The question over where to sleep was surprisingly sticky, as they hadn’t shaken it free by the second night in Burning Flag City. The obvious answer was to simply queue up at the gate, get a pass, get assigned a guest house to sleep in, and generally follow the rules. It would be a lot more comfortable, and less tedious, than hiding out in abandoned buildings. It was the proper way to do things. The thought made both of them grimace.
“Mortal air. It was bad enough in the Earthly Realm, but now it feels gross. It’s like going to the restaurants. I can enjoy the flavor, but it’s lacking something. I’m listening to the people, but I’m apart from them.” Liren’s voice dropped, moving from irritation to wistfulness.
“It feels like we are hiding not just from other Heavenly cultivators or heretics, but from the mortal world too.” Tian snorted, then bent over backwards. He stretched one hand up, over and back, until it was touching the tiles of the roof behind him. Bracing his fingertips against the roof, he was able to contort and lift his body into a pole position. Balanced on the tips of the fingers of one hand, feet facing the sky, unwavering. He removed fingers, until he was balanced on his pinky. With a flex of the tiny digit, he launched himself into the air. He went high enough for a noticeable hang time.
The tile he pushed off of was undisturbed. Nor was it damaged when he landed on that same pinky.
“Not the most immortal thing I can imagine, but I get what you mean.” Liren shrugged. “Hell with it. Empty storefront it is. They have the shutters locked down tight. Plenty of privacy, and the new tent is comfortable, if crowded.”
Before going to sleep, Tian ran through a set of palms. Still following the forms of the Eighteen Dragon Suppressing Palms, but subtly altering their use. The core of the art was in the internal use of energy, but a year of painful failure had taught him that the right mentality was necessary as well. There was something appropriately Heavenly about that, the notion that a proper art unified intention as well as the body and qi.
The thought made him pause mid routine. “Vital energy, which is to say the body and the foundational earthly realm, qi, the animating spirit, energy, air, the primordial stuff of the universe, for the Heavenly Realm, then intention. Mind, the intellect, but more than that, the thought before thought, and without thought. Shen. You need them all for a proper art.”
Liren looked at him, waiting for him to elaborate. He chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck. It was a bit like saying “To make chicken and rice requires both chicken and rice.” It’s true, but so what?
“I don’t know, it all just came together for me. Things people have been telling me for a while. That the best arts all lead towards a dao, that everything is in everything, that we contain all three types of energy from the moment we are born, all that. My palm art can’t just be controlling the vital energy or the qi, it also has to work with an intention or image like with Moon Crossing the Lake.”
Tian laughed and sat with a thump. “It isn’t so easy to make an art!”
The two cultivated through the night. Tian kept his Heavenly Swallows darts in his hands, nourishing them with qi. He was finding that intentionality was impacting his cultivation too. At Grandpa’s urging, he imagined a giant fish swallowing a sea, before spitting it out again. It seemed to be working. It was subtle, but he thought the efficiency had improved slightly once again.
Another recent discovery was that Tian and Liren’s cultivation arts were oddly compatible. The decrease in water qi floating around Tian meant there was relatively more fire qi available for Liren. Likewise, a reduction in fire qi made the water qi easier for Tian to filter out. The changes weren’t dramatic, but over a long enough time, such little advantages would add up. The Heavenly Realm had a way of insisting on new thinking. A decade was “short term.” What would the effects be in three centuries? Or six?
The next morning, they slipped out of the city. There was only one main road leading north. It was easy enough to guess which way Hanshen was coming.
“Hey, if we find heretics setting up to ambush Hanshen, do you think it’s because he has enemies, or because he has your teacher’s descendant with him?”
“Dunno. I still think it seems like a major coincidence for teachers’ descendant to wind up with him.” Liren shook her head. Tian had won the Rocks-Paper-Scissors game, so she was being grumpily cradled in his arms.
“Mmm. Still, though. A descendant of that venerable who has awakened a touch of their bloodline, even if they are a mortal, isn’t going to have a peaceful life, and they are going to hate lies and injustice. A censor who has taken on the role of the King of Hell for the kingdom, purging the civil service and the merchant classes? Who could be a better fit?”
“As someone with a bloodline inheritance, maybe, I have to tell you, they aren’t as strong as you might think.” Liren continued to grump. She twisted about a bit, trying to get more comfortable. There wasn’t really a comfortable way to be, so it happened fairly often.
Tian snorted softly, but didn’t argue. He was keeping his eyes on the ground, looking for threats or the column.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“Figure that everyone traveling with the censor is on horseback or in a carriage. How far can they travel in a day?” Tian asked.
“Dunno. Forty miles?”
Tian thought about it for a moment. “I have no idea if that’s a lot or a little for a mortal. It feels short, but who knows? Let’s say it’s forty. The rumors say he is about a week away from the city or less. That’s two hundred and eighty miles down the road.”
“Yep.”
“I don’t know exactly how fast we travel on this sword, but it’s been a few hours now.”
“I know. Ancestors, do I know.” She twisted her shoulders around again, the point of her shoulder grinding in painfully.
“Where is the cavalry?”
Liren didn’t answer. She stopped shifting around and looked out over the steppes. It wasn’t flat. The land flowed in rolling dales, short hills and valleys adding texture to the open country. You might not be able to hide a whole army behind those hills, but a few hundred men? Especially if they were scattered? Entirely possible. Unless the other side had cultivators.
Tian wanted to stroke his chin, but his hands were full of Liren. On the whole, he was content. They followed the road for another hour, when something began to tickle the edges of Tian’s awareness. He stopped instantly, tightening his grip on Liren as his eyes hunted for something out of place.
“There!” Liren pointed.
A patch of the wide blue sky had a speck on it. Tian focused on it for a long moment. “An eagle? But I can feel qi coming from it. Odd qi too, not cursed, but yin.”
“Enchanted, somehow.” Liren kept her eyes fixed on the eagle. “They must be doing the same thing we are. Looking for the army.”
“It’s circling. I’d say whoever it is, found them.” Tian leaned forward and drove the sword faster.
“The eagle spotted us.”
“Is it taking action?”
“Not yet.” Liren started looking around, trying to spot where the enemy was. “There is a haze over those hills.” She pointed. Tian looked over. The rolling hills seemed to shimmer, like air over blazing hot stone.
“And there is the cavalry. No wonder they were so far out!”
Troopers on white horses rode ahead and behind a long convoy. Dozens of wagons crept down the road, hauled by heavy draft horses. The pace was maddeningly slow. The wagons groaned and labored over every bump in the road, their burdens weighing on the axles, and wheels, and teamsters alike. The dusty, tired men looked every way but dead ahead. They didn’t want their eyes to linger on the black carriage pulled by six black horses at the front of the convoy, surrounded by a squad of troopers.
“It’s an ambush!” Tian ground out. “I’m only sensing six cultivators in the convoy, all Earthly, none at Level Nine. You?”
“Same. Whatever that haze over the hills is, it’s hiding the qi and vital energy of whoever is behind it. Wait. It’s moving.”
Tian sent the sword into a steep dive. “Get on the ground, now!” Liren nodded, and jumped at a height that mortals would consider fatal. She barely bent her knees when she landed. Tian rose up again, and cupped his hands to his mouth. “STAND READY, ENEMIES COME FROM THE EAST!”
The soldiers snapped to attention. Hands tightened on their lances. Squad leaders shouted orders, forming the troopers into ranks. Scouts raced out, horns blowing. A bearded man, looking like an ordinary teamster, raced to the back of a wagon and started throwing pigeons out. They desperately flapped their wings, heading south for Burning Flag City. Tian saw the eagle turn and dive for them. His hand flashed out. The eagle twisted in the air, trying to evade, but since when is an eagle more agile than a flight of swallows?
“Come forth, so I can kill you!” Liren shouted, her spear blazing.
The shimmering haze vanished. Horsemen in their hundreds raced out from behind hills. Short bows with wicked double curves were knocked with goosefeather arrows, then loosed with terrible accuracy. The soldiers charged forward on their white steeds, leaning over the necks of their horses, eager to close with the nimble raiders.
Tian kept his eyes moving, searching for the Heavenly Realm cultivator he knew had to be there. The Earthly cultivators had raced out from the convoy, diving into the mass of mortals. Ignoring them. Tian felt their vital energy- five at level seven, one at level eight, none impressive, none wearing uniforms he recognized. Mercenaries from very ordinary sects, or simply wanderers. They fell on seemingly ordinary tribesmen, trying to cut them down from their horses. They were met with the magic of the steppes.
Tian could feel it through his elemental and qi sense, even if he couldn’t explain it. There was a biting wolf on the head of a shaman’s lance, or the paw of a bear on a chopping saber. Armor made of metal plates sewn on to hide absorbed blows with the steadiness of ancient hills. The qi wasn’t cycling the way it did with a cultivator’s arts. He didn't understand what it was doing. Nor did he have time to study them.
“I came hunting for one rabbit, and caught three. The Spirits watch over their people, truly.” A withered looking man, more wrinkles than taut skin, rode out on a green furred horse. “Two baby wizards, lost on the steppes. Did you think you were coming to the rescue?”
He raised a withered hand and scattered a fistful of wolf teeth on the grass. White wolves, rimmed in yin flames leapt from the earth where the teeth fell. Not quite at the Heavenly level, but close enough. The shaman lifted a bow of his own, well worn, with red tassels hanging from it, and blue forms traced upon its limbs.
Liren didn’t wait around to find out what it could do. She charged into the pack of wolves. She fought using the horn spear, but didn’t bother with any arts. She simply stabbed, slashed and crushed the wolves. Wolves that howled when they were stabbed, and blazed with cold flames- but did not die.
Tian followed her example, sending the sword into a dive as he raised the staff. He would see what tricks the shaman could play when the weight of a small hill landed on him. The shaman looked up at him and laughed softly, with a bare hint of a smile. His green-furred horse danced backwards, its hoofs leaving no trace on the grass below as it moved to dodge Tian’s strike. The shaman coolly raised his bow and drew back the string to his cheek.
“Three rabbits in one hunt. What a good day.”