“Introductions first. You are Junior Brother Tian. We are your senior brothers Fan, Tang and Su.”
“Nice to meet you, Senior Brothers. This is my first mission, so please look out for me.” Tian bowed with his hands clasped. His seniors nodded back, laughing.
“Naturally, naturally. Now, did you go to the mission hall to get a copy of the mission?”
“Yes, Senior Brother Fan.” San was the eldest, Tian judged, as he had done almost all the talking. A lean man with high cheekbones who carried a saber on his hip. Tian knew he had a storage ring- all the senior brothers did. Yet he still chose to carry his saber.
Brother Tang had a cold face and sharply upswept eyebrows. He carried a sword on his back. It was surely a flying sword, so he was unlikely to draw it by hand, but… again, another senior brother who chose to wear their weapon.
As for Senior Brother Su, he just smiled. He seemed to always smile. Tian had the distinct impression that almost nothing could persuade Brother Su not to smile. But he didn’t have his weapon displayed, which made Tian take a particular note of him. Based on the other two seniors, that meant the weapon was hidden, not missing.
Tian handed Senior Brother Fan the slip with both hands. Fan took it casually, glanced at it, and then it flickered out of existence. Tian assumed it had been absorbed by the ring.
“Go to Shallow River Village and slay the demon. Except it’s not a demon, just some overgrown animal. Maybe a demonized animal if a Heretic has been messing around near there, but there would be way more casualties if that was the case. Pay- three spirit stones, five merit points. Your seniors will be taking the spirit stones, but you can have all five merit points. Since you are just starting out, you need all the points you can get.”
“Yes, I still owe ten points for my rope dart.” Tian frowned. This really was his senior brothers looking out for him, and it still would take two or more missions just to break even.
“God, remember those weapons we got starting out?” Fan looked over at Tang and shuddered theatrically. Tang shook his head and looked away. Apparently the memory was unbearable.
“There is nothing left in the Outer Court that we can buy with merit points that we want, need, or are bored enough to be curious about. On the other hand, we can go to Mountain Gate City, and there are lots of good things there. But they all cost spirit stones. You see?” Brother Su explained. His voice was a touch deep, and very smooth.
Tian nodded rapidly.
“Good. This mission is just nice for your level. Let’s not waste the Mission Hall’s good intentions and go get this critter. Here, put this on. You will have to tie it up a bit, I’m afraid. Nothing even close to your size in the store room.”
Brother Fan tossed him an enormous dusty black robe and a big straw hat. The hat was shaped a bit like a stool- just a solid cylinder over his head, with a few holes for his eyes. To his immense surprise, it was light, breathable and didn’t impede his vision or hearing at all.
“Specially prepared hats. Don’t ask me how they do it because I don’t know. The robes, however, are heavy cotton and if you don’t hate it already, you soon will. Here, I’ll help you tie up your sleeves. Just wear it over your normal uniform.” Brother Sui was already moving his hands, clearly expecting this problem.
“We are disguising ourselves as ascetic monks. There are thousands of these bastards running around, and a sizable fraction of them are Earthly tier cultivators in disguise. Stops the mortals from freaking out seeing immortals, or worse, forgetting their proper piety. It also keeps the monks safe, because every now and then some freak decides to kill a monk and just explodes for no reason.” Sui’s smile seemed to become extra gentle.
The party set off. Shallow River Village was only sixty miles away- not far even for Tian, let alone his seniors. Tian hadn’t learned a body lightening art, but he still ate up the miles with ease.
The countryside looked different to Tian, but he struggled to understand why. The paddies seemed unchanged- their stone walls and sluice gates controlling the life giving water. The rice stalks were green and tender, rising up to dance in the faint breeze. Peasants did some kind of peasant thing in the fields. Weeding, maybe. Tian knew nothing about farming, and wasn’t much interested in learning.
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They didn’t look at him. He was hiding from them still, but he was hiding right out in the open. And the reason he was hiding had changed. This time, he was hiding so that he didn’t hurt them.
Which led back to their disguises, and the Seniors flat out refusal to spend even one extra minute on this apparently routine job. The Seniors wanted to move faster. Much, much faster. But doing so would make their disguises pointless. A monk running down the road faster than the best racehorses was a dead giveaway. So they came up with a little trick. It was called “Strolling,” and it was sheer torture.
There was really nothing more to it than walking quickly, then returning seamlessly to a slow pace. The trick was that you could only walk quickly when no one was looking. A “simple” art, one that a mortal could master. Theoretically. Tian challenged any mortal in the world to notice when a peasant two hundred yards away and behind the rushing immortal in question turned to look at them.
“It’s too soon for you to manage that, of course, so you just focus on Brother Fan’s back. Match his speed. How easy is that?”
Tian was starting to believe that Brother Su couldn’t be trusted. Senior Brother Tang never said anything at all. It made him much more reliable.
The sensation of trying to stop and start seamlessly, going from twenty miles an hour down to four, then back up again, with no hint as to how long they walked at what speed… torture. Sheer physical and mental torture, slowly breaking down his joy as strolling along the wide dirt road and admiring the green paddies, tasting the humid, sweet air and watching the broad winged herons heave themselves up into the sky.
It was a painful journey, but it only took a day. They got to Shallow River Village after sunset. The Senior Brothers looking fresh and relaxed, Tian looking like he had been beaten with hammers.
Sometimes, Brother Fan slowed down faster than Tian could respond, so he slammed into his senior brother’s rock hard back. Tian wondered if his brother was doing it on purpose, but all the other brothers stopped at the same time, so… probably not?
Shallow River Village was a collection of shacks, with a courtyard overseeing them up on a small hill. The Courtyard belonged to a prominent family- it was the so-called Landholding Estate that Senior Brother Fu had mentioned before. The village, the fields, and even the peasants, were all the ‘property’ of the estate. Strictly speaking, everything belonged to the Monastery. Even more strictly speaking, the Emperor is far away and high above, disinterested in the injustices suffered by ants.
“Alright, we are hunting a low grade river ‘demon.’ It hides in shady parts of the river bank and hauls people into the water and drowns them. Then eats them. Pretty standard behavior for a few spirits, but given the lack of spirituality in the area and the fact it is targeting mortals, it is most likely a mutated frog or gecko or something.” Senior Brother Fan kept his voice down. The Mortals had petitioned for the Temple to resolve their problem, but it was best to remain unnoticed until the job was complete.
“Junior Brother, correct me if I’m wrong, but you haven’t learned any sensory arts, right?”
“Sensory arts? What are they, Senior Brother?”
“Seems I’m right. Go to the Technique Pavilion after the mission. You can't afford to borrow any right now, but you can at least see what they have. Basically, it’s arts that improve your awareness of the world around you, helping you find hidden threats and treasures. Very useful stuff, and if you practice diligently, it will lay a foundation for developing your divine sense at the Heavenly Person stage.”
Tian nodded and thought things through for a bit. “I’m going to be bait, aren’t I, Senior Brother Fan?”
“You are, Junior Brother. You are.”
Tian walked along the river bank, looking down. Partially hoping to see the demon, but mostly hoping to see a fat fish or some edible herbs. He didn’t have any confidence in spotting an ambush predator on its own ground, even with his improved night vision. After all, it was only ‘improved’ to the level of an ordinary person.
He stopped suddenly, and stooped, carefully picking three leaves off a small plant, leaving two to let it keep growing. He smiled and carefully put them in a pocket inside his robe. The local villagers would have combed this riverbank a dozen times a day, but the use of this plant was a bit obscure, and needed a few other ingredients. He still remembered Grandpa Jun’s lessons from the jungle.
Tian kept patrolling and kept hunting. He stooped to harvest some wild watercress, when he felt a sudden thrill of danger coming from behind him. He leapt forward, tumbling out of the way. Something long and sharp jabbed through the air where he had just been.
Tian came up with the rope dart out. With a sharp twist, he sent the dart smacking into the water. It hit something! Tian frowned. It hit, but the feeling on the dart wasn’t right. It seemed to have bounced off something, not sunk in.
“Ah. Maybe that’s why people coat it in poison.” Tian thought. Then some hideous thing twice his size exploded from the water, and he didn’t have the time to think of anything much anymore.
The creature jumped onto the shore, almost on top of Tian. A blunt head lunged forward, long tongue stabbing forward like a spear. Tian whipped his dart forward, letting it tangle with the tongue. The tongue recoiled, fast, so fast he could hardly react. But the training on the road wasn’t for nothing. As soon as he felt the pull on his rope, Tian jumped up. It was only a small jump, but the power of the pull was extraordinary.
Tian flew up towards the great beast’s face, focusing all his attention. He had managed to adjust the angle enough to avoid the mouth, slamming into the slippery forehead of the creature. It smelled of river water and something else, something he had never smelled before. Spicy, and a little unpleasant but not terribly so. He didn’t have time to think. He dug his foot into the slippery skin as best he could, took a hopping step upward, and slapped his hand down between the animal’s eyes.
Tiny threads of qi extended from his hand, piercing through the thick, rubbery membrane of the animal’s skin. They drilled through the bones of the skull, vibrating as they went. Finally, they pierced the brain. The vibrations sped up dreadfully, the ultrasonic ripples spreading through the medium of brain fluid and soft tissue. The interior of the skull was turned to chaotic pulp in an instant. As though a thunderclap had exploded between the demon’s ears.
There was barely a soft, wet pap sound as a little palm struck. The sound hardly made it across the stream, lost in the rushing, shallow waters.
The animal collapsed. Tian landed next to it. He looked at his ruined hands. The gnawed upon fingers had always been a proof of weakness to him. Even after he rebuilt his body, he couldn’t escape the label of ‘weak.’
This was the first time he had to make a move in a life or death fight since he began cultivating. With one move, he could kill a demon twice his size. Cultivation gave him this. This was the strength that came from constantly practicing. Constantly moving forward. Constantly cultivating himself. Tian clenched his hands and looked up at the moon. It seemed very bright tonight.
Which made it quite embarrassing that he didn’t see the second demon come out of the water.