A young man on his lunch break leaned against a wall in the back of a sleazy gas station, reading an imageboard thread on a nearly brand new but thoroughly cracked phone. His posture was odd, like someone who wasn't quite used to relaxing yet was trying very hard to do so, or at least trying to make it look like they were. His other hand held a greasy, processed stick of dough-coated meat of indeterminate but assuredly dirt-cheap origin. However, underneath the grease coating his hand (and, indeed, his skin in general, not to even mention his hair) was skin much too clear and muscles much too firm for someone that engaged in the sort of lifestyle that his current position implied.
He regarded the thread he was reading with a mixture of concern and amusement.
[Image has been removed by moderator] NONAME [OP] Lol how do you lose a whole dude. A senator's kid at that.
True Son of Earth Serpents [0] Reply To NONAME [OP] this is what happens to a fake, weak country like Wolf Nation. unsurprising that a country without even one Body Destruction ancestor is run by salted fish like these, so incompetent. even a low-level city official without any cultivation here in Mountain Snake Land would never let their only son out of their sight like this. absolute disgrace, Wolf Country green uniforms are subhuman. NONAME [1]
Reply To True Son of Earth Serpents [0] heh. Martial Junior, a grandson like you from that tiny, primitive nation has nothing worthwhile to say on the subject of cultivation or governance. How's that 23% mortality rate for a basic Sternum Etching procedure treating you? Simply embarrassing. Most of your 'glorious army' aren't even true cultivators, and a quarter of them that try to become one die because of your stupid obsession with stone age medicine. Remind me, what granddaddy's language is this "True Son of Earth Serpents" speaking on the internet? Nice premium subscription, by the way. I'm sure your boyfriend is real proud of your wealth.
The young man studiously ignored the quickly brewing nationalist argument (as was standard, and usually identical in every thread) and scanned the rest of the thread for any pertinent (or humorous) information. He had already read the article that the thread image was a poorly done screen capture of and found nothing he didn't already know.
The reason for his interest in this case specifically was for the most obvious reason; surprising probably nobody except for his father, the young man with an unusually deep cultivation that slept in the back of the gas station he worked in was, in fact, the recently escaped son of the Senator in question.
Nash Refraction Emerald, sole scion of the prominent Emerald family, slid slowly down the wall to sit down on the thin, lumpy sleeping bag that served as both his bed and couch. He took another bite of the dubious gas station food and returned to reading through the thread, shifting his legs into the least formal position possible; as soon as he took his attention off of his posture, it unconsciously returned to a proper cultivator's elegance, at least as far as could be done comfortably on the cheap sleeping bag. The food disappeared as quickly from his hands as any sense of civility did from the thread, and Nash found it quite difficult to find any even vaguely useful information; while he did enjoy a privileged knowledge of the event, being the focus of it, there was very little information in the thread that he didn't either already know or suspect.
NONAME [5] Reply To NONAME [OP] i'm one of the security guards for the Emerald family and there's been a lot of movement. i wasn't there on the day when the kid disappeared because it was my day off, but they're sending a lot of us out to go look for him. barely anyone here at the actual manor anymore, even the Senator hasn't been back much. i've been using the activity to waste more unsupervised time on the internet, of course. NONAME [12] Reply To NONAME [5] Great thinking, genius. Just say that you aren't doing your job and that there's basically zero security in their actual base of power. That definitely won't get you fired or the place robbed, no siree. NONAME [5] Reply To NONAME [12] As if anyone would dare to rob the Emeralds. That would be simply suicidal. Sure, the manor may look like a cicada right now, but the Emerald family themselves would be the oriole behind. Senator Emerald wouldn't hesitate to make sure they knew who their granddaddy was. Anyway, [6] is an absolute moron, Young Master Emerald is going to be found in no time, doubtless with a beating or two in his future. [13] is wrong too, the kid was definitely not kidnapped, no matter what the official story is. Every time I saw him, he had two modes: arrogant or brooding. The whole arrogant rich boy 'prodigy' type you see all the time on the internet. Absolutely no way he didn't run away. NONAME [8] Reply To NONAME [12] You are simply courting death. Slacking off at work is one thing, but insulting the Young Master of your employers? You're even refusing to give the Emerald family face by saying that they're lying! Are you that tired of living? I don't need to be a fortune teller to say that you will not be in poverty soon - maybe if you ask for forgiveness and kill yourself, at least your family will get to keep their jobs. NONAME [34] Reply To NONAME [OP] My brother's wife's cousin is a policeman and he said that Senator Emerald called in a favor with the Lord Chief of Police to involve the police in the search. They're really pulling off all the stops. Big Little Brother [0] Reply To NONAME [OP] who names their kid 'refracting'? no wonder he ran.
A timer he had set jolted Nash out of his reading and he stood up, wiping his greasy hand off on his pants, still more than a little amused at the novelty of being slovenly. He stepped out of the gas station's back room to wait for any customers to appear, a rather uncommon affair at this time of day.
Bored, he idly looked around the store to see if there was anything that needed his attention, beginning to reminisce about how he got there in the first place. Still better than under my father's thumb, he thought, picking back up a fallen display, kneeling on the ground to stack everything back onto it.
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Nash Emerald sat in the limo with perfect posture, a forcibly neutral expression on his uncannily symmetrical face. Scorn and annoyance built in equal proportion while he heard the driver prattle; he was another one of his father's lackeys, and was reminding him of basic etiquette that Nash had been taught immediately after learning to speak in full sentences.
Something about making sure to respect the Young Mistress of whatever too-full-of-themselves martial academy that he was being forced to pay a visit to. The same story every time, he grumbled inwardly, though his well-trained face showed no sign of his complaints. Some little sect or academy or family makes a business deal or aligns themselves politically with Father. So he needs to give them face. But he's oh-so-busy wheedling that room full of doddering geriatrics, so I have to go.
"Understood," Nash said as soon as the attendant stopped talking, not bothering to listen to the actual words coming out of their mouth - it was practically identical every time. And he has the gall to wonder why I'm not progressing. I'm spending more time doing this as I am cultivating. His thoughts trailed off into vague invective directed towards just about anything that even somewhat inconvenienced him, though most were focused on his current situation and, of course, his father.
The limo took that tell-tale turn, the one that Nash could feel meant that they were nearly there, and he looked out one window, noting the gate slowly opening.
The gate was ironwork, masterful scrollwork curving and blossoming on its face, proclaiming the wealth of the academy behind it. On each side of it were concrete pillars, thick and tall, topped with what were practically streetlights shining a soft yellow glow in the dark of the night, sending that mellow light scattering on the old but well maintained sidewalk in front of the gate.
Perfectly manicured plants lined the car path that hid behind the gait, the limo idling in front of it as it waited on the ponderous edifice to open fully, the motors more than likely concealed in the concrete pillars having a difficult time shifting the hulking mass of steel that the gate was made of. Straining his ears, Nash could barely hear the whine of the gate under the puttering of the engine, even with his enhanced hearing. Doubtlessly, it would be entirely inaudible to those of low or shallow cultivations, even if they made themselves look foolish by pressing their ear up to the pillar.
Eventually, the gate came to a smooth stop, flanking each side of the paved driveway. It stopped precisely at the edge of the concrete, crisply framing the path beyond as the limo rolled past the expensive door. On both sides of the pathway, there were symmetrical vanity gardens, filled with a variety of well manicured and obviously expensive plants.
Channeling some lums to the Greater Luminiferous Vision pathway that he had built in his soul, Nash could see that the gently glowing flowers that grew in raised plots had hundreds of small pathways of their own, their bodies in the Luminiferous Aether pulling in normal lums and filtering out any impurities before releasing the lums back into the environment. Each one was more likely than not an Aetheric treasure that dozens of rural sects would openly fight over in order to use as a centerpiece in their best cultivation room, and here in the Majestic Cloud Sect they were used as decoration.
Nash suppressed a yawn. Nothing was out of the ordinary so far; treasures like that were as common as rocks and sticks in any sect that Senator Emerald bothered to give face to.
The driver slowed to a stop at the entrance to an open air courtyard. The other limo following behind them stopped too, and two guards stepped out, going to flank the car door nearest to Nash, one of them opening it. He stepped out of the open door and the guard closed it as he adjusted his formal suit, both of the limos driving off to find parking. Nash gave his clothes one final brush-off (with a small sigh, simply to make clear his complaints in a manner even his attendants wouldn't be able to fault him for) and, not bothering to look behind him or check in with his guards, walked towards the delicate-looking courtyard door. Once again, the fixture was the perfect image of graceful elegance, the painted wooden portal beautiful and obviously expensive in a variety of manners that would simply bore the reader to numerate.
A sentry posted at the door noticed them and gave Nash a martial salute, to which he nodded. The sentry opened the door and beckoned them into the courtyard and Nash, hands clasped elegantly behind his back and flanked by his attendants, entered.
The courtyard was open to the night sky, and while the sky was black and starless this deep into the city, the hanging plants grown in a drooping lattice in the center of the courtyard provided a suitable substitute. They cast a soft blue light over the whole courtyard, imitating the absent stars, concealed as they were by the light pollution of the Capital of Wolf Country.
They were not the only plants there, though; the entire courtyard was replete with similar plants, in fact, and non-plants got into the action too. Small bioluminescent mushrooms, cultivated carefully in tiny pots set into the walls, took the place of normal lights. Several posts lining the pathways were covered in creeping vines covered in aromatic flowers that Nash could smell even here from the entrance. The paver stones weren't stones at all, but rather cuts of various types of wood carved into organic shapes and set into the ground, stylized to look like river stones. Going with the theme, the wooden paths took sinuous, winding paths through the courtyard, passing by small tables stacked high with expensive finger-food. Outside of the paths, the ground was covered in a soft, springy blanket of moss.
Nash stepped further along the winding path, making as much of a beeline for the food as was polite for someone in his position.
On the way, he momentarily met eyes with the Young Mistress of the hosting sect and sighed inwardly, knowing that it would be an insult if he pretended he hadn't seen her or went for the food first. A facsimile of a slight smile was on his face as he moved towards her and her guard, stopping a few steps away to give a short salute and extremely shallow bow. "Greetings from the Emerald family, Ms. Gardner. It is a pleasure to meet you," Nash said, lying through his teeth. "I have been impressed your sect's innovative use of spiritual plants. Perhaps my father would hire the services of the Majestic Cloud Sect for one of our own estates."
The Young Mistress giggled and waved him off. "No, no," she said, obviously amused, or at least trying to make that impression. "Our little Majestic Cloud Sect wouldn't dare to presume that our decorations were anything to interest the great Emerald family. You honor us more than enough by your simple presence in our humble soiree here - please, do take my regards to your father. I've heard he's quite busy, but he is always welcome here as a friend to our Sect. You too, of course," she continued, tittering. She smoothed her skirt and beckoned him to follow her, and he did. "You have just arrived, have you not? Please, come with me and enjoy our hospitality; you must be simply starving after that drive."
They moved up to one of the tables - the largest one, of course - trailed closely behind by both of their guards. Nash reached out and grabbed a small confection, pretending to marvel at the intricate detail on the pastry. "How delightful. The Majestic Cloud Sect certainly keeps good chefs on hand," he said, delicately moving it to his mouth and taking a tiny bite. "Quite delicious," he said, this time lying much less. A bit too sweet for my taste, he thought, but not bad. He turned his head back towards the Young Mistress and spoke again. "Perhaps your chefs, too, will want to speak to my father. I can see him enjoying this." No I can't. The old coot only ever eats stuff like this if it's too rude not to.
More of that grating giggling ensued, her hand rising up to her face in a delicate and rather artificial gesture. How insufferable, Nash thought, his fake smile increasing in strain. He took another bite mostly to take his mind off of it, and also so he didn't have to bother thinking up more empty flattery to fill the dead air. For a few blissful seconds, a wonderful silence emerged when the Young Mistress had stopped laughing but Nash was still chewing, but it couldn't last forever. He swallowed and began to wait as long as he could reasonably say was somewhat polite to wait before beginning to speak again.
He was saved from further politicking by the rumble of an explosion on the opposite side of the courtyard.
Nash raised an eyebrow and Gardner whipped her body around to look at the source of the sound, all three of the guards directly next to them joining them in staring at the cloud of dust. The whole party went silent, everyone joined in warily studying the slowly settling cloud, and Nash could see fear in the postures of many, especially in those wearing the colors of the Majestic Cloud Sect.
His thoughts, however, were rather different to that perceived norm. There aren't any cameras right here in the pavilion - it'd be unthinkably rude, he thought, slowly shifting his fighting stance to face towards his guards, gradually so they wouldn't notice.
A reasonable explanation for me to go missing in the confusion? I think this might be my chance.
His hands formed into a fist as he lifted off his feet and he could feel the lums thrum in every quanta of his body as he began channeling the signature combat art of the Emerald family, the Dimensional Phasing Art. He shot out with his hand, striking one of his guards in the chin before pivoting to run for the entrance, his formal shoes scuffing on the wooden pavers, digging into the grass.
He heard the surprised shouting of his guards beginning their pursuit, but he was already nearly to the door, his hand reaching out to force it open.
That was around when the second explosion happened.
Nash was looking away from it, so he wasn't quite sure where it came from. He felt it throwing him forward, through the door that had swung out on its own, the pressure difference in the air enough to force the light wooden door open.
He felt several things in short succession; first, the pressure wave. As a Second Calcification realm cultivator wrapped in expensive, high-end clothes that nearly counted as armor, he was only lightly effected. Shrapnel bounced off of his formal wear, saving the back of his body, but his neck wasn't covered.
He cursed, both from the pain of the shrapnel shredding his flesh, but also that high collars hadn't been in fashion recently. His neck - other than the pain, of course - felt warm and wet, blood seeping out of holes created by the fragments of wood and metal that pierced into his skin, but at least he was alive. Hit where he was, he would've been dead already if his cultivation had been just a little shallower.
His curses turned into inarticulate hisses and forcible exhales as he tumbled down the hill; he skidded and bounced on the pavement and, while his cultivation let his body withstand the actual tumbling, the forces on his body acted unevenly on the shrapnel. Some fell out, some snapped off, some dug further into his neck, the pain increasing for every shift of the splinters within his skin.
He skidded to a stop and immediately sprang back up to his feet. For a moment, he whipped his head left, then right, getting a sense of where he was, and then ran straight for the closest of the estate's walls, not looking back at whatever had caused the explosion. He sprinted with every bit of the body enhancement that his cultivation allowed; at one point, one shoe fell off, and he just continued in a stumbling, uneven run. When he was but a few body lengths away from the tall stone wall, he jumped into the air to try and clear it.
To call what was happening in his head a thought process was somewhat of a misnomer - certainly, even at Second Calcification, it was difficult to form a coherent inner monologue processing anything that happened at the time scale of a cultivator's jump. Instead, he simply noticed, a twitch of subconscious thought alerting him that his current trajectory would lead to him slamming into the wall at the hip.
Everywhere below his waist, for a few fractions of a second, simply disappeared into nothing. To an outside observer, he would have appeared as a floating torso, and one standing under him would be able to see into his insides; see the cross-section twitches of muscles working on nothing, the bundle of intestines that simply refused to fall out, as if Nash had been cut in half and set upon a glass plate soaring through the air.
He caught himself on the wall, hanging his legless torso down when, suddenly, his legs reappeared. He kicked off the remaining shoe and put both his socked feet on the wall, looking momentarily over his shoulder before kicking off of the wall. He tucked in his arms and landed with bent knees, using his cultivation to resist the force of the fall.
He took a moment to extricate his feet from the dirt, them having sunk in with the force of his landing. His hands scrabbled randomly through several pockets, hidden and plainly visible, and discarded most of what was within; a phone, pocket watch, several 'panic buttons,' identification, and a credit card were among the pile on the ground; there was no telling how many of them had GPS or other types of tracking planted in them by his father. What he kept was whatever cash he had on him, an ornate straight knife the length of his forearm with a small cross guard (still in its sheath,) and a small vial of minor healing pills appropriate to his cultivation level. He checked each pocket one more time and, satisfied that there was nothing to lead his father to him, set off into the night to find some new, less identifying clothing.
---
The sole heir of the Emerald family sat in a folding chair across from a greasy-looking man; the heir wore dirty, cheap, and ill-fitting but obviously new clothing. The shirt was baggy, excess fabric drooping and flapping in the air where it was not constrained by being tucked into the already too-tight pants. His shoes were similarly improperly sized, and the only matter of clothing that he had not seriously erred on choosing was the baseball cap[^1] that he wore, and that was only because the store had only sold them in one size. Sitting opposing him in a similar chair (and evidently just as much of an uncomfortable one,) was the greasy man. His clothes, too, were ill fitting, though more out of cheapness than inexperience; his clothes invoked formality, but his body could not assume that power. His formal shirt bunched up at the shoulders, not tailored for his slight build, but bulged out at his prodigious gut. Sweat soaked his armpits and every bit of exposed skin seemed to be dipped in grease, except his hands, which instead looked to be dipped in soot.
[^1:](Baseball does not exist in the universe Nash resides in, but this form of headwear is closest to the American baseball cap in form, function, and connotation, though the p^h^əgi ðik mu has a flap covering the back of the neck.)
The greasy man leaned back with a groan, though one without Nash's cultivator advantages would have difficulty telling whether it came from the chair or the man. (It was both, Nash noted, hearing a small squeak of the folding chair's unidentifiably cheap alloy protesting at the strain.) "So," he said, shifting a tab of gum between the molars of one side to another. "What's a kid like you want from a place like this? Can't fool a swindler, kid - can tell you're a rich boy from a mile away. Obviously never bought your own clothes, and by the look of your face you seem to even have a Sternum Etching, at least."
Nash inwardly smiled, his years of training in etiquette and politicking making the situation like putting an adult man into a test meant for an elementary school student.
Would be more ideal if he hadn't pried, Nash thought, but this isn't even close to the power play he thinks it is. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped together in front of his chin. "Maybe I can't fool a swindler, sir, but I'm under no obligation to disclose my motivations, nor my origins," he said, staring into the greasy man's piggish eyes. "What I want? A place to sleep. A source of income. I do some work for you under the table, you give me a place to crash and some spending money, and you get an employee you don't need to pay taxes on employing. Do you need anything else?"
"Woah, woah, calm down, bucko," the gas station owner said, raising his arms up in false surrender. "No need to get aggressive with me, little buddy. I just wanna know what I'm getting into - don't want to take in a fugitive, after all, and who has a Sternum Etching without any sort of backing? To lose that backing, you must have made enemies, one way or another."
"That might've been true a few decades ago, but have you even checked how easy it is to get one nowadays? A few months or years of savings pays for the procedure, and casualties are rare," Nash said, waving off the other man's concerns. "Indeed, I have a Sternum Etching, but my backing is nothing to worry about," he continued, lying through his teeth. "I may have taken out a few loans to pay for it, but not with anyone shady. I just don't want anyone to know I'm here or I'll get a court summons soon, and I don't wanna end up in prison for fraud. Nobody is looking for me too hard."
The greasy man leaned forward. "If anyone does show up, I had no idea about nothing that you're talking about. I didn't even know ya," he said, extending one of his greasy arms. "You're hired."
Nash took the hand and shook it, though not without a bit of a wince.
---
It was a normal day, or rather night. The sun had long set, but light was still ubiquitous in the capital city of the Wolf Nation, which never slept (because someone would have stolen its wallet while it did.) Bright neon lights shined, advertising stores selling liquor and other amusements, while seedy little gyms and schools dotted the cheaper alleyways, promising to teach martial arts or other cultivation secrets; flickering streetlights dotted intersections, with traffic lights hanging low on their cords glowing like massive lightning bugs. Behind glass doors of convenience stores, the cheap fluorescent lights shone out onto the dark streets, glinting off of the broken glass strewn through the parking lots and gutters.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Another thing that made the night normal was that someone was robbing a gas station convenience store.
There was, though, one thing that was incredibly abnormal. The cashier wasn't having any of it.
"Screw off," the cashier said, not a hint of fear in his voice. The only thing visible on his face was was a vague annoyance, his hands resting on the counter between them.
Perhaps his confidence came from the plastic screen between them, the robber thought, but the bystanders (those that hadn't taken advantage of the altercation to leave without paying) thought that it was rather unlikely, given that a thin plastic barrier offered somewhat inadequate protection against the strength of a cultivator. The robber was obviously a cultivator (though not a well rounded one, judging from their complexion,) particularly due to the fact that his fist was wreathed in sputtering flames. The employee of the small gas station, however, was either somehow unaware of this fact or too stupid and/or insane to care. He spoke again. "Now, sir, you can either buy something or leave, those are your two options."
Somewhere in the back of the thug's often concussed head, alarm bells rang; long ignored self-preservation instincts kicked in, and got nowhere. "I don't think you understand the situation you're in," the thug said, projecting heavily. He raised up his fist, covered in sputtering fire that repeatedly blew out and lit once more. "See, kid, I'm a cultivator. I'm half a step into the Second Calcification. A junior like you can't afford to mess with a senior brother like me, I don't care if you think you're a big shot."
"I'm going to have to ask you to leave," Nash said, deadpan. "You have thirty seconds before I am forced to make you."
"Haha, what a funny joke, buddy. See, you're a funny kid, so I'm not going to kill you outright. If you apologize and call me your Senior, I'll only break one of your arms," the thug said, clenching and unclenching his fist as it flared more intensely with flames. His eyes were open wide and his mouth was pulled up into a snarl, and he blew away a lock of his stringy, greasy and greying hair, speaking again. "Well? Insult me again like that and you've lost your chance. I'll just kill you; my mercy has limits."
The man behind the counter seemed to take that as a challenge. "Your cultivation method is poor. Your effort is poorer, and I've seen kiddie pools less shallow than your cultivation. Your flames are dim, and keep going out. You get no beauties. You look like an addict, and you haven't taken a decent bath for..." the cashier sniffed the air, his nose wrinkling in disgust. "One and a half weeks, approximately. Did you slick your hair with deep fryer oil? Sure smells like it. Your -" that last insult was destined to never be uttered, as before the pronouncement was finished, the thug lost his temper.
His arm swung in a massive haymaker, the flames wreathing his (incorrectly formed) fist flaring the brightest they had yet, breaking out of dull reds into the classic orange. The derision didn't leave the face of the cashier, even when the sloppy overhand punch slammed into the plastic screen, sending broken-off shards and globs of molten acrylic every direction out from the shattered screen. For a moment, everyone's eyes closed due to the large sound and sudden shrapnel content of the air, preventing them from seeing the expected outcome of a battered and rather crispy cashier.
Once their eyes opened and the flying plastic all clattered to the ground, the reality was quite different. Inexplicably, the cashier was unharmed; his clothes weren't singed or even (further) ruffled by the attack, maintaining the same level of fire-hazard greasiness as before.
Deadpan and obviously unimpressed, the cashier spoke again. "I'm stealing your wallet to pay for that, just so you know." He stepped back out of his casual stance, still behind the counter, and raised his hands slightly - just off of the counter, at his hip. "Don't blame this Senior for not taking you seriously," he said, "Before you demand respect, try to be worth respecting first." His front hand floated out in a jab, insultingly slowly. The would-be robber, still recovering from the shock of seeing his opponent unharmed, obviously raised his hand to block the sluggish attack.
Then it hit anyway.
It made no sense; there were no tricky angles, no use of overwhelming speed or misdirection. Everyone in the store had seen exactly where and when that fist was going, including the thug, and he had positioned his hands to intercept it easily. But the fist still impacted his face anyway. While he was still reeling from the unexpected blow, the next came, a bit faster.
It came along the exact same trajectory, directed exactly at the waiting arms of the thug. It hit his face again, this time causing actual pain. The thug brought his arms in tighter and leaned back, trying to puzzle out how the cashier had hit him.
Then the next jab came, and this time he could feel his nose break, forced to one side, but the jabs weren't stopping; he just swayed in place just trying to stay standing as his head was rocked by evenly spaced jabs passing straight through his guard, each one building in strength and speed until his balance finally gave out and sent him falling onto the floor, knocking over a display as he tried to catch himself.
"Just a frog in a well," the cashier said, standing over the thug.
Blearily, the thug managed a thought; when did he step around the counter? Continuing, the cashier knelt down, gathering some of the thug's clothing in his left hand, some of the thug's own blood coming off of it and soaking into his shirt. "I only needed my left hand to get you in such a state. I hardly need to say you're a disgrace to the name of cultivators everywhere; your face alone tells that story more than well enough," the cultivator said, standing up and effortlessly pulling the thug up with him by his one-handed grip on his shirt. "Tell you what, I give you some pointers on your technique. I'll attack five times, and you'll try to dodge them. If you manage to dodge any of them, then I'll let you leave without breaking any of your arms. Don't bother to accept or decline," the cultivator said, his eyes boring into the thug's soul while his perfectly symmetrical teeth bared into a mockery of a smile. "You don't have a choice."
One and a half minutes later, a bruised, broken and bloody man with one broken arm limped out of a gas station, feeling lucky to be, at the very least, alive. He pulled himself into the back seat of a car, uncaring that he was getting blood on the seats, and told the driver to gun it. It was time to relay his tale to his superior.
---
The man with the broken arm knelt on the floor, his forehead touching the ground. His arm had been haphazardly splinted, and he could still feel the stinging from the splashes of whiskey used to disinfect his wounds, which were covered in a similarly poor bandaging job. Above him, both physically and in the org chart, was his Boss; he leaned back in one of the booths of the diner that served as the closest gang-controlled business. The faux leather squeaked under him, and the thug on the ground heard the fingers tapping on the table as the Boss considered the information he had just heard. The tapping paused for a moment, and the thug, well acquainted with the movements of the other criminal, knew it was because the ganger brought his cigarette up to his lips. His suspicions were confirmed when the boss exhaled a puff of foul-smelling smoke, then spoke. "Sit back up and look me in the eyes, coward. Seeing a weakling like you grovel disgusts me."
The weakling did so, still not daring to stand up. He winced at the pain the movement brought; the cashier's beating hadn't been the only one he had received once he told his boss that he had lost to some chump without any fame or backing to call his own.
The boss tapped his cigarette off into the ashtray on the table, leaving the butt in the tray and reaching into his pocket. He took out another cigarette and reached out to the kneeling thug, a flash of amusement crossing his face when the thug flinched. "Light it," he bade.
The thug reached out the less injured of his arms and, as precisely he could manage, used his cultivation method to create a tiny, flickering flame at the end of one of his fingers. His hand trembled as he held it to the cigarette; he didn't even want to imagine what would happen if he dared to singe the hand of the Boss, whether or not it was an accident.
Another silence ensued as the Boss took a long drag of the cigarette. The thug's eyes, him knowing well enough to be wary of what could be done with a lit cigarette by a displeased Boss, followed the movement of the hand as it moved away from the mouth and onto its resting place on the table, the cigarette standing up like a burning, solitary birch tree on a wide plain. The thug watched with growing trepidation as the smoke redirected itself from the lit end, winding up the Boss's wrist and arm like a vine of tobacco smoke climbing a tree-trunk of an arm. Eventually, it reached his shoulder and began to loop back down, slowly and silently wrapping the Boss's upper arm, less like a vine and more like the cord-wrapped grip of a sword.
The Boss spoke again, interrupting the growing anxiety of the thug and replacing it with a healthy serving good old fashioned terror. "You know our way," he said, reaching one hand out and cupping the thug's chin with it, forcing their eyes to meet. "You make a mistake, you've gotta fix it. I'll give you one more chance. You know what happens if you fail the gang again. You are going to complete the original mission."
He took another puff of the cigarette. "You're going to get them to pay those protection fees. I don't care if it's by scare tactics like you were trying before, I don't care if you just ask oh-so-kindly. You're going to get that money, one way or another," he said. He tightened his grip on the thug's chin, bringing him even closer as he leaned in. "Of course, there's the matter of face too. The gang won't be insulted by having some no name beat one of our members. You will redeem yourself on that account."
The expectant silence made it clear that the thug was expected to speak. "Of course, sir," he said raspily, through a throat bruised by strangulation. "I will not fail you again, sir."
"Good answer," the Boss said, a predatory smile on his face. The thug noticed with no small amount of terror that is wasn't too dissimilar in construction to the one the cashier had shown him not long ago, right before the beating really began. His wariness was justified; the smile fell suddenly from the face of the Boss, and he picked the cigarette-holding hand off of the table, bringing it to his mouth, but not quite taking a puff. "Of course," he said, nearly in a growl, "I'm a merciful Boss. I'll give you some help, since you clearly can't to anything yourself." Instead of inhaling from the cigarette, the Boss let his hand drop towards the thug. The cigarette got closer and closer and the thug had to suppress a flinch and look straight ahead as it came to rest on his cheek.
"Thank you, sir," the thug said, feeling the burn start to form. As a cultivator that used fire-based techniques, he had a higher resistance to heat than most, but at his stage full protection only extended to his own flames; he forced himself to not wince as he smelt a mixture of tobacco and burnt hair just a few inches away from his nostrils. "You are truly merciful, sir."
The smile reappeared on the Boss's face; yellowed teeth, some filed down into sharpened points and others filled with gold, yawned out from the cultivator's maw. From one corner of his mouth, a trail of smoke wafted into the air; the thug couldn't tell whether it was from the cigarette or the Boss's cultivation technique. "Good man." He withdrew the cigarette and placed it back into his mouth, letting it hang there for a bit. The smoke wrapped around his arm snapped taut, bringing his arm with it into a punch that slammed into the thug's chest, sending him sliding backwards and cracking the back of his skull on the wooden floor. The thug's vision swam and he felt bile rise to the back of his throat, but he managed to force it back down, leaving a burning sensation that felt like he had taken a shot of battery acid. He attempted to sit back up, a ringing entering his ears and his vision darkening as he scrabbled back up into a sitting position. Eventually, most of his senses returned to him, and he caught the tail end of the Boss's sentence. "- five men. You will be the lowest rank of all of them. Do not fail. Understood?"
The thug nodded, fighting off the resurgence of nausea the head motion brought. I need to get away. Somehow. he thought, swallowing in an attempt to ease the pain of his throat. "You have been dismissed," the Boss said, waving him off with a bored look on his face. That bored look changed into one of mild interest and amusement as he watched the thug struggle to get to his feet, like a middle school child watching a bug with a few missing legs limp futilely to follow some invisible pheromone trail.
I'll just need to wait for the right chance, the thug thought, finally giving up and assisting himself with a hand on a nearby table. He hauled himself to his feet, grateful for his cultivation; if a mortal took any of the beatings he had received in the past twelve hours, they would have been dead many times over.
Swaying on his feet, the thug left the diner.
---
On the other side of the same city, a considerably more respected gang leader conducted his gang's business from the back of a luxury car, though anyone who wished for a similarly successful political career wouldn't call the clan in question a gang.
A taciturn expression sat comfortably on the face of Senator Emerald. An open manila folder sat in his lap, him himself sitting in the back of one of his limousines.
He scanned some of the contents of the folder, one hand on his knee, the other flipping between the papers stored within; even once computer technology progressed past the room-sized behemoths he remembered from his childhood, he still preferred to use physical paper whenever possible. It added to the air of tradition and sophistication that he had spent most of his one hundred and forty three years cultivating along with his actual cultivation.
One, especially at my age, can only look so sophisticated fumbling around with a phone screen, he mused as he memorized the information (he would have the folder shredded, then burned later.) That, of course, didn't even mention the issues of sensitive information being accessible from an electronic device - no, the Senator would have his documents done in paper until he died, and that would be a long time coming indeed.
Having acquired the information he wanted from the folder, he set it to his side and pressed a button on a small, nearly invisible in-ear device. "Patch me through to the Lord Chief of Police," he said. The other side of the line chimed in with a crackling sound quality that did little to mask the nervousness of the (obviously inexperienced) voice coming over it. "Uh, yes, Lord - sorry, Senator Emerald. The Lord Chief of Police should be on the other side of the line soon."
The line cut out, though not soon enough to avoid catching the sigh, which was a mix between embarrassment and relief from someone who was obviously not aware the microphone was still on. Senator Emerald felt a twinge of amusement; not enough for it to show on his face, but enough for him to overlook the slight of the mistaken title, if only once.
He did decide, though, that if that particular employee did the same thing again, especially where someone else could hear...
The Senator waited without a trace of anxiety in his mind. The Chief of Police owed his position to him; if he knew what was good for him, he wouldn't keep the Senator waiting for long.
He wouldn't be deposed immediately, but if it became a pattern, his reappointment would suddenly have dramatically less support and both of them knew it.
It didn't take long for the Senator's prediction to be confirmed. Two minutes and twenty three seconds, give or take, he thought as he heard the digital sound of an incoming call. He pressed a button next to his seat, and the call was accepted. At least judging by how many times I heard the tires revolve, assuming a constant speed.
"Great Senator, how may this junior assist you?" the Lord Chief of Police asked in the oddly precise tempo stereotypically associated with cultivators of his particular lineage.
One of the many reasons that the Chief was so dependent on the Senator's continued support was that lineage, or rather the rumors around it; the Chief of police tried to suppress that as much as his position would allow, which as anyone who knew anything about how rumors spread, served only to inflame them further.
The Chief of Police being of that particular race (or species, some argued) of experiments was a particularly useful piece of leverage for the Senator - he could be viewed as a virtuous example and role model for all of his kind and a symbol of the equality the Wolf Nation offered to all those strong enough to be worthy of it, or it could be a dangerous inhuman remnant of the Imperial Period that had to be disposed of before it showed its true colors.
All at, for the Senator, the flip of a switch. The reduced lifespan didn't hurt the Senator's ability to manage the position either, of course.
"Is there any more news of the investigation of my son?"
Unperturbed by the lack of respect, the Chief of Police responded, his syllables monotone and equally spaced in perfect 4/4 time. "This junior has sent out various police elements to investigate the case. The pavilion where your son was last seen has been put into lockdown, with the full cooperation of the Majestic Cloud Sect. One store owner that operates near that sect reported seeing someone matching the Young Master's description running away and then disappearing into a department store - he is being questioned, and the department store in question is being searched. I am currently in negotiations with that monastery we discussed to acquire an Aether Tracker, and -"
"That is enough," the Emerald patriarch said, taking advantage of a pause in the Chief of Police's words that only existed because he was obviously looking up information on the other side of the call. "I do not need every little minutia of the case. I only need to know about whether any actual progress has been made."
"No, sir," the Lord Chief of Police said, voice quivering in a rare tonal display of emotion for both his kind and his position. "My subordinates have not yet found your son," he said. The Lord Chief of Police, the director of all law enforcement operations in the entire capital, a descendant of Aethero-mechanical experiments, and a formidable cultivator in his own right, spoke with the same trembling resignation of a child admitting fault to an authority figure.
"Lord Chief of Police... such an admirable title, isn't it?"
"Yes, sir. Thank you for your support in my possession of it, Senator Emerald."
"When someone is so admired, they must be admirable it turn, or they are nothing but a fraud. To be admirable, someone must deliver on their promises."
"Yes, Senator Emerald. You are truly wise, sir."
"When someone is exposed as a fraud, they become despised by society; they lose everything. Remember that, Lord Chief of Police. Everyone is expecting results from you, and soon."
A few seconds passed in silence. The Police Chief spoke, and shortly afterward the line was cut.
"Understood, sir. I will not disappoint you."
---
It was the morning now, but not the type of morning that came to mind when mornings were mentioned. It wasn't a refreshing morning, as the sun cresting over the cityscape only made it both unpleasantly bright and unpleasantly cold after a night of being battered by cold winds, but it wasn't one of the bleary mornings either. It would be wrong to say it was bleary, as it was no more bleary than the other mornings in which the more normal denizens of the city woke up cursing their alarms clocks. It was quite a normal morning, in fact, odd only in how normal it was.
For Nash, it was currently one of the odd, in-between moments of the day. The morning rush had finished, and the stragglers waking up (or not having slept) coming in for a fix of caffeine became rarer and rarer as the day marched on. It wasn't quite the 'lunch' rush either, where the small gas station was sometimes considered as a source of sugars and carbohydrates by a particularly desperate construction worker.
In other words, Nash was still technically working, but not really doing much of anything at the moment - just how he liked it. Other than him and the whirring of dispensers for highly caloric "food" and "drinks," he was alone. While he, raised in a much more affluent social sphere than his current voluntary position, enjoyed the reprieve from the general demographic of the gas station (and, indeed, people in general,) there was always a problem with being alone.
When you were alone, you started to think.
Nash tapped his fingers on the plastic countertop, the digits raising and falling in succession, which one was up at any given time bouncing back and forth between the pinkie and pointer finger of his hand. He felt his channels deep within him with a kind of out-of-body proprioception, fashioned and solidified over years of hard work, thrum within him as they waited, ready at every moment, for an infusion of the Densified Aether that would let them fulfill their purpose.
Unbidden, an old memory came to mind, and he banished it as best as he could; he heard the words anyway, his fingers stopping their tapping to instead grip onto the table with the force of a stressed tic, pushing dimples into the polymer surface.
My son, his father said to him as a child, Nash barely old enough to comprehend the words. Remember what you have been taught, he said, the very tips of his fingers touching Nash's forehead. His eyes glowed with a color that made Nash's eyes cross when he looked at them, and his face was the same as always - bereft of both wrinkles and any sign of emotion. You are young, still in the Channel Building realm. You must take care here and build your foundation; here, you begin to build the channels that will be with you for the rest of your life.
Yes, Father, he remembered saying.
For a second, he swore he saw the corners of that irreproachably placid face's mouth curl up into the precursor of a smile, but the wisp of approval disappeared quickly enough that he could do nothing except consider it a trick of the light. He remembered trying even harder to feel his second body, the one floating in the ever present Luminous Aether that suffused everything, but it felt distant, ephemeral.
Try your very hardest, his father had said. Our family relies on being able to feel the Aether at every moment more than any other. One day, you will get your Sternum Etching and -
Does it hurt? he had asked, terrified.
Don't worry about it, his father said, waving his hand in the air as if a concern was like a mote of dust that could just be brushed away. When you get your Sternum Etching, then you'll be on the road to being a real cultivator. Do you remember what a Sternum Etching is?
They take a knife and cut you open and draw on your bones, Nash said with a mixture of excitement and horror. Then the Aether likes your bones and sticks to it and gets all heavy and you can push that through your channels to do stuff.
That's... Certainly a way to describe it, but correct enough for your age. Once you have that, you will begin to apply the family cultivation technique, as well as practice the Dimensional Phasing Art and Greater Luminiferous Vision. They are too deep for you to be able to notice anything right now; just the Aether that is drifting through your channels doesn't do enough for any noticeable effect. Even with the Sternum Etching, your channels will still be too permeable to use them efficiently, but it will be a start.
Father, what does permeable mean?
The Senator had muttered to himself. I have to see about replacing the boy's tutors... He turned back towards his son and sat on the mat across from him, speaking more audibly. Permeable means that more lums can pass through them - lums are the shortened name for Densified Aether. While the Sternum Etching gathers Densified Aether that can be used in your channels, that is only the first step to unlocking their potential. What comes after that will be the Calcification stages. In each stage, you harden your channels, making them less leaky but also less flexible. With every stage, more Densified Aether can pass through them with less loss to the environment, but each stage also makes changing your channels difficult or even dangerous.
Dangerous? the child asked, eyes wide.
Stop being scared and get back to practicing, the Senator says. You don't have to worry about that yet. Soon, yes, but first... You have to be able to see it. Close your eyes.
The child did, and he felt something trickle down the inside of his skin; two grains of what felt like sand worked their way through his father's fingers and his skin and skimming along the surface of his skull, apparently uncaring that they were passing through solid objects.
They settled behind his eyes and itched maddeningly, and Nash had to restrain himself from trying to scratch at them. Not that it would've done anything, due to their positions on each of his optic nerves. Nash's father spoke again, his fingers lifting off and drifting away from Nash's forehead. Open your eyes, now. Be careful to not get distracted; just look at my channels.
How will I know what your channels look like? Nash asked, his eyes still clenched tight in an attempt to alleviate the itching.
The Senator spoke again, this time in an exasperated tone of voice. Just open your eyes. They're impossible to miss.
Nash did. He gasped at the sight that greeted him; he saw the world as he normally did, with everything in its place. His father sat in front of him on the scratchy jute mat and the ceiling lamp above cast a glow on the minimalist cultivation chamber as it normally did, but that wasn't all he saw.
He also saw another layer of reality, a colorless substance suffusing everything. He could see - or was it feel? - the medium rippling as the light of the ceiling lamp passed through it like air distorting from heat. Nash could see the path of every ray of light, each ray bouncing hundreds of thousands of times around the room, reflected or absorbed by every little surface. He managed to tear his eyes away from the sight for but a moment, only to be captivated in another one.
He looked at his father, and could see something inside him. Little pathways traced their way throughout his father's entire body; he could trace one, coiled around itself in a configuration that hurt Nash's brain to look at, all the way from one leg up to his sternum, where it branched out to every other limb of his body. Others entwined with it, climbing up it like a creeper on a pole, separating into hundreds of little capillaries that reached out from the main trunk and wound through every bit of flesh.
Another actually went outside of his flesh, capturing the entire body in a net of sorts, like a scaled-up wire frame model of his entire body that was scaled up to sit about an inch above his skin. At his sternum all of the channels met like a cluster of roots wound into a drill. They reached deep into what was obviously a drooping, tear-drop bubble of Densified Aether, kept hanging to the bone by burning runes carved into the sternum that Nash could see glowing in his vision of the Luminiferous Aether. Little motes of this 'fluid' drifted off and were pulled away by the 'roots' of his father's channels, and Nash followed one particular mote as it percolated its way through, slowly thinning and dimming as it went.
Nash blinked as the itching behind his eyes subsided and his vision of the Aether dimmed. He tried to keep his eyes open as the Aether seemed to slip away, getting farther and farther from his eyes, but he blinked and the vision disappeared as quickly as it was granted. He strained his eyes, blinked, meditated, whatever he could think of, but the Luminiferous Aether refused to return; something bubbled in Nash, an emotion that he had few words big enough for yet.
He wanted more, and he hated that he wasn't getting it. It was the type of feeling that would've gotten the maids, or even Father, to call him petulant; it was the same thing he felt when Father had to leave for another business trip or Nash had to miss playing like he wanted to play politics instead, forced into stiff formal clothes and dropped into the kids section of some stupid dinner he didn't want to go to.
A sudden lack of resistance below his hand and a loud sound jolted Nash out of the memory, and for that he was thankful. What he was less thankful for was the current position of his fingers, given that they were in a rather inconvenient position inside the counter, buried up to the knuckles in the cheap plastic.
He sighed and flexed one of his channels, phasing his hand out of the physical plane and into the Luminiferous Aether and moving his arm outside of any solid objects.
His hand returned to the realm of matter and he rested it back on the table, taking care to avoid the holes made by his outburst. He scratched a bit at the edges of the hole with his fingernail, smoothing it over as a temporary measure (not that he expected a permanent measure would ever be implemented, even long after he left. Unless, perhaps, it involved the long-overdue demolition of the entire building.)
Another sigh escaped his mouth and he intertwined his fingers, leaning into to the table, waiting for something or someone to interrupt his thoughts. In the meantime, he inspected and calcified his channels, bit by bit.