“Third Generation-”
“Never mind that, do you know who Elder Starsieve is today?” Tian asked. Hong hesitated, then shook her head. “The Grand Elder. And my father’s master.”
Hong staggered a second. “Ah. Alright. So we are… very unlikely to catch hell for being here, then. So long as we are respectful.”
“I’m not going to touch the roots of anything, let alone a “dragon vein,” whatever that is. You?”
She shook her head slowly. “I’m too yang already. Phoenix vein? I might be tempted. Dragon Vein does nothing for me.”
Tian nodded. “Just going to… leave the words “other side of the Heavenly Realm” right there. I’m sure that doesn’t mean what I think it means.”
“I mean, it might be talking about death.”
“That is a possibility.” Tian nodded.
“Sweep up before we leave?” Hong asked, her voice bright.
“Lets make sure we tidy away any dropped leaves and the like, leave it better than we found it, that kind of thing.” Tian agreed. “Let’s check out the pond.”
“Shame the oranges and berries aren’t in season. I can’t help but feel like we are missing out.” Hong sighed.
“I’m not so sure.” The pond was almost glassy, still and clear and dreadfully deep. Tian couldn’t see the bottom of it. The phrase “Dragon Pool” did leapt to mind. He tried to banish it as quickly as it came.
“I don’t see anything, do you?” He asked. Hong shook her head, then frowned.
“The demon came out of there, though. It wouldn’t be down there for no reason.” Hong said.
“It also said we would go in the hole. I’m… not seeing any holes other than this pond.” Tian squatted down and stared into the depths. Liren joined him and delicately touched the water. She jolted, then gasped.
“Sister?!”
“It feels so nice!”
It was Tian’s turn to stagger. “Nice? It feels nice?”
“You have to feel this. It’s so, so soothing. Talk about moderating yang with yin, this is it right here.”
Tian put his hand gingerly in the pool and nearly collapsed. It was like his hand was being taken care of. Like his hand was now filled with cooling, healing water. Like every little problem was going to be alright. He just needed to relax. It just needed time. There was no rush. There was never any rush.
He yanked his hand out. “That does feel nice. And dangerous.”
“Dangerous?”
“How long do you think you can hold your breath for?”
“I dunno, five minutes?” Hong shrugged. “Longer, actually, now that I think about it. Maybe more like thirty or forty minutes?” She slowly dragged her hand through the water, luxuriating in the feeling of it running between her fingers.
Tian waited a moment.
“You know what? I really don’t know, but I’m game to find out. I’m going to just dive in-”
“I’m going to stop you there.” Tian looked grim. “You would drown. You would be so comfortable and so relaxed, you couldn’t be bothered to do anything. Just like the water cavern, except more so.”
Hong blinked in confusion, then frowned. “You are right. Damn. That’s sneaky. I guess we just use buckets to fill up a barrel or something?” She reluctantly pulled her hand from the pond.
“Nope, I’m going in.” Tian shook his head. “The demon was in there for some reason, and I’m pretty confident in handling a high yin environment.”
“Oh please! I’m overwhelmingly yang. Too damn yang. Why do you think you would be better?” Hong argued. Tian just looked at her. She looked back. Tian sighed and looked over at the crane, who appeared to have zero interest in getting in the pond but was pretty interested in the unripe oranges.
It took Hong another minute. Then, “Right. You were eaten by a demonic hawk and came out fine. You took a bath in yin acid, allegedly. Still seems dumb sending the person who can’t swim to work underwater.”
“Beats the person who won’t swim. I’ll tie a rope around my waist. Stop lowering me if I tug twice on the rope. You haul me up if I tug three times fast on the rope, or when… ten minutes… have passed.” Tian pulled out a length of rope. His brothers had stressed the need to always carry rope, and that there were only times when there was too little rope and not too much. The ‘length’ turned out to be a hundred feet of half inch thick sisal. “This will do for a start. We can always tie a second rope to the first if we need to.”
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“Brother Zihao…”
Tian looked up from untying his robes. Liren tended to just call him “Brother.” She never called him “Bro” though she occasionally slipped up and called him “Brother Tian.” “Brother Zihao” usually signified something important.
“Yes?”
“You could die. You would be falling in the darkness and there would be no one to catch you. Just falling forever into the airless dark.”
Tian smiled. “Someone would catch me. You.”
He tied the rope around his waist, tied the other to the tallow tree, and jumped in. His dart was coiled around his upper arm, just in case. The water closed around him, wrapping him in its peace. It was quiet, in the pond. Even the sounds of his falling were muffled. Even the beating of his heart.
Cool tendrils of watery yin qi drilled into his pores. Tian faintly regretted that he couldn’t use Advent of Spring to cultivate here. It would be so convenient if he could just breathe water. Fish could breathe water. They had gills, but they demonstrated the principle. He could be like a carp, sleeping under a rock, eating whatever he found in the dirt. It would be very peaceful.
“Grandpa, you may need to help me out here. I’m looking around but not seeing much, and it’s hard to remember to care about it.”
Not a problem. We are barely twenty feet down as it is. Just getting started.
Tian drifted down in an endless moment. Liren wouldn’t do well here. Tian wasn’t very happy with such an enclosed space, but if he looked up, he could still see a little patch of sky. Besides, all the yin qi was calming him down. But it was dark, and you were rather helpless, and there was a sensation of pressure, of being trapped. Sister Liren wouldn't do well here at all.
“It’s funny. I never thought there would be a human I could blindly trust, and now there are… at least two. And more I would definitely trust my back to, but two that I feel I can trust completely. Dad, and Liren. What an odd thing. What a strange word- “Sister.” We are all brothers and sisters, but my trust in her is totally different.”
Grandpa chuckled. Oh yes, it’s quite a different thing entirely. I’m going to let you slowly discover how and why, though. You will be better for it, and some things I’m useless to help with.
“What a strange life this is. I better not tell Liren I trust her so much. I think she would be very silly about everything.”
Safe guess. Oh! Stop the rope, stop the rope!
Tian gave the rope two sharp tugs and tried to see what Grandpa saw. It took a moment, but it wasn’t really hidden. There was a patch of wall covered in a waxy paste, white-ish, but darkened with silt and mud. It somewhat matched the color of the wall in the darkness of the well.
“I have no idea how I’m going to get this out. If I carve it away or yank it away, the cavity will flood. Whatever was stored in here will be lost or destroyed.”
Grandpa laughed one of his not-nice laughs. You are underestimating that spirit. Remember how it merged with the dirt? I bet it could do the same thing with this wax. Probably even easier, since they come from the same origin. Carve it away. Load up a fresh ring if the ring you are wearing gets full. The wax is a treasure, remember? This stuff is going to be Liren’s new favorite thing. You will want to grab all you can.
Tian pulled a long iron peg from his ring and anchored it into the wall. Once he was satisfied that it would hold, he drove in another. Once he had a secure place to stand, he pulled out a long knife and started carving lines. Hopefully, he would be able to cut away a big block.
“Why is she going to love it, Grandpa?”
“It’s the wax from the spiritual tallow tree above the pond. It’s already yin, and it’s been soaking in the yin pond water for who knows how long. More than a thousand years, probably, some of it. The arrays Starsieve set up kept this place from turning demonic. In fact, it’s meritorious. Put it this way. I know a recipe that will help her use this stuff to lighten her skin and enrich the yin within her. She will still be tall and tan, but… less tan. And definitely more yin.
“It won’t cost too much energy?”
I’m going to cheat. It’s a mortal recipe. We are just going to use better quality ingredients. Incidentally, don’t bother trying to pry out a whole block. Just chip away. I’d switch to a camp hatchet and cut in a v shape, alternating sides until a chunk falls out. It will go faster. Make sure to keep everything in big chunks for easy storage.
Liren hauled him up all too soon, looking worried. Tian settled her down, explained what was what, and enthusiastically faceplanted back in the pond.
He didn’t care about his attempt at diving. He was on a treasure hunt, and Grandpa was already cackling over the loot. By the end of the second dive, he started finding ripe oranges, sealed in the wax. They looked as fresh as could be, the yang qi tightly bound up inside its skin.
The hole wasn’t just the monster’s body storage spot, it was its larder. After the first hour of excavation, Tian had Hong drag the mortals into the secret orchard. There was nothing here that would hurt them, so long as they didn’t touch anything. It might confuse the monks, but so what?
Besides, the Censor had already collected Tian’s tea oranges. So all was well.
Peh. Only animal bones. What a disappointment. I was hoping for at least a few cultivator bodies.
“Grandpa, it’s a mortal art. What immortals would be coming here? For that matter, assuming they didn’t study at the Bamboo Medicine Hut or something, what immortals wouldn’t be able to put down that spirit?”
Oh, there is always someone who slips up. Now then. We are going to do something slightly cheeky. Get an empty storage ring.
Tian kept two dozen of them on a string. They might be legendary to mortals, but once you started fighting heretics regularly, you realized they were more common than good hygiene.
We won’t go too crazy. One storage ring will be plenty.
“Grandpa?”
Starsieve said you could take the water. This pond is clearly spring fed. It will refill in time. So just fill the ring with pond water.
All told, it was enough materials to make gallons of the ointment prescribed by the Elder on the tablet, and still have tons left over for skin cream. The fresh orange problem was solved too. The spirit had been stockpiling the oranges for years, clearly not willing to let them rot on the ground. It was an immense haul, so there was really only one thing to do.
Celebrate. Luxurious debauchery. And as a newly wealthy person, he would be generous with his companions.
“Everyone, gather around! Let’s try the new tea!”