Memories of the Fall

Part 2

~ Jun Arai – Misty Jasmine Inn ~

Morning brought… less rain, but not much improvement in the atrocious effects of the weather itself. Lying on the bed she shared with Sana, who was still sound asleep, Arai found herself listening to the rain scattering down outside, mulling over the previous day’s events, and this ‘Trial of Exploration’ that had been declared. Senior Ying’s explanation of the previous one, held on the Northern Tang Continent, had not really helped much.

Officially, according to her, this kind of grand occasion was couched as an opportunity for a province to play host of all sorts of influences and famous persons. Juniors from all over would compete to see what they could glean by way of achievements, opportunities and treasures… and those who excelled or stood out would receive acknowledgements, prizes and unique opportunities. It was an ‘opportunity’ for local experts to excel on a grand stage, and ‘rise beyond their roots’.

To her, though, beyond seeming like little more than a dangerous distraction to their own purpose up here, it just sounded like a licence to cause organized chaos.

Those coming here would certainly find the ‘reality’ much less glamorous than their lofty or greedy ideals, she knew.

With the rain falling outside, it was hard not to compare the labyrinthine death-trap that was Yin Eclipse to a wide river, full and fast at the best of times, with lethal currents, shifting banks, and treacherous shallows… now forced to full spate by the rains and the turning of the season. To fish in it, as they were doing, required expense and preparation. To do so recklessly or in ignorance… would only lead to tragedy.

Sighing, she was about to turn over and try to go back to sleep, banishing those thoughts for a while, when Sana rolled over beside her.

“…”

-I guess I should give her more time, she groaned. She did have a hard day yesterday.

Sitting up, she carefully slipped off the bed. Her light robe that she had slept in was basically slick to her skin with the humidity, so she stripped it off, cleansed herself with a bit of water and a towel and pulled on a fresh robe, then splashed some lukewarm water on her face from a bowl.

Shuddering, she tossed a few ward stones into it and watched as it steamed cold for a few seconds, then repeated the process, luxuriating in the feeling of cold water for a few blessed moments. Next, she went over to the little shrine they had set up on the way and said her prayers to their mother and a few more besides. Finally, she pulled on an over-robe, located her boots where she had kicked them off, and quietly left the room.

Arriving in the common room, she saw Han Shu already up, sitting at a table, reading a book.

“Good morning!” She said, giving him a friendly pat on the shoulder.

“How… can you be so chipper?” he grumbled, putting his book down and staring at her with darkened eyes.

“Did you not sleep at all?” she asked, wincing.

“I… did, but it didn’t help a lot,” he sighed.

“I guess my mantra helps, or maybe I’m just used to it?” she said with an apologetic shrug. “One solution is to burn a lot of qi fast, to help with the re-adjustment?”

“Ah, I suppose there is that,” Han Shu agreed. “I did try a bit during the night, but it was inside and hard to focus. The annoyance was sort of self-fulfilling, especially when you are used to being able to…”

“Yeah it’s not as easy as for a spiritual cultivator,” she agreed as he trailed off.

-The woes of being an inheritor, she mused. All too easy to get used to having the mantra as a crutch.

“We can always spar in the rain, after breakfast, if you want?” she suggested.

In truth, her suggestion was not entirely altruistic there. She had not really done a lot of stuff like that since her lessons with Old Xian, and actually rather wanted to practice bits of it before she forgot. Sana was a good training partner, but they were too familiar with each other. She would have asked one of the guards, but Han Shu was a friend and it would burn qi.

“Sure, I suppose it kills time and is kind of mindless.” Han Shu agreed. “I dunno that I want to be messing with herbs just yet.”

“Yeah, probably not a good idea,” she said with a grin. “So, what is breakfast anyway?”

“Third Edition Spicy Crab Noodle Soup,” Han Shu said drily.

“…”

“Had worse,” she grinned.

After claiming her soup, which was everything Han Shu’s description promised it would be, they chatted away fairly mindlessly about this and that, until Senior Ying also appeared, looking as she always did.

“Good morning, Senior Ying,” she said, standing in greeting as the older woman came over.

“Morning, both of you,” Senior Ying replied. “I see breakfast is the vestigial spirit of the crab of yesteryear?”

“Something like that,” she agreed. “Can I get you a bowl?”

Senior Ying nodded and sat down opposite Han Shu as she scurried off to the kitchen.

By the time she returned, the pair were happily chatting about herbs and monkeys. Han Shu asking Senior Ying about her experiences regarding them. So, once she gave Senior Ying her soup, she took out her own book, which was an earlier volume of ‘One with the Spear’ she had borrowed it from Ling Yu and settled down to read more about how the ‘brave hero had uncovered the duplicitous scam of the young master from the Green Entrance Organization to sell counterfeit divination jades to poor young women seeking lovers’.

There was something oddly cathartic about the stories, in a mindless way. She could see why Ning Sora and the others liked them as well. Encapsulated within them was a sort of helpful projection of an unattainable ideal that you could just follow along with. The escapism also appealed, particularly here and now, when most of the day would, in all likelihood, be taken up with a repetitive cavalcade of stressful circumstances.

“I did not take you for a reader of the fictional exploits of our generation’s iron brick…”

She glanced up to find Elder Lianmei had also joined them.

“Oh… you also read those,” Senior Ying added, glancing over. “They are still popular huh…”

“More so than ever,” Lianmei sighed, sitting down opposite her with a bowl of rice and a freshly cut up fish. “People like their escapism and a young hero in that mould, even if he is older than their village’s ancestral shrine in reality, is something that never goes out of style.”

“That is true,” Senior Ying sighed. “That is true.”

“So, what is the plan for today?” she asked, putting the book aside for a moment.

“If it stays like this…”—Lianmei paused to glance out at the misty rain—“logistical stuff mostly.”

“It should stabilize after a day or so,” Senior Ying mused. “That said, there are ways around it, to an extent, if we are stuck with it…”

“I was going to spar with Shu for a bit,” she said, glancing over at him. “That helps.”

“Yes…” Lianmei mused. “Perhaps that might not be a bad idea. Get everyone to practice ‘Intent’-intensive activities for a while?”

“Martial Archery?” Senior Ying suggested.

“…”

Those two words were how she, Han Shu, a slightly sleepy Lin Ling and an amused Lianmei found themselves all outside, in the rain, with Senior Ying, setting up small stone pots suspended from strings across the far side of the courtyard.

“The first arrow is going in your smart ass,” Lin Ling grumbled as she stood on her shoulders to affix one to the eaves of the building next to the shrine.

“Come on, I was only intending to chase Han Shu around with a stick for an hour,” she sighed.

“Ohhh, errr…” Lin Ling shot a faux-scandalized look at her, before giving a worried squeak as she pretended to toss the smirking younger girl down.

“We do need to do something to acclimatize to the weather though,” she pointed out. “Yesterday was a good haul, but can we really afford to lose an early day like this?”

“Euccck,” Lin Ling finished tying a second pot, then jumped down. “I know, but all I wanted to do was get a drink of water then go back to bed… I don’t see Sana here.”

“Sorry,” she apologised again.

“Okay, come get your bow…” Lianmei called out cheerfully as Senior Ying came over with a bunch of longbows.

Shaking her head, she walked over and took one, giving the string a twang and then drawing it a few times. It was a bit light for the strength she had, even up here, but that would not be a problem in twenty minutes, she knew.

There were two types of this kind of training. One was the normal kind, practicing hitting a target with accuracy, focusing Intent on the arrow and the act of striking the target. The other, which they were going to do here, was about speed and reflex, how many times can you hit the target in succession, while you keep your Intent trained on it. At the best of times it was hard, but up here, with the qi drain and the rain? She suspected most of them would be lucky to last ten minutes.

“You know how this works,” Lianmei said, taking a bow herself, as did Senior Ying, to her surprise. “As many arrows as you can, as accurately as you can, until your focus breaks. They have paint on the end, so we can keep track of who hit what!”

“What does the winner get?” Lin Ling asked.

“The knowledge that they won!” Lianmei giggled, sounding more like someone Lin Ling’s age than her father's.

Taking an arrow from the pot beside her, she knocked it in the bow and waited.

“And… go!” Lianmei declared a moment later.

She shot the first one, her perception almost travelling with the arrow as it hit a pot on the far side of the courtyard. Drawing another, she hit the same pot again, and again and again.

In the end, she lasted nine minutes, the first try. All of them lost focus at about the same time, first Lin Ling, then Han Shu, then her, leaving Lianmei and Senior Ying methodically sending arrow after arrow into swaying pots on the far side.

Lianmei endured for nineteen minutes before finally conceding to Senior Ying, looking slightly out of breath.

Their second round, she managed eleven minutes but was somehow outdone by Han Shu this time, largely because Lin Ling kept shooting the same pots and making them sway too much.

Lianmei and Senior Ying battled it out to twenty three minutes before Lianmei again slipped, an arrow missing the target.

By that point they had gained a further audience of Mu Shi, Kun Ji, Wentai and Wushen, who all joined in as well. The third round she again managed eleven minutes, just beating out Han Shu and Wentai, rather surprisingly, though this time Lin Ling came ahead of her. The eventual winner was, unsurprisingly, Senior Ying, again, but both Liamei and Kun Ji pushed her to twenty six minutes of solid focus with her Martial Intent before they both caved.

“Soooooo draining,” Lin Ling groaned, sitting on the wall, nibbling on a sour spirit fruit.

“It should be helping though,” she pointed out.

“It is…” Han Shu agreed, watching the arrows slowly vanish and return back to their pots. “Doesn’t make me like archery any more though.”

The actual martial archers, standing nearby, all shook their heads in amusement.

This exercise, and others like it, were honestly why the discipline was despised by so many. It wasn’t so much that the manuals were expensive and tended to require all sorts of supplementary arts; it was that unlike other weapons, the training was mind-numbing. With a sword or a spear, you could fight others. With martial archery, your first enemy was usually yourself, though her father had said that held true for all weapons and she didn’t doubt it. It was just that martial archery was the discipline where you hit that wall first.

In the end, they did another round, before Mo Shunfei appeared to call Lianmei away for a talisman call. At that point, she found herself drawn, with Han Shu, into helping Senior Ying sort out the shrine. It was again, a sort of trance-like, nice task that helped on a day where the weather was trying to curse your mental state.

They spent an hour doing that, before everyone came back together for lunch, monkeys included, who seemed to have taken up informal residence at this point. She had just sat down with her bowl of rice and fish, when Lianmei came in, looking… unhappy.

“I bring tidings from afar,” the elder said, sitting down and immediately pouring herself out some wine from the jar on that table.

“I guess it’s not good news?” Sana, who had appeared mid-morning and not taken part in the archery, asked.

“Maybe, depends,” Lianmei sighed. “We will be getting helpers, once the weather stabilized enough that long range teleports are possible again without spending heavenly jade on individual people.”

“Okay…” Jiang Wushen frowned.

“—And…?” Mu Shi asked.

“They are from the Ha clan.”

“…”

“As in the Cherry Wine Pagoda?” she asked, glancing over at Xiang Meilan and Fanqing Diaomei, the two who had already come from there, and who were currently playing a card game near the division to the kitchen.

“Nope… from the Ha clan,” Lianmei confirmed.

“I have many questions, but the first is ‘why’?” Kun Ji frowned.

“Yes, why?” Mu Shi echoed, not looking particularly happy either. “Given they are responsible for our predicament…”

“Several reasons, starting with: it is expedient,” Lianmei replied, with a vexed sigh.

“There are elements within the Ha clan that do not sing the same song as the others,” Senior Ying added. “Cherry Wine Pagoda is the notable one, though there are a few others.”

“Indeed,” Lianmei agreed, her expression still holding traces of annoyance. “This lot are, however, quite well known to me.”

“Who is it?” she asked, sort of dreading the answer really. Please don’t let it be—

“Ha Yun, Ha Leng, Ha Caolun, Ha Ji Wufan…” Lianmei started to read off the list.

“Oh come on… That is every dumbass troublemaker in or adjacent to the pavilion!” Lin Ling declared, throwing her hands up in the air.

“Ha Leng is at least decent,” she pointed out, trying to see some sort of upside.

“They are sending elites as well, including a few more from the Cherry Wine Pagoda, so that is something, at least,” Lianmei added, puffing her cheeks. “As is the Ling clan, including a few people to handle logistics on this side.”

“So long as they are good at what they do,” Jiang Wushen muttered.

“This is almost certainly related to the trial,” Kun Ji frowned. “I am not sure I like that…”

“Yeah, you and me both,” Lianmei agreed. “The fewer influences involved in this, the better, frankly. With that in mind, Ling Tao is also sending us a few more guards.”

“One solution would be to set up a secondary base-camp and have them based there,” Kun Ji mused. “That was going to happen anyway, wasn’t it?”

“It was; Juni was going to handle that over the next few days, with the Hunters here,” Lianmei said, gesturing her and laterally, Han Shu, Lin Ling and Sana.

“Where is Juni, anyway?” she asked, looking around and not seeing her.

“I have not seen Duan Mu or Mo Shunfei either,” Lin Ling added, also looking around.

“Looking at… maps,” Sana replied, between mouthfuls of fish and rice. “The other two are doing inventory.”

“Uhuh,” Lianmei nodded. “She is going over the targets you will be looking for, deciding which ones are viable and how far it is worth ranging.”

“We could have gone and done that,” Lin Ling grumbled.

“What, inventory?” she chuckled.

Lin Ling stuck her tongue out at her, getting a round of laughter from the others.

“In regards to maps and routes further up, I am happy to advise,” Senior Ying added, speaking up. “I have travelled quite a bit through these valleys, so perhaps I will go offer my services after lunch.”

“That would be a great help,” Lianmei agreed.

~ Ha Yun – Ha Clan Estates ~

“This is seriously anticlimactic…” Ha Ding grumbled from where he was lying on a stone table in the garden of the Ha clan estates.

Looking around at the others of his group of friends, Ha Yun had to agree, really. After all the rapid developments of the previous day and early morning, now that his ‘team’ was mostly here, it turned out that teleportation was likely to be out for the whole day.

“Maybe it’s just a ruse,” Ha Shi Mao added. “They don’t want us to go up there, so they are just saying that the teleports are out.”

“Uhuh,” Ha Wen Jiao agreed, from where he was sitting throwing dice with Ha Mun and Ha Chu Fang.

The five, most a few years younger than him, were all people he had known since childhood, and who had sort of stayed with him – rather like Leng, who was conspicuously not here – as friends and accomplices in various mischief through their teenage years. Only Ha Shi Mao was in an actual sect, having enrolled in the Green Fang Pagoda, largely thanks to his kinship with Shi Lian, who was a distant cousin.

“I doubt it,” Ha Mun remarked. “I mean, just look at the mountains up there. You can’t even see the Great Mount at the moment.”

“Yeah. Great opportunity or no, I am more than happy to be here, in the afternoon sunshine, winning spirit stones off you mugs!” Ha Chu Fang added. “You wanna join in, Ding, Boss Yun?”

“Who is your boss,” he remarked, trying to sound amused, but found he didn’t really have the heart for it for some reason.

“Nah,” Ding replied lazily. “I’m more than happy to lie here and remember the sweet memories of those dancers from last night. My spirit stones exist only for them!”

“Yeah, unless you can dance better than them, no dice!” Ha Shi Mao laughed.

“Clearly they stole your sense of humour when they stole your wits and your little friend,” Ha Chu Fang replied, tossing one of the spare dice at Ha Shi Mao, who tried to catch it and missed.

“—And, your reflexes,” Ha Mun added.

“…”

“Who else is coming anyway?” Ha Shi Mao asked him.

“Probably Ha Caolun and a bunch from the Ha Cao, a few from the Ha Ji, maybe one or two from the Ha Shi, beyond you,” he replied. “Yufan perhaps.”

“Brother Leng?”

“Yeah, Leng is coming,” he confirmed.

“I heard they are handing out some serious concessions for this,” Ha Chu Fang added. “Like promotions and shit.”

“They are,” he nodded. “A promotion to eight-star rank.”

“For you… or for everyone?” Ha Ding added, raising an eyebrow as he looked over.

“Only a few,” he shrugged, not willing to get drawn on that.

“Awww…” Ha Ding sighed.

“What would you even do if you were an eight-star ranked herb hunter?” Ha Jiao remarked.

“Why, I’d arrange the bushes of every beauty’s garden in the town!” Ha Ding cackled. “Starting with the Kun beauty!”

“…”

“Can we bring someone else?” Ha Chu Fang groaned. “He is making me feel old!”

“I rather think she can re-arrange her own gardens,” Ha Mun added, wigging his own eyebrows in a way that made everyone, bar Ding, groan.

Recalling what had happened to Han Shu’s older brother… Han Bao, who had actually been properly linked to Kun Juni at one point, he wondered if he should remind them…

“And as an eight-star ranked hunter, I’d be there to observe and advise,” Ha Ding smirked.

“If terrible humour equated to actual talent you would already be an Immortal,” he remarked.

The others all laughed at that, which on another day would have made him feel a bit better, but today, oddly, it was just hard to muster any real enthusiasm for their banter.

-Is it just the way it was presented? he wondered, idly turning the storage ring on his finger, which was now disguised as a much more normal-looking one.

-It felt like there was a lot more they were not telling me…

That slightly uneasy feeling had settled in when he finally had time to kill earlier in the day and started to ponder in more detail what his father, uncle and the other elders had been saying.

“—Ah, you are all here, excellent.”

He turned to find Sir Huang had appeared, with Ha Leng, Ha Yufan and another young woman who he didn’t recognise, dressed in a nondescript travelling robe, following after.

“Sir Huang,” he stood quickly and saluted the expert politely.

“This is Ha Faolian; she is from the Cherry Wine Pagoda,” Sir Huang said, introducing the dark-haired young woman, who looked over them and then at Sir Huang and just sighed.

-Well that’s a vote of confidence right there, he reflected, noting that her aura was totally inscrutable. I suppose that makes her my senior sister?

Elder Lan had been quite clear that unless a senior actually acknowledged him, he should make no overt show of saluting anyone just because they were from the Cherry Wine Pagoda.

“Are we going to depart?” he asked.

“Yes, although not to the mountains,” Sir Huang replied. “We are going to the Ling estates outside Blue Water City.”

“What of the others, Sir Huang?” Ha Yufan asked.

“They will meet us at the teleport,” Sir Huang answered, giving them a further look over.

“It is not on us if they are late,” Faolian added with a shrug.

…

They took a carriage through the town, which was a rather odd journey, because Sir Huang had a kind of oppressive presence to him, which made their usual banter fall a bit flat. Ha Mao and Ha Chu Fan mostly played dice, while he found himself staring out the window at the town, which just rolled by as if nothing at all was happening.

“You would hardly know there was a huge imperial visitation and a grand trial occurring,” Leng remarked as they pulled into the teleport courtyard to find several other Ha clan carriages already there.

“Yeah…” he agreed.

The door opened a moment later and a guard looked in, spotted Sir Huang and nodded.

“Everyone out,” Faolian said drily, waving for the others to move ahead of her.

Ha Ding half opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it in the end. He had tried flirting with her earlier and gotten nowhere at all, until he touched her leg, then she had nearly bent his arm off, much to the amusement of the others.

Exiting the carriage into the afternoon sun, he saw the other groups were already gathered on the teleporter.

“That’s… more than I expected,” he noted.

“There are two groups, the majority are going to the one out west,” Sir Huang remarked.

“Oh… yeah, of course,” he nodded, recalling the mission scroll he had been briefly shown the previous evening. “The one led by Fan Huangfu?”

“Yeah,” Sir Huang nodded. “We have twelve coming with us and about twenty going to them I think.”

Looking around, he could see Ha Caolun standing off to one side, with a few other youths he didn’t recognise at all and two older guards.

“Ha Ji Wufan is leading the Ji group,” Ha Leng muttered.

“Yuck,” Ha Ding made a face.

Ha Chu Fang just spat on the ground.

“OKAY EVERYONE!” a youth wearing Ling clan robes appeared, walking between the coaches. “GET ON THE TELEPORT; WE ARE GOING IN A FEW MINS!”

Avoiding twiddling the storage ring again, he followed after Sir Huang in silence, onto the platform, and stood there watching as the others followed after.

“When you get to the other side, don’t wander off. The Ling clan estates are not a place you can wander carelessly!” the youth declared as half a dozen guards with spears also got on. “If you trespass, you will be made to regret it, Ha clan or no!”

There were a few groans and some quiet complaints from those around him.

“They say that like we are idiots,” Ha Ding muttered.

“Why do we even need to go to the Ling estates though?” Ha Shi Mao added.

“Bigger teleport formation,” Sir Huang said absently.

“More than the town one?” he asked, surprised at that.

“Uhuh,” Ha Faolian nodded.

“…”

“Teleporting in five!” the youth, who had walked to the middle of the platform now, called over. “Don’t stand near the edge, don’t use storage rings, you know the drill!”

-Three, two… one…

He found himself counting down in his head, watching the formation symbols light up—

Space twisted around them. Even prepared for the moment, he still felt a faint hitch of uneasiness in his stomach. The courtyard, touched by the afternoon light, shimmered, everything blurring briefly into a rainbow-like haze, as West Flower Picking Town melted away, to be replaced by a broad, sunlit courtyard amid sprawling buildings.

“OFF THE PLATFORM!” an old man hollered almost as soon as their surroundings had stopped swimming in his peripheral vision.

“Everyone off,” the youth in the middle repeated blandly, waving a hand.

He found he had taken half a dozen steps before he even realised he was moving. The only people who had not moved were Sir Huang, Ha Faolian and another, Sir Teng, who he vaguely recognised as a senior guard from the Ha clan estates outside West Flower Picking Town.

-Did he just use Intent to…?

Faolian snorted, shaking her head and followed after them, while the soldiers standing with the youth just smirked or looked amused.

“Somehow, I feel unwelcome,” Ha Shi Mao muttered as they went down the steps and regrouped in the proper mustering area.

“You don’t say,” Ha Leng muttered, “It’s almost like our Ha clan might not be that popular around here, right now?”

“Tcch,” Ha Hou Jifan, a youth from the Ha Cao household back in town, sneered at Ha Leng, clearly disagreeing with that sentiment. “It is the Ling clan’s good fortune that our Ha clan is willing to cooperate at all.”

“…”

“Hmmm…” Sir Huang looked around pensively.

“—Ah, you must be Sir Huang,” a young man wearing the robes of the Blue Gate School appeared. “I am Leng Dushan. Please, can you have your wards follow me?”

“Oh, Elder Dushan, they have even got you involved in this?” Ha Faolian asked brightly.

“It was apparently my time,” the young man said, sighing a bit theatrically. “I can say the same for you.”

“Indeed, it is a time when seniors are tested by the actions of those below them,” Faolian agreed.

“I am sure we will have time to catch up later; it has been quite some time since I visited the Cherry Wine Pagoda,” the elder murmured. “Do they still serve that almost divinely terrible sweet wine?”

“That will never change,” Faolian chuckled, before patting Sir Huang on the arm. “This is Sir Ha Huang, by the way, another of our Pagoda’s experts who has been dragged out into the light and dusted off.”

“It does seem like that,” Sir Huang agreed drily. “Where do you want us?”

“We will have some time to discuss that…” Leng Dushan replied, looking around. “Ah, where did she go? Xiaopei? XIAOPEI!”

“Yes, Elder Leng?” a young woman in Ling clan robes with reddish-blonde hair appeared behind him like a ghost.

“Oh good, there you are. Take the Ha clan young masters to the main estate and offer them some refreshments,” Leng Dushan instructed. “It will be a while yet before the weather stabilizes.”

“Of course,” the young woman agreed, saluting him.

Without any further comment, Leng Dushan invited the seniors to follow him, heading off across the courtyard.

“If you would all follow me?” Xiaopei said brightly, gesturing for them to go in the opposite direction.

There were a few frowns, but most of the group started after her. The notable exceptions being Ha Caolun, Ha Ji Wufan, and two other youths who had been standing with their experts, who now all ignored her and instead started following after Leng Dushan.

They had only gone about four paces, though, when Elder Leng actually paused and looked back at them.

“You four as well,” he said, pointedly looking in Xiaopei’s direction.

“Hah…” Leng snorted a laugh into his hand.

Ha Caolun actually looked like he wanted to say something for a moment, before the expert who had come from the Ha Cao waved unobtrusively for him to stay with the rest of them.

“Aaaawkwaard,” Ha Mao smirked, garnering a few chuckled from the others nearby.

-Yep, awkward indeed, he agreed privately.

Before it looked like they were also lingering, he gave Leng and Yufan gentle shoves to get them moving.

“He actually thought that he could go with the seniors?” Ha Mao chuckled as they started after Xiaopei.

“People say Mao has an ego,” Ha Chu Fang chuckled, “but seriously, should we go ask Caolun to be his teacher?”

Ha Mao shoved Fang in the back and scowled at that, though everyone else laughed.

“What could you even learn there anyway?” Leng remarked, shaking his head. “Isn’t the goal of life to gain comprehensions, not lose them?”

“Walk quicker,” he muttered, giving Mao, and then Leng another poke in the back and a sideways look. “We don’t need a fight here. Half of you are only at peak Qi Refinement and Caolun is actually close to Soul Foundation.”

In the end, they were led through the estate to a large courtyard and guest house, which he noted only had one entrance and exit, and told by Xiaopei to make what preparations they needed to, and that someone would come and provide refreshments in due course.

“What preparations?” one of the Cao group muttered as they all watched her leave again.

“I dunno, like Hunter stuff, maybe?” another of that group laughed.

“Like, perhaps she thinks we are just some Hunters or something?” a third from the Ji group added.

“…”

“I rather suspect she was taking the piss,” Leng muttered as they moved away from the rest of the group, using looking at the gardens as a sort of excuse.

“Ya think?” Ha Shi Mao replied sarcastically.

“Gotta say, I’m really feeling welcomed here,” Ha Ding agreed, flicking a leaf at a statue of an old man in a scholar’s robe that was sitting beside the path.

Rather than get to drawn on that, he sat down on a bench and just took in the garden.

“So, what did the elder want to speak to you about yesterday?” Ding asked him.

“You… remember that conversation?” he asked drily.

“Pffssh!” Ha Leng had to bite his hand to not laugh.

“…”

“This actually,” he said, waving a hand at their surroundings.

“Oh, yeah, the promotion matter,” Ha Ding nodded, taking out a jar of wine and some cups. “Anyone care for some?”

“Sure,” Mao grinned, grabbing a cup and accepted a fill up from Ding.

Jiao and Mun also came over and claimed a cup, as did Fang, so in the end he also had to take one, as did Leng, if only so as not to feel a bit left out.

“To Yun’s good fortune!” Ding grinned, holding up his cup. “When he gets his promotion, just think of the juicy requests we can get!”

“Yeah!” Mun agreed, laughing.

“I don’t think it works like that,” Leng muttered.

“Leng, are you determined to be the voice of uncomfortable reason in everything we do?” Ding grumbled.

“…”

“Yes,” Leng replied blandly. “Because if not me, then who? You?”

“Ohh… good point,” Ding grinned, “Anyway, to Yun’s good fortune!”

“To our good fortune,” he muttered, holding up his own cup.

“Your good fortune is our good fortune,” Jiao chuckled, downing his own cup. “That’s the glory of being born the son of the boss lord.”

“If you ever actually call my father ‘boss lord’ in his presence, you may end up spending a year picking blue star grass,” he retorted, downing his own cup.

“I still say ten spirit stones says they are literally gonna keep us here for the next week and then send us off somewhere thoroughly menial,” Ha Shi Mao said, after they had all drunk their toast.

“I’ll take that,” Jiao replied, holding out his hand.

“I’ll take fifty on that!” Ding grinned.

“How do you have fifty spirit stones?” Shi Mao asked, staring at the cube.

“Heh… well, Brother Caolun was being very generous with that sexy Fairy Fire Blossom yesterday, so between us we scammed him out of it playing ‘Gu Takes All’ after Yun left!”

“But you are like the worst person I know at that game,” Mao retorted. “A drunk monkey is better at that game than you are. I know, because I’ve played it with one!”

“I know,” Ding cackled, holding up four cubes of spirit stones. “But apparently neither can Caolun"

“And there are people who wonder why the seniors sent us off to sit in the garden,” Leng muttered quietly beside him as the others fell about laughing.

“Yeah,” he agreed, carefully working to not laugh. “But at the same time, the fact that Caolun lost that much to Ding here and has no idea, is quite hilarious.”

“…”

“I will give you that,” Leng conceded, staring at the gardens, before signing: “Still, might be worth having a quick word with him?”

“Killjoy,” he signed back, though Leng was, again, right. It was one thing to play stupid games, but scamming hundreds of spirit stones was…

-Even if Caolun is a prat, that is the kind of thing that makes people bear a grudge in stupid ways, and Caolun’s parents are important people in the Ha clan… he mused, looking over to where Ha Caolun was talking to Yufan and a few others.

In the end, they wasted time in the garden until it was almost dusk, at which point an old man came from the Ling household escorted them to dinner. Rather to his surprise, that turned out not to be some informal thing, in a side hall, but in the main dining hall of the estate. Lady Ling Tao and her husband were in Blue Water City, as it turned out though, so the only person from the main household in attendance was the Vice-Headmistress’s niece, Ling Luo, along with several other juniors who she had invited. The other ‘senior table’ was thus Elder Dushan, the seniors who had come with them and a few other experts from the Ling estate who felt like appearing.

“When they said it was Lady Tao’s niece, I kind of hoped it would be Ling Yu,” Ha Jiao remarked as they sat at the table, drinking more wine and shamelessly devouring the excellent spirit food laid on.

“I heard she is a real beauty, but I have never met her, except from a distance,” Ha Ding agreed.

“She takes after her aunt, the vice-headmistress I heard,” Ha Jiao added. “And the vice-headmistress of the Blue Gate School is… the beauty of our province.”

Ha Leng, seated on his other side, just sighed and stared at his wine.

“…”

In truth, he was still not quite sure what to say, really. It had been an odd day, even by a standard that could include the Patriarch’s celebration in it with the painting competition and a martial tournament so disrupted by the weather that he could win one of the brackets.

“—Brother Ji, Sister Bai, this is Brother Yun!”

He was stirred out of his musings by Ha Caolun coming over to their end of the table, leading two youths with him.

“Caolun,” he nodded to him, noting that Ha Ding was studiously not looking in their direction.

“—And Brother Ding!” Caolun added, giving Ha Ding a rather slight nod behind the exuberant greeting.

“Brother Caolun,” Ha Ding murmured. “Thank you for your generosity the other day…”

“My generosity?” Ha Caolun frowned.

-Oh don’t… he groaned, hoping that Ding would not do something monumentally stupid like congratulate Ha Caolun on his skill with card games…

“For inviting us to the party at the Singing Lotus Teahouse,” Ha Ding said with aplomb.

“Oh, yes, of course,” Ha Caolun nodded, apparently oblivious to Ding’s subtle dig.

He had to fight hard not to visibly relax as Ding passed his self-inflicted trial, probably…

-I never did get a chance to say something to him, he reflected, as Leng caught his eye with a slight frown.

“How can I help you?” he said, glancing at the other two with Ha Caolun.

‘Brother Ji’, with long golden-blonde hair and fine features, was wearing a rather garish purple and red robe, with golden flame-like patterns around the edges. Both he and his robe looked vaguely familiar for some reason, but he couldn’t really place either in the moment. In any case, his attention was immediately drawn by Sister Bai, who was a petite beauty with dark, plaited hair, wearing a green and white gown with silver chrysanthemums on the panels, as she smiled warmly at him.

“I saw you fight at the Patriarch’s celebration, Young Lord Yun, and wanted to tell you I felt you did very well,” Sister Bai murmured.

“She is totally into you,” Mao signed unobtrusively from his right.

“…”

“Yes, my junior sister here was most impressed,” Brother Ji agreed. “She is something of a tournament addict really.”

“Oh, you jest, Senior Brother,” Sister Bai giggled. “I just delight in watching people try their best…”

“Ah… well, thank you,” he stood and bowed politely to her, accepting her congratulations.

“I… take it you are here with Young Lady Luo?” he asked politely, after trawling his recent memory to find that she had been talking with that group, who were still at the high table.

“Oh, yes, Young Lady Luo is a good friend of mine,” Sister Bai said with a smile.

“It is a shame that our provincial princess cannot also be here,” Ha Jiao agreed with a sigh, joining the conversation.

“She is quite fleeting,” Sister Bai agreed, nodding sympathetically. “Brother Ji here was most interested to make her acquaintance.”

“It is a pity; I had hoped to make her acquaintance as well,” Brother Ji agreed, adopting a scholarly air. “With the Prince Fanshu appearing so suddenly and all that, though, I suppose the Ling clan must deploy all their talents there… He is someone with a great appreciation for beauties among our peers.”

“Ah, Lady Faolian!” Ha Leng, who had been sitting there just not really engaging in the conversation, stood up and saluted.

The others glanced around as well, as he found that Ha Faolian, now dressed in a delightful gown in the Ha clan style that made her look much more feminine, had indeed come over, now that the more formal, sit down part of the meal was concluded.

“Lady Faolian,” he greeted the expert from the Cherry Wine Pagoda politely; the others mostly just nodded, or raised a cup of wine, though.

If Ha Faolian was offended by their informality, she made no overt note in this instance.

“—I had not anticipated seeing anyone from the Seven Star Pavilion here…” she mused, nodding to Brother Ji and Sister Bai, “And a young miss from the Bai clan.”

“You are familiar with it?” Brother Ji asked, “I would not have though it widely known this side of the ocean.”

“I have been to Meng City,” Faolian replied, leaning on the back of his chair. “It has its… attractions.”

“It certainly does,” Brother Ji agreed politely. “I must say, I grew up there. I wonder if Fairy Faolian…”

They chatted away for a few more minutes, mostly Fairy Faolian and ‘Brother Ji’ trading reminiscences about Meng City, until the pair and Ha Caolun bid farewell again, with Sister Bai promising to come and talk to him again, later.

“Hmmm…” Faolian mused, watching them go.

“Is something wrong?” he asked her.

“No…” Faolian shook her head. “I suppose not… Incidentally, the prediction is that the weather may have stabilized enough in the lower valleys by tomorrow afternoon that we can be sent up there.”

“It seems you are going to owe spirit stones,” Leng remarked drily to Ha Shi Mao.

“We will see,” Ha Shi Mao chuckled.

~ Jun Arai – Misty Jasmine Inn ~

Arai opened her eyes to darkness and the gentle sound of rain, and sighed, wondering what had stirred her out of—

“Good morning, sis!”

Rolling over, she found Sana was already awake and freshening herself up.

“It’s not even light yet,” she groaned, staring out the window into the dark gorge, the only visible light currently a few lanterns flickering in the doorway of the shrine on the far side.

“Sorry, I guess I woke you when I got up?” Sana added.

“I see the rain is getting back to something approaching normal,” she mused, noting that the sense of clammy oppression had lessened significantly. The uneasy disequilibrium in her qi had also almost vanished, which was good, as it meant yesterday’s suffering had been for a purpose.

“It is,” Sana nodded. “Or at least it feels like it, though it did that yesterday as you recall…”

“It did, true,” she agreed, swinging her legs off the bed and just stripping off her light robe directly; it was so clammy.

Stretching, she winced and rolled her shoulders, finding that the bruises from the ‘acclimatization training’ they had ended up doing for most of the afternoon had still not faded.

“I think I’ll go to the baths?” she muttered, bending over and touching her toes, trying to ignore the creaking sound her muscles made as she did so.

“That’s probably not a bad idea,” Sana agreed, tossing her a fresh light gown, which she pulled on. “I take it you are still feeling the bruises?”

“…”

“Don’t look at me like that,” she muttered, catching her sister’s innocent expression.

“You are the criminal who suggested being beaten up all day – sorry, ‘martial training’ – would help with the rain,” Sana giggled.

“True, but it has helped,” she pointed out.

“True, true,” Sana agreed, grabbing a pair of towels from beside their bed.

A twenty minute soak in the baths did indeed help, melting away much of the lingering stress and strain from the previous day. After that, they went to the kitchens and found Xiang Meilan and Fanqing Diaomei already there, sorting out food for the day ahead.

“You want breakfast?” Meilan asked them both as they entered.

“Sure, what is there?” she asked, “and please don’t say—”

“Quadruple distilled essence of immortal crab?” Meilan finished, giggling.

“…”

“There is some noodle soup, rice and fresh fish,” Diaomei answered, rolling her eyes. “Or you can go with the old staple that is fuelling the guards…”

“Oh?” Sana asked.

“Spirit fruit alcohol,” Diaomei sighed. “With a side order of fried bread.”

“We will take the rice and fish. Are there any greens and such to go with?” she replied.

“Counter on the far side. Fish is in the crate under the counter,” Meilan added, pointing to the cupboards and work top to their left.

Between them, the food took only a few minutes to prepare, just long enough for water to boil for some tea, really. They chatted away with the pair from the Cherry Wine Pagoda while they ate, then decided to go check on the spirit herbs that Sana had started nurturing in the storehouse next-door to the inn.

The small hall had gained a few more herbs since it was set up, mostly mushrooms, mosses and various water plants that liked the damp and humidity, but the metre-long lingzhi on its trunk was still the most spectacular thing there, by a long margin.

“You know,” she mused as Sana poked through the various trays of lingzhi, adding fresh spirit stones and elementally attributed ward stones where necessary, “I still find it hard to believe that that was basically the first thing they found…”

“Me too,” Sana replied. “Though I am slightly over the crab at this point.”

“True, true,” she agreed.

“Want to check the moss in case there is anything horrid hatching in it?” Sana added.

“Alright,” she murmured, going over to that wall and crouching down by one of the series of large bowls that held what at first glance appeared to be several large wodges of greenish-yellow coloured moss on flat rocks, but were actually a rather rare earth-attributed spirit herb.

‘Golden leaf rock moss’ was one of those plants that, in her experience, you usually only found once you had trodden on it, and thus ruined it. It was, rather like the lingzhi in the middle of the room, not particularly dangerous, but instead highly desirable as a sympathetic, nurturing earth element spirit herb that converted fire and yang qi into metal qi and could even enrich the qi purity of minerals in the rocks it grew on.

These twin properties made it highly desirable for… just about anyone who dealt with alchemy, artefact refining, gardens, feng shui… or simply wanted to set up an earth or metal element cultivation space. It was also only valuable with its foundation intact, very fragile, difficult to transport in bulk, and prone to harbouring all sorts of pests and nasty things as lots of creatures laid their eggs in it.

“I suppose you washed them?” she asked after looking at the first bowl for a few moments.

“Submerged in warm water and a very gentle formation apparently,” Sana said. “It was the Beast Hunters who brought it in.”

Nodding, she went back to checking the first bowl, which took a few minutes, then moved on to the second. It wasn’t until she got to the third that she found some leeches, which she carefully removed and put in a jar. The fourth and fifth were basically clean as well.

“—Anything?” Sana asked, coming over to crouch down beside her in the gloom of the room and look at the seventh bowl.

“Just some leeches, a few bug larvae,” she gestured to the bowl beside her.

“—You two are up and about early!”

Both of them glanced up to find Lianmei leaning in the doorway, looking a bit tired.

“It’s hard to sleep past a certain point,” she said, with an apologetic shrug.

“That is very true,” Lianmei agreed with a grimace, coming in to the room. “How is this treasure trove doing, anyway?”

“Pretty good,” Sana mused, looking around. “I replaced all the spirit stones and we are just checking for parasites and such. Some of the lingzhi are already stabilizing and starting to grow in size again.”

“Excellent,” Lianmei murmured, nodding happily.

“What is the plan for today?” she asked.

Lianmei puffed out her cheeks and sighed again. “We see how the weather turns out. The plan was to send up this second wave, but so many of them are from the Ha clan… and the Ling clan is no bed of roses either… This ‘trial’ has really upset things by the sound of it.”

“Oh?” she asked, frowning.

“Why can’t we just go for a week without some stupid thing like this?” Sana muttered.

“Hah! Yes… it does feel rather like that,” Lianmei agreed with a deeper sigh, staring around the room again. “Apparently there are influential elements in the Ling clan, backed by other elders, who want to use this place and a few others, not just as a base for this, but as a staging post for the trial, one they would control on a major route in.”

“Oh…”

“But what about the—?” Sana started to ask.

“The need to harvest a massive amount of herbs and not invoke the wrath of Azure Astral Court? Or get tied up in stupid politics?” Lianmei added with a grimace, cutting her off.

“Well… yeah,” she nodded.

“Yesterday’s plan,” Lianmei sneered. “Their justification, basically, is that the Ling clan should see some benefits, given it is ‘putting so much into this’. The Ling clan, as I am sure you know, is not badly impacted by the need to supply the gift and this whole intervention is very much being led by Ling Tao, rather than the clan proper…”

“They don’t care what happens to West Flower Picking Town…” she said, her stomach sinking.

“It is the Ha clan’s problem, in the eyes of many of the older elders,” Lianmei muttered. “Just another ‘opportunity’. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that just because the Ling clan doesn’t air its dirty laundry in public like the Kun or, to a lesser extent, the Ha, that it is a unified thing without its factions…”

“I guess this is the bunch who support Ling Yu’s older brother?” Sana murmured.

-Oh yeah… them, she recalled, grimacing. There is that split, and that Ling Yu’s siblings are very much in the Ha Yun, Ha Caolun vein of young masters.

“So you are familiar with them,” Lianmei agreed, with an understanding grimace, looking between them.

“Only tangentially,” Sana replied, sneering. “Ling Yu doesn’t socialize much with them and when I visit there we mostly don’t hang about with the other Ling clan scions anyway.”

“…”

Lianmei nodded, then sighed again and ran a hand through her damp hair, really looking quite jaded she thought.

-The rains must be taking their toll on her…

“As to what our specific plans are,” Lianmei added, giving herself a slight shake, “if the weather clears up, we will return to the valley we were in, with the goal of Juni leading your ‘team’ along with one or two others, up the far ridgeline and charting a path past the Eastern Falls Rift on that side. There are two other old operating bases up there, associated with ridgelines which can be used to set up teleport points, assuming they are still in reasonable shape…”

“Who would come with us?” she asked.

“I’ve left that up to Juni, but Senior Ying, probably. Maybe Jiang Wushen as well. I have yet to talk to them about who has been up there most recently…”

“—Elder Lianmei, here you are!” Mo Shunfei called from the corridor.

“What is it?” Lianmei asked, turning and looking back out of the room.

“Talisman transmission,” Mo Shunfei appeared at the door, looking apologetic.

“Ah… okay, I’ll go deal with this,” Lianmei sighed. “Keep up the good work, both of you.”

They both saluted her politely and watched her leave with Mo Shunfei.

“Why can’t we all just gather herbs and get along,” Sana muttered, stealing her words.

“Ah well, it’s hopefully not our problem,” she said, standing up and trying to ignore the niggling pains in her arms and legs.

“I love your optimism, sis,” Sana remarked, “but if this week has taught me anything, it is that no problem is too petty to not become our problem.”

Not quite sure how to refute that, she just shrugged her shoulders and looked around the room at the other shelves and their contents.

“Well, shall we finish off this lot?” she mused.

“Yeah, it’s a job done,” Sana agreed.

In the end, they worked for another hour, nearly, sorting through the various herbs, tweaking the formations that were nurturing them and checking the various alignments, until Juni came to see what they were up to.

“How long have you two been up for?” Juni asked, looking around the room.

“Long enough,” she replied, feigning a yawn.

“Heh…” Juni just shook her head. “I suppose you had breakfast?”

“Uhuh,” she nodded.

“Well, a snack at least,” Sana added, as Juni looked around at the various changes they had made. “But sure, another cup of tea would not go amiss right now.”

“Sounds good to me,” she agreed, looking from the lotus in a large stone pot she was checking.

“I’ll give you a hand to finish this up then,” Juni mused. “That way I can at least feel vaguely productive.”

-I guess she feels bad about yesterday, she mused.

“Rather than you, it’s us who spent the whole day prancing around in the rain,” she reminded Juni.

“Well, acclimatization is important,” Juni replied, walking over to another pot with a lotus in it. “All I did was stare at old records for the valleys north of here until my eyes started to bleed.”

“Learn anything useful?” she asked, as Juni started to check the spirit stones in it.

“That there has been precious little in the way of systematic recording this side of the Xuanwu bogs,” Juni grumbled.

“The valleys around the God Bewitching Jasmine and the Life-Breaking Aspen this side of the East Fury Rift are not popular?” she remarked sarcastically, thinking of what lay in the regions immediately north of them. “I am shocked I tell you, shocked.”

“I thought there was a fair bit though,” Sana asked, frowning.

“It’s deceptive,” Juni clarified. “There is, you are right, but not in any joined-up manner that is up-to-date enough to want to entrust your life to, for what we are doing. The provincial bureau records are very detailed up to about eighty years ago, then it slowly starts to unravel. Our pavilion’s own records are better, but even there, the best I had to go on is the patrols by the garrison here, which give good details on major threats at least. As far as requests and missions go though, you would think only the Rainbow Gate existed.”

Sana mimed a snapping turtle with her arms, which got a smile from both of them.

“Yes, who would think attempting to hunt snapping Xuanwu for their cores and ‘dragon blood’ is more popular than trying to traverse into those maze-like green hells, infested with spiders and mushrooms,” Juni agreed wryly, before adding, “This lotus seems fine by the way.”

Sana nodded, as Juni continued speaking.

“Senior Ying has apparently been up there in the last few seasons, and will be coming with us. She will then teleport back once we have set up the forward base, wherever that might be.”

“Up there it has to be a ridgeline,” she mused, considering the last water lotus pensively.

In the region they were in, a temporary base for a few days might just be possible on a massif or in a shallow cave, if you kept a very low profile. However, once you got to the East Fury Rift, the general term for the whole swathe of valleys north of here, almost to the inner valleys, that was impossible. The land was lower up there in many places, than their current altitude, and there were many notable death zones, just as terrifying in their own ways as the Red Pit. The God Bewitching Jasmine and the Life-Breaking Aspen were just two.

Passage into the inner valleys beyond there was usually done in two ways. You either went north of the rift, through the boggy valleys nearer Thunder Crest, or you went ridge-running: hugging the cloud line and navigating through the maze of gorges, valleys and sink-holes between the massifs as fast as possible until you got to either the Jasmine Gate or the East Fury Gate ruins.

“Yeah, probably either Jasmine Gate or one of the ridgeline ruins north of the Cloud Chaser Valleys,” Juni mused. “Those are a day or two north of the monkey valley, and mean we can avoid the worst of the Eastern Falls Rift.”

“Sounds fun,” she grimaced.

“Yeah,” Juni agreed, sitting back on her heels. “In any case, our immediate concern is just whether the weather clears up enough for us to head out safely… never mind that.”

“True…” they both agreed, almost in unison.

“—Well, this one is clear as well,” she declared, putting the lotus back in its pot and adding a few more spirit stones to the water.

“I guess we go get a pot of tea then,” Sana said, looking around one further time. “And see if the others are about?”

“Yep,” Juni agreed drily, also standing up. “That sounds like a nice idea.”

Leaving the storehouse with Juni, she found that the gorge had lightened noticeably, to the point where you could see the far side in spite of the lanterns, not because of them. The rain was still falling steadily though, and if she focused on her own self, her mantra was still not really engaging as well as she might have liked.

“This rain…” Sana muttered, holding a hand out and watching several fat drops scatter off her palm. “Euuugh.”

“Part of me wonders whether some of this was calculated,” Juni muttered, staring up at it.

“Calculated?” she asked, not quite following.

“When that Dragonship arrived… they had to know what would happen if they dispersed the bad weather over most of the coastal region of the province,” Juni sighed. “What if part of it is to really put the squeeze on efforts like ours?”

“…”

When Juni put it like that, it was difficult to refute.

“To do that deliberately though…” Sana muttered, watching the water scatter…

“They will take everything you offer them, then ruin you without blinking, as if you were no less than a vile villain who has offended their ancestors,” Juni murmured softly under her breath, almost as if she was quoting someone, her expression lost in shadow beneath her broad hat as she also held out a hand for the rain.

-What a cheery thought… she shuddered, wondering who Juni was quoting.

“…”

“Well, let’s go get some more breakfast,” Juni added, much more brightly. “This stupid rain really does get in your head.”

“It does,” she agreed, staring up at the gloomy sky, with its dark clouds barely visible above the overhanging greenery of the gorge above them. “It really does…”

…

Back in the teahouse area, Han Shu had also come down at this point, and was talking away quietly to Wentian about something. She gave him a wave when they entered, which he returned, but rather than disturb him, the three of them went and sat at a table near the kitchen.

“I suppose I should show you what the state of the pathing maps are,” Juni said after a moment’s consideration, putting a jade slip on the table and pushing some qi into it.

Several disconnected, ghostly images, little more than clouds of multi-coloured points in the air started to form after a few moments.

“I’ll go get us some tea while that sorts itself out,” Sana added, eyeing the slow rate of progress.

While Sana went to see that, she took out her own jade tablet and started to flick through her own mission recordings from previous trips into the high valleys, comparing them to what Juni was rendering.

“You… didn’t submit a lot of that to the pavilion,” Juni remarked after a moment, giving her a solid dose of ‘side eye’.

“…”

She had the good grace to wince.

“I always put in what was required of the mission reports,” she pointed out.

“…”

“What?” she grumbled, feeling a bit aggrieved suddenly. “I used to just give it all to them, then I realised that I got squat for it and all it did was enable people like Ha Yun to get even more of the ‘easy’ missions. It’s easier to hold onto it and see if it’s needed for a future request.”

“I suppose I should get this and try to integrate it,” Juni sighed, watching both their maps slowly condense. “Does Sana also have a store of data like this?”

“Nope,” she shook her head. “We share the data regularly. Lin Ling might have some, but she doesn’t do many missions up here; most of the High Valley stuff is the foothills of Thunder Crest or over towards South Grove. Han Shu would be…”

“Shadow Forest, I know,” Juni replied. “I didn’t mean it like that, sorry.”

“I know,” she said, sighing herself. “If I had realised you wanted it I could have given it to you yesterday.”

“Oh well,” Juni murmured, taking it in stride. “At least I have it now…”

“What about Mu Shi and Duan Mu?” Sana added, returning with the tea and presumably overhearing the last bit of their conversation.

“…”

“I’d have to ask Duan Mu, but Mu Shi mostly works in the east of the province,” Juni mused.

“—Ask me what?” Duan Mu, interjected, appearing with almost superlative timing to get his own tea.

“Do you have any… personal mapping… for this part of the High Valleys?” Juni asked.

“Hmmm… doubt it,” Duan Mu shook his head. “I looked before we came and most of what I have is from north of Thunder Crest. Anything else is from south of here. Mu Shi might? She was up here a few times in the last year with Kalis.”

“I don’t recall that,” Juni frowned.

“…”

Duan Mu looked a bit awkward.

-Probably they were doing personal requests, she guessed. Quite a few hunters, especially the higher-ranked, older ones, did, even if it was frowned upon.

“Ahh well, I’ll ask her when I see her,” Juni sighed. “In the meantime, want to join us for some tea?”

“Sure,” Duan Mu agreed, taking a seat as Sana started to pour tea into cups.

They sat there chatting about random stuff for a while, while the others who were sleeping filtered in and also got their breakfast. As it turned out, Mu Shi did have records of one of the valley approaches to the Jasmine Gate, which she was happy to provide for Juni to wrap into her larger map, along with the ones in her own tablet. While Juni sorted that, she and Sana quietly left the others to their breakfast and slipped across to the shrine to say their morning blessings to their mother in the shrine.

The only people there, as usual, were Senior Ying, who was just sitting quietly in meditation in the middle of the shrine, almost like a sixth statue, and the little rescued monkey, who was dozing on a pile of leaves in the corner, curled up under a grass hat.

Taking care to disturb neither, they lit some incense on the Queen Mother of the West’s shrine, then gave an offering of a paper chrysanthemum each. As the elder sister, barely, she murmured the simple prayer on their behalf, then they both sat there in silence, lost in their own thoughts.

…

*Ting…*

*Ting…*

*Ting…*

Exhaling, she glanced up to find that Senior Ying had stirred from her own meditation and run the bell on the main altar to signify that dawn had properly arrived.

“Sorry,” Senior Ying murmured, seeing her stir.

Bowing to the shrine, she stood and stretched as Sana also bowed then stretched her arms.

“It’s fine, we are the ones intruding, Senior Ying,” she replied.

“A shrine like this is here to be used,” Senior Ying observed, looking around. “Not that you would know it in this day and age. I think you two are the only ones who come here. Whom do you pray for?”

“Our mother,” she replied, glancing back at the shrine for a moment as Sana just nodded silently.

Senior Ying just nodded, and didn’t ask further.

In the corner of the room, she noticed that the little monkey had awakened and was nibbling on a piece of bread from the kitchen, watching the exchange with interest.

“What do… you pray for?” she asked, curious herself.

“Heh…” Senior Ying stared around the shrine again, a half smile chasing across her lips and just shook her head.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to ask impolitely…” she added quickly…

“Not at all…” Senior Ying murmured, waving a hand absently before looking at her directly again. “I suppose I also offer prayers on behalf of my parents, though both are long passed on to a new, better life. Sometimes to my teacher. Mostly, though, I pray that I will meet old friends again, and that if I do… we will be able to sit and have a good chat about the lives we have led.”

It was hard to know what to say to that, so she just bowed politely.

“Heh…” Senior Ying stared at them both and just shook her head, amused for some reason.

“…”

“Sorry, you remind me of me… when I was your age,” Senior Ying remarked drily. “Though that was so long ago that it feels like a distant dream now.”

“Is… it not hard living up here?” Sana asked after a moment.

“Yes,” Senior Ying said simply. “However, I like it. Yin Eclipse is dangerous, yes, but so is anywhere. There is an honesty to life up here that you cannot find elsewhere.”

“There is,” she agreed.

“Huh, this is where you vanished off to…” Lianmei murmured, walking into the shrine.

They both bowed politely to her, then to Senior Ying.

“Were you looking for us?” Sana asked.

“I was going to, in due course,” Lianmei chuckled. “They are happy that they can teleport people up from the lowlands, and there are a few things I want to sort out before that nest of problems arrive. In that regard, Senior Ying, I may also need your help, if you are willing?”

“Oh?” Senior Ying asked, raising an eyebrow.

“We have some life-bound talismans,” Lianmei said. “High grade ones, and I plan to give your group two for your trip further in.”

“…”

Beside her, Sana stared wide-eyed at Lianmei, as did she, actually. Life-bound talismans were like soul-bound ones, but much rarer and very expensive. Without exception they were special treasures capable of doing terrifying or miraculous things. Talismans like those tended to be crafted specifically for deep journeys into Yin Eclipse, where dangers were immense and soul-binding was not an option thanks to the suppression.

“Oh, you need me to help prepare them?” Senior Ying mused, nodding.

“It will go faster with your help, yes,” Lianmei replied, looking around. “Can we use the shrine here for it?”

“Absolutely,” Senior Ying agreed. “The feng shui will certainly help.”

“In that case, I will tell the other three to come over in due course,” Lianmei said. “We may as well start that now, while the others are involved with breakfast and all that stuff.”

“Will it require a ritual altar?” Senior Ying asked.

“Hmmmmm…” Lianmei looked pensively at the ceiling for a moment, then nodded. “Probably, given one of them is a fairly high grade talisman, as far as these things go.”

“In that case Arai and Sana here can help me with that,” Senior Ying said.

Lianmei nodded and then turned on her heel and left again.

“…”

They stared after her for a few seconds, before Sana gave herself a small shake.

“Umm… okay, what do we need to do?” she asked, turning to Senior Ying.

Senior Ying looked pensively at the floor, then around the room, for a long moment, before waving for them to follow her.

Glancing at Sana, she shrugged and they both followed her into the far room, beyond the shrines, which turned out to be a glorified storeroom, bedroom and kitchen all rolled into one.

“Sorry, it’s not exactly high living,” Senior Ying chuckled, seeing their drifting gaze. “Grab that table there, the small one with the four beasts on the legs, then that jade tray I think.”

Slightly embarrassed at having been caught staring, she hurried over to the round table and picked it up.

“Take it through to the shrine?” she asked, manoeuvring herself around so she didn’t knock anything off the other table.

“Yep,” Senior Ying nodded.

Sana followed after, carrying the jade tray and a few other things Senior Ying pointed out, putting them on the floor while she put the table down in the middle of the hall, roughly where Senior Ying had been sitting.

“Divine the auspicious alignments!” Senior Ying called through from the other room, “Then orientate the table so the tiger is facing ‘auspicious’ north!”

Looking at the table, it took her a moment to realise that Senior Ying was referring to beasts on the legs.

“—here,” Sana passed her a compass.

Nodding in thanks, she sat put it on the table and pushed a thread of qi into it, watching the four points move around.

“I guess it’s that way?” her sister remarked, pointing to a place half way between the shrine of the Queen Mother of the North and the Grandfather of Heaven.

“Yeah,” she agreed, though she still cleared the compass and tried again, to be sure.

…

By the time they had got the table properly aligned and the various bits set up to Senior Ying’s satisfaction, Han Shu and Lin Ling had also arrived, the former carrying a spirit wood box bound on all four sides by a seal.

“I take it that is the talisman?” Sana said, coming over to look at it.

“One of them,” Han Shu confirmed. “Lianmei and Juni are bringing the other now.”

“—Open it up and let’s have a look,” Senior Ying interjected, coming back into the room, carrying a small, circular jade pedestal in her hands.

Han Shu put the box on the table, and drew a symbol on it, deactivating the security mechanisms of the talisman, which detached in his hand without any difficulty. Lin Ling leant over and opened it—

“Ohhh…!”

Sana and Ling both exclaimed at the same time as she leant over, because it was not one talisman but six, along with a special altar to bind them.

“Oh wow, that’s a real treasure,” Senior Ying murmured, carefully lifting out the circular piece of jade inscribed with a remarkably complex formation and setting it to one side as she admired the talismans.

“What does it do?” Sana asked, taking one of the smaller talismans carefully.

“It’s a Skitter Leap charm, but a really well made one,” Senior Ying mused. “Ah, Old Man Mang?”

“Grandmaster Mang?” she blinked.

“Nope, Grandmaster Mang’s father,” Lianmei, who had appeared at this point, with Juni in tow, carrying a second box. “According to Old Ling it was a treasure the old man left for our pavilion before he departed the world with Lu Fu Tao.”

“I didn’t know Grandmaster Mang had a link like that to the Blue Water Sage,” Han Shu murmured.

“Neither did I,” Lianmei remarked drily as Juni placed her box down as well and opened it.

“This came from my grandmother,” Juni said, lifting out a pair of talismans that were painted in the form of an exquisite pair of black and white carp. “It is called a—”

“Dancing Carp Talisman,” Senior Ying murmured, sounding impressed. “I’ve only ever seen one of these before. This… is it an original?”

“Uhuh,” Juni nodded, sounding quite pleased that Senior Ying knew about it. “It’s a feng shui based movement art bound to a talisman that can also act as a short range teleport. Once refined, it doesn’t draw on the user’s qi either.”

“What’s the catch?” she asked.

“The people using it have to be siblings,” Juni said drily. “My brother was set to come out and join us later, which is why my grandmother gave it to me. In this instance, you and Sana can use it.”

“Won’t us binding it cause difficulties?” Sana frowned.

“No,” Lianmei shook her head. “They are not like soul-bound talismans. These are ‘called’ talismans, but basically they are treasures that can be reused and even passed around.”

“Doesn’t that make them a target for thieves?” Han Shu asked.

“They are very hard to steal,” Senior Ying chuckled. “Life-bound talismans are, as the name suggests, bound to the life of the user. Only you can unbind them, and in this instance, the parent talismans stay here anyway, so even if the child ones are lost or destroyed, with sufficient qi they can be replenished anyway.”

“Yes. Basically you bind a copy to yourself,” Lianmei added. “The limit really is firstly in how many people they can support at once and secondly how much of your qi it reserves for activation. The Skitter Leap talisman can take up to five people at any given time, so I suppose we should bind it first, and see how you get on.”

“Each of you take a seat around the table,” Senior Ying added, glancing up from the jade slip she had started skimming.

Taking a seat, she watched as Lianmei put the jade plate down on the altar and started to insert spirit jade into it. Soon the pattern on it resembling a butterfly was shining brightly enough that it cast dappled rainbows around the room which shifted a bit oddly when you looked at them.

“Take a talisman each and put some vital blood on it,” Senior Ying went on.

Accepting one of the five from Ling, who was nearest the box, she placed it flat on the table and then put her hand palm down on the activation point. Focusing on her mantra, she pulled a tiny bit of her vital qi out of the bones in her hand and fused it with her blood—

She felt her qi reserves in her body constrict subtly. It wasn’t that she suddenly had less qi, but rather that a portion, maybe a quarter, was now inextricably linked to the talisman. At the same time, a symbol resembling a multi-coloured butterfly appeared on the back of her hand for a moment, before fading away.

“How much did that take?” Lianmei asked them, holding another spirit jade.

“A quarter,” she replied with a grimace.

“About the same,” Sana agreed.

“Same,” Han Shu confirmed.

“A third,” Lin Ling grimaced.

“A fifth,” Juni added.

“Not bad,” Senior Ying mused, eyeing the altar.

“A third of my total qi reserves is ‘not bad’?” Lin Ling muttered, not sounding convinced.

“It’s a Dao Sovereign Grade Talisman,” Lianmei remarked, looking amused.

“A Dao… Sovereign?” she gulped, her mouth a bit dry all of a sudden.

“—Keep your hands on it,” Lianmei added, “I’ll see how much I can get that down. What would be an acceptable limit?”

“For them, probably a sixth of their qi reserved?” Senior Ying mused.

“…”

Lianmei sighed and pulled out an earthly jade and put it on the altar. Almost immediately, she felt the connection the talisman shift, the burden of activation on her qi reserves lessening gradually.

“That’s brought it down to a fifth,” she said, when the feeling had stopped, replaced by the subtle, suppressive pressure on her body once again.

Lianmei stared at the talisman, looking a bit aggrieved, then took out a heavenly jade.

“Spirit stones exist to be used,” Senior Ying remarked, looking a bit amused.

“They do, but Ling Tao did not give me a lot of these,” Lianmei muttered.

“So what now?” she asked. “How long do we need to hold our hands here?”

“Thirty minutes, I’d imagine. This is a fairly high quality altar I made myself out of materials from up here, so the resistance should be minimal,” Senior Ying mused. “That we are throwing heavenly jade at it will speed things up as well.”

“Here. While it binds, read what the talisman can do,” Lianmei added, passing her a jade slip.

Putting some qi into it, a shimmering butterfly appeared in her mind’s eye, flapping its wings and then turning into a screed of text that explained the various permutations of the talisman.

“So… if one person triggers it, everyone is drawn away, to the point the person using it arrives at… and it draws on the natural power of laws to leave clones behind that last until the talisman’s execution is complete…?” she said after a moment.

“Yep, it’s a powerful escape talisman,” Lianmei replied. “Those clones will draw on your comprehensions and basically be almost perfect copies of you, for the duration of the cast. At your realm, it will probably move you about half a mile, maybe further, if you can visualize your destination particularly clearly.”

“—What happens if we overdraw?” she asked, noting the talisman instructions said nothing about that.

“Overdraw?” Lianmei frowned. “Oh, use up all your qi… I advise not doing that up here; you will probably give yourself an inner injury, even with a physical cultivator’s constitution.”

“Here,” she passed the instruction jade over to Sana.

“Repeat casts will also take you less distance,” Lianmei added. “Unless you feed it more spirit stones. I’ll give you each a few earthly jade for that purpose, though I pray to the fates you will not need to use it.”

“Yeah…” Juni agreed with a grimace. “Let’s hope…”