NOVEL NEXT Chapter 6: SIX
In a very hot morning, when sun was a particularly bright yellow with its light causing the plants and insects and fish to celebrate, a ship with four masts and made from particularly dark wood docked on the island. They seemed to be the occasional visitors the clan. Once the necessary processes were done, a middle aged man and woman leaped from the ship. The man had a large beard on his face while his exposed arms were filled with thick hair. His skin was a beautiful and even bronze color but he had red nails that were shaped like short claws. He had a large smile on his face while his green eyes kept looking everywhere. "Quit it Anan Bing, he will be here." The woman reprimanded the giant man before she also started looking around. "What if he doesn't show up Miss Eryue? He could cause everything to fall and we can`t arrive at the pure lake late." The man asked but no answer was given causing him to turn to the women. He watched as her pure black eyes were trained on the figure of a large grey eyed man. A laugh threatened to escape from his mouth before he was met with the arrogant and uncaring eyes of the younger boy close to Tian Ho.
"Is that his child?" he leaned towards Miss Eryue and found her as dazed as he was. "He seems to be rank 2, impressive." Miss Eryue seemed to wake up from her daze when she saw the giant Anan Bing walk with large strides towards the father and son. The giant didn't seem to notice the gazes he was being given by the various clan members around the port but Miss Eryue did. Tian Ho seemed to notice the two as he leaned towards his son and whispered what she assumed were their names before turning to Anan Bing and returning his greeting. They hadn't seen each other for so long. The smiles the two men had would make someone who didn't know them to assume they had just met their long lost lovers.
"Is this your child?" Miss Eryue called out to the two as she got closer. The rest of the crew had walked into the clan to sell the various wares they needed to sell and buy what they needed to by. When they did that, the captain and the vice-captain were catching up with an old friend while his son just sat there silently. While Tian Zheng was nervous about meeting what his father explained to him as old friend that nervousness had been long forgotten when he awoke. Now, his mind was busy trying to wrap his head around the things he had come to realize after the clash between the two gu.
First he had realized or remembered what line of thought had been consumed by the broken mind gu. After the battle, the two wills that controlled the gu worms had unintentionally filled his mind with attainment in very many paths. Some were complete while others were still in their embryonic forms, but since most of those paths were dangerous, the broken mind gu had been forced to eat the thoughts he had begun to have of all the paths he had been introduced to. This lead it to spit up the line of thoughts it had once eaten causing him to remember what he had forgotten. The line of thoughts consumed was about the first two paths he had ever touched. Heaven and human path. Every thought about the two paths, their improvement and the mysteries that surrounded the two paths.
He had also found that he had another piece of knowledge in his mind, it concerned the two tattoos he had on his back. He realized that they were created due to the Dao marks of Heaven and whatever had hijacked his refinement. The two forces were somewhat equal and since they could not find a balance and were still battling although subtly, any other Dao marks he would nurture that weren't from those two paths would be transformed into either one of them. In his new enlightened vision merged with his father`s experience they had conducted experiments in the four days he had been awake and they realized that any gu touched by his primeval essence would be mutated by either of the Dao marks turning into a chimera and whatever was touched by his attached would feel like they were touched by one of the two forces assimilating them into a host. 'It's like I'm carrying a virus.' His mind wandered to the new and strange vision he had also gotten. It seemed like even his body was being slowly infected by the Chaotic Heaven virus but instead of turning him into a drone for the will as it did for the insects and animals it touched, it was strengthening him. His vision was now colorful and he could see small shimmers like stars around everyone but him.
He was awaken from his dive into the mysteries of Heaven and Earth when the large giant with a hairy body but a bald head asked him something. He looked at him like he was clueless for a second but that didn't stop him from hearing him ask his father if he was slow. This caused his mind to finally be taken from his thoughts in time to hear his father laugh off the question. "Don't worry about the child he just gets lost in his thoughts most of the time." Tian Ho educated his friends of the quirks his son possessed with a sense of pride. "You just have to know his tells. Like how his eyes glaze over and his hand reaches for his hair." His father explained as he pointed to his hand which Tian Zheng realized had been pulling on his hair, even tearing out a small amount. "Weird kid." Anan Bing whispered under his breath but all heard it causing Tian Ho and Miss Eryue to nod their heads while Tian Zheng felt that he had been slighted.
Anan Bing and Miss Eryue left the two and went to check upon the crew members. The father and son duo were left alone on the ship and Tian Ho went ahead and started to cultivate. Tian Zheng knew that once this ship left port, his father was going to leave him to his own devices. They had talked and they both accepted that the path of a Gu master was fraught with danger and Tian Ho didn't want to a child dependent on him. From the moment they set sail, Tian Zheng would need to earn his keep in the ship and life. His father would only protect him when his life was in danger, and even then he was required to at least try and save himself. He also wouldn't protect him if he searched for trouble so that he could use his father`s help as a borrowed knife against others.
When his father was busy cultivating, his face cold and distant, Tian Zheng walked below deck where he found five beds. One was relatively new but it looked like it had been used. "Guess I'll take the oldest one." He walked to a worn bed whose sheets had turned from their original yellow to something reminiscing brown due to the unwashed body that had been using the bed.
The boy sat down with a huff and started to also cultivating while once in a while he pulled a primeval stone from his satchel absorbing the essence to replenish himself. A few hours the rest of the crewmates arrived and Tian Zheng was called to the deck.
In a group, he saw as three figures stood before the rest and four seated around them. He went and joined those who were seated and waited together with them. "Our next destination is the great palisades where we three shall try and acquire an inheritance of a Gu immortal. The rest of you will be left on the ship to guard it, make sure the ship doesn't come to any harm or else it shall be your heads." Miss Eryue finished her part and Anan Bing cleared his throat to get the attention of the four who had started to whisper among themselves of the wonders of Gu immortals. "Now, the journey there will last for five months, and we shall not stop but pass through the Eye of the East. No need to worry about your little lives, if you die you just weren't strong enough for this life." His gaze fell on each of the men who were trying their very best to hide the fear in their eyes. Finally, they rested on the young black haired boy. "We also have a new member. He shall be joining us in this journey. Don't go easy on him since he is already a rank 2 Gu master at just the age of 16."
With the introductions done the three who lead the ship, and the only ones who mattered went behind closed doors to plot for the inheritance, while the five crew members started getting ready for the five-month long journey. The gu that needed to fed were fed and the ones needed to be activated to control the ship were activated.
Tian Zheng and another boy with ginger hair were mopping the ship. With a broom in hand, his thoughts slowly grew distant until his body was acting robotic. His mind, however, was going over the various thoughts that had been invading his mind since he was able to access the attainment of both Heaven and Human paths. Since those lines of thoughts weren't consumed by the broken mind gu he was having all the thoughts he could have had in a year at the same time. His mind was so chaotic that he couldn't activate his basic killer move for longer than a few breaths due to lack of enough concentration.
When he returned from the deep recesses of his mind he found himself laying on his bed. by the way the ship was dark, the only light being from some firefly like gu trapped in empty lanterns. He looked deep into his aperture and saw the countless golden lights and black spots that surrounded his gu. His aperture walls had taken on a crystalline appearance with an ethereal radiance.