John trudged his way to the Mission Hall despite his exhaustion. He had to fight the living Weird qi for hours before he successfully isolated it, and while he had gained a lot from the process, he had yet do fully digest the remnants. Only tomorrow morning would he be revitalized.
He was also dreading speaking to the Elders. The missions were very clear about how important it was that the plants were not harmed in the removal of the infection, any damage to the plants would reduce the reward given to the disciple. Seeing as John had deprived the sect of an entire fruit, he suspected he would not be getting much of anything. Oh how wrong he was.
Walking into the Hall John noticed as the tension in the air suddenly increased several notches. His minder, who had barely spoken during his task and his walk back, seemed to exchange meaningful glances with the Elder on duty.
"Disciple John greets Elder." John gave a salute and polite greeting as etiquette demanded. "I managed to remove the infection from the tree but it was more difficult than I anticipated, I only managed to prevail by pushing the infection up the tree and isolating it in one of the fruits." He held up the blue peach, black spots of corruption already appearing on its skin, as evidence. John offered no excuse but he wouldn't grovel either.
The Elder tapped his fingers at his desk. After a long moment of consideration he finally spoke, "Disciple John, the Morning Dewdrop Peach Tree is much more important than you are aware. It is a critical ingredient in a Core Forming Pill, for water cultivators ascending to Golden Core such a pill is nearly priceless."
John's stomach dropped while the Elder spoke, despite his conviction he had to remind himself several times that he was now going to take and take from the sect and give as little back as possible.
The Elder paused again, briefly this time. "Luckily for you, they are not literally priceless, as some treasures are. But this failure will cost you. Disciples are only permitted purchase of one fruit, and there are not enough fruits to go around. Three thousand contribution points will be struck from your account. Since you do not have enough, you will go into debt until you are able to pay it off, as well as being put under various restrictions.
… It would have been wise to consider whether your strength was up to the task before accepting a mission. Keep the fruit you ruined and be careful, further failure will get you expelled from the sect."
John grimaced, He only had around 100 contribution points before beginning work in the Inner sect, and with the various rewards from the smaller missions had put him up to around 300. He was now 2700 in the hole without much to show for it. His cultivation was up to around 10% full, but he would no longer be able to use the Exchange Hall to get access to resources, nor use any of the paid services in the sect until he had cleared his debt.
John doubted he was likely to actually get kicked out of the sect, at least. The sect needed him and the other Weird kids, kicking him out would be shooting their own foot. Still, he was in an awkward position now. Without resources from the sect, missions dealing with Weird qi would be even more important for his growth. The main issue was that Weird qi missions were already inherently rewarding since he could absorb the qi more efficiently and hence were rewarded with less Contribution Points. John would have to find a balance.
As he walked out of the Mission Hall he lamented that he was rewarded not too long ago and was now in the depths of punishment. John wanted to speak with the Sect Leader still, maybe if his ideas for future Weird cultivators proved valuable his debt could be wiped away. The other Weird kids might be able to help too. If they could reach Foundation Establishment and work with him on sortie missions, they could get a lot more done than John would solo. Maybe Kai could help him too.
Committing to work his network before working his ass off, John regained his focus. He still had one more troubling mission to do, and despite the admonishment from the Elder in the Mission Hall, he was going to attempt it no matter what.
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John came to another specialized garden, this one with a terraced style. A broad flat courtyard took the very center. Raised beds of pale chrysanthemums were arranged in a dish-like pattern, slowly ascending into a shallow bowl. In the center of the courtyard stood a tower with a single garden bed atop it, the focus of the entire array. Growing there was a highly unusual lantern plant, only a handful of the delicate lantern flowers dotted its limbs.
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The chrysanthemums were a most unusual and supernatural plant, they glowed with both ghostly moonlight and the gentle pale sunlight that breached the ever-present clouds. Each flower turned to face the lantern plant, sending light and qi to gather in the many small lanterns in the center of the garden. Ordinarily, the lantern plant would be gently glowing with a purifying argent color. Instead, it was twisted by Weird qi.
The most horrible and unnatural colors emanated from the tower, stygian blues that were as black as ink and impossibly bright blue at the same time. A reddish green light that twisted one's stomach just to look at. Worst of all was the blanching grey that seemed to steal away happiness; everything it illuminated looked dull and shabby, robbed of its positive qualities. Even compared to the demons John had seen, this was the most mystical and disturbing sight he had seen while not in a vision trance. Others avoided this place entirely, John wasn't sure how they had even gathered the information for the mission, maybe Elders were less effected by such sights.
To John's senses, the most unnatural part of this situation was that the Weird qi did not infest the plant itself, but lived within the light glowing from the plant's flowers. Even extending a tendril of qi into the flower did little. There were tiny berries at the heart of each lantern flower that did that actual management of storing light, but nothing unusual could be found even after prodding the berries multiple times.
John's first thought was to find a way to extinguish the light directly. John couldn't manifest his qi strongly enough to block light completely, but by using a clever weave of qi fabric he was able to scoop up soil and form a solid ball around one lantern. John felt a whisper of Weird qi hitting his dirt ball, and he absorbed what touched his qi strands, but it wasn't enough. Covering each bulb like this might take him months to solve the problem, and presumably when he eventually needed to sleep the chrysanthemums would refill the potency of the lanterns.
Suddenly something shifted, and the light from the covered lantern disappeared. The other uncovered bulbs grew that much brighter at the same time. That was something he could work with.
Over days of experimentation, John discovered a few principles. First, a lantern covered for long enough would wink out the light energy would re-route to other lanterns. Covering every lantern would cause them all to glow equally, as if no lantern was covered. Lastly, the Weird qi was definitely hiding within the light, protecting itself from most methods of interference, but in the moment it winked out one lantern and spread to the others it was briefly interacting with the plant again.
With another wave of experimentation, John was quite disappointed. Choking off the stems leading to each lantern had been his first idea, but it didn't work. The moment he tried the light within the lantern would evaporate, much faster than he slam close the trap. Quite literally the qi was able to move at near the speed of light. Any attempts to harm the Weird qi through the plant itself would cause a retreat. That was the most unsettling discovery, if the Weird qi was desperate enough, it could blink off every lantern and hide completely. John had no idea where it went in the meanwhile. Merely blocking off the light wasn't enough to cause this reaction, but strangling every stem of qi had done it.
John was sorely tempted to divert all the light to one spot and lop off the flower to save himself the trouble, but given just how unusual this garden was, it might actually be a priceless treasure. Also, John couldn't guarantee that the light would just escape before being fully chopped off.
The first breakthrough came when John tried to split his qi strands into as many thin threads as possible, touching many many points on the surface of the berry and then sucking in qi as hard as possible through each one. It felt like trying to breather while being actively smothered, but John managed to absorb some of the insidious light qi in the process. It wasn't enough to make a huge dent in the problem by itself, but it was a start.
The second breakthrough came when John realized the Weird qi would not retreat when john enhanced the lantern plant rather than cutting off various qi flows. Putting the two strategies together finally let him succeed.
John covered all but one lantern, causing the remaining one to glow like a camp fire. John then slowly amped up the performance of that stem and the sickening lights grew in intensity to that of a bonfire. John pulled hard with his fibrous qi trap and the light started to dim again. The plant shuddered, and John had several tense heartbeats as his trap was finally realized. A tiny corner of the Weird qi nucleus was pulled from the lantern and it was over. John latched onto it and yanked as hard as he could with his qi, combining all his free qi into a single powerful tentacle. The living qi was dragged kicking and fighting all the way into Johns dantian where he tore it to pieces. The inside of his dantian-space glowed with light for the first time ever in that brief fight, and it was a really unusual feeling.
Imagine being able to see the inside surface of your soul. John's looked like a damp cavern, which was a little unsettling, even if he could feel as much with his qi strands. After settling the soil and confirming the plant was recovering its natural silver light, John marched victoriously back to the Mission Hall. Completing it only knocked 100 points off his debt, and the Weird qi he pulled from the plant wasn't that substantive so it hardly felt worth it from benefits alone. Still, John learned some more tactics and his control improved even further. The Elder barely acknowledged him too, but showing he was good enough to pull it off was sweet enough.