A little more preparation for the potential trial might not go awry however.

  Once Ling Qi finished her meal and her tea, she slipped out to pick up an extra dosage of healing salve and stored it away in her ring. The spatial ring remained her favorite talisman. The ability to simply store things away without care was incredibly useful.

  Ling Qi was careful to keep from the main roads and to keep an eye out for any potential watchers. She didn’t much care for the idea of being followed by Huang Da again. She didn’t see so much as a hair of him though. Eventually, she snuck off the beaten path, cutting through the scrubby woods on the lower mountain slope to reach the crossroads Bai Meizhen had asked her to meet at.

  “Did anyone follow you?” Ling Qi asked as she stepped out from beneath the darkened eaves of the trees on the right side of the path. Bai Meizhen stood near the lone marker placed at the path’s splitting point, her arms folded over her chest.

  “Not that I am aware of.” Bai Meizhen seemed to have no more trouble seeing in the dark than Ling Qi did going by the way her golden eyes tracked Ling Qi’s movement. “There are few who would dare, and of those, fewer still who would opt for such tactics.”


  Ling Qi cast a wary gaze around. “Where are we going then?”


  “The chamber lies near the base on the south side of the mountain,” Bai Meizhen answered, turning to set off on the path leading in that direction.

  “Opposite the entrance, huh,” Ling Qi mused. She hadn’t had any reason to look at that part of the mountain before. All the facilities were higher up; even the vent was closer to the peak. She followed Meizhen in companionable silence. She thought they made a visually interesting pair. Bai Meizhen’s snowy white hair and skin along with her bone-colored robes made her stand out in the dark whereas Ling Qi was very much the opposite, a dark figure blending into the night’s shadow.

  Given that they were still on the path, it seemed like Bai Meizhen had no intention of actively sneaking anywhere. “Bai Meizhen, do you mind giving me some advice?”


  Her friend glanced over at her without slowing her pace. “I suppose not. What troubles you?”


  “It’s just…… Now that I’ve broken through to the second realm, I’m unsure as to how I should proceed with my cultivation going into the third,” Ling Qi admitted. “Do you have any tips? Anything in particular I should do?”


  Bai Meizhen hummed thoughtfully, hands clasped loosely behind her back as they began to descend the increasingly steep and rough path. “Each person’s Path is different, of course, but I suppose there are a handful of commonalities. Your qi pool is impressive given your current level, but I would suggest expanding it significantly before entering the third. Half again as large as what you have now – at the very least.”


  “How do you know how much qi I have?” Ling Qi asked, filing away the information. “Is it something to do with how Cai Renxiang could tell I had broken through?”


  Bai Meizhen gave her an unhappy look, and Ling Qi abruptly realized that she had interrupted the other girl. She still felt a thread of fear at the powerful girl’s disapproval, but it didn’t reach her face. She dipped her head in apology.

  “My perception art grants me such sight. You have seven meridians in use, two of which are devoted to wind, one to water, and the rest to darkness. You should be careful not to unbalance yourself toward a single element so much,” Bai Meizhen answered Ling Qi’s query. “I assume Cai Renxiang has a similar art. Such things are hardly unknown.”


  “Guess I won’t be able to do the same then,” Ling Qi responded, feeling put out. She would have liked to be able to get such detail about her enemies.

  “Returning to the original query,” Bai Meizhen continued with a disapproving huff. “I can only suggest that you diversify your arts further. I have mastered four arts to the limit of my cultivation and four others to a lesser extent in the interest of utility and a well rounded skill set.”


  Ling Qi had been thinking much the same. Her current techniques were good, but she could do to have more options than simply playing her flute or throwing knives.

  “What do you mean about unbalancing? Gu Xiulan uses nothing but fire, and she seems fine.”


  “Does she now?” Bai Meizhen asked tartly, a hint of arrogant condescension returning to her tone. “Tell me, does she lose her temper easily? Pursue her passions with far more than appropriate intensity?”


  Ling Qi fiddled with a strand of her hair. “Sometimes,” she admitted. “But she is not as bad as you make it sound.” Ling Qi felt the need to defend her other friend.

  “I did not say that she was. Some clans choose to accept the…… quirks that come with such specialization. For the Bai, we focus our arts around water, darkness, and the more yin-aligned aspects of wood. It is best to use at least three elements in abundance in order to keep a degree of personal balance.”


  “I see,” Ling Qi murmured. “Is that……?”


  Bai Meizhen raised her hand for silence as they reached the end of the path proper. There was only a narrow, crumbling cliffside ahead and dark trees below.

  “We may continue this discussion later,” Bai Meizhen said. “For now, let us concentrate on the path. The way ahead is treacherous.”


  Ling Qi straightened up and nodded. Time to focus on the task at hand; she could consider the advice Bai Meizhen had given later. The two of them descended the cliff carefully via a narrow ledge barely wide enough to walk one at a time. Ling Qi was certain that were she still a mortal, she would have slipped several times or fallen when a bit of stone crumbled under her feet, but as she was, descending was easy enough.

  What came after was far more difficult. Despite the fact that the darkness was no hindrance to her, the paths through the thick trees and undergrowth seemed to shift slightly each time she blinked, and the hairs on the back of her neck rose with the feeling of being watched. Bai Meizhen lead on confidently, unaffected by the twisting of perceptions. Several times, Ling Qi almost lost sight of her companion only to be guided back by Meizhen taking her hand in her own, seeming to simply melt out of the twisted landscape from nowhere.

  She needed to work on her ability to resist such illusions, Ling Qi thought. She wouldn’t always have Bai Meizhen with her. Perhaps she could ask later what a good method for training her perception would be.

  In any case, that was what lead her to walk hand in hand with the pale girl by the time they reached the wide mouth of the cave her companion had mentioned. Unlike the crevices that she had seen up to now, this opening was a yawning hole in the side of the mountain twice her height and nearly eight meters across. Ling Qi took one last glance over her shoulder at the twisted forest but now, it only showed a normal nighttime scene.

  Wordlessly, the two of them descended into the cave, following the shallow, sloping tunnel down into the lightless underground. She could hear the distant dripping of water, and her breath came out in wisps of steam as the air grew cool and moist.

  Her grip on Meizhen’s hand tightened as they reached another chamber, the simple beauty of it stealing her breath away. Her night vision was colorless, but the elegant natural artistry of growing stone was a sight to see. The ceiling was a honeycomb of free hanging and joined stone growths, and many twisting and smooth pillars of rock rose from the damp floor. This place was alive, and the qi in the air was thick and cloying.

  Meizhen didn’t pause save to cast a brief look Ling Qi’s way before tugging on her hand. She thought she saw the other girl’s lips quirk upward in amusement though. Ling Qi flushed; she must have been gaping like a fool. She hurried to follow her companion across the rounded stones that formed a path across the small, still lake in the center of the cavern.

  They left the beautiful cavern behind, taking another exit down a narrower and steeper tunnel, which soon opened into a much more unassuming round chamber. A pair of great bronze gates were set in the far wall, coiling dragons carved along the edges. There were four indents, two on each door in the shape of spread human hands, each pair surrounded by a complex circle of characters.

  She supposed that explained why Cui couldn’t do this for Meizhen.

  “I do not know what lies beyond,” Bai Meizhen said, finally breaking the silence between them as she released Ling Qi’s hand and stepped toward the door. She saw Cui slither down to the floor from under the hem of Meizhen’s gown, growing larger with each passing second. “The door requires that we activate each pair at the same moment. It is simple enough, but be prepared for the unexpected.”


  Ling Qi nodded cautiously, stepping up to the door alongside Bai Meizhen. “Alright, let’s do this.” This would be easier with arm meridians, but presumably Meizhen would have mentioned if that was needed. She could still direct qi into the structure in front of her. She hoped she was ready for this.

  “So, on a three count?” Ling Qi asked, placing her hands in the cold metal indentations.

  Bai Meizhen nodded, Cui now at full size and coiled around her feet. “That would be appropriate, I think.” Ling Qi could see the eagerness in the girl’s golden eyes, their glow making them the sole spots of color in her vision.

  “Three……”


  “Two,” Ling Qi murmured in time with her, steeling her nerves.

  “One,” they said together, and as one, they pushed their qi outward, the vast, cold pressure of Meizhen’s energy erupting beside her as her own less obtrusive qi awoke. As Ling Qi exhaled, a thin stream of blue-black misty energy enveloped her hands.

  The doors lit up, a dozen characters then a hundred and then two hundred making themselves known on the mirror sheen of the doors. Ling Qi shuddered as she felt her qi connect to something vast and aware. She felt the crushing, impossible weight of its attention, a mountain pressing down on her shoulders, bowing her knees from the weight.

  She had an instant to see Bai Meizhen’s shoulders shaking from the pressure, expression drawn into one of defiant determination, before darkness consumed Ling Qi’s vision.

  Threads 49-Perspectives

  Li Suyin allowed herself a small smile of satisfaction as she placed the last of the seeds into the jar of preservative and tapped the lip, activating the sealing formation on the container. Humming to herself, she collected the discarded rind of the fruit and brushed it into the bin beside her work table where they would be stored until they could be ground up and converted to feed for higher quality livestock back at the Sect proper.

  With that, she was done for the moment. With little medical work to do, she, like the other crafting students in the supply train, had been set to processing reagents collected by the army’s foragers. It was simple, tedious work, but Li Suyin knew it had to be done, and she was happy to do it. Li Suyin glanced out of the back of the wagon at the passing landscape and took a moment to admire the misty valley that spread out below.

  Idly, she drummed her fingers on the rough work table, the chitin claws that tipped the fingers of her new glove clicking lightly on the wood. It was strange. Here, working for the betterment of the Sect, she was more idle than she had been since her expedition with Ling Qi. She had been studying, dissecting, building, and crafting almost nonstop for weeks, pausing only to finally make her breakthrough into the third realm.

  The time had been fruitful though. The supply bags Ling Qi had taken were full of interesting things, and her glove was one of those innovations. It had been crafted from spider silk and the chitin of that third realm beast which had nearly collapsed the ceiling and treated with certain substances taken from that bag. Between the absorbing and consumptive properties imbued into the silk, Li Suyin was rather proud of the custom-built venom injectors in the claws, which greatly improved the efficacy of the arts she had received from Zhenli’s broodmother.

  “All finished then, Li Suyin?” asked a voice from behind her.

  Li Suyin turned to look at her work partner, seated at the bench affixed to the opposite wall of the wagon. Du Feng was a tall boy, although shorter than her friend Ling Qi. With handsome aristocratic features and dark blue, almost black, hair worn in a top knot, he was not the sort to stand out among their more colorful peers. The elaborate cut of his dark blue robes did give him a certain refined air though, Li Suyin supposed.

  “I am. You are as well then?” Li Suyin asked pleasantly.

  “Yes,” Du Feng said, idly cracking his knuckles as he glanced out the back of the wagon as well. “Are you still comfortable in your gown?”


  Li Suyin was glad that there was no one else here or she might have been embarrassed. However, the normally inappropriate question was only fair since the gown had been a joint project between her and Du Feng. She glanced down at the flowing silk of her new gown, pale lilac with highlights of darker pink and purple. The glimmering hints of silvery filaments were barely visible in the gown’s resting state. She pulsed her qi, and they twitched, sending a shimmering, hypnotic ripple through the silk.

  “Very much so. The wire has not chafed at all. It is truly lovely, Du Feng. I cannot wait until I can use its full functionality.”


  “A gown can only be as lovely as the girl wearing it,” he said lightly, looking at her over the narrow lenses of his spectacles. “And it could not have been half as well constructed without your help.”


  Li Suyin felt her cheeks color and glanced away. She was aware that Du Feng perhaps fancied her, just a little. However, she was never entirely sure how to react in the face of that. She was hardly a beauty, and her disfigurement had not helped matters. She did not want him to make a mistake when he could do so much better than a petty, stubborn, and mediocre girl like her.

  “You are too kind,” she replied evasively. “Really, it is only your work that allowed the whole project to come together.”


  “I suppose we will just have to take equal credit then,” he laughed. She thought that he had a rather nice laugh. “What do you make of this expedition so far?” he asked.

  “I am sure they have a reason to bring so many auxiliaries,” Li Suyin demurred. Even if it meant that they were left with little to do, having the workload split so many ways.

  “Very much so. It would not do for artists such as us to have to risk ourselves. I am glad that the Sect is so cautious,” Du Feng said with a smile.

  Li Suyin nodded, maintaining her smile. That…… was the other rub. It was unfair of her, but she had grown up with tales of chivalrous warrior poets and brave and clever hero scholars. Though she had been disabused of the notion that the real world allowed for such pure images to exist, some part of her was still the little girl who had sighed over such stories and wanted a hero of her own. It was one reason why she had kept her latest project a secret. It was just too embarrassing……

  Before the conversation could continue, Li Suyin heard a noise, and the wagon ground to a halt. “Disciple Li!” called the voice of their driver. “We have an injury ahead. Proceed to the front.”


  She shot an apologetic smile to Du Feng. “It seems that duty still calls,” she said.

  “Of course,” he agreed. “Do not let me hold you up. Stay safe, Li Suyin.”


  ***

  The crackle of flames mingled with the popping sound of bursting insects was a delightful backdrop, Gu Xiulan decided, observing her work with satisfaction. Before her, the whole of the tainted grove with its twisted and bloated trees, unwholesome growths, and miasmas of sickness and vermin burned. Roaring flames consumed twisted bark, and trees crumbled, bleeding blood-like sap as the jets of flame pouring from her outstretched hands roared forth. Wispy blue with cores of bright white, the purifying flames consumed it all, muddy earth flash boiling and stagnant streams exploding into steam as she poured heat and destruction from her hands.

  The disease spirits in the air, taking the form of vermin and sickly miasma, billowed out, threatening to engulf her, only to wilt and die at the sheer shimmering heat of her aura, and strong buffeting winds blew the rest back into the inferno.

  She was not the only source of flame; several other disciples surrounded the grove, casting their flames as well. But even if her blood was diluted,

  was a daughter of the Purifying Sun, and no other’s flames could cleanse such filth more efficiently.

  A groaning tree, its bark licked by flames, uprooted itself, a subsonic groan emerging from its burning leaves and a facsimile of a face twisted in hatred forming on its trunk. As it began to bend its boughs toward her, stones erupted from the ground, impaling scrabbling roots, and heat blackened earth softened, dragging the tree back into the earth. Gu Xiulan smirked, sparing a smile for the grim faced Shen Hu, who stood beside her. The thing howled and thrashed as she let the lightning in her veins free. The pale scars on her face crackled, and a searing bolt of lightning cut through the smoke to strike the thrashing tree, followed by another and another.

  Each strike brought a scream and a scattering of sparks as wood split and sap boiled. Above Gu Xiulan, Linhuo laughed, fluttering out on electric wings to circle the smoke. Linhuo’s newborn siblings, sparks birthed by the striking lightning, were called to her in a cloud of cruel fey laughter, and they spread the blaze further.

  Most importantly, Gu Xiulan could feel the gazes of the sect soldiers on her back. It was good to be reminded that for all that she was often overshadowed, she was nonetheless a noble, whose power overawed her lessers. Were it not for her, these men and women would be forced to painstakingly cleanse this land with their much weaker techniques. They would fight a bitter battle every step of the way and be hurt and infected by the spirits of disease.

  How fortunate for them, then, that she would bend her powers to such a task. Their awe and adulation allowed her to ignore the unending throb of pain from her burned arm for a while longer.

  “Thank you for your efforts, Junior Sister. But that is enough.”


  Gu Xiulan glanced to the side where her commanding officer stood. Diao Gen was a handsome man and a scion of the second most powerful family in the Emerald Seas.

  “I am not exhausted yet, Senior Brother,” Gu Xiulan said, smiling warmly as the flames continued to pour from her hands.

  “Of course not,” he chuckled, gazing appreciatively into the flames. “But it is time for phase two. If Junior Sister would join Disciple Shen, you may begin putting down the malevolent spirits in detail while I and the soldiers began reclaiming the soil.”


  ***

  Shen Hu watched the burning grove with an unhappy frown. This was ugly work, and he didn’t much care for it. But the screams of diseased beasts, the popping and cracking of boiling sap weren’t unfamiliar to him. The Shen family wasn’t so fancy that they got to avoid ugly work. Let disease spirits fester, mess around with half measures and laziness, and then, they end up with a plague on their hands.

  And these were no meek little spirits of rot sickness borne from meat left out to spoil. His grip on his elbows tightened, fingers growing white as he felt something unwholesome, swollen, and tumorous in the earth try to rip free as the flames scorched its moist hide. He saw a slick, sickly yellow tendril rip free, thrashing until it was consumed by white hot flame.

  He listened with half an ear as their commander gave them new orders. He already knew where the first stop was.

  “Understood,” he said aloud, acknowledging the order. Lanhua bubbled within his dantian, unhappy with the heat, but her mud began to puddle around his feet anyway, rising up to armor his limbs.

  “Understood,” said the girl beside him sweetly, letting the jets of flame erupting from her palms sputter out.

  Diao Gen gave them both a cheerful nod, striding off to give commands to the rest of their unit, while they stepped into the flames. The inferno parted around their feet, licking heatlessly at their legs as it closed behind them, leaving the soldiers to begin shrinking the perimeter.

  “There was no need to call on your spirit,” Gu Xiulan teased. “I’d have not let the flames touch you regardless.”


  “Why have one line of defense when you can have two?” Shen Hu said lazily. “First target is about three meters to the right past the big stone.”


  Gu Xiulan sniffed haughtily, stepping daintily over the charred corpse of something four-legged and furry; he couldn’t say what it might have been before. “I suppose. Convenient, then, that I have you,” she said with a dazzling smile.

  Shen Hu grunted with acknowledgement. He still didn’t know what to make of her. This wasn’t exactly the place for flirting, and Lanhua burbled an irritated agreement in his ears. It hadn’t taken him that long to figure out what she was doing. He just had no idea what to do about it.

  She was

  just playing around to get a rise out of him. That’s what he chose to believe, anyway. He’d have no idea what to do otherwise. If he just acted oblivious, she’d eventually get tired of it and stalk off. “It’s here. Some kind of plague boil. I’ve got it trapped.”


  Carefully, he parted the boiling mud between two crumbling trees, revealing the pooled sickness beneath the surface. The smell that billowed out was a mix of long spoiled meat and sickroom stench. Beside him, Gu Xiulan’s face twisted in disgust. “Ugh. Hold it a moment longer. I shall need a few seconds to charge something

  Shen Hu shied away at the sheer size of the orb of flame that bloomed between her hands, more layers of mud pouring out to shield him from the heat that threatened to ash everything within a good two meters.

  Well, at least Gu Xiulan was distracted. Maybe ugly work wasn’t so bad after all.

  ***

  They boiled from the earth like black flame. Eyes and mouths that were like crimson tears in black fabric let out echoing wails fit to freeze the soul as flickering hands reached for her throat, their spiritual being made material by the raw resentment and envy which the wraiths felt for those who still had the temerity to draw breath.

  The first collapsed in twain, split in half by a whispering hiss of metal and a flash of white. The second and third burned, spectral flesh boiling away into oily smoke where her radiance fell.

  Where Cifeng passed, the unquiet dead were cloven in twain, and when her stride brought them into her light, even the pieces were no more. It was necessary to take these foes in this inefficient manner. Should she unleash her primary skills, the ruin and the shrine it contained would be damaged, and that would only make the problem worse.

  Their wails were unpleasant, scratching at her ears, trying to pull despair to the surface. Where her blade cut them, they tried to show her blood and flesh instead of smoke and dust.

  But the dead were the dead. They were echoes and remnants, nothing more. These people had been slain long ago, laid low by arrow and trampling hooves, before her mother had even been born and before her grandfather had even begun to cultivate. It was a sad thing, but at least this blood was not on her hands. The tendrils of lingering malevolence crawling across her thoughts could not change that.

  She raised her hand, preparing to signal her compatriots to follow. Diamond formation, the priest they were escorting at the center with herself at the front point—


  Cai Renxiang did not allow herself a frown as she lowered her hand, instead moving into position, dispelling another three wraiths which rose to challenge her. Core Disciple Jia Song was a somewhat difficult commander. She did not resent being ordered ahead. These foes were no threat, but they already knew the layout.

  If she were uncharitable, when placed alongside similar orders, she might come to the conclusion that the young lady was taking some petty pleasure in being able to command her. However, there was no call to assume such. More likely, there must have been some facet of the situation which she was blind to.

  Liming’s cloth rippled, a low growl of leashed bloodlust echoing more loudly in her thoughts than any phantom wails. The reputation of her mother’s work made any truly untoward motive vanishingly unlikely.

  Yes, something missed or a touch of petty pride and no more. In either case, she would perform her duty to specification.

  Cai Renxiang strode into the cloud of malevolence which rose from the ruined fort, and it parted like the sea before the bow of a ship.