When 1 is locked to mortal and 9-10 is Chosen One That Shall Forge a 100,000 Year Empire, any increase, especially in the higher levels, is serious business,
Like, lightning boi is 2 talent boosting tribulations away from being a talent peer to the Sage Emperor. That is insane. It makes it even more likely that he'll get shiny patrons and power-boosting tribulations shoved into him, just because his potential means that the return on investment for boosting him is an order of magnitude greater than boosting a less talented pupil/minion.
When 1 is locked to mortal and 9-10 is Chosen One That Shall Forge a 100,000 Year Empire, any increase, especially in the higher levels, is serious business,
Like, lightning boi is 2 talent boosting tribulations away from being a talent peer to the Sage Emperor. That is insane. It makes it even more likely that he'll get shiny patrons and power-boosting tribulations shoved into him, just because his potential means that the return on investment for boosting him is an order of magnitude greater than boosting a less talented pupil/minion.
If we go to the other side, though, Talent 6s and 7s aren't so rare that they are certain to go farther than Talent 5s, and High Nobles have their own ways to increase talent given that pretty much anyone in prism has Talent 8/9 (but didn't begin that way). As such, Count+ clans probably can get someone enough boosters to get there every 300~ years or so.
If we go to the other side, though, Talent 6s and 7s aren't so rare that they are certain to go farther than Talent 5s, and High Nobles have their own ways to increase talent given that pretty much anyone in prism has Talent 8/9 (but didn't begin that way). As such, Count+ clans probably can get someone enough boosters to get there every 300~ years or so.
Which is coherent with the tournament results as seen. The Talent 6 and 7 were top 4-5 material, beating out the Count clan candidates(Kang Zihao and Han Jian) given some luck and resources, but they were DEFINITELY not in the league of the ducals(but COULD make them actually break a sweat) who solidly clinched the top spot in every contest, and Xuan Shi's project leaves little doubt he could have seeded highly in the facepunch contest if he wanted to use his secondary skill set.
Though, some brought up Xuan Shi's performance in the Thunderdome earlier...but we know Xuan Shi is a Production and Defense focused ducal scion, who...is really not in his best environment to be engaged in a big fight with no warning and no prep. So it winds up that Ji Rong can tie him up well enough there, but no more.
The problem is the timing. Ji Rong follows a strict narrative set up that clashes with simulationist knowledge of where he currently stood.
Early Week 15 he get put in stasis, and mid week 19 he leaves... but in the few days since he left he caught up to Xuan Shi and Huang Da to the point he could fight both of them at once when using fighting drugs, while in week 14 he was much weaker than the former and also weaker than the later. Week 31 he complains about not being able to go outside to do missions or get ressources, but he somehow did manage to get all of them enough to the point that even with being imprisoned from week 35-37 again (another three weeks), and not being peak at the time, he still manages to have breakthroughs extremely fast and find the 10 or so arts he needed to get rolling.
Ji Rong being rubberbanded to Ling Qi also retroactively shrunk the stakes for the whole Cai-Sun conflict. Of course we were fighting for Truth, Justice, and Oppression Mom's Way. But during the fight I at least also had the feeling that the winning side would enjoy material benefits while the losing side would suffer. And yet there's Ji Rong, early green with a fully fleshed out green art suite and domain weapon right in time for the tournament despite spending 10% of the year in time out.
It didn't wind up hurting us much but the Han Fang negaverse quest has got to be (quietly) salty as hell. Unless there's some twist coming that Ji Rong's cultivation is now suffering a backlash from something Liling did to boost him up for the tournament, but that seems unlikely.
well, the breakthrough target one has to roll under is talent*10 - past breakthroughs*10 and the breakthrough mortal -> red doesnt count, so to reach White one needs to be at least an effective talent 7 and for Great Spirit one needs to be at least an effective talent 8. This makes talent quite important, even if you can compensate somewhat with permanents or cultivation arts
It didn't wind up hurting us much but the Han Fang negaverse quest has got to be (quietly) salty as hell. Unless there's some twist coming that Ji Rong's cultivation is now suffering a backlash from something Liling did to boost him up for the tournament, but that seems unlikely.
Yes, that backlash is "lol what breakthrough bonus" and "lol what Domain Weapon synergy", which will have lasting consequences all throughout his time as a Third Realm cultivator.
Ling Qi simply has a hilariously better foundation for her cultivation than Ji Rong does. Not a crippling disadvantage to be sure, but it's one that lets Ling Qi narrow the gap between them even further under ideal circumstances.
Under said ideal circumstances, Ji Rong really would be in a plausible position to get a shot at punching out Cai Renxiang. Now that opportunity has been lost, especially with the fire that she's had lit under her ass by her mother. Further supported by having Meizhen and Ling Qi along for the ride. Where once Ji Rong had the potential to be something truly exceptional...Now, barring extreme circumstances and luck, that opportunity has passed.
So yeah, short term it doesn't look like much. But long term? Yeah, Ji Rong has lost out on his best chance to beat the median
I actually like the idea of Ji Rong crossing the line for more power and growing in such a way that forces him into not only direct confrontation with us, but also a continued threat long after our time at the sect.
I am not saying he is evil or something like that, just that it would be an interesting option.
Trying to parse my stream of thought about the last vote into a coherent post.
RE: future conflict.
The first thing that comes to mind is that Ling Qi is already going to be negatively impacted by her choice from the previous vote. By staying to meet the King Ling Qi is going to be swept in his wake whether she likes it or not; as he already mentioned in the update itself - '"Thou do not little dreamer," he said easily. "But you will, when you join us on our hunt. Only then will thy boon be granted. Pray that the understanding does not break thee."'. Ling Qi has no actual choice in the matter.
Ling Qi has also repeatedly been shown to be averse to killing people (Yan Renshu and the previous update with the prince) and the King is going to just outright force her to be part of his hunt in order to kill his brother and nephews. Remember Ling Qi desire for freedom? The actual core of it was a desire to never be put into a position that she has to be forced to do actions against her will (RE: prostitution) and the King is going to stomp all over it by forcing her to kill. At the very least Ling Qi is going to be soul searching about her desire to improve as fast as possible and thus entangling with high level cultivators/spirits (at least Zeqing desired Ling Qi's own wellbeing, the King is simply amused by Ling Qi).
The actual vote itself was how Ling Qi deals with the fact that she got practically drafted by the King to be part of his hunt for a paltry boon. Does she accepts the boon trying to eke whatever benefit she can despite being in over her head? Does she try to to ask the King to spare Shen Hu despite the fact that it could backfire and whether he actually needs her help? Does Ling Qi takes a stand and tries to spare all both Shen Hu and the mortals even though it will almost certainly backfire because that is what she believes?
It also casts a further contrast when the dream ends and Ling Qi has to grapple with the decisions that she had. Was she right to take the boon offered despite the implied deaths that followed? Will she tries to excuse/affirm her decision as the best she could have done at the time or would she look back with horror and swear she would never make that choice again?
Basically, this is a big visceral experience which ought to have Ling Qi grapple with its aftereffects and directly influence her cultivation/domain/way going forward when Ling Qi asks herself what sort of person she wants to be.
@Arkeus tagged me so I feel compelled to give my thoughts about Kang Zihao as a rival.
Maybe it's because I didn't start to read the quest until dark dreams and thus missed the inter-vote chatter, but Kang Zihao was absolutely Meizhen's opponent.
Before the Thunderdome he was basically just one of the talented nobles in Ling Qi class with no real narrative importance. During the Thunderdome he sent a bunch of minions to ambush Meizhen on the thinnest of pretexts (Meizhen noted they were awfully cocky for standing against a ducal scion), appeared to castigate her for 'bullying' normal disciples and taunted her about her mother's death, he attacked Ling Qi only as a way to harm Meizhen. He even shows it when Cai asks him about he thinks that he is doing and he replies "Lady Cai, please understand the statement you are making. I struck only for the good of the Sect, and of course, the province of Duchess Cai. The presence of one of the Bai…". And then next turn Meizhen vows to straight up kill him when she is able*.
Kang Zihao started shit with Meizhen for 'the good of the empire' and Ling Qi was basically a footnote in his effort to harm Meizhen.
By contrast, Ji Rong can work as a foil to Ling Qi, but only if the Cai-Sun war angle is being pushed harder where he is Ling Qi opposite in Sun Liling's side. Which ultimately reaches a crescendo at the tournament, so that when Ling Qi notes that talking is meaningless it is fully appropriate because they aren't fighting because they care about each other, but they fight to prove whether Cai Renxiang or Sun Liling is the superior lord.
* I don't think Ling Qi fully grasped Bai Meizhen sincerity when se stated this.
Yes, that backlash is "lol what breakthrough bonus" and "lol what Domain Weapon synergy", which will have lasting consequences all throughout his time as a Third Realm cultivator.
To put things in perspective one of the proposals for the new systems was a Talent^3 scaling to cultivation success rate (after taking everything into account) since that more accurately represents the time it takes to actually get anywhere.
Yes, that backlash is "lol what breakthrough bonus" and "lol what Domain Weapon synergy", which will have lasting consequences all throughout his time as a Third Realm cultivator.
Ling Qi simply has a hilariously better foundation for her cultivation than Ji Rong does. Not a crippling disadvantage to be sure, but it's one that lets Ling Qi narrow the gap between them even further under ideal circumstances.
Under said ideal circumstances, Ji Rong really would be in a plausible position to get a shot at punching out Cai Renxiang. Now that opportunity has been lost, especially with the fire that she's had lit under her ass by her mother. Further supported by having Meizhen and Ling Qi along for the ride. Where once Ji Rong had the potential to be something truly exceptional...Now, barring extreme circumstances and luck, that opportunity has passed.
So yeah, short term it doesn't look like much. But long term? Yeah, Ji Rong has lost out on his best chance to beat the median
Eh, Ling Qi's breakthrough wasn't even that great. Imperial 8 isn't that great for us since we're currently a Darkness/Music/Moon cultivator who also has some wood, water, and wind. Cool, I guess, that it helps out two secondaries but it's overall meh. Wood breakthrough gave us some bonus health: nice but not amazing and not all that much of a foundation. The Wind bonus was super useless to us, being related to archery specifically, and I'm not sure if it even exists anymore. The Water breakthrough never made any sense and can very easily get cut out of having any effect depending on our art choices, while also not being much of a foundation. The Darkness breakthrough was... OK, but has/had very weak thematic justification and doesn't help us cultivate Darkness at all, which is a critical weakness in terms of Way bonuses for a Darkness-primary-by-far cultivator. Our meridian breakthrough was again OK, but poorly optimized to what we actually wanted meridians for due to mostly awkward timing(and arguably, punishing us for having good arts in some categories which resulted in fewer arts and therefore meridians in those categories).
Where Ling Qi's breakthrough actually shone was in the main choice she picked, and the Moon/Music boosts and expression uncapping, anything related to those. That's great foundation material, there.
If Ji Rong just wants to lightning punch things good, I think he's pretty well set to be competitive on level with Ling Qi. She's got a wide variety of bonuses, but they're mostly not ones that can be leveraged towards anything, and some even have precarious positions in future builds while also being so small they're not even worth considering in build decisions.
How quickly perspectives could change. Had she not been bantering with Shen Hu less than an hour ago. Feeling confident that whatever was in this dream would just be another opportunity for her to capitalize on. She had gotten arrogant Ling Qi thought. She hated this, she hated being so wholly under someone elses power, and having her own helplessness rubbed in her face. She worked so hard, cultivated so much, and she was still so very small.
The words, asking that the king instead spare the person she had brought with her, died without ceremony in her throat. Could she really afford to risk herself in the face of this kind of power? Even if she was insulated from death in this dream, mere injury could spell out ruin. She was confident that she could maintain her pace, keep up with her liege and fulfill her goals. Everything seemed to indicate that she was right, her cultivation over the past month had gone smoothly, swiftly pushing her toward the second step of the green realm and mastery of her arts. With this dream things hand pressing down on her shoulder and his nails digging into her skin, it forced her to remember how fragile that position was. Could she really risk that for the sake of someone she was just barely getting to know?
"The blessing of Fang," she whispered. The words tasted like rot on her tongue, like spoiled food dug out of the trash in hungry desperation. Surely she thought, if this was one of her real friends, the ones who had helped her get through the whole of last year, she wouldn't have hesitated at all. Sure she would, some bitter part of her whispered. Had she really changed at all? Or had she merely been lucky not to have her resolve truly tested.
"I see," the thing in the shape of a man said. "Very well then."
She felt then a burning pain, beginning from her shoulder where is fingernails pricked her skin. A wild and chaotic qi bubbled under her skin.
Then the King howled in pain and the feeling cut off. She barely had a second to feel shock before the hand on her shoulder twitched. She screamed as she felt her collarbone crack from the sheer monstrous force behind that spasm. That was not near enough to absorb the force though. Ling Qi flew backward to slam bodily into one of the many trees in a splintery explosion of splinters and sawdust. Her vision flashed red, and she tasted blood in her mouth. Even as her qi pool dropped precipitously from cushioning the blow even that much.
Ling Qi slid bonelessly down from the crater she had left in the massive tree trunk and looked up. She saw the horned King, his snarling features lit by a terrible colorless radiance that was all too familiar. He held his right hand away from his body, and there Ling Qi could see a half dozen wriggling white threads digging into his flesh, and spreading glowing lines up his wrist, alight with colorless flame that seared through immortal flesh. All around her the phantasmal beasts howled and roared, nearly deafening her with the cacophony.
The King's left hand blurred, and with a wet, tearing squelch and a thump, his burning hand and forearm fell to the grass. It somehow grew and withered at once, lumpy growths swelling where radiant threads passed while the rest became little more than a mummified claw. As the King stared at his smoking stump, Ling Qi could only do the same.
She was going to die. That was her first thought. Her second, faintly hysterical one was… Just what had Cai Renxiang put into her gown?
There was a wet crack, and Ling Qi saw a length of bone grow forth from the stump, then another, swiftly followed by tendrils of sinew and meat as the King's hand began to regrow. Then his eyes fell on her once again. "What a jealous creature," he said, sounding faintly bemused, but Ling Qi could practically feel the pique bubbling beneath his passive mask. "Well, there are other methods."
Ling Qi had no chance to ask forgiveness before the multitude of rats and vermin carpeting the ground swarmed her, thousands of scrabbling claws and furry bodies racing up her limbs and engulfing her. Her last sight was the the king staring pensively at his half regrown hand.
…
……
………
She scurried through the grass and brush, racing alongside a million of her bretheren. Her sleek black fur gleaming under the ruddy moonlight. In her thoughts there was only fury. Fury at the Oathbreakers, the burrow destroyers, the diggers and choppers and despoilers.
They would pay, for the King stalked the night and all the forest raged at his side. She and her brethren were the vanguard, the rushing first wave, incalculable in number, each of them tiny, each of them weak. Yet their fangs were sharp and ready, durable enough to chew through stone and metal while others climbed and swarmed paltry walls, or burrowed beneath, sapping crumbling foundations.
They came upon the enemy all at once, their momentum crushing them against the straining barriers of spirit that surrounded the stout block of stone and its muddy spread which held their hated foe. The King's power waxed, and the barriers fell, torn asunder like leaves before a storm. Screams rang out as huts of cut wood and clay brick fell under the hooves and paws and branches of her King's greater soldiers. She raced on, ignoring the lesser Oathbreakers. She chittered in delight as she raced up the walls, pressed on all sides by her brethren, and they devoured the first of the Oathbreakers guarding the wall of their doomed keep.
She felt nothing but satisfaction as she dug her fangs into the squalling apes throat and tasted lifeblood in her mouth. She snarled in pain then as she felt hundreds of sharp little stones crack against her hide. Her brethren were torn apart, reduced to little more than gore and matted fur, but the gleaming white markings on her hide glowed, and she was protected.
She saw the Oathbreaker who had done it, his hand raised and another gathering cloud of sharpened stones gathering around him. It did not matter how many were slain, they were unending. They were the Hunt.
And as she blurred into shadow and clawed out the man's eyes, a fresh wave of her brothers and sisters crested the walls to devour him.
…
……
………
Ling Qi remembered blood and death. Men and women screaming, begging for their lives.
She retched as she remembered killing them. Her throat burned, and she tasted bile on her lips as she forced herself to to her hands and knees, scrabbling in the cooling dirt as her eyes stung with tears. She almost threw up in truth when she saw her surroundings. Wreckage stretched as far as her eyes could see ruined huts and houses, torn up streets, and everywhere, everywhere bones and meat. Glassy eyes and empty sockets stared at her from all around, full of accusation and mockery. An endless graveyard, a charnel house is what greeted her here.
"You are not one of mine."
Ling Qi's head snapped up at the sound of another voice, cold and dispassionate. In the shadow of a shattered doorway stood a figure, shrouded in black. She was unassuming, in stature, little more than a scrap of shadow amidst the graveyard. Her long black hair, matted and tangled, hung to her knees and shrouded her face, and yet, when the figure lifted her head, Ling Qi glimpsed only white bone and a burning red light in an empty eye socket.
Ling QI let out a strangled laugh that was more of a sob. It was crazy that she could recognize what this was so easily. The fear that had shackled her against the king was worn to tatters now "Why? What was this supposed to teach," she snarled at the Bloody Moon, rising to her knees as she shouted at the spirit, her restraint long fled. "What was the point?!"
"There isn't one," She heard Sixiang mutter bitterly in her ear. "Sorry Ling Qi." To her surprise, she felt their slender arms wrap around her shoulders. Were they still in a dream then? "I failed, I didn't see this bitch's fingerprints all over this until too late."
For her part, the Bloody Moon was unperturbed by the rudeness either of them had showed. "You have been coddled child, if you imagine that all or even most things hold a native purpose. It is the duty of humankind to forge meaning from the blind mechanics of the world."
Ling Qi shuddered in impotent anger. She could still taste blood in her mouth, see the faces of the dying in her mind. She could still see the terrible viridian light shining forth from the keep as an horned corpse had been flung from the broken battlements while greenery consumed the survivors. Roots and flowers and crawler vines erupting from everywhere, tearing and….
She took a shaking breath to control herself, resting a hand on Sixiang's. "Please, no cryptic speech," she began clenching her teeth. "What do you want?"
The burning red light in the spirit's eye socket flickered, and she raised a hand, wet and red with blood to cup her jaw. "I wished to inform you that there would be no further offers. You are not one of mine."
"I'm glad," Ling Qi spat, before she could even think about it. "If this is yours." The graveyard looked back at her, empty and stinking of rot.
The Bloody Moon stared at her, but Ling Qi was too exhausted to feel fear at the ominous weight that her gaze held. She could feel Sixiang's arms tighten around her shoulders.
"Vengeance is blood washed away with blood," the spirit replied, skull vanishing behind black tresses as she turned away. "This is its true form, the only ending it can ever bring. Vengeance is the claw lashing out in pain, the bloodied fist crushing a foes skull to paste in the throes of grief, before its owner is slain in turn."
Yet as the great spirit stepped into the shadows, she looked back, and beneath her tangled tresses, Ling Qi saw not a skull, but the face of a steely eyed matron of stern and unforgiving countenance. "Justice is something only humans can define. If you disapprove, then do not merely complain. It is such a troublesome mantle your kind have saddled me with."
Ling Qi closed her eyes, she just… didn't have the energy to decipher what the spirit was trying to say right now.
"I'm sorry Ling Qi," Sixiang said, voice muffled by her hair. "I'm a crappy friend. I shoulda been able to figure out that this was one of her butcher plays...I shoulda paid more attention. I could have asked around, even if she was hiding her mark."
"I should have been more careful with the map," Ling QI said with a bitter chuckle. "I could have… cross referenced it with the archive or… something. I got cocky too. I just hope Shen Hu is okay too."
As the graveyard faded away around them, and the warmth and weight of Sixiang's body dissolved away. Ling Qi could only regret. At least she hardly needed to sleep anymore as it was.
When she opened her eyes, she winced at the brightness of the early afternoon sun.
"Oh, you're awake," Shen Hu's voice drifted over her, and she immediately turned her head to where he kneeled in the grass beside her.
Her eyes were immediately drawn to the twisting scar across his belly, red and fresh. It looked like he had been gored viciously, it was a lethal wound by all measures.
He scratched his cheek nervously as he saw the direction of her gaze. "...I messed up," he admitted.
"What happened?" Ling Qi asked faintly, turning her gaze back up to the sky. She still felt dazed.
"Well, we were evacuating real good," Shen Hu replied, turning somber. "Lanhua dug out a shelter and started on a tunnel real quick, but all these spirit beasts came bursting through the shelter roof…. I couldn't hold them off long enough though, even with the choke."
"You should have run, they weren't real. What if you had actually died?" Ling Qi said without heat.
Shen Hu frowned. "If I would run now, why wouldn't I run later? Besides, it was a good lesson," he said looking down. "I spent all of last year alone, 'cept for Lanhua. It made me forget a lot of stuff that matters. Today I saw what it looks like when we fail. People depend on us, you know? I never want to see that again."
"Well at least one of us found a lesson in this," Ling Qi sighed. She had only been given doubts.
"...Yeah, I don't get it. I messed up, but the spooky lady at the end seemed happy for some reason," Shen Hu replied, scratching his head in confusion.
Ling Qi's gaze snapped back to him, and his blank stare met her hollow one.
"...Where are we anyway?" Ling Qi asked dully.
"Down in the valley. Looks like we found a site at least," Shen Hu replied, gesturing to the other side of her.
Ling Qi looked, and there she saw a tumbled field of moss grown stones, which might, if you squinted form a vague square.
Silent Stones: Multiply successes of Moon, Sun and Earth arts by 1.3. +1 to the XP dice of skills trained using those arts.
Well, at least this hadn't been for nothing Ling Qi thought, even if she could still taste blood on her tongue.
Blessing of Fang: +10 bonus to Physical and Spiritual Penetration(Way Bonus)
Ling Qi has been shaken. Apply a negative .1 multiplier to physical and spiritual cultivation until resolved. Negative multipliers are subtracted from total multipliers before determining final successes.
Str 3
Dex 5
Stam 4
Int 1
Wits 3
Resolve 2
Athletics 5
Perceptiveness 3
Spirit Ken 5
Fortitude 4
Resilience 2
Woodwind 2
+90 Successes to SCS(EPC) 60/30 Hidden/grinning
Shen Hu Bond advances to rank 1
Sixiang Bond unlocked for advancement, currently rank 1
Future exploration actions receive a +5 bonus. Events will receive scouting information before beginning.
No vote to end this one. Will start workin on the next update shortly. You got through relatively intact though!
To put things in perspective one of the proposals for the new systems was a Talent^3 scaling to cultivation success rate (after taking everything into account) since that more accurately represents the time it takes to actually get anywhere.
Basically, the current system means that a talent 5 takes about ~25% longer than us to do basic cultivation with the same level of work and resources. During the system revamp, proposals were made to change the effect of talent so that this difference would be more like 50-80%.
Like, narratively the fact that so few second years achieved Green is completely out of keeping with the mechanics, where that really shouldn't be particularly hard.
The lesson here seems to be that Justice doesn't exist in the wild, everything is unfair, brutal, and all about blood for blood. If you want it, that's on you, because that's not our job. Also, I'm a bit annoyed that you fuckers made me into something that had to care about it.
More importantly, holy shit Cai Shenhua what the fuck did you create. Just a thread from one of her masterworks was enough to make our outfit literally fucking eat a piece of a White's shade.
That's... Definitely going to have an impact on its development.
"Vengeance is blood washed away with blood," the spirit replied, skull vanishing behind black tresses as she turned away. "This is its true form, the only ending it can ever bring. Vengeance is the claw lashing out in pain, the bloodied fist crushing a foes skull to paste in the throes of grief, before its owner is slain in turn."
Yet as the great spirit stepped into the shadows, she looked back, and beneath her tangled tresses, Ling Qi saw not a skull, but the face of a steely eyed matron of stern and unforgiving countenance. "Justice is something only humans can define. If you disapprove, then do not merely complain. It is such a troublesome mantle your kind have saddled me with."
Hell no. I don't even care about the reward. The character stuff here here for Ling Qi was fantastic. And it looks like Shen Hu actually learned a valuable lesson from it too, so I don't even feel bad about not helping him (though I imagine Ling Qi will).
Basically, the current system means that a talent 5 takes about ~25% longer than us to do basic cultivation with the same level of work and resources. During the system revamp, proposals were made to change the effect of talent so that this difference would be more like 50-80%.
Like, narratively the fact that so few second years achieved Green is completely out of keeping with the mechanics, where that really shouldn't be particularly hard.
Except that you're forgetting a couple of things:
1. LQ was abnormally unaffected by the end of the Truce, since she had ducal-level protection in the form of Meizhen- and later Renxiang. Remember what happened to Suyin? that's probably far closer to the average commoner's experience than ours was.
2. We've cultivated about as hard as was possible- other disciples don't tend to as much. The second-years at Green are generally the ones who had reason to be comitted to getting as much power as possible.
One, Cai Robes are a bit more vicious than we think. Not surprising really, we could all guess that Cai Robes have something up with them that's suitably disturbing for the Cai.
But the bigger thing is the Bloody Moon's relation with us. It's been abundantly clear that Ling Qi (And the thread) is rather unreceptive to the idea of the Bloody Moon. And I suppose this is the Bloody Moon finding out why. After all, it had taken an interest in us before, and despite us being a pretty devout follower of the Moon, we still reject one of it's Phases rather vehemently. So I suspect this was the Bloody Moon's way of finding out Ling Qi's character.
As for the bigger picture...
I think this was the Moon's (And yes, I mean the Moon as a whole) way of trying to get Ling Qi to accept the Bloody Moon and what it represents. She doesn't have to like it, but vengeance and violence are a part of the Moon, and human nature at large, yet Ling Qi seems refuse to acknowledge that, in the name of trying to be "better" than she used to be.
Whether that's good or bad is another thing, but it's clear we're gonna have to come to some accord with nastier side of the Moon, and perhaps, by extension, the nastier side of Ling Qi herself, who seems to have simply locked away her more violent nature than truly confronted it.
But hey, that's just interpretation. Either way, seems like we're gonna need to sit down and do some reflecting.
Yes, that backlash is "lol what breakthrough bonus" and "lol what Domain Weapon synergy", which will have lasting consequences all throughout his time as a Third Realm cultivator.
Ling Qi simply has a hilariously better foundation for her cultivation than Ji Rong does. Not a crippling disadvantage to be sure, but it's one that lets Ling Qi narrow the gap between them even further under ideal circumstances.
Under said ideal circumstances, Ji Rong really would be in a plausible position to get a shot at punching out Cai Renxiang. Now that opportunity has been lost, especially with the fire that she's had lit under her ass by her mother. Further supported by having Meizhen and Ling Qi along for the ride. Where once Ji Rong had the potential to be something truly exceptional...Now, barring extreme circumstances and luck, that opportunity has passed.
So yeah, short term it doesn't look like much. But long term? Yeah, Ji Rong has lost out on his best chance to beat the median
That's really not true at all. Firstly Ji Rong has already beat the median. He's green within a year of cultivating for the first time and came fifth or sixth place in the sect tournament that was stacked with 3 ducal scions and the son of the empress' chief bodyguard. That's well above the media and he's fairly likely to make it to the next stage of cultivation.
His domain weapon, which refreshes him and gets around his weakness of really high cost for his high power offence, really isn't that bad for him, and is likely to be at least somewhat replacable and "Lol what breakthrough bonus?" is pretty much universal. I mean I've reviewed our breakthrough bonuses and they're generally pretty underwhelming, especially for meaning much past green 2 considering that Ling Qi had extremly good foundations. It's a problem that's been pointed out before.
Here's what we got in Yellow, which I'd expect Ji Rong to have pretty much equivilent to as it was before he hit his setbacks. A couple of decent stat boosts (saving a bit of time) a small qi bonus and site bonus. The autosuccesses and reduced successes needed rapidly dropped off in importance.
Green (below) is a bit more interesting, although it's difficult to work out what Ji Rong qould have gotten. Qi is a decently significant bonus at this stage, and it's a noted strength of Ling Qi so given his domain weapon choice provides a refill and he doesn't have a spirit beast it's fairly plausable he didn't get that. The Meridian bonus is very nice but I'd say it's reasonably likely he got that as more meridians is something everyone shoots for. Element bonuses are somewhat underwhelming for their level except for wood, which is pretty good. I'd expect him to have his own bonuses to heaven arts and their use in melee and his own domain bonuses are likely to be similar in strenght to ours.
The perfect breakthrough bonus we got turned out to be really, really, underwhelming for mangaing to crit (with bonuses), saving us at best what? Around 2AP. This may be partly due to the change in system but still.
So yeah I'd say Ji Rong's lack of breakthorugh bonuses probably put him a couple of turns behind us and maybe very slightly damaged his overall prospects (but it's probably not even noticable by stage 3 of Green). But to be honest a month or three behind us isn't really anything at all given how long even green cultivators live and he doesn't have Shenhua breathing down his neck to make that so dangerous. Especially how much having that good foundation is supposed to matter in the narritive.
Qi Bonus: +10 Bonus Qi
Meridian Bonus: Additional Heart, Spine, and Arm Meridians opened(Does not affect target number)
Spiritual Bonus: Auto successes to spiritual and qi increase to 5
Art bonuses
Wind: Wind arts require fifteen fewer successes per level after initial mastery, Initiative bonus increased to +3.
Dark: Ling Qi receives a two die bonus against all attempts to dispel darkness arts. Ling Qi receives a 2 die bonus on all offensive clashes using darkness arts
Imperial Eight Bonus: +5 auto successes to training imperial element arts
Wood Bonus: Gain one additional health box
General Bonuses
Perfect Success Bonus: Begin Early green with 100 successes.
Ling Qi received five bonus successes to the cultivation of moon and music arts
Ling Qi receives a ten die bonus to the cultivation of heart and lung arts
Expression gains one dot, and the stat cap is removed.
Domain Effects:
Allies with whom Ling Qi has at least four dots of positive relation receive a two die bonus to spiritual defense when within one hundred meters
General Bonuses
Attribute, Skill and Mastery Caps raised to 7, Dexterity raised to 8
Domain Cultivation unlocked
Auto Successes to Physical and Meridians increase to 5
Additional Health Box added
Elemental Bonuses
Heaven: Heaven specialty added to archery
Water: Ling Qi gains a two die bonus on all defenses while she has a water technique activated.
I am sad because I read Ling Qi's motivation completely wrongly. I believed she would choose Fang because she was confident in Shen Hu and wanted to experience what was going on, rather than being caught flatfooted and choosing Fang because she was terrified.
I guess it makes sense, though.
Also holy fuck those skill/attribute exp and that site will change things.
It's not being a bitch, it's both showing and telling us that it's been saddled with the aspect of "Vengeance" by humanity and that Justice isn't something that naturally exists on it's own. Justice has to be made with human hands, we can't just rely on spirits to do it.
Honestly, this is a great development for Ling Qi's personal ethics and finding her own Way through exposure to the awful parts of being a cultivator.
Plus, this is a great site and we learned something FUN™ about our Cai-Robe!
