Tian, Hong and the crane set off from the Monastery proper, loaded with every sort of useful thing their limited budget could buy. It wasn’t all that much. The Monastery had never bothered stockpiling mortal or earthly goods. When Tian asked about who did the laundry, he got a rather pointed look and the Martial Aunt he asked snapped her fingers. Her already immaculate robes were suddenly crisp looking, and with a faint smell of camilla blossom.
“Part of the reward for becoming a Core Disciple is a set of arts for easing one’s life. Do you think Core Disciples are so free that we have the time to wash sheets and air out mattresses? Do you think I mop?”
“Naturally not, Senior! My thanks for your patience in relieving my ignorance.” He bowed apologetically. There was not a word of lie either. Tian didn’t think about the Marital Aunt at all. It was easy to forget that the standard to even visit the Monastery wasn’t being in the Heavenly Realm. That just entitled you to live in Mountain Gate City. You had to be chosen, selected as a Core Disciple or a Direct Disciple. It was a place for those who would journey beyond the Heavenly Realm. Those who would never again have to worry about laundry. As a consequence, those in the Earthly Realm got a crash lesson in soap making.
It’s the little things you never think about that you start to miss intensely when they aren’t there. Tian might not smell when he got sweaty, but a good scrub was always satisfying. So they prepared carefully, traded for what they could, made what they couldn’t buy, and figured out how to do without for the rest.
The path out of the Monastery followed the contours of the spur of the mountain the monastery was built on. The monastery was, he was told, built around the mid-point of the mountain. This was largely due to the density of the qi. It was more potent the closer you were to the peak, but it also grew increasingly chaotic.
For those in the Heavenly Realm, this density of qi was just right. For those at the Earthly Realm, it was intoxicating. Every breath of cultivation brought in as much energy as ten breaths at the foot of the mountain. For those who had to sit in meditation to cultivate, it was an immense time saver. For Tian, it meant that he could go all day and barely feel tired.
The two were making for Flowing Fire Valley, about a week away on foot. The name came from the long waterfall that caught the sunset and blazed with reds and oranges. From the right angle, at the right time of year, it really did look like fire was pouring down the mountain and flowing into the valley below. Some ancient Senior had loved that view. He carved himself a cave dwelling near the river, then sealed it with a large stone and powerful arrays before he died.
Tian and Hong ran along the roads where they existed, and when they dropped away, they ran through the forests and the brush. Mists clung to the sides of the Mountain, and were denser under the shady leaves. The call of birds, some ordinary, some strange and terrible, would echo and bewilder the ears. Every bush or rock could be hiding a viper, or something far, far less ordinary.
“We have got to get away from the Monastery more often. This is awesome!” Hong was laughing almost non-stop as they pulled up wild parsnips.
“Look, under the log to your right. It that Fool’s Ear Mushrooms?” Tian was almost bouncing with excitement.
“Nice! Dinner tonight is secured!”
It was twenty minutes before they gathered themselves enough to move on again. An hour later- “Hey Sis, Blackhorn Deer were on the list of game we could harvest, right?”
“Right, not a protected species, but we can’t touch pregnant females. That one, however, sure looks like a buck to me.” They discovered a hidden advantage of the ear cuffs. While they couldn’t transmit thoughts, you could speak almost inaudibly and still be heard by the person with the matched cuff.
A minute later- “You missed! How could you miss?”
“You try throwing a spear eighty yards! And the mist makes everything a little blurry.”
“Excuses. Now dinner has gone running off, and we must get by on vegetables. Horrible.” Tian scolded.
“Alright, next time you get to catch the borderline magical- look out!”
The seemingly ordinary viper that had been resting on the tree branch flared with vital energy and dove for Tian’s neck. His elemental sense, and Hong’s warning, had him barely dodging in time. The snake landed with a thud that seemed too heavy for its slim shape, and immediately twisted and raised its head to strike. Which made it convenient for Tian to nip in, grab it seven inches from the nose, and snap its spine.
“Damn! Out of nowhere!” He grumbled.
“Seriously. It must have been… I don’t know, suppressing its breath or something. Somehow. Maybe it was sleeping.” Hong shook her head, then sniggered. “A snake was offering you its poison, and you dodged it. Shame. You missed out on a tonic.”
“Who did?” Tian ripped the snake’s head off, then split the viper’s surprisingly long body open and cleaned it out. “We’ll let it drain for a bit, and eat it for lunch. In the meantime-”
He pried the viper’s jaws open, and after a moment’s struggle, just ripped the lower jaw off. “Don’t know why I didn’t think of that before.” He grunted.
“Wait, you aren’t going to eat the venom sacks or something?”
“Why would I do that?”
“Safety?” Hong spread her hands.
“What’s not safe about this?” Tian jabbed the viper’s fangs into his wrist, making sure he got his thumb in the roof of the snake's mouth. A gentle but firm pressure, he reckoned, should force all the venom out and into his arm.
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“I know your cultivation art should handle that, but… no, it’s just freaky. It’s not right.” Hong shook her head and looked away.
“Hell, the first time I did this, I wasn’t even a cultivator. Oh, oof! Nasty. Necrotizing toxin, cyanide based toxin, no hemotoxins or neurotoxins, but those first two are nasty enough all on their own.”
“See, it’s things like that! Exactly like that!”
Tian half closed his eyes, focusing on the Hell Suppressing Sutra. The snake wasn’t all that strong, and its venom was weakened after death. Still, every little bit helped.
“Ginger scallion sauce. Roast the snake over the fire on skewers, hit it with the sauce and some chili oil, and serve with rice. What do you think?” Tian asked.
“Sounds good. We can roast the parsnips with it, and save the mushrooms for tomorrow.” Hong nodded.
“Oh, right! Ginseng!” Tian rapped his forehead, then removed the snake head. He wasn’t going to get anything else out of it.
“You think it grows around here?” Hong asked.
“No idea, but let’s keep an eye out. Can you imagine the medicinal effects, AND the flavor?” Tian was salivating at the thought.
They didn’t find Ginseng that night, or the next night. They did eventually take a deer, only to discover that neither of them had ever actually skinned or processed a deer. The results were disgusting, but after a day of running up and down steep slopes, their hunger far outweighed their non-existent squeamishness. Tian swore almost constantly as he tried to harvest the antlers and tendons, as they could be made into medicine. Nobody ever showed him how to properly harvest or process them, so he was relying on his textbooks and it didn’t go great.
The crane flew overhead, finding ponds and rivers to fish in while her slower, wingless companions caught up. There were endless new plants to try, and the fish were fat. It was a good place to be a crane.
Tian would catch the crane watching him and Liren. Not alarmed by them. It felt more like they were being studied. Like she was trying to understand something so utterly alien, she had no way to even conceptualize it.
“She’s reaching the limits of animal wisdom. I don’t know how animals break through to the Heavenly Realm, but if she wants to understand humanity, and wants to be able to use human arts, she will need to awaken her spiritual intelligence. Sister Lin would know. I haven’t spoken to her in almost six months. I’ll visit her when I get back.”
The wind in the bamboo forests shook the leaves, not loud, but such a consuming rustling that Tian couldn’t hear anything else. They saw a tiger, jet black with orange stripes, drinking down by the river. The qi on it felt like it was at the extreme of the Earthly realm. Every inch of it was a valuable material or medicine. They only watched it, then were on their way. The tigers were protected by the Monastery. It had been explained to them, in detail, just how many bad things would happen if the mountain suddenly lost its big predators. It had happened before, and the immortals had long memories.
On the fifth day, they were puzzled by a rock face.
“I think it’s malachite.” Hong pointed to a description in a field guide, but Tian didn’t look at it.
“It can’t be. Someone would have taken it if it was.”
“Would they, though? How much is a Heavenly Realm person going to care about what is probably pretty ordinary copper? Well, comparatively ordinary, it’s definitely got some spirituality now. And if you wanted it for decoration, you would really be stretching things to call it a ‘semi-precious stone.’” Hong put away the book.
Tian poked at the rock face. It was a vibrant blue-green, looking almost like mold. He had no idea what malachite looked like, but this was basically the same color as tarnished copper. Maybe it was malachite.
“We would need tons of it to get any useful amount of copper, right?”
“No idea.” Hong shrugged.
“I don’t feel like digging up a load of maybe-valuable ore all day. Let’s just leave it. If we ever need copper, we can come back for it. Besides, give it a few tens of thousands of years and it might really be worth something.” Tian found it hard to get motivated. It seemed Hong wasn’t motivated either, because she straightened her robes and set off running again.
“Still, good to know that we have backup loot in case the grotto is a bust,” she said, and Tian had to agree.
They had run a little behind schedule with their frequent stops for foraging. They reached Flowing Fire Valley eight days after leaving the Monastery. Not that either minded. They had time.
“Why are you staring at the stream?” Hong asked. Tian had been eyeballing the long waterfall for a couple of minutes.
“I was kind of hoping that it would do something without it having to be sunset. I guess not. It is pretty, though. Lots of fish in the stream, according to the Crane, and it looks like there are a lot of wild herbs and vegetables growing all through the valley. I bet deer come through here all the time. This would be a good place to live.”
Hong took a moment to admire the scenery with him. The drifting mists were a little thinner here, the breeze a little faster. Wood and water qi filled the valley almost to overflowing, anchored by earth. She nodded. “Yeah. It would.”
Eventually, Tian flexed his fingers. “Alright, let’s get to it.”
“Did you just try to crack your knuckles?”
“Do what now?”
“You did. You absolutely did, and your noodly fingers don’t crack.”
“I have no idea what you are talking about.” Tian lied with immense dignity. “Let’s get this array open, shall we?”
Hong snickered, then came over to investigate the sealed grotto entrance. It wasn’t exactly subtle. There was a bright blue-green boulder, carefully carved into a sphere, partially wedged into the side of the valley. Even covered with moss and lichen, some of the carvings on it peeked through.
“Hey, this is that same malachite we saw before!” Hong started peeling off the moss growing on the rock. “Pretty qi-rich moss too. Is it good for anything?”
“Not that I know of. Try to hang it on the rocks nearby, maybe it will keep growing.” Tian did his best to put his words into practice.
“Don’t you want to take some back with you?”
“Nah, can’t keep it alive.” He shook his head. “Not worth killing it for a maybe.”
Hong grumbled at that. “We are doing an awful lot of not-looting for a looting expedition.”
“Said the woman standing in front of a sealed grotto-heaven. What’s it look like?” Tian asked. He could see the elements flowing through the array, but Hong had the better eye for it.
The array wasn’t something simple. It was shaped like an octagon, with each side carrying an ancient sigil and each corner decorated with a different twisting shape. It didn’t look demonic or evil. If anything, it had a faintly holy air. It would be, in Tian’s opinion, a complete pain in the ass to get through.
“It looks like it could be broken by a slightly stronger gust of wind. They really did find us a spot that was practically already open.” Liren was unimpressed.
“Did someone weaken it or something?”
“Looks like it’s just worn down by time and erosion. One second and I’ll crack it.”
She was as good as her word, destroying the array with a well aimed finger wrapped in vital energy.
“Sometimes, things are just easy.” She grinned and rolled the stone away from the mountain, revealing the grotto entrance. “Come on, let’s see what good things we can pick up.”