Chapter 18 #2
“This one apologizes for any undue alarm. For I’ll also admit that this was a test!
” He beamed back at a nonplussed Sun La.
“I asked if it was possible for me and mine to delve today, just hours after our arrival. She expressed concern, and thus the second goal of our demonstration was to prove just how ready I am. Now, with our gracious host’s permission, I’d love to join the strongest among you for what will be a legendary delve!
Together, we’ll wrest free multiple cores of Ice and Water in a delve that will have the academy whispering our names with awe for years to come as we forge a legend of our own!
We’ll become the beloved focus of youling storytellers in all the better taverns and ensure Wanshi’s independence for a thousand years! Who’s with me?”
The crowd’s murmurs grew confused, before multiple enthusiastic and regrettably younger-looking cultivators roared their approval and interest in daring a truly legendary delve.
But Alex’s eyes were mostly on Sun La, whose furious terror had morphed into a cool nod.
And the look in her eyes… she either wanted his head or was grateful that he was saving her massive face, which Alex could only hope meant that he hadn’t made a permanent enemy of her.
Because surely he had fucked up somehow, and the look Nili was now giving him made it clear that he would most definitely be getting an earful.
Which he would put off for as long as possible, put this whole fiasco off for as long as possible, by daring a delve right now.
“I’m up for joining the Ruidian! Autumn’s harvest will be perfect. The game is plump and the fruit is divine!”
“Are you daft? The Waste Qi you’ll build up will barely make up for even the choicest spirit boar you can hunt. And their cores aren’t even Bronze!”
“Spring’s perfect for harvesting right now, and the cores are exactly what we need!”
“Ha, the waste buildup is far worse than Autumn, and you’re so saturated that not even your master’s techniques will save you if you push things any further than you already have, fool!”
“Quiet, idiot. Strangers are among us.”
“The Ruidian? What do they care for a cultivator’s cleansing? They can delve half a dozen times a season or more without feeling any strain at all, and need only plant bountiful crops in the basin below to cleanse themselves. Why do you think they’re so valuable to us?”
Alex tuned out the words even as Sun La’s anxious-looking husband raced within the dueling sands, clasping his wife’s hand with a desperate look in his eyes that turned into a relieved smile.
When he turned to Alex, he had to suppress a shiver.
Though the man’s expression was that of good-natured bemusement, his eyes promised death to anyone who imperiled his wife.
“A most invigorating performance. Your reflexes are nothing short of legendary, boy. Even if my wife did clue you in to where she would strike.”
Alex bowed low. “This one thanks you for the kind words, honored one. I’m just happy our hostess was gracious enough to allow our demonstration.”
The man nodded. “Are you truly willing to delve this very moment, even if it means plumbing the very depths of Winter itself?”
The crowd’s murmurs grew with those words, several cultivators giving the man cool stares.
“Ren La, bold as the youth’s performance was, Winter is the province of the strongest Silvers for a reason,” declared a scholarly voice from the crowd.
Ren La glared at the older man. “You know damn well how late the hour is, elder. We aren’t in the warm days of spring or the summer heights of Wanshi’s glory.
Autumn fades quickly, and when our sputtering Water core dies out, we all know what will happen then.
” He flashed the crowd of anxious-looking cultivators a bleak smile.
“Best we face winter now, on our terms, than deprived of food and water, forced to take on the jackals snapping at our flanks, eager to hamstring us before moving on to fresh prey.”
Alex blinked, hating the fact that he was starting to admire the handsome, dark-eyed cultivator glaring at the crowd as he held his wife’s hand so protectively.
Then Alex saw it, cheeks now blazing as brightly as Ya Ling’s or Linnea’s ever had.
“Fuck,” he muttered to himself, there now being no mistake as to just how badly he had misjudged the wujen before him.
Even if those ice spikes had been launched with killing intent.
But that was neither here nor there.
The past was already written.
All that mattered was what he did from this point forward.
“I’m in,” Alex said boldly, smirking at Nili’s horrified expression. “Winter it is! Let’s walk Peril’s Path and wrest free prizes that will ensure Wanshi’s eternal spring!”
“And I, Lao Tie, will join you!” declared a fiery-eyed youth emerging from the crowd, who looked far too young for the power radiating from his meridians.
His features were as vibrant as that of any young master, and for all that Alex could sense the faint residue of spirit pearls and exquisitely calibrated concoctions, he sensed as well the potency that only came from fighting for one’s life, no doubt in the rifts.
Alex blinked before the clear prodigy, an actual Silver who looked no older than Alex, ageless perfection achieved so young after blazing through Bronze, which itself added at least a century or two of life that, combined with Silver’s ageless perfection—for this talented cultivator, at least—had become eternal youth.
Alex suspected Lao Tie wasn’t a day over forty, for all that he looked exactly half that age.
In a city of a mere hundred thousand or so, he was a true prodigy, as further evidenced by the pained concern in the gazes of Sun La and her husband.
Yet neither did anything but nod solemnly before the young master’s declaration.
And thank the heavens that he didn’t glare at Alex with the arrogant disdain Alex had to fight not to expect, but an actual hopeful smile.
As if he would be honored to have Alex adventure by his side.
So Alex put aside all lingering misgivings and honored the prodigy with a bow of his own. “It would be my pleasure to delve by your side, Lao Tie. We’ll forge a legend worthy of Wanshi, side by side.”
The air roared with the crowd’s approval, and in very short order, Alex found himself facing a quartet of men and women radiating Silver-tier potency, eyes heavy with the weight of an entire city upon their shoulders, and all of them burdened by foundations absolutely filled with Dark Qi that somehow, by some exotic technique, they were actually managing to keep stable, so it wasn’t aging them or corroding them from within.
Beside them was a wan-looking Ya Ling, an absolutely beaming Linnea, and, much to his surprise, Rachel Li, who gazed at the two girls hovering so protectively next to him before sighing with a sad smile.
Yet she didn’t hesitate to bow her head when Senior Cultivator Ren La asked everyone a second time if they were willing to dare the depths of Winter itself.
He received nothing but the expected nods.
“Good! Introduce yourselves. You’ve all seen how fast the boy moves. He could easily serve as point man or flanker. The Ruidians will serve beside your wujen, as always.”
At that moment, a pair of smiling servants raced over, panting and bowing as they brought over several packs filled with water flasks and dry rations, in addition to fur-lined coats, boots, and gloves so well made that they shouldn’t affect one’s ability to swing a sword or polearm at all.
“One advantage of winter is that gathering water will be no problem at all. The snow will be melted and purified by your flasks, and we expect them to all be returned,” Ren La declared with a pointed look to Alex and the Ruidians, who bowed their head in acknowledgment.
In short order, they made their way down the escarpment giving an absolutely fantastic view of the lush fecund valley below.
A crystal-clear blue lake surrounded by crops of millet, wheat, barley, and fields of leafy vegetables caught Alex’s eye.
Countless varieties of fruit trees bowed under the weight of the most succulent bounty of ripe and luscious fruit that tantalized and teased his senses with every breeze.
Yet as beautiful as the sight was, he couldn’t help but note with some amount of dismay that the life-giving lake at the center of the basin was far smaller than it should be.
And for all that Alex could sense the tiny pulses of spiritual energy and arcane potency from both cultivators and Ruidians working the crops below, constructing masterworks of irrigation, ingenuity, and masterful crop care, all that effort would come to naught if limited water became no water at all.
“It’s a beautiful sight, isn’t it?” declared Lao Tie, the young master showing a warmth and fondness for the valley below that instantly eased Alex’s lingering reservations about having anything to do with anyone clearly born with near limitless privilege and opportunities, before dismissing that silly prejudice.
For hadn’t one of his closest friends of a lifetime ago been an heir to a vast mercantile fortune?
And his kung fu brother the Blue Prince was the grandson of the emperor himself.
Alex forced a smile he knew would become genuine over time. “Yes, it is. Filled with the sacred promise of life, nature, and abundance. A precious fragile sanctuary against the desert’s endless hot desolation that we must do all we can to protect.”