Book One, Chapter 8 - Undeniable Primal Attraction (And Other Arguable Delusions)

Hooraaaaay! Turns out I am, in fact, a woman of my word! Most of the stuff going on so far has been adding in worldbuilding notes that didn't exist when I first started writing, refining the language used, and heightening the characterization. It's distinct improvement, but no more than just... edits. I'm looking forward to when I hit the chapters I want to do rewrites for, or the points where I want to add chapters. See y'all again sooooooon.

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The role of cultivators has, of course, changed with the changing of the tides. Once selfish pursuants of primitive forms of growth and change, cultivators of all kinds have been united beneath the singular will and wisdom of the Emperor of Emperors. Standards have been created, removing unnecessary and less effective forms of cultivation, and the forms deemed too dangerous for the hands of individuals or reclusive sects have been successfully bound or destroyed by the hands of Imperial progress. All in all, cultivation is a far more effective and cohesive path than ever before, for while there are infinite paths to the Dao and infinite ways to confront the Heavens, who can dispute that some are better than others?

Ultimately, this extends to the purpose that cultivators fulfill in our modern society. Where before the blind pursuit of power was the only purpose of a sect, with protecting their territory or improving their foundations at best a secondary objective, now their primary purpose is to raise promising talents of provincial roots to powers significant enough to better the Empire as a whole. Just as we see promising young candidates for the Wall travel from the Academies and lesser sects in the tens of thousands every year, we also get to welcome fresh new recruits to our Divisions of Research, Mortal Affairs, Creation, and Education thanks to the hard work of our local sects.

Of course, some sects possess greater purpose than others, such as the Six Divine Sects of the second ring, whose techniques and mentalities have long been regarded as superior to many lesser sects’ learnings, and…

-Primer on the benefits of Imperial Living, mandatory reading in all lower-level governmental education programs.

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Li Shu does visit again, seeming to be surprised to be doing so. Raika, of course, knows full well that she’s a genuine magnet for kind, caring, and absolute hotties (Hisheng, despite his failings, was very much an example of both), and she wouldn’t be surprised if Rui Ka allowed the visits as an indulgence to her pupil. She seems like the kind of person to be abrasive enough to outright forbid it, yet start asking for cheap herbs in more-or-less Raika’s direction once or twice a week rather than once a month.

Li Shu, of course, seems to have taken advantage of these theoretical commands. The first time she came back she seemed relieved, as if just happy to find out Raika hadn’t been a hallucination and could indeed be found again. The second time, she seemed genuinely a bit uncertain as to why she’d come back, or perhaps if she should have come back. She did bring the dried berry ration, though, a bar of grain with embedded sweet notes in it, so Raika lets her be with her thoughts. It’s not up to her if Li Shu comes back, and it’s even less up to her if she wants to come back, as much as she hopes that both are the case. She plies her in raspy, clipped conversations and whatever trivial activities she can muster. As it turns out, describing some of her theories about how she might recover her strength or about the ways in which the world is super dumb is enough to get Li Shu to smile and occasionally laugh. So, Raika spends the time when she is around trying to be interesting and ridiculous enough to do just that: make her laugh.

It would probably work more often if not for him. 

Yeah, that’s right, Qen Hou came back. And he’s making a habit of it, too.

He doesn’t usually bring his original entourage, that sallow looking woman or the raven-skinned skeptic, but he does circle back. Usually it’s right before or after Li Shu comes by, though on the occasions she sees him she does usually just frown at him and head off (he has thus had his punishment upgraded from broken rib to the removal of the majority of his teeth), but he’s also come by on days where she hasn’t. It makes some sense, since he wouldn’t have access to her schedule after all, but it’s still weird.

Also it makes him a very obvious rival for the attention of one delightfully adorable young healer, which upgrades him from a tooth breaking to a curb stomp when she gets a chance. He’s horning in on her literal only source of social interaction, the bastard.

And then, almost three weeks since she started seeing him wandering by on occasion, he drops a coin into her bowl.

At this point it’s started to get properly cold. Paleblossom city isn’t exactly glacial by Imperial standards; it’s barely north of the Blue Ringed Teeth, the third track of mountains north of the capital. The third ring is hardly as “civilized” as the second, but it’s not the dangerous hellscape of the fourth. There are two more mountain ranges between Paleblossom city and the true north, further separated from the third ring by the Wall. At the northern Wall they say that blood freezes in one’s body through an open cut, and the air can freeze to blocks and knives of ice in one’s chest just from breathing. Even that pales in comparison to the fourth ring beyond- she’s only heard the tall tales, but if even half of them are true, it would take true Immortals to survive there, let alone thrive. Such places are meant only for the most alien of Spirit Beasts, for creatures of frost and death, or the frozen devils said to descend from the Cold Sun. No, Paleblossom city’s geographical location, like many of its features, is only barely notable.

That being said, Raika has: the clothes she’s wearing; one and a half blankets; and an entirely mortal flesh and blood body. Any winter is fucking cold now.

And with that cold, there are less visitors to the market, less free coppers to cast at the more downtrodden. Her bowl sits nearly empty most days, and if not for cheap rice, food scraps, and an ever increasing proficiency with trapping rats, Raika would be… not well. And considering her default state that’s saying something.

So it’s very audible when the well dressed dark purple-and-red blur with blue eyes drops a coin into her bowl.

She looks at him.

He looks at her.

She looks at him.

And he looks at her.

And then he walks away without saying a word.

She considers throwing it away. Considers taking his pity money, or whatever it is, and just fucking tossing it rather than have to goddamn kowtow to the bastard next time he comes around.

But shit, a copper piece is a copper piece.

So she nods at his disappearing back and makes sure that, between “Dinks”, she doesn’t lose track of it.

It becomes a bit of a ritual. Some days he passes by, and if he does, half the time he drops a coin. On days where Li Shu comes by he might drop two, like he’s thanking her for attracting her attention (and potentially opening conversation opportunities outside the watchful eye of Rui Ka), which keeps the act of potential kindness from downgrading his eventually incoming dental rearrangement. Still, copper pieces are copper pieces, and they become ever more valuable as things go on.

And then one day he drops a silver coin in her bowl. 

The staring contest lasts longer this time than the first.

“Why?” She eventually rasps.

A silver coin is worth twelve copper. It’s literally spare pocket change for someone as inevitably rich as the cultivator of a sect, so far above mortal concerns and so often rewarded by the Imperial machine, but it’s more than she’s made in any one day since she started begging.

“Why do you keep hitting yourself with that thing?” He asks instead of answering.

She sneers, as best as she can through the scar tissue and missing cheek. Conveniently, scar tissue and a missing cheek make one’s sneers quite potent. “I am sure a powerful young cultivator like yourself would have no need for the silly imaginings of cripples.”

“You don’t strike me as very silly,” Qen Hou says. “Even if you didn’t find yourself in such a serious situation, I don’t believe you’d strike me as silly.”

“Shows… what you know,” she rasps back. “I’m hilarious.”

He tilts his head at that, but decides it doesn’t merit a response. “Four or more times a week, I walk past this spot,” Qen Hou says. “Every single time, for hours and hours, you’re hitting yourself in the head with a broken tuning fork. You’re right that I’d normally just consider it a symptom of your crippling. It's common for a broken mind to follow so thoroughly broken a soul. But I believe that the wise and kind and talented young healer Li Shu wouldn’t be wasting her time on a mad invalid who thinks total nonsense, and I don’t disregard that you have survived this long in your state with little aid. So, tell me why you keep hitting yourself with that thing. For a silver piece, I’d say I’ve bought at least that much.”

Reasonable question, and a hefty price indeed. If she were in his shoes, she might even have done something similar. She reaches forward to grab the coin, lifting it, feeling the difference in heft and texture compared to copper. It’s a damn lot of money for her. It’s probably enough to feed her for a few days if she really scrounges. Maybe even splurge instead, buy a better blanket. It would alleviate so much pressure.

The part of her that thinks these things, unfortunately for all involved, is an idiot and a coward, and unfortunately for herself, Raika makes a habit of not listening to either. 

She tosses the coin back at him. He catches it without difficulty, no more strain than a frown and a flick of the wrist, but she smiles as he does.

Three weeks ago it would’ve landed at his feet. Today, admittedly with a pretty hefty effort, it made it to almost waist height. 

“Keep it then,” she tells him. “While I am sure I once had a great many talents to make all kinds blush, I am not a whore to be bought and made to speak.”

She ends the sentence with a harsh, rasping cough, her lungs and throat barely holding it together by the end. But she did kinda throw a coin, so it’s not all bad signs. Probably.

He lets her finish coughing, a consideration she kind of wants to kick him for. Then, he shrugs, and flicks the coin in the air.

“I suppose even worms have their pride, Raika the Bloody,” he says coldly.

She looks up at him, trying not to respond to hearing the title.

“Not exactly a secret, who you are,” Qen Hou continues. “The Silver Song family covered it up pretty good, but an event this close to town that ended with a crippled Dantian is impossible to bury completely. Your sect isn’t even that far from here. They didn’t make a fuss, obviously. Just enough to save face, especially after they heard how monumentally stupid you were. It does, however, indicate you may have been mad well before all this, even if the invalid status is new.”

She pauses to think. Quasi-shrugs. “Aren’t all cultivators?” She rasps.

He snorts. “Perhaps. So some elders say, when they want to sound smart rather than old.”

“You’re real arrogant, ain’t ya?” She rasps. 

He shrugs. “Aren’t all cultivators?” He asks.

She spreads her arm wide. “Not anymore,” she says.

He doesn’t really have anything to refute that with, so he just shrugs again. Then, silver in hand, he starts to walk away. 

She considers calling him back. Letting him laugh a bit at the idiotic dream she has, the delusion that she can somehow be more than mortal again, in exchange for the security that silver could bring. What harm would it do, save to the pride of a worm?

Well, the pride she can take or leave. She still has some, but it’s not as important as surviving, and surviving is important to getting stronger.

But then again, fuck Qen Hou. All her friends (read: “Dink”) hate Qen Hou, so no begging or sharing with him. So she lets him walk.

Might be time for something new though, with things so cold. She starts to ring Dink against her sternum, instead, and she spends the day as snow begins to fall picturing a nearly invisible mist in her body slowly starting to shiver and heat up.

It makes her less tired, interestingly. It might be her getting used to it, but it might also just be the fact that she’s been wildly concussed for a while and this just hurts her less. Either way, she feels like she can do more reps against her chest and ribs than she can against her forehead, which means… well, more reps.

She’s been falling deeper, lately. The illusion has been getting clearer and clearer as her mental picture solidifies with practice, and she can spend longer before her focus is broken. It’s a lot less vivid or trance-like than Qi meditation, but it still feels comfortingly familiar. Functional spiritual organs have inbuilt properties, one of which is the ability to perceive said spiritual organs, and if one focuses well, it’s easy to fall into a literal trance. It’s… a bit harder to meditate without that crutch.

Whatever the case, she’s started to picture whatever leftover Qi she has not as droplets but as mist.

Not fog or clouds or even a nice hot steam; all of the above would indicate something visible enough to affect one’s sight, visible to the naked eye. Mist is slow, intangible, ephemeral, its presence felt more by lingering glimpses than anything solid. If there were liquid droplets of Qi in her, no matter how small, they’re long gone by now, and she doubts there was ever that much. So, mist.

She pictures the note from Dink, traveling into her, fluttering along her bones and making her blood tremble, all ever so faintly, ever so slightly. She imagines the translucent mist of what was once roaring rivers and lakes, left to flutter and rot without its banks, tremble along as her blood moves through it. She pictures the ripple making its way to her heart, where it beats ever so slightly off, and leaves a single drop of mist’s worth of difference, ready for the next flutter to bring more and to make all of it tremble.

Raika rings against her sternum again (“Dink!”) and starts over again, unaware of the purple-clad figure, invisible to naked eyes, watching her from a nearby rooftop.