Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)

[yrsillar]

The tall, thin trees in this grove did not provide much shade. Loosely scattered around the stony hill, gone dry and brown with the oncoming chill of winter, they stretched like skeletal fingers into the grey and heavy sky adorned by bushy clumps of bright green needles that stood defiant against the cold. They were scraggly, rough pillars, bent and twisted, bark bleach from years of rough weather in places.

The trunks were vibrant with verdant qi. Despite the signs of breakage, despite the signs of stumps and the fertile earth that whispered of fallen and rotted logs, many of these trunks had persisted for centuries on end, enduring wind and lightning and slashing sleet, rampaging beast and fire. Sitting here quietly on the needle strewn dirt, she could hear their long, slow whispers, so easy to miss under the brighter louder noise of more active beings.

It was not the crushing pressure of Snowblossom lake pouring a millenia worth of data into her head, uncaring and unknowing that her mortal flesh was still too fragile. It was more akin to sitting by a circle of old grandfather's as they spoke low and slow of days long gone past. You could hear much, learn much, if you had the time to stop and listen.

Even if a great deal of it was long, rambling complaints about the impertinence of nesting birds and complaints about changing weather patterns.

But even that wasn't why she was truly here, because centuries old trunks were only the beginning. Among them were more than a few which spanned only decades and years, stripling saplings and low shrubs, shoots rising from the ground, all infused with the same spark of qi. She had, at first, thought it to be a matter of relation, seeds scattered growing near to their parents.

In a way it was. But it in other ways not.

Because under her feet was a vast and sprawling web of green and verdant qi spreading throughout the hill and beyond, sinking through the thin gravelly earth to dig into the bedrock, to tap into the heat of the earthveins below.

Every trunk from youngest to oldest was a growth of these roots.

And the roots remembered as far back as Snowblossom herself, their ancient, distant whispers dreams of an age when a vast glacier filled the land, when winter never left, when strange beasts and spirits clashed and roared atop millennial icepack.

They remembered countless fallen, broken trunks, they remembered eons of hibernation stubborn conservation of the last spark of life needed to push up from the snow when at last the wan sun showed his face again. Contraction and growth, a life unending for longer than the Emperors had sat atop the Dragon Throne.

Persistence in its purest form.
There was a reason she had found herself attracted to this subtle, quite place of power in the wake of their dream, why her long thoughtful walk with Zhengui around the periphery had ended here.

She'd have to let Cai Renxiang know it was here soon. A calm low intensity place of wood qi would be a good place for their lower cultivators to meditate in. It's qi was too thin to be of much benefit to her current cultivation.

It was strange to think that something so old could have so little power.

But that too was a lesson she could understand. One did not have to be a Sovereign to endure ones passing flames.

Though…

Her qi pulsed out into the earth, echoing through the network of roots, bouncing through ever deeper, depper channels. Perhaps power was not defined by how loud you roared your name to the heavens either. Such resilience followed from a deep well, not easily depleted…

Sister.

Big Sister Miss horizon chaser is calling.

She raised her head, eyes drifting open. Zhengui's voice was distant and tiny in her ears. But she heard it clearly. Xia Lin was calling for her then? They must have met something on the patrol worth a bit of exercise then.

Armor! Transform!

No, not yet. She chided her dress as she rose into the sky, darting past the top of the grumbling spruce tree with a careful swerve to avoid her passage shaking too many needles loose.

It didn't stop them grumbling, but she liked to think it was a little fond. Once she had left their canopy behind, her dress flared, the wind howled, and she tore off toward the distant feeling of Xia Lin and Zhengui's qi. They were off near the early logging camp, and she could see smoke rising into the air and the faintest flicker of heat distortion? A fire in the forest? There hadn't been any lightning. She wondered where that had come from.

***​

She descended, watching the flames dance with a critical eye. Zhenguis roots had woven a barrier, cutting off the path of the fires toward the camp site and the road, but in all other directions, the way was blocked only by scattered groups of their soldiers, sweating heavily with exertion wearing armor and clothing meant for these cold climes. They formed small knots of resistance, each group with a single cultivator whose qi could bend toward a snuffing element, whether it was scattered water summoned from the still moist air or earth to smother, or even fire to control.

It was not a truly ruinous fire. The air was cold and wet, the wood and grass saturated in that same moisture, the flames guttered red and orange, billowing heat licking at trunks and mostly burning at the brush.

Yes, she could see why Xia Lin would use this as an exercise. Particularly as the wildfire spirits born from the sparking flames hurled themselves with reckless abandon at their soldiers, cackling with wild abandon as they sought to spread with the single minded madness only such a spirit could have.

She had asked for a chance to practice her new art, if Xia Lin found one.

Descending from above the flames, she exhaled, the heated air making her gown and hair billow. Along with her breath she cycled the rich, verdant wood qi which now ran through a meridian along her spine.

Distant Paradise Resilience.

Her qi spread like a drifting shower of soft leaves over the battlefield and wear it went, men and women straightened up, the scent of clear fresh pine overwhelmed ash and smoke, and faint green light.

A man on the northern side of the firebreaks was caught out of position as a half dozen giggling flame fairies crawled and leapt and floated over the earthen rampart. He cut two from the air, little gusts of wind kicking the sparks of severed fairies away from him. But the third detonated in an eruption of flame before he could raise his guard.

She heard and felt his scream as the searing heat washed over his skin, and even down his throat. Viridian light flared and the flames clinging to his clothes guttered out, the shape of woven roots glittering in the shell of light that solidified around him as he was dragged back from the rampart by his comrades.

Ling Qi felt a trifling little prickle on her skin, a small drop of qi burning away

The weave of green over the soldier's body broke apart into drifting motes. There was not a mark on his flesh.

"I am here. The flames cannot harm you, though I cannot protect you from pain," she said, her voice clear in every set of ears.

"If Baroness Ling has arrived, then begin the second stage of the operation, shrink containment, achieve reduction, prioritize prevention of crown burning," Xia Lin's voice unlike hers crackled and buzzed artificially, carried on the power of a simple amplification talisman. "Follow the procedures from your drills."

Ling Qi observed them snapping into action, they were not exactly well polished even to her eyes, but she could tell they had been seriously drilled. The wave of pinpricks that had washed over her along with the first prickled like goosebumps on her skin and she felt the tiny draw on her qi grow as they began to advance among the fires.

Her technique drew all the harm which they could have taken unto herself. Dream and Wood. Persistence, perception and community. She shouldered what those frailer could not. But though her immense well of qi absorbed the harm, the pain of their choices was their own to suffer.

She could be a foundation to lean on, but not the final arbiter of their lives. Such was the technique she had put together from her own self and fragments of Kohatu's memories of absolute persistence.

"Where did this fire come from?" she asked absently, remaining there floating above the core of the raging flames. This time she spoke not to everyone, but just to Zhengui and Xia Lin.

"One of the groups testing and laying the groundwork to begin mining caused a deviation in the earthveins," Xia Lin's voice replied in her ear despite the distance

"Gui warned miss Chaser and she brought the people. But we did not arrive before the flame-air went boom!"

"Well it is not so bad if it stays like this. I, Zhen see that this place is much overgrown, a little burning is not bad."

She nodded absently, looking down, at them moving in, coordinating with each other. She spotted Xia Lin's shining armor among them, where the conflagration was at its worst, calmly keeping command. Heat and prickling needles washed over her here and there, but overall the men were not growing sloppy under the aegis of her technique.

And the small hurts of red realms fighting through peer spirits could hardly dent the qi cycling through her channels. The technique was certainly flawed still in this initial state, but it was a foundation to build on, to form the foundation of her thoughts on how best to protect.

Like the roots she meditated over she could not save every sprout and trunk, it was probably beyond her to try, but with her will, she could support and keep alive many who might otherwise perish, in the pursuit of the distant dream which they now pursued.

A dream even she could not yet see in full.

Spoiler: Distant Paradise Resilience

G5
Type: Armor, Support
Duration: Scene

You tap into the resolve which joins you to your allies and the memories of roots everlasting, of life that persists through all wrath and ruin. Shrouding your allies in light and weaving roots. While active you take all damage which would harm shrouded allies through their own defenses up to G5 as qi loss. The on damage effects of techniques blocked do not effect you unless you were among the intended targets. The on damage effect of otherwise successful techniques are not blocked on the intended targets

Your own defense techniques do not reduce this. You may not lose qi greater than an individual target's total cultivation plus one from any individual instance. (Protecting an individual R1 cultivator you take a maximum of R2 potency damage as qi loss from techniques effecting them.) You may choose to include or exclude individuals in this effect.

 

[yrsillar]

"Is Big Sister's technique doing what she wants?"

She considered her little brother's question as she drifted like a leaf tossed by the heat below bobbing gently on the currents of air. "I think so, it's hard to test at such low intensity, but… Any injuries reported Xia Lin?"

"Not since your arrival. It appears fully effective, though there have been two psychologically induced retreats."

Ah, she had felt one of those, a man had stepped into a smoldering underbrush and been engulfed entirely in flame. Even if she had not let him be hurt, an experience like that could definitely exhaust the mind. His comrades had handled the fire fairies that caused the blast well enough though.

There was a strong urge to just do everything herself. To take care of the problem in an instant of high clear song and howling icy wind, but that wasn't the point. They would not always be on site, and the soldiers of Snowblossom needed to be able to handle minor situations like this on their own.

Her presence and shrouding qi was a training aid for that, allowing them to experience the danger while no one suffered lasting harm. Not exactly what she had in mind for the technique, but she had to admit it was a useful benefit.

"And your own thoughts Zhengui?" Ling Qi asked over the air, lips moving a little out of habit, despite there being no need.

"Roots come much quicker when called by Gui… and it is easier to see and hear things now."

"I, Zhen, feel our heads are clearer now, it is why we felt this before it happened… annoying then that we could not stop it."

"But Gui will get even better!"

"I know you will," Ling Qi said fondly.

The flames were shrinking, the push of the soldiers through the burning underbrush shrinking the zone of lurid red and orange down step by step, leaving grey ash and scorched trunks in their wake, but they had done as ordered. There was no crownfire among their woods, those cultivators with enough qi to project or control water were concentrated on that task, extinguishing any licks of flame or rising fairies before they could catch on the leaves.

Their comrades trudging below had the more drought task, smothering the flames and only leaving drifting smoke on guard against the always sudden assault of freshly born wildfire fairies erupting from still smoldering ash and burning bushes.
But as the perimeter shrunk, Shenglu's soldiers grew more effective less space between the groups of fire fighting men and women meant more support, meant easier cooperation and communication.

They needed polish, it was true, but only that, the foundation Gan Guangli and Xia Lin had carved was good.

"Sister…. Gui has a bad feeling, there is not enough flame on the surface."

"Dastardly stink-gas, hiding and waiting. Ready to make a blast much bigger…"

"Xia Lin. Zhengui detects a remaining pocket of gas, I am going to investigate."

"Understood. Which location?"

Communication flickered back and forth, with her as the relay between her little brother and Xia Lin. While she did, Qiyi rustled around her ankles, taking her out in a lazy arc around the location Zhengui was worried about.

It did look unnatural now that she focused on it. Tree trunks tilted at odd angles, as if the earth had suddenly slumped beneath them, rising streamers of shimmering air invisible among the heat distortion of flame here near the core of the burning zone.

And through the grumble and grind of pained tree song and disturbed earth, over the crack and pop and laughter of flames and twirling fairies, she heard something else. The quiet and whispering voice of ruin. A spirit of destruction catalyzed by the meeting of open wind and flame imbued air, never meant to meet.

It wasn't quite a spirit, not yet. But its song was rising, completing the first verse of many if not silenced. She did not think she would allow it to reach wholeness.

The voice beneath tumbled root and burning bush and crumbling earth rose, and the wind whorled inward tugging at the tongues of ruddy flame in the depression. Ling Qi descended, and let green and vital qi pulse out, an emerald star born amidst and blasting away the ashy smoke.

The proto-spirit of destruction gestating in the flame- imbued pocket detonated with the force to rip trees from the earth and snap bones like matchsticks, and Ling Qi's boots struck the collapsing earth directly in the center of the blast with a thump.

Green glittered everywhere. Half collapsed trees, burnt out bushes, boulders alike. It spread beyond the depression, a thin woven blanket of vine and root ephemerally cocooning everything in her reach, all the way out to their soldiers, closing in on the epicenter.

The blast died before it could echo beyond the sinking bowl in the earth. It rustled not a single hair or dislodged a single leaf. Ling Qi felt it as impact, countless impacts like standing under a rain of hailstones.

Compared to the General's flame, it was nothing.

She looked down at her own hand curiously. She too was sheathed in green now. This second technique…. She couldn't truly put it to the test against such a lowly attack, but the weave of qi she had created from Kohatu's memory of persistence held steady. She reached up, studying a smolder strand of her head, one of the few signs of damage. As she watched the charred portion flaked away under a glimmer of green, restored to same glittering silkiness it had when she brushed it this morning.

And her dantian surged, refilling the small loss of qi she had suffered from enduring the force meant for everyone and everything around her.

Spoiler: Ruin Scattered Regrowth

G6
Type: Anti-Finisher
Duration: Stunt

From the least of seeds and scraps, the whole grove might regrow in time, so long as a single mote of life remains, you will allow no wound of body nor spirit to stop or slow you. For the duration of the stunt, you cannot be killed or reduced to zero qi by any non-shen effect.

After the stunt you will immediately regenerate all wounds and qi loss suffered during the course of the stunt.

Usable once per scene.

Under her feet the sparks that could have become a deadly spirit died, denied the kindling of pain and destruction that would have formed its foundation.

"Center neutralized. The rest of the suppression should go smoothly," Ling Qi spoke, this time she let her voice reach everyone. "But do not let your guard down until the work is done."

She lifted off the earth with a puff of ashen dust as the rippling shell of green retracted, leaving only her connection to the soldiers themselves.

When she descended next, it was down to where Zhengui stood, now carefully dismantling his wall of roots, bringing the earth and trees displaced by them back to where they had been before the eruption of his roots from the earth.

"Welcome Big Sister. Do not worry. Gui does not feel any more brewing big booms at all." he greeted her cheerfully

"I'm glad," Ling Qi chuckled, settling in on the relatively smooth bit o shell behind Gui's head. She seated herself cross legged there, threading a pulsed cycle of qi through his own diffused aura affectionately.

"The memories and practice of my old art eased things but… I think this is as far as I can take this art, until I face something a little more serious to test its limits," Ling Qi mused.

"It is hard to know how hard your shell is without something cracking it first," Zhen agreed, looping his coils once, loosely around her. "I, Zhen will support Big Sister if hers ever does."

"And I will do the same for you," Ling Qi replied quietly. She remembered the times when her little brother had been wounded, truly wounded. Every single one was deeply distressing.
But she supposed he would say the same of each and every time she took a serious wound.

"I can't promise I will never get hurt," Ling Qi said. "Or that I can shield everyone."

"Gui cannot promise that either."

She nodded quietly, rested a hand on top of his head. "But I think we can both promise to make anything which tries to separate us suffer miserably and long for it, Little Brother."

"I, Zhen, like the sound of this promise," he replied, his ashen tongue flicking over her cheek.

"Then let us persist together, Zhengui.

[ ] Please Select a name for your new art

AN: It's a little short but this completes your preview of your new art. Will see you guys after a weeks break for me to recharge and plan the next leg of the story.

Spoiler: Unnamed Art of Persistence

Yin, Wood, Dream
Keywords:
Persistence, Growth, Community
Antithesis: Stagnation, Solitude, Impermanence
Art Type: Armor

Passive Effects:
+2 to Primary Armor Trait
1 auto progress to qi growth Project

Distant Paradise Resilience: G5
Type: Armor, Support
Duration: Scene

You tap into the resolve which joins you to your allies and the memories of roots everlasting, of life that persists through all wrath and ruin. Shrouding your allies in light and weaving roots. While active you take all damage which would harm shrouded allies through their own defenses up to G5 as qi loss. This does not prevent on damage effects from coming into effect on targets. They do not come into effect on you.

Your own defense techniques do not reduce this. You may not lose qi greater than an individual target's total cultivation plus one from any individual instance. (Protecting an individual R1 cultivator you take a maximum of R2 potency damage as qi loss.) You may choose to include or exclude individuals in this effect.

Ruin Scattered Rebirth: G6
Type: Anti-Finisher
Duration: Stunt

From the least of seeds and scraps, the whole grove might regrow in time, so long as a single mote of life remains, you will allow no wound of body nor spirit to stop or slow you. For the duration of the stunt, you cannot be killed or reduced to zero qi by any non-shen effect.

After the stunt you will immediately regenerate all wounds and qi loss suffered during the course of the stunt.

Usable once per scene.

 

[yrsillar]

The pleasant cool of the manor was a comfort after dealing with the fires. While she could keep herself cool at all times and places with a mere cycling of cold qi, there was something to be said for the brisk, natural cool which the offices of the second floor of the Shenglu's manor offered, and the gentle, soothing sounds of falling water.

Her eyes roamed over the room thoughtfully. This was… her office. She could work wherever she liked, but this place was hers. It had the benefit of a balcony, looking out over the gardens through a curtain and falling icy water, but the interior was nothing special. A few shelves filled with reference books;each one a copy of a copy of a copy, churned out during the education of scribes in the capital. Her desk and furnishing were no different than any of the others though.

Maybe she should consider personalizing things a little. Cooler colors at least. She shook off the thought, and returned her attention to the forms on her desk. The shrine to winters, her tentative 'theater of frost' was nearing its first stage of completion. The bonfire sites had been cleared for congregation, the dirt packed flat and the supporting structures built. They were just waiting on some deliveries and then she would just have to consecrate the central shrine and determine who would be the acting priest when she and Hanyi were not here.

And she would have those chestnuts soon too. She could not believe the import route when through seven different baronies and three viscounties. No wonder the Empire was encouraging the cultivation of civil servants too. Mortal clerks would take ages to untangle that kind of mess.

…She was sure Renxiang would have taken a mere few minutes to arrange everything, but that was not the point, she thought a bit sourly.

But, she supposed it wasn't just getting back at her for maybe, sometimes, phrasing things to exasperate Renxiang on purpose. Her liege and friend did have a point. Just as it did no good to solve everything for their soldiers in an instant, it didn't help their burgeoning civil service is Cai Renxiang was the keystone of everyday operations.

The central granary even now having its newly built storerooms filled with foodstuffs, checked and marked and its distribution requests processed efficiently by their clerks. Cai Renxiang was quite satisfied with the Gold Autumn school by now. She had some plans for expanding their duties now, which might allow them to complete things with a bit less direct oversight.

The room darkened. Cold, oily tendrils of qi crept across her skin, made her throat constrict. Black, empty eyes crept into her sight, as hanging strands of twisting black hair tickled her neck.

She let out a breath, tilting her head up to look at Shu Yue, who stood behind her, leaned overtop her to look down from above.

"You do actually have to do that, don't you?" she griped, taking hold of her heart rate and slowing it down manually with a small fluctuation in her qi.

"Yes." Shu Yue said agreeably. Her office flickered and wavered, growing fuzzy before her eyes as her sometime tutor vanished, reappearing in front of her desk, long fingered pale hands steepled in front of their chest.

"I'm sorry Lin Hai had to go so soon," Ling Qi said. "Did you want me to send for anything?"

"The tides of fate carry us all into different times and places. We will meet again soon enough," Shu Yue said. "And you need not."

"As you like. I hope there's no emergency?"

"No, all is safe enough. I merely wish to speak of the future."

"Is this about my lessons? I understand I wasn't fit to practice."

"You were not. Though you have proven the resilience to keep yourself intact through many more lessons," Shu Yue said, their fingers dryly tapping against one another. They seemed pensive. And the silence between them stretched. Ling Qi could sense that they had more to say.

"You have impressed me. I deeply dislike what I asked of you. In truth I was uncertain if you would survive it."

Ling Qi inhaled deeply. "It was not a light thing to ask. But if I am not willing to put my life on the line for what I cultivate, the path to higher realms will never open, will it?"

Shu Yue's eyes did not contain pity or regret, only a teacher's satisfaction. "Yes. One who values their own existence more than any goal or ideal cannot tread in the realms of Sovereigns."

"That is not an easy thing for most people to do," Ling Qi said quietly.

"It is not a good thing for most people to do," Shu Yue replied gravely. "But your mind is tempered now, you have tasted obliteration, and remain on your Way. I do not doubt you will forge a true Name for yourself soon enough, should you weather this war."

"I'll take the encouragement," Ling Qi said. "My lessons?"

Shu Yue smiled thinly, the corners of their lips curling too far up toward their ears. "I shall have a lesson plan prepared by the time you begin your journey north. Call when you wish for it."

"I see," Ling Qi said. "Can I ask, have you looked into the caverns in the Cathedral of Winds at all? I intend to clear it out with some help soon. Anything you are willing to tell me would be appreciated."
"I am not to stunt your growth by removing trials within your capacity," Shu Yue mused, tilting their head in thought. "But, there is little need for further proving on such minor matters."

Ling Qi leaned forward in her seat.

"The preparations you and your former Sect sister have made are sufficient, if used wisely. The breach into the ith strata is sealable within your means," Shu Yue said thoughtfully. "The east facing branch of the cavern system from the green crystal chamber holds the primary breach."

Ling Qi took a deep breath. She hadn't even seen the caverns yet but that implied they were very extensive. "No more than that?"

"I will not eliminate the fun you wish to have with your friend. You have been looking forward to it, have you not?"

She supposed she had. The journey with Bao Qian had been fun, but she was looking forward to stretching her legs now that there were not any aches.

And… she hadn't really gone on an adventure with Suyin in some time. She wanted that kind of simplicity, at least once before she jumped back into the complexities her life now entailed. "I suppose I really have gotten too wrapped up in work."

"It is common. Your drive will only grow. You are suited to fighting for your diversions though, I think," Shu Yue said, voice pondering. "That niche will not easily be polished out of your way."

Ling Qi certainly hoped so. What she was building of herself… She wondered about it in her meditations now, as she grew toward the peak of the third realm. She could feel it in the way her qi grew now, in the certainty that shaped her channels. What was coming in her cultivation was final, in a way her old breakthroughs had not been. Every event and insight of the last hectic years coming together.

Ling Qi rested her chin on her hand, and Shu Yue was polite enough to remain silent as she gathered her thoughts. "May I ask what you are thinking of for my lessons?"

Shu Yue nodded, and she did her beast to ignore the unsettling crackling of shifting vertebrae. "There is a unique opportunity. You have mastered the maintenance of the self. If the General did not burn you away, only a clash with the most terrible lurkers of the liminal, or a failed invasion of a higher realms mind will break your self."

Tap tap went their fingers, the sound dry and papery.

"Or a moment of carelessness."

Ling Qi lowered her head in acknowledgement. There was always that.
"We focus then, on the outer expressions of the art. The faults and fissures and imperfections of identity. The ways in which it is worn away. The methods by which it is broken," their voice was low and cold. "This is the opportunity. You will walk in the Dream of Xiangmen with me, and together, we will look on what lingers there."

"You intend to take me where I promised not to walk during my last visit then?" Ling Qi asked.

"The roots would be a strong lesson," Shu Yue agreed. "You have seen the surface of it in your own life."

Ling Qi gave a small nod. The streets of Tonghou; privation, desperation, the wear it left on you, the crumbling of your boundaries. "You call it the surface only."

Shu Yue's smile was gone, their thin lips pressed in an unhappy line. "Yes. I would never have warned you away if it were only that. In the depths of the great tree, there were far greater horrors and nightmares. The whims of the liar lords, the dream makers, there in the dark, there was never any pretension that they were not absolute.That reality was not their clay to shape as they would. Even two hundred years and the scouring of Her radiance cannot remove that shadow."

Something about the way Shu Yue spoke sent a shiver up her spine, the whispers it sent clawing at her mind, like the whispering laughter and sobs of countless children, made her heart freeze in her chest more than any encounter with a winter spirit.

"There, you would learn of the tools which abrade a person down to their least selves," Shu Yue said. "You have learned to walk in the mind, in the personal Dream of a cultivator. Here you would learn to hurt, with the deliberation of a surgeon's scalpel."

"It will not be a kind lesson."

She swallowed. "You said it would be a strong lesson. Is it not you're plan?"

The corner's of her tutor's lips curled back up. "It is a choice. There is another lesson. You have seen her. The vortice in the canopy. The Empty Ascension. The Palace of One. She whose dream was never shared, the throne of ideals. You have floated in her orbit. I would take you deeper. To know the terrible, scouring fire that is hope. To know how minds may bend toward a distant and unreachable dream. And how these things may be turned. How they may be broken and twisted, the lesson the descendants took from her. This would be another lesson of sight. But as befitting the coming war, it too is a lesson of hurt, if one lesser than the roots."

"There are no lessons from those days that are not, are there?" Ling Qi asked.

"If there were, My Master, nor I would be what we are," Shu Yue said simply. "Which lesson shall I prepare?"

[ ] The lesson of the roots
[ ] the lesson of the palace

 

[yrsillar]

"The roots," Ling Qi said firmly.

"Truly?" Shu Yue asked, not judging, merely curious.

Ling Qi pondered the unspoken question. As a teacher, Shu Yue was not one to tell her she was wrong, or even guide her choices much, so it wasn't an oblique rebuke or warning. "I've seen the clashes of high ideals, and the towering perspectives of Sovereigns."

Shu Yue was silent, letting her speak her mind without any urgency. Just a silent, still shadow and a pale face looming over her desk.

"I've seen something of what a Way like mine could like, at those heights. My thought then was that the difference lay in the faes, the individuals of your kin and community. Letting them disappear into the whole… I think that's the start of a poor turn," Ling Qi said. "I'm already bad at remembering people who are too far away. I've engraved the lonely streets into my Way, but I'm not sure its enough," Ling Qi spoke carefully.

"I think seeing what an unrestrained ideal can do to those beneath its notice is a lesson I will benefit from, which will sharpen my own weapons well, such as they are."

She had chosen to make isolation her blade, the privation of the mind. What she had suffered, she had made her weapon. That was the cultivation she had chosen. In every art she had that had the capacity for harm, there were traces of that.

She knew she was going to hate looking into such a pit of ugliness.

But she knew somewhere down in her gut, the coming offensive against the ith would be so much worse.

"So yes, the roots, down where the suffering was all the sharper for its lack of malice," Ling Qi said. "The Palace… I have a feeling I'll need to see it again, but I don't think now is the time. I don't think that journey should be touched by war."

"I will not promise to offer my guidance toward it when you feel ready. A choice made is consequences set," Shu Yue said. "Without such, they are meaningless."

"I understand," Ling Qi said, bowing her head. "May I ask how we will proceed with this? I can't exactly disappear for long."

"I will pose you questions and assignments, observations to make during the days of your stay. When I am satisfied with your efforts, we will descend, and you will examine those answers in the face of the nightmares. This will keep the lessons grounded in the present, as your Way must be," Shu Yue explained."And prevent too much strain and mental pollution from ruining your other efforts."
"Alright then," Ling Qi said. "I accept my choice.

"Then let it be so," Shu Yue said gravely, straightening to their full height. "Another guest arrives."

Ling Qi blinked glancing outside, she saw the position of the sun. "Oh! Yes, Meng Duyi was meant to come by today."

"I will not delay your meeting with the Maker of Harmonies then," Shu Yue said. "We will speak again when you journey north."

Ling Qi lowered her head in acknowledgement. "I will look forward to our lesson."

Shu Yue's head tilted, their spine crackled, their ear left almost horizontal to their shoulder. "I do not know that you should. But it pleases me that you look ahead with clear eyes."

Their form collapsed shadows skittering away into the corners of the room and drifting like falling leaves, dissolving before they ever touched the floor. Ling Qi was once again alone, seemingly so anyway.

"There isn't much reason to drive myself to distraction wondering otherwise is there?" she wondered aloud, not expecting an answer. She didn't receive one. In the absence of Shu Yue's buzzing, empty aura pressing down on her she did feel the slow approach of Meng Duyi, like a winding stream burbling over the smooth river stones sedately and without excitement. She supposed his news must be nothing terrible then.

She gestured as he arrived, and the door opened with a faint click. Meng Duyi strode through without a pause. It was only expected when everyone involved had a certain level of perception.

"Thank you for receiving me Baroness," he said simply, the door swinging shut behind him as easily as it had opened.

"You were my scheduled meeting. I would not dare use your time so poorly as it push it back without good reason," Ling Qi replied.

"And the shadow did not have one to report," Meng Duyi replied agreeably. Shu Yue had not been hiding their presence.

"We were simply discussing lesson plans."

He pursed his lips. "I will not waste time speaking of wariness. You have already chosen a very old path indeed, when it comes to choosing mentors."
Ling Qi smiled faintly. He probably didn't even know about Huisheng. It was still true though. Learning from deadly spirits was perhaps the oldest form of cultivation. "I have slowed down for long enough."

Meng Duyi observed her beneath his antlered headdress, stroking the length of his beard thoughtfully. "If that is your Way. I have made some changes to the arrangement of your quarry. There were poor practices."

"..I'm surprised, I admit. What did Lady Cai miss?"

"Her plan was precision perfect for a more northerly city, but failed to take advantage of the geography and spiritual landscape. It is always easier to move goods by water to begin with. And you are arranging these small canals already. More effective transport back to your construction sites was the start."

"I see," Ling Qi frowned. The Quarry was a ways out from the town center to avoid the noise and dust troubling anyone. "And the run off?"

"There are several drainage techniques and rites to the earth which we use in the western fens which were applicable; the spirits of the earth and stone will avoid mingling with the waters if treated correctly, and the correct cadence and pattern of the stone cutting can induce them to cooperate and ease the labor."

"Can our mortal laborers handle the proper methods without causing more dangerous offense?" Ling Qi asked. She was not well versed in this kind of thing but she knew the horror stories which sometimes filtered back into Tonghou from the mines. Crushing and suffocation, the rage of the injured earth swallowing a dozen men whole or infecting them with choking, wasting sickness.

"I took your arrangement of the fishing rites and adjusted them. Work songs are already becoming commonplace. I've ensured the spoken rite is simple and… catching," Meng Duyi said, resting his hands heavily on the rustling top of his cane. "More expansive operations may require more of the foremen, but I judge neither you nor the Lady Cai will balk at the slight increases in cost. It will train men better for the dangers of spirit stone mining regardless."

He gestured, and a wooden scroll case appeared in his hand. He lay it on her desk and straightened back up.

"I have written a treatise for your Lady and yourself to review along with young Master Zhengui."

Spoiler: Tiny Quarry Change

+1 Material production per manpower, max Manpower reduced to 3

Iron and Silver mine production Increased by 0.25 per manpower

Ling Qi stood, clasped her hands in front of her chest and bowed. "Thank you, Sir Meng, for your efforts on our part. I regret that I have not had more time to avail myself of your lessons directly."

"Your brother is an attentive enough student. I will be here the decade yet, I am aware of the demands on your time. In the end, my lessons are yours to take," Meng Duyi replied serenely.

She supposed that was true. In the end it was her time she was spending, focusing on other things. "Still, I hope we might find the time soon. May I ask if you received the surveyors notes regarding the cultivation site on the upper cliffs?"

"This Cathedral of Winds? A well chosen name, the danger there is leaking a slight taint into the river but if you are taking care of the matter soon there will be no trouble from it. The flow of impurity is too dilute as things are."

"Good," Ling Qi said, feeling some relief. The last thing she needed was a spreading sickness here."Sir Meng, may I ask you to look into the construction materials for the shrine we intend to place down there? I would like a professional opinion on whether they will suffice for the spirit of the crystals when it awakens."

"The spirit is dormant, and its flows tainted, it is difficult to make any such judgment with certainty, even for I," Meng Duyi replied. "But I will look over what you have gathered and ensure there are no obvious problems."

"Thank you, Sir Meng," Ling Qi said. "I need to prepare for the expedition there, but I hope in the aftermath, I will find some time to hear your wisdom."

He hummed to himself, stroking his beard. "I suppose the communion with the spirit there and the clean up work may be a useful venue for an introductory lesson. Though, if I may…"

"Please," Ling Qi said, curious as to what he was going to say.

"The room was chosen well. The balcony facing east, to receive the strong yang of the dawning sun each morning, but if this is to be your primary office, it will not be enough, given your nature," the geomancer said, eyes panning around the room. "Yin pools in your presence, while you are suited to it, it will make your subordinates sluggish and fatigued. I suggest looking into other sources of yang, an art piece with brighter colors, perhaps a more intense lantern for light. Summer aspected floral arrangements may also work."

Ling Qi tilted her head curiously."...Would a muse of the Dreaming Moon counterbalance it at all?"

"To an extent," Meng Duyi said, raising an eyebrow. "But I would suggest some brighter colors in the halls and nearby offices regardless."

"I will see to it, though I really do like more muted colors," Ling Qi said, peering around the room. Some spots of brightness wouldn't hurt, especially if they were mostly in the halls outside. Some flower arrangements would probably make everything cheerier.

"For your own space, it may be fine, so long as you do not carelessly keep any subordinates working in the interior for too long, you yourself are a great attractor of Yin energy, amplifying what is in your surroundings. Mortals and low cultivators have much less constitution for concentrated energies than you or I."

Just another small thing to remember, Ling Qi supposed… It was no wonder that a higher realm could forget and trample others without any malice. "I'll keep that in mind… its only a leaders duty to take care of their subordinates."

"Easy words to say, easy words to forget," Meng Duyi said agreeably. "We will speak again when your expedition is done then, Baroness?"

"We will, thank you, Sir Meng," Ling Qi replied, looking back down at the work on her desk. She just needed to finish these reports for Renxiang and then she could go out to wait for and meet Suyin… and Sixiang.

She'd missed her friends a great deal.

Fief Page

Time to get in the vote for the fief projects as the rest of the turn will be a little packed. As usual, vote by plan.
[ ] Fief plan
-[ ] Project 1
-[ ] Project 2

*****
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*****​

 

[yrsillar]

"Qiiiiiiii!"

Sixiang's impact against her chest would have bowled her over if she were a mortal. As it was she nearly floated off her feet as they spun once around. Her cheeks warmed at the flagrant contact, but she embraced the muse back. It felt strange, for Sixiang to have this much weight and solidity.

"O-oh dear, Ah you really shouldn't do that kind of thing in public," Li Suyin sighed, climbing down from the steps of her carriage.

"Well, its fine once in awhile. Beside's there's no one here to be scandalized.

Because the workers and clerks at the temporary hitching post were probably not looking at her getting hugged.

Li Suyin's carriage was bone white, with deep matte black paneling, carved to seem as if it were made from the bones of a large beast, including a many toothed squared off jaw serving to hold the drivers bench. Which, naturally was occupied by one of her skeleton automatons. This one had a horse's skull.

The horses were entirely carved wood, porcelain and silver, emitting a low but fragrant smoke from the joints and crevices of their mechanical forms.

"They're supposed to do that," Sixiang confided, giving her one more squeeze and releasing her. "It's the fuel."

Ling Qi cocked an eyebrow. "Do they not use spirit stones?"

"That method is too expensive for daily use," Li Suyin said primly, smoothing out her gown. "Since I have the freedom, I'm experimenting with different methods."

Ling Qi squinted at the construct horses, listening to the faint susurrus of whispers she could feel if she listened closely. "...Are there fairies in there?'

Li Suyin tilted her head."Yes? How did you know? I've bound them to the formations in the chest and stomach cavities, they're fed small amounts of mid grade wood to keep producing energy."

Well she supposed they didn't exactly sound upset. "My senses have improved a lot...You should watch out for when they get bored."

"That is a problem, the feed keeps them mostly docile but its not perfect, and the method really doesn't have great efficiency," Li Suyin huffed. "But! It is proof of possibility."

"They're way more expensive to feed than just grabbing a couple of real horses," Sixiang drawled.

Li Suyin shot her a betrayed look, the iris of her artificial eye glinting and spinning dangerously. "Hmph, your own body is based on similar principles you know."

"Yeah, well I'm not a little baby fairy who can't string two thoughts together. I don't need your doodads to run all the processes for me," Sixiang replied, leaning on her shoulder and sticking their tongue out at Suyin.

"Have you considered employing spirits that are…" Less stupid. Less stupid and feckless than red grade fairies, she wanted to say. "A little more advanced?"

"I considered it, but the containment and binding formations are a problem, not to mention the danger if they break free while around mortals," Li Suyin replied.

Ah, her own methods weren't the most normal,were they? "You may be able to convince a spirit to enter a contract to operate a construct."

"Possible, for a personal piece, but it doesn't work well for wider reproduction," Li Suyin said, shaking her head. "But! Regardless, It is good to see you again Ling Qi. Thank you for welcoming me to your home."

"Thank you for coming to assist on our little expedition. I know the prodigy of the Argent Peak Sect must be busy," Ling Qi replied teasingly.

"Oh stop,"Li Suyin replied, cheeks flushing. "... I have been given a break from deployment before the offensive."

"You're going?"

"Of course, I have to be on hand for maintenance of the purifying talismans and formations," Li Suyin replied.

She really did have to get used to the more determined Suyin.

"I understand," Ling Qi said, turning then to Sixiang. "And you, are you better? The flames…"

"Of, I'm good," Sixiang dismissed. Ling Qi narrowed her eyes, sensing the slight edge of falsity in their voice. It wasn't a lie, but… it definitely wasn't completely true.

"Managed to shave off the worst burnt bits, and I've gotten the rest patted out. Really, just been kinda bored the last month or two, working out more body stuff…"

"And being a pain in my ass," another voice grumbled. Su Ling emerged from the carriage as well, to Ling Qi's surprise. She hadn't actually noticed her… Li Suyin's security formations were getting good.

"Don't be like that Lingling," Sixiang smirked. "I know you haven't gotten rid of that painting I did on your ceiling, you know? I think I really got the flex just right."

Su Ling's ears stiffened, the long points standing out straight from her head. "Take your fuckin jester back Ling Qi."

"Don't worry, I will," Ling Qi said, amused. "Since when do you paint?"

"Since I needed to find more things to do," Sixiang replied, shooting her a grin. "Oh, who's the new girl?"

"Ah, this is Qiyi, she awakened under Sir Lin's care and repair," Ling Qi said.

Hi! Echo empty shore waiting left. Return? Silky cushion waiting. Keeping warm.

"That so? Well aren't you a cutie," Sixiang hummed, peering down. "I might not mind a bit of time there."

They looked at Ling Qi questioningly. Ling Qi lowered her head a little. She wouldn't mind that at all. As comical as it might sound to say, her head had really been too empty lately.

"Oof, jeez, your dress is a spirit now too? I don't know how your okay with… wearin' somebody," Su Ling said. "I don't even like keeping Cibei in my dantian that much."

The little black bat, still no more than a handspan in size, poking out of her bushy hair with a squeak, making Su Ling's tail flick.

I have said that it is fine Master!

"And I've said I don't like people in my head," Su Ling snorted.

"Qiyi is a dress," Ling Qi said with a shrug. "Even if she is a person, she is still a dress. I'm surprised you're here by the way. I don't mind, but…"

"Trips are suspended for a bit. I am still a member of the Argent Peak Sect," Su Ling replied.

"And she wished to visit sir Gan, for which I cannot blame her," Li Suyin sighed, resting her cheek on her hand.

Su Ling scowled at her. "He's coming along isn't it he? Figured I might as well come help."
"He is going to be our anchor, the tunnels don't suit him, but you said he could help operate your formations in your letter, didn't you Li Suyin?"

"Yes, I'll need to be on site to apply the impurity seals when we find the breach, so someone else will need to operate the short range transport formations, and provide me the data for the proper environmental flows from the surface," Li Suyin agreed cheerfully.

"And to guard against any interference to the surface equipment," Ling Qi said, amused. Even if they weren't hostile, it was a spiritually active site.

"Yes, that too," Li Suyin said. "It's best if no one is left alone in the operation though, no?"

Li Suyin sounded entirely too innocent.

Su Ling's unimpressed look said that she agreed with Ling Qi's assessment.

"Yep, buddy system all the way. Better safe than sorry," Sixiang chirped.

"Look, just because you're right doesn't mean I don't know what you're doing, you buncha degenerates," Su Ling grumbled. "We just gonna stand around here all day or what?"

"I suppose we should get moving," Ling Qi agreed. "Please follow me to the Shenglu manor, honored guests."

"Please," Li Suyin said. The jeweled clap tipped fingers of her gauntlet twitched and the low rumbled and rising smoke from the constructs ceased. Ling Qi sensed the fairies bound to them briefly struggle to stay awake, only to sink into a low energy torpor after a few moments.

The horse headed 'driver' meanwhile, leapt gracefully down from the bench to stand behind Li Suyin as they began to walk, every inch the obedient porter.

Except for being a more than two meter tall polished skeleton with spider silk muscle and sinew. Details.

Best to start inuring people to it now. She certainly wasn't going to stop having her friend over.

Tug and pull, Stretch and contract. Make the walk and swing? Testing. Testing, ribbons and bones.

Qiyi no.

Wearer no assist? Sad.

If she was ever disabled again, maybe then Qiyi could assist her.
No Qiyi not allow. Bad. Failure. Bad girl ribbons not deserve. Damage wearer.

Well she could walk and move on her own just fine otherwise.

Wearer sleep? Cultivate? Assist then? Work good!

No.

Sad.

"Looking a little distracted there, Qi," Sixiang said falling in beside her as they left the hitching post, followed the packed gravel path toward the road that led into Shenglu proper. In the distance, she could see the many workers swarming over the temporary palisade walls, carefully deconstructing their more valuable elements, and streaming out to the new perimeter, where the construction of proper walls of earth and stone was being begun. Watched over by the majority of their guard compliment, mortal workers dug alongside low cultivation earth movers, digging out the trench where the foundations would be set. Cai Renxiang wanted them up and finished, physically at least, before they left for Xiangmen.

It really is impressive how much you all have carved from the wilderness in less than a year," Li Suyin said, looking admiringly up at the colors shimmering in the mist that billowed from Snowblossom's falls.

"...Looks a little empty, but I guess you're plannin for growth," Su Ling said. "Well, looks nice for now at least."

"You've been busy for sure," Sixiang said. "Is the fam all settled in now? I stopped in to say bye when they left."

"Yes, everyone is here and safe. Mother's worked herself into a bit of a fret, but Biyu loves the manor gardens," Ling Qi said fondly.

"It's good to be able to keep your family close. I do miss Mother and Father sometimes," Li Suyin said wistfully. We keep up with the letters, and I've commissioned a speaking mirror so we can talk on occasion, but it just isn't the same."

"You'd get even more testy about getting dragged out of your lair."

"It's a laboratory, not a lair!" Li Suyin pouted. "Doing things with family is the same at all t-those frivolous gathering's you've dragged me too."

"I dunno, I think it was probably good for ya to talk to some other humans after a month locked up," Su Ling smirked. "And you got awfully flustered when..."

"No! You both promised not to talk about that!"

Well that was just unfair of them.

How was she supposed to tease her friend if she wasn't allowed to know? Truly the temptation to don the mantle of the Thief of Names had never been greater.

Sixiang met her eyes and grinned. She grinned back. She was glad they could still meet up like this.

AN: Splitting the intro here, hope folks enjoy the catch up banter.

 

[yrsillar]

"Aha! What a wonderful surprise!" Gan Guangli boomed. His grin was brighter than the lights of the meeting room they had come to him. "Welcome to Shenglu, Lady Li, Lady Su!"

"Don't Lady Su me Guangli, there ain't anyone here who's gonna be offended," Su Ling huffed.

"As you wish Su Ling," he laughed.

Ling Qi chuckled herself, stepping around the large central table to find her seat at the head, Sixiang trailing along just beside her. "Take your time everyone. There will be refreshments on the way, the plan is to leave in the afternoon, so we have plenty of time to talk and plan."

"Wouldn't it be better to leave earlier?" Su Ling asked.

"Nah. Grandmother'll be up tonight, we'll have better luck then," Sixiang said with a grin, dropping into a seat beside Ling Qi. It was strange to hear the muffled rattle and clack of ceramic on wood when they did.

"Well, I don't know about luck, but I did design the qi siphon which will power the seal activation for lunar qi, since my Cleansing Argent Breeze Filter requires a potent source of yin qi," Li Suyin said, looking up at the door frame, examining the privacy formations subtly worked into the engravings in the wood.

"Which I'll also be helping with," Ling Qi agreed. "You said you had a physical sealing talisman too? It's well to stop any pollution, but we need to cut off physical passage too."

"Oh yes, though I can't take credit for those. My own work is only a small part of the Five Temple Impurity Seal Elder Jiao designed."
"That'd be that big silver disc thing right?," Su Ling asked, finally taking a seat herself. "I didn't get everything about it, but it's meant to lock in with the ambient earth qi and seal it against manipulation, right?"

"Yes, the impurity detection that makes it activate at its higher stage is mine, but Elder Jaio's work on the wide area sealing and repelling effects, is much more important," Li Suyin agreed. "One should be enough for any other undetected passages in the upper plateau region."

"Excellent? What would it take to overwhelm or bypass?" Gan Guangli asked, rubbing his chin.

"The energies required would render any stealth or subtlety in the attempt impossible," Li Suyin said. "And it is designed to be untamperable from beneath, save by brute force. It's not impossible that a skilled specialist like Ling Qi could bypass it with great effort."

No security was truly impenetrable or inviolate, Ling Qi knew. That was simply the way of passive defenses. Someone clever could always work around them in time. "Which still gives a great benefit. Raising the bar to infiltrate higher increases the opportunity cost of trying to operate where the seals are installed."

"Yes!" Li Suyin agreed, nodding cheerfully. "Together with the filter it should mean you will have no impurity worries save for active, invested attacks from the Ith. Which…"

"We would need military might to combat no matter what, and with this we will have more warning even for that," Gan Guangli boomed cheerfully. "Though I am curious, Five temples…?"

"Bountiful Earth, Celestial Dragon, the Heavenly Pillar, the Dusk sun, the Hidden Moon," Su Ling rattled off. "Five great spirits invoked, and woven into defense.."

Ling Qi's eyebrows rose. "Elder Jiao does not hold back. Invoking that many great spirits without offending or miscalling any of them into one formation is not easy. It's… operating off of demesne principles then?"

"Yes, invoking the sovereignty of the Empire and its ancestors over the earth, and reinforcing the division between the depths and the surface… it will make it a little less potent this far out, but testing has shown it should still function without serious maintenance for at least a decade," Li Suyin declared.

It was at the time that there was a timid knock at the door and they fell silent for a moment as Ling Qi gestured, opening the door, allowing the server staff to enter and bring in the refreshments. Su Ling, she noticed, still looked uncomfortable being served, but Li Suyin cheerfully thanked the servers, even as they eyed the looming skeleton behind her chair with not a little wariness.

It did make Ling Qi pleased that the fear in their postures was tempered and weakened as she let slip just a small part of her domain, a few wisps of mist crawling along the floor beneath the table. She was here. These were her guests. They were her staff. Both were under her protection.

Sixiang grinned knowingly at her, and Ling Qi merely sniffed, busying herself by filling her plate with some small treats.

"Softy," Sixiang whispered, accepting only a cup of aromatic tea, inhaling deeply from the rising steam. "I wonder if you even need me anymore, with how confident and together you are now."

"I will never not need my friend Sixiang," she replied back quietly. "Qiyi isn't the only one who noticed the silence, you know? I miss your voice."

Sixiang chuckled quietly. "Man, I've really gotten needy huh? I've missed you two, these gals are fun. I wouldn't mind spending one month outta three pestering Suyin to go out more, but I'm really glad to be back."

Ling Qi briefly reached out, resting their hand on top of Sixiang's, surprisingly, it felt like flesh and blood, not whatever was underneath.

"Suyin does good work, and so do I," Sixiang said cheerfully.

Ling Qi let the subtle screen over their words go and the sound of the dining room roared back in full force..

"...Gonna get yourself thwomped on the head like that one of these days, you know Guangli?" Su Ling drawled.

"Then I shall accept my lumps with honor! It is important that men know their leader is with them and will take the first blow!"

"I kind of want to see one of these 'beavers," Li Suyin muttered into her cup, eyes sparkling suspiciously.

"So you can feed them to Zhenli? Why's the fuzzball still in your dantian anyway?"

"Well, I didn't want to frighten the servants…"

All of them, every one looked at the looming bone mannequin behind her.

"I didn't want to alarm them more." Li Suyin pouted. "But fine, She should stretch her legs…"

Ling Qi's eyes widened, "Ah, Suyin…"

Li Suyin's spirit beast materialized by the base of her chair. Zhenli was still squat and compact for a spider, with thick fuzzy legs held close to her puffball pink body and huge, glassy and unblinking eyes.

"This Zhenli thanks the Baroness Ling for having her," Zhenli said in her mind, pedipalps spreading apart to match her lowering head.

"You are welcome, but…" Ling Qi, began..

It was then naturally that the door opened, revealing her mother and sister, who she had sensed coming down the hall. She'd invited them to eat with everyone today, wanting her family to grow more used to other cultivators…"

"My apologies for being late. We were held up in cleaning my younger daughter's…" Ling Qingge murmured, her head ducked low, only to freeze and pause.

Li Suyin had chosen a seat right by the door. Which meant Zhenli was directly in her mother's line of sight. Her sisters too. Biyu's eyes were widening even as she looked, and Ling Qi began to rise, preparing too…

"Fuzzy!"

Biyu squealed, high and loud, but it was not in fear as Ling Qi had expected. The little girl darted forward, out of her shocked mothers grasp.

"A-ah! Young Miss. Do not. This Zhen li…. Baroness. Help!"

Her little sister had pounced on the large, dog sized spider, squeezing her like a pet.

"Biyu. No!" Her Mother spoke out, voice strangled a half second after, rushing forward to pry the little girl away despite the fear Ling Qi could still feel making her heart thunder.

"Woah there little one, one must not touch others without permission!" Gan Guangli scolded. Rising to his feet and carefully helping her Mother disentangle Biyu. Zhenli rapidly scuttled under the table the moment the beast felt she could avoid harming Biyu in her escape.

"I'm sorry Mother, but I promise there is nothing unsafe in the room. That is only Zhenli, my friend's spirit beast. She would never harm her hosts," Ling Qi said reassuringly. Rounding the table to approach her Mother.

The woman still looked a little frazzled, her breathing uneven, but she was swiftly composing herself. "O-of course. Please excuse my shameful reaction, honored guests."

"No! Not all of them are Madam Ling. I am very sorry for my unthinking action. Zhenli is a good friend, but I forgot how she could be perceived," Li Suyin apologized rapidly, rising from her seat and bowing repeatedly.

Ling Qi sighed as her Mother and Li Suyin began their dueling, escalating apologies, and accepted her little Sister from the grinning Gan Guangli.

"Biyu, why would you do that?" She scolded quietly.

"Weird dog was very fuzzy," Biyu said, curling in her arms, unsure of why people were upset.

"You shouldn't grab onto beasts suddenly, they can be dangerous, or you might startle them," Ling Qi explained.

"But… Sis is here."

And anything around her big sister couldn't be dangerous, she sensed the completion of those words. "...You still need to ask before touching little sister."

She spoke firmly. Even if she wouldn't let Biyu be hurt, one had to have boundaries. "It's very rude. No matter how cute you think they are, okay?"

"...Okay."

Ah it looked like the duel was over, Suyin was victorious in having her apology accepted. "Well, let's not dwell. Come sit next to me Mother, the tea is still warm."

***​

Later when the refreshments were all cleared away, the catching up was done, everyone had been able to settle in, and Biyu had been allowed to carefully pet both the spider and the bat in the room, and had now curled up in her mothers lap to doze contentedly, conversation turned to more serious things.

"So, Li Suyin, you mentioned there was something you needed to establish in person in your last letter. Something about limited capacity?" Ling Qi asked, pushing her plate aside.

"Oh yes, just something we should decide so I can be efficient with storage space," Li Suyin said. "I have a limited number of arrays which I can upkeep on my current qi. Which I cultivate often enough."

Su Ling snorted. Ling Qi kept her expression innocent.

"And I suppose we can't power them for you."

"No, these need to be custom made to the user, which would take some months… I've made several for core disciples, but I have not had the time to spend with any of you on the project," Li Suyin replied.

Ling Qi sighed, and gestured for her to continue.

The most… intensive array is my Mother's Adamant Bones formation. You're familiar with the way distance and space become twisted and bent around and in the underworld's tunnels?"

Ling Qi grimaced and so did Su Ling. "Yes."

"And the way your own liminal travel was disrupted?"

Her first attempt at a long distance dream step. They'd almost been lost in the Deep Liminal. "That was due to interference from… something though."

"Yes, Elder Jiao has determined from studying the remains of the talisman he gave your group that it was some ith artifice, but it is something which comes easily to their impurity methods, and we will not have a talisman from the Elder."

Her mother looked a little worried, though Ling Qi could tell she only partially understood.

"My Array acts to solidify the laws of the surface and the material world in its radius, dampening the distorting effects of the underworld, but it would also certainly disrupt your own movement arts as well," Li Suyin explained. "In addition, its power issues mean that I would have to weaken the duration of my impurity filtering formations on us, so we would have less time to spend in the tunnels before the toxicity began to affect us."

"Which I assume you would strengthen if you didn't activate the other formation," Ling Qi said thoughtfully.

"Yep," Sixiang piped up. "You want more time but more potential for spooky twisty stuff, or do you want less spooky twisty stuff but less time?"

"Succinct!" Gan Guangli chuckled.

"Yes, thank you Sixiang," Ling Qi said dryly

[ ] Activate the Mother's Adamant Bones Array on the expedition.

[ ] Do not activate the Mother's Adamant Bones Array on the expedition.

 

[yrsillar]

"I think we can do without it," Ling Qi said. "I've grown much more skilled since then, and we won't be anywhere near the ith-ia's actual territory." Ling Qi said, thoughtfully.

"And it will be good practice," she added quietly, catching her Mother's worried eyes. "We will be going much deeper soon."

"That is true," Li Suyin sighed. "Well since I am with you, it will be fine. I suppose I'll save on the reagents this way."

"...Li Suyin, how much are you going to expend on this?" Ling Qi asked.

"No more than her discretionary budget for the month," Su Ling said flatly.

"...Since when do you use words like discretionary," Ling Qi asked, staring at her blankly.

"Lingling's been a real scholar these past few months," Sixiang said, bright and singsong

"Su Ling is very diligent when she decides it is important," Gan Guangli said serenely.

"Oh, all of you go to the hells. I just don't use big words just to sound flowery and sh-" Su Ling cut off her curse, glancing at Ling Qi's Mother.

"Yes," Li Suyin said, clearly hiding a giggle. "I am not expending anything I can't afford. So Ling Qi, it's been some time, what can I expect from you?"

"Well to begin with, I have been working through my cultivation of my construct arts, the Beast King's and I think this trip will help me bring it to another stage."


***

They'd spoken through the morning well after the dishes were cleared away, but eventually the time came for them to go. She offered to bring everyone up the cliffside, but only Suyin and Sixiang accepted. Li Suyin could just walk up the cliff, but flight was much quicker. Gan Guangli had just scooped up Su Ling, whose tails bushed out adorably, and just leapt to the top of the cliff.

Gan Guangli really did have a mischievous side, huh?

She hoped it had been worth it, because Su Ling looked like she could set fires with her eyes for the rest of the trip. They arrived at the cavern which held the Cathedral as the sun was sinking toward the horizon, staining the sky red and orange. The scouts assigned to the clifftop hadn't reported any changes, and true to their word, the exterior was no different than they had left it. However, they had not sent men into the cavern, given the danger, and so they proceeded inside with caution.

The piping sound of the wind blowing through the naturally perforated stone was much the same, an eerie and melancholy tune, carried out through the high crevice which led inside. Then came the great chamber itself, lit from within by rose gold light distorted through the great crystal growth which took up the great gallery.

The clean water of the spring in the center had changed. Gray and polluted, thick like silt, black fungal growths crept up onto the shore, extending stringy veins of fleshy material across the stone. Here, there were none of the predatory water spirits she had encountered last time, schooling beneath the water, the surface was opaque and still.

"Well that looks real welcomin'," Su Ling drawled.

"Ugh, well for what it's worth, I think that's a recent change," Sixiang said, grimacing as they peered at the water.

"I don't feel the echoes of dying or strife, so the natural spirits of the tunnels haven't been destroyed, I think," Ling Qi said, peering at the silty water suspiciously.

"The crystal remains pristine!" Gan Guangli boomed, looking up at it. Ling Qi's ears caught nothing from it though. The Spirit of the cavern was definitely still alive, but unresponsive, closed off, like a tortoise drawn fully into its shell. She could tell there would be no response if she spoke, and if she forced it, the spirit would certainly interpret it as an attack.

Li Suyin was already crouching, hands spread wide as the air distorted between them. Ling Qi had never seen an object take so long to withdraw from storage.

It looked a bit like a rain collector, a wide silver funnel covered in countless etched characters filled with some black gemstone dust, set in the mouth of a clear crystal glass container the size of a small barrel. Li Suyin examined it with a critical eye, before nodding, and much more quickly producing a stack of paper talisman's in her palm. "The Four trigrams Lunar Absorption array is undamaged. Sir Gan, if you would please find a flat place to install it outside. When you place the container please add four of the anchoring talismans at the prime radials, with the talisman edge exactly fifteen centimeters from the funnel's outer edge. If placed properly they will then activate themselves."

"Understood Miss Li!" Gan Guangli boomed. "Any further instruction?"

Li Suyin considered. "It should be placed on bare stone if possible, but if not please clear away any plant matter from the installation site. It would be a small inefficiency, but we should be diligent."

"Yeah, guess I go out with him. Prolly easier to cut grass than rip it up," Su Ling sighed. "You two gonna be good in here.

"I'll manage, certainly for long enough to call you back if it comes up," Ling Qi replied, amused. If there was something she couldn;t hold off for that long Gan Guangli and Su Ling weren't going to be much help.

"Think you want me to load up to the old digs, Qi?" Sixiang asked, turning her attention to them.

"Will your body be safe up here?"

"Haha, I can watch over it, Miss Ling," Gan Guangli said brightly, turning back to her the qi gathering device in his arms.

Ling Qi nodded then and Sixiang smiled brightly. Their form shimmered, silhouette blurring as the bent light and air wavered and vanished. Beneath the appearance of a body was a life sized humanoid doll, made from polished wood and porcelain, articulated with gears of polished silver visible in the seams and joins. The face was a panel of soft wood very loosely shaped like a human face, set with eyes of polished crystal glass.

As she felt Sixiang vacate from it, it sagged like a puppet with strings cut the lingering qi in its limbs guiding it down into a slumped over kneeling position. Which ended when Guangli scooped it up naturally.

"Tell him to be careful! I don't want my paintjob scratched!" Sixiang said. Their voice emanated comfortably in her head, as if they had never left.

"You can tell him yourself still," Ling Qi replied, amused. "But take care Gan Guangli. I wouldn't want Sixiang to need a night under the polish."

Bathtime. Fun!

That was because Qiyi was a good girl. Even if she didn't strictly need washing.

"Just get back and already getting bullied, this is a hostile working environment you know."

She thought Renxiang had a form for that. She could get Sixiang one later.

"And now paperwork! Abuse of muse!"

She had missed Sixiang, truly.

"... missed you too, Qi."

Ling Qi had begun to stroll as they spoke, with Gan Guangli and Su Ling going, walking the perimeter of the Cavern as Li Suyin got along with the rest of her preparations, chalking lines and characters along the stone, placing objects, from incense burners to tall flat wooden plinths set in stone bases, formations painted down both sides. She could feel the ambience of the qi changing, the air getting cleaner, even the small particulates being swept away into the purifying formations. She kept a close eye on the fungal scum that had begun to grow, now graying and withering, the silty consistency of the water beginning to break up. Li Suyin moved through it all in a storm of glinting wire and thread, characters being traced out and objects places by the dozen, while she held a tablet of jade in her hands, claw tipped fingers dancing over the smooth surface as incomprehensible markings flashed through the deep green, nearly black stone.

"Okay," Li Suyin said, looking up some minutes later, a complex grid of a formation formed by her efforts on the stone floor. "That will do for the surface. The others will be able to contact us as well when they finish setting things up outside."

"Does that mean we're ready to go down?" Ling Qi asked, turning from her examination of the great crystal formation. "Aren't you bringing any of your constructs?"

"I am, but I have them stored in various ways, I'll deploy them at need, it's more efficient that way. Are you ready to begin?"

Ling Qi nodded, stepping up to the side of the pool, where Li Suyin passed her a cloth facemask. Hers was dark blue, nearly black whereas Li Suyin's was a lighter lilac. Hooking the strings around her ears, she felt it snap into place, sealing down vacuum tight against her cheeks and across the bridge of her nose.

Qiyi extended ribbons from her color, brushing suspiciously over the foreign cloth.

It was only temporary, she assured her gown.

Qiyi could do better.

She could experiment with that later.

"Territorial little thing, huh?" Sixiang chuckled.

Ling Qi acknowledged with a nod as she joined herself at the slick edge of the pool. "Me first, or together?"

"Together, I think."

No more needed to be side, the both of them stepped out over the silty surface. Li Suyin sank like a stone, dragged along by grasping wires propelling her downward by pulling along the walls. Ling Qi dropped more like a billowing leaf, tugging at the flows of air to drive herself downward despite the buoyancy of her supernaturally light body.

VPhysical vision clouded, the water nearly viscous in consistency, they descended and descended. At her side a bright light blinked on, an orb of polished white jade floating over Li Suyin's palm. Where it shone, the silt was seared away, leaving clear water.

And soon, their feet touched down on stone. There at the bottom Ling Qi beheld the tunnels beneath the Cathedral for the first time.

Fleshy fronds squirmed in the currents, dark slimy fungal flesh encased the stone. In the dark, pale yellow eyes blinked and pulsed, scattering like schools of fish as her gaze turned to the crevices they lurked in.

And all around she could not shake the sensation that the tunnels were breathing.

 

[yrsillar]

The chamber at the bottom of the pool was only a couple of meters across, a rounded bowl of a floor filled with silt and mud, from which sprouted the grasping, fleshy fronds. One reached for her as her heels touched down on the mud, and she didn't even bother to glance its way, the water swirling as she pushed air into it, turning up a churning current.

The voices were distorted. They are not thinking things begin with. The eyes that peered in the dark, the fronds, they were only reactive things, impulses tied to primitive instinct. Her hair swirled around her head like a halo, as she peered around the dark waters. One… two… three… four… the number of twisting cracks and crevices branching off were numerous, though only a few were large enough for a solid human to pass through.

"We'll be looking for a chamber defined by green crystals. From there we will want the east facing tunnel," Ling Qi said. She didn't bother moving her lips, no bubbles escaped her mask, she simply impressed the sound onto the water with a flex of will.

"Oh, yes you did say your mentor had given you a little scouting advice," Li Suyin's responding voice hard a faint distorted warble to it, and a few silvery bubbles emerged through her mask. Unlike Ling Qi she did seem to using clean air generated by the seals inside of her mask, where Ling Qi had chosen to just convert her qi to breathable air inside of her lungs.

"I can't say I'm sad to avoid poking through a a few dozen muddy, yuck filled empty tunnels, but it does take a bit of the exploratory feeling away," Sixiang chuckled.

"Well, we're hardly just Outer Sect disciples, with nothing to do but poke around mysterious caves and vales," Li Suyin said lightly, a wire curled and shot out through the water, punching through the hardened hornlike shell of one of the impurity growths clinging to the walls and dragging her a bit further into the chamber. "Besides, it is not as if we haven't been left the bulk of the work in the sealing."

She hummed as the wire spun back, trailing dark purple ichor. "Hm, hybridized. Corrupted as others might say. The underworld ecosystem has not displaced the surface one fully yet."

"That is… some manner of mutated shell fish then?" Ling Qi wondered, drifting over.

"Some breed of freshwater mussel I think," Li Suyin said idly. "Now that I see the dimensions down here… let me bring out at least one guardian."

Her clawed glove flicked, something clicked and whirred, and a disc the size of a go chip, crimson red shot out into the murky water. Ling Qi sent herself drifting backward, giving more room as she felt the qi swell within.

Red.

The faint 'whump' of water displacing and bubbles erupting cleared to reveal a figure a few centimeters taller than her. It at first seemed a man, broad shoulders and heroically proportioned, clad in spiny, shell-like plate armor.

Only… those broad, fierce black domed crescents on the helm with glinting multifaceted eyes, the plumes, feathered antennae and even as she watched the stern 'faceplate' split open jaggedly into split and sharp mandibles which clacked and clicked, tasting the silty water.

The crack of a chitin fist against its breastplate shell was muffled in the water as it bent the knee to Li Suyin.

Mother-creator-great-lady. Humbled-protector-chosen-from-brothers-presents-inspection.

"Oh good, the moisture sealant is working properly," Li Suyin said absently. "Rise Xinghong. You're to focus on protecting my person while I work today."

Ling Qi pursed her lips. "...Can you hear his words Li Suyin?"

It was definitely a he now that she felt at the edges of the qi. Low third realm too… Suyin's experiments really had paid off.

"Hm, no my antlion soldiers aren't so advanced. They can follow complex commands but don't show the spiritual activity for human level abstract thinking yet," Li Suyin said, blinking. "Is this your 'sharp ears' again?"

The insectoid face turned to her tilted, assessing, jaws clacking.

"...He is extremely pleased to have been chosen from among his brothers, and honored to protect you."

It was true that the antlion's thoughts were simple, childish, not even quite to the complexity Biyu expressed, untranslated by Ling Qi's own cognition. But she thought Suyin was underestimating things… She didn;t know that it would be good to bring it up here though.

Li Suyin smiled. "Oh, I could pick that up well enough. Xinghong is a good boy, the most disciplined and obedient of his batch."

Click-clack-clack. The antlion soldier practically vibrated with resolve.

"Ling Qi is to be treated as a Level one companion and combatant as well Xinghong, defer to her in absence of my own orders."

Less enthusiastic, but understanding.

Sixiang, how many of these does she have, and how advanced are they?

"There's five of them, counting him, though she's got a sixth still growing. Other ones are only second realm though. First gen that hasn't exploded, withered or eaten each other." Sixiang said cheerfully. "Wait till you see the combo she's set up with the lot! I like 'em!"

Ah. Ling could only think. She wasn't even sure where to guide her thoughts on this. "So shall I begin scouting for our green crystals?"

"Please. You said you were intending to use a new technique?"

"Yes," Ling Qi agreed. "My usual perception extensions suffer some degradation in impure environments, but, this refinement of my Beast King's Savage Dirge Art should help."

Ling Qi drew in a breath, though it was only a mental exercise really.

This art had always been an awkward thing, so many movements and techniques, too many patterns to easily keep track of in battle. She understood why. It was ultimately a theater art, a form of expression she was only tangentially skilled in.

"You do a pretty good job of it when you try," Sixiang chuckled.

She could. That didn't change the trouble though. But as she studied more and more of the movements and arcs, she had begun to realize she was doing it inefficiently. She Expressed the the first low bars, it was a twist on the imperial anthems of the second dynasty. Regal, but with a pompously bombastic edge that invited mockery.

The Dirge of the River King, once the River Jing, fallen scion of dragons. A carp which deemed himself a dragon, on the strength of bloodline alone.

Scales shimmered in the water around her as her eyes multiplied. Five more points of vision blooming in the water, expanding her senses, silvery coins that swiftly flickered invisibly.

"Hm, I remember the play and the story both," Li Suyin said thoughtfully watching the gathered schooling phantom fish which surrounded them. "The River God, the fat and furious carp, squanderer of heaven's treasures."

"Disdained even by Vermin God. Who looked upon the glittering heights of his fathers, and only ever descended, descended the falls, sure his destiny was to be a dragon anyway," Ling Qi said absently. That was how the story went.

The fish skirled around her, mingled with the wisps, and shot off in every direction, swirling and swimming in shafting flashing patterns under the faint luminescence cast by some among the growths on the walls. Li Suyin's antlion soldier followed their motion with quick snapping turns of his head and clattering mandibles. She understood why Li Suyin had brought him. He was inexperienced.

It was a strange technique, and one which showed her more than others that in the completed combat form of the art, each King was more a component of a line in a more complex dance. The darting carp were not creatures of power but fright, she sent them out in panicking schools, where they would swarm and obscure the motions of others. Empty and blown up with the phantom of threat, to trigger defenses, trip ambushes, and take attention and blows. This was their basic function

As the stupid, prideful River God, least descendant of dragons, was cajoled and flattered into fulfilling the Spider Gods schemes.

It was very much not in her usual style, but there was definitely something to be said of 'scouting in force'.

Things shifted in the dark. Maw's yawned in the fungal flesh overgrowing the underwater tunnels deeper in. Tongue tendrils grown through with spiny bone shot out, speared furiously swimming phantoms, nests of wriggling white worm nests erupted, tangling and stinging with with toxic spurs embedded in slimy flesh. Mutant eyeless fish with sleek armored skulls and sharp bony jaws snapped and clattered.

Even clouds of toxins and impurity belched forth, dissolving them, dispelling them, but absorbed in turn by their dying throes. But most importantly, her 'eyes' traveled unmolested, unseen among the swarming school. She caught glinting green, spiking growths of crystal, jutting from the walls of a narrow winding passage, like the teeth in the throat of one of Yan Renshu's worms.

"We'll want to take this one here," Ling Qi said, pointing to a tall, narrow passage on the right. We'll want to mind the chamber that will come up after the second turn, it's filled with parasitic worms. They'll attempt to get under our skin or into any opening and nest."

"Understood. Xinghong, stoke your fire," Li Suyin said absently. "And stay close."

Click-clack, chitin fists crashed together, and steaming bubbles began to rise from his joints, the water around him rapidly heating to boiling.

"That will work," Ling Qi said with a laugh. She could just step past the chamber but probably best not to alert anything on deeper layers of reality just yet.

Together with her friend, she descended into the mouth of the cave.

***​

The chamber Shu Yue had vaguely described was unmistakable in the end, through the spiraling sikey growth of a tunnel was a chamber wreathed in emerald green light, pulsing gently.

The light warmed the water hear, and where it shone, the corrupted life of the tunnels did not reach, here the water was clean, and clear, and only clinging slime mold and water weed of normal types grew. Most of the light came from a central stalagmite of the organic crystal, a great fang rising from the floor as tall as Ling Qi herself. In it slept a node of power.

"This is certainly a qi locus of a kind…. Wind aspected?" Li Suyin wondered, examining it.

"It's connected to the spirit on the surface," Ling Qi said.

"...It's a chunk of their body, kinda distributed. A bit like the little bit I left back in my puppet, but more deeply grown," Sixiang voice animated from near her ear. "And…"

"There are others," Ling Qi said, gazing into the depths. Though the spirit of the Cathedral remained uncommunicative, she could feel it here, down below the sense blurring blanket of corruption. "This is wind aspected… I sense…. Heaven, the touch of lightning on the mountainside, earth, deep and rich… and the mountain cracked and breaking. There's others; extinguished fire, silenced thunder. Dead and broken. Water… polluted, flickering."

She shook herself, coming free from the vision.

"Li Suyin rested her clawed fingers against the crystal as well. "Useful. The spirit is a neutral entity overall then? Or at least a gestalt of smaller entities?"

She was hypothesizing, Ling Qi could tell.

"...Or the fire and the thunder in the deep was a different guy, doesn't the rule the other out though," Sixiang said.

She saw that Shu Yue had sent them here for more than taking the correct turn.

"We could attempt to cleanse one of the damaged nodes. This might get the spirits attention, and allow it to help us," Ling Qi mused, drifting around the crystal thoughtfully.

"Or we could go in the direction of the broken nodes, which will be wear the taint is strongest… and the breach will likely be," Li Suyin pointed out. "The main underworld entity is some sort of puppeteer creature right?"

Ling Qi nodded thoughtfully. Detouring might just mean doing more damage to controlled guardians and creatures of the natural ecosystem down here. But then, plunging right ahead could be risky.
"Not like that's ever stopped us."

[ ] Clear a node, see if the Piper can be reached.

[ ] Go unto the breach, into the belly of the beast.

 

[yrsillar]

"We risk doing more damage in breaking through to a node, but I think it might still be the right choice," Ling Qi said thoughtfully. "In the end, none will know the spirit's own body better than itself, no?"

"I suppose so," Li Suyin said, rubbing her chin through her mask. A few bubbles emerged along with her words. "Being able to secure conscious cooperation from the Place Spirit where the seal will be installed may increase overall efficiency."

"And we did choose the equipment to give us a longer time in the tunnels," Ling Qi agreed. "May as well use it. Can you fight to subdue?"

"It's not my specialty, but I suppose adjusting some of my toxin dosages should allow for disablement rather than death… Rather than quick death."

Ling Qi stared at her.

She looked away, color creeping up her cheeks. "I can administer restoratives, if we have the time and ability."

"Aw she's just being shy. Linlin can totally just fuse somebody's spinal column together if she wants them to hold still. Or their knees," Sixiang chuckled, voice rising from her shoulder.

"I do not think we will encounter many knees down here, and I would really rather not perform alterations to the spine on a subject you wish to recover. The complexity and potential for damage is…"

"I get it," Ling Qi said a little too quickly. "And Xinhong? Can you grapple?"

The red antlion soldier clacked at her, staring.

"Oh, Xinghong, please activate the routine…"

Before she had finished, the carapace along his sides made a sharp click as the shell unhinged, and two additional burly arms emerged from beneath the spiny chitin. These had only sharp three fingered graspers rather than humanlike hands. Under her eyes, Xinghong flexed, posed, bent his limbs as if going through a martial drill.

…She recognized some of those movements from Gan Guangli's basic drills. "You can then," Ling Qi said, relieved.

Li Suyin's brows were drawn together. "Hm, your ability is very useful. He generally only understands a handful of command words, and only with careful tones. But yes, I installed a jade slip containing many basic martial styles into their growth chamber, absorption is… uneven, but Xinghong has taken to the unarmed drills the best."
She wasn't precisely sure how the antlion was able to make chitin pectorals flex like that, but he was very pleased with the praise.

"Alright, the question then is which one we should pursue," Ling Qi said.

Water! Murky yuck bad no good clogging silencing stilling.

Ling Qi blinked looking down at her dress. "That's not a bad point."

"What isn't?" Li SUyin asked.

"Qiyi is suggesting the water node, since the flows of the water could be said to correspond to the spirits circulation."

"I might think the Heaven node, as that would be the closest to its higher thoughts," Li Suyin. "But I suppose if we want to ingratiate ourselves by clearing the threat from an embattled one, then water might be our best option. Water is often a purifying element as well, representing cleanliness…. It would most likely break up the underworld qi if restored fully.

"Is that the official word for it now by the way, 'underworld?"

"Nah, Suyin's just impatient so she's using the simplest, least controversial one till somebody higher makes a decision," Sixiang drawled.

"I don't know if I agree with how you said that," Li Suyin huffed, but yes. "Now, we know which section to follow, but can you sense where the water node is?

"...It's too attenuated, the impurity is too thick in the passages ahead," Ling Qi said, frowning. "I can send my eyes ahead quietly, but the impurity would damage the constructs too quickly… I can use my new technique…"

"But it will bring the attention of the impurity spirit-or beast- you mentioned attacking Gan Guangli and yourself…. Which is fine…"

"But we don't want it to attack here, since it would just make the Piper, the crystal spirit, respond indiscriminately, to an attack on one of its undamaged nodes."

It was nice going back and forth with Suyin, her friend picked up her thoughts swiftly.

Li Suyin gazed down into the darkness of the passage thoughtfully. "We just approach loudly then, and accept the attacks in the tunnels?"

"At least while I get a feel for the spiritual dimensions of the place. Impurity bends space, but so do I," Ling Qi said lightly. "And I have Sixiang here, to help me navigate."
Her friend nodded, and that was that. They advanced on the crevice, from which drifted tendrils of dull gray polluted water, even at the entrance. Even a few meters down the winding passage, physical sight was useless, it was like peering into a pool of stinking mud.

But, there were more senses than that. She advanced alongside Suyin drifting through the heavy waters like a wraith, while her friend's wire limbs pulled her along through the viscous water with little resistance. Xinghong loomed just behind, heavy footfalls and solid body wading through the darkness, aglow from within by fiery light, streams and bubbles of steam wrapping his chitinous frame.

It was not long before they met resistance. Again, water churned, silvery scales flashed fins slapped and pushed against silty water, and fish darted off schooling around her eyes. They found darkness and winding passages, and stone run through with veins of flesh.

There could be no doubt that this tunnel was respiringing.

"...It's not just physical Qi. This slimy boy is straddling the border, like a predator hiding under the water, and only snapping its jaws when somebody touches the surface."

Ling Qi inclined her head, feeling her constructs as they rippled out through the passages, pounced on, killed, speared, dragged into silty pits. It all gave her information.

"Incoming. We want to keep left for now, follow the wall," Ling Qi said curtly, as they turned, entering a straight open gallery of a cavern, spacious for the underground.

Li Suyin didn't have time to answer before the first real attack came.

Tendrils lanced out of the dark. They emerged from nothing, from rippling vortices in the water silt and stone. Sickly pale, like fleshy worms, each one bristling with near invisible hair thin barbs which stunk of toxin to Ling Qi's senses.

She sang the beat of war drums into the tunnels, and the water teemed with fang and claw, in this narrow space, there was little definition to the her phantasmal beasts, only a shimmering cloak of snapping fangs and reaching claws and tearing beaks. It was a hideous display, and the song had a chaotic tempo like this. But it illustrated where she's gone wrong before.

Each King was one part in the play, and there, they came in sequence, one after another. But a battle was far too chaotic for that. She had been taking each instrument in an orchestra, and making its part a solo. A bird screamed, and from churning phantom flesh an eagle's beak tore a tendril away from her face, sending up clouds of silt as it punched through the thinned barrier to crash into the pulsing liminal flesh which lay beyond it. The jaws of wolves snapped and tore, and vermin dropped in the wake of her footsteps devouring the twitching scraps that fell in the bloodying water. The song's crescendo rose into the deep, rumbling roar of a bear, the sound smashing swarming tendrils to paste before they could reach her.

They could be used apart, but the potential of the art was so much more freeform than that.
She spared a glance for Suyin.

Wire snapped out, gleaming with pale blue qi. It punched through reaching tendrils, and where it touched, flesh twisted. Tumorous growth, warping and bulging flesh, making muscle snap like overdrawn strings, barbs turning ingrowth, jabbing deep into the beast's own flesh, sinew and fat bubbling like wax, deforming and melting.

Xinghong's fists and grasping claws cutting boiling furrows through the water in flashes of red, stepping right into the grappling limbs and letting the barbs skitter off chitin, or even pierce the flesh between, venting boiling purple blood from pinprick wounds, and burning off the toxin. Tendrils ripped, tendrils tore

They were doing fine. But they could be bogged down forever here. She wished she could sing of ice here… but it would only damage the caverns more, sterilize them of life and freeze the currents solid.

No, her constructs were the best use here.

Hm, feel like I got a lock on a spot closer to the center of the water qi," Sixiang whispered as the veil tensed and strained, dozens of new limbs emerging, some thicker, more muscular, dense with parasitic qi. "But it's pretty turbulent, cause of fatty here."

Ling Qi eyes the echoes of flesh she could feel beyond the veil, walls of pallid meat studded with hungry eyes and toothless sucking mouths. But even those weren't really the core of the creature.

No, it was mostly more fused refuse from its prey, if she had her senses right. She sang a warning in her voice; to withdraw from this place, to flee, to preserve its own self.

The next attack was all the more furious. She tugged gently on Qiyi's spirit and the dress responded with giddy excitement as qi pulsed through her fabric, threads spinning out, the lowest layer of the gown turning snug and dry as the metal threaded fabric wrapped her from her neck down to her toes, and even the outer layers of the gown shifted to something more sleek and lethal.

She let a spiked tendril punch through her phantoms, and rebound uselessly off of her dress. The drumbeats of her art repeated her silent warning, and this time there was a fractional moment of hesitation.

She laid a hand on Suyin's shoulder. "Jumping."

She waited just long enough for a wire to snap out and curl around one of Xinghong's many wrists.

Dreamwalking here felt like sliding through rotten meat, overgrown with slime mold and rot. It stung her eyes and made the mask on her face burn hot, the formations woven into the cloth flaring to bright and straining life.

It would have been so easy to get lost here, in a vortice of decay and sucking depression, but she was better than that now.

And beside, another hand pulled her along. They emerged back amidst stone and waving fronds of cave kelp, a wide circular chamber, with two tunnels branching off near the ceiling, one speckled with the faint growth of blue crystal. Of course…

"Ahaha, well. I didn't say it was unoccupied, but we got this, yeah?"

They did, Ling Qi acknowledged, looking up at the spirits schooling overhead. Slender human bodies and glittering fins, black staring eyes and pale waterweed hair. She supposed this was where the luring spirits had gone.

It was a sad thing to see the writhing fleshy veins under their skin, the knots of black impurity and chitinous growth. Their 'voices' echoed, in two tones, the toneless predation of the beast they were fighting, and the wild struggles and howls of the trapped.

"Try to subdue where you can."

Something larger, sinuous and dark moved. A fleshy corpse gray hand studded with coral growth grasped the edge of the crystal tunnel. It was large enough to close around her chest like she was a doll.

"Except for that one," Ling Qi said quietly. There was only one voice there.

Constructs flowed like mist from the hems of her gown, beasts and shadows, the phantoms of dancers and the shades of long dead gods. In the end, the central lesson of the Beast King's was one of power. A simple lesson, some might call it trite or naive. Each Beast God was a manifestation of pride and authority. Their last march was made in alliance, but not together.

Together any three, even any two, might have broken even the Great Tsu. But they could not have done that, any more than a man could pluck the sun from the sky.

+2 Power XP

So they died, and their bones built the Throne of Seasons. That was the first lesson of Tsu. That…


[ ] Power is the ability to act on or resist the world, it manifests through many forces. The great and the small, the subtle and the strong, amplify in unity.

[ ] Power is the ability to act on or resist the world, it manifests through many forces. No individual is great in all. Power united is greater than its parts.

 

[yrsillar]

…Power is the ability to act on or resist the world, it manifests through many forces. The great and the small, the subtle and the strong, amplify in unity.

Each of the Beast King's was a demonstration of the failure of a form of Power. Each of their deaths was a demonstration of the Power Tsu had woven among the united tribes of the Emerald Seas. In this art, wielded properly, it was demonstrated that their lonely powers too could be welded to greater purpose.

The same way their bones supported the roof of the Throne of Seasons.

Ling Qi drifted up and back on streamers of bubbling water, pushed by summoned air, and her song clashed with the distorted voices which echoed from the parasitized spirits sharp toothed mouths. Qi roiled in the water, distorting the sound of the sweet, eerie and tainted luring song the spirit's furthest back sang.

As if she would let such a poor song taint her friend's ears. She couldn't be turned against her own with such a trivial amateurishly crafted lie. There was no warm embrace in sinking deep, just cold and pressure and the flash of razor edged teeth in the dark.

This alone, this surge of power and leaking mist, had cowed these creatures when she was last here. Here and now their screams to stop their own bodies could not leave their own heads.

She focused her attention on the rotten, parasitized giant hauling itself from the tunnels. It was gray as a corpse, bloated, fat and flesh hanging off of its bones, growths and cysts formed under its skin, wriggling rope thick worms of the impure parasite's flesh wriggling like a puppet's strings under its skin. The only thing that remained fair was its face, flesh preserved and porcelain pale, white blond locks drifting like long waterweed. Its features neither male nor female, but ethereal and inhuman.

Even if she felt it's dead dantian churning, trying to warp her perception, to see a beautiful, chiseled silhouette of masculine beauty.

An eagle screamed, its echo warbling in the water, and a mass of phantom muscle and feathers and ripping talons slammed the corpse puppet in center mass, slamming it back against the far wall, pushed away from the lesser spirits, swarming up around Li Suyin.

The puppet let out a low reverberating groan, that Ling Qi felt in her bones, it lodged in her ears, bouncing in her skull, threatening to burst something. And as it did its massive rotten paw swept down and crushed the eagle phantom's skull.

Its fading body rippled, and erupted into chittering, squealing crimson eyed rats, each gaunt and hungry and mangey in their desperation.

Below, Li Suyin fought, their song could not reach her, nor Xinhong or any others, with Ling Qi here, yet the spirits weren't helpless without their lure. Scales flashed in the dim blue light, they darted and schooled, weaving hallucinations with bent light and glittering water where the spirit failed. The water churned with their control of the chambers qi weight dragging at her friend, invisible bonds seeking her limbs, cudgels of liquid pressure forming and bearing down, imparted force from bare centimeters way.

The water flashed darkly, and two constructs materialized. The driver from before, the horse head, now clad in polished and ceremonial armor, in its hands was clutched a slab of solid mirrored glass cut in the shape of a towering shield. Flanking Suyin with it was a second, wide where it was tall, a skeleton with the low slung head of an ox, with gleaming horns of polished black stone. In its hands was a long wooden pole not tipped with a blade but a pair of curved grasping hooks. A mancatcher, a thing Ling Qi had seen once or twice in the hands of the guard.

The mirror flashed, and the qi invested into the water to control and wield it shattered, all the force imparted into it reflecting outward, in a buffetting wave that scattered the schooling spirits. The mancatcher darted out, catching the closest one, and the parasitized spirit screamed as the barbs installed on its inner surface dug into its skin and flashed with actinic light, sending a rippling tingle of electricity out through the cavern. The captured siren spirit twitched and went lip, wisps of pink leaking from its lips.

Li Suyin herself held poised and steady, her false eye spinning and flashing in its socket, darting around so rapidly that it seemed to blur even in Ling Qi's vision.

"Identifying lowest survival odds, Xinghong, receive data. Begin triage."

The antlion soldier's jaws came together with an echoing crash too loud for mere physical sound as fists crashed together water screamed to a boil.

Ling Qi grimaced and returned her eyes to her own fight, she the last of the thunderous qi of the creatures attack from her head. She had to trust Li Suyin's judgment on that.

Could Sixiang disrupt the parasite spirit's control?

"I can give it a go! Nobody's actually home in there, so I shouldn't have too much trouble," Sixiang whispered. "Just gimme an opening."

Ling Qi spun lazily on a swirl of bubbles as a pawing hand slammed past her crashing against the wall behind. It shook the cavern, spreading cracks through the stone where it impacted. It was only a distraction.

The eerily preserved face of the corpse opened its mouth, full of rowed razor edged teeth and screamed.
The water rippled from the pressure of the thunderous sound, but the physical force was nothing to the disruptive vibration which crashed down on her, emanating through the water.

But her hungry rats were dug in under its skin, and even as they burst with their gluttony, they dulled the emanations that would have driven its former fellows into a higher frenzy. The thunderous force and spiritual reverberations too shattered, Qiyi's threads dulled to solid matte black, the ornaments woven into her hair thrashing, jingling, wetted ribbons curling about her ears.

And the force that would have rattled her bones and shaken up her organs dispersed through the fabric, harmless.

She regarded it calmly as she drifted away on the current, still singing her warsong. It ignored the rats in its flesh careless of the damage to its puppet, save where they chewed close to its tendrils. Good to know. Sixiang, there was the opening.

She threw out a her hand, and from the churning silt and cloudy mist drifting from her dress a quartet of snarling wolves emerged as if darting from high grass, running through the water as if it were air.

The corpse bellowed, tearing at them as they pounced on it and began to savage.

"Right-o, think I got a lock on where to hit!"

She didn't see anything but she felt Sixiang's presence draining from her thoughts and dantian, and sensed their movement through liminal space, a curving streak of rainbow color on the back of her eyes.

She saw one rat in particular jerk, kaleidoscopic color rippling through its fur, somehow managing a manic grin on animal lips as it suddenly clawed with more purpose at the corpse… and leapt directly into its mouth when the spirit opened it to bellow.

Sheer mechanical reflex saw even a corpse gag, and Ling Qi grimaced as bits of flesh and gore streamed past its open lips. She was glad it was already dead.

Rainbow qi flashed in the dim cavern, shining out from every orifice in the puppets preserved face, and suddenly its limbs snapped taut, its muscles straining against the suddenly panicked thrashing of the tendrils under its skin.

They ripped free in a cloud of gore but the corpse, whose eyes now shown with rapidly shifting colors, snapped up a hand to grasp a whole bundle as they tried to snap back into the liminal and retreat.

Ling Qi released her concentration on her phantoms, brushed her hand through the water, parting the veil between material and imagination and stepped through to face the heaving squirming mass of eyes and flesh now trapped close to the surface.

And here, on the other side, she sang a song of frigid death and shattering cold without worry. Pallid and putrid flesh recoiled, blackened, broken apart into drifting chunks that swiftly dissolved into the churning chaos of unformed dream, and something tiny and black shot off, too fast for even her to catch. Disappearing into the liminal deep.

She narrowed her eyes but didn't chase. She'd had a look, a taste, a scent. That was enough for now. She stepped back through the veil, not gone long enough for her silhouette to even flicker.

Somewhere ahead, she felt a pale cyan light brighten as a mass of caked and filthy pollution broke apart in its depths.

"Ew. Ewewewewewewewewew. That felt so grosssss," Sixiang whispered, emanating disgust.

Before Ling Qi, the now badly torn corpse twitched, bobbing limply and beginning to…come apart in the churning waters.

"Corpses are the absolute worst," they gagged.

She was sorry Sixiang had to do that, but thankful that they would. It had ended things much more quickly and exposed some of the creatures…. Mass to actual damage.

And it left the parasitized sirens who remained drifting and confused, bodies twitching as they fought the residual will broken off from the parasite, leftover in the controlling flesh embedded in their bodies.

Not that there were a huge number left. Many drifted in the current twitching, occasionally emitting a spark. Others…

Xinghong emitted a warbling, distorted shriek as he brought a struggling siren pinned in his upper down against the wall, lower arms beginning to blur and pummel the pinned spirit roughly where a human's kidney's would be.

Given the others bobbing around him, bruised, battered and scorched, it wasn;t the first to receive the treatment.

"Xinghong, desist," Li Suyin said calmly, eye flickering examining those still struggling to regain control of their own nerves. "You drove it away Ling Qi?"

"And dislodged some of the impurity, I expect…"
She felt a frisson of tension in the cavern, the crystals glowing along the mouth of the tunnel above flared and pulsed gently. She felt something like a massive eye rolling her way, twitching awake from sleep.

"It seems I should have a conversation with our true host," Ling Qi said quietly. She winced looking over the freed water spirit, those who remained conscious. She let out a breath. Reassurance. Aid. An end to what had ailed them. "Can you please heal them, excise the foreign matter, make sure they can't be taken again.

"I can, best not to strain the place spirit any more than it already has been," Li Suyin replied, idly, already winding a thread around the poor thing XInhong had just been pummeling and winding it-him- in.

She sang another note, soothing, reassuring as the others stirred.

Time to learn what was going on properly.

*****
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