We're uncertain if Shouxi will be able to take our request in the timeframe we need him to complete it in, and if not we need to use the market to get the pills we need or to rent a Wood wonder. It's to hedge our bets. We can do a couple easy-medium jobs and somewhat reliably earn a few points that way.
EDIT - Also, we may be able to get a healing pill again, which we kind of need.
Unless you're voting for a different plan of a similar name, it may be a good idea to change the format of the vote you cast. The plan name could easily be type- and/or punctuation-sensitive.
My apologies for my inattention to the thread. Now that I'm here, let me answer the question I've been tagged on a few times: the pill question. Zhi can take up to his CON score number of pills per action (currently 2). Also, no one asked but since we're on the subject, Zhi can safely cycle a pill with a grade up to or equal to your CON times 2. So keep that in mind.
Also, have a tally:
Adhoc vote count started by Vesvius on Oct 1, 2020 at 11:58 PM, finished with 93 posts and 32 votes.
[X] Plan: For the love of pills.
-[X] Jai Shouxi is relaxing at home, enjoying the fruits of his labor. He seems like he would be happy to speak with you, and seems most interested in your new alterations
--[X] You have a fair idea of what's needed to progress your other techniques and it's tempting to buy pills to get all the necessary aspects for the Blooming Spear of the Auroch. How many pills of earth, wood and beast can Shouxi make in time for next week and what would be the cost? Can he use the Winter Crab's carapace? How many of those pills can you even ingest at a time? Ask him! You don't want your intestines to fail... Xu Yun will give you sect points for two more weeks, so if you don't have enough now maybe Shouxi will accept a delayed payment.
-[X] You have talents and you have sect points. They burn a hole in your purse and token the longer you have them. You shall go to the sect market and seek to offload some of your wealth.
--[X] You don't know what to buy before you have talked to Shouxi and you don't know what to arrange with Shouxi before you know what's available at the market. Get information and make a cohesive spending plan.
-[X] Nokai is beyond happy that Auntie Bi is gone. She wishes to celebrate with a trip to the Forest of Pearls. Perhaps some sunshine is what you need. You will accompany her.
--[X] Thank Nokai, Xue and Lan for helping you.
--[X] Offer her an invitation to join our expedition into the deeps
-[X] You have discovered some talent in the physical arts, but talent is useless if not honed. You will find an empty training field and work on your martial skills.
--[X] ( Talon of Remembrance ) x2
--[X] ( Raptor's Foot ) x2
-[X] You may now take assignments at the Delving Heart Assignment Hall. You will go, take one, and carry it out to the best of your ability. x2
[X] Plan Clever Guy
[X] Ming Hui is planning a tour of the village's many street vendors soon so that he may be more inspired in his future dishes. If you wish a seat and a plate, one can be provided for you.
-[X] Mei asked you to tell him that you received his gift, you will do so. It has been awhile since you've had the opportunity to catch up with him, but it is clear that he is a good friend.
[X] Nokai is beyond happy that Auntie Bi is gone. She wishes to celebrate with a trip to the Forest of Pearls. Perhaps some sunshine is what you need. You will accompany her.
-[X] Ask her if she would like to join you as you familiarize yourself with your new limbs, check to make sure Xue still enjoys your pets despite your new scissor-hands.
-[X] Offer her an invitation to join your expedition into the deeps.
[X] Mo Hanying has asked for you. Apparently she has plans coming up that she thinks you would greatly enjoy, and she invites you to attend her at your leisure.
[X] Jai Shouxi is relaxing at home, enjoying the fruits of his labor. He seems like he would be happy to speak with you, and seems most interested in your new alterations
-[X] Ask him if he can make pills needed to start integrting your other techniques and how much it would cost
[X] You have discovered some talent in the physical arts, but talent is useless if not honed. You will find an empty training field and work on your martial skills.
-[X] Talon of Remembrance X4
[X] You have discovered some talent in the physical arts, but talent is useless if not honed. You will find an empty training field and work on your martial skills.
-[X] Raptor's Foot X1
We've done the dark art of arithmancy in the Discord and determined that if we can get pills it will take 3-4 actions to cycle BSA to max with pills, which is about the same as for using a Wonder if we go that route. If Shouxi can make Grade 3 Wood pills, it will only take 3 actions, but if he can only make Grade 2 then it'll be 4 actions.
The current leading plan leaves the possibility of either the pill or the Wonder option on the table.
And with no further votes, vote is closed. For The Love of Pills takes it.
Fair warning: it's going to be a bit before the next update. Not only do I have strange, strange events going on IRL right now (that you can hear all about on Discord!), it is once again time for everyone's favorite event of the month. That's right! It's COMMISSIONS WEEK! We've got three canon sidestories this months, not to mention the next installment of the adventures of Kong Ves (also 10PG, which less of you care about). So look out for those!
Excellent. I might be able to make some progress in catching up.
Also, I'm wonder just how far you can push the "Technique integration" explanation. Everyone just seemed to drop that line of inquiry when it was said.
*You break into someone's house.* "What are you doing in my house?" "Technique integration." "Ah, that makes sense." *Drops the matter.*
*You take something from someone's pocket.* "Why are you taking my things?" "Technique integration." "Ah, that makes sense." *Lets you take it.*
*You stab someone.* "Why are you attacking me?!" "Technique integration." "Ah, that makes sense." *Lies down to make the stabbing easier.*
XD
We haven't really learned anything about Nightwatch Grove, but here's an omake about a Kong disciple there.
----
"Aww, I made it too big!"
Kong Wuying looked at the child's flower bracelet. She had picked up the trick of the weaving easily enough, but her fingers were still clumsy, and it hung far too loosely on her wrist when she tried it on.
"I see no problem. Your fingers knew that they didn't want to make a bracelet today. Instead-" he plucked the woven circle from her wrist and placed it on her head,, "you have made a lovely crown!"
She pouted a little. "But now I can't see it! And it was so pretty!"
Wuying leaned in, as though sharing a secret. "But everyone else can. That's the real beauty of making something, you know! Making other people happy."
She considered this for a moment. "Well, I still want to see it! I'm going to the pond!" She dashed off.
Wuying reflected on the energy of youth. No Step, no Technique, could recreate the boundless energy of a small child on a mission of importance.
There was a sound behind him. Or… the feeling of a sound. Shen Luxian would never have let even a breath of air escape his lips in annoyance. But Wuying heard the sound he didn't make.. When Wuying turned, there was only the slightest flicker in the man's expression. Wuying saw that as well. "Do you disapprove of flower crowns, brother Shen?"
Shen Luxian sighed. He was a tall man, a striking figure in the robes of the Nightwatch Grove, but contained in his space in a way that spoke of deeply ingrained habits of precise control. A breath exhaled, Shen's equivalent of a sigh. "Of course not. Children should play as they wish."
"Then it is not children of which you disapprove." Wuying's tone was light, his customary smile on his face. "It is me, then?"
Shen's eyes flicked close, then opened again. "We have discussed our… differences of opinion regarding the proper methods of crafting many times. Now is neither the time nor place to address those concerns. We still have much work to be done here. The guardian stones-"
"Need replacement, yes. But our duty in visiting the village is as much about making the sect a friendly and familiar sight as it is in the maintenance work. And besides, all children should weave flowers. It builds character."
Shen's mouth thinned by a degree no larger than a strand of hair. Wuying assumed he had played as a child, but he doubted flowers featured prominently. "You encouraged her after making an error. I have no issue with encouraging children. But you should have instructed her in the correct technique. Showed her how to fix her mistake."
Wuying went to pick up his pack. "Ah, brother Shen. The longer I live in this world, the fewer mistakes I find. I believe that so much of what we view as 'mistakes' are simply acts of providence that we have not foreseen."
"A believer in Fate's control of the world, then? I find such arguments beyond me, but I understand it is a popular opinion among some scholars."
Wuying shouldered his burden. "No, nothing so grand. Almost the opposite, in fact. Rather, I find the world is so vast, it seems impossible that any eye could see all ends. I follow the path where it takes me, and so often what seems an obstacle takes me right where I need to be."
Shen's mouth did tighten into a frown, then. Well, the beginning of one. "I hope you do not bring the same attitude towards error to your other work. Why…"
There was a scream from the other side of the village. Wuying's body glowed and rocketed like a comet, while Shen took a step up and onto a cloud that carried him with similar speed.
The two crafters had been sent early enough that the guardian totems were worn, but not dangerously so. But any defense could be overwhelmed.
Shen hovered twenty feet above, taking in the situation. There were Horrors here. Twisted shapes of claws and fangs and rippling tendons, blackened with corrupted Night anam and flush with Life. The work of some Dusklord trying to curry favor, no doubt.
Wuying was among them in moments, his movements still hastened by glowing light. An object dangled from one hand, what Shen reocgnized as a child's toy, a cord wrapped around a circular weight. Shen had seen Wuying make it do tricks. Right now, he was using it as a meteor hammer, the weight striking with a force like a five ton boulder. Wielded with Wuying's usual dexterity, it took off limbs and shattered bodies with each strike.
Shen drew his own anam into a small object held in his sleeve. At first appearing to be no more than a splinter, it grew into a deadly spear with a shining silver point. He cast it down again and again, its point never failing to find a Horror's heart.
Shen and Wuying had never fought side by side, but both had fought the corrupt spirit beasts of woods before. Soon enough, the beasts in the village were dead. Shen extended his sixth sense, and was fairly certain the monsters had failed to kill any of the villagers. Once the disciples had arrived, the horrors had focused on them.
There were few things the Horrors of the woods hated as deeply as the Nightwatch.
But there was a howling from beyond the village. Shen felt the weight of the Dusklord's presence: a Teacher. It seemed new to its power - it's anam was still wild and untamed.
As Luxian and Wuying were both Farmers, this was of small comfort.
Shen cried out, "The boundary stone!"
The guardian stones were not meant to stop Dusklords. But they could make the experience of taking a village painful and costly.
Wuying was faster. He arrived to find the stone cracked. Had someone erred in the sect's record keepers? Had the previous disciple failed to report the damage out of laziness? Or perhaps the stone had some hidden flaw only now exposed, or damage from a lightning strike or other whim of nature had left it vulnerable. But there was no telling now. Now, it was broken, and needed repairing.
There was no time for subtlety.. Wuying held the pieces together and forced his anam through the repair process. It was not meant to heal such significant damage. It hurt a great deal, and he could only hope the damage to his channels was not lasting. But the guardian field of the village crackled to life.
Shen arrived a moment later. He looked at the stone, which was… whole. That was the best that could be said. He placed a hand on Wuying's shoulder. "It will hold for the night."
Wuying rose from his knees. "No. It will not."
Shen felt his heart quiver. "No."
"The sect will not come before morning."
Shen tried to martial optimism. "They may. The Elders' spiritual senses could catch the Dusklord. A group of martial disciples may be on their way right now."
"No. This will not be the only attack tonight." The Horrors of the woods were predators, but they had remarkable cunning. Wuying spoke with his usual gentleness, but Shen thought he sounded… tired. "We are on our own."
---
Shen and Wuying dragged the bodies to the center of the town. Shen spoke first. "We are charmcrafters. These are components."
Wuying stared mutely at the bodies of the Horrors. "Do you have a diagram for a weapon that will kill a Dusklord?"
Shen bowed his head. "I have some notes. But…"
Wuying nodded. "They are at the sect. I see. Then I will work. You will infuse from your core as I go. We have little enough time."
The task was madness. An undiagrammed weapon made to fight a being a level above them? And to infuse as they went? The Kong was mad. Better to make a signal to the sect-
Wuying placed a hand on Shen's shoulder and met his gaze. "Brother Shen. Who triumphed in our last contest?"
Shen slumped. What other choice was there?
---
It was grueling work. Both were low enough on anam after the fight, and Wuying had taken wounds. PIlls helped replenish them both, but the medicinal energies could not quiet the howling of the Dusklord's forces outside.
The Horrors were stripped, deconstructed. Night and Life were ever prominent, but there was a host of other anam types available in various quantities. Shen prepared a refining formation and worked it as needed while Wuying muttered to himself.
They had discussed the issue. They had no chance of defeating the Dusklord with raw power. Only careful planning might allow them to succeed, and they were better equipped to stun it than strike it down.
Life would be part of it. And Wuying allowed himself a small smile when he found a Horror with parts belonging to an Ebon Widow. To a Kong, a spider could not help but feel lucky. But a Widow was just what they needed for another reason. There would be Betrayal in its fangs.
As Wuying began to work the Horror parts into shape and place the runes it would need, Shen worked his anam through the materials. It was a crazed way of crafting. They would make a bow, they had decided. And one arrow. Shen had argued for three, but Wuying had pointed out that if the first shot failed, they would not get a second.
---
The howls and screams of rage were fraying on Shen's mind. Dimly, he recognized the work of a Scholar technique. He mustered his mental defenses, but now there was another distraction. His own anam had never felt so unstable. It was in his core, in his channels. All he should have to do was coax it out. Wuying had finished the work, but they both knew his core needed to be saved for battle, so it was Shen's job to infuse.
His anam trembled. He felt a hand on his own, and looked up to see the Kong's quiet smile. "Shen. Whatever happens, it will have been my honor to be here."
Shen Liuxian did not cry. He did not show fear. He simply…. Nodded. And his anam stilled.
The screams were upon them, and there was a feeling of shattering as the barrier broke.
Shen wanted to scream. The infusion was not finished. He had been too slow. "We are dead."
The Kong glanced down. "The arrow is finished."
Shen looked up, his eyes hopeless. "The bow is not. There is no time."
"The bow was only ever a delivery mechanism. The arrow is all we really need, is it not?"
Shen stilled himself. He mustered his mask. If they were to die, he would do it on his feet.. He stood and clenched the arrow. "It is."
"Providence."
Wuying was gone in a flash of light. Shen stared at where the arrow had been, a moment before. Shen swallowed, and summoned his cloud.
Wuying was on top of a tree, his strange weighted string slamming down at the snarling Horrors below. He laughed and called out to the forest, "Dusklord! Will you send your weakest curs after me or must I hunt you down and drag you out myself?"
The Horrors stilled. The creature came forth.
No one knew whose blood had been shed to make the Vestige that dwelt at the heart of the woods that the Nightwatch Grove guarded. But it was something more now, something that fed on anam and spread forth its corrupted minions that hated Life and Light.
The Dusklords that had been examined were found to be some combination of kukuni and spirit beast, merged together in some horrible surgery that was too disturbing to contemplate. But they spilled forth and they did great harm when they did.
It lashed out with a limb of vines and thorns and darkness, and Wuying dodged.
Shen watched with sick horror as the vines exploded outworks into a net and caught him with almost no effort. He could not watch, but he could not pull his gaze away. Cursing his slowness, he descended, spear readied - but the Dusklord glanced upwards and met him with a blazing howl of Night anam that blasted away his movement technique and his weapon both, until he crashed heavily to the forest floor.
Well, he thought vaguely, it had been a foolish plan from the start.
He watched as Kong Wuying was pulled in, encased in vines and darkness. He was struggling, but his light seemed so dim…
Then he watched as a pair of second arms erupted from Wuying's shoulders. A Sage Technique.
The free limb plucked the arrow from Wuying's left hand and threw it into the Dusklord's eye. The arrow sunk in deep.
At first, Shen thought that nothing had happened. But Wuying was no longer being pulled in towards the Dusklord's maw.
And then… a hiss of pain.
The monster shook itself. Made a curious sound of pain and confusion.
Then it went wild. Bright green Life anam and dark Night shot through its channels, becoming visible to the naked eye. The anam raged against itself and Shen realized the two types of anam were fighting each other. The weapon had worked.
Shen crawled to his feet. The Horrors around were rustling in confusion, not knowing what to do. "Wuying!"
He summoned his cloud, and flew unsteadily towards Wuying. Grabbing hold of the fellow disciple's hand, he hauled it out of the monster's grasp, which was weak as its body raged against itself.
Wuying looked up at him with a dazed expression, then shook himself. "We could kill it!"
Shen shook his head. "Are you mad? Do you know how lucky we were to escape?"
Wuying grabbed him. "Think of it, Shen! The youngest disciples ever to fell a Dusklord! And we are not even martial disciples! We'd be legends!"
Shen rose the cloud higher. "No! It could master itself at any moment!"
Wuying shook his head. "The villagers must be rescued-"
"No!" Wuying was astonished to see genuine anger and.. Something else on Shen's face. "The Dusklord will retreat after being wounded so. And if it does not, it will chase us. The village is of no consequence compared to two of the Nightwatch."
Every moment brought them further away. 'The materials, Shen! Think of what we could harvest from a Dusklord!"
Shen clenched fists. "I - I cannot-"
"Are you-" A coward, was the end of the question. But Wuying stopped. He had never seen fear on Shen. He had pushed the man too hard. He sat back on the cloud, as the Dreadlord's pained howls faded in the distance. "I see. I'm sorry. I was foolish."
Shen "You were. Please do not be so foolish again." He braced himself, and completed his thought. "I can't… I do not wish to lose you."
It took a moment for Wuying to process that. And then he took a few more moments to make sure he completed the processing. And then another, just to be sure. "...I am glad I did not lose you as well."
The ride back to the sect was quiet, but Wuying rested himself comfortably against Shen's legs, and it was a pleasant sort of quiet.
This spawned from a random bit in Discord a few weeks ago about a "Kong Bob Ross". That somehow turned into this.
We haven't really learned anything about Nightwatch Grove, but here's an omake about a Kong disciple there.
----
"Aww, I made it too big!"
Kong Wuying looked at the child's flower bracelet. She had picked up the trick of the weaving easily enough, but her fingers were still clumsy, and it hung far too loosely on her wrist when she tried it on.
"I see no problem. Your fingers knew that they didn't want to make a bracelet today. Instead-" he plucked the woven circle from her wrist and placed it on her head,, "you have made a lovely crown!"
She pouted a little. "But now I can't see it! And it was so pretty!"
Wuying leaned in, as though sharing a secret. "But everyone else can. That's the real beauty of making something, you know! Making other people happy."
She considered this for a moment. "Well, I still want to see it! I'm going to the pond!" She dashed off.
Wuying reflected on the energy of youth. No Step, no Technique, could recreate the boundless energy of a small child on a mission of importance.
There was a sound behind him. Or… the feeling of a sound. Shen Luxian would never have let even a breath of air escape his lips in annoyance. But Wuying heard the sound he didn't make.. When Wuying turned, there was only the slightest flicker in the man's expression. Wuying saw that as well. "Do you disapprove of flower crowns, brother Shen?"
Shen Luxian sighed. He was a tall man, a striking figure in the robes of the Nightwatch Grove, but contained in his space in a way that spoke of deeply ingrained habits of precise control. A breath exhaled, Shen's equivalent of a sigh. "Of course not. Children should play as they wish."
"Then it is not children of which you disapprove." Wuying's tone was light, his customary smile on his face. "It is me, then?"
Shen's eyes flicked close, then opened again. "We have discussed our… differences of opinion regarding the proper methods of crafting many times. Now is neither the time nor place to address those concerns. We still have much work to be done here. The guardian stones-"
"Need replacement, yes. But our duty in visiting the village is as much about making the sect a friendly and familiar sight as it is in the maintenance work. And besides, all children should weave flowers. It builds character."
Shen's mouth thinned by a degree no larger than a strand of hair. Wuying assumed he had played as a child, but he doubted flowers featured prominently. "You encouraged her after making an error. I have no issue with encouraging children. But you should have instructed her in the correct technique. Showed her how to fix her mistake."
Wuying went to pick up his pack. "Ah, brother Shen. The longer I live in this world, the fewer mistakes I find. I believe that so much of what we view as 'mistakes' are simply acts of providence that we have not foreseen."
"A believer in Fate's control of the world, then? I find such arguments beyond me, but I understand it is a popular opinion among some scholars."
Wuying shouldered his burden. "No, nothing so grand. Almost the opposite, in fact. Rather, I find the world is so vast, it seems impossible that any eye could see all ends. I follow the path where it takes me, and so often what seems an obstacle takes me right where I need to be."
Shen's mouth did tighten into a frown, then. Well, the beginning of one. "I hope you do not bring the same attitude towards error to your other work. Why…"
There was a scream from the other side of the village. Wuying's body glowed and rocketed like a comet, while Shen took a step up and onto a cloud that carried him with similar speed.
The two crafters had been sent early enough that the guardian totems were worn, but not dangerously so. But any defense could be overwhelmed.
Shen hovered twenty feet above, taking in the situation. There were Horrors here. Twisted shapes of claws and fangs and rippling tendons, blackened with corrupted Night anam and flush with Life. The work of some Dusklord trying to curry favor, no doubt.
Wuying was among them in moments, his movements still hastened by glowing light. An object dangled from one hand, what Shen reocgnized as a child's toy, a cord wrapped around a circular weight. Shen had seen Wuying make it do tricks. Right now, he was using it as a meteor hammer, the weight striking with a force like a five ton boulder. Wielded with Wuying's usual dexterity, it took off limbs and shattered bodies with each strike.
Shen drew his own anam into a small object held in his sleeve. At first appearing to be no more than a splinter, it grew into a deadly spear with a shining silver point. He cast it down again and again, its point never failing to find a Horror's heart.
Shen and Wuying had never fought side by side, but both had fought the corrupt spirit beasts of woods before. Soon enough, the beasts in the village were dead. Shen extended his sixth sense, and was fairly certain the monsters had failed to kill any of the villagers. Once the disciples had arrived, the horrors had focused on them.
There were few things the Horrors of the woods hated as deeply as the Nightwatch.
But there was a howling from beyond the village. Shen felt the weight of the Dusklord's presence: a Teacher. It seemed new to its power - it's anam was still wild and untamed.
As Luxian and Wuying were both Farmers, this was of small comfort.
Shen cried out, "The boundary stone!"
The guardian stones were not meant to stop Dusklords. But they could make the experience of taking a village painful and costly.
Wuying was faster. He arrived to find the stone cracked. Had someone erred in the sect's record keepers? Had the previous disciple failed to report the damage out of laziness? Or perhaps the stone had some hidden flaw only now exposed, or damage from a lightning strike or other whim of nature had left it vulnerable. But there was no telling now. Now, it was broken, and needed repairing.
There was no time for subtlety.. Wuying held the pieces together and forced his anam through the repair process. It was not meant to heal such significant damage. It hurt a great deal, and he could only hope the damage to his channels was not lasting. But the guardian field of the village crackled to life.
Shen arrived a moment later. He looked at the stone, which was… whole. That was the best that could be said. He placed a hand on Wuying's shoulder. "It will hold for the night."
Wuying rose from his knees. "No. It will not."
Shen felt his heart quiver. "No."
"The sect will not come before morning."
Shen tried to martial optimism. "They may. The Elders' spiritual senses could catch the Dusklord. A group of martial disciples may be on their way right now."
"No. This will not be the only attack tonight." The Horrors of the woods were predators, but they had remarkable cunning. Wuying spoke with his usual gentleness, but Shen thought he sounded… tired. "We are on our own."
---
Shen and Wuying dragged the bodies to the center of the town. Shen spoke first. "We are charmcrafters. These are components."
Wuying stared mutely at the bodies of the Horrors. "Do you have a diagram for a weapon that will kill a Dusklord?"
Shen bowed his head. "I have some notes. But…"
Wuying nodded. "They are at the sect. I see. Then I will work. You will infuse from your core as I go. We have little enough time."
The task was madness. An undiagrammed weapon made to fight a being a level above them? And to infuse as they went? The Kong was mad. Better to make a signal to the sect-
Wuying placed a hand on Shen's shoulder and met his gaze. "Brother Shen. Who triumphed in our last contest?"
Shen slumped. What other choice was there?
---
It was grueling work. Both were low enough on anam after the fight, and Wuying had taken wounds. PIlls helped replenish them both, but the medicinal energies could not quiet the howling of the Dusklord's forces outside.
The Horrors were stripped, deconstructed. Night and Life were ever prominent, but there was a host of other anam types available in various quantities. Shen prepared a refining formation and worked it as needed while Wuying muttered to himself.
They had discussed the issue. They had no chance of defeating the Dusklord with raw power. Only careful planning might allow them to succeed, and they were better equipped to stun it than strike it down.
Life would be part of it. And Wuying allowed himself a small smile when he found a Horror with parts belonging to an Ebon Widow. To a Kong, a spider could not help but feel lucky. But a Widow was just what they needed for another reason. There would be Betrayal in its fangs.
As Wuying began to work the Horror parts into shape and place the runes it would need, Shen worked his anam through the materials. It was a crazed way of crafting. They would make a bow, they had decided. And one arrow. Shen had argued for three, but Wuying had pointed out that if the first shot failed, they would not get a second.
---
The howls and screams of rage were fraying on Shen's mind. Dimly, he recognized the work of a Scholar technique. He mustered his mental defenses, but now there was another distraction. His own anam had never felt so unstable. It was in his core, in his channels. All he should have to do was coax it out. Wuying had finished the work, but they both knew his core needed to be saved for battle, so it was Shen's job to infuse.
His anam trembled. He felt a hand on his own, and looked up to see the Kong's quiet smile. "Shen. Whatever happens, it will have been my honor to be here."
Shen Liuxian did not cry. He did not show fear. He simply…. Nodded. And his anam stilled.
The screams were upon them, and there was a feeling of shattering as the barrier broke.
Shen wanted to scream. The infusion was not finished. He had been too slow. "We are dead."
The Kong glanced down. "The arrow is finished."
Shen looked up, his eyes hopeless. "The bow is not. There is no time."
"The bow was only ever a delivery mechanism. The arrow is all we really need, is it not?
Shen stilled himself. He mustered his mask. If they were to die, he would do it on his feet.. He stood and clenched the arrow. "It is."
"Providence."
Wuying was gone in a flash of light. Shen stared at where the arrow had been, a moment before. Shen swallowed, and summoned his cloud.
Wuying was on top of a tree, his strange weighted string slamming down at the snarling Horrors below. He laughed and called out to the forest, "Dusklord! Will you send your weakest curs after me or must I hunt you down and drag you out myself?"
The Horrors stilled. The creature came forth.
No one knew whose blood had been shed to make the Vestige that dwelt at the heart of the woods that the Nightwatch Grove guarded. But it was something more now, something that fed on anam and spread forth its corrupted minions that hated Life and Light.
The Dusklords that had been examined were found to be some combination of kukuni and spirit beast, merged together in some horrible surgery that was too disturbing to contemplate. But they spilled forth and they did great harm when they did.
It lashed out with a limb of vines and thorns and darkness, and Wuying dodged.
Shen watched with sick horror as the vines exploded outworks into a net and caught him with almost no effort. He could not watch, but he could not pull his gaze away. Cursing his slowness, he descended, spear readied - but the Dusklord glanced upwards and met him with a blazing howl of Night anam that blasted away his movement technique and his weapon both, until he crashed heavily to the forest floor.
Well, he thought vaguely, it had been a foolish plan from the start.
He watched as Kong Wuying was pulled in, encased in vines and darkness. He was struggling, but his light seemed so dim…
Then he watched as a pair of second arms erupted from Wuying's shoulders. A Sage Technique.
The free limb plucked the arrow from Wuying's left hand and threw it into the Dusklord's eye. The arrow sunk in deep.
At first, Shen thought that nothing had happened. But Wuying was no longer being pulled in towards the Dusklord's maw.
And then… a hiss of pain.
The monster shook itself. Made a curious sound of pain and confusion.
Then it went wild. Bright green Life anam and dark Night shot through its channels, becoming visible to the naked eye. The anam raged against itself and Shen realized the two types of anam were fighting each other. The weapon had worked.
Shen crawled to his feet. The Horrors around were rustling in confusion, not knowing what to do. "Wuying!"
He summoned his cloud, and flew unsteadily towards Wuying. Grabbing hold of the fellow disciple's hand, he hauled it out of the monster's grasp, which was weak as its body raged against itself.
Wuying looked up at him with a dazed expression, then shook himself. "We could kill it!"
Shen shook his head. "Are you mad? Do you know how lucky we were to escape?"
Wuying grabbed him. "Think of it, Shen! The youngest disciples ever to fell a Dusklord! And we are not even martial disciples! We'd be legends!"
Shen rose the cloud higher. "No! It could master itself at any moment!"
Wuying shook his head. "The villagers must be rescued-"
"No!" Wuying was astonished to see genuine anger and.. Something else on Shen's face. "The Dusklord will retreat after being wounded so. And if it does not, it will chase us. The village is of no consequence compared to two of the Nightwatch."
Every moment brought them further away. 'The materials, Shen! Think of what we could harvest from a Dusklord!"
Shen clenched fists. "I - I cannot-"
"Are you-" A coward, was the end of the question. But Wuying stopped. He had never seen fear on Shen. He had pushed the man too hard. He sat back on the cloud, as the Dreadlord's pained howls faded in the distance. "I see. I'm sorry. I was foolish."
Shen "You were. Please do not be so foolish again." He braced himself, and completed his thought. "I can't… I do not wish to lose you.."
It took a moment for Wuying to process that. And then he took a few more moments to make sure he completed the processing. And then another, just to be sure. "...I am glad I did not lose you as well."
The ride back to the sect was quiet, but Wuying rested himself comfortably against Shen's legs, and it was a pleasant sort of quiet.
This spawned from a random bit in Discord a few weeks ago about a "Kong Bob Ross". That somehow turned into this.
