The Laws of Cultivation: Qi = MC^2

Tiang Feng watched the skies with a melancholic look. Grey clouds stirred in his vision, remnants of the many tribulations that had been working their way across the Seventh Peak. Yet all of that failed to come close to what this one had done.

His spirit Xian Yue floated next to him, her ethereal face watching the skies along with him.

“Does the child know what he is doing?” she asked, looking at the shattered skies where the heavens no longer existed. “This is no longer mere defiance of a young cultivator. False though it may have been, he touched upon Divinity itself, breaking the order of the heavens. There will be consequences.”

“I suspect he does not know,” Tian Feng said, his gaze not leaving the skies. “But sometimes, not knowing can be a good thing.”

“Not when his life will be in danger. You can no longer shield his fate, can you? All the seven peaks will know when they look, that this boy walks a new Path, and breaks the threads of Heaven.”

Tian Feng frowned at her words, before turning. His hands were set behind his back, as his eyes scanned the world. The threads of fate burned as if on fire. The world had changed forever today. How many lives had been changed from their destined path? His own fate stirred as well, the future muddier in his sight.

“Do you still see the visions?” the lunar spirit asked. “Perhaps this change can alter the Path you foresaw?”

Tian Feng closed his eyes, and let his art settle the world around him. A ripple passed through reality, like a water droplet had fallen into a pond, leaving behind a singular wave that traversed through the world endlessly.

Mist gathered in the chamber, ghastly sights and sceneries forming and breaking apart as they did. He watched war, watched men and women dying to terrible beasts, and watched the fall of an empire.

But where before, the visions were clear, now they appeared muddier, unsettled. His sight changed, as he saw the boy sitting in chains. His spirit was broken, when a hand reached out, from the darkest place there existed. The whispers of a demon.

Tian Feng opened his eyes.

“The demon tempts, a trial of his will, but do we trust him to survive it? His Path could be led astray, especially should his loved ones come to harm.”

“Interference would only make things worse. We’ll have to trust the boy, and those that watch over him,” Elder Tian Feng said, taking one last look at the skies before he turned to walk out of the chamber.

“Come, Xian Yue. We have much work to finish.”

***

Elder Yan was seething in anger. His Qi senses had expanded, boosted by the arrays set around his chamber as his vision took in all of the seventh peak’s skies. And though he would never whisper the thought out loud, the sight he saw from the eye of his spirit?

It terrified him.

The skies were shattered, and his vision could no longer even breach the perimeter. He had tried. A mere village, how could it have resisted the might of his spirit, with the entirety of his sect bolstering it?

Yet, as he had tried to pierce the boundary, a strange tree had burned brightly in his vision. The light of that tree nearly seared his spirit senses, as his wards had burned, catching fire from the radiance it projected.

That was no ordinary thing. That was a divine tree.

He’d heard stories. Very rare, when a spirit plant grows old enough, it can cultivate itself into the ranks of Divinity. Often, these trees do not survive that long, but if the Lord had given the boy something like that… everything would make sense. His growth, his powers, the unexplained flames and the tribulations.

Elder Yan clenched his fists and grit his teeth. So much for a demonic child of no consequence. Just what was the lord thinking? He spit on the ground in anger, looking at the skies.

“Shadow,” Elder Yan spoke. The shadows around him stirred, and a moment later, a girl bowed behind him.

“Master,” Zu Ri spoke. There was a shiver of fear in her voice, but Elder Yan ignored it.

“When does the Alchemy Hall’s Elder arrive?” he asked.

“In a few days, Master. The journey from the capital is long.”

Elder Yan looked back regarding the shadow that stood behind him. “Too long. We cannot wait a moment longer. The boy is no longer a mere pest. He is a threat. One that must be nipped in the bud,” he spoke, feeling his anger seethe. Reaching out into his spirit containers, Elder Yan picked out a small vial in his hand that appeared with a flash of Qi. Mists rolled around the vial, a sinister power filling the contents within. “Take this. It is spirit poison. Potent enough to make even an Elder die in spirit. Use it, and assassinate the boy. Then we will carve the divine tree from his soul.”

Zu Ri looked up at the man, surprised. “We—” she froze whatever she was going to say, before bowing her head again.

“Master. The young mistress would not… would not return if the boy is killed by you,” Zu Ri whispered.

“She will come. This poison kills the spirit, but leaves the body alive. Even the lord should not possess a cure of this. But she will know that I do,” he said.

Zu Ri looked up to him for a moment, before nodding as she took the vial in her hands. “As you command, Master.”

Elder Yan watched the shadows stir, as Zu Ri blended into them, leaving the halls behind on her task.

The man turned, walking out to the balcony as he looked upon the skies and saw the cracks within the world. A shiver filled his body, but he suppressed it.

Once he had the boy in his hands and the divine tree for himself, it would be time to begin his plans.

The Seventh Peak was in need of a new Lord.

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