques. Taking a deep breath, she began the difficult process of refining her energy into pure wind-natured qi.
Over the course of the next few days, Ling Qi refined her first faltering steps into something approaching mastery. With her stamina reinforced by the Argent Soul Art, she could practice for hours instead of minutes, and she found herself progressing quickly through the theory and preparatory exercises.
When it came to practice, however, Ling Qi found herself stymied. The simplest application of the art was the Guiding Zephyr technique, but it required either an arrow from a bow or a thrown projectile to enhance. She tried using pebbles at first, but that didn't seem to work well.
While the training fields were full of weapons, Ling Qi was nervous about doing her practice out in the open. Bai Meizhen had assured her that the Sect wouldn't begrudge a disciple for taking a few 'training toys', but Ling Qi could not help but feel dubious of her housemate's words as she examined the fine steel throwing knives plucked from a training rack.
Even she could see the masterful quality of the knives' forging and balance. At home, any one of these knives would likely be sold for two or maybe three silver coins, enough to buy quality food for a week. Then again, her disciple's gown was spun from silk fine enough to clothe a wealthy merchant's wife. She supposed cultivators valued things differently.
With real weapons, Ling Qi found herself advancing more quickly despite her lack of prior experience in handling knives. In the past, if a situation escalated to the use of weapons, Ling Qi would have already escaped; fighting had never been an option. It surprised her when using throwing knives felt natural.
After only a single night, she found her knives striking the straw targets more often than not. By the end of the next, she could reliably hit within the first two rings. When she channeled her qi, guiding the sliver of steel after it left her hands, she struck the bull's eye almost every time.
When her throw buried a blade halfway to the hilt in a solid wooden fencepost, she felt she had mastered the Guiding Zephyr technique.
Chapter 9-Exam Prep 4
That was as far as she could take the training alone. The second technique, Against the Wind, didn't simply enhance her throws; rather, it used the connection formed by a successful attack to hinder the opponent, battering them with gusts of wind that could slow and throw off their movements. To make progress, she would require someone to practice with.
... She also needed a team.
There was less than a week left until Instructor Zhou's exam, and while she could simply wait and fall in with some random stragglers, it seemed more prudent to group up with someone she knew. With how busy she had been, meetings with Han Jian had fallen by the wayside. She wouldn't be able to speak with him after he returned to the boys' residences so she would simply have to do it now at the end of training.
Unfortunately, he was standing with two other disciples, one of which was that irritating Yu.
The other disciple was a girl with pale skin and delicate features subtly painted to accentuate her beauty. Her long, straight black hair gleamed like silk in its simple braid. She was also rather obviously gifted in all the ways that Ling Qi was not, and the sweat worked up by today's lesson was doing little to hide that fact.
A splash of color drew Ling Qi out of her envious study. On her right hand, the other girl wore a red leather glove.The glove's bright, crimson shade caught the light as the girl waved a hand dismissively at something said by the boys. Dozens of black characters were embroidered on its surface.
Much like that Yu, she seemed friendly toward Han Jian. And if Ling Qi were to judge, the girl was also standing closer to his side than was strictly necessary. She found herself scowling at the girl's back. Just what she needed. Another complication.
The crowd was thinning out. Ling Qi would need to either approach or leave. As much as she wanted to wait until Han Jian was alone… she didn't want to put this off either. Every day that passed brought the test closer.
Ling Qi took a fortifying breath and began to walk briskly toward them, doing her best to put on a friendly expression despite the churning in her stomach. She did make sure to adjust her approach so that Han Jian would likely be the one to notice her first. Sure enough, she saw his eyes shift to hers as she raised a hand to wave to him. His attention made the other two look at her as well. Yu's look was brief and dismissive, but the girl regarded her with narrowed eyes for a moment before the expression smoothed out into a welcoming smile.
"Ling Qi. I haven't had a chance to talk to you lately," Han Jian said in greeting as she came into earshot.
"How'd things go with… ah, Li Suyin, was it?" Ling Qi had let him know why she was going to be busy.
Ling Qi dipped her head slightly in greeting, giving the other two a polite nod despite her irritation with Yu.
"We have both made some good gains from our cooperation. I reached the second stage of Argent Soul. I've also been able to reach the first level of mastery with the art I received from the Archive."
Ling Qi left out her lack of practice on live targets. She wasn't certain how to feel about the considering look this earned her from Yu, but she was glad Han Jian had given her an opening to talk herself up without it seeming awkward. She wondered if he had done it on purpose.
At this point, the other girl cleared her throat politely and spoke up. "Jian, are you going to introduce us?"
Han Jian laughed sheepishly, scratching the back of his head.
"Oh, right. I suppose I forgot that. Ling Qi, you've already met Yu… Fan Yu, even if the introduction wasn't the smoothest."
"I have," Ling Qi said sourly, unable to keep her dislike from her tone. The short, muscular boy seemed unbothered by her dirty look.
"I said nothing untrue," Fan Yu responded with a snort, "even if it turns out you have a little talent. At least Jian was not totally wasting his time. I suppose everyone must have a good point." Ling Qi wasn't sure if Fan Yu expected her to be infuriated by his bluntly unapologetic statement or flattered by his compliment.
... Definitely infuriated. Han Jian's smile grew strained as she glared at Fan Yu, a slight breeze coincidentally kicking up and sending the hem of her gown fluttering.
"… This is Gu Xiulan, Yu's fiancee, and one of my other friends from home," Han Jian said.
"My condolences," Ling Qi said dryly, drawing a scowl from Fan Yu.
Gu Xiulan just laughed lightly, covering her mouth with the back of her sleeve.
"That isn't necessary," Gu Xiulan responded sweetly. "My Yu is just a little too blunt for his own good at times." There was an edge of something in her tone as she looked Ling Qi up and down before turning her gaze back to Han Jian.
"Where did you meet her, Han Jian?"
"Oh, we just had a chat during orientation and I thought I'd help out," Han Jian said cheerfully. "Turns out she didn't really need much help to get going," he added kindly, smiling at Ling Qi.
Gu Xiulan sighed. "You are so kind, Jian. It is lucky that it paid off this time. I suppose you do have an eye for talent."
"Thanks," Ling Qi cut in, feeling slightly irritated at being talked over. Dealing with Fan Yu and Gu Xiulan was making her less comfortable by the moment, and she wanted to get this over with.
"I wanted to ask if you wanted to group up for the test, Han Jian. My art is good for support and ranged fighting and defense, but…"
"Well, at least she knows how to make herself useful," Fan Yu interrupted.
"But you shouldn't bother wasting the instructor's time. Just be content with getting a month of his training. It's already more luck than someone like you should expect."
Ling Qi bristled, scowling at the other boy, but Han Jian managed to speak up before she could.
"No need for that," he said warningly. "Besides, it's not a bad idea. You're a close up fighter and so is Fang, and Xiulan is not much on defense. We could use another supporting fighter to round things out."
"But a barely trained peasant? I know you're enamored, Han Jian, but this is ridiculous." Fan Yu threw up his hands.
"Have you ever even been in a fight, girl? I refuse to lose my place because we took on an amateur."
"I've been in a few fights," Ling Qi responded defensively, glaring at him. She left out that it hadn't so much been fair fights as taking advantage of drunks or tripping up angry marks to get away.
"Now, now. Let's not get too worked up," Gu Xiulan said placatingly, glancing at Ling Qi out of the corner of her eye. "Han Jian's judgement is good, is it not? Why not trust him?"
Fan Yu looked rebellious but eventually dropped his gaze, grumbling under his breath.
Ling Qi gritted her teeth but refrained from speaking. Instead, she looked to Han Jian, whose expression was neutral.
"I think we could use a fifth person. Weren't we talking about that before Ling Qi came over?" Han Jian asked lightly.
"That is the standard squad size. She fits the bill of what we need, if not perfectly. It's not like any first year disciple will have a healing art at this point.
"Unless you want to go try and chat up Sun Liling again?" Han Jian asked Fan Yu.
The other boy shuddered, rubbing his chest as if remembering a phantom pain. "...No, not again, I think," Fan Yu grumbled.
"Fine, I'm outvoted since Fang will go along with whatever you say, Jian. It's on your head if she ruins this for us."
"I can pull my own weight," Ling Qi responded irritably. "Thank you, Han Jian," she added in a softer tone. That was one less worry she had to deal with.
"Who is Fang though?"
"Ah. That would be my cousin, Han Fang," Han Jian replied. "He's gone into closed door for a few days to finish breaking through to Mid Gold." He must have spotted her confusion at the term "closed door" immediately because he continued, "Fang's cultivating non-stop."
Ling Qi nodded in understanding. She had been doing something similar, but now she had a name for it. "I guess I'll meet him soon then," she said.
"... Is there a time where the group trains together or…" Ling Qi trailed off.
"Afternoons on the days after Jian's spiritual lessons," Gu Xiulan said. "We'll have to make sure you're up to standard after all."
Fan Yu snorted, and Han Jian cast a suspicious look at Gu Xiulan, whose expression was the picture of innocence.
"Yeah. We meet up at a field at the mountain's base. Let me give you directions…"
With her worst worry resolved, Ling Qi found her thoughts turning back to Bai Meizhen as she trudged home that night. She wanted to pay the girl back for the tea, which had already helped her and would only help more in the future.
Ling Qi had not seen even a glimpse of Bai Meizhen in days though. It struck her just how little she actually knew about the odd girl despite nearly a month of semi-regular interaction. Bai Meizhen simply didn't talk about herself or even emote much. She had no idea of the girl's likes and dislikes beyond the fact that she got irritated when Ling Qi didn't pick things up quickly. Well, Ling Qi could probably say that she knew the other girl had a great deal of affection for her 'cousin'.
This was why when she opened the door to her house, she was brought up short at the sight of the little green serpent curled up by the hearth alone.
"...Bai Meizhen?" Ling Qi called out. She didn't hear her housemate moving about, but the girl could be disturbingly silent at times. Closing the door behind her, she continued to peer around. "Are you here?"
Her only answer was silence so despite the oddity, Ling Qi sat down to get the fire going so that she could fix herself dinner. As she busied herself with those tasks, her eyes drifted to Cui again and again. It was so weird seeing them separate.
She was careful not to tread on Cui, and the little snake didn't pay her any mind. As she was boiling water for the tea, an idea occurred. Bai Meizhen had assured her once or twice that Cui understood them and was capable of speech even if Ling Qi had never heard the snake do so.
Who would know what the pale girl liked more than her constant companion? Ling Qi still felt a bit foolish when she cleared her throat and spoke up. She couldn't quite get over the impression that she was talking to an animal.
"Bai Cui, do you know where Bai Meizhen has been?" she asked awkwardly, deciding to be respectful. "And why aren't you with her?"
The thin green coils didn't even twitch at her words, and as the seconds stretched on, Ling Qi's feeling of foolishness only grew. Finally, she sighed and looked away, preparing to set the pot containing the water out over the fire.
'Cultivation. Winter. Dark. Fear.'
Ling Qi jerked in place, looking back at the little green snake. That… hadn't been words. It was more like… a foreign thought directly pushed into her head.
"… Was that you?" Ling Qi asked, feeling even more foolish as the words slipped out.
The snake raised her head from her coils to flick her forked tongue irritably up at Ling Qi. She got the impression that Bai Cui thought her question silly. Still it was… garbled, and the feeling stopped.
'Not Understand. Not Speaker.'
That was a little clearer. It seemed like simple concepts were easier to convey. Cui was lowering her head again, apparently intending to go back to ignoring Ling Qi.
Ling Qi felt rather out of her depth but decided to push on anyway. She had already embroiled herself in this bizarre situation.
"Wait, please. I… want to do something for your cousin, but I don't know what she would appreciate. Could you tell me something she might like?" She felt rather awkward asking this, but she was out of ideas.
It still seemed to catch Bai Cui's interest, and the tiny snake stared at her, tongue periodically flicking out.
'Weak. Nothing.'
Ling Qi scowled at the spirit beast's disparagement, but the snake wasn't done. What came next was hard to understand, but she thought Cui was suggesting that she just keep doing what she was currently doing.
"That's not enough," Ling Qi disagreed vehemently. "There has to be something."
The little serpent stared at her until Ling Qi began to fidget. Finally, Cui sent an image of a necklace. It was made of fine silver links with a dark green jade pendant in the shape of a coiled dragon. The pendant hung from a girl's chest, bouncing as she walked. Along with the image came a feeling of covetousness.
"Bai Meizhen wants jewelry?" Ling Qi asked, bewildered. Why hadn't the other girl just purchased the piece then? It was pretty, but she was sure that Bai Meizhen's family was absurdly wealthy.
Her comment earned her what she was fairly certain was a look of supreme irritation from Bai Cui.
Was it something Bai Meizhen was actively trying to get or had Cui simply noticed her wanting it? It was so frustrating that she couldn't properly communicate with the spirit beast.
Said spirit beast laid her head back down, and all further attempts at speaking to Bai Cui were ignored. Ling Qi wasn't quite certain she wanted to start thieving at the Sect yet if only because she wasn't sure if she could pull it off without getting caught. She was also a little dubious that she was interpreting Cui correctly.
She would just have to explore other options for now. She couldn't afford to get distracted with Elder Zhou's exam looming.
Bonus 2: Lessons and Lore
The Paths of Cultivation are numberless, and the names for the steps along the Path are nearly as numerous.
At its core, cultivation is the art of taking in the qi of the world and awakening one's dormant potential. There is much debate as to why humans in particular require external sources to do so when plants, beasts, and even portions of the ground and sky can achieve this state naturally, but there are no concrete answers to be had.
What is known is that given time, resources, and talent, a human being can achieve far more than any other on the Path. Spirits are born with power but rarely exceed the limitations of their forms. Those that do can only achieve that ascension with human aid, willing or otherwise. It is speculated that part of the reason for this is the elasticity of a human's dantian. Unlike a spirit's core, the dantian is able to expand far beyond its initial limits with significantly less effort.
Another possible factor is the multitude of meridians or spiritual veins which the human body contains. A spirit's meridians are fixed and open from the moment of their creation, and carving out new ones is a matter of great difficulty for them. In contrast, a human being need only clear the spiritual detritus from one of the scores of veins twisting through their body.
Few but the most dedicated scholars bother with attempting to catalogue and label each meridian as the difference is largely down to the individual. However, modern cultivators have begun the practice of grouping them via broad categories of use…
- Lectures on Cultivation by Elder Su
The first realm of cultivation, the Red Realm as it is called today, is in truth merely a preparatory step for the far more difficult path ahead. While cultivators at even the middle stages of Red realm surpass all but the most skilled and gifted mortals, it cannot truly be said that they yet walk the path of the Immortal.
It is possible to reach the peak of Red Soul and of Gold Physique with even the meanest talent given time and dedication. The Empire holds hundreds of thousands of such cultivators. They serve as soldiers in her armies or as city or town guards protecting the mortals of the Empire. Their protection allows mortals to go about their lives as productive citizens rather than fearing the predations of spirit beasts and petty banditry.
In the past, this initial realm was often referred to as the realm of awakening or some similar moniker. Although that terminology has faded from common use, it remains accurate. To achieve it is to awaken, to see the world that lies beyond the veil of mundanity. Yet having managed to awaken is not an achievement to be truly proud of, not for those with potential such as yours. The common soldier serves an important role, but you, who have been chosen to join the Sect, have the potential to accomplish so much more.
Do not squander the opportunity you have been given.
- Preface to a Lesson by Elder Su
Spirits are simultaneously one of the greatest troubles facing the Empire and one of its greatest assets. As bound spirits, they can serve as powerful companions and multipliers of a cultivator's power. In other cases, they serve as a final and terrible warning against infighting amongst clans lest the losing party's ancestors, Sublime or otherwise, decide that there is no longer anything left to lose.
However, these civilized spirits are sadly far in the minority. Spirit beasts stalk the wilds between our carefully warded cities and roads. Even the weakest of them are a dire threat to any mortal who catches their attention.
Every moment, another Lesser Spirit, an ephemeral creature of raw element, emotion, or concept, is born and dies, their motivations largely incomprehensible for the short time it is alive unless bound. It is these creatures that the peasant whispers of, warning his children against the calls in the dark for many of these creatures are all too eager to possess humans in a twisted mockery of a cultivator's bond.
Yet those are only the most common
Hundred year spirits - the slumbering intelligences of mountains, forests, and battlefields, and even minor objects - are also among their number. The worthiest among the spirits are, of course, the Great Spirits, the most powerful of their kind who bless our Empire and are blessed in turn by our reverence. The focus of this treatise are the first two types. They remain the greatest internal obstacle and threat to the safety of our citizens, as well as the most likely source for companions for our cultivators.
In this book, the categories, habits, and natures of many common spirits and spirit beasts will be discussed, as well as their weaknesses and the most effective formations for curtailing their activities.
- Excerpt from A Novice's Primer on the World of Spirits
I have spoken before of the elements of qi but only in passing. Today, I shall take the time to educate you properly on this matter.
As I have previously mentioned, the true number of qi elements are as innumerable as the paths of cultivation. Ultimately, an element is simply a particular method and resonance to the flow of one's qi. It is entirely possible to 'create' a new element when developing an art, although given the length of history, most such creations merely come upon something which had already existed independently.
Many elements also overlap each other in function. This makes a cataloguing of various elements problematic.
The elements which the Sage Emperor used many millennia ago to unite the warring kingdoms and clans that now compose the Empire are what is now known as the Imperial Eight, along with the Traditional Five. These elements see the most common use today, and there is some overlap between the two sets in Earth, Water, and Fire.
The Imperial Eight is composed of the following elements: Heaven, Earth, Mountain, Lake, Water, Fire, Wind, and Thunder.
The Traditional Five is composed of: Earth, Water, Fire, Wood, and Metal.
Heaven, the creative force, separates and ultimately elevates man over beast. It is ingenuity and inventiveness and manifests as lightning when channeled into the world, thought made force. Earth is the element of devotion and plenty, the strong foundation which allows us to stand together in the face of our many foes. Its neighbor under the Emperor's system is the Mountain, representing steadfastness, immovability, and endurance of hardship. Lake is the element of joy and delight in material pleasures but also of content and tranquility.
Water and Fire are next. Water represents resourcefulness, wit, and the ability to adapt. In contrast, Fire drives one forward; aggression and passion are the hallmarks of fire. Wind is similar but not equivalent to Water. Where Water will wear a path through obstacles given time, Wind will flow over and through without conflict. Wind is the element of freedom, representing wanderlust and curiosity. Thunder is the element of conflict, ambition, and new beginnings. Those who seek the initiative in all things will be drawn to such element.
The Traditional Five incorporate Wood and Metal as primary elements. Wood is an element of life and spontaneity and overlaps with both Heaven and Wind in many ways. Metal maps well to the Imperial Eight's Mountain, although it exemplifies calm rationality rather than steadfast determination.
The subject of elemental qi is much deeper, but this will do for an introduction.
- Lesson on Common Elements by Elder Su
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