Chapter 2
Grandma Tang helps out
Swallowing the last of the bowl of tasty food, Ling Mai looked up at Grandma Tang only to find her still examining her closely. “What? Do I look weird now, or do I have food on my face?”
Grandma Tang sighed then said, “No you still look as cute and as weird as usual, but you do look like you decided to have a dust bath sometime today. You do know you are meant to use water?”
“Humpf! I will have you know, a lot happened to me today,” she complained, “I didn't have time to wash as I had to get back with your firewood.”
Ling Mai felt so embarrassed she went to pull out her water bag to wash her face but realised the bag was empty. Looking up at the sky in frustration, she noticed some fluffy clouds floating by overhead. Without thinking she activated her energy sense to pull the water from the clouds into her water bag. A feeling of stretching and straining came from her energy sense, then rain started to fall from the sky! “Whoops! That wasn’t what I was trying to do!” She thought to herself.
“Ah, crap on a cat, you can’t keep your cultivation a secret if you pull stunts like that!” Grandma Tang was half flabbergasted, half appalled, and completely worried.
Ling Mai was too busy being gobsmacked herself, and washing her face in the ever heavier rain, to worry too much about people figuring out who was responsible for the sudden downpour. “How did I do that?” She thought as she was perplexed by how relatively easy it was to make it rain. Maybe it was on a tipping point - it just needed a nudge?” After cogitating for a few seconds she speculated that she was becoming used to using her energy sense in the same way as she used her hands, eyes and other senses. Unconscious use could be problematic she surmised.
“Should I turn the rain off?”
“The little pixy now thinks clouds are taps… No! Leave it alone. One miracle a day is most likely to go largely unnoticed. Just try to not turn off the sun; that may make people talk!”
“The sun was a bit hot today for this time of year…,” she said with a very serious demeanour but quickly stopped herself from joking anymore so as to not annoy Grandma Tang or more likely, further exasperating her.
“Listen little kitten, no more mischief! And you are coming home with me tonight. I need to keep you from destroying half the town if you decide to do something crazy such as to conjure up a light to read by.”
Seeing the contemplative look on Ling Mai’s face, she scolded her, “Argh! Pink mushrooms in my soup! Now I am putting ideas into your head. No more crazy things or even anything!”
“But it is fun!”
Grandma Tang forlornly gazed up at the sky, “The gods help me because this mere mortal is struggling to control this evil child. You will send me to an early grave at the rate you are going.”
“Yes, Grandma Tang.” Ling Mai knew when to cease stirring her up. She decided she would secretly experiment with creating a light after Grandma Tang fell asleep.
Ling Mai decided enough was enough so she surreptitiously slowed the falling rain from a downpour into a light sprinkle. She was about to ‘turn off the tap’ when she noticed Grandma Tang lifting an eyebrow at her. “Whoops, I thought you would not notice,” she mumbled mostly to herself.
Grandma Tang shook her head in disapproval, sighed dramatically and raised her eyes to the heavens. Ling Mai hung her head as she thought to herself, “Nothing much gets past her.” and she also gave a sigh.
“Can I really stay with you tonight?” asked Ling Mai as she did not really believe it.
“Yes, as I have been thinking for a while now that I should take you into my home. You have proven yourself to be trustworthy and mostly well-behaved.” She did not say that Ling Mai would, in a few short years start becoming a young woman and would become even more at risk. Ling Mai also needed some guidance so she developed a more rounded personality and she wanted to further her already advanced education. Her deceased parents had provided her with an excellent start in many subjects. She was a smart girl. Grandma Tang wanted to help more of the street kids, but she was just one old woman with limited resources.
Grandma Tang had had a delayed start with her own education until her mother was remarried to a teacher. She shuddered at the thought of how she would have developed into an adult without having a kind and intelligent stepfather.
“Here,” Grandma Tang handed her a knife. “Help me by skinning and gutting your animals and then take the offal to Big Ming the pig farmer. Once you have done that, take the skins to the tanner.”
“What is the name of this animal?” Ling Mai asked while taking the knife from Grandma Tang.
“I don’t know. There are countless species of animals in the mountains, especially the magical beast variants.”
“Thank you,” Ling Mai replied with a smile. Grandma Tang was always honest with her answers to her many questions. If she didn't know she would say so. She displayed no adult superiority in the way in which she treated Ling Mai.
Ling Mai started on the larger of the two animals, first gutting it to remove the entrails. She then very carefully removed the skin. The knife was thin and curved, much sharper and of a better quality than her own small knife. She decided to examine the knife closely with her energy sense. The knife glowed with both the identifying silver colour of iron and some other silver colour. She hadn’t seen this metal energy colour before. She decided she needed to examine all the metal knives and swords she could get close enough to for her to sense accurately. Besides having the unknown metal, she also discovered other energies permeating throughout the knife. There were various shades of brown which indictated earth energy.
“Is this what they mean by adding special materials to alloy metal to make it stronger and harder? I must visit the blacksmith to learn more. So much to do and learn!” She grumbled to herself, but she ended up smiling at the thought of finding out how to make herself a sword.
Having removed the skin, she cut the animal into six pieces: head, body and the four legs. She took a rock hammer from underneath the shop counter and used it to break open the skull.
Extracting the brain she noticed a small glow of energy being emitted from the centre of the brain. She couldn’t work out why she hadn’t noticed it before with her energy sense. Using the skinning knife she pried out a small green gem. Examining it closely with both her eyes and her energy sense, she noticed lines of light and power circulating through the gem in a pattern of interwoven colours. The beast core had four different energies: light, wood, water and earth. Combined, the energy colours resulted in an emerald-green colour.
She hadn’t counted her own energy types so she proceeded to do that now; it took longer than she expected as there were ninety-nine types! When did she gain so many? The mana stones didn’t have anywhere near that many types of energy. “The energy from nature has this many types? Are there any more types?” So much to discover!” she decided, feeling very excited about what she had so far identified and the things she might unveil when investigating and learning about cultivation.
“Is this how animals cultivate?” She pondered to herself.
She had known about magical creatures, especially the magical beasts that often terrorised travellers and farmers but she hadn’t known they had cores.
Turning to Grandma Tang, she surreptitiously showed the gem to her as she thought it could be valuable. You didn’t flash wealth around, especially in the marketplace!
Grandma Tang’s eyes widened at the sight of the gem, “A beast core!” she whispered. Taking the gem from Ling Mai, she quickly hid it away in a pocket of her money belt. “I'll keep it safe for you. I’ll go to the trading house tomorrow to trade it in. Do you want anything from there? We can go together.” She sported a big smile as she was very happy with the items gathered by Ling Mai. Ling Mai would be able to have some money to spend on clothes and anything else she needed for cultivating.
“Do you think I can get a sword in exchange for the beast core?”
Grandma Tang’s head whipped back around to glare at her, “No, you can’t get a sword!” She then looked thoughtful, “At least not yet. Wait a few years until you are bigger. You can practice with a wooden sword until then. I’ll enquire about getting you some lessons.”
Ling Mai's face was beaming with a great big smile, “YES!” She shouted causing all the surrounding shoppers and stall-owners to turn and stare at her.
“Ah, I gather you really want this”, remarked Grandma Tang somewhat sardonically, and she continued in an extra dry tone, “and how are you going to reimburse me might I ask?”
Ling Mai went to take out the copper coins she had found then stopped as most of the surrounding people were still looking at her.
“I found some money”, she whispered, “I need to buy a new blanket but I should have some leftover.”
There went Grandma Tang’s eyebrow again. Ling Mai giggled and thought to herself, “I hope her eyebrow doesn’t get permanently stuck like that.”
Grandma Tang scowled, “And just what are you grinning about now?”
“Nothing, nothing, I am just happy.”
Giving Ling Mai a look of disbelief, she shook her head and clapped her hands, “That animal is not going to skin itself. Stop larking about else it will be pitch black when we walk home.”
Ling Mai quickly grabbed the knife and started butchering the second animal. Unfortunately, it didn’t contain another beast core.
Packing up the offal and skulls into the skins and then into a leather bag, Ling Mai turned to Grandma Tang and asked her, “How much money are these worth?”
“Two coppers for the offal and two coppers for each of the skins, totalling six coppers.*
“How much is my share?” Ling Mai asked with a gleam in her eye. Money was still scarce!
“You can keep it all, but you have to clean my bag properly. I don’t want it stinking up my home.”
Ling Mai bowed. “I will be very careful to do a good job.”
“I still need to finish packing up here, then transport the meat home, so meet me at my home. It is getting late so we need to hurry home before it gets dark.”
Ling Mai shivered at the thought. The last thing she wanted to do was to be out on the streets after the sun went down.
On the way to the pig farmer, she wondered about her inability to sense the beast core. Examining the skull of the beast core animal she saw that the animal had a passive shield in the form of a membrane which had broken when she smashed open the animal’s skull. She tried imagining how an active shield would work. Opposite colours? She couldn’t discover how to do this but it seemed possible?
Reflecting vortex? Or a double-sided mirror? She tried both and finally decided on a mirror - she set up an extra layer of her energy manipulation sense so that it allowed energy in but gently guided any energy that slowly dispersed from her centre vortex back into the appropriate type of energy band. She didn’t want any mixing of energy types! Returning any leaking energy to her core would also make cultivating more effective as she would have no energy loss.
Practising the new technique on the way to the pig farmer, she managed to make it permanent by integrating it into the already-created cultivation technique. She tried testing it to see how effective it was but was stumped by the fact that her energy sense was located in her head alongside the vortex. “I’ll just have to ask Grandma Tang if it really does hide my cultivation from others. Hopefully, she will be able to tell.”
Rounding a corner she was surprised by a tall man in a black hooded cloak. The man was standing completely still. He could have been dead as there were no purple energy flashes. She could only tell he was alive by the fact that Ling Mai could now sense his energy core which, surprisingly, was located in his lower abdomen and not in his head!
Ling Mai’s mind spun rapidly with multiple trains of thought due to the sudden threat that this man posed to her. “It seems I likely made a mistake when my vortex formed in my head instead of my lower abdomen and his motionless stance is uncanny. He could be mistaken for a statue! His core is so different to mine as it is not a vortex, and it only contains black-coloured energy. I wonder what type of energy that is? It seems very solid and concentrated. How did he achieve that? I wonder what level he is? I don’t know what the levels are named let alone what power level each would signify or what a level of cultivation allows for in techniques and abilities. Grandma Tang says some levels allow a cultivator to fly. That would be so cool! I have so many questions and so much to learn!”
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Ling Mai shook her head to clear her mind and tried to act nonchalant, “My apologies,” she said while taking a step back and bowing respectfully. The man didn't react all all so she surmised he was engaged in something that required his full attention or she was just too insignificant to warrant a response.
She swiftly stepped well to the side and made her way along the street. Other townspeople were returning home on the same street so she was soon lost from sight.
Feeling a shiver go down her spine, she resisted looking back. “He didn’t say anything to me so I think he didn’t notice that I am a cultivator, or I’m too puny to be bothered with. My new shield might have worked?”
If she had looked back, she would have seen the black hooded man slowly rotating in place as though he was searching for something. Eventually, he shrugged his shoulders and went on his way.
Having detected the man’s core, Ling Mai deduced how Grandma Tang had discovered her own cultivation. Thinking hard whilst hurrying along with her bag, she decided Grandma Tang must be a cultivator too, or she has an energy sense similar to her own. “I wonder why she didn’t develop any strength or have any techniques? Or maybe she is hiding everything for some reason? I can’t work it out so I’ll just have to ask her. She should be able to test my cultivation concealing technique!”
Ling Mai realised that there were a number of hidden figures in Dragon Town. The Mayor was a cultivator and there were rumours of other cultivators and concealed organizations though Ling Mai knew next to nothing about them. She was too scared to enquire and smart enough to know she needed to keep a low profile until she was older and had more strength and backing.
Arriving at Big Ming’s pig farm, which was forced to be located on the outskirts of town due to the smell generated by the pigs, she knocked on the front door. “Go away, I don’t have any slaughtered pigs left to sell to you today!” A man shouted from within the large building. His voice was the deepest she had ever heard, verging on thunder. She almost involuntarily looked up to check if a thunderstorm was approaching.
“It is me, Ling Mai. I have some offal to sell you.”
“Okay Little Miss, I’m coming.” Loud footsteps sounded out from within. The metallic sound of a security bolt being unlatched preceded the door swinging open to reveal a diminutive man, skinny to the point of emaciation. Even having seen Big Ming before, Ling Mai could hardly believe her eyes. Such a contrast to what people expected from hearing his voice.
“What are you looking at?” He frowned at the look on her face.
Ling Mai feared upsetting him as she wanted to get a good price for her offal, so she quickly explained herself, “My apologies, I was just wondering why you are called Big Ming?”
“I used to be very fat but my pigs looked like they wanted to eat me so I lost weight”, he replied with an emotionless face.” Seeing Ling Mai just staring at him in disbelief he continued with a smile and a chuckle, “There is no fooling you! I was a cultivator but I lost big time in a fight with another cultivator and lost all my hard-earned body cultivation and shrank down to my current size.”
Ling Mai asked excitedly, “You are a cultivator?”
Looking a little pensive, Big Ming shook his head and explained, “My core was destroyed in the fight so my dantian and meridians were damaged beyond healing. There may be a high-level healer in a large sect that could help me but I can’t afford what they would charge. But I’m somewhat happy to be out of the cultivation world. It is a dog-eat-dog world in most sects.”
“That was more information than I expected from him,” Ling Mai thought. “I must visit him again and find out more about sects and cultivation. But not now as I need to get to Grandma Tang’s home.”
“Thank you for explaining it to me. I will have to come back and hear more about your adventures if that is okay?”
Giving her a look, Big Ming hesitated then agreed with a nod of his head.
Transferring the offal into a bucket he took out his money purse, “Here is two copper for you. If you can bring me a whole animal then I will pay you a lot more.” Seeing her doubtful look, he continued quietly, “I get sick of eating pork every day, but don't let the pigs hear that!”
Ling Ming laughed then took the money and bowed respectfully, “Thank you. I’ll come back when I get an animal for you and your pigs, then you can tell me all about sects and fighting and cultivation and…”, seeing the look of sadness on Big Ming’s face she quickly said, “but only if you want to!”
Big Ming sighed sadly but gave her a small smile, “It is okay little Miss, as it will be good for me to talk about it with someone now that it is further away in the past. It may give me some closure.”
He then proceeded to hurry her out the door as he was closing up for the night. The metallic sound of the door bolt being slid into place reminded her she needed to hurry to the Tanner’s place as it would soon be dark.
She could tell from hundreds of metres away from the Tanner that she was getting close due to the foul stench of tanning skins that stuck in her nose. It was a different smell than the pigs and this smell made Ling Mai feel nauseous.
The red-faced hugely fat man who answered the door was a stark contrast to Big Ming the pig farmer. She didn’t know his name as everyone just called him The Tanner. He was a morose and angry man, so much so that he didn’t have any friends; not that this fact seemed to perturb him.
He rudely grabbed the skins out of her hands and examined them closely, looking for holes or damage from inept skinning or any holes caused by her hunting them, though he knew she used a sling which rarely did any damage. Not that Ling Mai blamed him for checking as she was young and relatively inexperienced. Animals also had old scars from narrow escapes from predators and injuries from everyday life in the wilderness.
He pointed at the second animal which she had killed just after she had started cultivating, and gruffly stated his price for the skins, “Three coppers as this one has damage to the head area,” he offered.
“Four coppers. The amount of damage is very small and is in the unimportant head area.” Ling Mai countered firmly.
Giving her a look, he realised she would not be cowed and would not back down from her stated price. He grumbled something about uppitty kids but still forked out the four coppers. He then picked up the skins and winced as he turned stiffly to take them out the back.
She bowed to him as a sign of thanks for not arguing with her. She wondered if he had an injury as his movements were not normal. He was extremely fat but he wasn't all that old. Dismissing the thought as she didn't know much about healing despite knowing the essentials about how the body functioned. She knew basic anatomy and some of the more important wound treatment skills.
She turned to go and then noticed it was now starting to get semi-dark. She nervously looked around, noticing a youth standing on the corner of the street ten metres away. “Did he see me receive the money? He must have!” She decided.
She had no option but to walk past him as it was a dead-end street. She couldn’t decide if the cudgel or her knife would be best if he did attempt to attack her. In the end, she thought she would run if she could, else she would use the cudgel as a last resort as it gave her greater reach.
Walking down the street towards the youth, who was watching her with a smirk on his face whilst starting to move to intercept her, she realised he was going to attack her for her money. Taking a quick step away from him to lure him in she then abruptly lunged at him as she took out her cudgel and struck him on his face leaving a bright red mark. The youth gave a cry of pain and clutched his cheek. She bolted past the stunned and reeling youth, sprinting as fast as she could.
Muscles straining, heart pounding and already gasping for breath she concentrated on not tripping on the roughly cobbled stone street. She found she could sense the uneven ground with her earth energy-sense and she adroitly avoided the holes and lumps in the road. This use of her energy sense made her very sure-footed.
Hearing the youth behind her tripping occasionally but not losing ground, she tried to think of any other ways to speed up her pace or to hinder the thief behind her. “Fire is heat so maybe I can use my fire/heat energy-sense to see in the dark?”
Trying this she could suddenly see extra detail around her and not just in front of her. The youth behind her had the purple flashes of moving people and additionally, he glowed with heat. More worrying was the unmistakable silver gleam of a steel knife tucked into his belt. The ability to ‘see’ behind her without having to turn her head was invaluable. There was less chance of her tripping and it was fantastic to be able to see concealed weapons. “I must learn to use my energy sense more thoroughly and at all times!”
Continuing to sprint as fast as she could, she noticed the youth was not catching up to her. If anything, he was starting to slowly fall behind! Her increased strength from cultivating and greater energy reserves meant she could outrun him and outlast him due to her greater stamina.
She was just starting to calm down a little due to her growing sense of being in control of the situation when she rounded a corner and ran smack face-first into someone. She had a fleeting glimpse of a black hooded figure flailing for balance before tumbling painfully onto the cobblestone street.
“Hell’s bells! It is the cultivator!” She discovered with rapidity growing fear. Scrambling to her feet, she quickly strived to get back up to speed. She was running even more quickly than before due to the adrenaline rush. With her energy sense, she could ‘see’ the black hooded man getting to his feet. Alarmingly, he started circulating black energy. Ling Mai started panicking as she didn’t know what his technique would do to her. “Would it just stop her or would it burn her to a crisp or worse?”
At the instant that she calculated that the technique would be activated, the chasing youth rounded the corner and ran straight into the back of the black-hooded man, knocking him flying due to the youth’s greater body mass compared to her own skinny and small body.
Loud shouts and sounds of fighting came from behind her. A few seconds later there was a scream of pain from the youth and then sudden silence except for the rapid pitter-patter of her bare feet on the cobblestones. Rounding another corner she felt a little safer due to now being out of sight of the black hooded man.
Slowing her pace down from her mad dash she further slowed to a jog and then a walk once she had gone a few hundred metres further. She was now close to Grandma Tang’s home. There were no signs of pursuit and she couldn’t sense the black hooded man despite doing a continuous and careful search of her surroundings. “That was a close thing! I must look in front of me and not just behind me when fleeing,” she thought wryly to herself.
Analysing what she had sensed from the black hooded man’s energy flow, she noticed a few differences to her own cultivation other than the already recognised different location of her core and his core only having one type of energy.
First, the quantity of energy he had in his core far surpassed her own by a few orders of magnitude. She supposed this was due to his greater amount of time cultivating and therefore him having a higher level of cultivation. She wanted to find out what the levels were called and how powerful they would likely make her. She would have to ask Grandma Tang and Big Ming.
Secondly, her own energy core/vortex seemed more efficient when compared to the man’s core. His core also leaked quite a lot of energy when he activated his technique and his energy wasn’t as pure as her energy. Her having two external vortexes when she actively cultivated seemed to result in better purification and compression plus she needed them to separate the energy into the different types before merging the energy into her internal vortex.
Thirdly, she wanted to find out if she needed to change how she cultivated as she levelled up.
She remembered that when she had read the cultivation description it had specified gathering the type of energy she had selected. She hadn’t realised at the time that it had meant just one type! This reminded her of her first attempt at using a technique. “What does combining several types of purified energy do to create a reaction?”
Didn’t that mean that if she lost control of her internal vortex of numerous energy types then her head would explode or disintegrate? Or even the rest of her body? Though she supposed the difference between exploding or disintegrating would not make any difference to her…
She hurriedly checked her inner vortex but it seemed to be serenely rotating without any deviation in the separate flows of energy. She breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed.
Nearing Grandma Tang’s home, she did another thorough scan of her surroundings. Nothing was visible or could be sensed. She quickly made her way to the door and knocked.
“Who is it?”
“It’s me,” she quietly replied.
The door opened quickly and Grandma Tang swiftly guided her inside, “It’s about time. It is almost completely dark and it is dangerous for a young girl such as you to be walking around on the streets.”
“Yes, I was chased by a youth who was lurking around near the tanner's place.”
Grandma Tang’s eyebrows lifted. Ling Mai decided she needed to learn this ‘eyebrow’ language. It was so expressive!
“I managed to get away and I don’t think he will bother me or anyone else ever again.”
Again, the eyebrows conveyed Grandma Tang's feelings. This time it was, ‘Tell me more, and right now!’ Ling Mai then described everything she had experienced from the moment she left the marketplace until she arrived at Grandma Tang’s home. She included all her discoveries and conjectures plus some of the aspects that puzzled her or things she wanted to know and understand.
Grandma Tang listened in silence, with only the occasional eyebrow twitch giving Ling Mai a sense of Grandma Tang’s feelings for the, at times, scary details of meeting the tall black hooded cultivator and the chase by the youth.
Grandma Tang examined her teacup as though it would reveal the secrets of the world. Looking up she stated very seriously, “You should have given the youth the six coppers. It wasn’t worth the risk of being hurt or worse for such a small sum of money.”
“But I had much more money!”
Ling Mai took out her money bag and emptied the contents onto the table. Around two hundred copper coins formed a pile on the table.
Grandma Tang’s eyes widened upon seeing the amount of coins. “You should have still given it to him,” seeing Ling Mai’s expression on hearing her admonishment she softened her demeanour and continued, “But I can understand how you would feel reluctant to give up what to you is a large sum of money. But you have to understand that you are a cultivator now. This means that you will be able to earn more money in the not-too-distant future.”
Ling Mai grew excited at this information, “How can I earn more money?” She pleaded.
“There are many ways but they can wait until tomorrow. You need your cuteness sleep otherwise you will only look weird, and believe me, that look isn’t to be desired.”
Ling Mai nobly ignored the jibe. She decided to change the subject. She had only been in this main room so she looked around and asked, “Where do I sleep?”
“In the small bedroom next to mine, so no experiments or making a noise. Just go to sleep. I need my anti-cranky sleep.”
Ling Mai noticed the glow of silver and copper metal energy coming from behind a painting hanging on the wall. There was also a very small glow of gold energy!
Grandma Tang noticed the direction of her gaze and said, “Yes, that is where I store my money and valuables. No poking about in there.”
“There is no hiding my secret thoughts from you is there.” Ling Mai disgustedly stated.
“And you had better believe it. That said, I now can’t detect that you are a cultivator so it seems your shield is somewhat effective. Though it may not be effective if a really high-level cultivator scans you.”
“Thanks for the warning.” Ling Mai was worried. She had been fighting for survival and had had a lucky discovery which should enable her to increase her strength. She was feeling very grateful to Grandma Tang for taking her into her home. Both of these would make surviving a lot easier. On the other hand, the black-clothed cultivator was an ongoing threat unless he departed the town. She realised that being a cultivator would most likely be dangerous in new ways. Fortunately, she had both a cultivation hiding technique and an attack technique though she needed to fine-tune it so as to have the ability to do non-lethal attacks.
Making a shooing gesture, Grandma Tang instructed her, “Off to bed. You can wash up in the bathroom through that door. Here are some clothes to change into to sleep in. They should fit you.”
Taking the clothes, Ling Mai went into the bathroom. The thought of sleeping, for the first time she could clearly remember, in a real bed made her feel excited but also sleepy. It had been an extremely eventful day!
Looking around the room she discovered soap and towels plus some cloths for washing. She had a rag which normally used for cleaning herself so she rinsed it out and used some of the soap to wash herself quickly. Feeling a bit guilty for using Grandma Tang’s soap, she consoled herself with the thought that she could now buy soap and other necessities that she previously regarded as luxuries beyond her reach. Eating and clothing were her previous necessities.
Having somewhere safe to wash herself and having a full stomach was starting to make her feel sleepy. The thought of a real bed was making her feel excited. Her thoughts and emotions were bouncing all over the place.
She then examined herself in the bathroom mirror as she dried herself. She very rarely had the luxury of seeing herself in a real mirror. Normally she would only get a look at herself in reflections from pools of water.
She decided she did look cute, if a little weird as she had a cute nose, bow lips and long silky black hair, but her eyes were an electric blue; not the normal brown eyes of everyone she knew or had met.
Pulling on the clothes for sleeping that Grandma Tang had given her, she drank some water and then went to find her bedroom. Grandma Tang was still in the main room, and she pointed at a door and smiled. “Good night, and sweet dreams of dragons and swords and gold and jewellery.” This caused Ling Mai to smile. She had not had anyone else wish her good night before other than her deceased parents.
Ling Mai was now feeling very tired so she simply bowed to Grandma Tang and almost staggered into her room. The bed wasn’t very big, but jumping onto it she found it very soft. She snuggled down under the blanket and nestled her head into the pillow. “This certainly beats sleeping on the ground!” Old memories of other beds briefly stirred but she swiftly dismissed them. She had to concentrate on the now. Dwelling on painful memories would not help her. She had to keep her spirits up and think of ways to continue to improve her life. She now had vastly higher chances of achieving a happy and comfortable life. She smiled in happiness and snuggled deeper into the blankets.
Despite the comfortable bed, or maybe because of the long unaccustomed nature of it, she found she couldn’t sleep even though she was dead dog tired. Her mind was still active as she kept thinking about all the unexpected and exciting things that had happened to her that day.
One thing that she had promised herself was to experiment with creating a light. She had had vague thoughts on ways in which she could accomplish this. One way was to concentrate light energy until light started shining. Another way was to form structures to guide the light energy to collide with itself to see if that produced light.
She remembered the attack technique she had started to learn. Her first, and so far only attempt, had used more than one type of energy with highly unexpected and spectacular results. The technique’s description said the target would glow. If she tried that method to produce light and she over-did-it then she could blow a hole through the ceiling! She decided she would not try that until she was outside. Grandma Tang would not be pleased with new holes in the ceiling and roof, even though it would make gazing at the stars much easier. Somehow Ling Mai could tell that this wouldn’t be a good enough excuse for Grandma Tang.
Gathering wisps of light energy coming in from the window she started a vortex to purify it before sending it to a second vortex to concentrate the energy. The light coming in from the window was the light from the full moon. She wondered if it was in any way different from the energy from the sun?
Soon she had a swirling vortex full of concentrated and purified white coloured energy. “Now comes the hard part. How do I efficiently and effectively concentrate it further?”
Slowing the vortex she guided the inner portion of the energy towards the centre, slowing the energy until it was motionless. She slowly gathered more and more energy, almost painting it onto the outside of motionless energy. She noticed it started to form a natural crystal structure.
Ling Mai thought with growing excitement, “It has a hexagonal crystal structure, I wonder if other types of energy have their own unique shapes and structures?”
The new crystal slowly grew until it had used up all the purified moonlight in the vortexes.
Ling Mai opened her eyes and lifted her face from under the blankets from where she had been snuggling, only to see a dazzling white light floating in front of her. “I wonder if I can make different coloured lights?” She thought absentmindedly.
“LING MAI!”
“Whoops!”
“Put out the light and go to sleep!”
“Hmm, now how do I do that.” She thought, then yelled back, “I don’t know how to yet. I will figure it out in a minute.”
“You had better figure it out and quickly!”
Closing her eyes to concentrate better, she felt for the energy crystal structure using her energy sense and pulled it apart. It resisted for an instant then exploded creating an extremely bright flash of light, so bright it dazzled her even through her closed eyelids.
Blinking to try to get rid of the afterimage she yelled back, “I turned it off!”
“More like exploded it off.” Came a grumpy voice from the doorway. “Now go to sleep.”
“Yes Grandma Tang” she replied sheepishly.
“I can perfect it tomorrow,” she thought to herself. “Though it could make for an effective weapon if I made the crystal bigger?”
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