The Boss of the Crimson Bonfire Gang was fuming, both emotionally and physically.
The luxury car had been parked in the lot of an abandoned mall with the windows rolled down, both him and his driver underling having exited the vehicle; the driver had left as he was currently concerned mostly with hacking his lungs out, while the Boss left as he didn't want to destroy something important. It would make him look rather foolish if he had, in his rage, forced both him and his driver to call a taxi or walk back, after all.
The smoke roiling off his body had already stained the inside of the car, but he had other concerns right now. They were the same concerns that had the foul smoke off-gassing from his skin and the inside of his mouth, billowing through the air as he stared furiously at a single picture of a parking lot outside of a gas station's convenience store.
The picture was of poor image quality, obviously taken on a cheap phone; not only of poor image quality of also of skill in photography, the annoyingly rotated image (obviously taken swiftly as the photographer walked by) showed more of the asphalt than the crime scene itself.
However, it showed more than enough to incense the Boss. The harsh light of the midday sun beating against the unprotected parking lot glinted off of a variety of things, each reflection interfering with the image further; barely shown behind the lens flares were the piles of broken glass in the parking lot, though the majority of the light bounced off the two police cars in the lot, parked just outside the crime scene, all cordoned off by the orange-and-yellow striped caution tape.
Within the area marked by the tape, the crumpled forms of dead men were barely visible.
Within the scene, three bodies were being inspected by the police.
One was in a pile of congealed blood, brain matter, and broken glass; the corpse's head had been crushed, everything on the same slice as the ears and eyes tamped down into a slurry of bone shards suspended in a gruesome paste of brain. What remained superior to that hole was eerily intact, but nearly separated from what was below the hole, hanging on only by a sheet of torn skin.
Another corpse was on the ground, lifeless hands clutching at the hole in the breathless chest.
Another was lying on the ground not too far away, singed slightly and seeming to have choked to death on the vomit that had dripped slowly out of his mouth in his unconsciousness, only barely distinguishable in the blurry details of the image by the Boss's expertise with the many unpleasant ways humans had to die.
The Boss's teeth gnashed; some of those teeth were filled with gold or silver, others were chipped or filed or ground to points, and all of them were blackened or yellowed from the smoke issuing from that brutish-looking maw while his teeth ground against each other. As they ground against each other, he lashed out against the ground with his boots, his heavy footfalls sending cracks spiderwebbing out from where his stomps landed.
His fists clenched, and the phone shattered in his palm; he dropped the remains of the phone and wiped the remaining glass shards off of (and out of) the skin of his hand onto the leg of his pants, his anger blinding him to the piercing, prickling pain of both motions.
Not too far away, the chauffeur was hunched over, clutching at his chest and coughing, moving his head the best he could to stay out of the smoke.
This did nothing but incense the Boss further. Smoke came off him like a signal fire and, unbeknownst to him, someone in the distance called the fire department. He walked up to the driver unnoticed (preoccupied by the state of their respiratory system as they were,) and slapped him in the back of the head, sending them falling onto the ground, clutching at their bruised skull.
"Stop being such a baby," the Boss said, the words coming out in a low growl, the syllables punctuated by the stored smoke resulting from the plosives puffing out all at once. "It's just a little smoke. Get me the backup phone. Now!"
Nodding, eyes watering and skin bruising, the driver opened the door to the luxury car and did so, handing the Boss a prepared smartphone. It was one of the latest models, and completely new. The Boss immediately went to work, already sending cryptic, encoded texts to several of his contacts.
"Back in the car," he said, shoving the driver towards the seat and forcefully grabbing at the handle for his own door. He opened the door with enough strength that, if the door hadn't already been reinforced and unlocked, would have torn it off the hinges. "Take me there."
"Where, sir?" the driver asked, through his tears and coughs, rolling all the windows down as the car filled with smoke.
"There, you imbecile. The gas station, with that uncouth thorn in my side. It's time for me to really teach him a lesson - personally."
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Nash was currently in a rather difficult situation, that situation being actively running from the police with a small bag of everything he owned in hand.
After what had happened at the gas station, he hadn't been stupid enough to believe that the cops would simply ignore the incident; even with his political training, he doubted he could bluff his way out of that particular situation, so he decided to immediately head in, pack his stuff, and run away.
It would look suspicious, sure, but so did any footage of him fighting with the thugs.
The problem wouldn't be dealing with the police. Normally, even in the Capital City, the department didn't even bother prosecuting fights between cultivators unless someone important was involved or it was destructive enough to make the police lose face; the problem would be when he got taken in, mostly as a formality, and someone inevitably recognized him.
It was that set of circumstances that explained why he was in the rafters of an abandoned mall, peering down through the gaps in the asbestos-laden drop ceiling below him, each one a slit of light in the dark.
He was not knowledgeable in how to shake a trail (his tutors evidently hadn't considered it enough of a possibility to train him in how,) so he had been using his unique ability to get into spaces ridiculous for a normal cultivator to his advantage. It was, in fact, one of his few advantages over the police looking for him, especially because they had dogs to track his scent.
At least they don't have Spirit Beasts, he thought. Could always be worse.
Because his family's art took him out of physical reality into the Aether and the dogs were mundane, his scent trail was interrupted, confusing the animals.
However, he could only do it over short distances. With the amount of lums it needed to function on his whole body made long distances impractical, and that range only grew smaller as he tapped more of his diminishing reserves.
His sternum felt uncomfortably "light" in the metaphysical sense, a reflection of the deflating balloon of Densified Aether that he could see hanging from the bone whenever he pulsed his Greater Luminiferous Vision in checking how far away his pursuers were.
If I'm thinking about it anyway, I might as well, Nash considered; a trickle of lums momentarily climbed through his channels, making their way up to his optical nerve. He felt the itch begin in his eyes as he scanned as quickly as he could for his pursuers.
Still only two. His fingers tapped for a moment on the top side of the drop ceiling, but he remembered the situation and stilled them. Plus the dog, of course, but the dog doesn't have channels; I can't see it in the Aether, but at least that goes both ways.
The two policeman accompanying the dogs were, of course, cultivators*. Here, though, it didn't really matter much, as they were each quite weak and both practicing only the provided cultivation methods of the precinct.
That technique, as Nash was happy to note, did not include a powerful enough Aether Sight technique to spot him from any reasonable distance.
Even if it did, it was doubtful either of them could maintain it long enough that he couldn't escape, given that the more powerful of the two was only in the First Calcification. Even then, they weren't very far into the realm, only halfway to the threshold of the Second; the other was still in his Sternum Etching stage, with all of the ridiculous leakiness of the channels that implied.
Nash started to crawl as slowly and quietly as he could manage, suppressing the coughs and sneezes that the dustiness of the rafters tried to draw out of him. He made his way across the ceiling, wincing every time he made a noise, even though the policemen were not even inside the building yet.
It was time to move.
He had to find another place to stay soon, after all.
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Senator Emerald sat on a rough jute mat in an opulent chamber, facing north.
In each cardinal direction, treasures to support his cultivation were placed equidistant; a flower that seemed to shift in shape, but was in fact only showing a different three-dimensional slice of a true four-dimensional form through Aether trickery was at his front, while on his left there was an ancient-looking cup filled with water and placed on a worn but high-quality table.
If someone tried to pour the water out of the cup, they would run into an issue almost immediately, as the cup contained a small lake's worth.
To his right, a freestanding weapon rack, made of mahogany and decorated with jade both mutton and green, held an ornate sword next to a similarly ornate scabbard.
Behind him, a bronze cauldron simmered over an electric burner, sending a soft, otherworldly fragrance wafting through the air.
He breathed in the fragrance as he beheld the flower, feeling the Densified Aether coming from the four objects stream through his Sternum Etching, replenishing his stores as he spent them on calcifying his channels.
Even using a cultivation method as high quality as the one of Emerald Family, progressing at the Fifth Calcification realm was a slow, infuriating process.
Senator Emerald had first broken into the realm over forty years ago, and he was still only about two-thirds of the way through, which was better than much of his generation were doing - or rather, had done, as most of them had died of old age at this point. The others were mostly politicians or teachers of martial academies or Sect Masters, often giving up on their fruitless efforts in cultivation to focus on their legacy.
But not the patriarch of the Emerald family. He intended to cultivate until he died, and that day was long off indeed.
He even dared to think that perhaps, one far-off day, he would have the chance to be the first Body Destruction Ancestor of the Wolf Country.
It was known that, when one reached the nigh-mythical Body Destruction realm, they would become immortal, untouchable by nearly anything in the world. (Though, on that account, his personal experiences offered a particularly exceptional counter-example.)
His musings were interrupted by a knock at the door.
His eyes closed and a small sigh escaped from his mouth, nearly inaudible. He collected himself and moved his hand to press a small button, raised off of the floor.
"Come in," he said into the microphone embedded in the floor, carefully concealed as to not interfere with the appearance of the room.
The door swung open, silent on well-made, well-greased hinges, and an attendant stepped through, closing the door gently behind him.
The old man that stepped through looked positively ancient, though he was in fact slightly younger than the Senator. "Lord Emerald," he said in a quiet, respectful voice, his age showing in every deferential syllable. "There is more news about the search for your son," he continued, his voice raspy as he hobbled slowly towards the jute mat and handed his employer a manila folder.
Giving a single nod, the Senator accepted the folder. Laying it on the portion of the mat in front of him, he opened it and spread out the papers, taking in all the information within.
The attendant continued speaking. "When investigating what seemed to be a routine battle between rival gangs, the police noticed that it was rather one-sided, with all the casualties being from the same, previously documented gang." he said, his hands clasped behind his back.
Despite his advanced age and visible weakness, the position was held perfectly still, without a hint of swaying or pain. "The area matches where the Young Master would likely have been hiding out, and the style of fighting mostly matches, except for one case where Aether fire was obviously used to attack."
"That is troubling," Senator Emerald said, his eyes focusing on one specific sheet of paper, filled with printed-out photos of the scene. "Even with only being in the Second Calcification, getting rid of any extraneous channels he establishes will be a difficult process. Especially if they're learned from those gutter rats that call themselves gangs."
"If I do not overstep in the saying of this, senior brother Emerald," the old man said calmly, "The Young Master may simply have had some allies in this fight, or used your family's Dimensional Phasing Art to provoke them into friendly fire. This particular gang, the Crimson Bonfire Gang, is known to be a relatively weak gang with members focusing primarily on fire and smoke adjacent arts. It is not impossible that your son dodged in such a way that he used them against each other."
"Of course, but a father worries, Junior Brother Beryl," the Senator said, his head turning to look one of the few remnants of the Beryl family in the eye. "I have no confidence in the ability of the police in this case. You shall find him and bring him back, old friend. "
That seemed to amuse the old man. "Of course, Senior."
He turned slowly, favoring one leg, but then stopped midway through to look at the Senator over his shoulder. "Though, once I'm back, this old man would humbly request that you are not too harsh on the boy. I remember from our own youth that you were even more hotheaded than he is now," he said, smiling like someone sharing a private joke. "Although that is perhaps above my station to determine, simple branch family member that I am, Young Master."
The Senator let out a rare, singular chuckle. "That much is true, but the war beat out of me what my father could not. He has not experienced anything of that magnitude."
Whatever good humor was visible on the old man's face dropped at the mention of the war. "Of course, Senator. I'll be off now."
He took a single step and, with a twisting of the Aether, space dizzyingly collapsed into a single insignificant point between him and his goal before returning to normal. Already at the door, he opened it and left without looking back.
Patriarch Emerald gathered up the sheafs of paper in the manila folder and placed them to one side, returning to his cultivation.
All thoughts of his son left his mind; with old Longstep Beryl on his way, the heir of the Emeralds would soon be in front of his father.
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A large man was laying down in a hospital bed, cocooned in bandages. IVs were pushed into his veins, administering the nutrition, hydration, and medication that he could not absorb through normal means due to the nearly total destruction of his face.
Several important-looking things beeped and bopped and whirred and generally made too much pointless noise for the comfort of a Second Calcification cultivator's sensitive ears, or at least what remained of them.
The cultivator-thug's fingers twitched.
He ignored the TV set across to him, which was, as such sets always were, tuned onto some banal channel nobody who had any other options watched, engrossed entirely with his cultivation.
There was little else to do here, so he focused on growing his strength in the only way he could at the moment; simple cultivation.
Calcifying his channels, layer by minuscule layer, sheets of strengthening scales wrapping around his channels and shoring up leaks, cladding the source of his power.
His method was better than most, but to him that was no longer enough.
Not when he focused on the image of his next obstacle, the man who had broken his complacency and a decent amount of his bones, the man whose face came up whenever he considered taking a break from constantly packing on more and more tedious, more painful calcification.
The man who had defeated him and made it look nearly effortless, and considered him so little of a threat that, despite their similar cultivation and opposing goals, gave him advice.
The voice that made his blood boil, the battle that had made his instincts sing.
The fight that had made him feel alive for the first time in months.
The man whose face he had seen on the news as the missing Young Master of the Emerald Family.
The man he was going to fight and kill as soon as he was able.
His eyes burned in hate and anticipation as he channeled lums to the tips of his fingers, feeling the cords of Aether grappling onto the asphalt outside.
He would be out soon enough.
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Nash Refraction Emerald sat on the roof of a miraculously still-active mall, his legs dangling as he shoved cheap food court fried dough balls in his mouth. More than a little amused, he watched the two police and their dog scurry around like little rodents on the far end of the optimistically large and mostly empty parking lot, making rather little progress.
From his current vantage point, the wind was blowing towards him, and he had made good use of his ability to go through anything thin or hollow to confound their attempts to follow his trail.
By this point, if they wanted to strictly follow his scent, they would need to go through a wall, up a ladder in the maintenance section of the building, through the roof, and then walk along the roof to the other side of the building.
They would then need to jump down onto the pavement below from multiple stories up and go inside the mall itself, following his scent trail through a building full of things that tended to distract dogs; he had weaved a path through a menagerie of food and interesting-smelling (though not necessarily good-smelling, though a dog would likely have different opinions on the matter) people.
Additionally, Nash had bought himself new clothes and thrown out the old in various places. Just to screw with them.
He popped the last dough ball in his mouth and crumpled the cardboard and wax paper packaging, reaching out and dropping it into the trash can three stories down. His eyes followed the trash as it fell, flicking away once he saw it fall exactly where he wanted it.
Guess it's time to go, he thought, bringing his legs back onto solid ground and standing up, brushing off his pant legs.
He grabbed a backpack and swung it around him, slinging it onto his shoulders and tightening the straps before taking off running, building in speed until he reached the edge of the roof.
He jumped and turned in midair, soaring through the air before catching the edge of the roof of a section of the building that only had one floor, using it to bleed off some of the speed before he actually hit the asphalt of the parking lot, tucking into a roll to blunt the last of the fall's momentum as he landed.
Standing up from the roll, he whipped his head back and forth to check exactly where he was and started running again, this time more jogging than anything.
However, the jog of a Second Calcification cultivator was still more than fast enough to begin eating up the distance between him and his destination, wherever that was - he still hadn't entirely figured it out, but thought that going for a jog would clear his head and look less suspicious than sleeping on the rooftop of a busy mall.
His breaths were smooth and deep as he considered his options; the first one he thought of was to find another job at a gas station or something similar, but the police and, more pertinently, his father would be undoubtedly investigating nearly every single one now they had evidence of him working at one.
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Another option was to leave the city, but that left an odd taste in his mouth when he thought of doing it, and was likely one of the things they were expecting.
Currently, the option Nash was most seriously considering was to hunker down in some tiny, backwards, unimportant martial academy or gym, giving a few lessons on martial arts in exchange for room and board.
That would likely be the easiest option, but he would have to be careful to not teach them too well and make the gym too famous, especially in connection to a mysterious new guest teacher - his father (or, rather, his agents) would put it together quickly and then he would have to do the whole thing again. To avoid that problem he could try to teach for a larger, more popular academy, but they would almost certainly reject or recognize him on sight.
He slowed down his jog and curved off into an alleyway, leaning against the wall and pulling out his phone.
Through the cracks in the screen and the low brightness (in order to conserve what battery power he could, as he hadn't been staying in one spot long enough to give it a good one recently,) he opened the map and looked for gyms.
The fewer reviews and farther they were from the center of town the better - eventually, he settled on one, with a grand total of five reviews all of which called the instructors mediocre at best but lacked too many complaints about cleanliness or personalities. "Perfect," he said to himself, smiling.
Barely audible, he muttered under his breath. "I wonder if it would be too suspicious to wear a mask."
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Approximately forty minutes later, he stood outside the door of the somewhat dilapidated dojo and knocked.
The lights were still on despite the late hour, and the building was sandwiched between a liquor store and a debt collection agency.
He stepped back from the door (a cheap one, veneered to look like the door of an ancient warrior-temple much like the rest of the exterior was) and waited, his hands clasped behind his back.
A few minutes later, the door creaked open and an old man peered out through thick, round glasses not on his face but held in one hand a few inches in front of his nose. "Yes?" he said, taking in Nash's appearance. "What can I do for you, child?"
"Senior," Nash said, genially. "This is the Unleashed Vine Martial Academy, is it not?"
"It is, Junior, and I happen to be the Master of this humble academy," the old man said, the corners of his eyes crinkling with his friendly smile. "How may this old man help you?"
"It is wonderful to meet you, sir," Nash said, nodding his head respectfully. "This junior is wondering whether this academy currently requires any assistants. This one is willing to take most positions as long as you can guarantee a place to sleep and enough money for food, and I have some experience in the martial arts."
"Hm," the old man harrumphed, letting go of the glasses and letting them dangle on the chain around his neck, turning around to face into the building. "Come in. It is no good for someone of my age to discuss something at length while standing up."
"Of course, sir." Nash followed the old man inside, noting the variety of weapons on the walls and the clean but scratched hardwood floor.
The decor seemed to be attempting to emulate multiple different types of 'martial' aesthetics, from the ancient warrior in wood and polished bronze to the modern tacticool, black weapons with plastic handles sitting in pristine glass cases; on the walls beside those cases, picture frames filled with images of students and the old Master smiling, hung next to ancient pamphlets for tournaments, faded with age..
Eventually, they stopped at the end of the hallway and went into a room with a worn table and similarly well-used chairs. The old man sat down on one, grunting as he did, and then motioned to another one for Nash to take a seat, and he took it.
"Oh, I must've forgot - things begin to slip in one's old age, I'm afraid. Junior, would you mind going and putting on the kettle and taking out the tea things?" The old man turned in his seat and gestured to some cabinets. "They're all in there, but you'll have to fill the kettle with water first. There's a sink in the other room."
Nash stood up and pushed the chair back in, walking more carefully than was probably required. He opened the cabinet over-gently, something about this place tripping some switch in the deep parts of his subconscious and making him feel uncomfortable for being on anything except for his absolute best behavior.
Somehow, likely by the intercession of his political training, he managed to take the teaware out with minimal blind fumbling and set it on the table in a polite manner. He closed the door of the cabinet and opened the other one the old man had mentioned, ignoring the prickling anxiety inexplicably building on the back of his neck, and took out the empty kettle.
He took it in one hand, the power cord wrapped around his hand so not to dangle it on the ground. His other hand closed the cabinet, and he turned his head to address the old man. "I'll be right back," he said, nodding. The old man nodded to him and he left the room.
Nash waited until the door was closed before he dropped into a more martial stance. There's something around here that I'm not seeing, he thought, sending Densified Aether to his eyes. He maintained the technique as he walked to the closest room, and it did indeed have a sink in it.
It was when he was filling up the kettle that he noticed the Aetheric vines in the walls.
They were staring at him.
The old man's channels connected through the floor to a network of vines that reached into the Aether, each tendril in the web capped with a single bulbous eye. From their (it's?) vantage point inside the wall, all the eyes followed his movements, a dozen 'pupils' the size of his fingernail staring at him through solid objects.
"Oh, so that's why," Nash said, chuckling nervously to himself. "At least I know he's legit," he muttered under his breath, heavily considering on whether this was the best option to find a place to sleep.
Finally, the kettle was full of water and he walked back to the other room and set it on the table, bending down to plug the cord into the nearest outlet. Might as well stop looking into the Aether, he thought. It's doing nothing but psych me out right now.
However, not seeing the eyes was little comfort when he knew they were there, and when he could almost feel them in currents of the Aether, vibrating it by the force of their gaze on his channels. "Would you like me to grab the tea, sir?" Nash asked, his hands clasped in front of him while he looked at the old man with all the composure he could muster.
"That would be wonderful," the old man said, and Nash could swear he had seen a knowing twinkle in those eyes that stared at him, the same shape and color as all the others that were also doing so, unseen. "They're in the cabinet on the bottom left. Get the one in the green tin."
He did so, setting it on the table next to all the other items. He wondered why he felt so rattled, and concluded that it had to be some feature of the old man's cultivation; it had obviously degraded in his old age, but it was still in the Second Calcification, nearly to the Third. With a cultivation higher than his and a technique intended to cause it, it wasn't impossible for the eyed vines to be effecting his mood in more ways than was natural.
He was drawn out of his considerations by the whining sound of kettle boiling, and he grabbed the handle. "Should I brew it, sir?"
"No," the old man said, leaning over to grab the teapot and the tea itself. "I'll handle that - you've done more than enough. Do hand me the kettle though, Junior, and sit down."
"Thank you, sir," Nash said, unplugging the kettle and sliding it over to where the old man could reach it before he pulled out a chair and sat in it, close enough to the old man that he was beside him, but not acting too familiar in an obvious way.
For once, Nash was thankful for the incessant training he had received in propriety as a child; he likely wouldn't have made as good of an impression on the old man without it, even though the quality of that impression was in question due to the ever-watching eyes embedded in the walls.
He clamped down on a shiver that rose unbidden, and tried to pass it off as adjusting in the chair - not too hard, since it wasn't exactly the most comfortable one that he had ever sat in.
Definitely an Aetheric effect on my psyche, he thought, smiling politely and nodding at the old man as he took a few leaves of tea* out and placed them in the pot, pouring the water over the leaves.
He placed the lid gingerly back onto the pot and chuckled, as he seemed to be inclined to do rather frequently.
"I see that you have noticed them, Junior. That's better than most of those who walk in here do."
Nash's already fake smile strained. "The eyes in the walls, sir? This junior would like to ask whether they belong to you."
"Of course," the old man said, dragging his hand up through the air. Where it had passed through, a green stalk manifested like it was being pulled out of the table through the gentle motion. It branched at multiple points as it grew, and at the end of every part of the stalk where it didn't a small eye dangled from it, all of them straining to look at him. "It's exceptional that you can see them so clearly - you must have a truly heaven-defying Aetheric Sight technique. I won't ask where you got it, or for you to teach it, but it is a good sign that you have one of such a caliber."
"You see," the old man said, laughing slightly under his breath at the pun, "Most can feel their presence, but it is truly rare to be able to find the source of the odd feelings they cause, much less resist them."
He took the small teapot and poured out the first steep into two teacups, handing one to him and taking a sip from his own. He set the cup back down, pouring more hot water into the teapot to start on the second steep.
"Thank you for the tea," Nash said weakly, taking a sip. It was expertly brewed despite being of a variety cheaper than he was used to, though he wasn't currently exactly in the mood for a detailed tasting and critique. "Excellent," he said, his smile nearly cracking as he put a great deal of effort into seeming unperturbed.
"That is good to hear. I have had a long time to hone my skill in tea; I would be disappointed if it wasn't." He made a small gesture and the eye-vine receded back into the table, disturbing the Aether in a way that Nash could feel the ripples.
A moment later, the feeling of being watched left Nash. "I have made them stop focusing on you. It is, after all, no good to make decisions of business under an effect like that. To answer the question you came here with, yes, I would be willing to let you join and sleep here in exchange for assisting with classes.
The old man's smile widened, bringing the many wrinkles on his face into sharp focus. "If you are still interested, that is. After feeling them focus on you from a location I'm so established in, it's quite understandable if you are not."
"I accept," Nash said, somewhat relieved. "May I know the name of my employer, sir?"
"I am Rigel Feldspar, but my students know me as Old Man Looking-In.* May I know the name of my employee, junior?"
"I would prefer it if you just called me Greenstone," Nash said, hurriedly making an alias. Not the best, but it'll do.
"Very well, little Greenstone," Rigel said, extending his arm, holding the teacup in it. "A toast, child?"
They clinked their cups together and drank the rest of them before Feldspar poured the second steep into them. The rest of the night, they tasted the tea and Nash made slow, awkward conversation before they both turned into bed, Nash being directed to sleep in a guest room. He was much too tired to bother questioning why there was a guest room in a gym, and as soon as he hit the sheets he was fast asleep.
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Another old man limped along the sidewalk in the dead of night, his white hair cast in various colors by the lights of glowing storefronts.
His formal clothes were dappled by the light passing through advertisements plastered on the glass windows into the places that never slept, choosing instead to simply shamble onward through the night just like their customers, though they were fueled by caffeine and regret rather than the motive to sniff profit out of whatever crevice it may be hiding in.
Most didn't pay attention to the old man, but some of those passing by him had to do a double take when they felt space twist underneath his feet, pulled into a knot by the Aether flowing through his channels. One moment, he was on one end of the building, and a step later he was another.
Despite his rather placid pace, for every slow, unsure step he took, he rocketed forward far enough that he was nearly keeping pace with those mad enough to go for a run at the late hour. Every so often, he would stare up at a street sign and look down at a well-rumpled, old-fashioned paper map, more than likely out of date, consulting it before he simply crossed over roads filled with moving cars in a single abrupt step.
Eventually, Beryl 'Longstep' reached the last known position of Nash Emerald before the police had lost his trail, a multiple-story mall that was still active despite the hour. He crossed the parking lot in a few hobbling steps, stopping to lean on a bench after pain shot up his leg.
"Never quite leaves me alone," he mused to nobody in particular, rubbing at one knee and waiting until the randomly tightening tendon had loosened enough for him to begin walking again.
He took one more half-step and was suddenly before the door, pushing it open and entering the mall.
The child had been running for a while - he probably used the variety of scents to throw off the dogs and give him some leeway to obtain food.
He carefully folded the map and tucked it into a pocket and began hobbling forward once again until he reached a freestanding map, this one of the interior of the mall itself. He probably isn't here anymore. There's a chance, but he'd probably be too cautious of security cameras.
Now that I think of it, that is likely the correct path. He raised his finger up and traced it along the map, looking for where a security office was indicated. Where would they store the video tapes? he thought, still scanning the map. No, it would probably be on those new-fangled computers.
Finally, he found the path he was looking for. He walked forward, assisted by his cultivation and generous use of Densified Aether, and reached an office labeled as security. He rapped on the door with his fist and stepped back, waiting for the door to swing open.
When it did, a woman much younger than Beryl stepped out, dressed in a baggy mall-cop* uniform.
Confused, the woman looked up and down the old man. "Sorry, sir, do you have an issue?" She slightly adjusted the hard plastic around one of her wrists anxiously, looking down at Beryl, who was much shorter than her. "Have you lost something or someone in the building?"
Beryl didn't bother wasting any time. "Young lady," he said, fishing around in one of his pockets before pulling out a badge. "As a retainer of the Emerald Family, contracted as a detective in an ongoing police case, I formally requisition access to all available security footage and records."
The security guard paled. "Sir, I lack the authority to grant your request; I simply do not have access to most of the things you request. Please direct your inquiries to the head of security."
"Get them, then," Beryl said, his smile unsympathetic. "This was listed as the security office on the map. I cannot afford to faff around with whatever inane bureaucracy holds sway over this place, especially considering the urgency of this case."
She frowned and worried at her uniform, rotating the vambrace slightly back and forth. "He's not here right now; he leaves before the night shift starts, and is probably asleep by now."
"Call. Him."
"But sir -"
"I told you to call him."
In response to that she nodded, anxiety showing on her face. Beckoning Beryl into the office, she closed the door behind him, and took a phone out of her pocket, selecting a colorfully (and not flatteringly) named contact before pressing it up to her ear.
It rang and kept ringing, and she had to try to call again multiple times as it automatically timed out. Eventually, someone on the other side picked it up. With his enhanced hearing (and, frankly, the ear-shattering volume the phone was at,) Beryl could make the conversation out even though it was not on speakerphone.
From the crackly speakers of the phone, a man's voice came through, groggy and more than a little hostile. "What?" he asked, said so curtly that it was nearly spat out.
"A man from the government is here," the woman said, obviously restraining some hostility of her own. She spoke quietly, but that didn't do anything to conceal her words from Beryl, who waited patiently, hands clasped behind him. She continued to speak, a hint of panic mixing in with her anger. "For a police case. He has a badge from the Emeralds, like, you know, the Senator."
The man swore. "What does he want?"
"Security footage. Records. You know, the kinda stuff that's helpful for a police investigation?"
"How do you know he's actually from the government?"
Here, Beryl chimed in. "My badge. My cultivation. That I can hear your conversation from over here."
The woman nearly jumped out of her skin. "The government man has a badge. Also, he could hear what you were saying from the other side of the room, from my phone, not on speakerphone." She turned towards Beryl. "Sir, do you want to talk to him directly?"
"That would be wonderful," Beryl said. He took the phone gingerly as soon as she reached out to offer it to him, and put it to his ear. "Hello? Can you hear me?" He tapped the phone with a finger, holding it far from his face, trying to work out the contraption.
"Yes. What do you want? And stop that tapping, it's annoying."
"I am formally requisitioning security footage and security records on behalf of Senator Emerald, the Emerald Family, and the wider government in order to assist with an active police case," Beryl said, speaking a bit louder than was perhaps required. "I have shown the young lady working here my badge. That should be more than enough; it's an honor to assist in an investigation of interest to such a noble family, especially when that family is the Emeralds."
It took a bit more wheedling and a few implicit threats, but eventually he agreed to hand over the footage and give full support to the investigation.
The first form that full support took was tech support by the still-anxious security guard, as Beryl had little idea of how to work modern technology.
An infuriating half-hour later, the security guard had shown him how to download and scrub through the video.
The rest of the night, Beryl sat tirelessly, looking through surveillance footage until he had found what he was looking for.
For the first time in months, another Emerald, or at least a branch off that ancient tree, saw the face of Nash Refraction Emerald.
----------------------------------------
Nash held a kicking paddle in each hand, slipping backward and adjusting them for the next strike from the student currently working with him. With each kick, punch, and slap (rather sloppy by Nash's standards, but acceptable for an amateur), a loud clap of flesh against plastic leather-imitation resounded through the gym.
The sound was not alone, joined by the shouts of other students as they did the same thing, the squeaking of their feet on the hardwood floors, and the greedy gulps from water bottles as those who could take respite did.
Eventually, Nash had backed up nearly to the wall, and he motioned to the student to go to the end of the line even as he moved past him to start on the next. The student was already exhausted, as were many of his fellows, but for Nash this was nothing but a warmup.
Tirelessly, his Second Calcification body carried him through the exercises that left the clientele of the dojo breathless, them mostly still in the Channel Building or the Sternum Etching realm. The next student came up to him and once again he repeated the drill, sometimes giving curt corrections to her form.
"Turn that hip over more," Nash said, just before the owner of the gym spoke.
"Water break!" Rigel Feldspar yelled, tossing the paddles he had been holding to the closest wall, where they were caught by a vine materializing out the the woodwork. This one, at least, had no eyes, though Nash could still feel a prickling under his skin from the few that were assuredly watching him from every direction.
"Alright," Nash said, tucking the paddles under his arm and turning to address the line of students as a whole. "Go, grab some water if you want. I would recommend stretching; you just had a pretty flexibility-intensive workout, and you don't want to get stiff before we get started again. Probably gonna be around five minutes, if I had to guess."
They nodded and broke off, filtering into the corner of the room by the door where their shoes, water bottles, and other possessions had been filed away in little cubbyholes. The sound of a dozen separate conversations of varying volumes and number of participants started while bottles of water and sports drinks were pulled out of cubbies of variable quality of organization, a cacophony of pops and uncorkings and caps being unscrewed echoing throughout the gym floor.
Nash himself went to see Rigel Feldspar, his hands clasped behind his back in an attempt to strike a balance between formality and comfort.
"Ah, it's young Greenstone," the old man said, turning towards Nash from where he had been talking to a middle-aged man. "This is the young man I was talking about, the one I've taken on as an assistant instructor."
Nash nodded and smiled politely, reaching out his hand to shake the middle-aged man's hand when it was offered. "You must be quite something if Old Man Looking-In took you on immediately," the man said, squeezing his hand as hard as he could and getting nowhere with the gesture. "What's the level of your cultivation, young man?"
"The Second Calcification realm, sir," Nash said, ignoring the posturing of the handshake and maintaining a polite smile. He had considered hiding that information, but it was too easy to see and too suspicious to conceal; hopefully, it would soon improve enough that it wouldn't incriminate him anyway. "May this junior inquire about Senior's, in that case?"
"Near the peak of the Sternum Etching realm," the man said, begrudgingly. He released the handshake and wiped his hand off onto his pants, scowling. "You are quite obviously a talented cultivator, especially for your age, but there is no need to overstate your achievements."
Rigel smiled. "I agree, it is quite unbelievable for one of his age to reach such a level, but I checked him personally - he is not lying, Eight Millipedes."
Eight Millipede's scowl only increased at that. Multiple attempts were made on his part to salvage it into something more neutral, but they failed, and the middle-aged man eventually gave up. "That's... Impressive. My commendations to you, junior," he said, the last word dripping with unrestrained malice.
"Don't be too quick to praise me, Senior," Nash said, his face expertly schooled into pure neutrality. "I'm nothing compared to the real geniuses of this city," he continued politely, none of the amusement he was feeling creeping into his voice.
"Of course," Eight Millipedes said. "There's always a bigger fish."
Their conversation ended there as the class started once again, the shout of Old Man Looking-In cutting the posturing short. They nodded to each other, and each went back to assisting the students of the martial academy.
---
In the night, an old man in formal dress was walking through a parking lot in the middle of the night. The asphalt was old and cracked, strewn with trash that scattered out from the dumpster like planets orbiting around their star, though the only thing being fused in the dumpster was interesting new varieties of filth. crawling and buzzing insects, and plastic waste.
Against the wall of a run-down bar, several rough-looking men were leaning, swaying slightly in their drunkenness. Most of them were smoking cigarettes, haphazardly tossing the useless butts of their (one of many, obviously) personal poison onto the ground, adding to the general malaise of the scene.
One of them saw the old man hobbling through the lot, covering more distance than seemed possible with each step. However, any worries the drunk were swiftly brushed over as his brain, swimming in so much booze his skull likely legally qualified as a container for an alcoholic drink, made the connection that suits equaled money.
Drunkenly, he stumbled forward, shouting at the old man. "Hey!" he screamed, barely managing the single syllable without slurring it. "Stop, stop right there," he said, nigh-incomprehensibly. "Me and... me and my f-friends gotta talk to you about. Something. I think?" his mouth said, nearly entirely unconnected from the gears turning in his brain, which were currently working overtime to keep him upright.
The sound of the old man's steps stopped, and he looked with undisguised disgust at the drunk and his friends stumbling towards him. "What is it?" he asked, a sharp edge to his voice.
Guffaws could be heard from the drunk and the similarly intoxicated peanut gallery. "You see," he said, waving his hands around in an uncoordinated manner, "me and my friends here are havin' some trouble paying off our tabs, so you gonna help us, kay?"
Not dignifying it with a response, he took an ornate dagger out of a sheath hidden inside of his jacket. He waved it lazily in the air and, despite the distance between them, the drunk and his friends fell to the ground, their hands wrapped around their throats where much of their blood was escaping. Soon, they went still, their bloodless brains giving out from the lack of oxygen.
"Mortals get uppitier every year," Beryl 'Longstep' muttered to himself, wiping the knife off with a handkerchief. Once he was satisfied, he sheathed it once more and tucked the bloodied cloth into another pocket before he set out once again, leaving the bodies where they laid.
He had a Young Master to bring back, after all.
There was no point in wasting time.