Kind Young Master [Progression Fantasy - Cultivation]

It took him half as long to filter the second dao seed as it had the first.

The first had seared his throat and shaken his spirit loose from its moorings. This one, though bitter, moved through him more easily. The qi it left behind was lighter, almost eager. Though it carried the will of the leopard, a beast with no desire to be tamed, tame it he did. This was not a hunger seed; the leopard had been developing a wood aspect.

Filtration was still required to make the qi amenable to his Yin root, but it was not the struggle that the hunger seed had been. Where once it had gathered in a diffuse mass, now it fell into clean patterns, filtering through a lattice that thickened with each cycle.

When it was done, Xiao Sheng examined him only long enough to nod.

"You'll need Sky Straining Moss to finish the hound's hunger seed. It is too dense for you as you are now. There's a patch not far from here. Collect it only when the sun is at its apex, or it will be ruined."

The phrase "not far from here" was relative. After receiving a more detailed description of the plant and its habitat, he set out with the third elixir in hand. He would reach the moss before he finished the filtration, but beginning the process on the way would prevent the loss of several days.

The mountain had grown warm with the promise of summer. The snow melted from the middle ridges, and with it the lingering hush of winter's breath. Spring had not been strong enough to banish that hush entirely, but there was no doubt now that the seasons were exchanging seats. Foraging had almost become too easy.

Sky Straining Moss grew high and alone. It clung to damp stone and wept from a sheer wall, and Fushuai climbed to meet it. The narrow paths presented no challenge, and he climbed as naturally as any ape. A refined body and a refining spirit, along with his runs to the parasol tree, had more than prepared him for the rigors of any natural terrain.

A series of granite knuckles jutted below the moss, and he leapt from one to the next to obtain the prize. The moss was sea green and speckled with purple flowers, closed tight like tiny fists. His spiritual sense told him it was a magic herb, though not its specific properties. As the sun had not yet reached its peak, he balanced on a finger of stone and cycled.

Three days to reach this place, and the hunger elixir was already gone. He'd taken the last draught the night before, and it was spinning in his dantian according to the Void Dilution method. The river of qi that ran through him, slow and inevitable, no longer surged or frothed. It simply moved.

The web within his dantian was firm. Each filament vibrated with quiet harmony, and as his breath settled, the qi passed through with neither resistance nor waste. The feeling was not dramatic. There was no flash of insight, no light behind the eyes. A sense of rightness expanded from his center until, for a brief moment, he felt as if his body had come into alignment with the universe itself. The turning of the celestial wheel. He blinked, and the sun was directly above him. The purple flowers had unfurled.

The insight had passed, leaving behind an echo that was almost an ache. He knew he did not need the moss anymore; he had reached the next step of qi refinement without it. Still, it was a powerful herb, and he had been sent to fetch it, so he collected as much as he could fit into his pack before turning back.

The sky was cloudless above him, and the warmth on his skin reminded him of his mother's hands, a time before he knew what the Jianghu truly was, when the cultivators of history had seemed as heroes to him instead of bloody tyrants. He did not smile, but the corners of his eyes softened at the memory

When he returned to the shrine, he found Xiao Sheng tending to a simmering pot. A thin trail of smoke curled from the stone-ringed pit. Something bitter was steeping.

Fushuai set his bundle of gathered moss down beside the pot, dusted off his knees, and said without fanfare, "It's done."

Xiao glanced at him sidelong. The words could have meant his task or his advancement, but the elder would know the truth by looking at him. He knelt and drew a single line through the ash beside the fire pit, long and deliberate.

"Then it is time." He did not say for what, but the moss disappeared into his storage ring.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

They moved a little downhill, to a flat space within sight of the shrine. The trees gave them room there, and the wind moved freely. Xiao Sheng stood at the center and tapped the earth with the toe of his sandal.

"Your qi is pure enough for a beginning," he said. "So the moss can go to restorative pills. First your energy must be tempered. You've been taught to cycle gently, yes? Soothingly. As though nurturing a child."

Fushuai blinked, that had not been his experience at all. Every advancement had come at the cost of hours of torture and strain. To Xiao Sheng, though, he was a child, and perhaps what came next would make Void Stirring and Dilution seem as comforting as a lullaby. Since his master seemed to be waiting for a response, he nodded, suppressing a shudder.

His elder moved a finger, and a cut in the earth appeared as if a blade had made it. He drew a circle, then he drew another within it, and another.

"Qi is not meant to remain soft. Not now. You are past that stage. From here on, you will not stir or stroke it, coddling with your intent. Instead, you will strike." He snapped his fingers, and the center of the circles depressed into a hand-deep hole with a thump.

"This is the Void Hammer's Ring," Xiao Sheng said. "A cycling pattern used by warriors before they even had names for what they were doing. You'll feel it in the spine first. If it doesn't reach the soles of your feet and the back of your teeth, you're doing it wrong."

He moved through it slowly at first, demonstrating with breath and posture before allowing Fushuai to catch a glimpse of the patterns in his qi. It wasn't exactly a circle, more an ellipse, or as the name suggested, a hammer's swing. The force coiled low, then rose through the chest and arms in a single snapping pulse before slamming back down to the dantian. It looked unpleasant.

"Each swing compresses the qi," Xiao Sheng explained. "The tension builds. If your lattice is weak, it will shatter. If your breath is uneven, your meridians will rebel. So. Don't be weak."

Fushuai tried.

The first cycle was a gut punch. He followed the rhythm, tried to mimic the rise and fall, and halfway through the second loop, something buckled. His breath caught. His dantian clenched as though scalded, and the qi pattern within him warped, spiraling into the wrong path before collapsing entirely.

He dropped to one knee, clutching his stomach and trying not to vomit.

Xiao watched without blinking. "Again."

Fushuai nodded, rose, and followed the instruction.

And so on.

Each time, the swing struck back at him. Sometimes as a ripple of backlash through his limbs, sometimes as a throbbing heat behind his eyes. Twice, his vision darkened. More than once, he felt a filament in his inner web strain and fray, but they did not break.

It had been midmorning when he returned, a time for rest so he could begin his training again in earnest in the evening. But his master had not offered that. By the time the moon rose, he could hardly stand. His legs shook. His mouth was dry. His tunic was stuck to him with sweat, and he thought he could smell his own failure.

Xiao Sheng had long since wandered off to his own devices, and Mah Goshung must have known what he was doing, for the Asura had not come to berate him for missing an opportunity for weapons training.

He did not sleep, and yet he dreamed. Hammers and anvils, and a weapon refined through countless variations. No matter how the blade was shaped, it would not suit his hand.

Two days later, Xiao Sheng nudged his hip with his sandal.

"What are you doing?"

Fushuai was sitting cross-legged in a depression in the earth he could not remember being there before. All the grass around him was dead. It took him a moment to remember how to speak.

"The Void Hammer's Ring, as you instructed."

"Have you not rested since I left you?"

He shook his head. His master was a blur.

"Fool of a child. Have you not eaten either? Did you not drink?"

Fushuai's mouth opened and closed, bitter and dry. His tongue was as rough as straw. "You gave me a task. I…you did not say that I could."

Xiao Sheng's eyebrows ascended to the heavens without him. Pressing his hand against his hip and grimacing, he sat down beside his pupil and sighed.

"You remind me," he said, "of a man I once knew in the port town of Lost Shallows. A carver of lacquerwood. Very old, very proud. Claimed he could shape anything. Handles, hilts, combs, flute-housings, with a finish smooth enough to shame still water."

His limbs buzzed with fatigue. His stomach had begun, at last, to notice its emptiness.

Xiao went on.

"This man began work on a jewelry box for a noble bride. Not a grand commission, mind you. A simple thing. Two hands wide, three fingers tall, a lid that hummed when closed. But he wanted it perfect."

He plucked a stone from the earth and rolled it between his fingers.

"So he carved the panels. Polished them. Then carved them again. The lid warped. He scraped it down. The grain caught wrong, so he started over. And over. And over. Months passed. The noble family forgot they'd even ordered it.

"When I saw the box, it was still unfinished. The lacquer was gone, the inlays stripped out. He had polished the wood so many times that it had begun to splinter. He kept it in a cloth under his bed. He still called it his masterpiece."

Xiao Sheng flicked the stone into the trees. It disappeared without a sound.

"Diligence," he said, "is a virtue. But so is knowing when to stop. When to rest. When to say: This is enough for today."

Fushuai lowered his head. His vision swam. "I thought I was supposed to endure."

"You are. But you're not the hammer." Xiao Sheng pushed himself back to his feet with a grunt. "You're the one being struck. The hammer does not care when it breaks what it's shaping."

He held out a hand.

"Come. Food. Water. Sleep. Then another lesson."

Fushuai took his hand, and the world tilted, then righted itself.