It was probably telling that the first guy to ever compliment her looks was both a complete creep and also physically blind, Ling Qi thought irritably. It was an irrelevant thought but one that crossed her mind nonetheless as she thought furiously on how to resolve this situation in her – their – favor.

  If she kept him talking, it would give her more time to think. She was wary of being the first one to attack; he could be bluffing about the laxness in the Elders’ enforcement of the rules, trying to trick them into breaking truce first……

  “So…… I’m thinking that I see a few flaws with your plan,” Ling Qi pointed out politely, if dryly.

  Huang Da cocked his head to the side. Ling Qi’s instincts, honed from years in the street and perhaps a little from observing her mother and her clients, told her this guy was bad news. He was the kind of guy who wouldn’t just hurt someone because he had something to gain but because he enjoyed it.

  “Is that so? I suppose I could explain some of my reasoning if it would gain your favor,” he mused, not seeming perturbed by Ling Qi’s observation.

  It was difficult to keep a straight face, particularly with Su Ling shooting her a suspicious look.

  “How do you figure that you’re going to keep this to yourself? Whatever you say, I doubt the Elders are going to just ignore two or three people disappearing before the truce is even over. Especially since two of us are in the advanced courses.” Ling Qi suppressed a wince at the fox girl’s scowl but pressed on. “But if we don’t…… disappear, we can just share the location, you know. This is assuming I don’t just give it to Bai Meizhen.”


  Huang Da hummed thoughtfully to himself, the sickle in his hand twitching with the tightening and loosening of his grip.

  “That is a pretty good point,” he admitted. “For all that you lack my lovely scholar’s refinement, you have a bit of wit to go with your resplendent qi and grace. I think you may overestimate the Elder’s interest in such things. But I may be wrong. Some may cleave closely to the supposed spirit of the rules. Suffice to say, I am confident that whoever leaves this place will not speak of it, even without such permanent solutions,” Huang Da finished pleasantly.

  Ling Qi swallowed. That wasn’t ominous at all. Su Ling certainly thought so given the way the tension in her stance ratcheted up.

  “Well, call me convinced,” Ling Qi said flatly. “But there’s no way that I’m going to willingly stay with you alone or let you take advantage of Li Suyin. You’d probably just slit our throats afterward anyway.”


  “That kind of accusation is just uncalled for. I’m hardly some barbarian brute,” Huang Da replied, sounding affronted.

  “U-um, can we please…… please not fight? I-I understand that you want to win the competition. I-I don’t know why you want access to the archives so badly, but it can’t be worth hurting your fellow disciples like this. Couldn’t we come to an agreement instead?” Li Suyin asked plaintively. “I would…… I would really appreciate that, and……”


  Li Suyin trailed off as Huang Da shook his head.

  “Your naivety is sweet. A lovely trait for a lovely girl. But no, that is a request I cannot fulfill. I will not be the loser in this competition,” he said regretfully. “Now, I think that is enough chatter. Sadly, it seems neither of you seem interested in joining me. I imagine you will be pliable enough once we have some time alone, Li Suyin.”


  Su Ling began to snarl something, no longer able to keep a leash on her temper, but Ling Qi didn’t have time to listen. Her time in Elder Zhou’s lessons had not been for nothing; she saw the minute twitch in his shoulders and the change in his stance so she was ready when he moved, rushing her in a shadowy blur.

  Even with dark qi flooding her legs and blurring her shape, she was unable to completely avoid what came next. She ducked the initial swing of the straight edged sickle but was unprepared when his other hand clenched and moved. She felt something heavy and spiked smash against her ribs. Although she managed to move with the impact, it left a heavy bruise.

  Ling Qi could see a glittering black chain extending from the bottom of the sickle now, and the malevolent-looking spiked weight at its end was now a spinning blur as Huang Da adjusted his footing to face her. Her ribs felt cold and numb where he had struck her, but she didn’t have time to think about that or the excited and admiring look she saw on his face. He hadn’t been expecting her to dodge even that well.

  Ling Qi flicked a knife into her free hand and plucked at the threads of the wind around her before flinging the knife at center mass. She didn’t need a perfect hit; even a nick would be enough to trigger the Zephyr’s Breath technique and slow him down. She would be essentially tapped out on qi, but she couldn’t afford to hold back at this point.

  Her first throw was merely a feint, but it did its job of drawing the spinning chain and weight up and out of position as she dropped her flute and flicked a second knife into her other hand. This one flew true, and she had the pleasure of seeing the boy’s blank eyes widen as the knife passed under the sickle blade he’d tried to use to bat the knife out of the way. It struck true on his side but bounced away in a flare of black qi rather than dig into his flesh.

  This didn’t matter to her though. She felt the currents of air take hold around him just in time for Su Ling to charge into the fray, ghostly fire glittering on her fingers and knife in her hand.

  Huang Da dodged to the side to avoid Su Ling’s knife, but his movements, hindered by Ling Qi’s technique, were a hair too slow to avoid the wispy burst of fire from her other hand. He came out of it with only a few embers burning on his robes and hair and a burn on the hand holding the swinging chain, which seemed to have blocked the brunt of the fire. He looked thoroughly displeased.

  “Get out of my way,” he snapped, a twitch of his hand sending the glittering black chain darting out. Su Ling avoided it, but she was unprepared as it changed direction mid-air to coil around her arm, leaving her unable to dodge as he brought the sickle blade down, The blade slashed down from her shoulder to her waist with a spray of blood.

  Ling Qi went pale at the sight, but instinct drilled into her during training with Instructor Zhou prevented her from freezing at the sight. She stumbled as she felt the bruise on her ribs throb painfully, and the numbness spread from it, making her right arm tremble violently.

  Some kind of poison?

  This just made it all the more urgent to finish this fight quickly. Huang Da’s weapon was still tangled up with Su Ling, and she took the opportunity to fish out the Qi card imbued with Bai Meizhen’s technique from where it was tucked under the collar of her gown. She pushed her qi into it, focusing fully on the dangerous boy as she did so.

  The brush of Bai Meizhen’s qi against her own was like ice in her veins, the numbing, deadly cold of impossibly deep waters. It was a heady rush. For a moment, she felt as if she were a giant staring down at a pathetic insect from on high, his fate entirely hers to decide. It passed quickly enough, but it was clear that it had struck the boy successfully. He was pale-faced and trembling, not even looking at Su Ling as she slumped to her knees in front of him.

  Despite his seeming paralysis, his chain seemed to have a will of its own, uncoiling without a single motion from him. There was still an unsettling intensity in his blind gaze, an undercurrent of excitement and want beneath the supernatural fear she had inflicted on him.

  The disturbing moment passed when Su Ling let out a snarl and raised her head.

  “D’n’t you fuckin’ ign’re me,” she slurred, clearly in a great deal of pain. “Burn.”


  Her final word was very clear, and Huang Da barely had a moment to tear his eyes away from Ling Qi before the tiny embers still smoldering on his robes erupted into blazing blue-grey fires.

  Huang Da cried out in pain, stumbling back as Su Ling collapsed to the ground, having expended herself with that last move. The Huang Da that emerged from the flames was decidedly worse for the wear, his robe burnt away to expose his thin physique and angry red burns covering his skin.

  “I really did not imagine you were this beautiful. To reduce me enough that a beast could do this. To make me feel this way……” His voice was manic as he stared at Ling Qi. “But it’s time to end this.”


  “It is.”


  Ling Qi blinked in surprise as she heard Li Suyin speak. She had lost track of the other girl entirely during the fight, so focused she had been on her opponent. So it was shocking to see her standing behind Huang Da, having just laid a hand on his back. The boy arched his back and retched, coughing up blood and bits of flesh, losing his grip on the sickle half of his weapon as he did so.

  The boy spun instinctively, backhanding Li Suyin across the face, causing the girl to crumple to the ground with a cry of pain. Whatever poison Huang Da had inflicted on Ling Qi seemed to be fading thankfully as the numbness in her side seemed to subside after another painful pulse that left most of her right side and arm numb and useless.

  Huang Da’s breathing came out ragged and wet, trickles of blood running down his chin. Though he was still standing Ling Qi could read body language well enough. He was going to run. Whatever Li Suyin had done had pushed him over the line from thinking he could win.

  The question was if she wanted to allow that or not. He had stalked them, tried to intimidate them, and hurt them. She wasn’t feeling very merciful, but she wasn’t feeling very strong either. She was out of qi, wounded, and surrounded by potential hostages if she couldn’t put him down right away.

  The decision was taken from her Her moment of indecision gave Huang Da time to stumble backwards a few steps and rip something off of his wrist with his free hand, vanishing in a burst of starlight.

  “.……Damn it,” Ling Qi cursed under her breath, hands clenching into fists as she stared at the spot he had been.

  Ling Qi hurried over to Li Suyin and Su Ling. Li Suyin was already sitting up, moaning weakly. She had tears in her her eyes as she cradled her cheek, which was already swelling and bruising purple. Her lips were bloody where her teeth had cut them.

  “M fine,” Li Suyin murmured at at Ling Qi’s concerned look. “Check Su Ling.”


  Ling Qi nodded distractedly, turning the fox girl over so that she was lying on her back.

  “What did you do to him?” Ling Qi asked. “And how did you get so close?”


  Su Ling was breathing shallowly, blood flowing sluggishly from the wound that extended from her shoulder to her hip. Fortunately, she had been wearing something like a vest of cured leather under her robe, and although the piece of equipment was ruined, it had prevented the cut from being fatal. Ling Qi guessed that Su Ling had been knocked out by the same spreading numbness that had been inflicted on her.

  “I-I studied a movement technique…… after…… things got hard for you. It lets me avoid others when I…… when I need to,” Li Suyin explained haltingly. “And……it’s easier to break things.” Li Suyin’s shoulders were shaking and further tears welling in her eyes even as she pulled herself over to help with Su Ling. “I can’t heal. I don’t have the control…… but if I just reach in and twist……”


  Ling Qi wasn’t sure what to say. She wished that the girl could have just made the bastard’s heart explode, but she doubted Li Suyin would want to hear that. Whatever Li Suyin had done seemed to have really bothered her. Ling Qi had a feeling that her friend was only holding it together out of a need to make sure Su Ling was okay.

  Instead, she just patted Li Suyin’s shoulder silently and helped her get Su Ling bandaged up. Su Ling soon stirred to wakefulness.

  “Shit,” Su Ling cursed as she cracked her eyes open, taking a moment to focus on their faces. “.……I get him?”


  “No, but we drove him off in the end,” Ling Qi said.

  Su Ling glanced from Ling Qi’s somber face over to Li Suyin, who had her head down with tears still running down her cheeks, and let out a huff.

  “Sucks he got away,” Su Ling murmured uncertainty. “Guess we’re gonna have to come up here together from now on.”


  “Yeah, probably,” Ling Qi muttered. “We should probably head down by way of the cliff once we figure this place out. It’ll be shorter, less beasts. We’re not in any shape for another fight.”


  “Yeah, sounds good. I have some rope in my pack,” Su Ling responded with a bit more confidence before glancing at Li Suyin and losing it. “.……You still gonna be okay to identify stuff?”


  “O-of course,” Li Suyin responded, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand. “I’m sorry for that. I-I’ll just be a moment.”


  The site really was amazing. Just sitting around it for an hour or so while everyone caught their breath was enough for Ling Qi to feel her dantian beginning to refill. She could feel the ‘skin’ she had created with Argent Soul pulsing in time with the mist rising from the vent, growing infinitesimally thicker with each passing moment. It was worth making enemies over, she thought.

  Once they could manage to move, they headed down the cliffside and took a look through the remains of the guardian as well. The shiny crystals she had seen turned out to be spirit stones, which a still-distressed Li Suyin had murmured was normal for such things. They divided the jagged natural spirit stones as evenly as they could by weight.

  The expedition could only be called a success, but it was only the beginning. The truce, dubious as she now felt it was, would be over soon, and Ling Qi had a feeling that Huang Da wouldn’t be content with just licking his wounds and backing down.

  Threads 31-Adventures 2

  “Incredible,” Xuan Shi breathed, stepping across the threshold from cloud to stone.

  Ling Qi was not sure she would go that far, but it was pretty impressive. Inside the doors was a long pillared hall like a grand temple with a thick red carpet leading up its center. The only light in the room came from the pale glow of shimmering walls of elemental qi that blocked access to the rear of the room. There were eight of the things, and though each one was partially translucent, together, they worked to block her sight and other senses from examining the rear of the room. All she could see was the blurry silhouette of a large, vaguely humanoid shape.

  She frowned as she followed Xuan Shi in, examining the area for a way forward. The barriers stretched from pillar to pillar, and access to the “halls” on either side was blocked by iron gates that stretched to the ceiling. While she didn’t care for her chances of going through the crackling wall of semi-solid that made up the first barrier, it seemed like the iron gates might be relatively easy for her to bypass. Of course, that itself might be a trap.

  “What do you think?” Ling Qi asked.

  Zhengui answered excitedly.

  Hanyi responded, giving the impression of rolling her eyes with naught but her tone.

  “Reality and script have merged here. Without doubt, we stand within the sealed temple, the final hurdle of the Temple of Storms,” Xuan Shi mused aloud.

  “What?” Sixiang asked, sounding amused.

  “What?” Ling Qi asked in a rather less enthused tone.

  Xuan Shi glanced over at her and tugged his hat down, further shading his eyes. “The author’s words described such a place in his first novel.”


  Well, if she took the assumption that the author or a dedicated reader had built this place, she supposed that wasn’t too strange. “What happened in the book then?” Ling Qi asked.

  Xuan Shi paused, as if deliberating on something. “This one will keep explanations short. The hero sought a sealed ship within a temple such as this. He reached this place together with the Storm Sorceress Hotene, who intended to take the ship for herself, but in the end, the trials brought them together, and they left the isle together on the ship.”


  Hanyi huffed.

  Leaving Hanyi’s comment aside, Ling Qi raised an eyebrow. “What did they face though?”


  Xuan Shi considered her question. “This one does not expect the exact details to match. The words were written for the benefit of those who had not yet drunk from the well of the world, as we have. With talents such as ours, the trials of trust and betrayal which they faced would be all too easy to bypass. However, the statue will likely still bring battle upon us.”


  Ling Qi squinted at the shadowy figure hidden behind the barriers. “Fair enough. Want me to scout out the ‘trials’ then?”


  “It would be appreciated,” he replied, dipping his head. “Allow this one to study the function of the barriers and if they might be pierced.”


  Ling Qi nodded. That seemed like a plan. She left Xuan Shi to contemplate the scintillating wall of lightning and headed to the left side of the room to examine the iron gate there. On her way, she paused near the pillar, and after a moment’s thought, she let darkness flow through her channels.

  That done, she carefully reached a finger into the stone pillar and recoiled at the sharp shock. Ling Qi clicked her tongue. Of course it wouldn’t be that simple.

  Sixiang asked, still amused.

  Zhengui grumbled sullenly.

  Ling Qi just shook her head in amusement at the byplay. Reaching the gate, she closed her eyes and breathed out, letting the misty, malleable qi of water and moon well up behind her eyes. A moment later, she opened them, and three little bobbing white lights shimmered into existence and slipped through the bars of the gate.

  The narrow stone hallway that she found beyond was unlit and unmarked by any decor. Studying its walls, Ling Qi tried first slipping an eye through the outer wall, and for a moment, Ling Qi glimpsed the open blue sky before a nauseous wrenching sensation made her vision swim and the point of view blink out as if she had suddenly moved it out of range.

  She supposed this must be a sealed space then. With that in mind, she sent the other two lights bobbing along to examine the rest of the hallway. Sure enough, the walls were covered in arrays, too dense and layered for her to do more than guess at their functions. Letting her eyes gleam silver with the increased flow of qi, Ling Qi saw barriers, illusions, paralysis and more lining the unassuming stone walls in a dense web. She could also see, standing out from the rest, arrays that joined the traps here to the hallway on the right side.

  Ling Qi frowned and let the lights blink out, just as an array activated, threads of qi spearing out to shred the fading remains of her wisps. A check on the right side of the room turned up much the same, an interlinked trap-lined hall that Ling Qi was not totally confident that she could bypass.

  With her task done, she returned to the middle of the hall where Xuan Shi stood, still as stone, examining the barrier. “The halls look like a slog, even if they’re the intended path,” she said bluntly. “We can probably get through between the two of us, but…… any luck for you?”


  “Perhaps. This one will require your assistance, however,” Xuan Shi said, seeming faintly disappointed. His staff disappeared with a faint ring, and in its place, a pair of iron rods, more like batons really, appeared with inscribed leather wrapping their handles. Their tips narrowed to blunt points.

  Ling Qi looked at the one which he handed her, examining the few visible markings. It was a pretty masterfully made talisman. Some kind of anti-lightning effect? “And what do I do with this?”


  “Place the tips together,” Xuan Shi said sedately, holding his own baton out. “Keep it so, and then press it to the barrier.”


  Curious, Ling Qi did so, following along in unison as he thrust the metal into the wall of lightning. It hissed, sparked, and snarled around the intruding material, but no shock reached her fingers.

  “And now, apart.” Xuan Shi drew his to one side, and Ling Qi pulled hers the opposite way.

  The barrier parted like a curtain, sparking ragged edges snapping out little arcs of electricity across the gap that they had made, but it remained open all the same. She shared a look with Xuan Shi, and then as one, they stepped through, turning as they did to maintain the batons’ positions until they were through and the barrier could snap shut behind them.

  “That’s one,” Ling Qi said brightly. “You made this for Ji Rong, I am guessing,” she said, handing the talisman back.

  “The wrath of heaven is better diverted than blocked,” Xuan Shi agreed. “This next obstacle may prove more difficult however.”


  Ling Qi looked ahead to the shimmering wall of turquoise qi. It was the concept of water, endless flowing motion that would strip away whatever touched it like the sea wearing away a stone……

  Yet it was the motion which gave it power. Ling Qi smiled to herself, and with a thought, she nudged Hanyi, who gave the impression of grinning as well as she formed in a swirl of frost at Ling Qi’s side.

  “I think I have this one,” Ling Qi said lightly.

  Together with Hanyi, she sang, and a wide section of the churning water qi began to slow and still, becoming solid and brittle. The frozen section was shrinking at the edges even as it formed, wearing away and melting back into its base state. Still, it gave a long enough window of opportunity for Xuan Shi to catch on, lower his shoulder, and bash his way through the now brittle barrier, leaving an opening for Ling Qi and Hanyi to slip through after.

  “And thus, the second passes,” Xuan Shi mused, dusting the frost off his robe. “A thought occurs, however. Though this method may be the simplest, a flaw may exist.”


  Ling Qi frowned, examining the next barrier, a shimmering surface that reflected her own face like a lake on a clear day.

  Sixiang murmured, peering out through Ling Qi’s eyes. At her side, Hanyi made faces at her distorted reflection.

  Zhengui grumbled.

  “What’s the problem?” Ling Qi asked, looking Xuan’s way.

  “In this sequence, the trials lead not only to treasure and trust, but also the key to the guardian’s defeat,” Xuan Shi explained. “And also, does this task not feel too easy?”


  Ling Qi did have to admit that even when she had looked at the trapped hallways, she hadn’t seen a single thing that was genuinely deadly, and the barriers did seem simple. It made her wonder if they were missing something. On the other hand, it wasn’t as if everything discovered had its challenges tailored to an appropriate difficulty.

  “I think we’re doing fine so far,” Ling Qi said. She gave Xuan Shi a sidelong look. “Are you regretting not following the heroes’ path here?”


  She caught the signs of a frown, despite his high collar. “Nay. We are not they, and this one would not presume.” He shook his head. “All things aside, it would be best to test this one’s creations in battle.”


  “Did you not do that in your challenge? You made a pretty high jump last month,” Ling Qi noted.

  “It was a test of creation, not war,” Xuan Shi answered. “The qi of the firmament is more my realm. Do you believe the lake is yours?”


  “Not hers, but mine,” Sixiang said aloud. “Think you two could hold hands for a second?”


  Ling Qi narrowed her eyes.

  Sixiang replied innocently.

  Ling Qi shared a look with Xuan Shi, who looked bemused. “Please don’t mind them,” Ling Qi said. “Hanyi, come here please.”


  “.…… Very well,” Xuan Shi said.

  She stepped closer to Xuan Shi’s side as Hanyi returned to her dantian. While she still didn’t like cramming herself in close with someone else, this would be fine for a moment. She caught the shorter boy’s sleeve in her hand as Sixiang spread their qi through the air around them.

  “Aaaaand forward!” Sixiang announced cheerfully. They stepped forward together, and the rippling lake qi engulfed them, only for its shimmering, distracting light to refract and scatter across the mist of moon qi saturating the air around them. She felt Sixiang straining in her head, letting out continual pulses of dispelling qi as they moved through the barrier, but their passage was swift.

  Sixiang whispered, sounding drained.

  “Is your companion well?” Xuan Shi asked as they faced down the next barrier, a thing of screaming, tearing wind.

  “Just tired,” Ling Qi replied. “Now……”


  Her words were interrupted as the room went dark, every barrier snapping off at once. While the lighting meant nothing to her, the rumbling groan of stone grinding against stone heralded something of much more concern.

  “Hah. It seems that cheating is not appreciated after all,” Xuan Shi said.

  Ahead of them, climbing to its feet, was the statue they had glimpsed. Easily ten meters tall, it was carved in the likeness of a brawny, bearded man in archaic armor. From its back rose eight additional arms, each composed of different elemental qi. It stepped off the dais it had been seated on, and the entire temple shook with its weight.

  “I’m guessing it didn’t have those arms in the book,” Ling Qi said faintly, her eyes once again gleaming silver as she examined the statue. Even with her techniques however, what she could glean of its power was limited.

  “Indeed not,” Xuan Shi replied, raising his staff defensively and taking on a wider stance. “However, this one suspects more than ever that brute force is not the answer.”


  “I’m all for ideas,” Ling Qi said, taking stock of their surroundings. Without the barriers, there was room to release Zhengui, and she had every intention of doing so shortly. However, even now, she didn’t feel too worried. The door remained open behind them, so fleeing was always an option given the statue’s lumbering speed.

  “It depends,” the boy answered as the statue took another long stride forward, rocking the floor, “on which of us shall bear the guardian’s ire and which shall seek its weakness?”