Kind Young Master [Progression Fantasy - Cultivation]

Fushuai did not know how long he had sat there in a clearing of toppled trees, uprooted shrubs, and slowly guttering fires. Though the pill had long since dissolved, he could still taste its memory on his tongue, a faint sweetness that would not fade. His breath had become shallow, each cycle threading the last of the pill's strength through his meridians. It moved as he directed, settling into all the branches carved by silent effort.

He opened his eyes and found offerings left at the edge of the clearing, just beyond the reach of the flag suppressive aura. The villagers had brought him clay bowls of rice and a few glass bottles of wine. The glass was a surprise; it had to be rare this far in the wilderness. Sticks of incense jutted up from the ground, a few of them still burning, their smoke curling with the scent of sage.

The trees rustled, a low and constant reminder that he did not belong. His tunic was matted with dirt, dust, and blood: both his own and that of the beast. It was thickest along his side, where its dagger-like feather had swept a deep gash along his ribs. The cloth clung stiffly to his skin, rough and damp where the wound had soaked through.

With the pill fully processed, he was left to face two truths. One, he was going to have to do something about Zhang Sha. The second, that without the additional energy provided by the Bursting Star-Lotus, he could not indefinitely support the flag's aura with his internal energy alone.

The carcass of the chimera was still beside him. When the breeze shifted, its stench washed by, the cloying fruits of death, thick and earthy. Spirit beasts decayed slowly, but this creature had already died several times over. The air around it was dense with the sour musk of blood and rot.

Wishing he could have held his breath without interrupting his cycling, he cut into its belly. Finding the core was simple enough, as he was now well acquainted with the taste of hunger aura. When he removed it, he was surprised to find that it was not a dao seed but a true core. Not as strong as the one they had taken from the brightmetal hawk, but still larger and more powerful than he had seen in the other chimeras.

A red so dark it was almost black, the core pulsed in his hand like a living heart, faint warmth bleeding into his palm. Tying it off in a strip of cloth, he wiped his hands on the grass and went to the offerings. He ate some of the rice, sticky and bland, and drank the wine, more out of politeness than need. Then he dug a shallow pit, burned the carcass, and left.

The journey back to the shrine dragged compared to his headlong rush to the village. He felt stronger now, but drained. Processing the energy of the pill had left him scraped out, and the flag was once again pulling on the corded threads of his qi.

The heat of summer receded before an afternoon rain, and he welcomed the cool cleansing of his skin, pausing whenever there was a gap in the canopy to receive it. The drops struck his face and shoulders in soft, rhythmic patters, washing away a layer of sweat and grime.

One of his legs was bare, red and inflamed where the cloth had been burned away. It was a minor injury, all told, overshadowed by the wound on his side, which at least no longer bled. The skin there was tight and tender beneath the damp remnants of his tunic. Still, his mind was quiet. The fear and pressure projected by the formation flag were no longer so overbearing that he had to fight them consciously. There was peace in that quiet, and a new certainty: his path ahead was clear.

It was still raining when the forest opened onto the vale where the old shrine rested. Mao Feng was there, waiting as instructed, and it seemed Xiao Sheng had not returned in his absence. He stopped a good distance from the steps and raised his staff.

The man went to his knees and bowed. Rain was draining through one of the gaps in the tiles onto his back, but he didn't appear to notice.

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"It's dead," Fushuai said, and the man looked up, blinking. He eyed him up and down, his gaze lingering on the torn and bloodstained clothes.

"I have a threaded needle with me. If you would allow it, I can mend your clothes. Your tunic at least. There's nothing I can do for those pants."

Fushuai paused, wondering to what length he was willing to go to keep hold of the flag. It was no longer the burden it had been, except for the cost to his energy. In that sense, his master's wishes had already been fulfilled. Its purpose had been to train him to resist killing intent, and so it had. He would need something stronger to challenge him now.

He planted the staff in the grass and disconnected the thread of Yin that was feeding the formation. Then he crossed the rest of the distance to the shrine and traded his ruined tunic for robes he had barely worn.

Mao Feng set to work repairing what he could, his fingers moving deftly with needle and thread. They spoke a little more of the beast and the state of the village, but no word passed between them of the man's daughter. Seeing what he had seen, Fushuai had no reason to believe that she would be alive, and no reason to give the commoner hope of it.

When the work was finished, the man thanked Fushuai for what he had done.

"May I know your name, great elder?" he asked.

"I am no elder," Fushuai said, "but you may know my name. It is Gao Fushuai."

"I will carry it to the village, and we will add it to our prayers and thanks. The heavens should know the service you have done for us, and that you have earned our eternal gratitude."

Fushuai's gut twisted hearing this. He had not saved the village, only delayed a predator. This man had lost his daughter because Fushuai had not been able to see Zhang Sha for what he was. But there was nothing he could do to change the past, and no use in explaining. Mao Feng thought that they were safe, and they would be safe if Fushuai could finish this.

If he could not, there was nothing they could do to save themselves, and knowing their fate would not help them. With many more thanks and bows, the man took his leave, leaving the young cultivator alone with the headless statue and the empty shrine.

He thought of Zhang Sha and felt no anger, only a thin, steady regret as he considered what to do with the hunger core. Xiao Sheng had not left his cauldron behind, but he knew the method of preparing the elixirs and still had plentiful herbs at hand. He would make do with a clay pot.

He could not refine it as he had the dao seed, and he had no ghost water to dissolve it in. Still, there was the purity of rain, the strength of his will, and the subtlety of the Threads of Still Night. The spiritual net he wove may as well have been a single line in comparison to the complexity of what Xiao Sheng had used in combining the five cores, but his task was far simpler than forging a spirit weapon.

All he had to do was dissolve the core without destroying its aura, and what burned down in the clay pot at the end of the day was an elixir of hunger qi. A faint, acrid scent hung in the damp air as the liquid thickened and cooled.

Rather than drinking it immediately, he meditated to restore his qi. The rain had softened to a mist by then, and the ground was cool beneath him as he sat. When he finished, he stowed the elixir in a clay bottle, stood, and considered his next steps.

His master had not returned with new instructions. He had been forbidden from pursuing the rogue cultivator only until his weapon was forged, and that requirement had long since passed. The more he waited, the more time Zhang Sha would have to craft another beast.

Even striking quickly and without hesitation would not assure victory. The rogue was a stage above him. The gap between the peak of qi refinement and foundation formation was vast, and he had not quite reached the peak.

Still, he did not believe his sworn brother would attempt to kill him on sight. Perhaps some understanding could be found between them, though even as he had the thought, the certainty formed within him that it was not to be. Fushuai's way of thinking was simply too far gone from how most cultivators viewed the world. Worse, Sha was a demonic cultivator and almost certainly suffered from a qi deviation. He had as much as admitted to it, hiding his corruption with a story about being poisoned in the Endless River Sect.

The wiser choice would have been to wait for his master's return while continuing to pursue advancement. But he could not stomach waiting. Besides, at this point, either elder did return, they were almost certain to expect him to solve this problem on his own.

He did not anticipate reaching foundation formation stage on this mountain; his master had said as much, so he would either deal with Sha as he was or not at all.

With a deep breath and a respectful gesture for the statue of the nameless god, he left the shrine and began to hunt.