9. Will to Power III

“An unborn fetus,” Reimallia continued, “Inside the belly of the beast, with bits and pieces of silver around it.”

“The silver was no mystery. That was the young master’s doing.”

“Stop calling him young master!” Reimallia sighed. “We’re seasons of travel away from the empire. There’s three of us here, he’s crippled and alone far from his family. What chain does he have of you that you’d grovel at his feet?”

Pria considered telling her. Then, “You still haven’t finished your story.”

“The fetus isn’t wounded,” she said. “Those silvers were sharp. They gutted right through the monkey dragon. But not the fetus. It was oozing black pus and infecting the surrounding organs. Not to mention the monkey dragon was thin. You saw it. We all did. Have you seen its fur? I can see its ribs through its body.”

Reimallia stared at her hands. “That fetus is still alive,” she continued. “I suspect it snatched anything that the monkey dragon ate, almost as if the fetus used it as an egg. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“And your plan?”

“I will cultivate using it as my catalyst, rise to the third realm, and hope that it’ll be enough to repel any predators that come our way. We can leave as early as tonight.”

“And if my answer isn’t what you expect?”

“Are you worried about him?” She said.

Pria pursed her lips. “A cultivator…”

“Yes, I know you don’t like our kind. If it’s not sentimentality, it’s something else. But I won’t pry. You don’t have to answer now. Think about it. Ponder over it. Let reason be your guide.” She stood up. “Tell me where he hid the silvers and you may not have to dirty your hands. He is still dangerous—to mortals, that is.”

“Do you not feel bad leaving him to die here? After all that you said when you carried him back home?”

Reimallia looked away. “He’s a cultivator. This is our world. He’ll understand.”

Pria watched her as she knocked on the door. When there was no answer, they found Lahrs Sarnasia asleep, sweating.

Reimaillia snatched a glance at him, then turned her attention to the study table. It didn’t take long for her to have found the silvers. She must have had a similar table, or was familiar with the mechanisms involved. Silvers, beneath the false bottom.

Reimallia took out a pouch and began stacking them. She had taken the last of them when Kal groaned awake. “Reimallia?” She strapped the pouch behind her back, blocked the drawer and slowly closed it. If she moved too much, he would hear the silvers.

“I’m thirsty,” he said, to no one in particular. Pria bowed, closed the door, and left. She would need a bow, a couple of arrows, and oil to start a smoke fire.

----------------------------------------

That night, Kal woke up for the third time. He had been able to sleep, but it was staggered. He wondered when this would heal. He had a method that could make his wounds heal faster, but that would involve revealing his face. His true face. When you roam one’s soul, everything else is laid bare. Secrets are thinly veiled, and memories swim through the air.

Kal, like all his kind, could peer into his soul and allow others in it. That was how all sacrifices were done.

The blood sacrifice was pure, honest, and easy to handle. But bones, limbs, and organs were more difficult. It could cause complications.

To heal his leg, he would have to enter his own soul and combat the demons. But that requires an anchor. Someone had to come with him, or else he’d drown in his own memories, mistakes, past apparitions, expectations, his parents and his brother and all the people that he’d lost.

Having an anchor would center him to the surface and make him more logical, and create a soul map, a physical world that represents his soul.

He would have to do this in the future anyway, if he wanted to teach Reimallia and Pria to pursue the Imperium.

He blearily opened his eyes, and found a hazy figure at the study table. “Reimallia?” he said. He licked his lips and felt dryness in his throat. “I’m thirsty,” he whispered.

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She crossed her legs. “I’m bored,” she said. “Are you hiding a private journal I can read to pass time?”

“Do you expect me to say, yes, and point where it is?” he told her.

“I’ll look for it myself.” She started opening the drawers.

“Manners, Lady Reimallia. That’s improper of you.”

“Manners,” she said. “Wear this only for this occasion, do not wear that on official matters. Bow to higher officials, smile to princes. Only talk when you’re prompted, and when introductions are in order, make sure to always have someone introduce you to them. So many things to remember, you can’t help but spill a number of manners on the ground.”

“And a private journal is reasonable? I dare say it makes plenty of interactions predictable.”

“Boring.”

“Safe,” he said. “You don’t want a rogue cultivator crashing on a party and turning the feast table and spilling wine on the host.”

“Is that what I am?” She grinned mischievously. “A rogue cultivator, here to steal your blankets, open the windows, and leave the door open?”

“That’s a devious cultivator if I ever heard one.”

“I’m not devious,” she said quietly. He didn’t expect her to react that strongly. “What are cultivators for you?”

She was asking for his opinion, not what cultivators are. He thought about it, letting it spin around his head. She seemed to wait patiently as well. “Well,” he said slowly. “The difference I find between cultivators and mortals is that cultivators have a tool they can use at their disposal, whereas mortals do not. Regardless, I find them both very human.”

“Terrible answer. Cultivators are more than mortals.”

“Are we?”

She shifted in her seat. “We have the seat of power. When I walk out to the street, mortals bow their heads in reverence—that makes us closer to gods than man. When I enter the store, the mortals scrape their clothes on the floor and praise me.”

“That illustrates more about you than it is about men.”

“Don’t mock me, cultivator.”

He cocked his head. “Am I? Strip away our inhumane strength, what are we? Flesh and bone, counting the years of our death.”

She sneered. “The elders are nigh immortal, living to hundreds of years. The Emperor looked as young as he was eighty years since he ascended to the throne. We wear the same skin as mortals, yes, but we have the capacity to be more. And that requires great sacrifice.”

“Sacrifice,” he said, smiling. “That’s a pretty word. Elaborate on this… sacrifice.”

“When you step into a sect, you are given a paper in which it states that you are prepared to die, and that the sect holds no responsibility over your life. Cultivators get murdered for beast cores—alchemists drugged and taken captive to create innovative pills. Betraying a fellow disciple is a common, and thus acceptable within what cultivators must do to survive.”

“Do you have the capacity to help a friend at the moment?”

“That depends.”

“When I told you I can’t heal like a cultivator, that isn’t strictly true.”

Reimallia put her hands on the table and began tapping nonchalantly. “Go on.”

“There is a way. As you might have guessed, healing this body is directly involved. But not in the manner cultivators do. It’s easier if you experience it yourself. Give me your hand.”

She stayed seated, staring at his arm. “If this is a trap, then it’s a poor show.”

“I wouldn’t be so blunt if it was.”

She snorted. “I know better, Lahrs. We’re cultivators. Sect masters suck out the vitality of their core disciples in a single touch. You and I, the only difference between us and demonic cultivators is their proclivity to prefer human cores as the essence of their cultivation.”

“I sense a colorful childhood, no doubt characterized by tragedies?” Hearing this, her expression darkened. “There are good men out there. Virtuous men, and I make no distinction from cultivators nor mortals.”

“Virtue.” She cackled. “It’s a lie for cattle to feed upon, haven’t you listened to what I said? Oh, I don’t doubt there are good cultivators. But they have already drawn their last breath when they first unsheathed their sword against the acts of ‘hedonism’ and ‘corruption’ of the masters.” She smiled. “You speak with a clean tongue, but your actions speak for themselves. We’re here, imprisoned in the north, while ice crawls up our toes and we stretch our hands for fire as if it’s gold.”

Kal didn’t answer her.

She paused to think for a moment. Then, “Why did you lie about failing to heal?”

“That will require some truths to be unearthed, and I despise revealing my skin to any man.”

“Until now?”

“Smartly put, Lady Reimallia. Your deduction is inspiring. The sooner we be done with this, the better. Take my hand now, and I won’t disturb you any longer. Sit down on the bed.”

She walked over to him, ever so slowly, as if she was counting the steps it takes. Eventually, she sat down next to him, reached out, and stopped. “You understand why we cultivators do the things we do, don’t you? Why we must do what we do. The path to heavenly peaks is oft in isolation.”

He craned his head to think, and stark memories came unbidden. “Perhaps.”

“Do you feel… wrong for betraying a friend?” She was staring at her sandals.

He answered with the truth. Quietly, he said, “I often imagine an alternative future where I didn’t betray them.”

“But it was worth it in the end, I imagine.”

“Never.”

She looked at him as though he had slapped her in the face. Then, violently, she clasped his hand, and the world blinked to darkness.

He visualized a map of his soul and recited what he learned to her. She was in his soul now, with the defenses equating to wooden palisades and stone.

If he entered his own soul, he would fall unconscious and may never wake up again. His kind have done that to escape this world. But now he had an anchor—Reimallia, who kept him chained to the surface, not drown in his memories and mistakes.

“Do you feel any different?”

In that world of darkness, she looked around until she found him. “Who are you? Where am I?”

Kal smiled sheepishly. He was wearing a formal red military uniform. “This is chaos you so loved, Lady Reimallia. I had hoped I can hide my soul, but who I am is as naked as sunlight. I’m not Lahrs Sarnasia. I’m Kalliarus Val Sorvenn.”