Hmmph... this junior is a good seed [Cultivation Management Quest]

[occipitallobe]

Good Seed and Omake Spreadsheet Rules:

Firstly, if you have questions about Good Seeds and the like please read here. If that doesn't answer your question please ping me in thread, or on Discord.

If you write a new Good Seed, or write an omake, please update the spreadsheet if you have access.

If you do not have access, please ping a collaborator (Swordomatic, Alectai, Quest, TehChron, Insane-Not-Crazy, Humbaba, ReaderOfFate, Kaboomatic, no., BungieONI) letting them know what you want and they will update the spreadsheet here. To gain access, you will need a gmail account of some kind. Throwaway emails are fine (I'm using one for the spreadsheet), but to gain access it's as simple as sending me either your email via PM, via DM in Discord, or just in Discord's #spreadsheet-requests channel.

This is mandatory. If a Good Seed does not record their omake by pinging collabs (or just requesting access and editing things themselves - this is the preferred option), I won't give out awards. If a new Good Seed is not recorded here, they won't advance. By doing this it makes the whole thing manageable for me - it's gotten pretty unwieldy!

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Omake Writer Instructions:

There are four fields you need to fill out.

Omake Link, which is just a link to your first omake for the turn. This makes it easier for me to read them as I do the update - without this it's tough to know off the bat which omake were written this turn, and to properly

Requested Bonus, which is your requested bonus for your omake. You can leave it up to me if you like. You can see more info in the Good Seed infopost here.

Cultivation Aims. For those following unorthodox paths - higher than 9th Heavenstage or later than 7th Dao Pillar paths. Please put in what you are aiming for before you break through. I have left it as 'default'. If you do not edit it, I'll go with that.

Turn Notes - Do you want to do something specific? Enter a Secret Realm? Help the Clan out in some way? If you have something specific you want to accomplish on this turn, put it in turn notes so I can adjust your Fate around it.

All other fields are for QM use to record character information to properly run the flow of the game.

 

[Shard]

Even that's not necessary. The whole thing is is a game, but they're making the rules. If we start to exploit the rules too bad, they will change them.

Want to strap qi condescension disciples to all the cores as human body armor?

Soul Severing will just obliterate the armor and wag their finger at us for not playing fair.

Same thing with building an impregnable fortress. They'll just crack it.

Click to shrink...

The rules seem to be already decided by the Iron Pillar that sent them to begin with. Can they really change the rules?

 

[Gore17]

Basically, the only way to get them to stop would be to get a member of the Clan to reach so high and powerful that nothing the Fifth Sea could throw at us would be able to stop them that works to protect the Clan.

Which would then just have people from other Seas teaming up/being thrown at us.

Basically, unless the strongest beings that can be thrown at us are still inferior to the strongest of the Clan, the Trials will continue.

On a completely different note, I've been wondering for a while, but are the Golden Devils of the Desert of the Flipper Region of the Third Sea the only remaining descendants of the old Invaders? I can't help but wonder if there's other remnants hidden away on other Seas, since they used to rule 3 whole Seas.

 

[uri]

Basically, the only way to get them to stop would be to get a member of the Clan to reach so high and powerful that nothing the Fifth Sea could throw at us would be able to stop them that works to protect the Clan.

Click to shrink...

Or destroy the pillar that sends them to the third sea, even damaging it might help weaken the trials since the fifth sea probably can't repair it fully.

 

[Liliet]

On the topic of the interlude, I kind of really like the POV character there.

She's just so... mundanely unlikable. Kind of an ass. It's great <3

 

[BungieONI]

On the topic of the interlude, I kind of really like the POV character there.

She's just so... mundanely unlikable. Kind of an ass. It's great <3

Click to shrink...

I love it too. Having mundane unlikability is kind of nice, especially when they're getting the wool pulled over so hard. It's very funny.

 

[AlphaDelta]

In Medias Res​

Anastasia Outi​

Sand. Stone. Sun.

"We shall defy!"

Anastasia Outi is a new Essence Gathering cultivator, the leading talent of her basic training centuria. Specialty? Heavy Infantry. Purpose? Die for the good of the clan, in the Trials.

"Disciples, Cohort dismissed." Senior Centurion Megalos salutes, about-faces, and rejoins the officer collection

And with that, training's over. One year of drills condensed, completed. Essence Gathering, unlocked by tutelage and spirit stone expenditure en-masse. Everybody knows why.

In good centuries, the legion's only decimated twice over. In bad ones... Death benefits ensure the growth of the next generation.

Still, if she's going to march to war, it won't be alone. Matthaios Outi, Delia Zhao, Stephanos Ioannidis, Zheng Zheng, Xinyi Liu, Ling Fei, Lysandre Xiang – the Red Squad would march together.

"For Iphigenia," Anastasia whispers. "For Iphigenia."


---


Sand. Gust. Storm.

As befitting a Heavens-forsaken clan, even the Earth conspires to enhance the suffering of the patrolling trainees. A higher tiered Expert or Elder may have bronzed skin capable of casually bouncing the air-blasted matter, but for this unlucky patrolling squad barely halfway through basic? Only padding and goggles leave the suddenly swirling sand its earthy tan instead of a crimson red.

Through a sweat-soaked mask, Anastasia calls out to the squad climbing up behind her. "Iphi, I think we're off course!"

"First squad, halt!" comes the immediate shout from behind her. "Circle up."

At squad leader Iphigenia's command, the column halts. Carefully maintaining contact, trailing-legionaire Zheng turns slightly and shuffles sideways, then Lys, then Steph, and so forth, repeating until the entire column stands in a huddle.

Zheng speaks first. "As per training directives, we should seek shelter and continue on af—"

A violent gust kicks the rest of that sentence a few kilometers downwind.

Iphi's saying something. "—Summit—"

The sandstorm's a bit deafening. Far faster, much harsher than the usual, even accounting for their height.

"—side of this dune—"

As per procedure, Anastasia recites the order back. "Proceeding to opposite side of dune."

The blob unfolds, and with the accelerating wind at their backs, it's only a few more minutes more to reach peak, hunched forward to reduce the line's profile to the picking-up wind.

"—don't like this—" Delia shouts. "—think there's a bit of Qi in the air."

Naturally, this is when a palm tree hits Iphi, an explosion of sand hits Anastasia – and Anastasia, now without Iphi securing her, discovers the terror of unpowered flight.


---


Sand. Dust. Everywhere.

She can already imagine Iphi's voice: "Again! Up that ladder, roll with your landings."

"—cursed!—" Someone's there. Well, she's not dead yet.

"—Blood Path—!"

Oh, Anastasia thinks, jumping up. Pack – where's my pack? At least I still have my dagger. This close, she can sense this fellow's Qi – fresh, first-stage, just like her. Well, looks friendly enough. Just... a little abused.

"You don't look like Blood Path," she states.

"Not–" the other cultivator says, struggling against the sand and wind, "–path."

"I can take you to my squad. We can get you patched up while we wait for the storm to die off." Anastasia tilts her head towards the lee behind them.

"–chasing me—" they gasp, pointing behind them. "Follow—"

Anastasia's face hardens. "Where's my pack, where's my pack," she mutters. "No time."

Raising her voice again, she starts running. "This way!"

 

[BlueHelix]

Rise and Shine
"Matthaias Outi"​

Waking up is always a fun experience, here in the desert. There's always just so many points of failure that you can always definitively say that "hey, you're fucked", but there's only so many ways you can be fucked at one time before you're dead.

So if you're awake, that means that you're not quite there yet! Small victories, eh?

Absolutely none of this passed through the mind of the boy who was actually waking up in this quite literally gods-forsaken desert, naturally speaking for two reasons. The first reason is who the hell actually thinks like this in the morning, even when you've had a good night's sleep, in a decent bed, without being run down by a pack of monsters in the shape of men?

Oh, right, reason number two: the pack of monsters in the shape of men.

The legacy of that one really angry cook – Blood Path cultivators will want to kill you for like, any reason. Really, no reason at all, they're just really, really bloodthirsty all the time, one wonders why—oh, right. Well, the name really just tells you, in all honesty. So let's not get into why they're chasing the boy – let's assume that his very existence offended them, which is fair, considering his life so far – all you, dear reader, have to know is that they are, and this is where the story starts. Where a boy meets a girl, a lot of people die, and lives change, for better or worse.

Let's not kid ourselves, definitely for worse.

. . .

Pat. Pat. Pat.

The water dripping in the cave, as planned, woke him up when his exhaustion was minimal enough to allow him to wake up.

How many stolen hours of sleep did he manage this time? 1? 2? Irrelevant, need to get up. Brush sand off self and clothes. Grab satchel. Eat something. Take a sip of precious water. Can't eat too much, will upset stomach when running. Must eat enough to sustain self when running. Cannot draw on grudge flame now, must conserve. Endure, endure, endure.

Check the horizon. The east is burning red, as it was yesterday. And the day before. And the past week that he had been running.

Good. The sandstorm is still there. Most likely cursed, as he expected. It's his final hope, to shake off the pack of Blood Path walkers chasing after him.

He still does not know why they do, but they are. He accepts it. He does not like it, but knows pondering about it now will not do anything. Assuming he survives, it'll be an interesting topic to think about as he walks to the next town. Assuming, assuming, assuming.

. . .

Hah. Hah. Hah.

Everything burns in the boy. His fragile bones, shattered too often. His quivering muscles, tearing themselves apart to keep him moving. His heaving lungs, doing things no mortal organs should do to fuel his ruinous run.

Good thing that he's not quite mortal, if barely so. For nothing compares to the burning in his soul, searing away at his right to existence. The black flames, barely leashed, sense that something will change. Animals always do have that sense that humans do not quite have. Soon, they feel, they will finally get another chance, to consume him--or perhaps, to be fed, once more? It's been a mere fortnight since the last external curse he consumed, on that job with the farmer, but, what are curses but not greedy, ambitious, and overeager?

They're right, of course. He can sense the Blood Path cultivators, mere kilometers away. Their bloodlust, their corrupted souls, their hate and despair and anger and--in any other circumstance, they would almost be blinding in their blazing weight of existence, a curse on this Sea.

This is not any other circumstance.

He does not enter the sandstorm. The sandstorm consumes him. There is a difference. The former implies that when he got within eyeshot of the roiling mass of sand and wind and general disdain for life, he had agency, or choice. Such a concept is laughable for a mere first-stage Cultivator as him. Nature, even when dispassionate and caring not for those in its path, moves on, moves forward, breaking and making as it pleases. In this accursed wasteland? With him? Oh-ho.

But this is fine. This is what he had hoped for--

Oh. Those Blood Path cultivators are still chasing after him.

The boy grit his teeth, adjusted his clothes, mask, and eyewear. The sand and wind whipped around him, seeking any gap to tear strips from his flesh, but he pressed on. Continuing on meant near-certain death, while stopping meant certain death, and when put like that, the choice was obvious.

One step. Two steps. Three steps--wait a moment, were there other people in here?! A group moving with the weight of heaven's wrath over them, yet their souls still shone through, unlike the red-mouthed savages. Nobody sane would go through this landscape willingly if they knew what was going on – he had to go warn them.

---

He heard her more than he saw her, truly speaking. Could barely see a damned thing, as he walked through the blood-gold veil.

A yell. Impact. Bounce, and skid. Akin to a skipping stone, truly. An armored figure, in a different fashion than he had seen before, laid spread-eagled out in the dunes. Not good. They needed to get up; the Blood Path cultivators were about to enter, and he had no idea how they were tracking him—

He rushed over, fast as he could in this turbulence: crouched, knees bent, had to keep the wind from picking him up like they did the girl. Gritting his teeth to keep the worst of the debris out of his mouth, he did his best to speak loudly as he approached.

"You need—get up now! Sandstorm—cursed! Blood Path approaching!" are all that manages to escape his parched, sandpapered throat, the gales carrying off the rest, the whistling wind sounding like mockery.

The girl got up, thank whoever still looked kindly on him, and faced him, some kind of shimmering cloth covering her face.

"You don't look like Blood Path," the girl enunciates with a bell-like voice, ringing through the dunes.

"Not Blood Path," he quite literally grits out, doing his best to not choke. Be a sad way to die, after all this time.

"I can take you to my squad. We can get you patched up while we wait for the storm to die off." The fellow cultivator tilts her head towards the lee-dune, sandwiched neatly between the cliffs, behind them.

A . . . squad, huh. A military force then—a gale near bowled him over, and the thought was almost physically pushed out of him.

"Blood Path—chasing me," he gasps, in his best effort to be heard over the howling winds. "Followed me into storm."

The soldier's face hardens. "Where's my pack, where's my pack," she mutters. "No time."

Raising her voice again, she starts running. "This way!"

He nodded, and started moving once more. Legs began pumping, feet began pushing.

Near-death, or death. Near-death, or death. Near-death, or death–

The coin of fate kept on flipping.

 

[BungieONI]

Nice! I like these dual perspectives quite a bit and, the setting of this in a sandstorm is serendipitous to me since I was working on an omake that had Ferenike in a sandstorm at the start of it as she's hunting a Trial Hunter (I've since backburnered that one to work on a different one). Comparing the two perspectives and writing styles is also quite nice due to the different tones, which share a commonality of the Desert is Awful.

I'm really interested to see where these two Outi go.

 

[AlphaDelta]

I'm really interested to see where these two Outi go.

Click to shrink...

To meet Mori Calliope, of course

The main idea I want to explore (and traumatize Blue with) is death. What happens to the mooks?

...

It occurs to me that I could have named Anastasia's starting bonus "Calliope, my old friend". Oh well. If I don't find a poetic enough CN name, I'll swap to that.

 

[Gore17]

To meet Mori Calliope, of course

The main idea I want to explore (and traumatize Blue with) is death. What happens to the mooks?

...

It occurs to me that I could have named Anastasia's starting bonus "Calliope, my old friend". Oh well. If I don't find a poetic enough CN name, I'll swap to that.

Click to shrink...

What happens if she doesn't die?

 

[Liliet]

Yep, Spirit Severing doesn't seem to get booted if they break the rules.

Click to shrink...

Pretty sure it's just that the rules say they ARE allowed to kill those who have broken the rules.

 

[Mochinator]

I love the Devils in their current incarnation, but I do sometimes wish we had gone for the mountain start. The combat bonus and uber fortifications would be handy right now.

Click to shrink...

Same. I really like the idea of Mountain Forts, so i'm hoping that the mountains be the first bit of territory we seize outside of the desert.

Eirene reported the matter dutifully; the Kreatos had definitely at least attempted to assault her, which was definitely illegal for the Golden Devils. How big a violation this whole thing would be found to be and how many laws were actually broken she did not know. Nor what that would mean to the Xia family; that one she didn't want to know, she was willing to admit to herself as she all but fled Greensand with a group of legionaries bound approximately in the direction she wanted.

Generously compensated, the other mortals had told her.

​

Click to shrink...

Very Mystery, i mean i kinda get the gist of what's going on but personally speaking considering the historical time-period Xianxia and even the Clan's origin is based on, i don't find it that bad for the Mortals.

I'm sure i'll find it bad if i'm the one experiencing it, just that things could have been a lot worse for the Mortals.

What I'm thinking is that someone should create a bomb that detonates when sufficient amounts of Qi is gathered (like say the very air of the Fifth Sea), plant it in the pockets of enemy Qi condensation and teleport them out. Boom

It wouldn't even be against the rules if another Qi condenser did it.

Click to shrink...

That sounds interesting, but likely the main problem is establishing what counts as sufficient amounts of Qi and making sure it only triggers when they reach home and not elsewhere.

I mean one of our limiting factors right now is the lack of tech and skills available to the Clan as a whole, which is likely something the Good Seeds to need fix via contributing them in Omakes or as Omake Rewards.

I love it too. Having mundane unlikability is kind of nice, especially when they're getting the wool pulled over so hard. It's very funny.

Click to shrink...

I'm hoping her POV gets used for all the 5th Sea interludes, where it will allow us to see her start to panic and fumble around

 

[Liliet]

Very Mystery, i mean i kinda get the gist of what's going on but personally speaking considering the historical time-period Xianxia and even the Clan's origin is based on, i don't find it that bad for the Mortals.

I'm sure i'll find it bad if i'm the one experiencing it, just that things could have been a lot worse for the Mortals.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, the ending kind of flopped. It was past midnight and I needed to get up for work the next day so I just kind of wrapped it up without writing out a proper emotional conclusion.

I might edit it later...

(also, I did viciously enjoy writing a "mystery" with the solution in the title. Glad to hear I managed to get the genre across, it was necessary for the joke )

I'm hoping her POV gets used for all the 5th Sea interludes, where it will allow us to see her start to panic and fumble around

Click to shrink...

Ha. I thought about what I wanted to see, and it's this: I want her to break away from her fellows the minute shit starts going south and enjoy the sight of them being slaughtered because less competition in the future! Even better if she backstabs her own side at some point for shinies, and walks away from these Trials whistling and perfectly satisfied with the Bronze Demons' strong showing.

Awful person all the way!

 

[Mochinator]

Ha. I thought about what I wanted to see, and it's this: I want her to break away from her fellows the minute shit starts going south and enjoy the sight of them being slaughtered because less competition in the future! Even better if she backstabs her own side at some point for shinies, and walks away from these Trials whistling and perfectly satisfied with the Bronze Demons' strong showing.

Awful person all the way!

Click to shrink...

Hmm, i feel like the personality of the POV character won't fit that process, but what would be cool will be the friend mentioned in the interlude acts in this fashion. Like they stay together throughout the interludes and while she gets more and more panic, she notice that her friend remains calm throughout and gradually starts to rely on them and their cool-head to find a way out through all the encounters with our monstrous Good Seeds.

Then at the end, just when she's filled with relief at making it + vowing to never do the Trials again, she get's backstab by her friend who monologues that now she will be the top of the list to get resources. Bonus if the friend says stuff like " Don't worry about your family, i tell them you died saving me etc.. "

Leaving her to die filled with despair! Ideally as a snack to Ninth Prince's Snakes since his clan seems to have become the boogeymen to them.

 

[Gore17]

That's just cruel. Also, I'm a sucker for redemption stories, so I'd greatly enjoy that.

But personally, I'm expecting her story to be "joins, gets a spot, kills a Golden Devil or two and then returns home happy", because this is not a kind world.

 

[Liliet]

Hmm, i feel like the personality of the POV character won't fit that process, but what would be cool will be the friend mentioned in the interlude acts in this fashion. Like they stay together throughout the interludes and while she gets more and more panic, she notice that her friend remains calm throughout and gradually starts to rely on them and their cool-head to find a way out through all the encounters with our monstrous Good Seeds.

Then at the end, just when she's filled with relief at making it + vowing to never do the Trials again, she get's backstab by her friend who monologues that now she will be the top of the list to get resources. Bonus if the friend says stuff like " Don't worry about your family, i tell them you died saving me etc.. "

Leaving her to die filled with despair! Ideally as a snack to Ninth Prince's Snakes since his clan seems to have become the boogeymen to them.

Click to shrink...

Naw, her friend has to lead her into backstabbing someone else instead, to return to their world thoroughly traumatized and mutely nodding to her friend's version of the story of heroic hunt for those terrible demons.

 

[Mochinator]

Random musing!

I wonder if Good Seeds at Foundation Establishment can volunteer to join the Siege against the Demon Altar dudes as a way to help out the Clan's Prestige/standing.

I envisioned it something like Secret Realm where the Good Seed gets 4 rolls with low rolls having the same effect. But Good Rolls don't give the GS anything, instead it improves the Clan's rep by a bit. So average rolls would be a increase in Golden Devil Rep for the Clan.

And maybe any Crit Rolls or high rolls can be treated as the Good Seed doing something like saving a important person or achieving a key objective etc thereby earning them personal renown with the faction involved.

It would be interesting since it'll be the Good Seed taking additional risk at almost no personal gain to improve the Clan's position.

 

[Liliet]

I wonder if Good Seeds at Foundation Establishment can volunteer to join the Siege against the Demon Altar dudes as a way to help out the Clan's Prestige/standing.

Click to shrink...

The problem is, for the Righteous powers, admitting any kind of feather in the cap of a Demonic power is an egg on their face - are they not perfectly correct to loathe all Demonic powers forever and classify the Demonic powers they do as such?! Can they not be relied upon for that perfectly?!

That's not pointless arrogance, either - the sheer severity and definitiveness of the Righteous/Demonic divide in people's consciousness will be a good part of what's keeping people from going down the Blood Path en masse. The current balance is owed to the Righteous Sects being trusted by their subordinate cultivators to know what's best.

The Golden Devils are on the wrong side of that divide, and "one guy from there went to help us with the war" is WAY too weak an argument to allow to chip that facade of flawlessness. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and that is just not extraordinary enough, not even if a large group goes to do that. If they want to keep their face - again, VITALLY important - they need to find a more plausible explanation.

And that would be, like, super easy. Sleazing their way into the Righteous Sects' regard is an automatic hit, because in the scenario you are proposing that would actually be true! Not to mention war profiteering, infiltrating their ranks for future betrayal (this would be the super bad for our dudes one)...


Golden Devils aren't loathed for their cowardice/indecisiveness/weakness. If that were the case, yes, that measure could help. But instead they're considered evil/wicked/terriblebadwrong. Bravery in that situation, somewhat like loyalty, makes the problem worse, not alleviates it.

 

[Nordlending]

Demetrius Ceres – Temple Time

"This building is enormous," Julius yelled in his normal outdoor voice while waving his hands.
"Understatement of the year" I responded. There was no point in discussing that fact. The building was taller than the sky itself. We could not see the roof of it, which was strange. When we inspected the area from a tall hill a couple of days ago, this temple was not here. It could not have been here. Yet here it was. Waiting.

The strange part was that the doors were opened. Someone had clearly arrived here before us. Dim blue lights appeared as soon as we stepped inside. A promising sign. This place was still active, which meant that discoveries await. Whoever had entered this place before us was either dead or still inside.

As we walked, we were the spectators of a story. A story of murder, slaughter, and murder.

"The hell-sender" Julius muttered. "A children's story my grandparents used to tell when they wanted to scare us. A great demon of slaughter," He quieted down after saying that. A silent Julius. How strange, yet not completely unwelcoming.

The "Hell-sender". Those words sounded familiar. It was one of those rare insults. Wasn't there a guy who had made a big deal of that name? I delved into my memories, a place that had started getting cluttered after 70 years of living. A memory of slaughtering my way trough a minor demonic cult came to me. How did it go again? I had been tasked to deal with some weirdos and had ended up entering a massive room where robed individuals were doing a sacrifice of sorts with scented candles infernal screaming. After dispatching some of them with an ax, caving in some skulls, and ripping a man in two by pulling both of his arms in the opposite directions, the leader had pointed at me and said "The Hell-Sender is here. Praise him because he is eternal. Praise him because he is power. Praise him because he is god. He will devour our enemies. He, who has bathed in our blood, he has sacrificed our members for a greater purpose." Probably should have let him finish before splitting him in half. So the Hell-sender had been a real person. The more you know. Those mortals always have a tendency to poke their fingers where they do not belong.

After the rows of pillars had ended, we encountered the next part of this temple. Traps, a lot of traps. In response, we did the tested and true method of running like the forests were nibbling at our feet. Trusting our instinct we jumped over pitfalls, outran blood monsters, and dodged the falling axes by the hair as they fell behind us. Thankfully, a lot of the traps had been disabled, so we made it to the end. It was a room with a masked statue. It was clutching something, The statue was thorn and beaten. Much like the room, it appeared in. The floor and walls had the marks of battle. There was also a Qilin.


"Look at that, lunch has appeared," I said as I turned my face towards Julius. I was on my way to elaborate on how to best cook it, but the beast took the opportunity to kick me in the face, which sent me flying into a wall. I quickly recovered and readied myself to battle. The last thing this donkey would see was its own entrails covering the walls.

"Don't," Julius yelled as he jumped in front of me. "This noble and honorable beast is part of the Golden Devils"
"What!" Those words were the only thing that stopped me from owning a new carpet. I don't know how he determined that, but I could only assume it was one of those full-blooded clan member abilities. I had heard a lot of this "blood of bronze" but it wasn't something they were willing to share with an outsider. Still, I didn't let my guard down. Julius also called stray dogs noble, and those monsters went for my throat every time they saw me.

The Qilin shuffled and made some noises

"Yea, tell me about it."

The horse thing whirled its head around and made another noise.

"It's not you. He isn't the easiest person to deal with"

After saying that they both looked at me. My raised eyebrows should be speaking for themselves. If I raised them any higher they would pierce the heavens.

"Ask it where its owner is?" I growled out.

The beast stamped its feet and looked expectantly at Julius.

"No offense Demetrius, but he does not want to talk to you. Could you move a bit away? I will tell you what he said later"

The Donkey snorted.

"Don t be like that. He is a good man, despite his deficiency."

If Julius weren't my friend I would probably have dumped him in the closest pit I could find. With my sense of adventure evaporating by the minute, I decided to leave. Didn't seem like there was much to find here anyway.

Later, Julius informed me that the Qilin with the name of "I don't care" had a brother, or something who had dissipated after destroying a pillow, and\or grabbing a fragment and that it was currently waiting for him to return. Julius, being the bag of air that he was, he had asked it if it wanted to come with us back to the clan, and I can happily say that it declined.

=====================
From reading the Omakes of Xiao Yi, I got the impression that his partner was an intelligent animal, and I wanted to show off some of Julius Kronk-like qualities.

Second Omake of this turn. This will be a fate supplement, and hopefully, make it possible for Demetrius to survive the next turn.

 

[Humbaba]

Wei Feng 7 - Desert Ambush (Hua war, Year 65)

==========================================

Above the village of Panmei Wei Feng peered at the sky. Out here he looked like just another peasant labourer out for the day. Better still, with use of his soul filling rasp he would feel exactly like another peasant labourer to the senses of any cultivators. A qi condensation practitioner, even one who had ascended to the half-mythical 13th​ heaven stage, could stand not 2 inches away and not know him for anything other than a mortal. A foundation establishment's more acute senses could pierce his protection, but he hoped that it would at least mean they would have to get closer than usual.

He was out here as one of the forward scouts. Devil bees could travel at incredible speeds but had limited endurance. That limited endurance was even further exacerbated here with the thin qi of the desert.

With their capture of the one of the floating hive islands deep within the Hua Empire, the Devil Bee sect had been sending out large numbers of raiding parties at villages and towns across the empire. Villages like this were tempting targets to the devil bees. The wanton slaughter of the villages strengthened the Devil Bee cultivator and their beasts, allowing them to range further. It also forced the Golden Devils and the Hua empire to divert forces away to counter them, lest the enemy behind them grow stronger even while the larger towns became glutted with refugees.

A cold strategic calculus that belied the horror that might await the people behind him.

The plan was simple. The Devil Bees the cultivators rode gave them superior strategic mobility. His first strike had to cripple the beasts. This would prevent them from retreat to return another day and protect the village behind him by stopping them from hopping over him to attack the village.

He heard a droning noise and looked up abruptly.

A hairy desert bee looked back at him, buzzing around his sweat soaked form before flying off. Another false alarm.

This was the 4th​ day he had been out here, and he had to admit he was getting pretty tired of doing peasant work. Not that it was hard. He was many times stronger than the people who would normally be doing this work. In all honesty, it was too easy. For the plan to work he had to appear as nothing more than another labourer, which meant he had to limit himself to the strength of a normal human. Worse, he had to be alert to possible devil bee incursions, so he couldn't allow himself to fall into a meditative trance to the rhythm of the work.

He heard a buzzing drone and looked up. No errant bee or fly this time. They were here.

He reached up into the sky with his senses.

Three of them. Two at the fifth level of Qi condensation, one that matched him in the seventh heaven stage. Tricky.

It would be easy to dismiss the fifth levels. As a seventh heaven stage cultivator he was almost half again as fast as them, even before the advantages provided by his Blood boiler cauldron body tempering. But Wei Feng was a veteran of many battles. He knew better. Speed was a great advantage, but in battle positioning and number were just as important. All the speed in the world wouldn't help if you would be skewered no matter where you turned.

Worse they were veterans of the worst sort of demonic sect. They would be capable fighters. The incapable would have been food for the bees long since.

Wei Feng bends back to his false task and begins muttering to himself. Under his body, invisible from the air, he begins making the gestures for a spell. Under the cover of a canopy shielding them from the sun, the lids of the labourer's 'water supplies' begin to shake.

==========================================

Li Ping looked towards the village before him. He was as bored as a cultivator from the Abyssal Devil Bee sect could be, which is to say he was only really paying attention to preventing betrayals from his fellow disciples.

The mission was routine, and with the glutton that was Fat Lin leading he was not likely to even get a decent share of the bounty. None of the Hua's pathetic armies were in the area, and the wretched cultivators of the Golden 'devils' were only threatening when cowering behind their walls or in groups large enough to be easily detectable.

With some warning, he was certain their Devil Bee mounts could outrun anything short of a foundation establishment cultivator, and even those pathetic simpering sentimentalists wouldn't spare a foundation establishment cultivator on these nothing villages of mortals.

A bright reflection flashed at the base of his peripheral vison. He turned slightly. You never wanted to look head on at sudden flashes. More than a few of his brothers and sisters had paid far too much attention to a sudden brightness in front of them to see the non-reflective dagger in the back.

It was… a river? Sparkling with reflected sunlight below them.

It had to be a mirage. This was still the desert, and the maps of the region showed no river here. It was…

Coming closer.

He jinked his mount to the side.

"Move!" he screamed. Ahead of him he heard Fat Lin cry out, struck with the full brunt by the geyser. Beneath Lin, the Devil bee let out a vespid scream as the water struck like a blade, shearing through one wing and amputating three of its legs.

Behind him, he though he heard Du Peng curse, then the water was upon him.

With his split second warning, Li Ping had avoided the main focus of the technique. Still, he had reacted far too slowly to guide his mount to avoid it entirely. Water slammed into them, lacking the sharpest killing edge granted to it by qi but still hammering home like hammer blows. Knocking him back and forth until he could barely tell which way was up. He chocked instinctively as liquid forced its way into his nose.

And then he was through, fine mist replacing pulverising drowning. He looked up, only to see the earth above him. He was still falling.

Yet Li Ping was a veteran of many battles. Forcing his panic aside he fought to regain control of his bee. Cursing and kicking at it as they spun until, in seconds that felt like minutes, the great beast began to flap its wings again, controlling their fall.

Free of panic, he looked around to see what had happened to his fellows. Below him, he saw Fat Lin hit the earth, trapped beneath the dying corpse of his mount.

For a second, he couldn't see Du Peng, then he spotted him, falling to the earth, mount nowhere to be seen.

Both had likely survived, though with injuries. Even with the attack, falls from such heights were unlikely to kill cultivators of their level. Thoughts that he, intact and still with his mount, might be temporarily the most powerful of the group were tabled firmly for later.

He scanned for signs of their assailant. Stretching out his senses, he searched for the qi of their attacker.

Nothing. Nothing at all. Just some shirtless peasant mortals, one of which was running to see what had happened.

He sat up straighter, straining and stretching his senses to their upmost limit. Still nothing. Below the peasant had almost reached the form of Du Peng. Li Ping squeezed his mount urging it to fly higher again so he could have a better view. It ignores him, continuing its descent.

Simultaneously, two things happened.

Li Ping realises that his mount is not ignoring him. Wings soaked by water and laden down by rider and weight of water in its fuzz, the Bee is being forced downwards.

The peasant reaches Du Peng's prone form, raises its foot and stomps on his head. Rather than bouncing off and leaving the mortal with a very sore foot as expected, instead the foot passes right through Du Peng's skull, splashing bone fragments and brain matter across the desert sands.

Their adversary had somehow disguised his qi!

Many would be dismayed by this, but as a cultivator of the Abyssal Devil Bee sect Li Ping is a veteran of many battles. He instantly reads the flow of the battlefield and decides on a course of action. He orders his mount to dive on an attack run, stinger extended.

From the water attack and the ease with which he had dispatched Du Peng, it is likely that his opponent has greater cultivation than him. Escape on foot is unlikely and with his mount's wings also sodden he cannot hope to flee. But poison has ever been the weapon of weaker cultivators hoping to strike at stronger ones. Few in this desert will have faced the venom of an Abyssal Devil Bee before.

By the time the shirtless man reacts Li Ping is almost on top of him. He cannot hope to dodge!

Still the man tries, succeeding in shifting the impact of the tip of the stinger to the flesh of his arm. Less imminently fatal, but that is all the better. The pain will paralyse him, and feeding his still living form to his mount will lay another tile in the base for Li Ping's ascension.

His visions of glory are interrupted as he feels a vice-like grip on his ankle drag him from the back of his mount, slamming him into the earth. He tries to roll to get his feet under him, but a fist hammers into his chin, bouncing his head off the ground behind him. He hears a terrible crack as his vision goes grey.

…..... ......

He starts, sounds of battle ring in his ears. He hears the sounds of flesh on flesh, hears and feels the roar of a fire spell. He tries to roll over. Fat Lin is still alive. He has to get up and help fight. If he's still on the ground when Lin wins…

He can't move. His arms won't respond. The sounds of battle recede slightly into the distance.

Move. Move. Move.

*Bubump bubump babump*

Have the sounds quietened or is his own heartbeat too loud? Move, he wills himself. Move!

Another sound is heard. Closer. Six thumping sounds. A pause. Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump.

His eyes shift wildly. Suddenly he sees. It is his mount, wounded and bleeding. He nearly sobs in relief. His treasures are in the saddlebags. Even crippled, his command over his qi was not gone. With that, his mount can be made to trigger one of his treasures to allow them to escape.

Six thumps.

The bee is standing over him now. Terrible compound eyes stare at him. He reaches out with his qi in the appropriate patter to command the beast.

And bounces off.

Too late he realises, this is not his mount. It is Du Peng's. It will not respond to his commands, for no demonic cultivator trusts a beast that another may control.

Li Ping stares into pitiless, hungry compound eyes.

Mandibles open.

Li Ping screams.

==========================================


Wei Feng winces as he limps back to the corpses of the two fifth heaven stages he killed.

Even having been heavily wounded from the fall and his initial ambush; the Seventh Heaven Stage cultivator had put up an incredible fight. His body is covered in singes and light burns, and he bleeds freely from a dozen cuts to his torso.

His arm burns, pain radiating up it and into his chest. That sting had nearly done for him. If not for the resilient constitution and resistance to poison he had gained during his meditation beneath the Faeces Coconut tree he doubted he would have been able to keep fighting long enough to put down the seventh Heaven Stage fighter.

As he comes closer, he realises that there are too many Abyssal Devil Bees ahead of him. He had killed two, but he sees a third. Its thorax is half crushed and it is bent low to the ground. It will die soon even without his intervention.

It is eating something. Even as it lays dying it attempts to devour the corpse of its former master. It almost certainly cannot recover even if it eats every scrap, but it greedily swallows and bites at the flesh before it.

It stands there. A perfect metaphor for most demonic sects.

It's almost a shame to end such a perfect tableau. Still, as with both Demonic beasts and evil cultivators, Wei Feng has learned it is best be certain.

==========================================
==========================================

AN: 2112 words.

This one fought me for days. I just couldn't get the battle scene down. Then when I was thinking about what situation the initial strike would cause, I started thinking about the positioning more and tried writing it from the other side. Then it finally flowed.

This is set relatively early in turn 4 during the Hua war, when Wei Feng was out defending villages. It was originally supposed to be a couple of scenes with him fighting cultivators of his own level, leading up to his trapping the foundation establishment cultivator away to be ended by the clan and saving a town. Alas I got hung up on one fight scene and had trouble coming up with a plausible scenario for the foundation establishment portion. So instead it became a view of his time defending a single village.

Comments and criticism's welcome.

Edit: A few more typo's fixed.

 

[Mochinator]

"This building is enormous," Julius yelled in his normal outdoor voice while waving his hands.
"Understatement of the year" I responded. There was no point in discussing that fact. The building was taller than the sky itself. We could not see the roof of it, which was strange. When we inspected the area from a tall hill a couple of days ago, this temple was not here. It could not have been here. Yet here it was. Waiting.

The strange part was that the doors were opened. Someone had clearly arrived here before us. Dim blue lights appeared as soon as we stepped inside. A promising sign. This place was still active, which meant that discoveries await. Whoever had entered this place before us was either dead or still inside.

Click to shrink...

Oh yeah! Nice to see the Creepy Temple lives on!

"The hell-sender" Julius muttered. "A children's story my grandparents used to tell when they wanted to scare us. A great demon of slaughter," He quieted down after saying that. A silent Julius. How strange, yet not completely unwelcoming.

The "Hell-sender". Those words sounded familiar. It was one of those rare insults. Wasn't there a guy who had made a big deal of that name? I delved into my memories, a place that had started getting cluttered after 70 years of living. A memory of slaughtering my way trough a minor demonic cult came to me. How did it go again? I had been tasked to deal with some weirdos and had ended up entering a massive room where robed individuals were doing a sacrifice of sorts with scented candles infernal screaming. After dispatching some of them with an ax, caving in some skulls, and ripping a man in two by pulling both of his arms in the opposite directions, the leader had pointed at me and said "The Hell-Sender is here. Praise him because he is eternal. Praise him because he is power. Praise him because he is god. He will devour our enemies. He, who has bathed in our blood, he has sacrificed our members for a greater purpose." Probably should have let him finish before splitting him in half. So the Hell-sender had been a real person. The more you know. Those mortals always have a tendency to poke their fingers where they do not belong.

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Oh i like this! It expands on the legend i set-up and shows the perspective of other people to it. I might make the Cult a reoccurring thing if the reforging is a success.

I was on my way to elaborate on how to best cook it, but the beast took the opportunity to kick me in the face, which sent me flying into a wall. I quickly recovered and readied myself to battle. The last thing this donkey would see was its own entrails covering the walls.

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I see his presence still irritates Spirit Beasts! Also the imagery made me snort

The Qilin shuffled and made some noises

"Yea, tell me about it."

The horse thing whirled its head around and made another noise.

"It's not you. He isn't the easiest person to deal with"

After saying that they both looked at me. My raised eyebrows should be speaking for themselves. If I raised them any higher they would pierce the heavens.

"Ask it where its owner is?" I growled out.

The beast stamped its feet and looked expectantly at Julius.

"No offense Demetrius, but he does not want to talk to you. Could you move a bit away? I will tell you what he said later"

The Donkey snorted.

"Don t be like that. He is a good man, despite his deficiency."

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Hahaha! I like Julius! Him being the interpreter/diplomat to Demetrius' Natural aggro is really funny. I can't wait to see more such scenes!

From reading the Omakes of Xiao Yi, I got the impression that his partner was an intelligent animal, and I wanted to show off some of Julius Kronk-like qualities.

Click to shrink...

Yep! Thanks for this! I think you did it really really well! I envisioned Qing Yun as intelligent but with a animal mindset. So stuff like Human Morals or reasons are stuff he knows about but not something he considers.

He will see stuff in the Stronger/weaker context, and knows that Golden Devils are not to be attacked because Xiao Yi taught him that they're friends.

The bee is standing over him now. Terrible compound eyes stare at him. He reaches out with his qi in the appropriate patter to command the beast.

And bounces off.

Too late he realises, this is not his mount. It is Du Peng's. It will not respond to his commands, for no demonic cultivator trusts a beast that another to control.

Li Ping stares into pitiless, hungry compound eyes.

Mandibles open.

Li Ping screams.

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This part was interesting in that it very clearly shows how despite being a sect and literally raising the same kind of Spirit Beast, the Devil Bees are individualistic in nature. I like the idea of each Bee being bound to only 1 Cultivator and any screw-ups leading to death.

Very Demonic in temperament

As he comes closer, he realises that there are too many Abyssal Devil Bees ahead of him. He had killed two, but he sees a third. Its thorax is half crushed and it is bent low to the ground. It will die soon even without his intervention.

It is eating something. Even as it lays dying it attempts to devour the corpse of its former master. It almost certainly cannot recover even if it eats every scrap, but it greedily swallows and bites at the flesh before it.

It stands there. A perfect metaphor for most demonic sects.

It's almost a shame to such a perfect tableau. Still, as with both Demonic beasts and evil cultivators, Wei Feng has learned it is best be certain.

Click to shrink...

Oh i agree! It's pretty poetic. I like how the scene about consuming without regard of anything really shows the Demonic Sects behavior and how they just indulge in what they can take.

This one fought me for days. I just couldn't get the battle scene down. Then when I was thinking about what situation the initial strike would cause, I started thinking about the positioning more and tried writing it from the other side. Then it finally flowed.

Click to shrink...

Yeah! I agree on this! Choreographing a fight scene is pretty damn hard! Most of the time, it's what stops me from completing a Omake since i know the start and end but have trouble building up the fight to suit it. For me when i get stuck, i try to read a few Xianxia or books like Jim Butcher's to get a feel of how a Fight Scene is suppose to come across and try to get that same feel into the omake.

 

[Alectai]

Rina Callista
The Gathering Storm
​

The Junior Council had met, plans were assembled--and what little might could be pooled together by the finest crop of youngsters in the Clan's history had been marshaled to this great endeavor. Not this time they said--whether the Heavens marshal their utmost might to strike the impertinent Golden Devils down or not--or cowered before this unmatched resolve and slunk away to let the Clan enjoy their gambled treasure, the results were the same. Schemes were set into motion, logistics trains established, and great boltholes dug in the sands were established--as places of rest, healing, and resupply for the onslaught that drew near.

A scarce handful of years remained before the storm landed--her Cultivation had stabilized within the Twelfth Heavenstage by now--and she could already see the early signs of the Trials beginning to make themselves known. Explosions of banditry as Blood Path legacies began to reveal themselves in the sands of the Organ Meat Desert, enticing the ill-virtued to take that darkest of roads. Cohorts marched out in response, Rina leading no small number of her juniors to battle--the strength of a Cultivator unmatched beneath Foundation Establishment was no small thing when stomping out wickedness at the early stages.

"Goodness" Muqin Guo would note after the sixth such expedition. "Things have gone rather poorly while I was sealed away, have they?"

"I can hardly say" Rina acknowledged. "This has been the way of life for my generation--and many of those prior. The slightest lapse of vigilance will see a cancer growing in even the best cared for lands."

"Well, yes--but that's not quite what I was referring to" The cauldron added. "The Demonic Path is nothing new as I understand it. Poison, Curses, Soul Arts, Necromancy... All of these disciplines have been a pest, but the Blood Path?" She rumbled in something that might be called distaste. "At least as we see here? It's... Strange. It doesn't seem to behave by the same rules that the other Demonic Paths play by."

"Oh?" Rina asked, pausing in her stride there. "Father did mention that the Blood Path's interactions with other methods of Cultivation were an anomaly, is there any more you can say of that?"

"Yes--Blood has always been a source of power in Cultivation. Usually in the form of self-sacrificial techniques" the ancient cauldron spoke, entering a somewhat lecturing cadence as the conversation continued. "Sacrificing one's essence blood to empower a technique, or suffering a wound to gain a greater advantage. Using blood alone to strengthen oneself... It's strange--very strange. It should rapidly introduce impurities into the body and soul, which would explain how other methods of Cultivation become useless rapidly. But the Blood Path itself should not be exempt from this--instead, from you say, the Blood Path becomes easier as it is employed, and ones who walk it can make gains simply through devouring mortals. That shouldn't be effective anymore after Qi Condensaton."

Rina didn't like that. "Father and his friends seem to think it's the Heavens ensuring that there is an easy source of villains to always plague folk, forcing them to have to commit all of their resources to violence, and in doing so ensuring all contests are resolves through bloodshed."

"Oh no, that's silly--the Blood Path didn't exist back when my previous Master was alive" Muqin Guo tittered at that. "People do not need help to seek petty, short-minded solutions. Cultivation is ultimately a mountain that many seek to climb, but there is only so much room at the summit. The easiest way of easing your path after all is ensuring there is less competition at the height, no?"

Rina's expression turned ugly at that. "That's dirty" She muttered. "People are supposed to be better than that"

"It is the nature of the world, that power be offered to those who are most able to seize it" Muqin Guo's voice sighed. "The wise seek to limit their involvement with such violence."

"Not quite an option for us though." Rina looked off into the distance. "It's only a couple of years left."

"Yes, those 'Hundred Year Trials' " Muqin Guo added uncomfortably. "You are certain you wish to go on this path? While your strength is certainly nothing to dismiss--even in my era--if your foes come from a mature Sea, the best of their number will be of the Thirteenth Heavenstage. While the difference in strength is relatively small in absolute terms, when coupled with the techniques they will undoubtedly possess and the fact that anyone ambitious enough to reach for the Thirteenth Heavenstage is going to have no small number of potent treasures to amplify their strength further. And by standing out the way you intend, you will draw their attention."

"Am I to simply let my kin die then?" Rina asked. "To suffer because I was unwilling to place myself at risk for their sake?"

"Truthfully? Yes. Given how you have a very real chance of achieving the One-Pillar Foundation Establishment Method, coupled with the strength of your bloodline? There is a very real possibility that upon your breakthrough, you personally will be capable of influencing the future of your Clan. To abandon that and risk death or maiming simply for a group who may not amount to anything at all? It seems reckless to me, that's all."

"Not an option" Rina shook her head. "I don't seek conflict--if there was a way to resolve this trial without violence? I would be glad to take it... But they do not negotiate, they do not show mercy--if we extend an open palm they will treat it as an invitation to cut it off. It has happened before, many times." She grit her teeth, remembering the histories she had studied in the past several years.

"We barely even understood their tongue before the Ninth Prince showed himself, and... I wouldn't forgive myself if I just spent all of my time running away." Her gaze softened, as she looked off into the horizon. "I spent all of my time tempering myself--while the people of my Golden Devil clan were doing their duty, fighting as one against the tides of the Abyssal Bee Sect. They fought and died, so that many others would need not live in fear. I was protected--given easy missions with strong supporters all this time--and my path was eased at every turn by the hard work of those who had come before me."

"Then why put yourself in such danger?"

"Because What's the point of simply accumulating power if I'm not going to use it for something?" Rina barked. "To live forever simply for its own sake? To become an immortal capable of shaking the firmament, and then simply sitting on a cloud and spectating?" She shook her head. "No, that's ridiculous. My people have bled and fought for the sake of our dignity and pride--that we could forge a territory that worked. That would be a place where people can live in peace despite all of the terrors of this world. What kind of person would I be to simply keep my head down when they are in the greatest danger they've ever been in?"

She clenches her fists. "I can influence things. Not easily--and yes, I may be hurt trying. But I can walk forward with my head held high, knowing that I did my best. If I'm going to run and hide and rely on my seniors to protect me now, when I am in as little risk as I'll ever be in the Trials... I'll fail in my path--I need to do what's right even if it's hard... Especially if it's hard."

There is a pause, and a sigh.

"I can't truly argue with that" Muqin Guo replies. "Still, I would rather not see myself without a Master again anytime soon. Promise me that you will not carry on in this should you truly have pushed yourself to the limit."

"I've promised to do my best--and my best is the best I can do." Rina smiled. "If I've really given all I can, I'll retreat and hope for the best. Just because I'm not going to hold back out of fear doesn't mean I need to commit to a suicide pact after all." She giggles, covering her mouth with one hand as she did so. "I'd be terribly irresponsible if I fought beyond my limits once I've gotten the outline of my world sketched in after all, wouldn't I? It's not just my own life at risk then."

 

[veekie]

The rules seem to be already decided by the Iron Pillar that sent them to begin with. Can they really change the rules?

Click to shrink...

Heaven will fuck us if its possible.

 

[Mochinator]

Rina Callista
The Gathering Storm

Click to shrink...

I like the conversation between the two of them! It shows a excellent clash between the standard Cultivator mindset of prizing the self compared to the Golden Devil's Sacrificial spirit/burden of power.

"Yes--Blood has always been a source of power in Cultivation. Usually in the form of self-sacrificial techniques" the ancient cauldron spoke, entering a somewhat lecturing cadence as the conversation continued. "Sacrificing one's essence blood to empower a technique, or suffering a wound to gain a greater advantage.

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I like this as well! I was considering expanding on Blood Path using this train of thought since my Good Seed is using Blood Arrays. I had a scene in mind where if he gets crippled or killed during the trials i can use that idea of sacrificing his own blood essence to wound or kill the one dealing the blow. Something like a " who says the only blood i can use is my enemies? " before cutting a arm off and blowing it up

I was thinking of using aspects of Black Magic from the Black Magician series by Trudi Caravan. I like the idea of how Blood Path like Black Magic is about the power of sacrifice except it's easier to sacrifice others for your own gain. Why diminish yourself when you could enhance what you are via the blood of those weaker then you ?

Exploring this will be interesting.

 

[occipitallobe]

In other years, he sought to protect the Clan more directly, Manuel mused.

But this was utterly necessary. If Lady Jiao reached mid-Nascent Soul after a disastrous trial... it would mean the end of the Clan. Not with certainty, but he would be forced to cede the Scorpion Road, and with it, the Clan's income. It would be a rapid decline into irrelevance after that, especially with the Jingshen happy to cede the southern Clan lands to the Cannibals if they could hold their valuable trade routes.

He let his will infuse into the jade slip one more time. The information was simple, and well-laid out.

The Soul Draining Parasite is a subtle creature. It does not hatch, save when there is a great amount of ambient qi to nurture the egg and provide nourishment. From there it drains only a small amount, a droplet of qi from it's host to sustain itself in its larval form. Growing swiftly but steadily, matched to it's host like one of any number of parasites found in the wild. It remains, largely indistinguishable from it's hosts own Qi even as it draws more and more of its hosts energies into itself, fueling its growth until even a Nascent Soul is unable to sustain this burden without harm to themselves. What makes this all the more deadly, is that though the Soul Draining Parasite is a rare creature, to match its rarity and better enable the pursuit of its true hosts, why, this smallest of Demonic Beasts can - like the many insects in the world - reproduce and scatter its eggs upon the winds of Qi, and only requires that the prospective host take that Qi into themselves willingly, if not knowingly. Such a nefarious creature.

Leaving it with the corpse would be too obvious. No, it had been forged, imprinted with the Qi fingerprint of the dead Core Formation man next to him, and he had arranged to have it quietly put back into the Seven Divine Saber Palace. Lady Jiao would likely go down the Road herself, and without knowing of the plot the Saber Palace could hardly hide the evidence of their guilt. A guilty man could burn the papers, destroy the contraband, and so on. An innocent one wouldn't even know the illicit materials were there.

He smiled. Forging a new cultivation art involving the Soul-Draining Parasite had taken him nearly two years, and was a work of inspired genius on his part. The art would even work, if you cared to cultivate it. To a degree, of course, and would require centuries of refinement before it was usable. Still, for someone to discover that, they'd need to cultivate it themselves, and no-one of consequence ever would.

The Parasite Transferring Ying-Yang Art was drawn up, and Manuel had carefully, thoughtfully destroyed key components of the information. After some time, he had resolved on leaving five silver pages among seven he had forged. Those that remained would be sufficient to infer the remainder of the art, and any gaps or imperfections would simply be seen as information that would have been on the missing pages.

He looked over at the dead Core Formation man. Coming here himself had been a risk, but allowing him to adjust the scene just so, to ensure a stripling like Lady Jiao danced to his tune was worth it. Sowing discord among his enemies and rivals was well enough in itself, but by terrifying the woman out of dual cultivation methods, he would help introduce dissonance into her Dao and thus weakness into her path of cultivation. Acceptance? Accept a man who aimed to use a parasite to drain you of your cultivation and kill you? He would, he hoped, terrify the girl out of the notion of finding a Dao Partner entirely, thereby setting her at odds with Old Jingshen as well. Small things like these, small advantages were what one piled up over the decades - and eventually they tipped the scales enough for the Clan to survive.

Beyond that, it was enough to let the report come through a Foundation Building Expert who would be overheard by a local information broker, who would send a report to the Jingshen Clan for a considerable sum of spirit stones. Lady Jiao would come running - she would have to, if she wanted to see who to blame and what had happened - and by then most of the information would point in one direction. Of course, there would be several pieces of evidence pointing towards the Clan as well, including a clumsy attempt at tampering by a Qi Condensation cultivator - Alexia Konstantinos was one of his very, very distant relatives - she had taken remarkably well to his instructions on how to blunder believably.

So when Lady Jiao arrived, the trail of evidence would lead her to a Core Formation cultivator using a Soul-Draining Parasite to consume her cultivation and rise into the Nascent Soul realm, leading to her tragic death. Such a man would obviously return to the Seven Divine Saber Palace a great elder, leaving the Jingshen with no recourse. A clever plot, and of course only known and implemented by a single man. The leadership of the Palace would have no knowledge of such a vile plot! They would truthfully and furiously deny it.

Manuel chuckled briefly, wishing he would be able to hear their denials. When you lied often - as old cultivators such as he did - nobody believed you even when you were telling the truth. There was a certain beauty in imposing that on an enemy.

He shook his head.

"It doesn't bother me, killing you. Perhaps you were simply a man seeking a wife, but more likely you were an unwilling cultivation cauldron, used as a bargaining chip. Still, you chose your path of cultivation, and it is one that ends with the death of those I care for, those I protect. In a different world perhaps I could have spared you."

He sighed, leaving the artfully-prepared body to be found.

-----------------

"A most fortuitous circumstance in a larger tragedy, Lady Jiao. Preliminary investigations of the corpses condition have revealed that the poor man was afflicted with a fully matured Soul Draining Parasite."

"And so something along the Road caused it to grow out of control? How?"

Manuel smiled.

"We have not performed an autopsy of course, but from all appearances it seems that this man was never intended to finish the journey to Jiangshen Clan along our Scorpion Road. Presumably the numerous efforts by our Golden Devils to renovate and improve the Road triggered the creature to hatch, and devoured the poor Elder to death before he completed his journey, though it seems odd to sacrifice an individual so valuable on such a poorly built frame job."

There. Now she could admit he was a cultivation cauldron, and accuse him of murder, or simply take the face offered. Either way, her reaction would inform him of what she thought. She was shaken, and her Dao of Acceptance was shaken as well. He didn't even need to resist the mental effects of her Dao, though he had three plans against them readied at any moment.

"How did such a parasite enter him? Do you mean to say the Divine Saber Palace implanted it on him?"

Manuel shrugged, and felt everything falling into place. Lady Jiao was returning from the Great Battlefield. She had been fooled - of course, only an incompetent wouldn't investigate every loose end, but even asking that question...

"I doubt it. Perhaps one of our enemies? I don't see why the Saber Palace would bother killing one of their own, even to attack us. More likely it was of our enemies, or perhaps one of theirs, seeking to set us at worse odds against one another. After all, the peculiarities in how those creatures reproduce is enough to make me think... well..."

"What do you mean? How do they... reproduce?"

"Hmm? How do they reproduce you ask? Why, the eggs are implanted into a host by sending them along emanations of Qi, so it is all but impossible to implant one into an unwilling target you see, as they must be prepared to take in and integrate foreign Qi, a practice that is nominally restricted to the reproductive habits of certain-Is something the matter, Lady Jiao? You've gone rather pale all of a sudden."

Lady Jiao's red skin flushed a deeper red, from the tips of her fingers to the top of her smooth head. She actually looked a little ill.

"My apologies, Grand Elder. This news has shaken me - Huyin Wan was a dear friend of my father's, and to hear someone had done such a thing has left me distraught."

Manuel let what looked like a smile settle on his face. The secret beneath it was simple enough - bared teeth and stretched skin, with eyes above twinkling, the skin around them wrinkling just so. Darkness covered the simple fact that it was not a smile, though Lady Jiao would never know. His voice took on a warm, calm tone, like he was lecturing a beloved student.

"Of course. I hear such deaths are horrifying, as Qi and body are both often consumed from the inside-out. Of course, he was lucky he was only Core Formation - apparently the pain is magnified a hundredfold once you reach Nascent Soul. To my mind, I would think it an action by the Devil Bees - such insects are well-known in their mountains, and setting the Saber Palace, Golden Devils, and Jingshen Clan against each other would benefit them greatly. Is there anything further you would like to know? We are at your disposal."

She shook her head, twitching a little.

"No, thank.. no. Grand Elder I will see myself out. Yes."

She left hurriedly.

His face didn't move, the teeth and skin remaining in the same position, the eyes still twinkling. Yet somehow what was a mere rictus of skin and bone mere seconds before... somehow became a true smile.