Reforged from Ruin [Eldritch Xianxia Cultivation]

Shin Ren:

She's…

He doesn't know what she is now.

He felt his Souls stir at the sight of her. Felt the Corpse Aflame experience something akin to both completion and grief at the version of her shown before him now. He has no words.

She's broken. Or gone. Or turned into something so alien that almost nothing of her was recognizable.

In that pillar of roiling eyes and metallic fractal of bio-armor and the many many mouths it spoke through, there was almost nothing of the person who set him on his path.

And that is what they are to each other. It's weird, to say the least. He's barely spoken to her, after all. They've never been close- and why should they have been? Their first meeting came in the midst of an unjustifiable perversion of justice, where his single purpose had been to ritually murder her in front of a crowd. Then she was the ghost haunting him, the proto-demon that became the Corpse Aflame, taunting him by always being a step ahead, just out of reach.

And then, when he called down the attention of the Heavens, when he summoned forth everything he was and transcended, she was there. And somehow, he took her with him.

He saw all of her. An island of existence. An ontology that self-referenced, a being of recursive self-identity that was still somehow a person but also greater than him, different. And she saw all of him, his every piece, and together they were judged, and together they experienced creation through a new lens, and together they went their separate ways.

The closest he has ever been to her friend has been to be her ally in a plot neither of them has fully seen or grasped, trusting in someone that neither of them really trusts at all.

And yet… here they are again.

Him standing before her.

Her… gone. Yet remaining. A thing which has died and which refuses to die at all.

He owes her.

He's not sure what he owes, but it's something. They have broken each other and orbited each other's journey and both been shattered and reborn, and he's not sure what that means because the person he knew was gone and whatever this thing is is no longer her- but it bears her name. It bears her allies. And, apparently, it's out here to deal with the same damn thing he is.

The wasteland remains hungry. The latest organ added to it only magnifies that hunger, and grants it more ability to spread.

He walks to one of the quarries, staring at the colossal corpse at its center.

Shaped like a centipede made out of guns, the few pieces of it that hint at more humanoid limbs are particularly damaged, as if undone by a greater calamity than the rest of the body. Its barrels are torn and broken, its gears, pistons and architecture torn apart by force and unnatural decay- and even still it's larger than most buildings outside of a cultivator city.

The quarry goes deeper, too. There's hints of even more of the corpse, still buried beneath obsidian metal and hints of bone-ash sands.

He lets out a breath, spitting out the smell of this place as it leaks past his half-ruined armor.

Then he inhales, and casts aside his thoughts.

It is always a time for self-examination. Especially in a world like this, where one seeks power and often attains it foremost through violence. But there is a difference between spending time in meditation and spending it aware of one's surroundings. Here, a lack of understanding could be lethal, and a lack of awareness doubly so.

Mei Yu and Gou Mai are his best-understood assets- but Gou Mai is out of the running for the moment. It shouldn't take more than a few hours, but he needs that time to regrow his leg and increase his Qi reserves. Mei Yu is an infiltrator, assassin, and manipulator- she's staying behind to guard Gou Mai and try to interact with the "priestess" of Raika.

Definitely. Definitely for sure staying behind.

Yun Ka is staying back with them, doing her research in the relative safety of the pillar's shadow- Taran, meanwhile, is exactly designed for this exact situation, to a point that makes it seem almost suspicious.

That leaves three out of the four he arrived with out of commission.

And the Fisher.

He's there. Shirtless and pantsless, wearing a simple loincloth and playing with the wire of his fishing hook. He's overlooking their surroundings, perched comfortably with one leg hanging off of one of the tallest spikes around. He sits on material so violent, so destructive, that it's simple presence saturates the world with Death Qi, with Ruin, with Destruction- and he seems entirely at ease, shooting a smile over at his fresh compatriot of the Warrior Realm.

He won't be journeying down. He's watching over the pillar, watching over the other quarries, the other "central whirlpools" where the Qi and concepts of this place are loudest.

Mercenaries and people of the Tribes and spirit beasts and corpses are digging into the center of this place, trying to find its core. Its origin. Its source.

This quarry, now empty due to his own violence, calls to him.

If he finds what's at the core of this place, they can unmake it. Or control it. Or use it against the others. Or betray the Empire with it, forge it into a weapon. Or, or, or.

There are more things beneath the Heavens than can be imagined.

Shin Ren is trapped between many of them.

But his Domain, and the triumvirate Souls that sit within it, tell him what he needs to know.

He does not need to obey others. He does not need to bind himself to the plans of strangers so freely.

The Bull may have been planning this for a long, long time- but he is not the only arbiter of right and wrong. He may not even be interested in such things. There is a corpse-plague born partially of Shin Ren's own sins actively expanding into and destroying the world, a madman whose plots he knows precious little about guiding his actions, and Blades bared and ready to violate existence itself, partially depending on where his actions guide them.

He stands as a turning point for things he does not understand.

There are only two solutions for this.

The first is to gain power. The second is to gain knowledge.

Below, in this hazardous, ruinous place, there is both, if only he has the strength and the force of will to reach out and grab it, and to make a decision about what to do with it.

He can't just follow orders anymore. He can't just be a plug against the Breach, killing for a cause he barely believes in and only furthering a slaughter that's been ongoing since before he was born.

He has to be more.

So he will be.

Fisher

The kid's got gumption. Stupid lil sectie's even got a decent Domain. Most of his type end up with some vague picture of a thing, or a single snapshot moment, but the kid went and built a whole damn courtroom instead, a living place. Those are rare as teethy hen, which is to say not super rare, but rare 'nough to be noteworthy.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

Most of the mentality he's seen with secties is pretty damn matched with the "Imperial" types wandering in. Proper uptight, all of them taught to think the same, act the same, believe in the same damn things. A Domain is a weapon, a Soul, a tool- like they've been convinced to spit out all the magic in life, to vomit up anything creative or fun or unique about what they could be. Easier to control that way, Fisher reckons, but what a fucking shame about it. Probably why all the dressed up little shits are so damn good at marching and killing and all that, but it makes them piss fucking poor at making things, at figuring shit out, at doing anything new. Maybe that's worth somethin. Fisher's seen how it looks when they do make things, how well they march, how good they are at killing. Hell, he's sitting here in a place built from that very fact, a horizon-spanning hell of death and decay and fated End.

A thousand thousand thousand thousand frozen pictures, each of them aimed like a knife at everything that isn't them.

It's a damn shame. Really, you could do just as much harm with just one if they shaped themselves right.

Harder to control that though.

Destruction is secondary, after all. That's not the point. As much as many of the Tribes tend to think that, as much as the Beasts of the world assume it to be the case, Fisher knows better. The Empire and the sects, they're destruction, and ruin, and horror and war and death, but only for the things that can't be controlled.

The Sects of that Morae-place, where most secties come from, are perfectly alright with allowing spirit beasts in their borders, after all. So long as they have a leash. So long as they're useful, as weapons and farm animals and things which can be milked and bred and harvested.

So long as they can be controlled.

Empire place seems much the same. Kill whatever, unless its useful. Their void-beasts are plenty enough evidence of that. Their marching soldiers with dead little pictures as a replacement for an ideal world, their violent, blunt little tools in place of Souls.

It's a real pity. Probably be a lot easier if folks just live and let live. Sometimes when you're fishing, when you catch something, you just let it go again. Fish it again later, or have it just wander off and live a life. Really, there's not much fun to be had, fishing in a static pond where you know where and how and when every little fish is going to bite and why. Fisher doesn't see much point in it- and he's tried every kind of fishing there is.

He loops the thread, swinging the heavy hook at its end over and over. Not much fishing to do here, but that's alright- sometimes the most important part of fishing is patience. After all, being patient got him to meet the little one and his ever so vibrant little crew.

Shin Ren, was it? Fresh and brand new to the big leagues, to the World Beyond. A true immortal now- moreso than most with those three different Souls of his. His chubby friend, with the abstraction and the conceptual strikes- he's got a while to go, but he's moving damn fine up into the higher reaches, moreso than most. Abstraction techniques like his are a bitch to fight against.

And the girl… hmm. Didn't leave much of an impression, but he's starting to wonder if that wasn't on purpose. Finding Many-Grasping-Young-Of-Harsh-Lands-Reaching might not be the most difficult task in the world, but the "priestess" has compensated for her relative weakness with other skills. The living corpse-god that used to be the woman he decided to lend a hand to is almost entirely willing to do whatever her priestess asks, and the beastkin woman has become talented at wielding the tools and landscapes provided.

And the misty-gal just slipped right by all that, grabbed her, and brought her back with a knife to her throat, all without Fisher noticing. That ain't nothing.

A talented group of youngsters. Frankly, he's surprised they've been allowed to grow as they have, considering the way everyone else of their kind he's met.

He sighs. So much busyness. A little extra energy is good for some kinds of fishing, but he's in his slow-hook phase. He'll probably give this another week or so before he heads back to someplace proper. Even with all the infinite time in the world, there's only so much he's willing to commit to for the sake of a stranger, no matter how nice it was to speak to her.

So many promising young talents. So much chaos. It truly is a messy age.

He sighs, casting his hook up into the air. There's a quiet, polite little boom of the sound barrier breaking, followed by the squelch of bone entering a body and tearing it apart.

He reels in his catch, catching it neatly in his hand. It's a few dozen feet long, some sort of serpent, and part machine- "empire", then. Probably. They seem to like all this machine stuff, full of metal and bits and connecting chunks and all.

He shrugs, taking a bite out of its neck and slitting it open as he does. Easy to carve through it with his hook, yanking out its core and spiritual organs and tossing them inside himself.

His favorite fish gulps it down with a hearty wiggle.

Yeah. A week sounds good. Messy, not his preference, but still, plenty of catch out here. And even the most peaceful of fishermen enjoys a little bit of a show now and then.

Many-Grasping-**********-Harsh-*********-Reaching

Many-Grasping has spent years of her life wandering these sands. She has spent the better part of a decade training under Ko-es, a guide that spent the entirety of his life learning the secret paths through this land. Half a century to learn, to be good enough to teach others, and to become competent enough to pass unmolested by warlords and predators- because a courier is always valuable.

And it has all been unmade.

The sands are more awake than they have ever been. Safe trails that can last for years or decades have vanished beneath roiling ash, new dunes forming and falling sometimes in hours, the millenia of corpses and weapons and vile spirits that live beneath them more awake than she's ever seen. To walk in these lands now, without power, is the same as to walk off a cliff's edge.

And she can walk it freely. Completely at ease.

Her God is with her.

Her God is wounded. Weak. A Goddess in flesh and mind and will and Intent no more- but still divine. Still something she's chosen to put her faith in, still something beyond all else, still an arbiter of truly divine and oncoming change.

But she is wounded. She is broken. She is shattered entirely.

And more than ever before, her God needs help. Needs help from her. From her first and truest priestess.

There are others now. The city of Singheart, still partially connected to her God, has those who believe in her, who are grateful to the changes she has made even in her comatose convalescence. There are Beasts who worship in their own way, blessed in their consumption of her flesh and gracing her with offerings of their dead.

But she is the one grand priestess of her God. The first worshipper of the Coming Change, the Flesh Divine, the Beating Heart of Transformation.

And her god needs her.

She touches a hand to the metallic death that has subsumed the sands. Feels the bits of black powder and iron mixed into it, making of it a desert all its own, watches how those grains are affected by even the smallest swaying moments of the thorn-trees.

Blessed be the weapons of her God. Blessed be her flesh.

It does not hurt her. She needs no defenses from it. Even without the Pillar, the core and foundation and spine of her Goddess' strength, it would not hurt her.

Her God is not a dead or silent thing. Her God is awake- and even broken, her God knows love. A love alien, perhaps, but a love nonetheless.

And her priestess worships, and answers- and feels herself changing.

A name is an important thing to a Beast. In the language-without-words, in the True tongue, a name is perhaps the most important thing any living thing may possess, be it their own or another's. All her life, she has been a part of the clutch of her mother, a grander and stranger beast than she could ever be, and it has been tied to her identity. A part of who and what she is.

It is still a part of who and what she is- but it is no longer the greatest part of her. No longer the most defining.

She is changing.

Glory Be.

Many-Grasping-Reach-Towards-Divinity. That will be what her name is. That will be what she will be. To be less… to be less would be to shame herself and her God.

And her God needs aid.

Beasts do not grow as cultivators do, even when they "cultivate". A cultivator of the kind that invade her home from beyond the edge of the world and the mountain-lands of the Morae, they take from the world, unmake it, and then remold it into their own desired image. Not like the users of the grander mysteries, the liars which turn themselves into the world around them, and not like void-beasts, which invert what they touch and become it.

A Beast hungers.

A Beast consumes.

A Beast eats of the world, and of what it eats, it builds. It does not unmake and remold, it does not lie, it does not replace or invert- they become what they consume, and what they consume becomes them. If a Beast eats water-aligned things, they become water aligned.

Perhaps such is true in all cases. There's plenty of overlap, after all- each path is unique, but each path must be walked, and there are only so many ways in which to step, for one must always move forward.

She has eaten well.

Her God is a feast divine.

It ferments in her. It roils and changes her. What she was is transformed by what she has added, because unlike the cultivators which unmake and remold, and unlike the mystics which weave themselves into other things, a Beast only adds, only builds eternally, each brick of their being what they consumed.

She is blessed. She is changing. She is the priestess of the Divine Raika, and for her gifts and for her very being, her God deserves aid.

She inhales. She exhales. She tastes warmth on her tongue and in her gut.

She walks towards the man of Flame, and prepares to descend into the corpse of her God, that she might put them back together anew.