Chapter Eight

“God damn it stupid!” I yelled to myself in my head. “When will you learn to not just go with whatever brilliant thought pops into your head! Why do you have to be so sure of yourself all of the time. Stop blanking up because you ‘know’ you figured crap out. All of that energy just got wasted because you had to test the first god damn thought that popped into your head instead of taking the time to finish experimenting.” I continued berating myself in my head.

Looking around, I saw that instead of spraying out of the hole I poked, like a rocket shooting forth into the sky. The barrier had instead completely evaporated, and all of the Chaos and Order Qi were streaming out to the sides, before heading off into the sky in a wave of darkness. Looking down and seeing the energy also soak up out of the ground, like a reverse rain puddle, before continuing on its journey away from me. I quickly looked back inside of me to see the Chaos and Order braid continue its circuits through my channels, it at least seemed to show no intention of leaving my body. With a small, thoughtful sigh of relief, my flip flopping emotions once again found themselves quickly turned to horror. As I felt with that small tiny sigh, a noticeable amount of braided energy left me, to flee and try to join back up with their brethren farther ahead up into the sky. Quickly closing my mouth, I was determined to keep the rest of my Qi internalized. While I undoubtedly only hastened this process only a quick minute, as it would have certainly also happened had I waited for the wall to continue its inexorable rise. As the last of the Qi streamed its way up from the ground and its suppressing pressure started to wear off I tried to tell myself comfortingly that it was okay and I hadn't actually hurried the process along. Hearing the crash of a wave for the first time in ages I quickly began noticing several other facts, letting my mind quickly forget the catastrophe it had just caused.

Firstly, the rising Qi wasn't taking anything with it, like hydrophobic sand being pulled out of an aquarium, it was leaving everything that was part of my world behind. Two, there wasn't a rush of air coming back in, like if it was a fuel air bomb going off. No, instead of a rush of air bombarding myself and the rest of my former roommates. It was like a tank slowly being pumped full of water from the bottom, gently rising up, and resuming its former place. As the pressure from the chaos Qi removed itself, I began to see the birds in the air beating their wings again. It seemed that the advent of wind moving as well had been what returned sound to my ears, as the waves of the ocean continued their crashing. With a light feeling in my stomach that I at first thought was my body turning nauseous, instead I saw when I looked down that my body was slowly rising from my pack. As the Chaos and Order in my channels wanted to rejoin its friends in the cloud of darkness, that was already starting to quickly disappear into the boundaries of sky and space.

Already screwed by my lack of planning, I had no choice but to double down and make some quick final decisions before hoping for the best. Doing my best to swiftly run through options in my mind, I went down the decision trees as fast as I could:

Try to keep the Qi in my body or let it go? Stupid question, not taking that risk. Already I have messed up twice, so let's not go for the trifecta. Whatever the possible benefits there might be to retaining my internal Qi, it is not worth the risks of being dragged off to space and living the rest of my short life in the coldness of vacuum.

First decision easily made, and with my future multitudes of descendants no doubt cursing my choice to give up power so easily. I next moved on to deciding both how to get rid of it and if I wanted to use it on the way out to make any final last minute changes to my channels. I had never been completely happy with what I ended up with. It always seemed incomplete to me. Yes, they had amazing flexibility and toughness, tempered as they were with broken Chaos and Order. But what use is there with a highway with the only exit being where the entrance is? I need more ways to get off!

Continuing to maintain circulation. I focus on my capillaris, going around my body to all of the spots I had skipped before in my effort to make circulation easier without submerging and tempering my body in broken energy. I quickly worked on drilling into the end of them so they could go back to their original function of providing nutrients to the muscles, organs and bones. In essence, now that I had an exquisite highway system and amazing surface roads, I wanted to pour billions of driveways to match, so the blood was able to go to their home and smoothly roll down hill into their garages.

Carefully, I pulled the Qi back into my circulatory system after creating each exit at the end of the capillary. I still didn't want to take a risk of tempering any actual parts of my body. Possibly upping the energy requirements, and leaving me desperate for sustenance or worse unable to move. With my being miles from civilization weighing hugely on my mind. As long as I still had an empty core, contrary to what every cultivation novel told me should exist in my body. I was not going to upgrade the energy requirements of the engine, without having assured my fuel supply. Even though I had an amazing power grid, without the energy to run through it, I had no desire to shut down in a blackout so far from another human being. Becoming a bear's lunch, because I was unable to move, made the thought on gambling with another possible upgrade to my body completely unpalatable. Forget a bear eating me, if I fell to the ground here, unable to move, the crabs would no doubt get to me first. Okay, that is enough nightmare fuel for now, shivering I gave myself another second to envision the horror of slowly being swarmed by crabs, being eaten alive, frozen in gridlock. Going to nope myself right out of that! Definitely not worth the risk. The upgrade to my circulatory system was fine, and only upgrading my heart was enough of a risk as it was. That just was infrastructure, with no energy requirements necessary to maintain it currently, it seemed to be several tiers above my still mortal blood.

With my internal cultivation future assured for when I ever figured out how to fill my core. I opened my eyes to see my pack floating on the ground about five feet away…Nope scratch that, the ground wasn’t floating away from me, clearly I was floating away from the ground. As the abandoned braided Qi that remained in my body, desperately fought to rejoin its brethren disappearing over the horizon. With all that I could think of being left was outlets for my future cultivator powers or spells. Depending on whatever had happened to the rest of the world while I was away. Too many apocalypse books went through my head, was this an invasion? Or, was it a system universe taking over, removing us from the planet while it was remade around me? With a decision needing to quickly be made I chose to give myself a broad base for the future. Deciding to swiftly kill two birds with one stone, I chose to use the effort of releasing Qi to rejoin its friends to cut the apertures I would undoubtedly need in the future to power my skills.

Swiftly running through my option of cookie cutter builds for cultivators, I started venting Qi. While knowing that the apex of techniques to learn is healing, I didn't have any good thoughts on a way I could quickly create something to cast spells like that with channels externally. I would have to hope I could find the means to internally heal myself later. Next on the list of must have spells, has to be a movement spell. Flight is normally prized, but if given the option I would choose to have a quicker step; rather than hang in the air, waiting to be shot like a glorified balloon. So casting down into my feet, I started to slowly cut microscopic holes. Being sure to get the bottoms of all of my toes and the soles of my feet. I cut a bigger opening into both of my heels in case I wanted a channel for a kick strike as well. Being parallel to the ground from hugging my pack, the venting luckily pushed me forward, instead of up into the sky. Working my way up I put holes into my knees, for the possible knee strikes I would need when my eventual master chose to finally come find me and take me on a training arc that would make any Chosen proud. One at a time, I cut them, so that the venting would start to flip me over. Continuing to spin, I moved onto my upper extremities and counter acted the spin by cutting the holes into the tips of my elbows in the reverse order. As I made my way perpendicular to the ground. I wanted to finally be done with this, so I can begin my trek home to the kids. I raised my hands above my head, facing them up to the sky, so as not to amplify my stupidity. I pointed my hands toward the retreating energy and began venting out my finger tips the channels I would undoubtedly need to write runes in the air later. Sending it out in lines of power. Feet hitting the ground in a crouch, I moved onto the palms of my hands, where the exiting Qi then combined into one giant beam which shot forth into the sky.

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With the majority of the Qi, I had kept back from its friends, sent on its journey to catch back up. I looked up and sent some of the last little bit out through my eyes, in the effort to prepare myself for the future for gaining the third leg of every successful cultivators repertoire, an eye technique. Feeling pretty good about the quick choices I had made for my future powers. I had the evil part of my brain whispering quietly that I had undoubtedly f'd up bad. Shutting down the doubters' voice, I lifted my mouth to the sky and with a giant exhale, vented the last of the braided Qi out. To finally escape, now that its dastardly mission was finished. As I inhaled my first real breath in ages, I felt some of the chaos get tangled up and dragged back into my cavern along with a lighter energy in the air. As it was a miniscule amount, it didn't seem to affect me, so I ignored it in my efforts to move around again for the first time in centuries. Feeling a heaviness slowly start to come back to me, as gravity began reasserting itself. The last of the braided Qi made its way back up to the sky, chasing after its brethren in a stream of golden black rope.

Looking into my core, I had some hope that the exodus of braided Qi leaving would have caused a vacuum to suck in the natural energy of the world. Starting the process that I needed to use to be able to compress and ignite it. The first of many steps most writers agree was the beginning of the journey I needed to continue my growth. Returning to my center, disappointment quickly began to grow, as I swiftly observed that it was now an empty cavern. A small few Chaos Qi particles still in the center, bouncing chaotically around in a randomness that had prompted my naming them such.

Leaving them alone, with no good way to force them out. I focused on taking more real breaths, now that I was finally returned to Terra Firma. The emptiness in my lungs was starting to weigh heavily on me. As I started to breathe in, my mind quickly started spinning out possible scenarios wanting to be ready for all possibilities that the universe would choose to throw into my path. The top likely scenarios for me, based on all of the apocalypse lit I have read, seemed to be:

Everyone had found themselves in either their own ball or groups of people had been taken, I leaned more to the second option, seeing as all of the wildlife that got taken with me. With everyone removed, the planet was free to be upgraded, seeded with new resources and challenges to promote our growth. Leading to our eventual harvesting or exploitation from a greater power.

Parts of the world got ripped away and upgraded, while the rest remained the same. This being more likely due something natural that happened in the universe, rather than an outside power finding us and choosing to invest in our growth.

Or, all of the world had been ripped apart by the shadow balls and we were dragged somewhere else to be combined with either another world or several. Where humanity would either have to unite for survival or a champion would emerge to lead us.

Options one and three seemed like the most likely options in mind, which led me to think that with the departure of the chaos Qi there should be something coming in to replace it. But the only thing that was troubling me was that I didn't see it with my chaos vision, which itself seemed to be getting weaker with the energy's departure from my body.

Steeling myself to be ready for anything, with my lungs feeling like empty bags, I finally inhaled deeply… I felt my lungs reinflating and my heart began pumping blood alone in my circulation. Starting to feel disappointed, I quickly took another breath, then another… stopping before I began to hyperventilate, I sat down to pause and take a beat. This was getting me nowhere. You can't live off of hope and what if's. All you have is reality. Crossing my legs I began to try and meditate. With the higher energy gone, I didn't seem to be able to get back to my central core. Breathing slowed down, I tried to focus on finding my center, by trying to remember my previous path there now that I no longer had the Chaos Qi to light my way.

With my legs crossed into a lotus pose, I took a deep breath and sent my consciousness with it, following it down into my lungs and from there I lost it. Again I took a breath and sent my consciousness spiraling down into my lungs, searching for the core that I had found so easily before. This time I stayed down longer, going from my lungs to my heart and straining to see the massive mountain that I had helped build there, but once again I found nothing. I started into my circulatory system and made it part of the way through before once more being dragged back out by my body. I need to take a breath. It seems that I no longer can maintain myself in my body endlessly. Whether this is because I no longer have the massive amounts of Qi running through me to power possible energy requirements, or because I am no longer being frozen in time by the ball from hell. Either way it doesn't really matter.

Glancing up at the sky, I focus on the braid of Qi retreating over the horizon, focusing on it and trying to remember the way it looked and felt moving through me. I take another deep breath and dive in, this time I don't try to follow it down. I just ignore it and try to go straight to my core itself. Rather than trying to maintain logic and follow a guide through my physical body, I turn to memory and try to not focus. I had spent several lifetimes growing my energy pathways and building the cavernous globe that was my core. So I stop trying to find my way there and instead just go home. Such a simple concept, part of me is surprised when it manages to work. Finding myself inside the asteroid that is my core, I see several Chaos Qi particles floating in the center. Confused because the last time I was here they were bouncing off of the walls, I moved in closer.

The core still seems empty, but something is now holding the Chaos Qi in the center around the black speck. It seems from my vantage like the tiny dot in the center is now glowing even brighter than the Chaos that surrounds it. The speck is a blackness that seems to glow dark despite being surrounded by the light of the Qi around it. Like an inverse of the sun in an empty solar system, the black maintained itself dead center, while trying to gobble up the light which was furiously trying to escape its grasp. Sending myself as close as I could before I was repelled, I look more closely and see that the darkness alone is not maintaining its hold on the Qi particles. Instead the Chaos seems to have the energy to get away, but in their attempt to escape, they were running into an invisible wall about a third of the way out from the black dot. This invisible globe only seemed able to affect the Chaos that was trying to escape being consumed by the glow of the black dot. Although there doesn't seem to be any direction to its actions, the particles of energy are bouncing around the speck and off the walls energetically. With the complete randomness that got them their name, they seem to be hitting an invisible barrier, rebounding off the wall at a different angle everytime with boundless energy. They reminded me of the representations of an electron that I had learned about in school myself and more recently had to help my kids understand with their homework. Using that analogy I zoomed out, while I wasn't able to see this barrier, which I assumed was the neutron force. I should be able to see an opposing force on the other side of the barrier. The more stable protons should be rotating around holding an equal number of electrons in. It appeared that the analogy wasn't the best, as the cavern still seemed to be empty. As I moved out I couldn't even sense the barrier anymore, all I saw was a glowing light in the middle. Before I could continue my search for the anomaly, I found myself being dragged out by the need to take another breath.

Coming back to my physical body, I gasp for air, clearly I need to work on my meditation. Although to be fair, when I was standing here before this kidnapping so long ago, all I was trying for before was calm and inner peace. I wasn't searching for magical powers in my possible metaphysical center. Taking several deep breaths, like I was coming up from a dive where I had pushed myself just a little too far. I started calming my body back down. Trying to bring myself back to calm and focus, I look up at the retreating Qi for any clues as to what might be holding it inside of me. As I do, since I am no longer focused just on the energy, my jaw drops. Unable to fathom how I missed it before, I find myself staring at a giant planet in the sky. Not a giant mountain on the horizon.

A

GIANT

PLANET

HANGING

ABOVE

ME