Kind Young Master [Progression Fantasy - Cultivation]

The emptiness of the village was not caused by grief over the tragedy of a fallen immortal. A barn was serving as a hospice, with people sleeping or sitting on straw mats in the stalls. Sickly scents pervaded the air, which was warm, stagnant, and dim. Ganmopai shut the door behind them, and Zhang immediately rounded on him.

"What are you doing?" He snapped. "Leave it open."

The burly body cultivator bristled at his tone. "If you're afraid to be here, then get out."

"Do you not know anything?"

In the next instant, Zhang Sha was lifted by the front of his robes. Their faces were an inch apart when Ganmopai spoke again.

"Talk to me like that once more and I'll break your legs before I send you all on your way."

Fushuai stopped himself from intervening. Another cultivator in Zhang Sha's position would have killed the young man then and there. Their spirits were veiled, and the youth hadn't advanced far enough to be able to sense them properly anyway, so there was no way for him to guess how close to death he was. Mei Li and Lin had both tensed, expecting a confrontation, and Bai Tu was growling in a manner that did not befit a cat.

"I'm a trained physician." His tone didn't carry the slightest threat, or even a sign that he had noticed he was being manhandled. "This space is too closed, so the air doesn't circulate. They need it to recover."

Ganmopai set him down, his anger giving way to unease. Though he was no more advanced than a child by the standards of a sect or a cultivator family, in a little village like this, he might have never met anyone who wasn't afraid of him. "You haven't even looked at them. Won't opening the doors help it spread?"

"Open air dilutes any disease that spreads through the breath. As long as the other villagers remain outside, they are in no danger of infection." He stepped past the man to open the door himself. Ganmopai frowned, but didn't stop him.

"Examine them, then, if you know so much."

They went from stall to stall. Men and women, young and old, there was no common factor among those who had taken ill other than their affliction. Yellowed skin, weakness, and shortness of breath. Most of those who were conscious didn't look at them, let alone rise. The corruption of the aura in the barn was plain to anyone with a spiritual sense. Mei Li made a sharp comment about the smell and stepped outside.

"Little doctor," Zhang Sha said to Lin, "what causes illness?"

Her eyes narrowed at the name, but she still answered. "Qi imbalance. Everyone knows that."

"Hah. If only they did. You said you'd learned a little medicine, so you must have an interest in the subject. Mortals sicken more easily than cultivators because they have so little qi that the smallest imbalance can be crippling. Healing injury spends Yang, leading to too much Yin in the body. But that kind of sickness is less likely to spread, and these people were not injured. So the imbalance must have another source."

"It isn't just Yin and Yang," Lin countered. "All the elements need to be accounted for."

Zhang Sha smiled with genuine pleasure. "Very true. I am simplifying matters." He glanced at Ganmopai.

"How many dead?"

"Only one, so far. She was the first to fall ill." The spear tapped against his leg. "Why do you say 'mortals' like you aren't one?"

"I use whatever language is the most appropriate. Now, these people. Are they all neighbors?"

"We're all neighbors. It's a small village."

"Were the first to sicken living together? Have people fallen ill without contact?"

"It started with one family. We weren't using this building until after it spread."

"But it continued to spread even after you separated the sick from the healthy?"

Ganmopai's expression had darkened with each successive statement. "Why are you asking me so many questions?" He barked. "If you know what's wrong with them, then say it."

Fushuai was fascinated. He'd spent enough time in the Gao library to have a passing familiarity with medical methods. But the fact was that cultivators, even weak ones, were largely immune to mortal ailments, and hardly thought about it, let alone wrote treatises. It sounded like Zhang Sha was claiming that there was no fundamental difference in how commoners and sacred artists sickened, only a matter of the scale of the qi involved and its effect.

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"My son is only trying to help," he said. "Please forgive him. When he has his mind on a problem, he forgets his manners. But he is asking these things to identify the source."

Somewhat mollified, the village leader nodded. "Not as many, but the spread hasn't stopped. I stick people in here as soon as they show signs. But I think others are hiding it."

"Then we have what we need." Zhang Sha strode out of the barn, and the rest followed. Mei Li was tapping her foot in the grass.

"Are you done yet? I thought we were here for rice and salt, not pampering mortals."

Ganmopai stopped in his tracks, then spun, menacing them all with his spear. "Enough! Tell me who you are."

"Pilgrims," Fushuai insisted. "Simple pilgrims."

"Why are you hiding your cultivation?"

Mei Li blinked. "Oh. We were supposed to be hiding it?"

Fushuai resolved to be clearer with her regarding their plans and intentions in the future. He held out his hands in a placating gesture even as Bai Tu came to stand between them, hackles raised.

"You're right, we are, like you, aspirants of the Golden Road. But what I told you of our purpose was true. My name is Zhou Jun, this is my family, and we are on a pilgrimage seeking to pay our respects to the rising emperor, may he live forever."

The spear did not waver. "What stage are you?"

"Qi refinement." It was easier to be honest in that, at least. He didn't need to know that his "son" was above them all in advancement. Ganmopai looked between them, and the realization crossed his face in a flash. There were four of them. Even if they weren't actually in qi refinement, as long as they were all cultivators, he didn't stand a chance. His attitude flipped like a coin.

"Apologies," he bowed deeply, speartip now pointed at the ground. "I did not understand, elder."

"It's quite all right. Nothing has changed between us. We are here for supplies, and we are happy to barter a service in exchange."

"That isn't necessary." He remained bowed. "You can have whatever you need."

"Perfect," Mei Li said. "A few sacks of rice, salt, if you have it. Hmm. One of those pigs?"

"We...uh, don't grow rice here."

Mei Li's eyes widened, and Fushuai was forced to consider the possibility that she didn't know what a rice paddy looked like. The fields around the village were obviously for other grains. "Are you joking?"

"Millet and wheat. As much as you like. There isn't much salt, but I'm sure someone has some."

"Wait," Fushuai said, raising a hand. "We are not bandits or fugitives, we are pilgrims and healers. Let's finish what we began, and then we can discuss a gift of grain."

"The well," Zhang Sha said, pointing to a stone circle surrounded by buildings on the far end of the village. "Did the sickness begin in the homes there?"

"Yes, uh, elder."

"Good good good." He was already moving, and it was once again up to the rest of them to follow or be left behind. When he reached the well, he stepped up to its lip and dropped right in.

"Is he mad?" Mei Li exclaimed.

"Not at the moment," Fushuai said seriously. The comment won him an alarmed glance, but this wasn't the place to discuss it further. In any case, Zhang Sha's descent was accompanied by a brief splash, and then he hopped out of the hole onto the stone lip again a breath later, soaked from head to heel. There was a silver toad in his hand, its legs kicking wild and futile.

"Darkmetal aspect." He stepped down. "Not much of a beast, but a sure poison for mortals."

Lin gasped. "That's all?"

"That's all," he nodded. "No great mystery. Here." He tossed the glistening beast at Bai Tu. "Catch."

The slick-skinned amphibian rolled and jumped, but the fox didn't hesitate, sinking its teeth into the creature's metallic skin. Its scree was grating, sharp, and short-lived. Ganmopai's mouth dropped open, and his spear fell from his hand.

"Where did you come from? Are you sect members?"

"Yes," Zhang Sha said. "Father, why don't you show him our sign?"

Mei Li and Lin looked at him in open confusion, and it took Fushuai several heartbeats of stillness to realize what he meant. Reaching into a pouch, he produced the laquered emblem his master had left behind. "We are not large or well known, I admit, but growing in the far south. The Devouring Death Sect."

"The what?" His oldest sister said.

Ganmopai was more confused than ever. "That is...quite a name."

"A thousand apologies. It is perhaps more menacing than intended."

"You've done us a great service. Whatever your name, we are in your debt."

They left the village with several sacks of grain and most of a slaughtered pig in Zhang Sha's storage ring, along with a few other handy tools and cooking implements that they had been missing, and a very satisfied fox. Bai Tu had devoured the toad, every scrap, and was prancing along beside them with as much vigor as he'd ever exhibited.

"Why are we going in the wrong direction?" Mei Li said as the village shrank behind them.

"We told them we were pilgrims headed for the capital," Fushuai replied. "We can circle around when we're sure to be out of sight."

His mind was on imbalances. In a cultivator, any sickness that was not easily remedied was a potential deviation. Zhang Sha's imbalance went all the way to his root, and righting it was beyond any of them. Too much Yin had killed a woman in that village, and would have killed many more if the source had not been found. But because of the nature of his root, he thrived on Yin. It was Yang that would be the poison.

"Sha, you are foundation stage. How did you reach it?"

"Mostly killing," he said. Their disguises had fallen away, and the bags under his eyes were as purple as ever. "Why?"

"I mean, did you travel to a place rich in earth or dream qi to reach your breakthrough. Or were you still at the sect?"

"Ah. Yes, I was still a Hollow Reed then. They saw me as a promising pupil and provided the resources they thought I needed. But it wasn't the pills that gave me my Path; it was the poison. A gift from an inner disciple. Killing him was the second gift. And then I left the sect. Are you doubting your master's advice?"

"No. Only seeking to understand."

If the Coughing Valley proved to be a dead end, he could still reach foundation formation. All he would have to do was continue to expand his meridians until they flowed like rivers filled with midnight, and eventually, it would be enough to reforge his body. The thought nagging at the back of his mind was that advancement itself was the pursuit of a kind of balanced imbalance. Was he seeking to become a creature of pure Yin? A shadow that recoiled from the faintest touch of light?

"Pardon," Lin said. "I think there is something wrong with Bai Tu."