License to Cultivate [Progression Fantasy Tower Climber] (FOUR books completed!)

After a brief pause to meditate and think about what he'd learned about the different flavors of yellow lux, Chang-li and his friends set off once again for the mountain. The land began to slope upward toward it. They were more or less following the river back. As they approached the edge of the mountain, Joshi pointed to the left. "That looks like a trail."

Chang-li squinted, following Joshi's finger. He saw what his friend was pointing out, a zigzagging trace halfway up the mountain, back and forth across its face. The trace seemed to peter out lower down, but he made a guess where the start of the trail might be, and they set off for it at once. It was not far from the place where the last fall of the river splashed down into the plains below, forming a wide pool.

As they approached, Chang-li's senses stirred. Something powerful was waiting for them. He turned to speak to Joshi just as his friend pointed. "Look!"

There was a figure sitting on a rock by the edge of the water. He looked like a man. A foot-long gold-tipped rod sat beside him.

Prepared for anything, they spread out, Chang-li and Joshi ahead and to either side of the two women. As they approached, the figure stood up.

He was not even as tall as Chang-li, with coppery hair brushed back from his face. He wore a bronze mail shirt and green leggings beneath it and had a curious cap on his head, round with a feather in it. Beyond him were stone steps carved into the mountain, leading upward.

The man picked up his metal-tipped staff. It was only about three feet tall. He pointed one end at the approaching group.

"Cultivators," he said with a bit of a snarl. "I recognize your ilk anywhere. Come to take advantage of me now that I am trapped in this place?"

Chang-li spread his hands in what he hoped was a conciliatory gesture. This Primal Tower was proving full of surprises, and by now the idea of another creature displaying signs of intelligence barely fazed him. "We merely seek to travel up the mountain."

"Yes, no doubt. Like the others, you wish to take the peaches of immortality," the man said. "But the Emperor does not allow just anyone to enter his domain."

"The Emperor?" Hiroko asked. There was a note of fear, almost panic, in her voice.

"The Jade Emperor, of course. These are his lands," the man said. "He has trapped me here at the foot of Five-Element Mountain, forbidding me to set foot on its slopes."

Hiroko let out a tiny breath of relief and turned to the others. "My grandmother told me legends about the Jade Emperor's celestial court. It's – it's all right." She managed a tiny smile.

"Not the emperor, then?" Min asked. "That's a relief. In that case, honored sir, if you will permit us to pass?"

The stranger smiled, then bowed low. "Oh, I think not. I have been trapped here for a very long time, and I have become quite bored. This is the first opportunity for playtime I've had. If you wish to pass me, you'll need to show me your mettle."

Chang-li and Joshi exchanged a glance. This was clearly a challenge, and not one they were going to get past with words. Joshi summoned his lux gauntlets. Chang-li drew his sword, then conjured a Mirage Blade in his other hand. It felt so good to use his lux freely, without the Lens's intrusive note distracting him.

Their opponent's eyebrows raised. "Oh, a wielder of blade and illusion, then. Excellent. I've been looking forward to a good fight." He began to spin the staff in his hands very quickly around its midpoint. It whirled and blurred, lengthening into a seven-foot-long rod, and then abruptly the man split into six.

All six phantoms leapt up at once, springing across the river to land surrounding Chang-li, and his friends.

"Back to back!" Joshi called, and they formed a quick knot facing outward. Min had her bow in her hands, an arrow nocked to the string. She wavered between the closest two targets. Chang-li kept his eyes on as many of them as he could.

"Which is the real one?" Joshi asked.

Hiroko replied, the note of panic in her voice rising, "All of them. None of them. I don't know. It's like they're all illusions. There's so much blue lux in them."

With that, the key fell into Chang-li's hands. Each of the copies of the enemy was still whirling a staff. Balls of lux were forming at the ends of the staffs, each a slightly different hue of yellow. Chang-li sensed one of those balls, nearly large enough. It was fire-flavored.

"Joshi!" he shouted as he quickly conjured a strand of matching lux. He pushed it through his channels. Joshi caught it up with his will, and then, as the enemy's ball of lux flew forward at them, slammed Chang-li's lux against it.

When the two luxes met, there was an explosion, far enough away from the group that it did no more than ruffle Chang-li's tunic.

Right. They had a way to fight back. Chang-li prepared himself.

Min followed up with a bevy of arrows straight to the first of the copies. He batted them away easily with his staff, while the next copy in line began to unleash a water-tinted lux attack. The technique swept forward like a sinuous snake. Barely in time, Chang-li supplied lux, and Joshi delivered it.

This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.

Hiroko was whispering to herself, her fingers dancing as she wove something blue. Chang-li couldn't spare time to watch it. The next of the illusions was already sending lux toward him. He reacted just in time, matching the lux the enemy was shooting at him perfectly.

"You do have talent," the man's voice said from six different mouths. "Let's up the stakes a little, shall we?"

A cool sensation washed over Chang-li as Hiroko's enhancement technique hit him. He felt sharper and more alert, and let himself smile.

Now, two of the enemy copies held staffs gleaming with lux, in two different colors. Chang-li wasn't going to be able to deal with both in time. "I have the Earth lux," Joshi snapped, and Chang-li focused on the remaining illusion, whose lux was air-flavored. He conjured up and purified out the right color strain, but he had no way to deliver it.

"Min, target that ball!" He infused his lux into the tip of Min's arrow. She, without so much as asking a question, turned and fired an arrow straight at it. Her arrow hit dead on. The lux at the arrowhead exploded, detonating the attack.

There was a shimmer, and all at once, the illusions collapsed in on each other leaving a single enemy standing there. He held his once-more shortened staff in the crook of his arm while he gave them lazy applause. He bowed. "An excellent first round. I think that we may be able to teach each other something here. Now, I would like to spar with the two of you, since it's clear you appreciate hand-to-hand combat." He blurred again and separated into two copies of himself. "If you gentlemen will come at me."

Chang-li was wary of a trap, but Joshi was already racing forward. "Watch our backs," he told the women before following in. Joshi went left, he went right, and his copy of their opponent greeted him with a mocking smile and a raised staff.

Joshi was throwing furious punches only to be met by the gold-tipped staff. Chang-li took a moment to infuse Liar's Blade with Bloodflame Venom. He didn't intend to try to kill this opponent; the creature seemed much too strong. But if he could get some Bloodflame Venom working in his veins, it might give them an edge later on.

He fell on the man, dual blades swinging. The opponent easily blocked, his staff a blur.

"Interesting," he called. "You have some fascinating technique here. Self-taught, largely, I think. But no matter. That could be corrected, given time."

Over to the left, his copy was keeping up a running patter with the silently sweating Joshi. "You have a bit more power in those blows than you need. You're overcommitting. I can see your blow coming from a mile away. Who lets you get away with such sloppy technique? This is shameful. But you have good spirit nonetheless. Let's see."

Chang-li tried to ignore the banter. He could see Min and Hiroko whispering to each other and focused on trying to distract his opponent while the women hopefully came up with a plan of their own.

Back and forth, the pairs fought as the warm heat of an invisible sun beat down on them and a scent of plum blossoms sprang up from nowhere. Chang-li could hear gentle music playing, taking the notes of the stream and the tunes of the lux all around them and winding it into a refrain. The tune invigorated him. He felt himself growing stronger. His reach seemed to be longer. With a jolt, he realized Hiroko was casting her blessing on him and Joshi both.

His opponent seemed to catch on at the same time. "Well done. I applaud the teamwork," he said before springing back from Chang-li.

The strange man did a soaring backflip. As he came down, the end of his staff hit the ground. He pushed back off, sprang high into the air, threw the staff up, caught it as it came down before landing in a pose similar to Joshi's Meteor Punch. There was only one of him again now.

Chang-li wasn't sure how long they had fought. It had felt like quite some time, but there was no way to tell in here. When they finally broke apart from their opponents Joshi looked about as tired as he felt. The man smiled and grinned at them.

"Very, very well done," he said. "You have passed my test of lux control and my test of your physical strength. One test only remains, and then I shall reveal my mind to you. You may take the offer I make or proceed up the mountain on your own, whichever you choose. But if you fail, I shall bar your way, and this time, it will be no test."

His smile turned vicious. His teeth were sharply pointed, like a predator's, and his eyes narrowed with gleaming intelligence.

Joshi and Chang-li fell back to stand near the women. "What is it? What is your last test?" Chang-li asked warily.

The man threw his arms wide.

"You are skilled cultivators. You are skilled fighters. But are you clever thinkers? I pose a riddle for you. If you can answer it in three guesses, then I shall let you pass."

Chang-li took a deep breath, casting his mind back on his training. He'd read the Six Classic Books of Riddles, and the stories of the trickster Yah Lin. He could do this. "I —"

But Min stepped forward, crossing her arms over her chest. "No. We're done playing games."

"Min, we should—"

She held up a hand. "Hold on. I let you two boys show off because that's your area of expertise, but negotiations are mine. This fellow wants something from us. He's tested that we're strong enough and now he's just trying to put us on the back foot so he can get a better deal. No way. You can skip the riddles and tell us your proposal, and we'll go from there."

The man smiled even wider. "Oh, my, but you do have spirit! Yes, I think you four are just what I have been waiting for."

He clapped his hands together, then bowed low. "Sun Wukong, at your service. I have traveled the heavens, I have been to the ends of the earth and back, but now here I stand, trapped in this tower. For five hundred years I have waited here at the foot of this mountain for someone, anyone to come past."

Min's eyes narrowed. "Who has trapped you here?"

"Hmmm." He pursed his lips together. "Let us say, my very nature is what most binds me. Nevertheless, I am not free to act, not as you are. But with your aid I could perhaps be freed."

"How?" Chang-li asked, carefully not offering to aid the man. It would be best to learn as much as possible before committing themselves to his aid. This stranger was unlike anything he'd met in a tower before. While they had met Tower Beasts and spirits who could talk, and who had seemed to have lives of their own, this stranger felt different. More like a fellow cultivator, and yet something in his eyes was different.

"Atop the temple waits the guardian of this floor, the Jade Emperor's Majordomo. Present yourself to him and he will allow you to pass. But — what if instead I could teach you how to summon a far more powerful guardian. The one who controls this entire tower. The Jade Emperor himself?"

Hiroko gasped and turned to the others. "My father—"

"I know," Joshi cut her off with a shake of his head.

There was no sense in giving away too much. Chang-li cleared his throat. "What good will that do?"

"For you, powerful boons. A chance at a Tower Guardian's blessing not once but twice. For me?" The stranger smiled. "The only one who can free me. I think we can help each other. And we should hurry. There are other, stronger cultivators in this tower now. From the Sect of Golden Locks. They have reached the orange floor, and are rushing onward."

Sun Wukong put his hands together and smiled. "What do you say we strike a bargain, hmm?"