Unintended Cultivator

While their brief moment of playfulness had helped lift everyone’s spirits, they all grew warier and warier as they traveled even deeper into the wilds. Every noise caught Sen’s attention. He refused to even entertain thoughts about his cultivation method after the ambush attack by the bear-cat. Of course, it wasn’t the attack that bothered him. He wasn’t above being ambushed or caught off-guard. No one could be perfectly attentive at every moment. Human minds weren’t meant for that kind of singular vigilance all the time. If they were, there would never be new inventions or new ideas. Human minds wander and sometimes those internal journeys bore interesting fruit. No, what he kept coming back to was that flash of anger he’d felt at Lo Meifeng when she’d killed the spirit beast before he could.

At first, he’d just chalked it up to being all wound up in the wake of the attack. The more he thought about it, though, the less true that felt to him. He had been wound up, but he couldn’t even remember a time when he’d felt possessive about who got to kill something. Normally, he’d feel relieved that someone else did the killing. It wasn’t that he’d push that kind of thing off onto other people because that wasn’t his way. In a fluid situation like that one had been, though, it shouldn’t have mattered to him who resolved the fight, just that the fight was resolved. So, he found himself revisiting that moment in mind again and again. He tried to dissect it, to understand where that feeling had come from, but he got nowhere. He couldn’t identify a specific source for his response. He’d just been angry, in general, that she’d stolen the kill.

Yet, even the idea that she’d stolen something from him struck him as foreign. No matter which way he turned the moment over in his mind, though, he couldn’t find a reason that he’d reacted that way. The fact of that reaction bothered him. The nature of that reaction bothered him. His inability to trace it to anything specific bothered him most of all. He hoped that it was just an aberrant moment brought on by surprise, trauma, and the infection that had already been burning in his body. Yet, he didn’t think that was the case, which bothered him most of all. Yet, he saw few avenues that he could take to pursue the seemingly minor problem. All he could do was watch himself for similar reactions in the future to ward against some kind of rash action on his part.

While a little piece of his mind chewed over that problem, he scanned the forest around them. The tugging inside of him was getting so strong that it had almost taken on an audible humming noise. On top of that, there seemed to be a pressure emanating from the forest. It wasn’t the kind of pressure he’d expect from high-level spirit beasts. It was too diffuse for that, but it weighed on him all the same. Glances at Lifen and Lo Meifeng showed telltale signs that they were also operating beneath some kind of pressure. It wasn’t obvious, and no one had raised a fuss, but he could see tightness around their eyes. Their lips would often press into hard lines like they were concentrating on ignoring something. Those dual pressures from outside and inside left him torn. One part of him desperately wanted to just call the whole mad idea off, turn around, and take his chances with the demonic cultivators. The other part of him was all but screaming at him to keep going, to hurry, to race ahead and discover whatever knowledge or enlightenment was waiting ahead. He did neither. Instead, he kept a steady pace and let the miles of forest trail out behind him. Finally, Lifen stopped dead in her tracks.

“What’s out there?” she demanded.

Sen and Lo Meifeng looked back at her with puzzled expressions.

“Sorry,” said Lo Meifeng. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Look, you both have way higher cultivation than me, which means your spiritual senses are better than mine. I can’t figure out what’s out there. So, just tell me. Not knowing is making it a hundred times worse.”

Lo Meifeng traded a look with Sen that asked if he wanted to handle it or not. Sen frowned, then turned his attention to Lifen.

“The pressure you’re feeling isn’t a spirit beast if that’s what you mean. At least, not one that I’ve been able to identify. In fact, I haven’t so much as sensed a spirit beast in the last day or two. What about you Lo Meifeng?”

“I know it’s not a spirit beast, but that’s all I know. It certainly doesn’t feel friendly, though.”

“No,” agreed Sen. “It doesn’t.”

“Then why are we going there? Yes, I know why. Sen is having some kind of spiritual experience, but even he said those tugging feelings don’t always work out that well. This feels like one of those things that isn’t going to work out to me. No offense, but we’ve already got plenty of problems. I don’t see much benefit in going somewhere else where we’re likely to find more problems. Maybe we should just go, you know, anywhere else.”

Sen was struck silent for a long moment. Lifen had never objected to anything before. This staunch stand against going forward was such a surprise that Sen didn’t know how to react to it. He wasn’t even really opposed to the suggestion. He’d been caught up in the possibility of gaining knowledge, but even he was torn about reaching the finish line on this one. He looked from Lifen to Lo Meifeng.

“I know this was my suggestion,” said Lo Meifeng, “but she’s got a point. I go where you go. So, if you keep going, I pretty much have to go. If you decide we should take a pass, and I really want to you decide that, I will gladly slog through another hundred miles of this forsaken forest in any other direction.”

Sen kept his mouth shut for a minute and tried to think it through. That tugging inside his chest had turned into a relentless feeling that almost dragged him along. Yet, there was no guarantee that he was going to get anything of value if they reached the right destination. Even more importantly, the others weren’t experiencing that tugging feeling. Even if he got something valuable from it, there was a good chance that they wouldn’t. That oppressive feeling that just got worse and worse the farther they went was a pretty solid indication that something or someone ahead did not want to be bothered. Even a month ago, Sen might have pressed forward regardless of anything anyone else had to say. This time, he reminded himself of the lesson he’d struggled toward during his core formation. I can be more than one thing. He could be reckless and headstrong, but he didn’t have to be that way all the time. He could also be the kind of person who did silly things like listening to good advice. He looked in the direction they’d been heading, then made his choice.

“Then we go somewhere else,” he said.

“What? Really?” asked Lifen, sounding a little stunned.

“You made your case. Lo Meifeng agrees with you wholeheartedly. I’m not dumb enough to think I know better than everyone else.”

“They are wise to fear this place,” said a voice from the trees.

Sen let his spiritual sense and qi swirl out all around them, but he sensed nothing. The voice continued.

“You are wise in that you would have heeded their advice. Unfortunately, it’s too late for that. You have come too far. Now, you must finish the journey.”

The oldest-looking person that Sen had ever seen seemed to step into existence from nothing right in front of him. The man was tiny, shorter even than Lifen, and so thin it looked like any random breeze might knock him over. He wore peasant robes that had dirt stains on them where the man might have knelt near a garden. Sen wasn’t sure what to make the man or his proclamations. He offered the man a polite bow.

“Greetings, elder. While I do not wish to be rude, it is not for you to demand that we go anywhere.”

The old man gave Sen a smile that was equal parts amusement and pity. “Young man, you speak as if you have a choice to leave. You do not. You will continue on or be made to continue. That is the only choice available to you.”

Sen decided that the old man must simply be insane, and he’d learned long ago not to entertain the ramblings of crazy people. Instead, he offered the man another polite bow.

“Good day to you, Elder,” he said and turned to the others. “Let’s go.”

He tried to step past the old man, only to find himself flying through the air and crashing through a tree. He lay there in stunned bewilderment for a moment, more in shock than pain, before he lurched back to his feet. Then he gaped as Lo Meifeng came flying through the air at him. He caught her more out of reflex than anything else. He stood there with her slender frame in his arms and watched as the old man casually deflected Lifen’s primitive strikes with that big metal club of hers. Sen wondered just where she’d gotten that club in the first place. Sen jerked a little as a finger poked the side of his head. He looked down to see Lo Meifeng giving him an annoyed look.

“At this point, you either need to put me down or kiss me.”

Sen stared at Lo Meifeng. Was she serious? Was she making a joke?

“Put me down, idiot!” she yelled.

Sen put her down on the ground and asked, “What just happened?”

“I have no idea. Maybe that guy will be more talkative after we have a violent chat with him.”

Sen balked. “But he’s old.”

“That old man just tossed you through a tree.”

“That’s a good point.”

Sen and Lo Meifeng stalked toward the old man. Things happened so fast at that point that even in his memory, Sen couldn’t make sense of it. All he did remember was crashing through another tree. Then, Lo Meifeng landed on him. Then, Lifen landed on her. When the three of them managed to find their feet, Lo Meifeng looked livid.

“I’m going to end this,” she declared.

Sen felt her cycling qi and, a moment later, dozens of fireballs appeared in the air. They were so hot that nearby trees caught fire and lesser plants were turned to ash. The old man looked at the fireballs with mild interest, then waved a hand. The fireballs vanished and Lo Meifeng staggered to one side as blood spurted from her nose. Sen stared at the man. He’d felt nothing. Sensed nothing. Is this what it’s like fighting me when I’m hiding, he wondered. Still, just because the old man had dealt with fire, it didn’t mean he could cope with lightning. Sen withdrew the ascendant-level spear he’d gotten from the Soaring Skies sect and cycled for lightning. If he didn’t know better, he’d have sworn that the spear was eager for the fight the way it soaked up his qi. He focused on the technique and a lance of lightning covered the distance between him and the old man. The old man simply batted aside the lightning with his bare hand. Between his surprise and the backlash, Sen didn’t have the mental resources to object as the old man firmly herded them farther south down the road.

Sen considered other attacks, or more powerful attacks, but ultimately rejected them. The old man, whatever he was, clearly outclassed them all both individually and collectively. Instead, Sen focused on ignoring that oppressive feeling and giving Lifen encouraging looks. The concerned look she’d worn before had become a look of tightly controlled fear. Sen stole a look at the old man, who caught him looking. The old man gave Sen a considering look.

“You three are strange,” said the old man. “So much power, and yet so little understanding. None of you has the faintest idea about how to wield the paths you walk. Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter now.”

Sen gave the man a sharp look. “Why doesn’t it matter?”

He was so busy looking at the old man that he almost knocked Lo Meifeng down. He caught her and looked ahead to what appeared to be some kind of temple. It took him a second to realize that Lo Meifeng hadn’t even chided him for being clumsy. He glanced at her, and now she wore that look of tightly controlled fear.

“It doesn’t matter because this is the Temple of Eternity’s Edge,” said the old man. “And of all those who come here, almost none ever leave.”

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