Reach Heaven Via Feng Shui Engineering, Drug Trade And Tax Evasion

[Winged_One]

Is it good to resolve an argument calmly? Is it bad to fight?

No one true key will fit all feuds among all people. Emotions might need airing to make progress, even if this will turn an argument into a fight - but in the end, what is the true danger? Perhaps you would come to blows - but even that is quite unlikely.

This sort of logic is common among ordinary people, but in the world of cultivators, it is a dangerous road to thread. An open quarrel between two cultivators is always deadly, and the first person to strike is most often the one to walk away alive. Worse still, in the moment, how could you tell why your opponent bursts forth with spiritual energy? Are their emotions out of control, or are they about to strike you down with a technique? Activating your spiritual energy in front of another cultivator without warning is like swinging a sword at their neck: even if you are fast friends, can they really trust you to stop before it cuts into flesh? Perhaps it would be safer to cut you down first.

By provoking Wang Yonghao, Qian Shanyi was playing with fire, but frankly she felt this conflict was long overdue a conflagration.

"A couple deceptions?!" Wang Yonghao threw his hands up in the air, "It was way more than a couple! I thought you wanted to be friends, in your bizarre way! Friends don't deceive each other!"

"Friends?" She sneered, "Because I like your stories? Do you even comprehend the situation I am in?"

"Oh what, does your 'recuperative training' require you to lie all the time?" he rolled his eyes, making mocking finger gestures in the air.

"I am stuck in the middle of demon beast infested forest, fighting for my fucking life!" she ceded through her teeth, advancing on Wang Yonghao, "You have your luck, but I don't. Do you know why I built the chiclotron? Because the feng shui deviation in your damned inner world almost murdered me! A dozen threats compete to see which one will take me first, but do you try to help me? No, you would rather sit around and relax. Is this what 'friends' do?"

His face gradually went white, and he took a step back. Qian Shanyi followed after him.

"How was I supposed to know you needed help?" he muttered, "I thought you were some kind of old monster and didn't need any! I am sorry, but you didn't even ask!"

"You apologize." She stabbed her finger in his direction, "I pay my debts." She continued, pointing back at herself, "That's the difference! And in terms of debts, you owe me. You owe me for beating me up, you owe me for cleaning up your inner world, and you even owe me for saving your life from the dead air last night! And yet you bring up my deceptions?"

"I said I'll pay you back!" He threw his hands up in the air, recovering his composure, "But just because someone owes you, it doesn't mean you get to lie to their face! At least say you are sorry it turned out this way!"

"What is there to be sorry for?" she threw her hair back, "I didn't know whether I could trust you, so I deceived you. If I had to do it all over again, knowing what I did at the time, I wouldn't change a thing."

"Seriously? Not a single thing?" He said, "Did I do anything untrustworthy to you? You would just keep lying forever then?"

"Forever? No." she snorted, "I would have preferred to reveal this once we have reached a city, where we could have simply decided to walk our own separate ways, not in the middle of a deadly forest."

"So you admit you still don't trust me? Then you are awfully confident for someone a full minor realm below me!" Wang Yonghao narrowed his eyes at her, "What if I, the traitorous villain that I am, were to just beat you up again?"

Well, if threats were how he wanted to play this…

Qian Shanyi bared her teeth, and put an entire fifth of her spiritual energy into strengthening her spiritual shield, making it glow faintly and sparkle from energy overflow. Wang Yonghao took a careful step back.

"I am a cultivator," she hissed, "and to cultivate is to rebel against the heavens! Do you comprehend what that means, junior? To wage war against a foe that could squash you at any second? To burn your life and soul to cinders, even if all you can do is break their single finger? Confident? Of course I am not confident! But I would rather detonate my dantians than bow my head in fear."

She spat on the ground between them, unsheathing her sword with deliberate slowness.

"You want a fight?" she sneered, "Come on, then! This daoist will not die quietly."

Wang Yonghao took another step back, and she felt his spiritual energy vanish as he finally got his emotions back under control.

Coward.

"You are crazy," he said, breathing out, "you are actually just crazy."

"I am a cultivator," she snorted, sheathing her sword back in a single move. On some level, she was glad her bluff got him to back down, even though she wouldn't have minded blowing off steam with a proper spar, "It comes with the job."

"No, it doesn't," he shook his head vigorously, "I must have met hundreds of cultivators in my life. Do you know how few of them would throw their life away on a point of principle? I've seen dozens beg for mercy in front of demonic cultivators or angry sect elders, drowning in tears, even when they must have known their ending was a foregone conclusion."

Wang Yonghao grabbed his head in both hands.

"When normal cultivators break their leg, they take it easy until it's healed!", he continued, his voice raising in pitch, "They don't just go around getting into more fights!"

"That may be so, but what do normal people matter here?" Qian Shanyi said, crossing her arms.

"I am saying you are insane!"

"It takes a bit of insanity to break into the heavens. Anyone who steps on the path of cultivation should know this."

"No they don't! You keep talking about breaking into heavens, but not even one out of a dozen cultivators would care about this! It's ancient history!"

"Their ignorance of the roots of cultivation is no excuse."

"I just - I need a minute," he breathed out, walking off in the direction of the river. She let him go.

---

While she waited for Wang Yonghao to come to terms with reality, she picked up one of the ropes and started practicing thread control techniques.

Her control over the rope was still weak, but getting better over time. Many days of practice while floating down the river were starting to add up, and by now, she could easily construct both spiritual energy envelopes, though the actual movement of the rope remained slow and jerky.

By the time she ran out of spiritual energy, a good hour had passed, and he still hadn't returned. Unlike within the world fragment, spiritual energy concentration in the forest was very average, and she figured she would need several hours just to recover her reserves. To pass the time, she opened up Three Obediences Four Virtues to the page with the needle control diagram, and started to analyze it.

The rest of the manual claimed to be suitable for cultivators in the refinement stage, and all other techniques fit this assessment, with the needle control diagram remaining as the only exception. Qian Shanyi suspected that she must have simply missed something - perhaps there was a secret sub-diagram hidden within the picture, or a code that would lead her to an expanded version of the manual, or something else of that nature.

After half an hour, it finally clicked for her, and she groaned, raising her eyes to the skies. She saw a solution, but she almost wished she didn't.

The diagram could be broken up into different parts: ones responsible for directing the "needle", controlling levitation and acceleration, strengthening the material beyond its normal tolerances, and so on. Many of these subcomponents were duplicated in order to push the "needle" to the peak of speed and power. If she were to remove three quarters of the duplicates, the diagram would shrink radically, and thus would become much easier to manage at her level of cultivation.

She could even see where Tang Qunying intended for these changes to happen - small marks she previously dismissed as irrelevant delineating sections that could be removed wholesale, and so on. She must have been legendarily talented in order to design a technique that could be broken up in this way without sacrificing its stability, and left the process of actual modification as a teaching exercise for her inheriting disciple.

The problem was that she couldn't just erase some sections of a picture - parts of the structure would need to be strengthened, others weakened, all by very precise amounts in order to ensure that everything was balanced. This was due to a principle that the flow of spiritual energy into a junction must always be equal to the flow out of it, lest the technique blow up in your face - but because the development of new cultivation techniques was far outside of her education, all she could recall was that the name of the daoist who discovered it sounded quite foreign.

In order to apply the changes, she would need to meticulously go through every point on the diagram and recalculate every single flow ratio of spiritual energy. This would be a massive undertaking, and she didn't even have an abacus on hand.

She put the jade slate back into her robes and went off to find Wang Yonghao. She would deal with this problem when she at least had some paper to write on.

---

When she came over to the river shore, she found him sulking, using his sword to cut a small tree into a statue of a fish. He glanced over at her, then turned away.

"You are really taking this harder than I expected," she said, leaning against a nearby tree.

"Why do you care?" he grumbled, not turning her way.

"We are still in a life threatening situation," she said, "it would be awfully stupid if we couldn't manage to get along and work together simply because of some personal issues, at the very least until the danger is over. I prefer not to turn my life into an overdramatized theater play."

"Oh yeah?" he scowled, turning towards her, "Then why did you make fun of me so many times? Even if you wanted to deceive me about your strength, that wasn't at all necessary."

"I will readily admit my own hypocrisy. It doesn't make my point moot."

"I don't know," he glanced at her again, and sighed, "I guess I sort of get why you pretended to be an old monster. I often pretend I am weaker than I am so people don't notice me, and that's different, but not that much. But still, how am I supposed to trust you now?"

She let the question hang for a while before responding.

"You really care that much about lies?"

"You don't?"

"No. I care about actions."

"But those aren't separate," he sighed, "how can you trust someone to do good things if they aren't honest?"

"By looking at what they actually did in the past?" she raised her eyebrow, "Have I ever done anything to harm you?"

"You tricked me into digging for rocks," he squinted at her.

"Which we both needed to do, to prevent the feng shui of the world fragment from worsening," she shook her head, "You get a safer inner world and a bath out of the deal. It's hardly harmful when it benefits you in the end."

He stayed silent for a while.

"I guess nothing else comes to mind," he finally said, "but that doesn't mean much. You can just do it in the future."

"Why would I do that?"

"I don't know? The whole point is that I don't want to have to guess."

"But you always have to guess," she said, "someone can tell you the truth and then still harm you. People change their minds all the time, they can be confused, speak in error, or misjudge their abilities or those of others. Sometimes they get drunk and act out in rage. Honesty doesn't buy you safety."

"You are trying to trick me again," he sighed in exasperation, "being honest obviously helps."

"To an extent," she said, conceding the point, "but less than understanding the actual motivations that guide the actions of others."

"So what motivates you to lie?"

"I enjoy tricking and embarrassing people," she answered bluntly, "My mother once told me that if I didn't look so similar to herself, she would have been sure I was a kitsune switchling. The first thing I did after I was old enough to enter an imperial library was look them up - It turns out they eat people, and when I told her about it, she just asked me what my favorite type of victim would have been."

He turned to her with wide eyes.

"That is a terrible thing to say to a child."

"How so? I thought it was hilarious. The answer is sailors and pilgrims, they go missing all the time."

He turned back to his unfinished statue with a sigh.

"When it comes to you," she continued, "cultivating within your inner world has accelerated my growth by leaps and bounds. Since I need your cooperation to access it, I have no reason to harm you. Nor do I know how to take it away from you, before you ask."

"And what if I want to get rid of it?" he asked, "I want to get rid of my luck, and all the other nonsense."

"Yonghao," she sighed, "I have no clue how someone could completely change their luck. I have certainly never heard of it happening, outside of some frankly questionable myths and legends. It should be possible - there is nothing impossible beneath the heavens - but finding a way to do so will take you many years, and I doubt your special luck will assist you in getting rid of itself. I am more than willing to help you, since by the time you manage it, I would have long gotten stinking rich from selling all the treasures within your inner world."

"I told you, you can't sell them. It doesn't work."

"Junior, with respect, you suck at managing your inner world," she smiled, "I think I can figure out a trick or two you didn't."

He narrowed his eyes at her.

"Junior?" he asked, "How old even are you?"

"Twenty three."

"Twenty three?! I am twenty six! I should be calling you junior!"

"Seniority comes from skill, not age," she snorted, "You can call me junior when you manage to trick me."

"I don't want to trick anybody!" He grit his teeth, turning away from the statue and sending some slashes of light into the depths of the forest in frustration, "Why can't you just be honest?"

"I have laid all my cards on the table. Why can't you?"

"Me? I've always been honest!"

"Really?" she raised her eyebrow, "I saw how you reacted when I asked you why you travel alone. You are very much hiding something."

"That's different," he scowled, "It's a personal secret. Everyone has those. You wanted to trick me about much bigger things. And you still haven't apologized for any of it!"

"Sure, I apologize," she blinked, "But what good are these words? Apologies are worthless, people say they apologize and then keep doing all the same things. What matters is wherever I would continue to deceive you, and I have no intention of doing so. Deceptions are always impermanent, and a flawed basis for a long term relationship. I have no secrets to keep."

"Really now?"

"If you don't believe me, then ask away."

"Why do you want to establish a new sect? Why not just join one?"

"Rare few sects accept a loose female cultivator, but I have been a part of one in the Golden Rabbit Bay," she answered, "It's not acceptable. I want to start from scratch to do it better."

"Better how?"

She took a bit to answer, and Wang Yonghao went back to carving his statue.

"You said I talk about the heavens more than the other cultivators," she said, "you are right about that."

"So what, you actually want to break into the heavens? Be the next Gu Lingtian?"

"It's not…about the heavens," she frowned, "It's about what they represent. Every cultivator - even the karmists, no matter their own self-deceptions - chooses to cultivate even though the heavens will try to strike them down. They reject the unjust will of the heavens and impose their own will on the universe, their desires, ones they are willing to fight and bleed for. Cultivation is a tool of infinite freedom - it can let you soar through the sky like a bird, live as long as you want, and crack any wall in your way."

He kept his eyes on the statue, but she could tell he was listening attentively.

"Most cultivators would agree with this," she continued, "They have learned some history, and they know all the usual platitudes, such as 'to cultivate is to rebel against the heavens'. But for them, this is just…ancient history, like you said. They do not grasp, deep within their soul, the fact that the only reason they are alive at all is because Gu Lingtian broke the gates of heaven. And because of this, they betray his rebellion through their own actions."

He finally turned to look at her.

"Do you know how many times I have heard one of the elders speak of the heavens a scant few minutes after refusing to teach me their alchemical secrets, because they couldn't trust a woman to keep her mouth shut?" She scowled, feeling her skin flush from the echoes of that old anger, "Talk of needing to cultivate until my muscles ache, right after giving medicines and resources that rightfully should have belonged to me to disciples who worked one tenth as hard, but who happened to have a powerful relative? I will not even mention how hard it was to even join a sect. Why should their will overwrite my own? If I want to break into heaven, who gave them the right to ensnare my legs?"

She spat on the ground.

"Sanctimonious pieces of shit, you simply replaced the heavens! The need to rebel is referring to you!"

She paced a bit, calming herself down. Wang Yonghao watched her with a strange expression.

"So you want your own sect so the elders wouldn't bully you?" he said, folding his arms on his chest.

"I want freedom!" she snarled, spinning around to face him again, "For me, for others, for everyone! And you can't be free alone. Look at what we are doing here - even for something as simple as a chiclotron, we need to strain our backs for days on end. The higher your realm, the more resources you need - spirit stones, medicines, special cultivation rooms, spiritual food - and getting those takes time which you aren't spending on cultivation. This is why cultivators form into sects in the first place: they put the manual work on the shoulders of outer disciples to free up their own time, and this is fine - most people will never open their spiitual roots and become cultivators, after all. But this exchange is lopsided, warped until those higher up get everything and those below get almost nothing. This is what disgusts me. Freedom for fair treatment - that's what I want!"

"You hypocrite!" he responded, "You yourself said you liked to embarrass people! When they push you down you hate it, but when you push me down it's fine?"

"My jokes and trickery aren't going to permanently sabotage your entire life," she glared at him, "they will merely leave you annoyed and frustrated. What I am talking of will. There is no way to compensate for being deprived of resources at a critical moment in your cultivation. It is a dagger stabbed into your stomach simply because someone else could."

She stabbed her finger at him.

"You want to get rid of your luck?" she continued, "Just figuring out a plan for doing it could take you decades. You can't do that alone, but if you tell anyone about it - a sect, the empire, even a random loose cultivator - how could you be sure they wouldn't soulrape you to take your riches for themselves? Inner world like yours would be a temptation for even the most studious monks. You wanted to know how you can trust me? You can trust me because I'd rather eat dirt than let Heavens get away with anything they did, because if I told anyone about you I would be the first one on the chopping block, and because I need your help too."

"If this isn't all just an even bigger lie," he said, squinting at her, but she could tell she got through to him.

"Would I do that to you?" She responded, brushing a hand through her hair casually.

"Yes?"

"Come now, really?" She put a hand on her chest, "This here cultivator is best known for her honesty and trustworthiness. I barely even know how to haggle, let alone lie."

She managed to keep her face in a schooled mask for a good ten breaths before her laughter burst forth. Wang Yonghao scowled at her.

"Jerk," he said, heading back towards the entrance to his inner world, "we can discuss details later. Let's go deal with my inner world."

---

They left the rosevines within the world fragment for the time being. After the night they have spent in the tree, the plants have burrowed deep into the earth, and pulling them out would be a nightmare while the air was still full of poison. Instead, Wang Yonghao simply moved the fire treasures around to cut off the open fires, and closed up his internal world. Their hope was that with no new dead air being produced, the problem would solve itself.

They spent the rest of the day foraging around the river bend. Wang Yonghao managed to catch another small fish, and she gathered some forest flowers, which they cooked on a small wood fire while discussing their future plans. It wasn't enough for both of them, and their stomachs rumbled in hunger.

As the evening approached, they opened up the world fragment and she poked her head inside to check the air. It felt much fresher to her, and they decided it was worth the risk to try spending the night inside.

Another long argument spiked when she asked Wang Yonghao to carry her down. He again insisted that her previous way of standing on his back was far too embarrassing, and also completely unnecessary when he could use the much more comfortable bridal carry. She stood her ground, and said that not only did they have an agreement, but also if he tried to hold her like that then he wouldn't need to worry about marriage for the rest of his life. In the end they settled on him tying a rope to his waist, and her hanging off that rope a good meter below his feet.

Once they descended down to the ground, they quickly discovered that their troubles weren't over: all of their food reserves had vanished.

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read three chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon where the rest of volume 1 has been posted for a low price of 3$.

 

[Winged_One]

"Our food is gone," she swore, having checked every water trench in the chiclotron, "the damn rosevines must have eaten all of it."

"All of it?! There'd been an entire bear in there!"

"Come on," she motioned to him, walking over to a spot where the earth has been disturbed, "We need to dig them up. There's a chance some of the meat is still undigested - it will be disgusting, but it's better than starving."

They quickly dug up one of the rosevines, murdered it in cold blood and dissected its stomach, but all they found was some disgusting grayish slime, clearly well beyond the point of consumption. Qian Shanyi closed her eyes and sighed, her stomach grumbling in hunger, reminding her of that first horrific week in the world fragment. After having spent a while eating as much as she wanted, the sensation felt sharply unpleasant. Wang Yonghao groaned right next to her.

"Maybe the other ones have some?" Wang Yonghao said hopefully, "We should dig them up too."

"No," she shook her head, "Save it. Any hole you dig now will just burn your own strength, and we'd need it to traverse the river. It's best to hope they won't attack us - and if they do, then at the very least they would have to dig themselves out."

"You want us to travel further while we are hungry?"

"I don't want to, but we have no choice," she shook her head again, "Remember today? Neither of us is skilled enough at foraging to fully sustain ourselves, at least as long as I am not willing to try my luck with plants I can't identify for sure. If we try to stick around, we would burn more calories than we consume every day, hopelessly trying to forage further afield until we starve. Our only choice to find civilization - and thus food - is to risk it all and go through the tunnel in one go. As soon as the sun is up, we'll set off."

"Yeah, that makes sense," he sighed, "I guess I just got used to not being constantly hungry for once."

"You and me both, Yonghao."

Wary of the rosevines and the dead air affecting them again, they agreed to sleep in shifts, and Wang Yonghao headed straight to bed. Qian Shanyi debated wherever she should cultivate while he slept, and in the end, decided in favor: she was feeling on the cusp of unblocking her sixth dantian, and if she managed to do it, it should benefit her more than the calories she would lose in the process.

---

Tension was thick in the air as they woke up in the morning. The rosevines stayed underground, though they heard them moving around underneath their feet, and Qian Shanyi was sure that if they were both asleep at once they would have attacked. Not wanting to spend more of their energy, they put the modifications to the chiclotron on pause, and instead played more shatranj and talked about life. Now that she didn't need to keep her past secret, she told Wang Yonghao about her childhood while he taught her how to play shatranj strategically.

"So you didn't get born into a sect?" He asked her while they were having yet another practice match, "That's surprising."

"How so?" she quirked her eyebrow at him, "Most cultivators do not belong to any sect. Out of the ones that do, most weren't born into them either. I only joined my former sect at fourteen."

"It's just the way you speak, how much you know," he shrugged, quickly responding to her move on the board, "I figured that you were taught this from birth."

"I was indeed. Just not in a sect. My father paid through the nose for tutors to teach me how to be a great merchant - or at the very least, an imperial official."

"A merchant?" he gave her a confused look, "What does that have to do with cultivation?"

"Everything?" she returned his confusion with a look of her own, "Who do you think buys the most expensive goods if not the cultivators? Every good trader should know how to recognise sect cultivators with a single glance, and learn the types and properties of the most common heavenly materials and earthly treasures by heart - if for no other reason than to be able to store them safely, and know which ones have to be smuggled without a license and which ones could be left out in the open. There is a reason why basic knowledge of cultivation is a part of the imperial examinations - many jobs require you to know all the basics."

He hummed, pondering her words.

"Did you pass these exams?"

"I didn't take them in the end," she replied, "I studied hard for the attempt, but then my spiritual root unblocked, and I felt it would be pointless to continue. What use is a diploma to a cultivator?"

"You could have joined an imperial daoism school, right? A lot of cultivators do that."

"I could have," she nodded, "but at the time, I thought that it's best to be a big fish in a small pond. The Empire is massive, and their resources are split between a hundred different things. I figured that in a sect, it would be easier for me to get the things I needed - and perhaps become an elder later in life. There is fluidity there that the empire lacks - if you sign up with them, then you are forever prohibited from joining or forming your own sect, and your career will be rigid and regimented. Basically, I thought I could strike it big."

She sighed.

"In the end, I was wrong. Small ponds grow stagnant. Unfortunately for me, leaving a sect is even harder than joining one. Not that it matters now - with your help, I should be able to advance by leaps and bounds."

---

After they got tired of practice matches, Wang Yonghao started to run her through a series of endgame positions, where she had to pick the best move possible for her side of the game. It was a challenging puzzle, scratching her mind in just the right way.

"But enough about me," she said, bringing their conversation out of a lull it has fallen into, "Let's talk about you. I keep thinking about your luck - for example, take your treasury. The distribution of weapons you own is very skewed. You own around a hundred swords, but only five bows, and not even a single musical instrument."

"You actually remember how many bows I have?" He gave her a befuddled glance.

"Of course. I counted them while I was sorting them," she frowned at him. "But let's not get distracted. These numbers are puzzling, even when taking your luck into account. For example, the conditions of the ruins you explore were set well before your birth - surely you couldn't avoid running into some of the other weapon forms."

"Oh, that. It's mostly down to me," he sighed, "These days, I only pick up weapons I have a talent in, or ones that interest me for some reason. Why would I pick up musical instruments?"

"To sell them?"

"I told you, it doesn't work."

"Then why do you pick up swords? You will never need this many."

"Force of habit, I suppose."

"I remember you throwing a whip inside too. Do you know any whip techniques?"

"No, I picked that one up because it was lying next to this cool looking sphere I found nearby," he said, "I figured they might be related. Mostly I only have talent with the sword, spear, dagger and ax."

She nodded, and went back to the game.

---

After they both got sick of playing shatranj for the day, she got Wang Yonghao to help her catalog all of the various weapons and artifacts laying around in their treasury, for the purposes of selling them later. They split them in four groups: "Unknown", "Legitimate", "Archeology" and "Stolen", which she renamed into "Appropriated" after loud objections from Wang Yonghao that all of those stories of him picking up weapons from people he beat up were a totally different situation. Any artifact he couldn't remember clearly was put into "Unknown"; ones he won from tournaments or got as gifts went into "Legitimate", results of graverobbing secret realms were sorted into "Archeology" and finally everything that was in any way connected to living or dead cultivators or sects went into "Appropriated".

Qian Shanyi had never tried selling cultivation artifacts before, and her father did not trade in them either, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that selling "Appropriated" weapons would pose a much bigger problem.

All of the weapons were expertly crafted, perfect for channeling spiritual energy, and seven were the rare kind that possessed additional abilities, just like the fly whisk. There was an emerald jade spear that could warp the air in front of a cultivator's face into a lens, letting them see further into the distance; a sword that could store small animals it touched like a cosmos ring (currently empty); a chakram that would release a powerful lightning bolt after draining the blood of their user; a pair of daggers that could turn into sandals, concealing their nature in the process (which she immediately borrowed, replacing her own crudely crafted footwear); a sword that would turn some of the blood of those it cut into liquid metal; a saber that shuddered when someone else looked at her; and a hammer that could telekinetically pull the enemy's weapon towards it. Wang Yonghao thought that there might have been more, but she wasn't about to start randomly testing artifacts - that was a great recipe for getting their hands blown off. There was a reason why cultivators occasionally called careless fools as "artifact testers".

There was no real reason to rush, either, as they would be harder to sell. Few refiners bothered to create weapons that included permanent abilities, due to their cost, difficulty in production, and because such abilities could never be as flexible as a technique performed by a living cultivator. Because of this, what few weapons that reached the market were incredibly expensive, and until she could accurately price their value, they would simply suffer a loss if she tried.

Well, first they would need to reach civilization - but despite their difficulties, she was feeling relatively optimistic.

---

By the time the sun rose outside, the relations between them were starting to mend, until conflict sparked up again from a direction she didn't expect.

"I just think it doesn't make sense for both of us to be swimming downstream," Wang Yonghao sighed for the tenth time, as neither of them was willing to cede their position. "I have to be out because otherwise the entrance of the world fragment won't go anywhere. You don't."

"Not a single squeak from you about it over the past week, and only now it becomes an issue?" she responded, keeping her hands folded on her chest. She wrapped one of her silk ropes around her waist for easy access, and kept the fly whisk on her belt alongside a dozen other, shorter ropes for easy access.

"I thought you were an old monster back then!" he said, "What would be the point in you sticking inside?"

"There is no point now either."

"The point is safety! Who knows what will happen? Last time we walked through the forest we got attacked by vine monsters."

"If you get knocked out again, I'll starve to death within your inner world, Yonghao. It isn't safe there either."

"If something could knock me out, it would outright eat you."

"Eat me? Please. I am all bones, no meat at all. Any demon beast would choke if it tried."

"You aren't taking this seriously."

"I am taking it precisely as seriously as it deserves. If anything happens, we will retreat to your inner world, and I am prepared for all the likely eventualities. I am going on that tree trunk."

"It's a pointless risk!"

"The only real risk here is you somehow fucking it up without my gentle guiding hand."

"It's a river," he scowled, "stop being rude, there is no way to screw up traveling downstream."

"You could drown."

"I know how to swim and I can fly!"

"You'd have to fight me to keep me away from that tree trunk," she rolled her eyes, "so either take out your sword or shut up."

He did neither, and nagged her about it as they set off down the river and into the dimensional tunnel formed by the walls of the world. Even threatening him with a fight didn't help.

---

The river flow quickened within the tunnel, and soon they were left surrounded on all sides by the empty blue - bright sunlight above, and dim below, where it filtered up through the water. There wasn't much else to see around them, and the water seemed to be flowing fast enough to carry off any sediment on the bottom of the river.

As the day went on, they passed suns traveling alongside the world edges. From up close, their heat was scorching, and both of them dived into the water to avoid dealing with it. Qian Shanyi stayed in the warm water, enjoying how it felt on her skin, merely putting her arms on top of her log for support, while Wang Yonghao climbed back out. She was telling him a story about her youth helping at their main store, when he suddenly interrupted her.

"Why didn't you pick up a new sword from my treasury?" He asked.

"I already have a sword," she responded, "why would I need another one?"

"Sure, but it's probably not as good as the ones that I have, right?" He shook his head, "Sorry, I just can't stop thinking about how we could best deal with demon beasts."

"It's a good thing to think about," she answered, eyeing him, "It's true that your weapons are probably better overall, but I would have needed time to adjust to using a new sword, which we do not have right now."

"You could have picked one a week ago though."

She paused to think this through. Frankly, the idea just didn't occur to her.

"It's my sword in more ways than one," she finally answered, climbing on top of her log. She pulled her sword out of its scabbard, and showed him a faint inscription engraved on the blade, "I won it in a tournament back in the Golden Rabbit Bay, so I suppose I am being somewhat sentimental."

Into heavens through sweat and blood, the inscription said, which is about what it took for her to win, with her garbage spiritual energy circulation law. To this day, it was one of her finest plays, pitting two strongest competitors against one another before swooping in to finish off the winner.

He opened his mouth to respond -

- and suddenly was thrown off his log as an enormous fish tail battered it from below.

"There's a fish!" she called out to him, seeing him starting to walk on air, but the fast river current had already carried her a good distance away. He unsheathed his sword as he ran to catch up, staying far away from the water.

No such safety for me, she thought grimly as she quickly circulated her thread control technique. The rope tied around her waist came alive, its movements linked to one of the shorter ropes on her waist, and she quickly used it to tie herself to her log by her left arm. With her right hand, she quickly tightened a lanyard on her sword, securing it in place. Her eyes frantically searched through the waters for the signs of the fish, but sunlight reflecting off the waters made that almost impossible.

Before Wang Yonghao could catch up and open his inner world, she saw a shape move below her, and barely managed to brace herself before being thrown into the air. She hit the edge of the world and bounced off back into the water, thankful that she managed to bring up her spiritual shield up in time. Her vision blurred in the water, but with how much light was around her, she could still clearly make out the shape of the fish pivoting in her direction. She surfaced and pulled on her rope, dragging herself towards her log as fast as she could. Her sword dangled awkwardly off her right arm, but at least it wasn't lost.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of light from the water, and instinctively pushed herself to swim faster. That was the only thing that saved her.

Her vision swam as the loudest screech she had ever heard in her life slammed into her ears. She yanked her head out of the water, but it only helped so much.

If it hit directly, I'd be unconscious, she thought, struggling to stay awake.

She was still too far away from the log, and abandoned that idea as she saw the fish getting closer. Instead, she brought her sword back into her hand, and turned towards the fish, bracing herself behind her sword. It lunged straight at her, and for a moment, she saw sharp jaws below a head of smooth, black skin, before the fish tried to bite down on her sword only to find sharp steel.

Not familiar with cultivators, are you? She sneered in her mind. The fish responded by barreling her down into the water with its sheer weight and momentum, knocking air out of her lungs.

The hit threw any sense of direction out of her mind, and she struggled to reorient herself, but finally managed to surface, breathing hard. Wang Yonghao was mere meters away, already stretching out a hand to pull her up out of the water, when she saw the fish leap up and slam him out of the air with a swipe of its tail.

She cursed, and ducked her head back under the water, trying to find him. He ended up a good two dozen meters away from her, lying strangely still in the water, and she saw the fish circling around him. Her wood log ended up in the exact opposite direction.

Damn you Yonghao, can't you fall more conveniently? She cursed him, forced her rope to untie itself from the log, and swam towards him. Her rope streaked through the water ahead of her, carried by the power of spiritual energy. Feeling her lungs burning, she swam up towards the surface to draw air, but hit a solid wall.

What?

Her fingers clawed at the edge of the world as the horrible realization set in. The dimensional tunnel must have narrowed so much it was completely filled with water, and the current had carried them inside. Worse still, she had lost her sense of direction, and couldn't even tell which way was upstream.

No! I need air!

She spun back towards Yonghao, and saw that he came back to his senses, and tried to slash at the fish with the Honk of the Solar Goose, but the technique was not designed to pass through water and dissipated almost immediately.

Without any better options, she swam towards him again, only to see the fish bite him on the leg. He struggled against it, and she saw the fish start to swim away, carrying him along.

The sense of doom within her heart deepened further, and the pieces clicked in place.

Wang Yonghao had great luck. He probably wouldn't die here, so this fish would carry him to safety.

Luck only kept the cultivator safe, not the others.

He repeatedly pushed for her to stay within his inner world because of "danger".

Did he…expect this to happen?

Did this happen before?

Was she going to die here?

She swam even harder, and just as the fish was passing by ten meters away from her, she managed to thread her rope through its mouth and around the top of its head, tying it into a bridle.

I hope I am right about this.

She tightened her end of the rope, and felt it yank her forwards, dragging her behind the fish. Water pushed hard against her body, and if she didn't tie herself down, she would have been sure to slip out.

Come on, you stupid fish, she thought as her vision started to go black at the edges, do your fucking job. Serve your Heavenly masters.

Suddenly, her face breached the surface of water, and she finally let her lungs heave, coughing violently as she finally breathed clean air. She burst spiritual energy from the pores near her eyes to whip water away from them, and finally she could see clearly.

They were falling.

The tunnel had opened up in the sky of a wide open space, and the river fell down from it in a thick column of water. The fish had burst through the surface of this column, and was now falling freely through the air, dragging her along with it. She saw Wang Yonghao stab it through an eye, and the fish released him. For a moment, he stepped on air, and stopped. She and the fish kept falling, instantly leaving him behind them.

A hundred meters below them the water crashed down into a caldera, roiling and steaming as hundreds of tons of water hammered down into it every second, pulverizing anything that would fall in like the jaws of a hungry water spirit.

If she dropped into that plunge pool, she would never come out.

A distant part of her mind calmly estimated the distances and told her she had five seconds left to live.

She needed to grab onto something, anything to arrest her momentum, but the rock walls were so distant, almost vertical, gleaming in the daylight. Above the tops of the caldera, she could see trees reaching towards the waterfall, thick leafy crowns slick from the moisture, but even the closest of them would pass them by a good twenty meters. She spun her neck around and saw Wang Yonghao way above her, but she could already see he was too far away to offer any help.

Four seconds.

In desperation, she yanked on the rope, sending her flying closer towards the fish. The rope went slack, and she pushed it towards the closest tree she could see below her with the thread control technique. If she could only hook it onto a branch, she would survive…

Panic shot through her as she lost control of her technique and the rope started to flutter freely. She grit her teeth and wove spiritual energy around it anew, forcing it to obey.

Three seconds.

At the same time, she dived through the air towards the fish - it was struggling aimlessly as it fell, crying out in sharp tones, but its dangerous call did almost nothing in the open air. Her fingers cramped from the pressure, and she almost fumbled her technique again, but managed to keep it together.

Two seconds.

The fish almost slapped her aside with its tail, but she managed to avoid its strike by the width of a hair, and stabbed her sword into its body to keep them together. With it helpless in the air, she could have chopped off its head, but she needed as much of its mass as she could manage. The rope stretched out towards the treeline, and she could see it would still come out just a bit too short.

One second.

She sprung off the fish towards the trees, thankful that it was so large - if they weighed equally, her kick would have just sent it back towards the waterfall. The rope stretched between them, and at the last moment, she managed to hook it onto a branch of the tree she was flying past. At the same time, she pushed as much of her spiritual energy as she could into her left arm and shoulder, strengthening them for the impact.

The rope wrapped around the branch as she and the fish fell down, until it went taut and sent their collective weight into the wood. The branch groaned and cracked, but thankfully resisted, and the entire tree bent down towards the waterfall under the sudden impact of a giant fish and one desperate cultivator. The weight of the fish pulled on the rope and it slid over the bark, dragging Qian Shanyi up towards the branch. Ready for it, she stabbed her sword into the wood to arrest her momentum. Pain shot through her left shoulder - no doubt dislocated - but she held tight, and hugged the slippery, mossy branch with both of her arms and legs to keep herself in place.

The tree groaned more and started to bend backwards, as the elastic energy of the trunk was converted back into speed. As it swung the other way, Qian Shanyi felt the weight on the rope relax for a moment, and in one smooth move, she reached down towards her feet with her good right arm, grabbed one of her slippers and turned it into a dagger, and cut the rope off. The tree swung back and forth as the weight of the fish suddenly vanished, and she held onto for her dear life. Finally, everything went still.

With great care, she raised her head. Agony was shooting through her left hand, and when she focused her senses on it, she realized it was indeed dislocated. She quickly popped it back into its socket with her spiritual energy, but knew she wouldn't be using it in the foreseeable future.

Slowly and carefully, she inched her way along the slippery bark towards the tree trunk, and finally leaped off onto the stones below. Her heart hammered in her chest, and she laid down on the rocks, and closed her eyes.

Safe.

She felt the stress instantly leave her body, and laughter bubbled out of her chest as the weight of what just happened finally settled over her mind. She laid there, giggling, feeling more alive than she had ever been before.

Hearing the rustle of cloth, she opened her eyes to see Wang Yonghao descend from the air, his face white with fear.

"You are alive," he breathed out, "I thought for sure I would find you down on the rocks."

"I am a cultivator, Yonghao," she grinned at him, "We are very hard to kill."

She got up, and dusted herself off with her one good hand. As she turned around, she saw what laid beyond the caldera. The river flowed out of one of its sides, rushing down the side of a mountain, and streaked through the landscape, through forests and fields down below their feet. Far in the distance, she saw it enter a canyon, and in that canyon, she saw smoke, and a ship on the water.

They finally found civilization.

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read four chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon where the rest of volume 1 has been posted for a low price of 3$.

 

[Winged_One]

"Is your arm really alright?"

Qian Shanyi sighed. He'd asked her several times already, but it seems that the shock of the river drop affected him in a different way from her. She was feeling alert, filling her lungs with air as her mind raced ahead at lightning speed. Meanwhile, he seemed to still be stuck on what happened in the distant past of ten minutes ago.

"Yes, it's just a dislocation. Given that I had to hold up a fish five times my weight with a single hand, I frankly got off easy. Speaking of the fish -"

She approached the inner age of the caldera, putting her good hand on that life-saving tree to keep her footing stable. Glancing down, she saw the corpse of the fish that almost killed them smashed down on the rocks below, lying close to the edge of the water. Its skin was smooth like that of a human, black without any scales. Its jaw was surprisingly small, poking out below a fat, bulbous head, with beady eyes set on both sides of it. Organs have exploded out of its stomach from the impact, and overall, Qian Shanyi thought that it was the ugliest fish she had ever seen in her life.

"Help me down, will you?" she said, throwing him her rope, "I killed that fish, so I want to butcher it."

"What, do you want to cook it?"

"That one?" She snorted, "Fuck no. It looks far too strange, and since it's not in my recipe book, how would I know if it's poisonous? No, I want the demon beast core."

"Those are pretty rare, aren't they?" Wang Yonghao frowned, tying the rope around his waist, "How do you know it even has one?"

"Ordinarily, they would be pretty rare, yeah," she nodded, then grinned at him, "However, since this fish clearly came here to get a certain Wang Yonghao through the tunnel, the chances of it having a fire-type demon beast core that could greatly assist his cultivation are almost one hundred percent!"

"You can't possibly know that," he scowled at her, "and I am not going to use any demon beast cores!"

"Want to bet? Besides, it's my kill, remember? I want to sell it, not give it to you. No use wasting resources."

He declined to bet, and five short minutes later she dug out a fist-sized yellow stone out of that giant bulb on top of the fish head. She figured that it was probably what it used to make those annoying sound attacks, and casually tossed it into their world fragment.

---

They descended down the mountain, still following the path of the river. The climate here was different from the pine forest - much drier, with grass and ferns clinging onto the gaps in the rock where little soil still stuck around despite the erosion of water and winds.

She fashioned a crude sling for her arm out of her rope - it was best not to disturb it too much, especially while they walked over bumpy terrain. She figured her arm would be back to perfect working order in only a couple days.

The canyon in the distance was their current goal. If they could get on a ship, then they could travel to a town, and find out where they ended up. Most importantly, they could finally enjoy such luxuries like food prepared by an actual chef, tools that weren't just cobbled together from random planks, and access to imperial libraries for information.

Wang Yonghao sulked as they walked along, and it took her a lot more coaxing than usual to get him to start talking. Eventually, they started to argue over what would be an ideal first meal after coming out of the forest, even though neither of them could know what the cuisine was like in the local area. Wang Yonghao held a solid edge due to his wealth of travel experience, compared to her who had never left the Golden Rabbit Bay in her life, and his vivid descriptions of food made her mouth water.

Their discussion took a backseat when they entered a forest at the foot of the mountain, and she saw a dilapidated slaughter post hammered into the ground on one of the river shores.

It was a very simple thing - a tall, solid stake with a cross-bar at the top, and various stones, animal bones, and carved pieces of wood hanging off it on strings, clacking together lightly in the wind. The cross-bar was painted with a faded image, its paint peeling and falling off, leaving behind only the overall shape of a lotus with thirteen petals. She couldn't discern any of the symbols that she knew were supposed to be drawn on the petals, but there was no mistaking the emblem of the thirteenth lotus empire.

Even though she was so far from home, her heart still felt warmer. They weren't alone against the wilds any longer.

She approached the post with a smile, and gave it a respectful nod, putting her hand on her heart. Wang Yonghao looked at her curiously.

"What are you doing?"

"Giving my respects to the spirit hunters who have bled and died to push the wilds back up to this point," she responded, raising an eyebrow at him in return, "Surely you know the tradition? You can't open a history book and read about the slaughter posts without stumbling on it."

"Why would I read about them?" he scratched his head, "They are just sticks, aren't they? You aren't going to tell me they are a part of some enormous formation, are you?"

"I keep forgetting that you didn't have a foundational education," she shook her head, smiling slightly, "No, the posts have no power of their own. They are just a symbol."

She motioned to the forest floor around the post.

"These posts form a border. On one side are the wilds - on the other, lands of the human nations. They are a message for the humans to tread carefully, and another message entirely for the beasts of the forest."

These are the lands of humans. Flee, or be slaughtered.

Wherever the posts stood, local spirit hunters and sect cultivators would sweep through the area every other week, clearing out dangerous animals and demon beasts. Smarter beasts would move away, learning the lethal threat of the quiet clacking sounds. Dumber ones would be exterminated. The border of the empire stretched between the lonely posts, expanding year to year.

The shape of the posts themselves changed all over the world. In some places, they were carved with elaborate decorations, while in others, a simple pair of planks would do. Some posts were adorned in stone, others in wood, animal bones, feathers, chitin, or whatever other materials were at hand. Some carried flags or emblems - where the borders of other countries brushed up against each other - while others had none. But wherever they stood, one thing remained the same: if you were a human, you could feel safer, knowing you could count on the help of others.

"And that's why it's polite to offer thanks when passing by one of these posts," she concluded her short lecture, "because without the spirit hunters, we wouldn't have fields to farm or towns to live in."

"Well now I am definitely not offering thanks." Wang Yonghao folded his hands. "You know how many times spirit hunters chased after me? Persistent buggers."

"Hm. Yes, I suppose you would have an atypical experience there."

He stared at her in silence for a moment.

"What, no joke at my expense?" he asked warily, "I was starting to get used to it. You have been strangely friendly over the past three days."

"It's true, I apologize for missing my mark," she frowned theatrically, "In my defense, I am no longer feeling constantly stressed from wondering if you would finally choose to finish what you've started by beating me up, and either kill me or turn me into a cauldron."

He winced, and she couldn't help but laugh.

"Oh come on, you have to stop flinching when I joke about this," she shook her head ruefully, "Or people will start to think I am the one who kidnapped you instead of the converse."

"How can you joke about this?!" He snapped back, gathering his composure, "You almost died today!"

"What matters is that I didn't die." she grinned, "Why would I be stressed about living instead of dying?"

---

In the end, they didn't need a ship, as they saw a town only a short hike away. It was cut into the red, rocky sides of the canyon, terracing away from the waters where they split around a thick pillar of rock, with rope bridges stretched between different levels and across the canyon like the web of a busy spider, linking different parts of the town together. The entire place felt like tightly packed luggage - not quite cramped, but space used and reused for a dozen things at once until nothing was left.

There were hardly any farms around - the forest here must not yet have been quite safe enough to farm - but small orchards were already starting to flank the entrances to the town, and most of the place was covered in green, from small parks to gardens and potted plants on the windowsills. All the way down below, they could see half a dozen ships moored to wooden docks, looking for all the world as if the spider that wove this town had put on boots.

They followed a narrow path cut into the side of the canyon, passing by a crew of workers that was chipping away at the rock to widen it enough for a cart to pass through. Lookouts were standing watch over the group, and Qian Shanyi could hear their conversation trail off into deferential silence as they saw the pair of cultivators leaving the forest. They nodded to the workers, and passed by unhurriedly.

At the end of the path they came to a stone gate crowned with a pair of ballistae on rotating platforms. A shocked guard greeted them and lead them into a small room inside of the gate structure, and after apologizing profusely for the poor reception (if only they knew that honorable cultivators would appear today, he assured them, the captain would have greeted them personally), he meekly asked if they could be recorded into the entry books. Not seeing a reason to refuse, she took out her sect seal and passed it to him, seeing Yonghao do the same.

"Shouldn't a cultivator be here with you, in case of a demon beast attack?" Qian Shanyi asked him curiously, startling the poor lad while he fumbled with their paperwork.

"Well, ah, honorable immortal, of course there should be," the guard hedged his response, "but most cultivators only pass through Xiaohongshan and we don't have any local sects, so we only have a couple spirit hunters - they can't sit around at the gates all day. If we need help, we will ring the alarm."

He motioned towards a large bell that was hanging off the room's ceiling.

"But this rarely happens," he continued, "most things we can chase off with just our crossbows and spears."

She hummed, and asked him some more about the town while they finished signing in. As they left the gatehouse, she noticed that Wang Yonghao seemed to be grumpier than usual.

"Did you not want to leave your name behind in the books?" she guessed.

"It's not that," he sighed, "I just hate being recognised as a cultivator. It brings trouble."

"You didn't mention this," she raised her eyebrow, "We could have snuck in after nightfall, if you wanted."

"No, sneaking in tends to go worse." he sighed again, "The best is to pretend to be a common pilgrim, but it doesn't really work when you stroll alone out of a wild forest - everyone knows you have to be either a cultivator or insane to travel that way. It's hard to hide even at the best of times - one glance at our clear skin, defined muscles, long lustrous hair, and people start to put the picture together. What could we have done? Sown us thick, concealing clothing from the hides of demon beasts? That would only attract more attention."

"I see," she nodded, "if it's any consolation, I despise it as well."

"You?" He gave her a baffled look, as they headed through a market in the direction the gate guard gave them for a good tavern, "But you like cultivators. You always talk about how they are the sabers of humanity and what not."

"It's the constant deference," she sighed, eyeing the stalls around them. They were getting some looks from the shopkeepers, though when she met their eyes, they pretended it was anything but. "You've seen how that guard talked to us. I am not dressed like a spirit hunter or an imperial official, I am not from a local sect, he doesn't know me and hasn't heard of anything good I might have done. For all he knows, I am a complete scumbag, perhaps just one step shy of being a demonic cultivator. Why should he give me that much face? Because I can snap his spine like a twig? That isn't a good reason at all for such debasement."

"But you could be any one of those things. How is he supposed to know? He was just playing it safe."

"And what if I am? That still isn't a reason to all but kiss my boots. In fact, if I was the sort of person to assault him over lack of deference, he should have spit in my face. Cultivators only expect deference because they think they can get away with it - if people stopped giving in, the culture would shift until the demands would stop."

"You want people to put their lives in danger because maybe that would make the culture better?" He raised his eyebrows at her.

"I don't," she shook her head, finally spotting a stall filled with cloth and making a beeline for it, "but it is why I hate it. In the end it all comes down to strength, but there is no justice in that."

"Sure didn't mind your own strength when tricking me…" he muttered, following after her.

"You had all the same tools and information as I did," she snorted, "You just used them worse. A challenge on equal terms is fine, it is the asymmetry that bothers me."

She approached the merchant with a smile, hoping to put him at ease, and began haggling, though her heart wasn't really in it. In the end, she was still pretty sure he ended up selling the goods to her at half price. It rankled, but until they could sell something, they had to be careful about their own funds.

She bought a backpack, a pair of hooded leather cloaks, a sewing set with needles, thread and scissors, as well as some assorted cuts of fabric she figured she could use for repairs, and a compact writing set in a nearby stall for the letters she wanted to write. The damn cloaks took almost half of her remaining money. That left her with three silver yuan and seven jian: three or four days wages for an outer sect disciple, or a good week and a half for a laborer from outside a sect. She threw most of it into her backpack, then handed one of the cloaks to Wang Yonghao, who took it with a raised eyebrow.

"It will make you stand out a lot less - consider this as a gift of apology," she said, putting her own cloak on, "For playing on your heartstrings as much as I do. Perhaps I pushed the line a bit too much on a rare occasion."

His expression turned grateful.

"I had one before. Lost it though," he said, "Thank you."

"Now let's hope I still have enough left for a private room at an inn," she said, heading off.

---

The tavern they were directed to was a two-story building wedged in between the back wall of one of the terrace levels and a small park, built to service various cultivators that passed through the town. The rooms were a bit larger than usual, with thick walls and solid locks, each having their own fireplace, and even the window looking out over the street had wooden blinds that could be latched from the inside. The two-person bed could be raised and attached to a hook high up on the wall, freeing up most of the floor space. It was a safe, isolated place: a cultivator could easily practice here without being disturbed, as long as their techniques were not destructive or required a lot of movement.

Of course, the price for the rooms was similarly high: three yuan for a week, but Qian Shanyi paid it willingly. Without rooms like these, they could not have easily opened Wang Yonghao's inner world without risking discovery. At the very least they only needed a single room, since they could sleep in their separate hammocks in the world fragment.

After they got their room, they paid for a meal, and ate in their room, toasting each other to a successful escape from the forest. Heading off to a restaurant was far too dangerous with Wang Yonghao's luck - if something happened on the first day they were in town, their payment for the room would be wasted.

"So, what do we do now?" Wang Yonghao asked, lounging on the bed while she was quickly grinding ink at the table.

"I'll write a couple letters, and then I will find out who would be willing to buy swords in town and see what they want for them," she responded, "if we are lucky, and as long as they are reasonable, we might have enough money to last us for months by the evening. If we aren't quite so lucky, I'd need to negotiate, or find a buyer among one of the wandering traders in town. I still have some money left - enough for me to buy us food for the rest of the week, I think, as long as I can get ingredients for cheap."

"Letters? You know someone here?"

"Letters are unrelated," she said, looking over at him, "One is for my parents, while the other is for my sect. They should know I am alive and safe, at the very least, since from their perspective I vanished after you beat me up in public. They must think I have surely been killed, or worse."

He winced, and she sighed.

"That you didn't necessarily have bad intentions at heart does not change the fact of what happened, nor the reactions of other people to it," she said, "You are making amends, so why do you keep blaming yourself for it?"

"Won't they think I am forcing you to write it?" He asked, looking away, "After kidnapping you?"

"Why would you bother after weeks of silence? I suppose my sect might, but my family wouldn't. My father taught me a code to tell him if I am under duress, and other such things, in an otherwise ordinary-looking message."

"Your father did what?"

"He is a merchant," she shrugged, "the business can be somewhat cutthroat. When I was young, there was always a distant possibility I might be kidnapped by one of his rivals as leverage, and we prepared accordingly."

She wrote for a bit, until he sighed again.

"It's not going to work though, I told you," he said, "The sale, I mean."

"Why not?"

"Because I tried it before. It always went wrong somehow."

She put her brush down, and turned around to face him once again.

"Well, you are the expert on your own luck, so I would be remiss not to listen to you here," she said, "how many times did you try and how did it go wrong?"

"Maybe a dozen," he shrugged, "It's different every time. Sometimes I get interrupted. One time spirit hunters chased after me for a whole week. Once the shopkeeper told me that I'd get my money in three months, and then I had to leave town for other reasons. I think of it as pressure points - if I go somewhere and it's one of those, something bad happens. Near sects, places of high spiritual energy concentration, shops, big restaurants…those kinds of places, there is a lot of pressure there. Things go bad quickly."

"I see," she said, "But you also thought you couldn't have a bed or bath, and then we built those inside of your inner world anyways."

"And then it went wrong, and you almost suffocated."

"That wasn't due to your luck," she told him bluntly, "that was due to me being stupid and fucking it up by doing too much at once."

He threw a baffled stare at her.

"The point I am driving towards is that even if some things didn't work in the past, if we do them differently, they might work now," she sighed, "and even if something unexpected happens, we just have to be proactive at handling it. Luck only works in probabilities: as long as you can stay on top of the ball, there should be a way to resolve it."

He didn't respond, instead simply shrugging. She supposed it would have to do.

She turned back to her letters, quickly finished both of them, and left them alone to dry.

"Then, once we have the monetary question handled for a while, we should travel to a larger city," she said, turning back to face him, "One with a good imperial library, and start researching your luck problem. Depending on how quickly I will figure out a way to offload your massive treasure trove without raising eyebrows, we might need to start hiring experts to do some of the work for us too. I doubt we would hit anything worthwhile soon, but it's the best path forward that I can think of."

"You still want to help me?" his eyes widened.

"Why wouldn't I?" She raised an eyebrow at him, "I am getting the best side of the deal here by far, from the spiritual energy in your world fragment to the wealth I'd get from the sales. Even direct disciples of most sects would jump at the opportunity. Helping you with some research in exchange is nothing."

He didn't respond, and somehow his mood seemed to worsen.

What a strange man.

Qian Shanyi quickly descended into the world fragment and picked out four swords that, to her eyes, seemed safest to try selling initially. She avoided any weapons with unusual properties, instead focusing on the lowest common denominator - which is also why she picked swords, as they were the most common weapon type by far in the world of cultivation. She wrapped them up in Silvered Devil Moth Silk to keep them concealed while walking around town, threw them in her backpack, tied a new rope around her waist, and climbed out.

When she returned, Wang Yonghao was pacing nervously around the room.

"Well, let's go I guess," he sighed, motioning for the door.

"You know, you don't have to go if you don't want to," she raised an eyebrow, guessing at the reason behind his distress, "I can manage the sale myself. If you want, you could stay in the room until I return. I can see your view on the pressure points, even though I think my reasons for it are different - without meeting other people on the street, there should be much fewer factors for your luck to affect, and so the chances of it causing a catastrophe should be lower."

He stopped and did a double take. She smiled, approached him, and patted him on the back.

"I'll make sure to buy groceries on my way back. With a market to work with, I could even buy some spices, or at the very least salt."

He actually teared up at that, and had to wipe his eyes off with the back of his hand.

"Shhh, there is no need to get emotional over this," she said, patting him some more, "I'll be back to annoying you in no time whatsoever."

"Thank you," he said, going back to bed, sniffling throughout, "it was - nice - to have some help for once."

She rolled her eyes at him, and left through the door. She was just leaving for a couple hours, not forever, for the love of the netherworld.

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read five chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon where the rest of volume 1 has been posted for a low price of 3$.

 

[Winged_One]

Qian Shanyi saw the thirteen-leaved lotus flag fluttering in the wind above the roofs of the surrounding buildings from a good distance away, and headed straight for it. Soon enough, she reached the edge of the town, and stepped out onto the wide wide circle of flat, featureless, grassy ground separating her goal from any other nearby buildings. It was a squat building of packed earth and stone, trapezoid in shape, like a pyramid with its top cut off. Its walls were angled so much that it could pass for a strangely-shaped hill, if it wasn't painted completely black, absorbing light like a void in the world.

The building was, in a way, a marvel of modern engineering - designed to be as resistant against attacks of all forms as humanly possible within the narrow confines of using cheap, local, spiritually inert materials, every aspect of it optimized to perfection. The walls were multiple meters thick, with the only weakness being the skylights letting light and air inside of the structure, barely visible against the building's color, and Qian Shanyi knew that they too could be sealed shut from the inside in the event that proved necessary. The exact details of the construction were something of an open secret - she had never seen the blueprints, but knew that Luminous Lotus Pavilion's treasure storage was based on the same design.

Above the roof, the thirteen-leaved lotus flag flew gently in the wind on a long mast, the only decoration allowed to remain on the otherwise barren structure.

This was the imperial post office.

Qian Shanyi headed over to the solid metal doors, and pushed them open. Despite the intimidating outward appearance, the lobby was surprisingly bright and accommodating, full of warm tones of wooden furniture and almost white, tiled floor. There was plenty of natural light - all of the skylights were lined with polished stone, reflecting more light into the structure than could be otherwise expected - and a couple of lamps near the ceiling added to the atmosphere, shining in the clear and stable manner of something powered by spiritual energy. The room was cut in half by a long counter, with seats lining the walls on the side of the doors, and walls full of closets and cupboards on the other. A single door led deeper into the building, to what she knew to be storage areas, a small imperial library, and cozy housing for the officials stationed here.

A middle-aged woman dressed in black imperial robes with white lotus patterns was reading a book behind the counter. Her hair was gray, though from dye instead of age, and pinned into a neat little bun. She nodded at Qian Shanyi as she saw her enter, put a string in between the pages and put her book down, turning her attention towards Shanyi as she approached. Small ocean symbols running along her sleeves marked her as a fairly low rank official, but still higher than what she expected to see in a frontier town like this. She was a cultivator, though still only somewhere between the low and middle refinement stage, despite her advanced age.

"Postmaster Lan Yu, at your service," She greeted Qian Shanyi, bowing her head slightly. She returned the gesture.

"Pleased to meet you, fellow cultivator Lan. I am Qian Shanyi, a loose cultivator."

"What can I do for fellow cultivator Qian?"

"I'd like to send a pair of letters," she said, taking them out of her backpack and handing them over. Lan Yu glanced at the folded pieces of paper, reached behind her counter, took out a pair of envelopes, and slotted the letters inside, sealing them with drips of wax in a practiced motion. She returned them to Qian Shanyi alongside a small brush so she could write the recipient address on the top, and she did so, using the blocky, clear script she always used for letters, before returning the envelopes to Lan Yu.

"No return address?" Lan Yu asked, her tone cut down to the precise minimum after years of practice. Qian Shanyi would have expected her to at least raise an eyebrow, but her expression was entirely neutral, merely clarifying a clerical question as opposed to having any actual interest in her motivations for not leaving the recipient any way to respond.

"No," she shook her head, "I will be leaving this city soon, and I am not sure where exactly I will stop. Any return message would not find me."

Of course, the real reason was that she didn't want her sect finding her at all, as she was still legally tied to them - not to mention, her message to them was less than flattering. They could no doubt force her to come back to the Golden Rabbit Bay until she was declared fit to leave the sect and paid her debts to them, but without a return address to start with, she didn't see how they could manage to track her across the entire empire.

"You could leave the address of this office instead," Lan Yu offered, "We keep such messages until the recipient comes back for them, and you could make a request from any other post office to have all your correspondence moved there."

"There wouldn't be a point in any case," she shook her head, "these messages wouldn't require an answer."

Lan Yu simply nodded, and put the two letters inside of one of the cupboards on the wall behind her.

"They should be delivered in about a week," she said, "Nine days at most."

"How much do I owe you?"

"Nothing," Lan Yu responded, "Imperial post does not charge cultivators for postage."

That made Qian Shanyi raise an eyebrow. She learned about the postal system before she became a cultivator, and sorting correspondence of her teacher was one of her duties back in the sect, but she had never actually sent any letters in person before. Lan Yu gave her a measured look in response.

"If I may inquire, fellow cultivator Qian," she said in the same precise intonation, "you do not have a lot of direct experience with our system, do you?"

"You could say that."

"Then if I may have a couple minutes of your time…" she said, finally getting up out of her tall chair and heading to the side of the room. She pulled out a scroll case, and took a thick set of papers out of it, laying them in front of Qian Shanyi.

"This is a cultivator almanac for Xiaohongshan," she explained, showing her different papers. Some of them included a sketch of someone's face, while others did not. "It lists all cultivators who reside in this city as well as other nearby settlements and who consented to be listed here. Any such almanac would include their appearances, as well as overall preferences, stated allegiances, family members, duels they have engaged in, and other basic information. You can request a similar one in every city with an imperial post office, and I highly advise you to memorize as much of it as you can."

"This is…a lot of information," she said, raising her eyebrows as she read through the pages, "why would the empire simply give this away?"

"We have a vested interest in minimizing conflict between cultivators, and this tends to help significantly," Lan Yu responded, "at the very least, this way people know who to avoid crossing paths with, and who they should make sure to avoid offending by accident - the number of open blood feuds in the empire has dropped by sixty percent in the years after this systematic tracking has been introduced. I further advise you to list yourself here - this is also free, and some sects use it to recruit loose cultivators, whenever they have a need for it. For a very small price, a painter in town will even do a sketch of your face."

"But it isn't required?"

For a moment, she saw a shade of deep exhaustion pass over the other woman's face.

"No, this is of course entirely voluntary," Lan Yu said, "Some cultivators prefer their privacy and refuse to get listed. However, I assure you that this is not worth it. You will be much safer if everyone knows who you are than if they do not."

"Perhaps another time," she responded noncommittally, "is there any other information you can give me?"

There turned out to be quite a lot - she could get a list of duels that were officiated by a city or a local sect, basic financial information about the local sects (none in Xiaohongshan, but Lan Yu told her she could expect it in other cities), a list of shops and businesses catering to cultivators, access the local imperial library (which she did know about, admittedly), read the recent census, and even sign up to receive updates from some well-known research sects (though for that one, she would have to pay, since someone would need to copy over the text by hand). Most of this information was only available to cultivators, though from what the postmaster told her, most of them weren't aware of all the services they could access. It was no wonder that the tutors she had before becoming a cultivator didn't tell her about this - chances were, they simply didn't know.

There was a calm intensity about Lan Yu that Qian Shanyi found mesmerizing - the sheer focus on every single aspect of a single topic, carving it up until there was nothing else left to explore. It brought back her memories of first deciding to join the Luminous Lotus Pavilion - she could have entered into one of the imperial programs instead, and if she did, she would have likely ended up just like Lan Yu, assigned to one of thousands of positions that cultivators filled all across the empire. Back then she thought it would be like entering a cage and throwing away the key, but knowing what she did now about the sects, she might have chosen differently.

There was one thing that brought her up short, and reminded her why she made the choice she did. Lan Yu hadn't even entered the middle level of the refinement stage, and with her age, she would almost surely never enter the building formation stage. The empire might have given her training and a good post, but stretched thin as it was, it could not dedicate sufficient resources to every individual official. At the end of the day, every cultivator needed plentiful spiritual energy in order to advance in realm, and if they could not get it from the environment they needed to supplement it with spirit stones, which were expensive. Qian Shanyi hated to admit it, but even with how insufficient the support of her sect was, it was still clearly more than the empire could spare for a relatively low-ranked clerk.

What a damn shame. Such talent, yet she will still die young.

She ended up spending a good hour here listening to the older woman, but eventually, she had to get going. The swords wouldn't sell themselves.

"If you have more questions, you can always come see me again," Lan Yu told her, "I am on duty every other day from sunrise to midday, and at other times on occasion, helping out my trainees. If I am not here, you would have to make do with them, but I have only just started on their training, so I could not vouch for their skills yet."

"Thank you. I think I will take you up on that."

"It's my duty as a postmaster," Lan Yu grumbled, her mask lifting briefly for the second time from the start of the conversation, "No thanks are required. Just give us your mail, and we'll deliver it wherever it needs to go."

She looked directly at her, her eyes boring into her with a calm intensity.

"Some people say the empire is whatever is in between the slaughter posts," she said, "it isn't. Empire is the post office - we are its blood and sinew, sending information and resources all around its gargantuan body. As long as our mail can reach you, you are in the empire; and there are very few places we cannot reach within the mortal realms."

---

With the information she got from Lan Yu, it was easy to find a trader she needed. Despite the relatively low population of Xiaohongshan - several thousand as of the last census a decade ago, and probably approaching ten thousand by now - situated as the town was on the relative frontier of the empire, many loose cultivators passed through it in search of riches, and a small district appeared to serve their interests. She noticed the colorful sign above the entrance to the small shop immediately, proclaiming itself to be "Cheng Dao's amazing spiritual wares", painted in brilliant colors to showcase potions, salves, and monster cores that were sold inside.

Entering the shop, she found it to be a cozy space, walls padded with thick red fabric that dampened all sounds within the store. Most of the floor area was taken up by long shelves that carried small wooden plaques, painted to resemble this or that product that was sold here but kept in storage instead of displayed outright. Most of it seemed to be medicines and salves, of the sort that even a lot of the common people would find useful, but a lot was dedicated specifically towards cultivator concerns. She even saw two swords being presented for sale in one of the corners.

Perfect.

"If you see anything you like, don't hesitate to bring the plaque here, and I will bring the product out right away for your perusal," she heard the shopkeeper call out to her from the back of the store, and she turned to observe the man. He was built like a bear, dressed in expensive red silks to match his store, and though his face was marred by a long scar passing through his destroyed left eye, the smile he was showing her more than made up for it.

"I am not here to buy, but rather to sell," she smiled, approaching the counter, "Qian Shanyi. I take it you are Cheng Dao?"

"In the flesh," he laughed, his eyes quickly flickering over her, "What do you have for me? I pay well for most demon beast organs - much better than anyone else in town, if you would believe my boasting."

"I am afraid not. I am looking to sell a sword."

"A sword?" His eyebrows flew up, and she saw his opinion of her adjust upwards, "Well, let's see it."

She awkwardly reached into her backpack with her one good hand and slowly pulled out one of the swords, unwrapped it, and passed it over for examination. His eyes flickered over the silk, and she could tell he recognised it for what it was. He took the sword, and she saw him use several examination techniques in sequence, and channel some spiritual energy through the sword itself, swinging it in a few practiced moves. When he finished, he put it down on the counter in between them, and gave her a considerate look. She waited patiently for his response.

"I am not familiar with this smithing style, but this is a very good weapon, fellow cultivator Qian," he said, "I would need to consult my books for a proper evaluation, but I am definitely interested. I could offer you one hundred and fifty low grade spirit stones for it."

Her face remained a mask of polite contentment, but in her soul, she cheered. This sale was halfway over already, as were their monetary troubles - spirit stones never went for less than three silver yuan, and often were a fair bit more than that - the prices she saw in this store were more than double that. Wang Yonghao worried over nothing.

Still, it paid to push the envelope.

After some haggling, they settled on a preliminary price of two hundred low grade spirit stones, with her implying Cheng Dao could expect more business out of her in the future. He said that he would need three days to get the money together, as well as make sure his estimation was right, so the deal would be finished by the end of the week. She had a feeling that if she sold the sword in a larger city, she could have gotten a lot more for it, but ultimately they needed money right away, and a single sword would not make the weather. Once she had the time and funds to research the market better, she could start to make much better estimates.

"Still, I do wonder about the smithing style," Cheng Dao mused, "is it from the southern provinces? With the style of your robes, I figured your sect might be from there…"

"I am afraid I can't say," she chuckled.

She saw his expression shift slightly, becoming more wary, and realized she made a misstep.

"It should be noted in its refiner certificate," he said, "Together with the name of the refiner who made it."

"A refiner certificate?" she asked, raising her eyebrow, trying to figure out how to play off her obvious ignorance.

"Yes, refiner certificate," he frowned, "Every weapon that is refined in the empire is required to have one, and it of course needs to be passed over during the sale."

She mentally kicked herself for not doing her due diligence by visiting the library before she came here. No doubt her sect still held this certificate for her own sword - she had never heard it mentioned to her personally, at the very least. And Wang Yonghao might have simply not cared about it.

"What I mean to say is, this weapon has been found in an abandoned ruin quite far from here," she continued, "It has no certificate because I do not know who the refiner was."

This was true - she always figured found swords should be easier to sell than the other types. Cheng Dao pursed his lips in response to this, though she saw his mood improve somewhat.

"Well, so much for an easy sale," he muttered, rummaging around below his counter, "I take it this is your first time selling a ruin artifact? Your sect master really should have warned you about this."

"My master is something of a recluse, I am afraid," she said, "Which is why I am the one conducting this sale in the first place. What seems to be the issue?"

"When a ruin artifact is sold, it first goes to the spirit hunters so that they could make sure it has no owner," he said, finally taking out a sheet of paper with a form written on it, "Many thieves try to pass off stolen weapons as something they simply found lying around, so they send messages to all nearby cities with its description, and check to make sure nobody reported it as stolen. The whole process takes a good month, and then there are taxes on top of that."

"Taxes?"

"Treasure tax, yes. Twenty-five percent of the sale value or the estimated value by the spirit hunters, whichever is higher, on top of the standard sale tax on spiritual goods of twenty percent. It's a good thing you are in a sect, too," he chuckled, quickly filling out the form in front of him, "For loose cultivators evaluation takes three months, and the treasure tax is seventy percent. Imagine only getting ten percent of the sale value!"

Her blood froze for a moment. Didn't Wang Yonghao mention something about three months?

"Well, this is all filled out," he said, turning the form over to her, "I just need your sect seal, and I'll head over with you to submit the sword for examination."

She kept her face still, and reached into her pouch, pretending to rummage around for the sect seal. This was a disaster.

Her sect seal contained her name and the name of her sect - even though the sword itself wasn't stolen, if it went up for examination they would end up on the form. Then the spirit hunters would surely contact her sect, and the sect would tell them that she was a runaway. As soon as that happened, she would surely be dragged right back.

She couldn't let that happen.

"How silly of me," she frowned, opening her purse up fully to look inside while stealthily palming her seal to hide it, "I must have left my sect seal back at the tavern. I will be right back."

She took the sword and tossed it into her backpack, bowing to Cheng Dao. He frowned a bit, but shrugged and let her go. She hurried out of the store, her heart beginning to hammer in her chest.

She should have thought of this. It was unforgivably careless for her to still be using her sect seal freely - she needed a replacement as soon as possible. How did loose cultivators get their seals?

Damn it, damn it, damn it.

She turned away from one of the main streets and headed down a narrow alley. Her paranoia was starting to spike again. What else was she missing?

Would Cheng Dao report her as a potential thief? He let her go, surely not…

No, she couldn't take the risk. The only safe assumption was that she was already reported. They needed to get out of town before that caused problems. She should head back to the tavern -

No. That was also a mistake. If Cheng Dao was going to report her, he would most likely head over to the spirit hunters immediately - at this point, the only safe assumption was that they must be looking for a black-haired cultivator in a long leather cloak and red robes. She needed to change her appearance as soon as possible. Furthermore, she needed to hide her backpack somewhere - if she was questioned about all the swords in it, it would cause even more problems.

She immediately circulated Crushing Glance of the Neverworld Eyes, turning her hair a brilliant shade of green, and started looking over the buildings near her. Soon enough, she spotted exactly what she needed: a clothesline, hanging high up in the air from a well-off house - one rich enough that they surely wouldn't miss a few clothes, but with clothes themselves that were not so rich that her appearance would draw eyes. She glanced around her, making sure nobody could see her, and quickly leaped off the narrow walls of the alley to reach it, taking a long green dress to match her hair. Having to do it with one hand almost made her slip and fall, but she managed to keep her balance.

Sorry for this. I will make it up if I can later on.

She folded the dress and quickly put it into her backpack, then headed off down another alley. She was reasonably sure the loss of some clothes would be beneath notice of spirit hunters - if the family even reported it, and didn't just assume it flew off in the wind. A few more thefts later, and she was holed up on one of the roofs near a terrace wall, hidden from sight behind a large chimney in a spot that she was sure nobody had even glanced at in months, judging by the amount of dust and dry leaves all around her. She quickly took out her sewing set and her jade slate for reference, and set about adjusting the dress to fit her figure.

Her work was amateurish, but she wasn't trying to win any beauty pageants - only to make the dress look presentable, as if it was fitted for her height and build. Half an hour later, she got it to a passable point - spending more work on it would simply waste crucial time that she did not really have. She concealed obvious stitches with the Crushing Glance where she could, put her old robes into her backpack, wrapped it in her cloak, and covered it in dark, grimey dust to make it look like absolutely nothing of value. Hopefully it would remain hidden until she made sure that the tavern was safe.

She quickly descended back down to the ground, dusted herself off, and calmly headed off towards the tavern, looking for all the world like a completely different person.

---

Qian Shanyi leaned back on the park bench, breathing deeply and observing the world around her. Ordinarily, this would be a relaxing scene: people were strolling down the park pathways all around her, cute ducks were playing in a nearby pond, and wind gently ruffled her brilliant green hair. Unfortunately, she wasn't here for nature. She kept the tavern where Wang Yonghao should have been in her peripheral vision, making sure not to stare at it directly.

When she arrived here, she didn't head inside of it right away, and that ended up being the correct move. Not twenty minutes after her arrival at the park, she saw a pair of spirit hunters head inside, wearing their robes of many ribbons, and then five minutes later, one of them had left. The other one remained inside, doing only Heaven knew what.

It was possible they weren't here for her. She didn't see Wang Yonghao anywhere - if they came to ask her questions, then surely they would have knocked on his door? But perhaps he hid away, or left before they came, guided by his luck. And now one of the spirit hunters might have been laying in wait, awaiting her return.

But this was only a possibility. She had nothing to base this on, except her own rampant paranoia. And the longer she hesitated to move inside, the larger the other risks became: Wang Yonghao might decide that something happened and leave the tavern, attracting attention to himself. Or perhaps the spirit hunter wasn't here for her now, but his colleague could come back and tell him about a new person they should be looking out for at any moment. To make matters worse, she couldn't stay at the park forever - eventually someone might notice that she hasn't left her spot in hours, and that too would raise questions.

Her arm ached, trying to distract her from her thoughts - the sling would identify her just as well as her hair, and so she took it off - but it was nothing compared to what she had to deal with over the past weeks. The movement would aggravate the injury, but that should only slow the healing process down, not stop it completely.

She needed to test her theory. Even if spirit hunters were looking for her, the shopkeeper couldn't possibly have given them a perfect description - she would walk around town and pass by a few of the guards to test if her disguise held up. If it did, she would head inside of the tavern and see what the other spirit hunter was doing there.

---

Liu Fakuang thought this new assignment was some of the easiest he had ever had. Sit in a tavern, get food on imperial payroll, and wait just in case someone showed up? What could be easier? The only problem was that he couldn't drink on duty, and he knew that by the time his watch was over, he would already be bored to death.

"Ah, a fellow cultivator. I hope you won't mind it if I join you for a drink or two?"

He raised his head, and saw a green-headed jade beauty looking down on him, dressed modestly in a floor-length green dress.

"Afraid I can't drink," he smiled at her, "but if you only want company, I wouldn't mind offering. Who do I have the pleasure of speaking to?"

"Lan Yishan," she smiled, sitting down, "Thank you for your accommodation. My master used to be a spirit hunter - is the work difficult out here on the frontier?"

They got talking, and he found himself opening up a bit. His mission here wasn't even a secret - just a tip off from a merchant who thought something strange was going on. Personally, he thought waiting around was pointless - even if they were sure this "Qian Shanyi" that he talked to was the same one that rented a room here, the innkeeper didn't see her ever since, and her spouse had left shortly after she did. They didn't even have enough to go on to break into their rooms, and even if they did, the couple had surely skipped town by now, but he supposed it paid to be cautious. His seat was positioned so that he could easily keep watch over the entire room, and even see into the corridor towards the locked door into the room the couple had rented out.

"Well, I am afraid it's getting late, so I will be heading to bed," Lan Yishan said, stretching her hands, "I do not know if I will stay in town for longer, but if I do, it has been pleasant talking with you."

"Please don't tell that to my betrothed," he shook his head, "if she finds out I have been chatting with women at work, she would be very irate."

"My lips are forever sealed."

Lan Yishan headed down the corridor towards the rooms, passed by the door he was keeping watch over, and rounded a corner. He leaned back in his seat. He would wait until morning, and then report that predictably their target had never shown up.

What an easy assignment.

---

Qian Shanyi reached a window at the end of the tavern corridor, glanced around to make sure she was alone, and climbed out and onto the roof. Doing it in skirts was immeasurably annoying - she hadn't worn any since she joined the sect, and the way they constrained her legs made climbing far harder than it needed to be, and her damaged arm certainly didn't help matters. She hoped she wouldn't have to fight like this, because as soon as she pushed herself to truly move, there would be nothing left of the fabric but the tears.

She carefully sneaked over to the chimney she knew led into their room, took off her clothes to keep them clean from the soot, tied her rope around the chimney and climbed in. By now, the night had fallen and the streets were almost empty - the chances of someone seeing her were really quite low.

There was also a chance that the spirit hunter would ask the innkeeper if she booked a room here, but she made sure to sit so that the innkeeper couldn't see her face clearly, and picked a time when he left the room to excuse herself, so she doubted he could tell on her. On top of that, Liu Fakuang seemed remarkably careless for his position.

She shimmied her way down the chimney, not breathing lest she descend into a coughing fit from the dusty soot inside, and popped out of the fireplace. After carefully whisking the dust away from her feet with her spiritual energy to not leave any footprints, she entered the room and looked around.

Liu Fakuang told her Wang Yonghao had left just after she did, which made no sense whatsoever. She hoped she could find something in here that could give her a single bloody hint where the fuck he might have ran off to.

Sure enough, there was a letter left on the table, right by her writing supplies.

Fellow cultivator Qian Shanyi,

You are devilishly smart, so I think you probably already figured this out. I already told you I brought someone into my inner world before, but I didn't say what happened. For a month, we've traveled together, and it was one of the best times in my life. Then I ran into demonic cultivators, they caught him, and tore him apart limb from limb to get back at me.

This is what always happens. I don't want people to die because of me. It's already bad enough that I bring misfortune to towns I visit, but it is so much worse when it is someone I know. How many times have you almost died just in the couple weeks you've known me? Just me getting drunk once was enough to almost kill you. You make jokes about it, and I do not understand it, but if I were to stay I know for sure you'd be dead within a couple months, and it will be my fault again.

Even though you are a massive asshole, I can't thank you enough for giving me a piece of hope that this nightmare might have an end. If - when - I find a way to get rid of my luck, I'll repay you tenfold,

I hope you are right and no catastrophe happens today,

Sorry for tricking you,

Senior Wang Yonghao

She crumpled the paper into a ball, wishing she could do the same to his neck.

"He cut me off?" she hissed, "Just left me here to deal with the spirit hunters by myself? You asshole, we had a deal! Oh I'll find you, Yonghao, and then you won't hear the end of this."

Alone in a town not of her choosing, with no money and the law on her tail, she started to scheme.

End of Volume 1, "Spherical Jade In A Vacuum". Volume 2, "Tracing The Runaway Trails" starts next week.

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read five chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon.

Thanks for reading!

 

[Winged_One]

Author Note: The full title of this fic is, of course, "Reach Heaven Through Feng Shui Engineering, Drug Trade and Tax Evasion". The fic is about all three things, as well as something extra; the first arc has gone a lot into the basics of engineering, which means now it's time for the economics arc.

Chronologically, this interlude ends several weeks in the future - next chapter will pick up exactly where chapter 24 ended.

If you absolutely detest interludes, then you will find a summary of the plot in an author note at the start of the next chapter. Originally, I intended to release this interlude alongside a regular chapter, but unfortunately NaNoWriMo somewhat sapped my time with work on a different project.

Enjoy!​

---

The letters Qian Shanyi left at the post office remained untouched until the following morning, when a postrunner came to make new deliveries. Even the spirit hunter coming over to investigate Qian Shanyi's whereabouts did not ask to see them: with no solid proof that a crime has been committed, opening the mail of another cultivator would be a serious transgression.

The post office sorted the letters into different cupboards, grouped together based on how far away their destination was from Xiaohongshan, as well as wherever they would be headed upstream or downstream. Most were addressed to the few nearby cities, each having a dedicated cupboard, but an occasional one would be sent off to provinces on the other end of the empire, where the letters could be redirected by postmasters closer to their eventual destinations.

The postrunner that came to Xiaohongshan in the morning didn't even look at the pair of letters while scooping them up alongside hundreds of others into specialized leather bags, each one corresponding to a single cupboard, and headed off back to the docks to catch a ship downstream. From that moment, they were lost as thoroughly as a card shuffled into a deck by a magician's hand.

For two days the pair of letters remained safely in the bag, until they reached a town at the confluence of the river and were handed off to a new postmaster, and from them, to a new postrunner. Neither of them asked where this pair of letters came from or who wrote them: as far as they were concerned, these anonymous letters were no more deserving of individual attention than coins at the market.

Passing from one hand to another, from a cupboard into a bag and back into a cupboard, the letters traveled through the invisible pathways of the imperial post, steered just as inexorably towards their destination as water flowed downhill. Eight days later, they finally arrived in the Golden Rabbit Bay, where they were sorted by district, and finally dropped off in the hands of their recipients on the same day, appearing as if a lightning strike straight from the heavens.

---

"You went through my mail?" Zhao Lieyan, known as Elder Striding Phoenix, glanced over a letter that his colleague and a long-time friend had thrust in his face, raising an eyebrow. He had read it several times when it first came in, so he recognised the writing on sight.

They were sitting at his desk in his study, a small kettle of tea set between them. The atmosphere had been friendly on this pleasant summer morning, and even this confrontation didn't soil it much.

"Outer disciple assigned to sort mail for you had reported it. That's not the point, Lieyan," Fang Caoyuan, Elder Four Strangling Weeds sneered, "Your disciple has run away from the sect!"

Fang Caoyuan was a man well into the years, and the alchemical dusts and fumes he worked with were not kind to his body. His hair - both on his head and in his beard - was patchy and tinted in strange colors, a rare sight for a cultivator, having partly fallen out long before he reached the building foundation stage. Despite the unkind appearance, he was one of the best alchemists of their sect.

"I think you will find she had carefully avoided using those terms," Zhao Lieyan smiled. His disciple's skill with words was the reason why he always offloaded letter work on her shoulders, and her replacement was barely keeping up. As well as snitching on him, apparently.

"I've read the words she used, and I do not think this slap in the face is a laughing matter. But the fact remains no matter what she wrote," Fang Caoyuan folded the letter back up and tossed it down on his desk, "you should have reported this to the other Elders."

"What I do with my disciples is my own business."

"It is the sect's business!" Fang Caoyuan curled his upper lip, cradling his tea cup in his hands, "We train her, waste pills and herbs on her growth, and this is how she repays us? By spitting in our face?"

"It is just a youthful fling," he sighed, "She will run around, smell the flowers, and soon enough she will be back to us."

"How confident of you."

"What else will she do? Be a loose cultivator?" He shook his head, "I know my disciple, her ambition couldn't stomach that sort of life. Besides, what do you want me to do about it?"

"Send the hunters after her."

"The empire?" Zhao Lieyan snorted, "The empire wouldn't lift a finger unless we could say exactly where she is right now. You know as well as I do that their unofficial stance is that runaway cultivators should be left alone - the weaker the sects, the better for them. They are certainly not going to declare a manhunt on her. And how do you want us to find her?"

He picked up the letter and gestured with it.

"No return address, no details of where she is, nothing. The empire does not record where the post came from, so it might as well have been delivered by a Deva straight from the Heavens. Did you find something I didn't? Is the paper made out of reeds that only grow around a single city?"

"I don't mean an imperial one," Fang Caoyuan smugly noted, "A distant relative of mine is a retired spirit hunter. He lives in the city, and I have been told that he still finds things for his clients."

"A private spirit hunter?" Zhao Leiyan raised his eyebrows, "Do you think the walls of our sect are made out of spirit stones?"

"We would only pay if they find the mark. Now what do you say?"

"Sure," he shrugged, "If it will make you and the other Elders feel better. You realize that if you drag her back by the hair, she would resent the sect for the rest of her life?"

"If she didn't want this, she shouldn't have run away," Fang Caoyuan sneered, getting up and heading towards the doors.

---

Rays of the sun streamed in through the shutters of a cramped, narrow room, making dust in the air light up like little stars. The walls were covered in cupboards, full of case files, books and unlabeled bottles of colorful liquids.

Fang Caoyuan saw his quarry as soon as he walked in: a small, unkempt man with messy black hair, his back turned towards the door as he lounged in a chair behind a desk at the end of the room, his feet resting against the shuttered window. He was wearing baggy, leather clothes - like a strange middle child of robes and a cloak, nothing like the usual robes of the spirit hunters - dyed dark brown, making him blend in with the furniture. In his hands, he held a glass, and even from the doors Fang Caoyuan could smell the overwhelming stench of liquor.

If he couldn't sense the spiritual energy flowing like a smooth stream into his body, he would have immediately dismissed the man as a hobo, not a cultivator in the building foundation stage.

"A dame walked in through the doors, carrying the scent of disaster on her heels," Fang Jiugui drawled, not looking over at him, "But was it her own to bring, or hers to cause?"

Fang Caoyuan paused in the doors.

Is he talking about me? I am a man!

"Fellow cultivator Fang Jiugui," he opened his mouth, pushing down his irritation at the blatant disrespect. Even if the man was retired, he was still a spirit hunter. He didn't want to start a conflict, "I am Fang Caoyuan, of the Luminous Lotus Pavilion. Your services have been recommended by the family."

The other man finally turned his chair around to face him.

"So what did you bring me on this dark, stormy day?"

Fang Caoyuan glanced at the clear sunlight streaming in between the window shutters while he approached the desk, and Fang Jiugui pursed his lips.

"The storm is metaphorical," he grumbled, "What do you have for me?"

Fang Caoyuan reached into his robes and took out three letters - a recommendation from the relative who worked with Fang Jiugui before, a detailed description of the case, and the one that Qian Shanyi sent to the sect. He only wished his relatives told him how the man would behave before he met him. Fang Jiugui put all of the letters side by side on his desk and read them carefully, before glancing back up at Fang Caoyuan.

"We need the runaway found," he said, "the sect will pay handsomely, of course."

"But will I have to pay in blood or sweat to make the catch?" Fang Jiugui wondered, taking a swig of his drink. Fang Caoyuan's sense of scent, honed to perfection from his delicate alchemical work, protested at being made to smell the vile concoction, and he discretely held his breath. If the man wanted to drink poison, couldn't he at least open the window?

"I'll take the case," Fang Jiugui said, "You already know my rates?"

Fang Caoyuan nodded, not wanting to spend more time than absolutely necessary with the man, and quickly excused himself. Cultivators tended to be eccentric people, and only got more so with age - as long as his skills were good, it wasn't a good reason to reject cooperation.

But next time, he would send his disciples to do the talking.

---

When Fang Caoyuan left, Fang Jiugui put the three letters into a pocket of his robes, grabbed his wide bamboo hat, locked up his bureau, and set off into the city. The first step in any investigation was to make sure his own employers didn't lie to him.

The recommendation letter he was given let him enter the sect, where he questioned several disciples, and was even allowed into Qian Shanyi's room to see if he could find something. There wasn't much - clothing, some medical supplies, notes on her personal cultivation, her sect duties, and a couple books. He took the notes to reference later: the handwriting seemed to match her letter, at the very least.

He checked with the Northern Sky Salmon: it was the last place anyone has seen Qian Shanyi on the night of those demonic cultivator attacks, and the sect told him as much. What they didn't mention was that she was last seen having a public fight with another cultivator, and later on, both of them vanished together. Perhaps they themselves were not made aware of it - proprietor of the Northern Sky Salmon was quite embarrassed about the whole event, and asked him to keep the rumors down if at all possible.

Checking in with the imperial offices, he found out that they haven't investigated the fight either - after that day's tragic events, a minor scuffle between two refinement stage cultivators fell by the wayside. He did find out the name of the man - one Wang Yonghao, a loose cultivator, seemingly with no prior connections to Qian Shanyi. He wasn't sure what to make of them vanishing together - a kidnapping? Two secret lovers staging a scene to run away?

The last step on his trip was a small store near the docks.

"Qian's General Trading Goods" was the middle man between the small traveling merchants that would come to the Golden Rabbit Bay from all across the empire and the locals. It traded in pretty much everything there was to be traded - silks and fabrics, spices, metals, tools, and even an occasional spiritual salve or pill. Largest merchants would of course sell their goods directly to their customers, operating their own warehouses and distribution networks, but for those without the money or connections to do so, and for those not willing to spend the time to sell their goods in person, Qian Yang's shop was their stop of choice.

The sign over the door was painted with an image of a bald, cheerful man carrying a large sack bursting with goods, and the door jingled as Fang Jiugui entered the store. Eponymous Qian, looking much like the sign, was chatting with another customer behind the counter. He waited until they were done, and approached him in turn.

"Mister Qian?" he asked, watching the man's face carefully as he showed him his hunting seal, a complex carving of wood and stone, glistening slightly when he pushed his spiritual energy into it, "Fang Jiugui, a spirit hunter. Fates have put me on the tail of your daughter, and her scent led me to you."

Qian Yang's eyes opened in surprise, and he bowed respectfully.

"Honorable immortal Fang, it's a pleasure to host you in my humble store! Unfortunately, my daughter no longer lives with us. You should ask in the Luminous Lotus Pavilion - they would know where to find her."

"Her sect seeks, for it does not already know," he chuckled, "it seems your daughter is a bit of a runaway. Has she, perhaps, whispered something to the winds, sent a little missive with a bird?"

The shopkeeper stared at him, taking a moment to parse what was said. His manner of speech tended to unnerve people, and he usually didn't see the need to push the instincts down. He gave the man time - he was in no hurry.

"I can't say that I have received any messages from her, no," the shopkeeper shook his head, "But if any come in the future, I will be sure to tell the sect."

"Hm. Yet what if the little bird stepped into a spot of danger herself? A shade of kidnapping, perhaps?"

"Kidnapping?" Qian Yang said, his eyes growing wide, and used a handkerchief to wipe away sweat from his forehead, "Mercy to the heavenbreakers, who would do such a thing to her?"

The inflection, the tone, the movement… It was perfect. A bit too perfect, in fact, like a rehearsed speech rather than a natural reaction. It was very subtle, but this man was not truly worried about his daughter - which raised a question of why.

"A spot of kidnapping, yet who knows the truth?" Fang Jiugui shook his head, studying the man's expression, "Perhaps she is the one doing the deed instead."

That was a mistake. The man scowled, and a vein popped up on his forehead as he balled his fists together.

"My Shanyi," Qian Yang hissed, "Is the best damn cultivator in the entire Empire! You say she kidnapped someone? That's a dirty lie, and if you want my help catching her so you can blame her for it, you will have none of it. I'd sooner go to the gallows in her place!"

Fang Jiugui could see that he was being honest, too. There was no point in threatening this man, or trying to bribe him.

Instead, he raised his hands in a placating gesture.

"It seems my talk upset you, honorable storekeeper Qian," he said, "Excuse this weary cultivator for my riddles. In truth, none know what happened - only that two birds have vanished, and one is from your house. And be they foes or lovers, who can say? Only you may know a hint or whisper."

"I don't have anything to tell you."

"Does your soul not even shake with worry, too weary of this stormy world?"

"Of course I am worried. But she is a big girl."

"You trust her, I see."

"She always knows what she is doing. If she ran away from the sect, then she was sure it was the right decision."

"I see," Fang Jiugui scratched his head below his hat, "To tell you the truth, I think the bird has sent a word to you, and you don't want my eyes on it lest it lock me on her tail."

"Like I said, I don't have anything to tell you."

"Is what you speak truth, or is it lies?" he scratched his head, "Many say I speak in riddles, but are you quite so different? But say I leave with nothing - then I would make my path back to ones who write my checks, and tell them my hands are empty. I would speak of what I did, and I would speak of you - and perhaps they will forgive you, but for a sect to come to me, ready to pay my rates, their rage must already burn quite bright. Perhaps they step into your home, and perhaps they break your knees - all against the Empire's law, of course, but many do so anyways. You might end up a worm, impaled on a hook to catch a larger fish - or a bird that flew away from its cage. Would your daughter stay away, or come rushing back to help you, if she heard what happened?"

Fang Jiugui shrugged theatrically.

"My pay is strict, I will get nothing in return. And I am no sect - Empire would squish me like a bug if I laid a hand on you. I am simply on the tail of your bird, and I see these things to the end. But is there a safer way out for her than for you to give me a hand?"

He saw that he still needed a little push.

"Is your dame quite so dumb as to write down the steps I need to reach her grave?"

Qian Yang paused, then shook his head slowly.

"No. No, she would have thought the mail might get intercepted."

He sighed, and went into the backroom, returning with a letter. He handed it over to Fang Jiugui.

"I hope this isn't a mistake."

Fang Jiugui smiled, and quickly ran his eyes over the letter. It was longer than the one she sent to the sect - talking a bit of her good health, an opportunity to improve her cultivation, and of having found a "promising ally", and saying she would write more when the situation cleared up - but it was all still frustratingly vague. She talked a lot about the wilderness though - perhaps that was a clue? A vague one if so - wild forests could be found all over the empire.

"Well, hunter, did I betray my daughter?"

"There is nothing here," he shook his head, handing the letter back, "The sect won't hear your name from my lips, shopkeeper."

---

Having investigated the city as much as possible and not found any easy paths forwards, it was time to resort to expensive methods.

He returned to his bureau, and laid the letter down in a metal tray, taking out one of the many unlabeled bottles from his shelves and spraying the liquid within onto the paper. He waited for the alchemical substance to be absorbed, then locked the paper in between a pair of steel sheets, and heated it over a candle. Once the letter popped out, it was covered in purple fingerprints, standing out against the yellow paper.

This substance was something from back in his days as an imperial spirit hunter, and he avoided using it as much as he could - getting his hands on more would be a pain and a half. The empire kept the recipe quite secret, as well as what it was actually used for - if all cultivators learned how easily they could leave evidence behind, they would lose one of their best tracking tools. After all, not many people knew that fingerprints tended to be unique.

He repeated the process with her cultivation notes, and started making a mental list of the fingerprints. One set was from Qian Shanyi herself, and one he recognised as that of the local postmaster, but the other ones escaped him for now. He folded the letter to use for reference later, gathered his things, and set off for the post office.

There were about a dozen postrunners bringing express mail - that of cultivators, as well as civilians who were willing to pay more than usual - into the Golden Rabbit Bay. Each of them would generally work a single path between distant cities, shuttling mail over it from one end to the other and only rarely moving on to a different one. Fang Jiugui camped out at the post office each morning, and over the next several days, interviewed all of them that had been in town on the day the letter was delivered. He asked them which path they tended to travel, as well as if they have seen Qian Shanyi - her description was conveniently given to him by the sect - not really caring about their answers. All that he really needed to do was throw a single covert glance at their fingers to check their fingerprints and see if they were among the ones on the letter.

Two days into it, he finally found his mark, and after thanking them for the trouble, set off upstream, tracing their path back and interviewing postmasters along the way. Once he found someone who had touched the letter - and thus a place where the letter had changed hands - he repeated his series of interviews until he knew of a new direction to head in.

One by one, the fingerprints on the letter found their owners as he followed the river upstream. Soon enough, he was down to one unknown set, as he entered the postal office in a small, frontier town of Xiaohongshan. A middle-aged lady with a gray hair bun was seated behind the counter, reading a book to pass the time.

"A darkened day brings me here, your ladyship, one of fire and drama", he drawled, tipping his hat to the postmaster, "I am looking for one Qian Shanyi. Did she pass through here?"

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read four chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon for a low price of 3$.

 

[Winged_One]

Author Note: Reminder, this chapter continues where chapter 24 had ended - events in the previous interlude are, relatively speaking, several weeks in the future. For those of you who wanted a summary - one Fang Jiugui, a private spirit hunter and an occasional alcoholic, was hired by Qian Shanyi's sect to find her after they received her mail, and had managed to trace her back to Xiaohongshan by following a trail of fingerprints.

---

Qian Shanyi decided to spend most of the night within the hotel room, her rage slowly simmering down into despair.

It was pointless to try to search for Wang Yonghao in the dark. He had a lead of several hours on her - without any tracking techniques, she would be relegated to pure guesswork as to where he headed. Her best plan for locating him was to question the gate guards to see if anyone had seen him leave town, and if so, in which direction, but trying to improvise a way to approach them in the middle of the night would simply bring questions to the identity of Lan Yishan she could not answer.

Ironically, at the moment, this hotel room was one of the safest places for her in the city, even though it's doors were under surveillance - it kept her concealed, and if the spirit hunters did not choose to break in already, they likely would wait for the innkeeper to open it at the end of the week. At the very least for tonight, this room should be safe.

Safe it might be, but comfortable it was not. The bed sang its siren song from the middle of the room, but Qian Shanyi blocked it out with her iron will, knowing touching it would be a mistake. When she descended down the chimney, she got covered in soot - even if she managed to mostly clean her feet with spiritual energy so that she could walk around the room without leaving black footprints behind, this cleaning was not perfect by far and wasted a lot of spiritual energy. There was no way whatsoever for her to properly clean her entire body - if she crawled under the sheets, then at the end of the week, when the innkeeper would open the room, they would find soot all over the bed and know she had entered the room through the chimney. From there, they could deduce that she was probably still in the city, and her cover would be quickly blown. The only safe option was to leave no evidence of her intrusion behind.

After packing up her writing set, she settled down on the cold stones within the cramped fireplace, throwing one last longing stare at the nice, soft bed. She doubted she would get a full night's sleep, but even a couple hours would be good for the day ahead.

---

To say the fireplace was a bad place to sleep was an understatement of the century.

Qian Shanyi's body ached all over by the time morning came. It was much worse than when she had to sleep on the grass in the world fragment: at least there, she could stretch as much as she liked, and the soot didn't threaten to send her into a coughing fit every half an hour. Her limbs grew numb from sitting on the unyielding stones, making her fidget the entire night, and keeping her in a torturous state between true sleep and wakefulness.

No matter. Her mind received some rest, and her body would just have to deal.

She left the tavern well before sunrise, after smoothing out the remaining soot in the fireplace as best as she could, hiding the last signs of her presence in the room. There was no point in prolonging this cruel self-torture: she got as much rest as she was ever going to get. She left the same way she came in, bringing her writing set with her.

She didn't want to soil her only set of clean - though stolen - clothing by putting it on while she was still covered in soot from head to toe, and instead tied them into a tight bundle she could hang from her neck, and quickly made her way to the river over the rooftops, avoiding the sight of what few people still roamed the streets.

The docks took up the entirety of the bottom terrace, workers busy loading and unloading ships even this early in the morning, but sneaking past them was no trouble at all. She left her writing set on the roof of one of the houses overlooking the waters, made sure there was nobody within earshot, and dived down into the river straight from the roof, her clothes still tied around her neck and her sword in her hand.

The ice cold waters cleansed the last remains of sleep from her mind, and she held her breath, keeping herself underwater and letting the current carry her outside of the town limits. Once her lungs started to burn, she surfaced, and quietly swam over to the shore.

She didn't have any soap, so she cleaned herself as best as she could with forest moss and the river waters, trying to get herself to a state she could call presentable. Once her teeth started to clatter from the cold, she put on her wet clothes, took out her sword, and started to cultivate - more to keep herself warm than anything else, as the forest air contained little spiritual energy.

Cultivating finally gave her time to think, and that only worsened her mood. Her situation was well and truly fucked, in some ways leaving her worse off than back when she was stuck starving in the world fragment. Back then, she was in acute danger, but her long-term prospects seemed bright; now, she was in little direct danger, but all paths ahead lead to disaster.

She couldn't take back the letters she already sent to her sect, telling them she was, in effect, running away. Going back into the imperial post office and asking to take them back would get her questioned by the spirit hunters the very next minute, and there were no good answers she could give. On top of that, she couldn't even be sure if the letters were still there - perhaps they were already well on their way down the river.

She could try to race the letters downstream, but she frankly doubted she could ever catch up to them. The imperial postrunners have been doing their jobs for years, knowing the fastest and cheapest ways to travel, while she knew close to nothing about the local area. To make matters worse, she had four jian eight fen left - she doubted it would even be enough to pay for a ship halfway to the Golden Rabbit Bay, let alone to feed her on the way. At best, she could arrive some weeks after the letters did, and that meant she would have to beg for her indiscretions to be forgiven.

She had, perhaps, been a bit too scathing in her wording when writing the letters. She doubted the sect would forgive her easily - she would be lucky if she was let out of the compound at all before the decade's end, and any hope of advancing into the building foundation stage would be slashed to ribbons. A life of restless, physical labor would be all that awaited her down this path.

She could approach the empire and get into one of their institutions, but even if she wasn't given up to her sect straight away, she would simply be trading one jailer for another.

The life of a loose cultivator would be little better - there was a reason why most cultivators tried to get into a sect if they could. Ultimately, a refinement stage cultivator was fighting against time - trying to purge their meridians and strengthen their body before their age took its toll and made them too frail to survive the spiritual energy condensation required to advance into the building foundation stage - and without the resources provided by the sect, this was a monumental challenge.

That left trying to find Wang Yonghao, but her prospects there seemed equally grim. He could have headed upstream or downstream, or even deeper into the forest in a random direction - there was just no way to guess. If he wanted to, he could have easily avoided being seen by the guards, and that meant her catching him would be entirely down to luck - a playing field where she couldn't possibly hope to compete.

She still had some other ideas for how to find him, of course, but nothing that was sure to work.

Once she felt reasonably clean, Qian Shanyi sneaked back into the town the same way she left. She briefly considered hopping over one of the walls instead - it wouldn't have been much of a challenge, really - but without knowledge of guard patrols, the risk of being spotted and questioned was too high for her to tolerate. That meant her clothes got wet again, but the river waters were mercifully clean, and she walked through the back alleys of the town waiting for the heat of her body to dry them, occasionally taking some time to cultivate to keep herself warm.

No matter how much she wanted to go after Wang Yonghao, her first priority was to find housing and a way to make money. Even her best plans would take some time to work, and after last night, she would do anything to avoid having to sleep on the streets.

---

Qian Shanyi spied her mark from afar, the sign shining brightly in the rays of the rising sun. It wasn't something she would have considered before her life turned on its head, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

It was a ramen shop, set in front of a small square just a couple streets away from the waterfront. She picked it carefully: large enough that it took up an entire lower story of a house, but not very prestigious, clearly made to serve dockworkers and sailors as opposed to merchants or, heavens forbid, cultivators. It was far away from both the post office and Cheng Dao's store, and while there was a lot of foot traffic, the kitchens weren't visible from the streets at all.

A young waitress was setting up tables on the square in front of the establishment, and called out to her as Qian Shanyi headed inside.

"Miss? We aren't open yet."

"That's alright," Qian Shanyi smiled back at her, continuing towards the doors, "I am not here to eat, but to talk to your proprietor. I assume they are inside?"

"Propri - do you mean old Chen?" the waitress hurried after her, covering her mouth to stifle a yawn. The skin on her hands was hard, muscles in her arms clearly strengthened by years of carrying food and drinks all day.

"If old Chen owns this restaurant, then yes."

The room inside was cozy, only large enough to fit another half a dozen tables, lit by small red lanterns near the ceiling.

"He is the boss, yeah," waitress continued, trying to catch up to Shanyi's wide stride, made harder by her being a good head shorter in stature, "What do you want with him?"

"Xiao Li, who are you talking to?" a scratchy voice came from the back of the restaurant, where a door led to the kitchens, soon followed by an old man coming out of it. He looked like someone drew a person on a piece of paper and then crumpled it up to wipe a spot of grease: short, wrinkly, with his ears jugging out of a messy head of gray hair.

"Did you bring a friend to work too?" he grinned, leering at Qian Shanyi, "She looks fine enough to be a waitress."

"She isn't my friend! She just walked in!"

"My name is Lan Yishan," Qian Shanyi bowed politely, "I am looking for work, but not as a waitress. I would be of better use to you as a chef."

"I already have a chef, and besides, won't I be wasting your best assets that way?" he looked her over again.

Qian Shanyi laughed at that, and circulated the Crushing Glance of the Neverworld Eyes, making her eyes flash and her hair change through a dozen different colors in a breath. She saw Old Chen's eyes widen, while Xiao Li yelped, actually leaping away from her in shock.

"Honorable immortal, this humble servant apologizes - " Old Chen began, his demeanor changing on the spot, as he tried to make his rigid spine bend at the waist. Xiao Li apologized, and ran out of the restaurant, saying she had to get back to work.

"Oh give it a rest," she waved the owner off, pursing her lips, "I am merely studying to become an immortal chef, and my master sent me to get experience cooking in real restaurants. I hope that clarifies things somewhat?"

"We couldn't possibly - " he responded, still trying to kneel in front of her, wincing from the pain in his old back.

"Unbend yourself, old man," she scowled at him, "I will be quite cross if you manage to die giving me courtesy I did not ask for."

He didn't do that, and she had to come closer and help him up directly, hating every moment of it. Most people did not react this way, but even mild amounts of all this damned deference still made it impossible to interact normally with any ordinary person, except for those who already worked closely with cultivators. If she had a choice, she would have preferred to conceal the fact that she was a cultivator at all - but she needed a freer schedule and a lot more pay than a commoner could really ask for.

"Now," she said, keeping her hands on his shoulders and staring straight into his eyes, so that he couldn't start trying to kneel again, "Do you have a spot in your kitchen for another chef or not?"

"We couldn't possibly accommodate you in our measly kitchen, honorable immortal!"

"I do not require accommodation," she ground through her teeth, "a set of knives and a stove would do just fine. Now do you have a spot or not?"

"If the will of the Heavens demands this, then of course we would have a spot!" he nodded vigorously, a look of almost rapturous dedication on his face, "But what could my humble restaurant have done to deserve this great blessing?"

Is he an actual karmist? Just her luck, meeting a fanatic. No wonder he was being this extreme.

She sighed, closing her eyes for a moment.

"Look, this isn't a demand. If you do not have any need for a second chef, then I will look somewhere else," she said, "You stand to benefit from this arrangement - I could mix in spiritual energy into your dishes, and they will taste better and become more nutritious. I work quickly, so your kitchen would be as fast as lightning. Overall, you should have more customers and earn more money with me here, even though I would be gone in a week at most. But if you do not want me here, then that is also fine."

He shook his head.

"Of course we want to serve all Heavenly servants in whatever they demand! If you have a need for my restaurant, then it is yours!"

"Good," she said, pinching her nose in frustration, "this leaves the question of remuneration."

"If you have any need of money, then all my family's funds are yours!"

"No," she ground out, "I will not steal food out of your family's mouths. You will pay me the same as your other chef. Then if - if, you hear me? - I actually get you more customers, then you can pay me a third of the added profit, compared to a typical day when I did not work here. I would also appreciate a bed."

She needed money, but damn it, she had skills with which to get it. She wasn't yet desperate enough to simply take it from a bloody karmist - they were loose in the head as it was, without any need for the ravages of malnutrition.

"A bed - absolutely! You will have my personal bedroom -"

"A cot on the kitchen floor will suffice, thank you."

In the end, she had to intimidate him by flashing her eyes to get him to back down.

Well. At least she found a place to stay.

---

Qian Shanyi left the restaurant to find Xiao Li finishing up bringing the tables around and setting the chairs around them. She was concentrating on her work, and Shanyi coughed slightly as she approached to catch her attention, making the waitress jump slightly in the air.

"Oh, uh, honorable cultivator, you startled me," she laughed slightly, turning to face her.

"Please stop it," Qian Shanyi rolled her eyes, "My name is Lan Yishan. You should call me Lan Yishan, or just Yishan, if we are to work together."

"I couldn't possibly -"

"Whyever not?" Qian Shanyi cut her short. Sweet mercy, would she have to go through this with the chef too?

"It - it would be insulting, would it not?" Xiao Li blushed slightly.

Shanyi sighed. Well, this wasn't the first time she had to deal with this. Newcomers to the sect also needed time to adjust, but there was a faster way, when it was necessary.

"Alright, I can see that you haven't interacted with cultivators before, is that right?" she said, approaching Xiao Li, and sitting down on the edge of the table near her. The waitress just shook her head slightly.

"I am sure you have heard all sorts of stories about us, that we are like gods among men?"

"Old Chen has us stay after we close to listen to them," she nodded, "he has a little book."

Of course he does.

"Most of these stories are nonsense," Qian Shanyi continued bluntly, "Cultivators are just people. We aren't any more moral or upstanding than any others, and often we are less."

She could see doubt in the waitresses' eyes.

"I see that you need a demonstration," she hummed, leaning forwards, "slap me."

"What?" Xiao Li squeaked out.

"Across the face, as hard as you can," she nodded, intentionally suppressing her spiritual shield, "don't worry, I won't be hurt."

"I - I can't -"

"You have hands, you can slap anyone you want. I am not going to hurt you either, this is no trap."

"I can't! You are a cultivator, how could I - "

"I am asking you to," Qian Shanyi said, "don't you know it's rude not to do the things people ask of you? Come on, just do it."

Xiao Li looked around herself, but the street was still mostly deserted, with only a couple passersby in the distance. Finally, she breathed deeply, closed her eyes, and slightly slapped Shanyi on the cheek.

"You can do better than that," Qian Shanyi rolled her eyes, "that was barely a touch."

She got a somewhat stronger slap in response, and a little giggle from the waitress. Out of the corner of her eye, Shanyi could see passerby stop and stare at the scene of a woman being slapped. She ignored them: they were too far away to hear their conversation, which is all that mattered. Xiao Li had her back to the street, and so couldn't see any of them.

"Are you caressing a kitten or slapping? Come on, put your shoulders into it."

She had to goad her a couple more times until finally Xiao Li hit her properly. She caught Xiao Li's hand on the backswing, and looked her in the eyes.

"Well? Did anything happen when you slapped God?" She asked, "Did the Heavens fall down? Did the Netherworld open up?"

"No," said Xiao Li, still giggling.

"Great," Shanyi sighed, hopping off the table, "nothing will happen if you call me by my name either. Now let me help you with these tables."

They talked a bit as they worked, and shared some stories about their lives. Shanyi kept to the generalities, of course - it was still far too dangerous to leave identifying marks behind. The passerby started to move on, seeing that the slapping show was over.

"You are a strange woman," Xiao Li finally said, as they put the last of the tables down on the square, "why wouldn't you want people to bow to you? I definitely would like that."

Qian Shanyi stopped and bowed theatrically, making her head almost touch the ground. Her long hair pooled comically around her.

"Honorable daoist Xiao Li," she spoke loudly, projecting her voice across the street with the practiced ease of a lecturer, "the practitioner of the dao of food and drink, of the seven chair-flipping techniques, this humble woman beseeches you to forgive her ignorance!"

At first the waitress giggled at her antics, but blushed as she saw the passerby starting to gather for the show.

"Truly, my wisdom is like an ant in front of your great virtues!" Shanyi continued, bowing a shade deeper still, "Could there be any greater honor for me than to listen to your advice - nay, to even stay in your presence - nay, to even lay a glance upon your boots! My life would be fulfilled - "

"Stop, stop!" Xiao Li whispered to her, pulling her up by her arm, "This is getting ridiculous, people are staring at you!"

"Well there you go, now you understand me," she sighed, heading towards the restaurant doors, "it is impossible to deal with this every single time I have to talk to someone. Now help me convince the other chef to relax around me, just like you did."

She had a roof over her head, and a fairly safe way to make money. Now she just had to convince these people to keep their mouths shut about her being a cultivator, and she could start on her plans for finding Wang Yonghao.

Talking to karmists had to be less painful than sleeping on cold stones of the streets, right?

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read four chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon.

 

[Winged_One]

"Is this cut fine?" she asked, stretching out her hand to show a small plate of carrots she was chopping up to Zhang Sheng - the other cook at the restaurant - so that he could judge the size and shape of the little vegetable cubes she was making. He glanced at it, nodded, and she continued to make her way through the rest of the ingredients, gradually ramping up her speed.

Her worries about him turned out to be unfounded. He was a man of few words, but she could tell he held a faint disdain for the owner of the restaurant, which immediately brought them together, and despite being surprised at having to work with a cultivator had adapted to the situation surprisingly well.

They quickly agreed on a simple division of duties: she would prepare the necessary ingredients, infusing them with a sliver of spiritual energy to make them more nutritious, and pass them on to him to be turned into the actual dishes. The great speed and dexterity that came from being a cultivator made up for her lack of practical skill, and with a scattering of advice from the other cook, she only got better and better as the day went on.

As her hands worked the knife, her mind kept itself occupied with observations. She started to count all the little things: how many clumps of noodles went into each bowl of ramen, how long it took for her to cut servings of various vegetables, how many bowls they made per hour, how often Xiao Li came by to give them new orders from the customers, and so on. When she had the time, she noted her observations down, setting her writing set down on the windowsill. Her observations helped her slowly adjust her work accordingly, keeping a little task schedule inside of her head to make sure Zhang Sheng would get just the right amounts of the necessary ingredients at just the right times.

Old Chen came by several times to ask if she needed anything, and if she perhaps wanted to rest, annoying her to no end. In the end, she had to lie and tell him she practiced a special cultivation art that could blind anyone who wasn't already a cook, and if he didn't clear out of the kitchens right now he might suffer that very fate at any moment. That finally made him flee. Zhang Sheng seemed amused, at the very least, though she could tell he didn't believe a word she said.

She wasn't sure how to feel about the fact that Old Chen didn't tell Xiao Li about her "special cultivation art", nor asked how the waitress could be protected from it, when she had to enter the kitchen to bring the plates of ramen to the customers. Was he too stupid to notice the contradiction, or simply didn't care what might have happened to his waitress?

By the time the evening approached, she had memorized all the steps needed to produce every dish sold at the restaurant - all five of them, plus the sides - and was sure she could take Zhang Sheng's place if absolutely necessary, though she would need some time to truly gasp all the small adjustments that had to be made on top of the overall recipe to account for the individual differences of each batch of ingredients. She wasn't going to try and upset the employment of the other cook, of course - her stay in Xiaohongshan was to be measured in days, not months, and after she left, this restaurant would need to manage somehow.

Keeping all of the recipes in her memory was no great task: she knew a dozen small tricks for keeping information inside of her head when the need called for it. For example, the human mind wasn't particularly suited towards memorizing numbers and quantities, but the numbers could be turned into words according to a simple substitution schema, and those words could be made to rhyme, making the process so much easier.

Back at the sect, she trained those tricks to perfection once she realized the Elders would not grant her the same knowledge of the sect secrets as her supposed peers. She hoped an opportunity would present itself to at least glance at some of the hidden manuals, letting her learn something of use, but sadly, that was not to be.

At least the skills were occasionally useful in gambling. Few people would even suspect the possibility that you could have memorized the deck of cards after casually looking through it once, but once the mind was used to quickly dancing through the many-layered substitutions, the trick was no harder than reading words off a page.

When the evening fell and Old Chen closed up shop, he seemed poised to try and get her to speak about the Will of the Heavens to about a dozen other karmists that came by. Instead, she claimed that she needed to retreat into meditation for the night. In fact, it would be better if the rest of the house was quiet as well - could they skip today's sermon entirely?

Old Chen was disappointed, but told his flock to leave, and even managed to keep his mouth shut on the subject of her being a cultivator - as was their agreement. Zhang Sheng gave her a little smile and a nod as he left, and she knew she did the right thing in saving at least one other person from the torture.

Instead of meditating, she took a piece of wood from the stove, stole a small liquor bottle from the stores of alcohol, and made herself a new divination tool, with much the same design as the one she had used back in the world fragment. Once it was ready, she shook it, and started to count the dice.

Her main plan for finding Wang Yonghao was simple, and also completely insane in that it could not be used to find anyone in the entire world except this one elusive man, whose luck rampaged all out of control. She would shake her divination bottle filled with dice, focusing on the idea of finding him, and then see which side most of the dice fell on. If there were more ones, she would turn left; if there were more twos, she would turn right; threes and fours would control if she went up or down, and if sixes filled the bottle, she would know she was staring straight in the direction of Wang Yonghao.

Ordinarily, no cultivator's luck could be powerful enough to make a method like this worth trying. Furthermore, the luck of their quarry would fight against the attempt, making it even more futile. But Wang Yonghao's luck was strange in many ways, and she hoped she could piggyback off it: if her theories about what it was trying to make him do were correct, then there should be a narrow sliver of opportunity for her to exploit.

She rolled the dice, and they came up with nothing of value. This wasn't unexpected: she would have to try focusing on slightly different intentions, until she would find one that worked best.

All she could do was keep rolling.

---

When the sun rose, she got up, stretched, and started making noodles they would use for the day. Zhang Sheng came by soon after, bringing fresh vegetables from the port, and joined her in the task.

She felt strange as she worked, and it took her a while to figure out why. For many years now, she had cultivated every single day unless she was too sick to manage it - but spiritual energy in the middle of town was incredibly poor, even thinner than in the surrounding forests, so she barely had anything to work with. If she cultivated to purge her meridians of impurities, she would be relying almost exclusively on the spiritual energy already contained within her body - it would run out rapidly, and take many hours to recover. Given that she already needed that energy to cook, she could scarcely afford to do that - but her body ached for exercise nonetheless.

If she had ample wealth, then she could have consumed spirit stones in order to supplement her spiritual energy reserves, but there was no way to afford them on a cook's salary. She was paid a single silver yuan per day before her bonus for bringing in more customers, but from what she remembered of Cheng Dao's store, low grade spirit stones in this town started from seven yuan. Back in Golden Rabbit Bay, her sect issued her four low grade spirit stones per day for her cultivation, and she would have preferred to have double that number. As it was, she would be lucky to afford even a couple of them per month.

For all the issues she had with her sect, she supposed she couldn't fault them for being too cheap, even if she hadn't put the numbers together until now. Of course, her so-called peers got much more than she did, and even a successful merchant would lust after the riches of princes.

It really put things into perspective that for all the wealth on display within Wang Yonghao's inner world, his largest treasure remained the dense, yet invisible spiritual energy it was constantly producing.

She wasn't used to having to scrounge for every little scrap of spiritual energy - when she had time, she would need to sit down and rewrite her training plans from the ground up, now that she had to make do with being a pauper in the world of cultivators.

She could only hope she would find Wang Yonghao again soon.

---

"How lucky of me - fellow cultivator Liu Fakuang! You are just the man I need." She smiled, approaching the familiar spirit hunter she tricked back at the inn.

Luck had nothing to do with it, of course - she casually walked past every spot where guards aggregated looking for the man out of the corner of her eye - but there was no need to mention this. She finally found him on the southern edge of town, where he seemed to be performing an inspection of a gatehouse. He was dressed in much the same way as two nights before - dark robes with many lanyards and ribbons, with his black hair tied back into a short braid.

"Lan Yishan?" He raised his eyebrows at her, recognising her, and smiled openly. "Is there a problem? Please, let's go inside where we can speak freely."

He led her to a small rest room within the gatehouse, where a couple guards had been playing cards while waiting for their shifts to start. As soon as they got a stern look from Liu Fakuang, they cleared out, and left the room to the two cultivators. There wasn't much in the room itself: just a table, some cabinets full of paper records, and a small clay stove. Liu Fakuang put a tea kettle on the fire while she took a seat at the table.

She didn't hurry the man - she had plenty of time to spare. The noodle shop was busiest late in the evening and early in the morning, as sailors who were spending the night in town came to have a hearty meal or a good breakfast before setting off down the river. In the middle of the day, the flow of people dried up, and so she excused herself for several hours to handle her own affairs. She didn't expect the conversation to take longer than ten minutes, in any case.

"So, miss, how might the Empire help you on this fine day?" Liu Fakuang sat down once both of them had cups of tea in hand. She cradled her own in both hands, warming her fingers from the cold mountain air, as she pretended to consider her response.

"In truth, it's somewhat embarrassing," she sighed, "I appear to have misplaced my seal, and I want to know how one would go about acquiring a new one."

Seals were a widespread fixture of the empire, used by cultivators and common people alike. They differed in size and shape, with some small enough to fit on a ring and others as large as a fist. Their overall design wasn't particularly complex, with most being merely an embossed engraving on wood, stone or metal, that could be pressed into paper to leave behind an identifying mark of ink, but some were radically different. Spirit hunters like Liu Fakuang carried special seals, so as to better identify them among other cultivators. Her own sect seal stated her name, her sect, and the name of the city she came from - all the information she wished to conceal at the moment.

It wasn't particularly unusual for someone to lack a seal, even if they were a cultivator - in fact, the majority of the people in the empire did not possess one. However, having a seal was a requirement for accessing many important services - for example, entering any imperial library, selling or purchasing landed property or major cultivation goods, and so on. This was a part of the overall imperial effort to make their adoption more widespread, and in turn, to make it easier for people to identify each other on paper documents.

Her father helped her acquire her first seal when she came of age, and once she joined the sect, the Elders handled the replacement. She had personally barely interacted with the entire process, and so couldn't begin to guess where to get a new one, or even if she could do so at all.

Ordinarily, this would be the time to head over to the local library to research the topic - but of course, a seal was already required for entry. To make matters worse, in a town of this size the imperial library would be managed by the post office, and in fact should be located underneath the building itself - trying to enter it would be dangerous, as postmaster Lan Yu was one of the only people in town who could conclusively identify her as Qian Shanyi. Having a seal with her fake name on it would make moving around the empire so much easier, especially when she would set off on her chase after Wang Yonghao.

"Misplaced? Do you mean you have lost it or did someone steal it?"

"I am not sure," she hedged, taking an opportunity to pull on her other investigative thread, "I would rather not make any accusations without good evidence, but there was this strange man…"

She described Wang Yonghao, and a fictional situation where they had a short argument on the street, and saw a frown come onto Liu Fakuang's face like a cloud coming in front of the sun.

"Hmm, he sounds very similar to the man from the pair of cultivators I have been told to keep an eye out for," he said, scratching his chin.

"The ones you mentioned to me back at the tavern?" She raised her eyebrow, taking a sip of her tea. It was surprisingly good, for a guard post. "Did anything come out of your search?"

Lan Yishan, a burgeoning immortal chef and a disciple of an unnamed spirit hunter had no particular reason to be interested in the search for an unlicensed sword seller Qian Shanyi and her accomplice. By making up the story about Wang Yonghao, she was simultaneously justifying her lack of a seal in the eyes of Liu Fakuang and giving herself a reason to be interested in the investigation. This was one of the main reasons why she sought him out personally: the rapport she built on the night before would help sell the story better.

"No, they pretty much vanished into thin air," he shook his head, "Without anything concrete to base our suspicions on, we don't even have the grounds to send missives to other cities about them."

Well, so much for that.

"Unless you would be willing to make a report about the theft?..." he trailed off.

"No, I wouldn't besmirch the honor of a fellow cultivator on a mere suspicion," she shook her head, pushing down her disappointment. Relying on the empire was always going to be a reach. "It's just as likely that I lost it to a mere pickpocket in town."

"Yeah, I wouldn't either, in your place." He shrugged, and the frown vanished off his face as if it was never there. "But enough about them, let's talk about you! How did you come into this town?"

"Through the port, of course," she said smoothly. It wasn't much of a choice - there were only two ways into the town, but cultivators entering from the forest were a highly memorable sight, and if the guards at the gates were questioned, her story would fall apart quickly. The port saw dozens, if not hundreds of ships per day - she could easily hide among the crowds. "Do you think I lost my seal there?"

"No, no," he shook his head, getting up, and putting away their empty tea cups. "You see, normally for a cultivator to get a new seal, they would have to wait several months as we send messages around to make sure they aren't trying to impersonate someone. But if we already have evidence they are who they claim to be - such as reliable documents, or the vouching of someone honorable from the local community - then we can expedite this process. There should be a ship manifest at the port with the mark of your previous seal still on it - with my help finding it, we'll get the whole thing wrapped up within just a couple days. It's good that you didn't enter from the forest - there is no guarantee that the guards on duty would have even recorded your entry."

Her mind ran into a wall and bounced off.

"I see." She nodded, following after him as he strolled out of the gatehouse, frantically trying to think of a reason why her name wouldn't be where he expected it to be. "Thank you for the advice, but surely there is no need for you to involve yourself? I can find the port authority on my own."

"Oh it's really no trouble," he waved her off, "I was about to head off to have lunch with my fiance in the docks in any case. With me there, you'd get to skip queues - it would be over in a jiffy."

She studied his face carefully, but there wasn't even a hint of duplicity or self-satisfaction there. He was really just that helpful.

"Surely you'd prefer to have lunch instead of escorting me around through dusty port offices?" She smiled, still following after him through the streets. "I do not mind queues. I have some reading with me to pass the time."

"Nonsense. It's the least I can do after you entertained me with conversation that night." He waved her off, giving her yet another of his sunny grins. "I always hate stakeout missions, they are incredibly boring."

Damnable moron, stop being helpful!

"What will happen if I find my seal again?" She asked to pass the time, as she searched for better options to get out of the trap she walked herself into. Rudely refusing this courtesy when she clearly had no reason to would only make the man suspicious, but he was clearly missing her subtle hints. At this point, her best idea was to try faking a medical emergency, but she wasn't sure she could do that convincingly. "Would I have two different seals to my name?"

"It's not that uncommon," he responded, "for example, when a new sect is established but before it is properly registered, cultivators that join it often carry two seals. They can't use a proper sect seal before the registration is complete, of course, so instead some order loose cultivator seals with the name of the sect added next to their name. Various clubs and organizations that don't pass the mark for registration do so as well."

"But doesn't that defeat the entire purpose of the seals? To identify someone?"

"No, not really - it still uniquely identifies you, you can just choose which one to identify with. Now, if you wanted a sect seal, this would be a whole process, but the requirements for loose cultivators aren't quite so stringent. After all, what would we care? If you were in a sect but pretended to be a loose cultivator, you would just pay higher taxes."

"Couldn't someone pretend to have a different name by making a new seal?"

"Well, yes, that's why even loose cultivators need to have some evidence they are called by their chosen name before we grant them the seal," he grinned at her, "Empire isn't quite so loose! Besides, why would anyone except demonic cultivators bother? There are legal ways to make a seal with a pseudonym, if your deals require discretion."

Unless the one you are trying to keep discretion from is the Empire itself.

She kept spinning the problem inside of her head as they walked into port, and was already prepared to try and use her spiritual energy to "stumble" and "accidentally" dislocate her own foot, when a young, richly-dressed woman from a group of merchants near one of the ships called after them.

"Shining Fakuang! Surely you won't walk past without giving me a smile?" the woman said, quickly separating from her group and approaching the two. She was dressed in a long, emerald dress, with a matching overcoat and a small parasol to shield her jade skin from the sun. Her other hand held a small fan. Her black hair was tied into a complex shape, with only two loose locks framing her face on both sides, fluttering gently from the quick and practiced movement of her fan.

Despite her refined appearance, there wasn't even a hint of spiritual energy circulating through her pores: this woman was no cultivator. When Liu Fakuang saw her, his face lit up like the morning sun.

"Who is your friend, my dear?" The woman drawled, giving Qian Shanyi an interested look over as she came up to them.

Dear? Is this his fiance? Bless my luck, an opportunity!

Qian Shanyi stepped closer to Liu Fakuang, sneaked a hand around his waist and pulled him closer before the man could react. The other woman's eyes narrowed jealously.

"Fellow cultivator Fakuang was just helping me with a little administrative issue," she said, fluttering her eyelashes innocently, and using her other hand to brush off imagined dust off his sleeves, "he has been ever so helpful!"

The woman's gaze shifted between the two of them, and Liu Fakuang chuckled awkwardly, trying to politely extricate himself from Qian Shanyi's grasp. She held firm.

"Is that so, dear?" The woman's tone became as cold as ice, and she closed her fan with a single dangerous clack of ivory, putting it away into her dress. "And what help might that be?"

"Lanhua, it's not like that!" he chuckled again, finally managing to pull himself free, "I was just going to show fellow cultivator Lan where the port authority was and help her with some documents!"

"I even said it wasn't necessary, but dear Fakuang insisted," Qian Shanyi helpfully threw some more oil on the fire, "he said with him there, it would be done in no time!"

"I don't suppose you forgot we were supposed to have lunch together, dear Fakuang," the woman's tone somehow became even colder. Qian Shanyi couldn't manage that range of emotion with her voice alone, "while you were busy helping honorable immortal Lan?"

"Ah, no, it's just it would be so quick -" Liu Fakuang looked between the two in a bit of a panic, until he finally made a decision, and bowed deeply. "I am sorry, fellow cultivator Lan Yishan, I think I'll have to go with my betrothed and won't be able to help you."

Miss Lanhua seemed pleased at that, and while outwardly Qian Shanyi made sure to appear dejected, in her soul she shared the sentiment. She would need to find a way to pay this woman back for her unknowing assistance.

"But then I would have to wait in a queue for ever so long," Qian Shanyi sighed theatrically, bringing her deception to a close, "and I was already feeling quite hungry. But I suppose I shouldn't get in the way of young love…"

"Look, I - ", the man looked torn, but then sighed and reached into a small bag on his waist, drawing out a stack of papers clipped to a small wooden board, as well as a tiny inkwell and a brush on a short chain. He held the board with one hand while writing with the other, then reached into his bag again, bringing out his seal, and stamped it on the paper. Tearing it off, he handed it to Qian Shanyi. She accepted it, hiding her surprise.

"Let's make this easier," he said, "I personally vouch that you are Lan Yishan, on my honor. With this paper you should be able to get a new seal made - just show it to anyone at any of the guardhouses, and they will tell you where to go. This way, you don't even have to go to the portal authority."

Qian Shanyi took the paper, and bowed in thanks. This was an entirely unexpected outcome, but very much an enjoyable one. Lanhua hooked her hand around Liu Fakuang's, and led the man down the street. Qian Shanyi watched them walk away, and saw Lanhua glance back, giving her a completely different look: not of jealousy, but of interest and calculation.

Their eyes crossed, and for a moment, she had the strangest feeling that she was looking in a mirror.

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read three chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon for a low low price of 3$ per month. Sadly due to working on another story in parallel during NaNoWriMo, the backlog is getting a bit shorter as of late.

 

[Winged_One]

Two days passed as Qian Shanyi was slowly growing stir-crazy.

She wanted to, needed to cultivate, but all the spiritual energy she could spare went into her cooking, and she couldn't justify making her dishes worse simply because of her own deeply ingrained habits. Even as it was, she was barely managing to scrape by, and tended to run completely dry by the time the night fell - the city wasn't like the world fragment, where spiritual energy was so dense she could easily recover her entire reserves in only a dozen minutes. Sword exercises she did each morning helped only so much: without spiritual energy coursing through her meridians, it was simply not the same.

To get her mind off it, she went to visit the public baths, and paid for a private room for herself. It set her back one and a half yuan, a full day and a half of her salary - an outrageous price for a mere hour - but she no longer cared.

The room was small - only a couple meters to the side, tiled with patterned ceramics, and with a mosaic of a cultivator slaying a demon beast up on the ceiling. She couldn't recall anything similar from any myths she knew, so perhaps it was a local story, or simply made up whole cloth by the artist.

The rest of the room was pretty bare, with only a single bench alongside one of the walls, and most of the floor taken up by a pool of heated water, the basin sloped gently on one end and just long enough for a person to comfortably lay down in.

Dim light streamed in from slits above the door, leading back into the corridors of the bathhouse, and sent strange water reflections dancing across the walls. Right next to the door was a sand clock, and she flipped it over to keep track of how much time she had left.

She quickly undressed - leaving her sword and jade slate on the bench - put her clothes into a basket and pushed it out through a small door back into the corridor, where a servant would pick them up to be washed, cleaned, dried and brought back well before her bath ended.

With a tired sigh, she walked into the pool of water, and laid down on the stones. Hot water felt like liquid bliss on her skin, and she closed her eyes, letting stress slowly wash out of her.

The need to cultivate constantly banging in the back of her head was only a part of it - her attempts to find Wang Yonghao had all but hit a dead end. The worst part was that her divination idea was producing results - just not enough to actually work. She had been fruitlessly spinning her bottle throughout the days, on the assumption that his luck might vary by the hour, and noting down the results on a sheet of paper. It was good that she decided to keep records: without written data, she would never have noticed the effects, no matter how good her memory was. When she was concentrating on the search, she was rolling markedly more ones, twos, and sixes than would be expected - not enough to tell anything at all was occurring with a glance, but enough that with a bit of math, she could prove it wasn't mere chance after hundreds of rolls.

She supposed she should be glad her crazy idea worked at all, but the effect was so slight as to be all but unusable. That is what made it all the more frustrating: if she got nothing whatsoever out of it, she could have made her peace, and focused on trying to find rumors about Wang Yonghao from traveling merchants, or looking for another path forward. But as it was, she always felt that it was just on the cusp of working, and couldn't quite get herself to call off the plan entirely.

To top it off, she had a very strong suspicion of what could make it all snap into place, but to do that, she would need to go directly against her principles. Wang Yonghao's luck was quite clearly centered around making him cultivate - so if she pre-committed herself towards forcing him to advance in realm, as opposed to merely thinking of how her presence might indirectly strengthen his cultivation, she suspected his luck would immediately begin to cooperate. She could even seal the deal with a heavenly vow, if the need called for it.

But of course she didn't want to force him. It was, after all, ultimately his decision how to advance his cultivation, or wherever to do so at all - going against it would be the exact thing that made her blood boil. Perhaps if she was on the verge of death she would have done it, but not as she was now. And that meant this path was largely closed to her.

You could fool the heavens, but not blind luck.

Despair filled her mind at the thought that she might be stuck, running in place, merely working to make ends meet, and she submerged her head underwater to keep a hold of herself, blowing bubbles to the surface. How often could she cultivate, working like she did? Perhaps one day in five, if she limited her expenses as much as was feasible? The building foundation realm would remain forever out of reach.

She was caged just as surely as if she went back to her sect - it is just that this cage had an open roof.

She couldn't even write to her parents. Not only was it dangerous - she was sure the sect would surveil their mail in some fashion, and who knew what they could discover if she sent more than a single letter - but the thought of telling them she gambled, lost and still couldn't return was unbearable.

She stayed underwater until her lungs started to burn and then surfaced, breathing deeply. Perhaps she could find a way to earn a lot more money - become a merchant guard, or something of that nature. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps…

She relaxed again as she washed herself with soap, finally starting to feel clean as opposed to merely adequate, circulated Crushing Glance of the Netherworld Eyes to put color back into her hair, and got out of the bath, putting on a bathrobe provided by the establishment. The sand clock near the door said that she still had ten minutes remaining, so she closed her eyes, resting on a bench near the wall of her small private room and waiting for her clothes to come back.

For now, there was no need to think of that future. The local imperial offices told her her new seal should be ready tomorrow, and by then she could expand her search beyond this town. If she could find some rumors of Wang Yonghao passing through, then she might be able to find him without any need for divination.

---

She drew stares as she returned to the ramen shop from her trip to the bathhouse, but she was used to that. Her beauty was noted by many customers at her father's store while she worked there, and it only became more pronounced once she became a cultivator. Refining your body with spiritual energy didn't just make it physically stronger and more resilient against damage - it also normalized most biological functions, and gave you a significant degree of control over them. Until a cultivator got into the building foundation stage, this merely meant better digestion, mildly stronger resistance to disease and poisons, an ability to stop your hair and nails from growing, and other small things - but it did tend to lead to clearer and smoother skin, stronger and denser hair, and more controlled fat distribution, which, in turn, meant that cultivators tended to be more beautiful than average.

There were exceptions, of course - one of her sect Elders was famous for having ruined his hair due to what Qian Shanyi privately considered to be decades of an abominable disdain towards safety precautions when working with "safe" alchemical concoctions - but they did not affect the overall trend much.

What she wasn't used to was that some moron decided to tag along after her from the bathhouse. She wasn't sure what he was planning, as she didn't reciprocate his attempts to call after her near the baths, but perhaps he got foolishly brave from seeing her walk around without any guards. This had only rarely been a problem for her back in the Golden Rabbit Bay - nobody was stupid enough to approach a cultivator wearing sect robes with a sword at their waist without a good reason. Only on the rare days when she dressed down to visit some gambling parlor without revealing herself as a cultivator did she have to suffer the occasional annoyance of such "courtship".

Her sword was wrapped in a piece of fabric she borrowed from Old Chen, and she carried it in her hands as if it was a mundane package, so it wasn't surprising the idiot felt safe, not knowing she could run him through at any moment. She could have worn it in the open, for some women certainly carried swords around - but if you saw a jade beauty armed with a sword, then chances were you were looking at a cultivator, and that would bring a different type of attention to herself, one that she didn't need.

She circled a city block to make sure he was still following her - he was - and then led him into the narrow alleys of the docks, broke line of sight, and vanished by quickly parkouring up onto a rooftop, crossing the line of buildings, and dropping down into the next street over. She briefly considered breaking his leg - or at least threatening to do so - to teach him a lesson about wasting her time, as well as about trailing other women from the bathhouse with unclear intentions, but then he might talk, and she needed neither rumors about a mysteriously strong woman in a green dress, nor an investigation into the case of assault.

---

In the evening, she finally sat down with old Chen to look at his financial books, to figure out how much he owed her for the extra sales that came from customers ordering more food due to the spiritual energy making it that much more delicious. He readily agreed, saying that it was crownday, the start of a new week, and thus a perfect time to work with money. She personally did not care for that old superstition - she knew from her experience processing mail for Elder Striding Phoenix that various subcontractors and branches of their sect did their accounting on all sorts of days - but she thought it would make a karmist like old Chen a lot less obnoxious to talk to, and she needed every advantage in that regard that she could get.

What she saw in his books surprised her.

It wasn't anything major, but she had counted the number of dishes sent out of the kitchen every day, and so she knew exactly how much the revenue the restaurant should be bringing in. She had worked here for four days so far: twice, she left for several hours around noon and couldn't be sure, but on the other two days, the figure in the books was lower than it should be by about five percent, and thus so was her bonus pay.

She glanced over at the old Chen. There was no reason for him to underestimate his own earnings - the empire only taxed him on his land, not his sales. That left one obvious culprit.

She waited until the day was over - and until old Chen stopped proselytizing to his flock. When she heard the people start to disperse, she left the kitchen through the window to avoid meeting anyone else, and caught up with Xiao Li. The little waitress jumped as she tapped her on the shoulder, and Qian Shanyi raised an eyebrow at her.

"Jumpy, aren't we?"

"Honorable - uh, I mean, Yishan," Xiao Li laughed, "I was still thinking back on what was read today. Was there something you wanted with me?"

"Just taking a stroll before bed," she said, shaking her head, "I hope you don't mind if I join you?"

"Oh, not at all!"

To get the waitress to relax a bit, she spoke about some of the real cultivation stories from the empire's founding - not the trash that karmist would bring up. Xiao Li seemed to enjoy it.

"I did actually want to talk to you about something, Li," Qian Shanyi finally said, once she felt the waitress had calmed down enough, "Are you stealing from the restaurant?"

The waitress jumped up again, yelping as if she was bitten by a wasp, looking around in a panic.

'N-no?"

"You are a terrible liar."

"I am not lying!"

"I counted the dishes," Qian Shanyi continued calmly, "and I know how much money the restaurant got. I suspect you aren't telling old Chen about some of the orders, but get the kitchen to prepare them, and pocket the pay. Do you have another explanation?"

Xiao Li breathed in shallow breaths, her eyes flickering between Qian Shanyi's eyes and her hands. Finally, she saw the waitress deflate entirely.

"So what, will you chop off my arms now?" she said, sniffling as tears started to roll from her eyes.

"Why would I do that?" Qian Shanyi blinked in confusion. She didn't even bring her sword with her, figuring it wasn't necessary for a short stroll, and she could still defend herself with her sandal daggers if the need called for it.

"Because I a-am a thi-ef? Old Chen said - "

"The empire doesn't punish thieves this way," she pursed her lips in disappointment. What was that man telling the people who came to listen? Perhaps she shouldn't have avoided his lectures after all. "And I am not the empire. I didn't even tell old Chen about it."

Xiao Li looked up at her with hope in her eyes.

"You di-didn't?"

Qian Shanyi sighed, and came closer to put an encouraging hand on the waitress's shoulder, only to have her close in and bury her face in her chest. What a mess - she didn't expect it to blow up this badly.

"There there, you'll be fine," she said, patting her on the back, "I just wanted to know why you did it."

It took a while for her to calm down.

"I have a little brother," she said, still sniffling, "he is sick, but I don't earn enough to buy him medicine."

She wrung her hands.

"I - I promise I won't steal anymore, but please don't tell Chen! Without me working here, we'd both be out on the streets!"

Qian Shanyi stared at her before sighing. Originally, she just wanted to know what was going on - her agreement with old Chen meant that by stealing from him, she was also stealing from her, and she figured she could get the waitress to pay her a cut to keep quiet, for as long as she was working here. Depending on where she'd have to travel to find Wang Yonghao, she might need every fen and yuan. This, though…

"I won't tell anyone, Li, and I don't care if you steal more," she shook her head, "But if your brother is sick, then let's go see him. I am not much of a healer, but I know enough about the basics to tell you what to ask of a doctor and how much it should cost, so you don't get screwed when talking to a merchant."

Xiao Li opened her mouth in shock, but quickly gathered herself up, and led her further into the streets of Xiaohongshan.

"Why don't you care that I steal?" she asked as they walked, "I-I mean I appreciate it, of course, but Chen always said cultivators exist to enforce the heaven's will, and stealing is one of the Nine Great Transgressions - "

"Chen has no clue what he is talking about, Li," Qian Shanyi interrupted her, adopting a lecturing tone, "To cultivate is to rebel against the heavens - this principle lies at the heart of all modern cultivation. If I blindly enforced anyone's will but my own - heaven or otherwise - I wouldn't be a cultivator, I would be a lapdog. You need the money more than Chen does, so why should I punish you?"

They walked together in silence for a while.

"My name is Ling," the waitress said quietly, "Li is my family name, but people started calling me little Li, and now everyone assumes it's my name because I don't correct them. It's easier that way."

Qian Shanyi did think it was a strange name, but kept quiet.

Xiao Li glanced up at Qian Shanyi.

"You are a very strange cultivator, Yishan, but please call me Ling."

---

In the morning, Xiao Li's - or rather, Li Ling's - behavior towards Qian Shanyi changed subtly compared to the previous days. She was a lot more relaxed, and not once did the waitress have to stop herself from referring to her as an honorable immortal - they were finally on a proper first name basis. They also talked a bit more about history, and for once, Qian Shanyi felt like she was really listening and thinking about what was being said. She could only hope she managed to put a few cracks into the surface of karmist propaganda around her mind.

Her musing on how to further push Li Ling's burgeoning education was interrupted when she heard loud cursing followed by a crash from the main room of the restaurant. Someone must have started a fight.

She briefly debated what she should do, before deciding that she might as well save Chen's furniture from being wrecked. Her seal should be ready later today, and once it was, she would most likely leave the town right away - there was no longer a need to conceal the fact that Lan Yishan, an immortal chef taking her first steps on the dao of cooking, worked at this particular restaurant.

She grabbed a towel and marched into the main room, wiping off her hands still wet from washing vegetables, and took the scene at a glance. Two young men - neither of them a cultivator, thankfully - were wrestling on the ground next to an overturned table, with Li Ling watching in horror not far from them. Old Chen was berating them from behind the counter, but wisely kept his distance away from the pair - his old bones probably wouldn't have survived a glancing blow from either of them.

She had no such concerns, and approached the pair casually, whistling shrilly to get their attention, but they seemed to be too focused on each other. Oh well, she tried.

A couple targeted kicks to the solar plexus of either man later - she didn't even have to use spiritual energy, just time her strikes well - and the pair was lying down peacefully, gasping for breath. She picked one of them up by the collar and brought him outside - his futile struggles against her grip leading nowhere while he still could barely breathe - and set him down on the ground, taking the time to dust him off as much as she could.

"Apologies, honored customer, but I had to stop your mighty duel before you would have destroyed the rest of the restaurant," she said, helping the man stay upright. Color was slowly coming back to his face, and he scowled at her. She returned it with a smile, "What brought this on, if I may ask?"

"That bastard Liu Shishou dared to take my seat, and then insult my wife," he gasped, "how was I supposed to let that go?"

"I see. Liu Shishou has been a menace at our restaurant for quite a while," she nodded, pretending to know what inane drama he was talking about, "I again apologize for kicking you, but you understand that I have to give face to all our customers. How could the other people know which one of you was in the right? If I openly sided with you and simply threw him out, nobody would patronize our restaurant anymore."

She leaned forwards conspiratorially.

"But honored customer, I made sure to secretly kick him twice as much as you," she winked, "Besides, let me offer you a much better seat outside - in this beautiful weather, would you want to be cooped up within a stuffy room where smells from the kitchen would disturb your meal? Let Liu Shishou suffer on his lonesome."

She motioned towards one of the tables on the open square, and waited until he nodded in agreement. Knowing that his rival was getting the worse seat seemed to really placate the man.

She made sure to get his name before she returned inside, ready to solve the other half of the puzzle.

Liu Shishou was standing down on all fours, slowly managing to get up off the ground while Li Ling berated him, still not daring to approach. She crossed eyes with the waitress and winked at her, closing in on the other man and giving him a hand to rise up.

When he saw her face he recognised her, and actually tried to throw a punch. She caught his wrist and squeezed just tightly enough to cause pain, brought her face in close, and flashed her eyes with Crushing Glance of the Netherworld Eyes so that only he could see it. His face contorted in a mix of pain and shock, and she patted him on the back with her other hand.

"Honorable master Liu, I humbly apologize for kicking you, but you understand that I have to give face to all my customers, right?" She lowered her voice so that only he could hear, "It was quite discourteous of you two to start a fight in my establishment."

"That bastard Zheng -"

"- is as sinful as a pig is dirty, I know. He had been terrorizing our humble restaurant for a long time - do you think I do not know your suffering? But how could the other people know which one of you was in the right? If I openly sided with you and simply threw him out without giving you a kick too, nobody would patronize our restaurant anymore."

She leaned closer still, pitching her voice conspiratorially.

"But honored master Liu, I made sure to kick him three more times than you on your behalf," she winked, "Besides, I made him sit outside in the wind, where his noodles will get cold and tasteless. Why not let him suffer alone while you enjoy a warm meal here?"

She reached behind herself and flipped one of the chairs lying on the ground with her foot, sending it just behind Liu Shishou, and helped him sit down. She nodded to Li Ling, helped her put the table back up, wiped her hands off again, and headed back towards the kitchens.

"Oh, Lan Yishan! Is that you?"

She glanced over at the corner of the restaurant, and was surprised to see Lanhua, soon-to-be wife of that spirit hunter. She was dressed completely differently from how she saw her last time: her hair covered by a headscarf, wearing robust dark green clothes suitable for a sailor instead of a dress, and a solid pair of boots. Her eyes, though, remained just as cold and calculating as before. Qian Shanyi approached her carefully, letting surprise show on her face.

What in the netherworld's name was she doing here?

"I believe we haven't been properly introduced. My name is Wu Lanhua, I happen to be an insignificant merchant of little note," the woman smiled at her, which just unnerved her more, "would you have a couple minutes to talk to me? Our last meeting ended somewhat poorly."

The name Wu stirred something in her memory, from back when she visited the local postal office and read a lot of information about the surrounding area. Wasn't this the wealthiest merchant family in town?

Qian Shanyi glanced over Wu Lanhua, and then the rest of the tavern. Why did she come here? There was no way this was a coincidence - there must have been a hundred dining establishments in Xiaohongshan, and a woman this rich should have had her own cooks besides. She glanced at her table: there was a kettle of tea, but no food. A slight chip on the handle of the kettle was familiar - it had been sent out of the kitchens a good twenty minutes ago. If the woman was going to eat, she would have received her food already - but who came to a ramen shop just to drink tea?

That meant she had to have come here specifically to talk to her. But about what? And how did she even find her? She never told anyone where she worked.

Worry started to flood her veins again. Was this some kind of revenge for her not so subtly implying Liu Fakuang was cheating on her?

Or, perhaps, did she get fully discovered?

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read three chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon for a low low price of 3$ per month.

Alternatively, if you are feeling parched on new writing while you wait for new chapters, how about read my other story, The Summoned Hero Is A Historical Materialist?? It's been called mildly political and is very different from Feng Shui Engineering, but it is the best I can offer.

I also now have a discord server, where you can discuss my fics, and perhaps read some semi-exclusive worldbuilding notes. Come hang out!

 

[Winged_One]

Cautiously, she sat down opposite the other woman. It was pointless to try avoiding a conversation - if Wu Lanhua went out of her way to find her, she wasn't about to lose interest. Idly, she noted that this was the most private table in the entire room - sat in a corner, quite far away from the others, and even obscured somewhat by a column that reinforced the ceiling.

"How may this humble cultivator be of assistance to honorable merchant Wu?" She asked, lowering her voice so as to not be overheard, while the other woman poured both of them some tea. There were, of course, already two cups at the table.

"Dear Fakuang has told me that you are an immortal chef," she responded, "I happen to have a party planned for this evening with my fellow colleagues in business. I have been wondering if we could taste some of your cooking?"

"At what price?"

"How could I put a price on culinary art? But perhaps three gold yuan could be considered a bonus."

Three gold yuan were equal to thirty silver - in other words, a month's salary for a normal chef. What was her angle in offering this particular price? To see if she could be swayed by money, or if she was motivated by something else? Or was this simply a standard price for private immortal chefs? She didn't know enough to even begin guessing.

"You believe this to be an appropriate price for my immortal cooking?" Qian Shanyi raised her eyebrow, testing Wu Lanhua.

"I didn't mean to cause offense," she waved her off, "if I have, may you propose your own price?"

Was she really just trying to get her to work for her?

"Hm. How did you find me?" Qian Shanyi hummed, changing the topic, "I never told anyone where I live and work."

"Couldn't I have simply happened by your restaurant?" She even fluttered her eyelashes, just like she did back at the port. That had to have been intentional.

"No."

"Fine," Wu Lanhua sighed, "I told some of my men to keep an eye out for you - without telling them who you are, of course - and one of them happened to have followed you to the docks from a public bathhouse, where he lost sight of you."

"Your man is quite lucky I was in a good mood. I considered breaking his legs for the insolence."

"I very much wish you had," Wu Lanhua waved her off, "my order was to simply observe, not harass you by playing some sort of spy. He did it of his own initiative, and it is only appropriate that he be punished for his stupidity. But from there, it was quite easy to find you - you draw more looks than you might think, and people have already noticed old Chen here had a beautiful new cook. I hope I didn't cause offense? I only hoped to meet you to properly apologize for pulling my dear Fakuang away from helping you."

So she was right. This woman had planned everything out. This only left a question of how she should react.

Qian Shanyi didn't much care for her own face, so being tailed in the abstract did not disturb her. She only cared what the other woman might have intended to do with the information - but for now, she couldn't make a solid guess.

For a moment, she considered playing up her reaction to get some sort of concession out of her, but this entire situation gave her pause. What else did she orchestrate? Was this fight between two men also her doing, meant to see how she would react - wherever she would intervene, and how would she behave around the common people? Qian Shanyi could name a dozen ways to make that happen. Regardless, Wu Lanhua would have already seen that she did not take offense easily, so it wouldn't be a plausible lie to sell.

Furthermore, what could she demand? Wu Lanhua had already thrown her subordinate in front of the flying sword, and if pushed, could simply claim this offer of employment was the intended compensation. She couldn't even rightly say it was a bad one, if so.

"But about my offer of employment?" Wu Lanhua brought her back to the table, seeing her sinking deeper into her thoughts.

"I will have to consider it," Qian Shanyi replied noncommittally, shaking her head. She still didn't know what the other woman's angle was, and until she did, agreeing to anything specific felt dangerous. "It is now noon - by when will you need my answer?"

"I prefer to plan my evenings well in advance. Can I truly not make you decide right away? Would a larger monetary bonus sway you?"

"What is money in the face of immortality?"

Wu Lanhua leaned forwards excitedly.

"In that case, why are you wearing my stolen dress?"

Qian Shanyi clamped down on a spot of panic she felt, keeping her face and posture carefully even, and then kicked herself a fraction of a moment later - being neutral when accused of theft was the wrong mask to show entirely. She did her best to spin her momentary hesitation into a haughty, annoyed question - as if she was shocked someone dared to make the accusation at all. With anyone else, she would have been sure the transition was perfect and impossible to notice, but this woman was dangerous.

"What?"

"I didn't recognize it back then - I have quite a few, you understand," the merchant continued in a mild tone, "but it is unmistakably mine, even if you have had it tailored. Do you sew as well as cook?"

Qian Shanyi narrowed her eyes, letting the other woman talk.

"Oh, I don't mean to threaten you," Wu Lanhua chuckled softly, "It would be insanity to quarrel with a cultivator over a mere piece of clothing. Consider it my gift to you - but it is interesting, no? Even the poorest loose cultivators have enough money to buy their own clothes. Yet you choose to wear a stolen dress? My man told me you wore it the other day too - one begins to wonder if you have stolen it simply because you didn't have any other clothes to wear. What would bring a cultivator so low?"

She didn't mean to threaten her yet was a better way to say it. That she could always tell her fiance, a spirit hunter, about the theft was simply left unstated.

"There are many things that interest me about you," Wu Lanhua continued, "How you had my fiance dancing to your tunes? From one woman to another, I must extend my admiration for your craft."

She reached into a pocket of her clothes, taking out a card of hard paper with street directions written on it, and handed it to Qian Shanyi.

"You can find me at my estate - I believe that the preparations for the dinner would begin in about four hours. I hope to see you there, honorable immortal Lan - all I am asking for is to hear your story. I am very much looking forward to it," Wu Lanhua purred like a satisfied cat that was done playing with a particularly fat mouse, got up, and left the restaurant, leaving her payment on the table.

---

The first thing Qian Shanyi did when she was sure the merchant woman was gone was tell old Chen she was taking the rest of the day off. The restaurant would struggle without her - the number of customers had markedly increased since she came here, and Zhang Sheng couldn't manage the evening workload alone - but she needed all the time she could spare.

The second thing she did was rush over to the imperial offices and ask if her seal was ready. As she had already expected, some "unexpected delay" - no doubt wearing an emerald dress - had happened, and the office said it would only be ready by tomorrow morning. She cursed Wu Lanhua in her heart, but there wasn't much she could do about it.

That only left the question of wherever she should take the offer on the table or flee the town immediately.

She couldn't deny that she was tempted. The payment alone would resolve a lot of her monetary troubles on the spot, and free her hands in her search for Wang Yonghao. Furthermore, she was sure that the merchant had a lot of other resources she could try to borrow - connections, allies, and so on.

On the other hand, rejecting the offer would force her to flee before Wu Lanhua could punish her - abandoning any hopes of getting her new imperial seal. Setting up the conditions that allowed her to easily get one made so quickly in another town would be extremely difficult - she might be forced to operate without one for weeks, if not many months.

But if she accepted it, she would be placing herself into a situation prepared by a rich, well-connected, manipulative woman with unclear intentions, who must have at least suspected Qian Shanyi was lying about her name, and knew she was a thief. If Wu Lanhua so chose, she could have Liu Fakuang on her tail in moments.

To get more information, she swept through half a dozen taverns throughout town seeking rumors, talked to dock workers while asking for directions, and even pretended to look for a job with one of Wu Lanhua's competitors.

She didn't find all that much. Wu Lanhua was the only daughter to a pair of minor merchants, born somewhere downriver. She built her fortune on the back of an exclusive contract to deliver grain and vegetables to one of the many frontier towns, one very much like Xiaohongshan. Despite what one might have expected, she didn't raise the prices of food into the sky, and instead kept them quite reasonable. It wasn't an altruistic move by any means - she simply had the foresight to realize bleeding her first cow would not end well for her. Cheap food meant that more people moved towards the frontier, increasing the demand for her services, and the number of her contracts with local governments expanded as well.

At this point, her company operated just under half of the ships moving goods up and down the river.

Qian Shanyi had neither the time nor the resources needed to get access to more private information about Wu Lanhua, but she could read between the lines. She was married once, though her husband died a good five years back. In fact, she was well over forty, but looked almost two decades younger - a fairly clear sign she was using expensive alchemical treatments. She would have dismissed it as vanity if she hadn't seen Wu Lanhua wearing sailor clothes like a second skin.

Her romance with Liu Fakuang was the talk of the town a while back - apparently, shortly after he was assigned to this area, he needed to travel to neighboring settlements to coordinate with the imperial administration there, and she offered him a room on her ship that just happened to be heading in the same direction. Their cruise was attacked by demonic cultivators seeking to kidnap Wu Lanhua for ransom, and Liu Fakuang fought them off, sparking the first signs of love. It was truly just like a story from a theater play, but given how often the merchant traversed the river, Qian Shanyi couldn't help but wonder what made demonic cultivators pick the one time her ship happened to be guarded by a spirit hunter to stage their attack.

Apparently, their wedding was set to happen two months from now - many people were involved in planning it, as it was going to be a very public affair.

In the end, she decided to take the offer. There was still a chance it was a trap, but on the whole, she didn't think it was very likely - if Wu Lanhua wanted Qian Shanyi to come to harm, she could have simply tipped off her fiance, and left it at that. In fact, she was starting to suspect that her coming to the ramen shop in person was probably meant as a sign of respect to a fellow conwoman. Whatever plans she had in place, Shanyi would take the place of a tool, not of a sacrificial pawn.

Probably. It was a dangerous assumption to make, but such was the nature of dealing with people.

She gathered all her things, picked up her backpack of swords from its hiding place on a non-descript roof, and headed over to Wu Lanhua's mansion. Just because she was accepting the offer didn't mean she trusted the woman: if she had to run away halfway through the festivities, she wanted to have all of her things already on her.

As she walked, she felt herself growing excited. The days of agonizing waiting, wondering wherever she had unknowingly exposed herself, and trying to guess at threats she could neither see nor anticipate weighed heavily on her, but this? This was her element, a gamble of wills trying to take advantage of each other, and like a fish thrown back into water she felt her soul unfurl.

Now she simply needed to play well, and battle with the unexpected. She couldn't help but think back on when she fell down from the sky, dragged down by the weight of a monster: back then, there was no time to worry, only to sink into the flow and move.

The house from which she stole her dress actually turned out to be merely the back of a much larger estate, meant for servants, kitchens, and the laundry. The front gates were a lot more opulent, leading out into expansive gardens. A young servant was already expecting her at the gates, and led her towards the main house.

She hummed a wistful tune as they walked, scanning the estate for anything notable. The gardens were quite impressive, at the very least by the standards of Xiaohongshan - she even saw an occasional talisman stapled to a post in the middle of a flower bed, controlling moisture or temperature for the plants that could not grow easily in the cool mountain air. There were a couple small pagodas around - nothing more than a roof and some benches, offering shade from the sun.

When they were almost at the main house she saw something that made her pause in her step. It was a small shrine, barely large enough to fit a single person, and clearly kept in good repair - the ground around it was clean of any leaves, and the wood was recently painted. There was a single large candle with small offerings around it, and above the entrance, a symbol that resembled a person, with the moon to their left and a sun to their right.

A karmist shrine, to the heavenly will.

She wasn't sure how to take it. It was placed close to the house, in a spot of some provenance - but at the same time, Wu Lanhua really did not seem like the type. Perhaps it was used by a relative? With the time pressure she was under, she did not spend much time asking about the merchant's other family, but she did know her aging father lived with her.

She asked the servant about it, but he did not know much, only having been hired a few months ago. She still didn't decide how she should deal with this new revelation by the time she was ushered into the kitchens.

The kitchens were truly splendid: wide and gleaming, with every surface polished to a shine. She was greeted by the head chef: an elderly man with a strict gaze and calloused hands, who seemed to take her being there at all as an affront to his skills. She kept her manner polite and noncommittal: she didn't know what Wu Lanhua's plans for her were, or what she told her servants. The chef might have falsely believed she was there to replace him, but telling him as much would not strengthen her position in any way. It was equally plausible that this was meant as a test of her ability to work with others as it was that she was simply being used to put this man in his place: if need be, there would be time to mend relations later.

Once they started to cook he only grew even more disappointed by her skills, or lack thereof, and even started getting a bit snippy. She mostly ignored him: she wasn't hired for her skill as a chef, but because of blatant nepotism, and she saw no need to worry that she wasn't fulfilling a non-existent expectation. If he couldn't get over himself and work with a less competent cook, then that was on him.

Instead, she studied the other workers: surprisingly, most of them didn't even know she was a cultivator. That likely meant Wu Lanhua didn't simply intend to hire her on as an immortal chef - so what brought her here?

She did, of course, observe as much of what the chef and his underlings did as she could, stealing minor tricks and techniques along the way. That was only common sense.

Cooking for a party of merchants was a completely different experience from cooking for herself and Wang Yonghao, or from the ramen shop. The main dish was a piece of river fish cut into the shape of a flower, gently seared, and placed into a careful arrangement of vegetables and rice, topped with a light delicate sauce. The cooking was less about the taste, or speed and consistency, and more about perfecting every individual element to turn every dish into a piece of art. Despite his attitude, the other chef was a real master of the craft, and she greedily sank her teeth into meeting this new challenge. It took her some time to switch her thinking away from worrying over the throughput of dishes: with only a dozen guests to serve, they all could take their time.

Once it was time to present the dishes, Wu Lanhua sent a message that Qian Shanyi was to bring them to the guests, presenting them as if they were her own. This made the older chef go red in the face, which meant Wu Lanhua once again didn't warn him in advance, even though she surely planned to do this from the start. Was it another test? To see if she would let the more experienced man take the spotlight? Or to see if she could find a way to placate him later, to settle things so that they could work together? Or perhaps it was a nod of respect to her, meant to make her more amenable to what she would be asked for later.

She lacked too much information, and there was no time to deliberate things. She decided to err on the side of taking her chances with the presentation: if nothing else, she could better judge Wu Lanhua's mood in person.

If Wu Lanhua wanted to flaunt having an immortal chef on staff, then she could easily oblige her.

One of the maids even brought her a set of cultivator robes: of much lower quality than the ones she wore in Wang Yonghao's world fragment, but appropriate for any normal loose cultivator. The robes were a bit tight in her shoulders, but otherwise fit her figure - she wondered where Wu Lanhua got them, as it couldn't have been from her fiance, who was a much larger man. She quickly stripped out of her skirts and donned the robes, ignoring the looks from the other kitchen workers and cries of protest from the head chef, and joined two other waiters in bringing the dishes into the dining hall.

The guests were sitting around a long table, with Wu Lanhua at the head and Liu Fakuang at her side. He was wearing the same set of spirit hunter robes he always wore, while the merchant woman wore yet another green dress - this one bright and sewn with golden thread, flowing in many layers, making her look like an exotic, yet deadly flower.

Qian Shanyi observed those present carefully, trying to puzzle out the significance of the karmist shrine. Besides the head couple, there were nine other people there, though she only had to service the pair closest to the head of the table. There were two civil servants from the port authority, six other merchants, and even the town's governor. None of Wu Lanhua's relatives ever appeared, and she saw no overt signs of karmism - in symbols or speech.

She told the guests about the dishes - partly from what the other head chef mentioned during the cooking, and partly by blatantly making up stories based on niche cultivation techniques - and they seemed suitably impressed. She thought Liu Fakuang was the only one there who suspected she was spinning tall tales, but he didn't call her on it. A shame - she had prepared a good way to turn it into a joke.

Once the dinner was over, she got some time to relax, only marred by the head chef coming over and trying to challenge her to some sort of cooking duel to determine which one of them was more deserving of the job. When she immediately conceded defeat, not even bothering to open her eyes from her short meditation, he seemed to become even more incensed. Some people just couldn't accept simply being given face.

She heard Wu Lanhua coming from a while away, but didn't bother warning the head chef. He was ranting at her about respect, and she was responding lazily here and there, but largely staying quiet. Ordinarily, she would have applauded his bravery at being willing to openly fight with a cultivator, but the reason for his fight felt so pointless that his admirable commitment to his beliefs and defending his place in the world just felt vaguely annoying.

Perhaps she really was being disrespectful. She realized that with everything she was trying to keep in mind, she managed to forget his name, which was a rare misstep for her.

Asking him about his name did not help him relax in the slightest.

Wu Lanhua saved her from needing to clean blood off the walls - the chef's face was getting so red she could swear his spiritual root dantian was on the verge of explosion, despite his total lack of cultivation - by walking into the room and giving her a convenient excuse to leave.

"So," she said, picking up her backpack and approaching the merchant with a grin, schemes starting to spin up within her mind, "I think it's time we had that talk."

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read three chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon for a low low price of 3$ per month.

Alternatively, if you are feeling parched on new writing while you wait for new chapters, how about read my other story, The Summoned Hero Is A Historical Materialist?? It's been called mildly political and is very different from Feng Shui Engineering, but it is the best I can offer.

I also now have a discord server, where you can discuss my fics, and perhaps read some semi-exclusive worldbuilding notes. Come hang out!

 

[Winged_One]

Wu Lanhua led her to the upper floors of the mansion, and out onto a balcony that encircled the building. The wide gardens surrounded it, and with the added height, she could easily see all the way out to the surrounding streets, and from there, to the rest of the town, terraces spiraling down below them. Below them, the other guests were starting to mingle together, with waiters and waitresses bringing out glasses of warm wine and plates of delicate, airy cookies. The head chef mentioned they had a formal name, though it avoided her at the moment - something foreign, starting with maca-, she was almost certain - and she resolved to look it up in the library, once she had her seal and could do research like a proper cultivator.

As they stepped out into the cold, windy night, she saw Wu Lanhua put on an overcoat and a pair of thick gloves, ones she clearly prepared in advance and left next to the balcony door just for this talk.

"Should you be leaving your guests to their own devices?" Qian Shanyi asked her, "You are the host, after all."

"They aren't the only guests of my estate tonight." Wu Lanhua gave her a meaningful look. "My absence would not be missed quickly."

They were speaking quietly, making sure that none below could hear them. Qian Shanyi leaned against one of the thick columns supporting the balcony roof, with her back to the gardens, and faced the merchant woman. Out of the corner of her eye, she kept a watch on Liu Fakuang, far away in the gardens where he was regaling a pair of merchants with a story. She made sure to turn her mouth away from him when she spoke - she wouldn't put it past the spirit hunter to be capable of reading lips, even if he wasn't looking in their direction.

Wu Lanhua just happened to stand so that the column concealed her from Liu Fakuang entirely, and she wondered whether it was a coincidence, or if her paranoia really was justified.

"I hope my cooking has been to your satisfaction?" Qian Shanyi asked to start off their verbal fencing on a neutral note.

"It was exemplary." Wu Lanhua smiled. "A true credit to your cooking skills."

The woman must have known she did much less than a third of the actual work - in fact, her largest contribution was simply suffusing the ingredients with her spiritual energy. This might have been a jab, meant to imply her cooking skills were mediocre, but if so, she did not take the bait.

"I cannot take much credit, I am afraid. I merely prepared the ingredients - your chef did all the rest."

"That man is far too arrogant for his station." She waved Shanyi off. "It will be good for him to know his place. Don't try to diminish your contribution on his account."

Qian Shanyi hummed noncommittally. Perhaps that explained some things, or perhaps it was merely another jab. It mattered little, in the end. She decided to go for a probe.

"I couldn't help but notice that your estate is lacking an immortal chef," she said, "surely a merchant of your station could afford to employ one?"

"You flatter me," Wu Lanhua responded, "I am merely a minor regional trader of little fame or wealth."

Qian Shanyi gave her a look. Being deferential was only to be expected, but that edged into outright lying.

"Besides, perhaps you underestimate your own value, honorable immortal Lan," she continued with a smile, "immortal chefs are rare, even among you cultivators, and most of them do not travel so far out towards the frontier. They have little reason to. I had one in my employ - but he had sadly left us months ago, on his own business to a city downstream, saying he would return in time for our wedding."

That…didn't really fit. She was missing something, and for a moment, debated wherever she should hide her ignorance - but newly minted immortal chef Lan Yishan had plenty of reasons to be ignorant.

"If they get paid as handsomely as I am here," she said, raising a curious eyebrow, "then surely many loose cultivators would jump at the chance?"

"Oh, some do." Wu Lanhua nodded easily. "But not even one in thirty. Some lack the talent for it, others disdain the practice of cooking - but for most, it is an issue of trust. Would you welcome a stranger to cook for you? The techniques of honorable cultivators set them apart from us mere mortals, but this separation also invites suspicion, and those without the proper connections struggle to ever gain them."

"Yet you have trusted me," Qian Shanyi kept her eyebrow raised, setting the obvious proposal aside for now, "What a curious thing to do, for a stranger."

"I simply thought I had a good read on you - and I was right."

"I am a private person by nature, honorable merchant Wu." She frowned. "I say little and reveal less."

"Come now, there is no need to be so formal," Wu Lanhua winked at her, "Just call me Lanhua. I practically feel like we have been born under one roof, gossiping over each other's loves, sharing each other's clothes... Is it so strange to trust my sister in spirit?"

"Gossip can be dangerous, if it comes to rest in the wrong ears."

"And with whom would I have time to gossip? I do not want to bother my fiance with such trivialities, but I can also hardly share the secrets of my friends outside of the family, can I?"

That was probably about as good of a promise to not tell Liu Fakuang about her as she was going to get. Despite the inherent threat, Qian Shanyi felt perfectly relaxed. It felt good to spar with someone who knew what they were doing. With that small assurance in place, she felt it was time to get down to business.

"Then let us gossip, from one woman to another." She smiled. "What was it that you wanted to know?"

"Oh, just to hear your story. The life in these frontier towns can be dreadfully boring - I hope you will indulge me?"

There was no way that was true, but she could play along.

Before coming to the estate, she had already decided on her cover story, built to suit her needs. Her first priority was getting Wu Lanhua off her tail so that she could safely leave town without her cover being blown. The distant second was figuring out whether she could borrow some of the merchant's resources in her search for Wang Yonghao.

The trouble was that she could tell that Wu Lanhua wanted her for something, but had not laid out her demands in the open. It could be that she was simply looking to hire her on as an immortal chef, but that seemed doubtful. She had clearly used the pretext of this night to arrange this exact conversation, where both of them could talk in relative safety and isolation - if she simply sought an employee, there was no need to bother with this charade. This meant that her proposal had to be unusual, and potentially illegal.

Sadly, Qian Shanyi could not read minds. She would need to weave her tales blind, with only guesses at the other woman's true intentions.

If she made herself seem too vulnerable, then Wu Lanhua might decide to push the issue, put her into a gentle armlock of unstated threats and implied blackmail. But neither could she claim to be secure and in no need of help, lest her entire story shatter into the dust of disbelief, for they both knew she stole her dress. Worse still, even if she managed to sell it, then it might simply invite a different type of interest from the merchant.

There was a razor-sharp line here: one where she made herself seem powerful enough to not be worth directly coercing, yet not so powerful as to demand a close alliance. Then she could take some gifts from Wu Lanhua under a promise of future profit, and vanish into the wind.

"I could tell you of my childhood, or of my path of cultivation, but that is not what truly interests you, is it?" Qian Shanyi raised an eyebrow. "You are wondering how I ended up in Xiaohongshan without any clothes to call my own."

Wu Lanhua nodded at her, smiling with only her eyes.

"An unfortunate accident is to blame." She shook her head. "I have been stranded in the wilderness for quite a while, and once I reached civilization, my robes could no longer serve me."

She told the merchant an amended story of her adventures, avoiding any mention of Wang Yonghao or his inner world. Even though she trusted her rhetorical skills, it was best to keep to the truth, as much as was reasonable, and so she cut the events down to the bare essentials: after suffering a teleportation accident she ended up in the ruins of a sect with a malformed spirit vein, and managed to survive in the wilderness until she reached Xiaohongshan.

She spoke of the sect in casual terms, but she was sure that an experienced merchant like Wu Lanhua would realize the implication hidden between the words: she, and she alone, knew the location of an entire unclaimed spirit vein, one that she could share with any potential allies. In the end, this was all about a balance of leverages, and great riches were a solid lever.

"A wonderful story, honorable cultivator Lan, but I wonder how your companion fits into this?" Wu Lanhua raised an eyebrow, once her narrative had concluded. Her face seemed impassive.

"My companion?"

"The man you were with, when you rented a room at a tavern?"

So she knew about that. Qian Shanyi already figured it was fairly likely - it wouldn't have been hard for Wu Lanhua to connect the dots, if her fiance simply told her about his day - and so made sure not to say anything that would directly contradict her story in the event the topic of Wang Yonghao came up. It was still worth trying, just in case it worked.

"Hm," she said, "I suppose it would have been somewhat pointless to try to conceal this from you. No disrespect was meant, of course."

"Of course," Wu Lanhua said, with slight amusement in her voice. From anyone else, she would have expected resentment of the fact that she would try to hide something so major, but she could tell that the merchant woman would have looked down on her if she didn't even try.

"I did indeed have an accomplice," Qian Shanyi continued, switching seamlessly to her second story, "and the teleportation accident was anything but - we came to the ruins on purpose, though we did not expect to be stuck there with no exit. We knew where to find them, through methods that I must keep to myself."

She wove her lies again, this time a story about a pair of cultivators on an expedition for riches, one that built naturally on what she told before - but as she went along, she saw the face of the merchant woman turn to bored disappointment.

"Perhaps I really was mistaken about you." Wu Lanhua shook her head, pursing her lips. "A shame."

"You do not believe me?" She raised an eyebrow.

"How could I question the word of an honorable cultivator?" She sighed, stepping out of the column's shadow and smiling at someone far away in the gardens. "But the weight of the tales you spin is beyond what the thread of mere words can hold."

"I could see how what I say may be hard to believe." Qian Shanyi nodded. "But perhaps it would be easier if I showed you?"

She put down her backpack, and carefully took one of the swords out of it, unwrapping it from the silk that concealed it from the senses of cultivators. She was glad to see Wu Lanhua step back behind the same column she was using to obscure herself from the gardens - that meant the merchant still believed it was worthwhile to keep their conversation private. Once the sword was free, she flipped it over and handed it to the merchant, hilt first.

"I trust that Miss Lanhua would know how to appraise a spiritual artifact?"

Showing off the swords was an undeniable risk, but she felt it was a good bet. Wu Lanhua already guessed that Qian Shanyi was the very target of her fiance's stakeout. The swords would give her proof, but ultimately, this mattered little for the true guarantor of Shanyi's safety was the interest and calculation of the other woman - as long as that persisted, she would not tattle to Liu Fakuang. Keeping that interest afloat by whatever means necessary was of primary importance.

Wu Lanhua took the sword with great care, and Qian Shanyi saw the gloves on her hands shine with a gentle light, and felt spiritual energy flow into the weapon. Shanyi's eyebrows rose: she expected her to know how to perform a basic appraisal - even her father could manage that much - but this was far beyond that. Wu Lanhua was no cultivator - those gloves had to be one of the rare tools that allowed an ordinary person to channel spiritual energy. Such channeling was, by necessity, much cruder than anything a cultivator could accomplish, and was a waste of spirit stones besides - but it was still invaluable, for the surface features could only tell you so much.

She waited while Wu Lanhua calmly swept her hands over the sword, pausing at the key points along its length with practiced ease, watching glyphs and spiritual conductance lines shine with different colors on its surface. Where did she learn to do this? As far as Qian Shanyi could find out before she came here, she did not trade in spiritual energy goods, let alone weaponry. Perhaps her suspicions of illegal dealings were not as baseless as she thought.

When Wu Lanhua finished with her examination, she gave Qian Shanyi an appraising look and a slight smile. At least for now, her gamble seemed to have worked.

"I carry three more swords of a similar quality," she said, kicking her backpack for emphasis. "I trust this makes my story more believable?"

"There are many places in the empire where one might obtain a sword or two," Wu Lanhua mused, handing the sword over, and watching Qian Shanyi hide it back in her backpack, "yet perhaps it doesn't matter. One cannot live by the sword alone - it seems to me that you are in need of a buyer?"

"Is that an offer I hear? Made to this humble, estranged cultivator?"

"Are there truly strangers in the world of coin?"

"What if these swords were stolen?"

"Are they?"

"No. But you had no way of knowing this."

"I assure you, I have my ways of checking."

"I must commend you on your relaxed attitude, Miss Lanhua," Qian Shanyi said, crossing the arms on her chest. "What if I were from the empire, here to test your honor?"

"You are not from the empire." Wu Lanhua laughed loudly, a sudden burst of sound among their quiet dialogue. "You don't have the character for it. Besides, the imperial tax office might have long hands, but it moves slowly. If you really were an inspector, I would have seen the signs far in advance of your arrival."

Qian Shanyi frowned. 'Don't have the character?' What did she mean by that?

"An interesting attitude, for someone with a karmist shrine on their estate," Qian Shanyi said, taking the opportunity to probe her, "I would have expected you to give a lot more face to the empire, what with the business around that so-called 'heavenly mandate'."

She scrunched her nose as she said the words, but it had to be done.

"The shine is not mine, but a gift I made." Wu Lanhua waved her off, "I have never been much interested in cosmic questions. The world of men is much closer to me."

A gift? What kind of gift is built on your own estate? And a gift to whom?

She considered pushing the issue, but by the time she made the decision the moment had already passed.

"It seems I was not wrong about you after all," Wu Lanhua said, ignorant of what was going through her head at that moment, "and there is a fruitful ground for cooperation between us. My kitchen is lacking an immortal chef - would you like the position? It would make our future discussions far, far easier to arrange."

She briefly considered hiding the truth, but decided against it.

"I am afraid I would make a poor chef," she shook her head, "for I may have to leave town at any moment. You know about my accomplice - we have split up due to a misunderstanding. Once I find where he went, I intend to go after him."

"Go after him?" Wu Lanhua raised her eyebrow. "For what purpose? Revenge?"

"I made a promise to help him with a certain problem, one I intend to keep."

A complex series of emotions passed over Wu Lanhua's face, finally settling on pity, her posture tense.

"There will be other…accomplices in the future, honorable immortal Lan." She sighed. "That is no reason at all to throw away - or, at best, delay - our mutually beneficial relationship."

"What are you implying?" she frowned.

"There are few things that lead to more mistakes than love and lust."

Qian Shanyi blinked, and couldn't hold herself back from laughing. Wu Lanhua watched her carefully, though some tension seemed to have left her.

"Love - oh sweet heavenbreakers, absolutely not!" She wiped away a tear from her eye, still chuckling. "The man is as transparent as a cup of water and as complex as a board, there is nothing there that interests me. No, that relationship is far more material."

"I have seen men and women fool themselves as easily as taking a step off a cliff," Wu Lanhua said, but she could tell that her worries have largely vanished.

Still, it always paid to push the envelope.

"If it is courtship you wish to speak of," she said, purring and taking a small step forwards to put a hand on the other woman's shoulder, "I much prefer those who have some hidden depths to them."

Wu Lanhua's gaze grew sharp, and she slid away with a step of her own.

"I have a fiance, honorable immortal Lan," she spoke quietly, the cadence of her voice mirroring that of a slammed door, "one I have worked quite hard at acquiring. I would advise you not to sabotage my work."

"Oh but the challenge makes it all the wilder, does it not?" Qian Shanyi chuckled. "Finding ways to hide, to get away with it, dancing just on the edge of possibility?"

The merchant's gaze grew harsher still, yet curiously, she did not protest further.

"Oh I jest, I jest." She laughed, stepping away. "Still, Lanhua, I hope that proves my point - and it's about time you started to call me Yishan. This asymmetry of respect is starting to unnerve me."

"If it isn't attraction, Yishan, then why bother with the man?" Wu Lanhua said, visibly relaxing.

"I made a promise." Qian Shanyi raised her eyebrows. "Is that not enough?"

"Come now." Wu Lanhua waved her off. "Be serious. Those like us bend promises like wind bends grass."

"Perhaps we are not as alike as you may think." She frowned, "I take my promises quite seriously."

"That simply moves the question backwards. Why give a promise in the first place?"

She couldn't tell her the truth, obviously, and took a moment to come up with a plausible alternative.

"I intended to delve into more ruins in the future, and he would be a great assistant," Shanyi said, "I still believe so."

"There are hundreds of loose cultivators willing to do that work." The merchant woman scoffed. "And with wealth, you can easily seek out the ones you like. If what you say is true, then whatever treasures he may have taken with him cannot compare to a spirit vein. It is pointless to chase after him - this is a waste of your time."

They can, actually.

"Miss Lanhua, I have my plans and you have yours." She frowned. "I have made no comment about your fiance, even though what you are doing - this emotional manipulation spanning years, with no end in sight - frankly disgusts me."

"He benefits from it as much as I will," Wu Lanhua said, crossing her arms. "Ask him how much of my money he spends on cultivation, and it will be proof enough."

"It isn't his choice. But my point is that even if we are alike in some ways, we differ in others. For me, a promise, given of my own free will, is important."

"A lie if I have ever heard one." Wu Lanhua scoffed. Qian Shanyi's eyebrow twitched in response. She was starting to grow irritated at this line of questioning.

"Will you claim to know me better than I myself do?"

"How old are you?"

"Of what possible relevance is this?"

"Young, then, or you would have said." A smile twitched on Wu Lanhua's lips. "I have decades of experience above your own, and I tell you that you are lying to yourself. At the end of the day, you will always choose your skin over that of a pawn."

"This is nonsense." Qian Shanyi crossed her arms on her chest. "I am not like you, Lanhua."

Wu Lanhua sighed in exasperation.

"Do I have to spell it out, child?" she said. "You said you may vanish from this town at any moment - this means you think yourself on the cusp of finding your man, yet you did not name a date when you would leave. But if you knew of a way to proceed - some divination or tracking technique, no doubt - you would have used it already, so why are you still here? I would venture a guess that this technique has a cost, and for all your rationalizations about your promises, you are simply unwilling to pay it."

"The cost wouldn't be borne by me." She narrowed her eyes. "That is why I am hesitating."

"I can't speak of cultivation, but every debt I have ever seen could be paid by either party."

The words shook Qian Shanyi, and it took her a moment to stabilize herself. Wu Lanhua saw her hesitation, and a grin bloomed on her face.

"I am right, aren't I? Perhaps you didn't even think of the possibility? Subconsciously, you will always put yourself first - that's who you are."

Qian Shanyi pursed her lips in silence as gears spun in her mind.

"I thought of taking you on as a project." Wu Lanhua shook her head ruefully, sighing. "I could teach you how to use your natural talent, shape it into a truly versatile tool. I am held back by my lack of cultivation, but you wouldn't be so limited. Come on, abandon your foolish chase."

Qian Shanyi looked away.

"I will have to think about this," she said quietly. "Thank you for this conversation, honorable merchant Wu."

"Take your time." Wu Lanhua smiled. "Find me in the gardens when you decide - and make sure to partake of the refreshments. They are, after all, exquisite."

She watched Wu Lanhua retreat back into the house, picked up her backpack, and went on a walk around the balcony, heading to the other side of the house. What she said kept spinning in her head.

You will always put yourself first - that's who you are.

Was it true?

How much of her desire to find Wang Yonghao stemmed from their deal being broken, and how much from her own selfish desire to use his resources for cultivation? She had to admit that the agreement they had, if it could even be called that, was made by putting him under a degree of pressure. And when she thought back on it, even if there was no deal in place - would she have not tried to find him anyways?

She didn't think to pay the cost herself, even though the way to do so was obvious in retrospect. Didn't even consider it.

She leaned against the balcony railing on the other side of the house, sighed, and stared into the starry skies. Wu Lanhua was offering her a way out - a life of relative luxury, with little threat to speak of.

But not a life that could challenge the heavens. Out here on the frontier she could, at best, advance into the building foundation stage. With Yonghao, the threat would be greater, but so would the rewards.

Was she willing to make that gamble?

"Fine," she whispered to the skies, "I give up, you bastards and murderers. You win."

She drew breath, and scowled.

"Heavens, you who gaze from on high," she ceded through her clenched teeth, "you who slaughter thousands, who bleed and suck dry entire kingdoms, who would rather have the entire world burn than cede a single hair of your authority to us mere mortals, hear my vow!"

She spat on the floor. Small mercies, but at least the vows did not have to be polite.

"Grant me luck enough to find Wang Yonghao," she lied smoothly, "across whatever lands he fled to, from your stores of stolen power. In exchange, I pledge that I will force him to cultivate as hard as he can for an entire month. The bastard owes me for leaving me in the lurch."

She stumbled, feeling all the spiritual energy in her body drain to nothing through her spiritual root, vanishing in a direction askew to reality as the vow took.

For a moment, regret flooded her mind. The energy heavens took would not simply vanish - it would go back down in the form of tribulation lightning whenever another cultivator challenged the heavens, risking their life to ascend to a new realm of cultivation. Every person who made a vow to the heavens made the task of others that much more hazardous, that much more likely to fail - a stain on the world, making it worse for everyone involved. Fortunately, most cultivators would never stoop so low - even those who did not know their history would avoid helping the enemy that sought to kill you whenever they could.

The vows did not take most of the time - motives of the heavens remained mysterious, and what they chose to officiate and what they did not was a matter of guesswork - but she was not surprised hers did. She already suspected that they kept a tight watch on Wang Yonghao, and this seemed to confirm it. Fortunately for her, the Heavens could not read your mind - merely make guesses, same as any other person.

You could not fool blind luck, but you could fool the Heavens.

Her arms grew weak as for the first time in years all her meridians were fully emptied. The flow of spiritual energy ceased, and she felt the vow settle in the back of her mind, like a kernel of corn stuck in between teeth - always there, always bringing attention to itself, but easy enough to lose track of, with time.

She took her divination bottle out of her backpack, spun it, and half the dice were ones.

Spiritual energy in her body would regenerate, of course, and maintaining the vow itself would only reduce her reserves by a mere fraction. It would stay there, waiting for her to either complete the terms or violate them.

And when she would find Wang Yonghao and break off the deal she just made, she would have to face the heavenly tribulation.

---

Author Note: If you'd like to read three chapters ahead, or read other works I write, you can find me on patreon for a low low price of 3$ per month.

Alternatively, if you are feeling parched on new writing while you wait for new chapters, how about read my other story, The Summoned Hero Is A Historical Materialist?? It's been called mildly political and is very different from Feng Shui Engineering, but it is the best I can offer.

I also now have a discord server, where you can discuss my fics, and perhaps read some semi-exclusive worldbuilding notes. Come hang out!