Seeking Perfection in a Puppet's Performance
Li Touko brushed scarlet hair out of her eyes and glasses as she surveyed the path forward. Shifting sands belied treacherous ground, as walls of ash and dust obscured the horizon. Behind her, she knew, lay clean golden sand, relatively safe compared to what lay ahead. White, grey, and black sand, still clinging to a death an eon past. Pillars of towering twisted glass, black as the sand that had birthed them, appeared far in the distance. Some even obscured by the churning storm that still had not dispersed since the Sun's death. Soon, remnants of sacrificed soldiers would rise from the earth, ghosts wailing at the injustice of death and envious of those who still hold life's bounty. Given half a chance, they would stick her with so many spears that she would appear to be a pincushion of an elderly lady from the Peaks. So, she would give them not a single moment to spear her.
Lighting the ivory pipe clamped between her lips, Touko took a calming breath of scented smoke and began to walk forward hoisting a surprisingly durable burlap sack over a shoulder. Even as the wind howled for her to stop, she walked forward, forward into death's embrace. Around her, shambling failures secured from ancient Li vaults loped in the same direction. Rotting flesh, slavering jaws, and creaking bones sought to protect their master from the horrors that would soon arrive. They would fail. But they would buy the time needed. Time to pass the worst of it. Time to find remnants of her soon-to-be, and hopefully, very dead tutor.
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"I have mastered all the subsequent trials! Even the Patriarch complimented me on the skills I had honed, the work I had completed, the efforts I underwent. Now you tell me to slow down!? To contemplate the severity of theoretical consequences!? No! Either grant me permission to further my study on the Li traditions of soul surgery, or deny it. Do not, however, promise to give to me in one hundred years that which you are unwilling to give today!"
"Your request is denied then. If, in due time, you learn more temperance and caution then a review may occur."
"May a hundred rats spit on your review and a thousand sheep use it for cud! You'll not see me again and in one hundred years you'll weep at what could have been!"
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Ash attempted to choke her breath, radiant heat attempted to burn her flesh, and Ash Walkers attempted to spear her heart. Until, that is, her twisting flows of qi turned their hatred towards better targets. Such as their brothers in arms. Which unfortunately didn't do anything about the ash or heat. An Ash Lord, in his warped regalia and black plume, was being stymied by Muscle two, five, and ten while she made her escape deeper to the southeast. Not killing it, she had read up on the disastrous effects that could bring, instead preventing it from following her. Only a handful of the failures remained though, the rest preventing the three other lords from following her, or, for a more accurate description, taking so long to be destroyed that the Ash Lords had lost her trail. But that was alright. Soon enough she would be out of this accursed desert and into some accursed mountains! It had been months in this terrible land, months of skirting the worst of the calamity, keeping to the south of it for the most part. But that was still months of ash and sand. Heat and hatred. Of fitful rest and poor food. Soon, though, the real struggle would begin.
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"My decision is final in this matter."
"Surely not! I know that normally an apprenticeship with Scions of Shenhua is something to be lauded, but you have such a bright future with the Li! As you have constantly reminded everyone, even the Patriarch lauded your accomplishments and drive. In the Li traditions, you are a genius without peers! Surely you can wait a mere few decades to prove to those conservative idiots that you deserve the deeper secrets! With those in hand, there would be nothing outside your reach!
"If you believe that I would content myself with merely the Li traditions, then you have done a poorer job of understanding me than those who hold your leash believe. I will make it clear to you then. My ambition can not be reached with the traditions of the Li. It is my belief as well that Cai Shenhua's traditions also can not contain my ambitions. But it certainly won't hurt to see."
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None of the failures remained. But neither did the Ashwalkers. Cool, clean air filled Touko's lungs with every breath, the remaining golden dunes with their heat and ash were left behind with their accursed masters. Cloud nomads still ruled these lands, warring with the Ice nations to the southwest, their northwestern brethren who were being pushed out by the Empire, and, if the rumors were true, those nomads who had settled in burgeoning cities to the east of the Grave. But it was here where the journey would become difficult. Maybe even impossible. To find the caves that Ao Longshen cultivated in, studied in, and experimented in during his rise to become the Twilight King.
While the material world would likely not provide any clues to the locations she was searching for, the Liminal realm was much more interested in the weight of an event. Hopefully, enough so that even after all this time Touko would be able to find the way forward. While she wasn't adept at traversing that side of the world, tools could make up for many glaring deficiencies.
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"Are you telling me to slow down as well! I thought that a follower of the traditions that Cai Shenhua herself set down would appreciate more fully the speed at which one can learn! She became a White in a shorter amount of time than a Peak aristocrat learns to walk! And you are telling me that I need to slow down!"
"Your frustrations are understandable, but before we delve into the trickier aspects of crafting that Cai Shenhua developed, one must take some time to digest the lesser lessons."
"No! I have demonstrated well above normal understandings required for the basic levels of the Cai traditions, far more than even Yu Peng demonstrated before he was inducted into the deeper lessons!"
"Envy is hardly a reason to accelerate your learning, why…"
"Envy! You think it is envy that stirs my outrage! It is the fact that politics should never be a reason to suppress progress! I know that the Li Patriarch cordially called upon Cai Teng just last week, and I hardly believe it is a coincidence that now I am being told to slow down!
"What passed between the Li Patriarch and the venerable Cai Teng has nothing to do with you, and I feel this obsession you have that everybody around you is trying to slow you down to be a prime example of why more time needs to be taken to…"
"May your bones and skin make a glass drum for use by the devils of hell in their torment of the damned!"
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It was in these moments that Li Touko felt most alive. When the puzzle piece fit just so and understanding bloomed like a lotus at dawn. No matter where she was, no matter how filthy she was, no matter how tired she was, these moments were what she lived for. And here, in a rancid cave filled with the mad scratches of the Twilight King, did the final puzzle piece fit.
The perfect puppet was in her reach. She finally knew the road to making a perfect copy of herself.
A/N:
@yrsillar another omake for the omake throne! Three guesses which fantasy character inspired this omake, and they all should begin with Touko and all should end in Aozaki. I hope you all enjoyed the read!
