DoSomething
Trash in trash can
I'm on this moment and i have quote for this
"It's time to party like it's 2023" - Johnny Silverhand
Reach Heaven Via Feng Shui Engineering, Drug Trade And Tax Evasion
- Thread starter Winged_One
- Start date
- Original Novel Fantasy
I'm on this moment and i have quote for this
"It's time to party like it's 2023" - Johnny Silverhand
BagFullOfLizards
Some bag, mostly lizards
- Location
- A bag
Adds another note to the "something Is Up with this reality" column
And apparently it's getting worse! You'd think maintaining and repairing the fabric of reality would be a responsibility of the gods! Depending on how things are going, overthrowing the heavens may just be a matter of long term survival.
I wonder if Yonghao's luck could be a bid by the universe to make someone capable of fixing it? Based on no evidence, but it does seem like the weird state of the world keeps coming up.
Chapter 55: Pass On Your Wisdom To Save A Thousand Souls
Winged_One
Head Engineer of ATHENA
- Location
- Low Earth Orbit
Author Note: Want to read ahead? You can find some patreon-exclusive posts, as well as FIVE more chapters, over on my patreon, for a low price of 3$.
I also have a discord server, where I post memes I make about FSE, and occasionally discuss some plans and worldbuilding details.
I also have a discord server, where I post memes I make about FSE, and occasionally discuss some plans and worldbuilding details.
The two towns, Reflection Ridge and Glaze Ridge, were home to three sects - Nine Singing Vessels, Northern Scarlet Stream, and Palace of the Glowing Cliffs, who, collectively, controlled most of the trade in heavenly materials and earthly treasures. There was no way to sell the loot they got from the tribulation in any reasonable time without going through one of them.
The most natural choice would have been Northern Scarlet Stream - the sect of Jian Shizhe and Jian Wei, but Qian Shanyi didn't want to put all her eggs into a single basket. Which brought her to the sect compound of the Nine Singing Vessels.
Nine Singing Vessels was a sect of refiners, making and selling swords, talismans, and other equipment that used spiritual energy. That meant they had a reason to buy the materials for their own use, or have customers that would be interested - but it also meant she had to deal with refiners. Refinement of materials held a hundred times more secrets than all other cultivation, and the sects dedicated to it grew all the more insular for it, and guarded their positions in the empire with vicious jealousy. To this day, most refinement sects were still family clans, just like a hundred and fifty years ago, all disciples merely members of a single extended family, and women barely even let out of the compound.
Ordinarily, they would have turned her around at the gates. Fortunately, a mountain of money opened all doors.
It took her a good hour to go through her list of materials together with one elder Li, a representative of the sect - a cultivator well into his age, his beard white as snow. He wanted her to sell them everything in a single go - but she could never agree to that. She and Wang Yonghao were playing at being mysterious, yet possessing great wealth, and selling everything at once would make them seem desperate for money. After all, the longer you sought a customer, the better the price you could fetch.
Instead, she wanted the sect to work as her middleman. They would put up her materials for sale in their stores, and after a month, find the highest bidder for any given ingredient. In exchange, she would grant them a percentage from every sale - or the material itself, if they could offer a higher price.
Elder Li was an experienced haggler, not giving an inch to her, for all that his style differed radically. They were swiftly approaching an impasse - which is exactly what she wanted.
"Very well." She sighed, pretending to concede. "How about this: I will sell you one tenth of the materials immediately. In fact, I will bleed myself dry and give them to you at half price - but the other half, you will pay in information."
Elder Li's stare could have pierced straight to her soul, if her eyes let anything show. "Information?"
"I have an academic interest in the Heavens," she lied, "and thus I seek out any information about them. Artifacts, tribulation records, stories of sects that have practiced heavenly techniques - anything. Anything you sell - either directly, or by refining one of my materials further - has to be paid with an article that I could not easily find elsewhere."
Elder Li pursed his lips. "We are refiners. Not researchers."
She folded her hands in a begging gesture. "Elder Li, this here humble cultivator begs you, do not stab a dagger of refusal straight through my heart like this. If you cannot do so, then pay someone else. Surely a sect of your eminence can open many doors with but a glance? This is already the best gift I could possibly offer you - after all, I have no way of knowing how valuable this information will be. Do we have a deal?"
They did not have a deal. It took her another twenty minutes to argue Elder Li into something they could both agree to - but in the end, she got exactly what she wanted. The supposed heart of the deal, thousands of spirit stones worth of materials, she couldn't care less about, even if the sect ended up scamming her entirely. It was a massive amount of money - but they didn't need a massive amount of money. A tenth of it at half price was still well over four hundred spirit stones, more than enough for the foreseeable future.
And on top of it, she got an agreement for information she would struggle to get any other way.
The postal office seemed different with every visit. The first time, it was dark out, the hall deserted, with only Junming manning the post. The second time, she came for her tribulation, and had no mind for anything else. The third time was brief, merely a few hours later, and only to tell Junming what to do with their loot. The fourth was just before they went off to the forest to steal trees - to consult maps, check out a couple books, and ask for a copy of the cultivator almanac - but merely a single day after the tribulation, the hill still stank of blood. But the office still stood, and after yesterday's rain, even the flowers framing the entrance seemed to straighten out.
No matter the crisis, after a while, everything went back to normal - and when she walked through the doors, she saw a good dozen people waiting for their mail as if nothing had happened. Junming was back behind the counter. Yesterday it was postmaster Chen Changjie - perhaps they simply switched up every other day.
This time, she patiently waited in line. She was the only cultivator here, and the ordinary people around her tried not to stare - or at least, averted their eyes when she met theirs with a smile. All except one.
A boy, not even ten years old, was holding onto the long skirts of his mother close to the front of the queue. His head was spinning around the room like a windmill, and when he saw Qian Shanyi walk in, his eyes widened in awe, and he immediately headed over to her. The mother was too engrossed in shuffling through some papers in her hands to notice.
"Are you the one who killed the tribulation?" the boy asked, positively vibrating with excitement. His voice was surprisingly quiet for a child.
Qian Shanyi crouched to the boy's eye level, lightly angling her sword sheath on her waist so it wouldn't scrape against the floor. She had no affinity for children, and had, thankfully, managed to largely avoid dealing with them back in her sect - but if someone looked this excited about cultivation, she couldn't just brush them off. She was much worse than this at his age, after all.
"I was the target," she said, "but I didn't fight alone. Did you see us transcend?"
The boy nodded. There were sparks in his eyes. "It was so cool! The ox was so big but then you went swish and swoop and it was dead just like that, and then the dragon - "
The boy's mother at the front raised her eyes from her papers, and gasped as she realized her son was gone from her side. She spun around, and breathed out when she saw him talking to Qian Shanyi. "Ah Muyang!" she said sharply as she approached. "I told you to stay by my side!"
A spike of panic raced across the boy's face as he spun around to face his mother. "I just -" he said, and fell silent under her stern glare, shrinking in on himself.
Turning towards Qian Shanyi, the woman bowed. Qian Shanyi gave her a small nod in return, not rising up from her crouched pose. "Honorable immortal, I must humbly apologize for my son bothering you. I will correct this misbehavior at once."
"He wasn't bothering me," Qian Shanyi said simply. Cultivators were eccentric existences, so she understood the wariness the older woman must have felt at seeing her son talk to a stranger. "It seemed to me that he wanted to hear some cultivation tales, that's all."
Muyang nodded vigorously. His mother sighed, rubbing her eyes. "We live nearby, and he has always been obsessed with it… He even begged to come with me today, just to look at where that terrifying tribulation happened two days ago," she said, before turning back to glare at her son. "But that is no excuse to leave his mother's side!"
Qian Shanyi tapped her cheek. She would have gladly entertained the boy for a bit, but this woman had, in her short-sightedness of voicing her own misplaced worries, made this quite a bit harder. By all rights, she should have been happy that someone else could keep an eye on her son while she dealt with the mail - but by publicly telling him off, she'd be losing face if she immediately backed down and agreed to do exactly what he wanted. Worse, if Shanyi proposed it, the mother might also lose face if she didn't agree - and that just might make her take it out on the kid once they went home.
The last thing she wanted was to get this child into trouble over something so trivial. She needed to give this woman some kind of excuse…
Qian Shanyi stood up, taking a step closer to the woman and lowering her voice, so the boy would not hear. "Fellow -" she began, just as her mind reached out for something in common between the two of them, and ran into her complete ignorance. "- petitioner of the postal office," she continued, blowing past the spot of awkwardness, "Of late, my life has been filled with trials, and this latest tribulation almost killed me. On top of that, I have not seen my family in what feels like years. To have a spot to share the brightness of cultivation would be such a contrast that you'd be doing me a favor."
She saw the woman hesitate, and, glancing behind her, pushed her final card in. "It seems that your place in the queue is almost up."
"Of course. I would be honored to assist you." the woman bowed, and glanced down at Muyang. "I will take some time with the post. Entertain the honorable immortal in the meantime."
Muyang nodded vigorously. Qian Shanyi smiled, motioning to the seats lining the walls. "Take a seat. Have you heard the tale of how the immortal monkey king helped the cultivators?"
She didn't know how Muyang managed to not squeal.
"...and that's why to this day, there is a cultivator talking to the monkey king at all times of day and night, and in return, he allows us to harvest hundreds of different heavenly materials and earthly treasures from his body." she said, finishing up her tale. Reaching into a bandolier, she pulled out a little bottle, full of powdered ivory of the rampaging divine ape, and shook it to punctuate her point.
She'd gathered a bit of an audience once she started - other people waiting in queue, mostly, and she spoke a bit louder for their benefit. They gave her looks - most cultivators wouldn't have been quite so casual in their interactions - though their surprise faded quickly. One man even left and returned a minute later with a pair of his own children.
"That is so sad," one of the new girls said quietly, "they cut off his teeth every day, like some kind of fruit?"
Qian Shanyi shrugged. "It is his choice. To cultivate is to rebel against the heavens - if I was sealed under a mountain, I would have done the same thing to spite the bastards."
"It's not sad, it's cool," Muyang said, "Tell us another one!"
"I think you won't have the time for it," she chuckled, glancing at the boy's mother. She could see that she was almost finished with Junming.
Muyang deflated in disappointment. "Do you think I could be a cultivator?" he asked quietly.
She snorted. "How old are you?"
"Nine," the boy said without blinking.
Was that plausible? He seemed a bit too short to her eyes. How tall were nine year olds supposed to be, anyways?
When in doubt, bluff.
"Did you know cultivators can smell lies?" she said, tapping her nose.
He blushed, folding immediately. "Seven…" he said, quietly.
The two other kids gasped in shock, amazed by her powers of divination.
"Hm." She hummed. "Well, Muyang, most cultivators only unlock their spiritual root around fourteen, so you have a long way to go. But even then, most likely not. Only one in a hundred ever unlock their spiritual root, and it's down to chance who is lucky and who is not."
He deflated further. "But I want to be a cultivator," he said stubbornly.
She ruffled his hair, and he glared at her in annoyance. She laughed at the look on his face: if there was one thing that made dealing with children tolerable, it was honesty. No ordinary adult would dare glare at a cultivator quite like that.
"To cultivate is to rebel against the heavens," she said, "and so if you rebel against the heavens, you are already a cultivator, aren't you? We all do the best we can - even the monkey king still rebels by sacrificing his teeth. If you strive upwards, you'll always find a way to help, even if you won't be the one holding the sword."
She saw Muyang's mother step away from the counter of the postal office, and decided to leave the kid on a high note. "Here," she reached into her robes, and drew out a whistle Wang Yonghao made from a bone of the Heavenly Rooster. He had taken to bone carving as easily as to woodworking, and had made three different whistles in his free time over the last couple days - they had no shortage of small bones, after all.
The whistle looked the part - dark gray and with a shine of steel. She handed it to Muyang, and he all but fainted from the excitement.
"A little present, in return for having listened to my stories," she said, "it's made from a bone of a heavenly rooster, and will attract a bit of metal-type spiritual energy. Treat it with care."
"And if I get in trouble I can blow on it thrice and you'll come and save me?"
"No." She laughed. "It's just a regular whistle."
A whistle made from a heavenly material, so tough you could ram it straight through a block of stone and not even scratch the surface, and ridiculously expensive for what it was - but at the end of the day, just a whistle.
Muyang leapt up off his seat, and caught up with his mother, clutching the whistle tightly. Before they left through the doors, he turned back and gave her a comically low bow.
"Can we also get a whistle?" one of the other kids asked, bringing her attention back to them.
"One gift per day," she said, rolling her eyes. "But I suppose I could tell you another fable."
She still had some time to kill before her spot in the queue was up.
By the time she managed to extricate herself from the crowd of children - she swore that they multiplied any time she looked away - a good twenty minutes had passed. Without the oversight of her sect elders hanging over her head, telling them stories felt surprisingly relaxing - though a part of it was how enraptured they were that she was talking to them at all. As soon as that faded, she was sure the usual annoyances would creep right back.
When she stepped up to the counter, Junming gave her a small nod. With this many ordinary people in the room, they were back to wearing their face-concealing cowl. It was impossible to tell their reactions through it, so she hoped they weren't annoyed about her unintentionally turning their office into a nursery. She certainly would have been.
<How may I help?> they signed.
"I am here for my copy of the cultivator almanac," she said, pulling three letters out of her robes, "The Postmaster said it should be ready today. And I would like your opinion about a couple letters."
Junming glanced at the stack in her hands, and then nodded, locked up the letterboxes behind themselves, and led her into a small, private side room, with a solid table and a pair of chairs. She took her seat, setting the three letters on the table, while they pulled their cowl off and sat down opposite her.
<Almanac isn't ready yet>, they signed. She had to guess at the first word, but a sign that was based on a book being opened seemed clear enough. <Scribe said it will be ready by noon.>
"That is fine," she said, "If I don't come for it later today, send it to our tavern, if you don't mind."
Junming nodded, and picked up her stack of letters, giving the top one a curious look - it was already sealed into an envelope.
"That one is private," she said, "the other two, please."
The first letter was to Wu Lanhua, broadly explaining that she was in good health, and thanking her for the assistance. She deliberated on wherever to send it or not, but in the end, decided in favor. For all that Wu Lanhua's overtures had been misplaced and pretty forceful, it was unquestionable that she had been incredibly helpful, and had kept Shanyi's identity secret from her fiance. If Lanhua wanted to, she could find out where Shanyi had gone easily enough - Curls leaping into the sky was hard to miss, after all. Sending a letter was only polite, and the merchant would be a good contact for the future - not to mention being an interesting person in general.
Of course, she didn't address it directly to Wu Lanhua - there was no need to make their personal relationship known to everyone who would so much as look at the letter. The envelope was addressed to the general offices of her shipping business, and contained a second envelope, this one addressed to Wu Lanhua personally. Her underlings could deliver it from there.
While she was busy ruminating, Junming had already picked up the next letter, and was quickly reading through it. It was a detailed account of their tribulation, with her and Wang Yonghao's notes on what they observed, and how they dealt with various challenges.
<Many people forget to write these,> Junming signed once they were done, <I haven't even started mine yet.>
"It's my civic duty, is it not?" she said, running a hand through her hair, "I am sure the ministry of statistics would appreciate an update, especially with how rare the Zodiac tribulation is."
<You said you wanted my opinion?>
"Just to make sure I didn't miss anything important. I couldn't explain what you did with the ice, for example."
<I'll add it to my report,> Junming signed, and set the letter aside, picking up the last one.
They read it quietly. Their natural inclination to stay silent made her glad it was their shift today. <This is tricky,> they finally signed, setting the letter aside.
"It is." She nodded. "But do you foresee any issues?"
The third letter was her proposal for helping cultivators get out of heavenly vows.
It really was a tricky subject, especially since none of it could ever be spoken aloud. Very few cultivators made heavenly vows in the first place, and only a vanishing few made one without being sure they could fulfill their part of the bargain. Absolutely nobody, outside of fables and herself, even tried making one while intending to break it. This was why no system of help already existed.
But some cultivators might, through no fault of their own, end up in a situation where completing the vow became impossible - and realize this before the Heavens did. To save even a single cultivator from the jaws of Heavens was righteous, even if they walked into those jaws themselves - it was just a question of how best to accomplish it.
Her proposal was three-fold. First of all, cultivators had to be informed about the possibility. The simplest and most unobtrusive possibility was an informational message pinned to one of the walls of the postal office. Vow-takers could hardly be blamed for reading it while their eyes roamed around, after all.
The second step was getting a cultivator in touch with someone who could help. This was also tricky: after all, if they went to a Ministry of Helping People Get Out Of Heavenly Vows, the Heavens would know exactly what they were doing. But the Heavens could not read, and that provided an opportunity. A vow-taker could send an innocuous request for information to one of the many ministries of the empire, and attach their plea for help to the end of their letter. The clerk receiving it would be handling hundreds of letters every week, and if they later directed a new request to another ministry, it could hardly be linked to this one letter coming in.
The final step was actually receiving help. This was far too general for her to provide much advice, but when it came to information, she suggested establishing a general system of requesting copies of passages from books stored in distant libraries by mail - it would help hide the letters about the tribulations, and would also help reduce the need to move precious books around.
Junming deliberated for a couple minutes, before leaving, and returning with a brush and an inkwell. They set the letter in front of themselves, and quickly added some notes to the margins. Qian Shanyi leaned over to read them.
This is not a new idea, they wrote in regards to her second proposal, a portion of mail is already shuffled around from one postal office to the other to hide special correspondence. Adding this would not be too difficult.
"I see," she said neutrally.
<It's not my decision to make,> Junming signed, leaning back, <the best I can do is send it up the chain.>
"Thank you," she said, raising up from her chair.
<Before you leave,> Junming signed as she was passing by him, and she stopped, turning around to watch his hands. <One question. What is your name?>
"Is this about my seal?" she said, raising an eyebrow. She was long prepared for the question - she had given her name as Lan Yishan when she asked Junming about crossing the glassy fields, but Wang Yonghao shut the door on keeping a single coherent identity with his big mouth as soon as she met him, and then she sealed it up herself with bricks and cement once the tribulation came. "I have two. Lan Yishan is how I was called from birth, and what I use for official business - that's why it's on my seal. It is also on many other documents. Qian Shanyi was given to me by my teacher, and is the one I prefer to use."
Junming shifted around, clearly anxious. "Not supposed to do that," he croaked, switching to spoken language.
"And what am I to do?" she said, already knowing where this discussion would lead, "Abandon my name? I might as well cut off one of my fingers."
"Make a pseudonym. Official."
"I've never felt the need," she said contemplatively, "nor had the time, frankly. We do not stay in one place much."
It was still hard for her to tell, but she felt that Junming was fighting against themselves to make a decision. "Don't make trouble," they finally croaked.
"I am a cultivator, Junming - I can't promise that." She smiled. "Best I can promise is to make a little trouble for a lot less trouble later. But I'll try to find the time for a pseudonym while I am recovering."
Junming shook their head, but waved her off. She left the room, humming to herself.
All things considered, this morning was unfolding brilliantly. Now it was time to meet up with Wang Yonghao, and see if the Heavens were set on ruining it.
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This is clearly foreshadowing how both of those cities would be destroyed by Wang Yonghao opening his mouth around wrong people
BagFullOfLizards
Some bag, mostly lizards
- Location
- A bag
I'm not sure they'll actually believe that the person who just went through an incredibly rare tribulation only has an academic interest in the heavens. 😄
But if it gets her the info it probably doesn't matter.
Chapter 56: Pluck The Arrogance Right Off Your Lips
Winged_One
Head Engineer of ATHENA
- Location
- Low Earth Orbit
Author Note: Want to read ahead? You can find some patreon-exclusive posts, as well as FIVE more chapters, over on my patreon, for a low price of 3$.
I also have a discord server, where I post memes I make about FSE, and occasionally discuss some plans and worldbuilding details.
I also have a discord server, where I post memes I make about FSE, and occasionally discuss some plans and worldbuilding details.
Qian Shanyi had agreed to meet up with Wang Yonghao at the central square of Reflection Ridge once she was finished with her mail, and she headed there, keeping her eyes open for anything notable. She was done earlier than expected, so perhaps she would get ahead of him.
She put on her leather cloak on the way. When she reached the square, she stopped, casually leaning against a column that supported the second storey of some fabric store, partly obscured from sight by a small crowd. Outer disciples of the Palace of the Glowing Cliffs seemed to be loading spools of fabric and crates of thread onto a cart - perhaps for their uniforms.
The square itself was something to behold. The edge of the world here curled down into a funnel, falling down in a column of pure blue sky right into the middle of the square. It was only midday, so the suns were still quite high in the sky - but as the evening came, some of them would descend down into the middle of the square, spiraling around the funnel, before vanishing below the ground.
The ground glittered in the daylight, glass crushed down into sand, the space empty and wide open - nobody wanted to build their house too close to the funnel, lest the scorching fires of the suns burn it down, after all. The only notable structure was a wooden platform built close to the center, no doubt treated to resist the heat, where half a dozen body fundamentalists were wrestling with each other, busy training throws and body locks.
She spotted Wang Yonghao as soon as he arrived, all the way on the opposite side of the square, his pure white scholarly robes sticking out like a sore thumb in the crowd of the townsfolk. She stayed hidden, watching him head into a restaurant - an opportunity to see how he behaved without her around was precious, and not to be wasted.
The restaurant was a two-storey building, with the second floor forming an open space, encircled by a balcony railing, the wide roof above it only supported by columns. Tables were set up on both floors, with a cooking area in front of the building, where the chef and his underlings were working with an enormous array of lenses pointed straight at one of the suns. A pair of waitresses were running between the tables, and when Wang Yonghao walked in, one of them made a beeline for him. An excitable one - wide gestures, bouncing on her feet.
After a couple words, the waitress led Wang Yonghao upstairs, and towards one of the tables at the very edge of the balcony. After seating him, she hovered around, talking for a long time, and Qian Shanyi regretted that she had never learned to read lips. Far too many words to be merely a list of dishes.
All throughout, Wang Yonghao barely even glanced at the woman, his answers curt, and finally just waved her off. She left, but soon returned, carrying a pot of tea. The waitress tried to get him to talk again, but he was just as stone-faced, merely looking out onto the square as if searching for someone, and soon the waitress left entirely, looking a bit dejected.
Qian Shanyi watched the restaurant for a while longer, making mental notes. This waitress didn't seem to be doing her job right - she stuck mostly to the second floor, and spent entirely too much time talking to the customers, though her talk with Yonghao was the longest by far, and she seemed to avoid couples. Her counterpart had to work twice as hard to compensate, and Qian Shanyi wondered why she even went along with it.
Qian Shanyi smiled. This confirmed some of her suspicions about Wang Yonghao - they'd have plenty to talk about. But first…
With a playful smirk on her lips, she turned away from the square, and circled around it through side alleys until she came out behind the restaurant, from a direction Wang Yonghao couldn't see. Closing her spiritual pores to hide her presence, she headed inside, and straight towards the stairs leading up to the second floor.
"Miss? Miss!" a voice called out behind her as she stepped onto the first step.
"Hm?" she said quietly, turning around. She wanted to surprise Wang Yonghao, and didn't want him to hear her voice.
Behind her was the same waitress she observed from afar, her hand stretched out, ready to grab her by the edge of her cloak. Qian Shanyi casually stepped around, moving neither too fast nor too slow, letting the fingers of the waitress close on empty air.
As the gaze of the waitress swept over her, falling on the scarlet silk robes beneath her cloak and the sword at her waist, her eyes widened. "Oh!" the waitress said, covering her mouth with one hand. "Ah, honorable immortal, I didn't realize…"
Up close, Qian Shanyi could tell that the waitress was quite young - perhaps not even twenty. Her face was cute, though not exceptional, with a button nose and wide eyes, and her robes matched her well - equally cute, soft-colored silk, with decorations around the waist and wrists. Her hair was pinned into a bun, with two hair sticks poking out from the top left side. In her hands, she carried a wax tablet, orders noted down in clean handwriting.
"It's nothing," Qian Shanyi said, patting the waitress on her shoulder with a smile. She gave the hairsticks another glance. "You haven't done anything wrong. Now what did you want to say? Speak freely."
"Oh, thank you." The waitress sighed. "It's just, usually you need a reservation, and I thought you didn't know. We get travelers who simply walk in sometimes, and it's so hard to keep track of everything…"
"Don't worry about it," Qian Shanyi said, "My partner should have already gotten a table. White robes, arrogant face?"
A strange, displeased look passed over the face of the waitress, with just a hint of a blush to her cheeks, gone as fast as it appeared. "Oh, yes," she said flatly, "he is on the second floor. Should I show you the way?"
"That won't be necessary," Qian Shanyi said, shaking her head. "I would like to surprise him, so I will go up alone. Thank you for the offer."
The waitress bowed again, and turned toward the room, tapping the wax tablet against her shoulder with a frown. Her lips were curved a bit downwards, and on impulse, Qian Shanyi put a hand on her shoulder. The waitress turned back to her with surprise.
"You seem to be a bit down on yourself," Qian Shanyi said, "I am an immortal chef myself - I know this work can get a bit chaotic. You noticed me right away, so you can't be that bad, can you?"
The waitress grimaced slightly, rubbing her face. Her open, pleasant attitude appealed to Shanyi, even if the professional pride in the back of her mind whispered that the waitress should be keeping her eyes on the customers, not chatting with her. "I have been working here since I was a child," the waitress said, "I think I just don't have any talent for it."
Out of the corner of her eye, Qian Shanyi spotted the other waitress glance at the two of them from across the hall, her eyes full of concern. The two women looked almost identical - if her eyes were not sharpened by cultivation, she wasn't sure she could distinguish the two. Even their robes were the same, though the other waitress had her hair sticks in the typical cross. Twins?
"What's your name?" Qian Shanyi smiled.
"Chu Lin, honorable immortal," Chu Lin said, giving her a short bow.
"Please just call me Shanyi. Fellow restaurant disciple Chu, not even a phoenix can ascend into the Heavens in a single flap of its wings. 'Talent' is simply what years of hard work look like from the outside. I am sure you'll get there in time."
A sad look passed over Chu Lin's eyes. Perhaps she read her wrong?
"I don't want to take up more of your time," Qian Shanyi said instead of trying to puzzle her out, "but there may be some disciples from the Nine Singing Vessels sect looking for me later today. Could you tell me when they arrive?"
Chu Lin nodded readily, and Qian Shanyi headed upstairs.
Soft, refreshing wind blew across the second floor, bringing with it delightful smells from the kitchens below. She had kept track of where Wang Yonghao was, so her eyes snapped to him right away. He had his back turned to the rest of the restaurant, looking out onto the square and the cooking area down below, and Qian Shanyi quietly approached him, stepping carefully to keep her sandals from tapping on the wooden roof.
When she was right next to him, she brought her lips up to his ear. "How was your day?" she said, opening all of her spiritual pores at once, and reconstituting her spiritual shield.
Wang Yonghao all but lept out of his seat, clutching his heart with one hand and the pommel of his sword with another. She cackled as she took the seat opposite him.
Wang Yonghao grimaced, forcing his heartbeat back down. "Why did you have to scare me like that?!"
"Because it amused me," she said, lounging back in her chair, and glanced over the edge of the balcony. She watched curiously as one of the cooks adjusted the massive lens array to keep it pointed at a sun traveling across the sky. "Great news: Nine Singing Vessels took my offer."
"And where's the money?" Wang Yonghao said, bringing her attention back to the table. He sat back down, and was pouring her a cup of tea. She nodded to him in gratitude.
"I didn't want to wait for it," she said, "and so I told them to find me here once they were done moving the goods to their own warehouse, and verifying the quality. Four hundred and thirty six spirit stones right away, and easily ten times that over the next several months, once the sales start coming in."
"If they even pay us," Wang Yonghao grumbled.
She rolled her eyes. There were reasons to be concerned about the deal, but this wasn't one of them. "I have an agreement with their stamp on it, and they have no reason to cheat us. Unless the warehouse catches fire right this moment, I don't see them backing out."
She cackled again as Wang Yonghao winced. The Heavens didn't need her help to make their plans.
She picked up her cup of tea and took a sip. It was black tea, brewed quite strongly, and with herbs added for taste - not what she preferred, but she could still appreciate the quality.
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Wang Yonghao frowning at her. "I kept meaning to ask. Why do you do that?" he asked.
She blinked in surprise. "Do what? Drink tea?"
"No, with your pinkie finger," he said, making a hooking motion with his own. "Whenever you pick up a new cup, you flick a drop into your mouth before taking a full sip."
"Oh, that," she said, curiously looking down at her hand. There was a bit of tea on the tip of her pinkie where she dipped it into the cup, and she quickly licked it off. "It's an old habit. I barely even realize I am doing it at this point. Is it that noticeable?"
"Not very," he said, "I only picked it up in retrospect. But why do you do it? Testing for poison?"
"Something like that," she said slowly, "Not…poison, exactly."
"But you don't do it when we are together. At least, not anymore - you did it back in the forest, and then you stopped."
"There's no reason to do it when we are together," she said, "But back to today -" she quickly continued, before Wang Yonghao could ask another question she wasn't in the mood to discuss, "How was your shopping trip? All went well, I hope?"
"Well, I didn't buy anything," Wang Yongao said with a sigh, thankfully letting the topic go, "in case you couldn't get the money. Just looked."
"Sensible," she said, looking over the railing again. The chef had caught her eye - a big man, with broad shoulders. There was some family resemblance there to the two waitresses - father or uncle, perhaps?
"See anything interesting?"
"A couple things, yeah. There's a blackout formation, and some decent formation ink. Some of the tools you mentioned, too. I've actually been thinking… Well." She made a motion with one finger in the air, prompting him to continue. "Would you mind if I get some bone and wood carving tools?"
She looked back at him, and raised an eyebrow. "Why are you even asking me? Half of this money is yours in the first place. If you want to buy them, then buy them."
"Well, we don't really need them for anything," he mumbled.
"So?" Her eyebrow rose higher. "We have plenty of money and, at least for now, aren't under any direct pressure. Please, enjoy yourself while we can. I intend to do so as well."
"I was thinking of how we'd carry them," he said, no doubt meaning his inner world, and the need to conceal its existence.
She shrugged. "So buy another bag to carry them. You are a big man, I trust you to manage. Still, aside from this - no problems?"
Wang Yonghao looked directly in her eyes. "No," he said simply.
Very interesting.
Sending him on the shopping trip was something of a test, to see if anything would happen. A bait for the Heavens, in a way.
"Let's talk about this back in the tavern," she said casually, noticing Chu Lin heading their way with a plate full of steaming ribs. "Our food is almost here."
Chu Lin engaged the two of them in conversation while she set the plates down - a big one with the ribs, and two empty plates for each of them. At least she tried, because Wang Yonghao mostly looked bored, content to let Qian Shanyi speak. Shanyi didn't mind it too much, and made up a salacious story about how they've met, to some grumbling from Wang Yonghao. When Chu Lin heard that they were merely business partners, her eyes sparked.
After a minute, she thanked Chu Lin, saying they had something private to discuss, and the waitress left to one of the other tables.
Wang Yonghao dug into the ribs as soon as Chu Lin was gone, and Qian Shanyi stared at him curiously. When he raised his head, his eyes met hers and he froze. "What?" he asked with a mouth full of meat.
"I didn't say anything," she said.
"You are looking at me like I am a bug you want to pin to an exhibition wall," he grumbled, but slowly went back to eating. "It's very creepy."
"That's not fair at all." She frowned. "Why would I pin a bug? I'd put it in a terrarium."
"That makes it sound even creepier."
"I was just wondering if you really were mostly attracted to men," Qian Shanyi said casually, finally reaching for her spare plate and pulling a couple ribs onto it from the common one.
Wang Yonghao choked while she ate calmly. "What?!" he finally said, when he was done coughing.
Some of the other tables were giving them curious looks, but they were speaking quietly enough they shouldn't have heard anything specific, relying on their sharpened senses to hear each other. She shrugged. "It's a simple question, I think."
He scowled at her. She winked back. "The question is not the point! How does that at all relate to what we were talking about before?"
"Oh." She bit into a rib, and moaned in surprise. This was some of the juiciest meat she had ever t. "Well, let me put it like this: what's the name of the waitress?"
"What does that have to do -" Wang Yonghao closed his eyes, breathing out sharply. "You are just messing with me again."
"I am," she admitted easily, "but I also have a point. How to put this…" She tapped her cheek, thinking it over. There were several ways to phrase it, some gentler than others - but if she wanted her point to stick… "It seems to me that unless you are in the mood to talk, you treat most people as if they are barely there. Closer to furniture than human beings."
"What?" He sat up straighter. "No I don't!"
"Hm. I wonder." She tapped her cheek, before glancing around. None of this should be too secretive, but still… Better safe than sorry. "Would you mind putting up the sound muffling formation?"
He glared at her a bit, but got the five talismans out of their bag, and handed her a couple. She put them on her side of the table, eyeballing the distances - the formation had to be laid out in a circle, but it didn't have to be precise down to a millimeter. The first talisman she placed was off by a whole hand's width though, and when she shifted it with her foot, the noise of the restaurant around them quieted down to barely above a murmur.
"So what was the point behind insulting me again?" Wang Yonghao said, leaning on the table.
"I did nothing of the sort. I know this may be hard to hear," she said patiently, "and of course, it's only a hypothesis - but it's what makes the most sense to me, taking all I know about you into account."
"Because I don't know the name of some waitress?"
"No, I was actually thinking about this for quite a while," she said, shaking her head. "It's also about how you talk about your adventures, what you focus on. You almost never mention any individual people, their lives, their troubles. It's all… beautiful vistas, danger, demon beasts. It's also how you met me - why was your first, instinctual reaction to pick me up like yet another sword and run away, instead of finding a healer together with other people in the restaurant? Your interaction with Chu Lin and how you've brushed her off only put the last brush stroke on the overall picture."
Wang Yonghao narrowed his eyes at her in suspicion. "You haven't seen me brush her off. Were you hiding somewhere?"
Qian Shanyi nodded easily. "I arrived before you did."
Wang Yonghao rubbed his face. "Of course you did. Why couldn't you just tell me?"
"I wanted to see how you behave without me around - telling you would have defeated the purpose."
"And how would you feel if I did this to you?"
Qian Shanyi tilted her head curiously to the side. "What do you mean? You already do this for me. It's hard to notice all the errors you make on your own, and you point out when I rush ahead too much. I am annoyed, but mostly grateful."
"I don't mean that part. I mean stalking me like this."
She shrugged. "If you think it would help, go ahead. It would be far from the first time."
Wang Yonghao snorted. "Oh, what, you had someone following you around before to 'point out your mistakes'?"
Qian Shanyi sighed in exasperation. How could he be so oblivious? "I've been a jade beauty from birth, Yonghao," she said, "sometimes men would follow me around town, when I went about my business. I am used to it."
Wang Yonghao gave her a long, shocked look while she chomped down on a rib. "Um." He swallowed. "Following you around… to do what?"
"Who can truly say?" She shrugged performatively. "I've never had the misfortune to find out. Perhaps they just wanted to say hello. But somehow it stopped once I became a cultivator and started wearing a sword."
Wang Yonghao shifted around uncomfortably, and she waved him off. This wasn't something she particularly enjoyed talking about either. "Let's move on," she said. "What do you think about my theory?"
He sighed, glad to get off the topic. "That it doesn't make any sense?" He said, "I didn't want to talk to her because she was asking me strange questions and I was on edge, not because of… What you said."
"It's polite to reciprocate."
"So? It's not like she'll challenge me to a duel over it. Why would I talk to some waitress?""
"Well, for one, it'd make her less likely to spit in your tea," she said, timing it just as Wang Yonghao was about to bring his tea cup to his lips. He pulled his hand away, his eyes darting between the tea kettle and his cup in concern.
She sipped her own tea casually. Chu Lin didn't seem like the type, and besides, spit was just spit. "But also, it makes you seem like an arrogant bastard. I suspect it's one of the reasons you have so many problems with other people - you are just not very likable."
In all fairness, it wasn't just his attitude. Wang Yonghao's lips tended to be stuck in this unpleasant curl, as if he could barely tolerate the sight of his surroundings. She knew it was because his thoughts were spinning around like rats in a cage, imagining the worst in every situation - but other people couldn't read his mind. Together with his innate confidence, built upon close to two decades of getting out alive from every scrap, and his advanced cultivation, the image of an arrogant young master was hard to shake.
"You are telling me I am not likable?" Yonhgao raised both eyebrows at her. "Have you looked in the mirror? First time we've met you tricked and drugged me."
She shook her head. "No, that was the second time. The first time I insulted you for being a penniless bastard and spilling soup on my robes."
"That doesn't make it any better."
She shrugged. "I am likable when I want to be, Yonghao - which I had little interest in at the time. I don't mean this in some inherent sense - just that the way you are used to approaching people is unlikable. If you accquire different habits, that could change."
Wang Yonghao's face twisted into a grimace. "All of this because I didn't want to talk to some waitress?"
She sighed. "That you keep calling her 'some waitress' rather proves my point. Her name is Chu Lin."
"Fine, Chu Lin, whatever." He waved her off casually. She frowned, but let it go, for now. "What would we even have to talk about? We have nothing in common, and there is no way she could help me with anything whatsoever."
"But that is just your assumption. One that's based on nothing."
"What do you mean, 'assumption'? She is a waitress and I am a cultivator! What, do you think she just happens to know some secret technique that could help me at a crucial moment?" Wang Yonghao shuddered. "Never mind, perhaps she does."
"Hm." Qian Shanyi leaned back in her chair, gesturing with a beef rib. "No, likely not, but let's think about this carefully. Set aside everything that relates to the food. First way she could have helped you was to warn you that I was coming up the stairs, and then I wouldn't have been able to surprise you."
Wang Yonghao frowned. "Okay, I mean - maybe that's fair, but it's not like it mattered."
Next time, she'd be sure to scare him more. "But it's not just about Chu Lin, now is it?" she said out loud instead. "It's about the principle. How many times were you surprised by some young master appearing when you didn't expect it?"
Wang Yonghao froze for a moment, and she grinned at him.
"Second way she could have helped you," she continued, "was by telling you about the town. How long did you spend here before I arrived, three days?"
"Two."
"Fine, two days. Yet you still didn't know that Jian Shizhe was just one spark away from dueling anybody." She pointed her rib bone at him accusatorily, before discarding it onto the plate they were using for the bones. The common plate was almost half empty now. "Are you saying that in those two days, you had no way to learn this?"
"Hey, now," foolish Wang Yonghao tried to defend himself, not knowing he was but an ant walking among the forest of traps, "I didn't know about the cultivator almanac - "
Qian Shanyi wagged a finger at him, cutting him off. "That's a separate thing entirely - the people around you already had all the information you needed. I was told about Jian Shizhe by pretty much the first person I talked to - the only way you could have missed hearing about him in two whole days was if you just didn't talk to anyone."
Wang Yonghao blushed, and she knew she was right. "I mean - look, I was busy," he said quickly, "And even if I didn't - so what? That means it's my fault I almost got challenged to a duel?"
"Of course it's not your fault - it's his, the man is an idiot." She scoffed. "His pretext was clearly ridiculous. But busy with what? Shizhe's hunts? All day long, with not even five minutes left out? You are just looking for excuses - ones you don't even need, since I am not blaming you for anything."
Wang Yonghao folded his hands on his chest, food forgotten almost entirely. "You are still putting me on the spot," he said.
The fool would walk away hungry at this rate - for all that she was talking more, she was also eating faster. She capitalized on his distraction by stealing another couple ribs.
"You put yourself there," she said, mirroring his dismissiveness of Chu Lin, "You asked me why you should have taken the time to talk to 'some waitress', so I am explaining why. Many cultivators think that ordinary people are worthless to them, and all of them are morons for it - we are all rebelling against the Heavens together. My point is that it'd be better for you if you took more of an interest in other people."
"And how do you imagine this? It's not like I can tell them about what is happening to me." Wang Yonghao's lips turned sharply downwards. "Nor would they even understand if I did."
She gave him a long, contemplative look, and flicked the fat off her fingers with a burst of spiritual energy, leaning back in her chair. "You don't think there could be anything in common between you and Chu Lin?"
"Oh what, are you about to tell me she is also on the run from the Heavens?"
"No, I was actually going to say that she seemed to be into you."
She timed her response perfectly, and Wang Yonghao choked on his tea once again. "What?"
"Well, perhaps not you specifically." She waved her hand in the air vaguely, looking out into the square. The body fundamentalists were still there, and she watched in fascination as one of them tossed another a good ten meters up in the air. "I suppose it would be more accurate to say she is into the idea of you. I think that she resents her father and wants out of the house, and away from the restaurant business - and a woman in her position does not have too many good options. The easiest by far would be marriage, and if she could score a young, attractive cultivator, she'd be set for life. If only this hypothetical cultivator wasn't so arrogant he couldn't even notice it."
"That's…" Wang Yonghao rubbed his forehead in shock, before narrowing his eyes at her suspiciously. "How could you possibly know this? Did you spy on her too?"
"Not particularly. We barely even spoke."
"Then how -"
"By taking an interest in the people around me." She shrugged. "None of it is new to me. Look, it's quite simple. Did you see her hair sticks?"
Wang Yonghao gave her a blank look. "She was wearing hair sticks?"
Qian Shanyi rolled her eyes. "Yes, Yonghao, she was wearing hair sticks. Two of them, on the left side of her head - that's a sign that a woman is actively looking for a partner. If she was wearing them in a cross, it'd mean she was taken, or at least not looking. Vertical cross would mean she's into women instead, but that is a little less known."
"Hair sticks?"
"Yes, hair sticks."
"And what does that mean?" he said, gesturing to her head. She had a pair of her own, worn horizontally, one inserted from the left and one from the right into a knot at the base of her long hair, keeping most of it away from her face.
She grinned widely. "That I am a cultivator and I do what I want."
Wang Yonghao rolled his eyes at her. "Hair sticks, really? That is so stupid. Why couldn't she just say it?"
Qian Shanyi snorted. Yes, that also was her question, way back in the day. "Because she'd get called a prostitute for being so open about it," she said, "Anyways - that, and how much time she spent with you, is how I know she was interested. But a waitress isn't supposed to seek a partner at work - it'd distract from her duties. Nor is she supposed to talk up every single man on the floor. This means she is doing this against the orders of the chef - and if you glance over the railing," she nodded her head in that direction, "you'd see the family resemblance. That's how I know there is a conflict at home."
Wang Yonghao glanced where she indicated, and scratched his head. "Maybe he's fine with her looking for a husband?"
She shook her head. Conveniently enough, Chu Lin walked out of the doors at that exact moment, to pick up some plates from the kitchen. "She shifts her hair sticks into a cross whenever she goes outside," she said, "The other waitress is her twin, and wears the same clothes - deliberately, I suspect, so that their father doesn't notice one of them spending so much time upstairs. It's not too surprising that two sisters would help each other, now is it?"
"No, I guess not."
"On top of this, she told me herself that she has no talent for being a waitress. So, her father is the chef, and doesn't want - or doesn't let - her quit this job. Now tell me: do you think you might have anything in common with someone who is forced to live against the wishes of their own heart? Someone who doesn't have a good way out?"
Wang Yonghao groaned, covering up his face with his hands. "Fine. Okay, I get it. I'm sorry."
Qian Shanyi raised an eyebrow at him. "Sorry for what? You are the one who suffers from your own ignorance."
"I mean… I'll try to talk to people more." He sighed. "This is a lot to take in."
Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a group of disciples from the Nine Singing Vessels sect circling the square, and got their attention with a wave of her hand. "You say that a lot," she said lazily.
"You do that a lot."
"Why thank you." She grinned. "Now, I'll admit that the theory is a bit of a stretch - it's built on too many assumptions. But that's the thing with assumptions - until you clarify them, anything is possible. Look at the body fundamentalists -"
She gestured towards the middle of the square, where they were still wrestling out in the open.
"Sects used to think you had to keep all the training in house," she explained, "Show nothing, lest someone steal even the most insignificant secret. But that this was the best way to do things was just an assumption - one that nobody tested, until one of the imperial pugilism schools decided to try the opposite. I think they even swap advice about drug regimens by mail. They had very little to start with, no secret techniques, no divinely inspired recipes. On top of that, pugilism always had a bad reputation among cultivators - after all, a sword is so much more dangerous and versatile. But nowadays, I think that it's the fastest growing style in the empire, because it's so open to all the loose cultivators, ones who have no sect to speak of." She shrugged performatively. "It seems that the original assumption turned out to be quite mistaken."
She turned back to the table, and went after the remaining ribs. She gave Wang Yonghao long enough - if he missed his opportunity now, it was his own fault for going hungry.
He was still struggling with what she told him, even blushing slightly, clearly wanting to say something - but too awkward to go through with it. She gave him time, focusing on the ribs. "So…" he finally said, his blush deepening. "Do you think I should, um. Ask her out?... I mean, I don't want her to get hurt…"
His voice was conflicted. She knew his attitude towards romance already, but it seemed that talking about it in the abstract was different from a concrete possibility being put in front of him.
She thought about it for a moment, before shaking her head sadly. "Probably not. I doubt she'd be in too much danger, especially since we are already going to be moving on shortly, but… Well, if my assumption is right - and like I said, it's just an assumption - then she'd be looking for marriage, something you can't provide. But a conversation can't hurt anyone, right? As long as you are open about your intentions and don't lead her on, at least."
To speak of the demon beast.
Chu Lin was heading towards them from the stairs, and Qian Shanyi shifted one of the formation talismans on the floor with her foot, letting the noise around them flood back in. Chu Lin approached the table, and bowed to the two of them. "Honorable Shanyi, the disciples from the Nine Singing Vessels sect you mentioned are here."
Qian Shanyi gave Wang Yonghao a significant look, and then nodded to Chu Lin, rising up from her chair. "Thank you," she said, "I'll go talk to them. In the meantime, would you mind keeping my partner company?"
As she passed by Chu Lin, she leaned close to her ear. "He is far too shy to ever admit it," she whispered, "but he regrets his earlier coldness. You are actually his type."
Chu Lin's eyes widened, and her cheeks flushed slightly. Qian Shanyi winked at her, and walked past, leaving the two of them alone.
She gave Wang Yonghao and Chu Lin a lot of time to talk - after she was done counting the spirit stones delivered by the Nine Singing Vessels sect, she took a long walk around the square, and even went to talk to the body fundamentalists. Half of them seemed to be employees of the Thrifty Bat Bank - apparently the head of their branch here in town was an advocate of the style. It was something to think about - pugilism had always seemed far too brutish for her tastes, but her recent experiences had changed her attitude somewhat.
After she returned to their table in the restaurant, a good twenty minutes had passed, and Chu Lin was already gone. Wang Yonghao stayed quiet for the rest of the day, while they went through a dozen different shops in town, and visited the post office again to grab her finished copy of the local cultivator almanac. He didn't tell her what the two of them spoke about, and when she tried to prod, he just blushed, his lips twitching slightly upwards. She supposed it couldn't have gone too badly. Good for him - the man desperately needed to get laid.
By the time they returned to the tavern, loaded up with several bags after a small shopping spree, the sun had already set. She was humming a little tune as they headed to the main doors, when Wang Yonghao suddenly froze, his eyes going wide. Qian Shanyi raised an eyebrow at him, and looked around, reaching out with her spiritual energy senses to try and find whatever had alarmed him.
She found it easily enough. A trio of cultivators, walking down a corridor of the tavern from one room to another, obvious even through a thick wooden wall. Spiritual energy roiled angrily around all three of them, but especially around the one in the middle. She could feel a dozen active amulets, like little suns to her spiritual energy senses - and that meant only one thing.
A spirit hunter, ready for battle.
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Winged_One
Head Engineer of ATHENA
- Location
- Low Earth Orbit
- Location
- London
This kind of world-building that to us is super fantastical but to the actual characters is just quite pretty is really cool. It's disappointingly rare that fantasy is actually fantastic and even rarer that the viewpoint characters treat it as an expected part of their lives.
You've done a good job making a world and cosmology that's wildly different to our own and has a believable enough society that we're exploring.
dhasenan
always lowercase
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Plot agar!
- Location
- The Soviet Republic of Canuckistan
- Pronouns
- He/Him
News of her tribulation is going to travel like wildfire, especially if you're someone with official connections trying to stay up to date on the movements and activities of cultivators.
nicoo
Malfunctioning neurochemistry, please be kind.
- Location
- Europe
- Pronouns
- They/She/Meow
Yas, I've been really enjoying that as well... though I've been also really curious about how the "edge of the world" thing in particular works, but we are getting little hints and glimpses casually strewn around, like they are completely normal parts of the scenery... which they are, within the setting =^.^=
- Location
- Earth
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Just like real geese (and swans). They look harmless, but don't pick a fight with them unless you know what you're doing. And are significantly larger, which might be a significant factor when fighting magical sun geese.
Love to see Shanyi using the same intensity she brings to "How do I survive this perilous situation?" when handling the much smaller issue of "How do I talk with this random kid's mom?"
Shanyi does not have a dimmer switch.
A little reminder of the absurd wealth cultivators have access to. Okay, Wang is a bit more absurd than the average cultivator, but still.
Another nice Shanyi moment for the pile.
I wonder if there's a specific dramatic backstory reason why she does this, or if testing tea for spirit roofies is just a thing female cultivators learn to do.
Main Character Syndrome affects all of us sometimes.
"Jade beauty" bit aside, there's something compelling about a reciprocally unreasonable character. Yes, sometimes I'll watch you without your knowledge to see what you're like when I'm not around. That's just common sense.
It seems like Chu Lin had some ideas.
If you're uncomfortable talking to people, admit it. It'll be less painful than beating around the bush with Shanyi until she gets an answer she's happy with.
He's not wrong. I don't think Shanyi's wrong for putting him on the spot—Yonghao doesn't seem to even realize that he's being antisocial—but this statement is accurate.
Another Shanyi using her high-intensity mode for mundane situations. She's dissecting her conversation with Lin like a detective explaining how he knows whodunnit.
"Either she's lying about why she cares, or the Heavens really don't like academics."
Very well, thanks for asking.
Chapter 57: Sink Into Deep Eyes Of Hatred
Winged_One
Head Engineer of ATHENA
- Location
- Low Earth Orbit
Author Note: Want to read ahead? You can find some patreon-exclusive posts, as well as FIVE more chapters, over on my patreon, for a low price of 3$.
I also have a discord server, where I post memes I make about FSE, and occasionally discuss some plans and worldbuilding details.
I also have a discord server, where I post memes I make about FSE, and occasionally discuss some plans and worldbuilding details.
As soon as the realization passed through Qian Shanyi's mind, she pretended to stumble, and grabbed Wang Yonghao's hand for support. If they could sense the other cultivators, then they could be sensed in turn, and even a transparent excuse to talk privately was better than simply freezing in public. Wiping her forehead with her other hand, she pulled him away from the tavern entrance.
There was a convenient blind corner nearby, hidden from the windows of the tavern by the geometry of the walls, and from the street by a line of trees. She dropped her bags on the ground, and leaned against the wall, faking exhaustion. Glancing up at Wang Yonghao, she saw a wild look on his face. <Breathe,> she signed, <they aren't here for us.>
Wang Yonghao's eyes snapped to her face. He slowly lowered his own bags. <How do you know?>
She kept her eyes on the parts of the street visible from their blind corner, making sure nobody else could see them. It was late, the street was almost deserted. <They might as well have lit a fire to announce their presence. If the spirit hunters wanted to catch us, they would have waited until midnight, when we would have been asleep.> She shook her head. <On top of that, you can feel where they are, can't you? Our room is in the other wing of the tavern.>
Wang Yonghao breathed out slowly, looking at the wall in the direction of the three cultivators. This habit of his amused her greatly - spiritual energy senses did not rely on sight, and so most inner disciples were taught not to look in the direction of their focus sometime during their first year. <Thank you,> he signed, <I lost my head for a bit there.>
<Why?> She raised an eyebrow at him. <Afraid of missing your date with Chu Lin?>
Wang Yonghao blushed deeply. <It's not - how did you even know we planned anything?>
She didn't - she was only joking, but now that she hit the mark, she wasn't about to reveal her ignorance. <It was obvious,> she signed instead, <don't let me discourage you, it's good that you finally take some charge of your own life. But let's focus on the present. Any ideas?>
<About what to do? Walk away before they notice us.>
She shook her head. Jumping ahead of the cart, as usual. <No. About why they are here.>
She kept her attention on the three cultivators while they talked. At this distance, and through several walls, she couldn't tell much more than their relative position, and it took effort to think of how it related to her mental map of the tavern. They seemed to be sweeping every room adjacent to the corridor, the spirit hunter always taking point.
<I don't want to stick around to find out,> Wang Yonghao signed.
The flows of spiritual energy around the two cultivators behind him felt familiar to her, and one of them was clearly missing a foot. Did the spirit hunter request local assistance, or did Jian Shizhe spot him and offer it first? Both possibilities seemed plausible.
She sighed. <Yonghao, we need to know why they are here so we can decide what to do.>
Wang Yonghao gave her a look as if she asked him why bears shat in the woods. <Why? Because of my luck.>
She nodded. <It does seem likely. But that isn't the point. Even if your luck is involved, there will be a reasonable explanation for why two respectable cultivators and Jian Shizhe are running around looking for a fight.>
They stayed silent until the three cultivators moved out of her range of spiritual energy senses. <Searching for something?> She signed.
<Or someone,> Wang Yonghao agreed, <You think they'd open our room?>
<It would be an incredible intrusion if they did that in our absence,> she signed, frowning. <Even if the room was on fire, I would hesitate to casually walk into another cultivators' space to put it out.> She paused for a moment. <And even if they did, there shouldn't be anything for them to find.> They had prepared for something of this nature, and left their publicly known possessions in their room, exactly in case someone searched it while they were gone. <But I wouldn't bet my life on it. If we were already in the room, we could control the situation much better.>
<And would be more likely to be involved.>
<Exactly,> she signed, before shaking her head. <There are just too many possibilities. Make a decision - are we leaving or heading in?>
Wang Yonghao gave her a baffled look. <Why should I make it?>
<Because I don't yet have a strong intuition for your luck. You do.> she signed, <Now decide quickly. Time does not wait for a cultivator.>
The tavern complex was built as a square ring, with the two-storey house of the innkeeper's family - and a small cafe for the guests - as the gemstone. There were two entrances, on opposite ends of the ring, and a garden in the middle. Thankfully for them, this meant they did not need to cross paths with the three cultivators as they headed to their room.
Qian Shanyi was pleasantly surprised that Wang Yonghao decided to stay - based on how he behaved in Xiaohongshan, she fully expected him to make them flee town entirely, even if it would have meant abandoning everything they had left in their room, as well as all the plans she had for Jian Wei. She mulled over the change as they walked, the corridor around them strangely quiet, with no maids sweeping the floors, or even a single guest heading out towards the gardens. "Still, this Chu Lin," Qian Shanyi said, trying to dispel the ominous mood, "what is she like?"
Wang Yonghao groaned, rubbing his eyes. "Shanyi, is now really the time?"
"When if not now?"
He glared at her, and hefted one of his bags higher on his shoulder to free both of his hands. <When there aren't spirit hunters in this very tavern!> he signed angrily. She was glad he didn't blurt it out loud, at least.
"What of it?" She raised an eyebrow. "I've heard it said that the best time to marry is in the middle of a tribulation."
"That does sound like something one of the old monsters would say."
"Hm." She hummed quietly. She had remembered the saying from a novel that circulated among the sect disciples, but she supposed it did sound about right. "You haven't answered my question."
"She's… nice," Wang Yonghao said, blushing profusely.
"She is 'nice'?" Qian Shanyi deadpanned. "What a deep observation, Yonghao. Perhaps next you will tell me that she has a pair of legs."
Wang Yonghao glared at her, then sighed. "She invited me to a poetry reading two days from now, together with her friends," he said, "I don't know if I should go."
"Did you tell her we'd surely be leaving within a couple weeks?"
"Yeah. I don't think she cared that much."
"Hmm," Qian Shanyi hummed, tapping her cheek. "Perhaps I was off about her."
"In what way?"
She shrugged lightly. "If I was in her position, I would have been after marriage. But just because that is what I would have wanted, it doesn't mean it is what she wants. Perhaps she is simply looking for some escapism in you." She paused for a moment. "Then again, perhaps she thinks she could convince you to stay. In either case, as long as you avoid giving her a kid, you should be fine."
Wang Yonghao blushed hard, and she grinned at him, fishing her key out of her robes. She slid it into the keyhole of their room, turned it twice, and swung the door open -
- and saw an unknown woman standing in the middle of their room, looking out of their window. She turned towards them as the door swung open, and Qian Shanyi's gaze swept over her linen skirts of a maid, shoulder-length black hair, and a young, freckled face.
Qian Shanyi's hand immediately fell on her sword at the same time as she tossed her bag aside. She stepped away from the doorway to give Wang Yonghao more space, and reached out with her spiritual energy senses -
- only to find nothing. Less than nothing, really. Cultivators relied on the circulation of spiritual energy, and could close their pores to hide their presence entirely - but the woman's spiritual energy was not circulating, or beating like that of a spirit or demon beast. This close, Qian Shanyi could feel that the flow was there, but incredibly faint, in and out like the weakest breath - that of an entirely ordinary person. Not something you could fake.
Which meant…
"Do you know what the punishment is for stealing from a cultivator?" Qian Shanyi asked sharply, narrowing her eyes.
She herself had no idea, because scarcely anybody was stupid enough to risk it.
The woman backed up against the window, her face contorting in terror, knuckles going white where they clutched the windowsill. She was breathing fast. It was a perfect picture, and just as fake.
"Please, honorable immortals," the woman begged, falling on her knees. "I am not a thief. I just - "
Her eyes didn't fit. It was subtle, but there was no terror. Just a deep exhaustion.
"Stop scaring her, Shanyi," Wang Yonghao said quietly, stepping into the room and putting down his own bags. "We don't have anything worth stealing in the first place. There's nothing to fight over."
Qian Shanyi glanced at the small table in the room, where her spare sword was simply laying out in the open on top of her chest of chef knives.
The ignorance of riches.
"This remains to be seen," Qian Shanyi said, glancing down the corridor. The three cultivators were still on the other side of the tavern, and she wasn't loud, so her words didn't carry far - but if she shouted, they would surely hear her.
"I just needed a place to hide," the woman said, prostrating herself. "Honorable immortals, I beg of you, do not give me up to that wicked spirit hunter!"
At least she isn't denying it.
What in the netherworld's name did she even do? Run away with an entire sect library? Spirit hunters weren't supposed to deal with ordinary people at all.
Wang Yonghao had an ugly grimace, almost as bad as when she said she was going to face the tribulation. "Yonghao?" she said.
"We can't just give her up," he said quietly.
"We absolutely could."
"I mean that we shouldn't." He glared at her.
"The best thing for her would be a fair trial," Qian Shanyi said.
"You are saying this?" His glare only intensified.
"Yes, I am," she snapped. Was he really this easy to blind by a pretty face? "What do you think makes a spirit hunter bring out the talismans? Whatever she did, it's not a trifling matter."
"You said I should make more decisions," he said, crossing his arms on his chest. "Well, I am deciding I won't have her blood on my hands."
Not like this, you idiot.
"Thank you," the mysterious woman breathed out.
Qian Shanyi's eyes flickered between the two. What was the Heavens' plot here? Dangle a young, helpless girl in front of Yonghao until he gets into a fight with a spirit hunter over her? Drive a schism between the two of them? Or was it simpler - to put them into a dangerous situation, and hope she got herself killed off?
Wang Yonghao's lips were pursed, but his eyes were determined, set on their course. Could she convince him? Perhaps… But not fast enough. Forcing the issue wasn't worth sacrificing the trust that was so slow to build between them.
She focused all her senses back on the woman. She was pretty sure she recognised her face, having seen her around the tavern in the morning, and her clothes fit her very well, clearly tailored to her body after long years of use. The soft beat of her spiritual energy didn't change in the slightest - nor could it - and Qian Shanyi didn't feel anything else on her body, no spirit bombs, no talismans, nothing that could be a danger at all. This of course proved little - there were a dozen ways to hide any of them from her senses - but more likely than not, this woman had nothing that could harm either of them.
It was probably safe. In the worst case, they could always call for help later.
Qian Shanyi closed the door.
"Let's set up the damn formations, at least," she said, "if you absolutely insist on harboring a fugitive."
She grabbed the two talisman bags from Wang Yonghao, quickly arranging them in accordance with chalk markings on the floor. While she was busy, Wang Yonghao ignited the fireplace, and put a kettle over the fire to make tea. When she put in the last two talismans, the distant sounds of the town had vanished and the spiritual energy around the three of them began to swirl. Qian Shanyi breathed a bit easier: at least now they won't be heard from the outside.
The mysterious woman huddled close to the bed, still playing at being scared. Her eyes darted around the room - to the window, to Yonghao, to the door - and for just a moment, met Qian Shanyi's, before she glanced away.
"What is your name?" Qian Shanyi said, studying the woman closely.
"Linghui Mei, honorable immortal," she responded.
"Why is the spirit hunter after you?"
Linghui Mei shrunk in on herself. "He is a wicked man," she said quietly, "I do not know what lies he had told about me. You must not believe him."
Qian Shanyi frowned. "That's not what I asked."
"We… have been in love," Linghui Mei said, "but he wanted us to keep it secret. We met after dark, when he passed through town, messages left on my window. He swept me off my feet… Until I found out he had a wife in another town. I tried to talk to him about it, but he - he - "
Linghui Mei squeezed her eyes shut, covering her mouth with one hand. "He turned violent," she continued, "he said he would kill me if I told anyone about us. And I swore I wouldn't, even despite that I loved him - But I told my sister, and he found out."
Linghui Mei sniffled, rocking in place. "He made it look like an accident," she said, "that was two years ago. I have lived in fear ever since. And now - and now he is coming back to finish the job. I beg of you, save me from that man. He will surely accuse me of some heinous crimes, and have my head before the day is over. I am sorry for intruding into your room - but I simply had no choice. He would search every other with impunity."
"See, Shanyi?" Wang Yonghao said, "We can't just give her up!"
Linghui Mei looked at Wang Yonghao with gratitude, and Qian Shanyi narrowed her eyes at her. It was a perfect story. It explained everything - why a spirit hunter would be after an innocent ordinary person, why she needed a place to hide, even why she picked their room specifically - if she really worked in this tavern, she would know where they were staying. Except…
Except that it didn't fit.
Cultivators were the sabers of humanity, and spirit hunters were the sharpest of them all, standing against the demon beasts of the wilds. Qian Shanyi was not so naive as to think this meant they were incorruptible - but even a single spirit hunter who abused his station would sour the trust in them all, and so the empire weeded out those unfit to serve with sword and prejudice. To suggest that one of them outright violated the fourth imperial edict and then planned to do so again did not seem entirely plausible.
But fine. Suppose that a spirit hunter murdered an ordinary person and got away with it. Suppose he planned to kill a second one. Then why did he bring two other cultivators with him? That would simply make his job harder. If he wanted to kill this woman, then his best bet was to once again make it look like an accident - or, failing that, to plant some demonic talisman on her body, so that he could claim he had no other choice. Bringing other cultivators with him meant witnesses, it meant this woman would surely go to trial where she could plead her case - and that was scrutiny that he could ill afford. It simply didn't make sense.
The whole situation stunk like high Heaven. It didn't escape Qian Shanyi's notice that this story was impossible to confirm either way - this supposed sister was dead, and Linghui Mei's relationship with the spirit hunter remained private.
Qian Shanyi glanced at the window, and saw that the hair she tied around the blinds was still there - they were never opened. And the door was locked when they entered.
So how did Linghui Mei get in?
Door, window - that left only one possibility, yet there was no soot on her feet or hands, nor around the fireplace. After Qian Shanyi's experience, she was sure that no acrobat could manage to descend down the chimney while remaining clean. If the woman was a cultivator, she would have suspected a cleaning technique - but she was just an ordinary person.
"How did you get into our room?" Qian Shanyi asked bluntly.
The sudden question startled Linghui Mei. "What?"
"It's a simple question," Qian Shanyi continued, "how did you get into our room?"
"What does it matter, Shanyi?" Wang Yonghao asked, "we should come up with a plan for how to deal with the spirit hunter."
"It matters because I think she is lying," Qian Shanyi said, frowning.
Linghui Mei shrunk back, shaking her head. "Please, honorable immortal, I wouldn't dare -"
"Then how did you get in? The door was locked."
"I've used a spare key." Linghui Mei bowed her head. "Our tavern keeps one for each room, in case the guests lose theirs."
Qian Shanyi's frown deepened. "Show me the key."
Wang Yonghao sighed. "Shanyi, is now really the time? For once I think you really are being too paranoid."
Qian Shanyi's lips twitched in anger. "Then you truly have eyes, yet cannot see Mount Tai. When we got this room I asked the innkeeper for all the keys that they had, including the spares. I did so specifically so that nobody could easily enter our room without our knowledge. Either the innkeeper lied to me, or she did just now - so show me the key."
Something snapped behind Linghui Mei's appearance, and she glared at Qian Shanyi, drawing herself up as if ready to spring at her. Did she actually have some weapon? But she wasn't reaching for anything, her hands were wide at her sides. Qian Shanyi's hand dropped on the handle of her sword, her spiritual shield strengthening a fraction, before Wang Yonghao stepped in between them. "What does it matter if she has the key or not?" he said, glaring at Qian Shanyi in turn. "Maybe she picked the lock. So what?"
At least Linghui Mei seemed just as baffled by this change as Qian Shanyi was. "Because if she lies about this, she may be lying about anything," Qian Shanyi responded, crossing her arms on her chest. "She claims innocence, but words of a liar have no weight."
"So what if she is not innocent?" he said, still glaring at her. "Does that mean she should die?"
She gave him a look. "Depending on what she did, yes."
"You are not so innocent either. Neither am I," Wang Yonghao said, "does that mean someone should get to kill us on the spot? Because that's what that spirit hunter will do - you don't pack that many talismans if you want to ask questions. Maybe she did something wrong, practiced the wrong technique, joined a bad sect, or stole the wrong artifact - but this doesn't mean she should just die."
"That is exactly why I want her to stop lying so that we could judge better!"
"Like you did when you met me? Will you make me stop lying too?"
Qian Shanyi held Wang Yonghao's stare for a while, before nodding in acceptance. She thought he threw his caution to the wind, but maybe he just didn't want to state his concerns out loud. There was long-nursed hurt in his tone, and on reflection, perhaps this entire situation struck a bit too close to home for him.
Linghui Mei stepped back to the wall, looking a bit confused at their exchange. Qian Shanyi leaned to the side, to look her in the eyes without Wang Yonghao in the way. "Did you ever kill an ordinary person?" she asked.
Linghui Mei snarled, with a spark of such sudden fury in her eyes that it made Qian Shanyi raise both eyebrows. "Since when does a cultivator care about people?" Linghui Mei spat out, hatred so plain in her voice that even Wang Yonghao turned back to face her.
"Answer the question, fugitive," Qian Shanyi said calmly.
"No," Linghui Mei said sharply. There was no hesitation in her tone. Either she became a much better actor over the last minute, or she was telling the truth.
"Very well. We'll help you," Qian Shanyi said, before stepping out of the sound muffling formation for a moment and reaching out with her spiritual energy senses. She heard the three cultivators knocking on the door just a bit further down the corridor. "We don't have much time," she said, stepping back in, though staying just on the edge. Not hearing herself speak in one ear was a strange sensation, but she wanted to keep track of the other cultivators. "Hide under the bed. It's not visible from the door - I'll talk to the spirit hunter and distract him, until we can figure this mess out."
"No." Linghui Mei shook her head. She breathed out, a bit of tension leaving her body. Her demeanor changed, the mask of a terrified maid quickly melting away. "The spirit hunter has a dog. It will smell me as soon as the door is open." She motioned to the window. "He has a partner on the roof. I can't leave alone, but if you fight him off and carry me to the edge of town, I can flee on my own." She paused, and then added, her tone strangely flat. "I would be forever in your debt."
"Ridiculous," Qian Shanyi snorted. "We are not fighting with the spirit hunters based on your say-so."
"I could… Do it on my own." Wang Yonghao said, ruffling through his hair. "If you don't want to help."
She glared at him. "No. Use your head, Yonghao. She doesn't deserve to die if - if - an over-eager spirit hunter is out for her blood. But neither does she deserve to have you jump in front of the sword of justice aimed at her heart. For all you know, she sold poisoned candy to children."
Linghui Mei snarled at her again, but Qian Shanyi ignored her. "We need to talk to the spirit hunter before committing, one way or another," she said, "anything else would be too stupid to even contemplate."
"Then what do you suggest?" Wang Yonghao said.
"There's two options," Qian Shanyi said calmly, raising two fingers. The three cultivators were now in the next room over. "One, we tell the spirit hunter she is under our protection, and talk to them openly. If she really is innocent, I'd be the first to raise my sword for her. Of course, if she is not, then we would lose any element of surprise."
"No," Linghui Mei shook her head, "absolutely not. You would abandon me right away - I am better off risking my luck out this window."
"Could you please tell us what happened?" Wang Yonghao cupped his hands, pleading to her. "Shanyi is right. We wouldn't judge you."
Linghui Mei glared at him. "No."
"Then the second option - you hide her," Qian Shanyi said calmly.
"Hide her - how?"
"You know how," she said, staring Wang Yonghao in the eyes. "If you really trust her enough to fight the spirit hunters for her, surely it'd be but a trifle? I think this would be stupid as well - but much less so. At least she would have a reason to keep her mouth shut."
Wang Yonghao stepped back, his face twisting as if he bit into a lemon. He glanced between Qian Shanyi and Linghui Mei, and squeezed his eyes closed.
"They are knocking on our door," Qian Shanyi announced. "Make your choice now."
Wang Yonghao cursed, and finally stepped over to the maid, offering her a hand. Linghui Mei took it with a puzzled look. "Please hold on," Wang Yonghao said, and opened the entrance to his inner world beneath their feet. Linghui Mei's panicked scream was quickly cut off as she vanished through the boundary of his inner world, and the entrance closed a mere moment after.
The second option, then.
Qian Shanyi sighed, and casually stepped over to the fireplace, taking the kettle off the fire. That brought her out of the sound muffling formation entirely, and she called out to the cultivators at the door, pretending she only just heard them. "Coming! Wait but a moment."
She slowly put the kettle down on a nearby table, took her hair comb and hair sticks out of her hair, and ruffled it until it looked completely unkempt. Pulling her sword off her belt, she tossed it on the bed, took off her sandals, and re-tied her robes, so that they'd seem like they were put on in a hurry. A quick sweep of her hand over her face smudged her makeup, and she headed to the door, looking for all the world as if she was in the middle of some very vigorous competition of beliefs.
When she reached the door, she glanced back. Where was Yonghao? It should have only taken him what, perhaps twenty seconds to descend down to the ground, and another twenty to rise back up? By all rights, he should have been out already. She needed him to be in the apartment before she let anyone look inside, lest they arouse more suspicions.
Perhaps he decided to waste some time calming the other woman down. Well, she could waste time just as easily.
"How may I help you?" Qian Shanyi said, cranking the door open a fraction, just enough for her to look out. Outside, she saw an unfamiliar, young cultivator in bright green robes. His eyes, strangely emotionless, were concealed behind a pair of circular glasses. A dozen talismans hovered around his body, tied down by long tassels on his robes, sending out sparks from his spiritual shield. Jian Shizhe and Rui Bao stood a short step behind him, and each gave her a warm stare - though for different reasons. As her glance swept downwards, she noted that Jian Shizhe's foot was already replaced with one of sharp, thorny wood - impressively fast, for a living prosthetic of this complexity.
At their feet was a small brown dog, barely a foot long. As soon as the door was opened, it snarled, and started to bark.
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- Location
- Massachusetts
It appears that the primary cultivation path in this world is that of dramatic timing.
- Location
- Minnesota
- Pronouns
- She/Her
So there's definitely some sort of mental compulsion that Yanghao is seeing through but Shanyi can't. He clearly sees the woman as a cultivator but Shanyi is incredibly insistent that the woman is totally normal, and definitely would have picked up on this line in particular if she was in her right mind.
- Location
- My happy place
This whole thing seems really fucking stupid. Very, very sus that Wang Yonghao would be acting like that towards some random girl running away from the law. There is literary no reason for him to be helping her. This makes no God-dam sense!
BagFullOfLizards
Some bag, mostly lizards
- Location
- A bag
It doesn't seem to work that well, it ate an entire sect!
- Location
- Earth
- Pronouns
- He/Him
One of these days, Shanyi needs to teach Yonghao about the "You Just Told Me" gambit. Obviously not when she's messing with him, but...eventually.
(Falling for the YJTM gambit is acceptable in situations when the other guy could obviously figure it out if you don't tell them.)
From my perspective, xianxia lends itself naturally to stories about class conflict. The gap between the haves and the have-nots is extreme; immortals are a step below divinity, mortals are just ordinary people. In theory, anyone can cultivate, anyone can become an immortal; in practice, success is dependent on access to resources. Secret cultivation techniques or spirit-energy-rich meditation spots or spirit stones or elixirs or whatever; the details vary, the shape remains.
In practice, I have found very few xianxia stories which do anything with that. I assume that's because most xianxia is written in a language I don't read, and the few translators are more interested in broad-appeal power-fantasy sort of stories, but it's frustrating either way.
Oh.
One way or another, this is gonna disrupt Yonghao and Shanyi's plans. I kinda hope that she ends up joining the group, at least temporarily; I enjoy the Shanyi/Yonghao dynamic, but it would be interesting to see a third party disrupt it.
What was it that Shanyi said last chapter?
Anyways, it's not like Yonghao has been reluctant to help people in the past. Insofar as he's reluctant to become an overpowered xianxia hero, it's because he sees himself and his power as a danger to other people. When trouble shows up, he doesn't just run; he tries to do something about it.
Yonghao deciding he'd rather reveal his secret to some random woman running from the law than hand her over to the cops is unusual, but it's hardly unprecedented. And it's in line with the lesson Shanyi just taught him, no matter how much she thinks other points render that lesson moot.
Look, they built their sect right next to a pre-existing black hole. I'm not sure we can blame the hole for that.
Shirube
The Devil in the Details
- Location
- In the Details
Yonghao isn't really known for making decisions that make sense, though? This seems like a very Yonghao sort of stupid thing to do.
- Location
- Minnesota
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I wholeheartedly agree, re class conflict, etc. I wonder if it has something to do with the class of the typical author/translator as well? I'm essentially completely ignorant of the political situation in china, but one would imagine that there would at least be some sort of communist interpretation written somewhere. I would definitely be interested in reading about a maoist revolution sort of period in a xinxia setting.
I'm curious to see who exactly Linghui Mei is. Is she another cultivator, or is she some sort of sentient demon beast? Her comment about cultivators caring about regular people had a lot of vitriol, but I'd be curious to see if it was warped by Shanyi's perception because it makes it seem like Mei isn't a cultivator. Would Yonghao have heard something else?
BagFullOfLizards
Some bag, mostly lizards
- Location
- A bag
It may be that Yanghao is seeing something Shanyi doesn't, but it's just as likely to me that he isn't seeing something she does. Shanyi spent some time examining the woman to conclude she wasn't a cultivator, Yanghao might not have thought to do the same. Or he might have also registered her as a mortal but just be assuming she's got a secret concealment technique or is powerful enough to hide her cultivation or is some sort of mystical shapeshifter. With his luck ridiculous unlikely explanations aren't.
- Pronouns
- He/His/etc
She definitely killed somebody.
nicoo
Malfunctioning neurochemistry, please be kind.
- Location
- Europe
- Pronouns
- They/She/Meow
Oh, I believe Shanyi guessed as much, given she only asked whether Linghui Mei "killed an ordinary person." I would assume there are preciously few things that would get a spirit hunter sent, ready to kill and with significant backup, especially against a non-cultivator.
If anything, I suspect she'd approve of a mortal resolving to kill a cultivator (and succeeding) if it was for morally acceptable reasons... which could well be, given that she must have been desperate to even make the attempt.
Plus, she was just considering that a spirit hunter would have been unlikely to be so corrupt (and get away with it) but said nothing about the corruptibility of cultivators in general.
I think the shape of (her guess at) the situation is painted in the negative space here, in what's not being said/thought.
Yes, we only saw Shanyi's perspective on the situation, and while she's more socially and politically savvy, I would guess Yanghao would be the one to have had experience with that sort of nonsense, or to have stumbled upon the cultivators' equivalent of True Sight, etc.
I think it is somewhat unlikely that he wouldn't have checked anything at all... though this kind of obliviousness would be excellent leverage for his "luck." Either way, that makes me quite hyped for the next chapter... too bad I'm too broke to just yeet money at Winged_One and read it already. :3
(though TBH I'd be more curious what the Patreon-exclusive posts are like)
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