Despite setting off with such determination, after the first hour Chang-li was starting to get bored as they trudged along, picking their way past occasional sand drifts, and the ever-present blank stone walls. Every so often, they passed a path branching off to the right or the left. Joshi ignored them, continuing straight on the largest of the paths. His fingers traced along one wall as they went. Chang-li didn't have a better idea, so he followed along closely.
Overhead, the sky whirled and changed as first one color, then another, dominated over the rest. Chang-li started getting a little better at his cycling technique. He could only manage his most basic technique while walking, but he felt the lux moving through his body.
He didn't feel as though it was any particular flavor of lux, which was disappointing. To progress as a cultivator, one needed to learn to distinguish between different types of lux and attune to one or more. At the Bodily Refinement stage, almost all cultivators specialized in a single flavor of lux. By the peak of Mental Refinement, they were expected to master two or more. If they ever reached past the height of Spiritual Refinement, to the Paragon level, they would be masters of six different flavors of lux.
Beyond paragon lay the Peak, which only the emperor’s Prisms presumed to strive for.
For now, Chang-li would have been happy with one kind of lux, showing that he was on the right path.
At last, Hiroko sighed. "This place doesn't seem to go anywhere. There's so much lux, but so little life,” she complained. "I can't sense anything."
"What do you know of such matters?" Joshi challenged.
"I told you, I've been inside the emperor's own tower on multiple occasions. The higher-ranking court princes and princesses are raised nearly to the Peak of Bodily Refinement before they are of an age to make a cultivator's marriage. I'm close to the peak myself.”
Joshi snorted. "So you were taken inside a tower and fed lux like a baby is fed milk. That's not how it works. That is not progression."
"And I suppose you know so much about it," she snapped. "What towers have you ever been inside?"
"Only this one," Joshi admitted. "But the monks of Hapiru taught me what to expect. I would have been a cultivator in a few years, if I hadn't..." He trailed off as he turned away.
Chang-li ignored him and addressed Princess Hiroko. "Go on. You were saying that you spent your life inside."
"I'm attuned to blue lux, whatever he thinks. I may not be skilled as a cultivator," she shot an angry look at Joshi's back. “But I have a bit of training.”
"Blue is for spiritual connections, yes?"
"It's much more than that," Hiroko sighed. "Better to say I can make connections between things which are alive. I can sense them. In the tower of the emperor, there's so much life feeding off of the lux. Anywhere you go, you encounter it. The princes and princesses absorb lux from the creatures killed. Lux is easier to process if it's been inside a living creature. You don't have to be a cultivation expert to do it."
"It's a lazy and wasteful method," Joshi said. "I suppose the emperor does it because he is wealthy beyond imagining and because he does not wish his children to learn the secrets of cultivation and talent."
"You dare question the emperor?" Hiroko demanded.
"This place is completely dead?" Chang-li ignored the argument. “What does that mean for us?”
They had come to a place where the corridor split three ways. There was a small circle of raised stones about two feet off the ground in front of the split. The three circled the stones, looking for any sign, and at last, Joshi sat down. "All right, if I'm going to be saddled with you two, I at least want to make sure you are not complete fools. You, scribe.”
"My name is Chang-li.” He held Joshi's eyes until at last, the barbarian nodded.
"Very well. Chang-li. I am Joshi. You,” he turned to the princess, "are Hiroko. Right now in this place, there are no princesses, there are no slaves.”
“And there are no scribes," Chang-li snapped. "We're in this together for now. If we want to survive, we need to work together."
"Agreed. So tell me, scribe — Chang-li, what is it you bring?"
In answer, Chang-li removed his pack, set it on the stone beside him, and opened it up. "I have about two weeks of dried rations for a single man. Water enough for perhaps two days in my canteen. I had expected to be able to find water easily enough, but perhaps I was wrong. I have purification rations enough to last me over a month. Split three ways, perhaps two weeks."
"What are purification rations?" Hiroko asked.
Chang-li and Joshi exchanged a look. She might have been in a tower previously, but she clearly did not know the principles.
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“We have not reached Bodily Refinement yet, not even you," Chang-li explained. "The lux that we are taking in is too much for a mortal body. We must take a purification ration every day or risk death and madness."
Hiroko shuddered. "I hope you are willing to share, then.”
Chang-li shrugged. "I have fire starters, a knife, and my scribe's kit,” though that didn't seem like it would be much use. “And this." He removed the cultivator journal that had started all this and opened it up, showing it to them.
Joshi shook his head. "That's not the script the monks taught me."
"Part of it is in scribe script," Chang-li said. "I can read that part. The other part is the secret language of this cultivator sect."
"Who were they?" Hiroko leaned forward to peer at the pages.
"They were called the Sect of Morning Mists, and apparently, about 200 years ago, they displeased the Emperor and were crushed. This account is of the last of their cultivators and the scribe who accompanied him on his journey."
"His ultimately failed journey," Joshi pointed out, "just in case you were planning to rely on his journal a little too much."
"It got us in here.”
"And we will have to get ourselves out," Joshi nodded. "Good. You've proven your worth.”
Chang-li felt a quick glow of pride, then wondered himself at why he was so happy for praise from a barbarian slave. Joshi seemed like a man in command of himself, despite the circumstances.
"And you," Joshi said to the princess.
She frowned, her lips pressing together. "Well. I have been inside a tower before, which gives me an advantage over you both." Chang-li appreciated her spirit. For a coddled noble, she seemed remarkably level-headed. "And I have several useful abilities. I am not fully trained in using blue lux, but I had a lesson or two my father arranged for me. If we get into a fight, I may be able to help. Oh," she added, "and of course, when we get out of here, I will be able to intercede and save both of your lives."
"That could come in handy.” All of Chang-li’s plans were in disarray. He was less and less confident of his ability to slip back into the camp unnoticed, should they actually escape from this tower. Having an indigo princess on their side seemed like it didn't hurt.
"But what about you?" Hiroko asked, fixing Joshi with a glare. "Chang-li has knowledge and food. I have knowledge and skills.” She stared him down in a deliberately provocative sort of way. "You have muscles, at least, but no weapon."
Joshi folded his arms across his chest. "I am trained in the Way of the Closed Hand. Should we need to fight, I am ready. And I have been taught what a beginning cultivator should know. I do not think either of you have."
Hiroko and Chang-li exchanged a quick glance and both shook their heads.
"Not really," Chang-li said. "I've always hoped to seize a chance to cultivate, but scribes aren't generally expected to rise past the Peak of Bodily Refinement. My masters said that sticking close enough to a cultivator on the rise would let me get there without trouble."
"You may perhaps reach that peak, but you will never rise beyond it.” Joshi looked to Hiroko. "Which I suspect was the reason for your own inadequate training, to hobble you. I am glad you have not reached the peak. There may still be time to repair your foundation."
"Wait," Hiroko said. "You are an escaped slave, having entered this place for the first time two hours ago, and you are already speaking to us of rising beyond the Peak of Bodily Refinement?" She looked skeptical. "Who do you think you are?"
"A man discontent with his station in life," Joshi said. "And so should you be, if you ever wish to rise as a cultivator." Now he folded his legs beneath him and put his hands into a posture that was clearly part of a cycling technique. "The most important part of your time in the tower is in learning to deepen and broaden your flux channels. You must cycle constantly. For every hour we spend navigating the tower, we should spend another hour cultivating. It may cut into our sleep time," he admitted, "but the theory is that cycling can take the place of sleep to some extent."
"So what, we're supposed to sit here for the next two hours and cycle?" Chang-li asked. "Cycle what?”
“By now your body should have absorbed enough lux for effective cycling. I assume you must know some technique.”
"I do," Chang-li admitted. "I was taught the Way of the Faithful as a child."
Joshi snorted. "Don't use that. It is designed to cripple and stunt peasants. What else?"
"The scribes have a technique. You imagine yourself as..." Chang-li hesitated. “I am not supposed to share secrets."
"I assure you, I am not looking to steal the secrets of a scribe." Joshi’s words could have been cutting, but he seemed amused. Almost he now reminded Chang-li of his older brother. A stab of homesickness struck him. He had not seen his family in more than a year. They had grown distant in the past few years as Chang-li devoted more time to his schooling, and yet his brother had always been there for him, paying the bills at the scribe school, encouraging him, celebrating his honors and achievements. He would like to see his mother and brother again someday.
Chang-li took a deep breath. "Imagine yourself as an inkpot. Six colors of ink flow in. You dip your pen in and draw out the black ink. Then you trace each vein of your body outward from your heart with your brush, and the ink becomes part of you."
Joshi raised an eyebrow. "That's it?"
"That's it," Chang-li confirmed. It sounded hollow to him now.
Hiroko nodded. “It reminds me of the Way of Meditation taught to me and my cousins in the Imperial Gardens. We learned a cycling technique designed to move lux around in our bodies, but not to distinguish between the flavors. Then, when we entered the tower, most of them were able to achieve red lux affinity easily. That's the dominant color there. I wasn't. I always had a very strong affinity for blue lux, which was a problem. Once we resolved that and they helped me gather enough blue lux, I was taught a different cycling technique and told not to use the basic one anymore, as it merely attuned your body to whatever's most common."
"Yes," Joshi agreed. "I think that's the case. Scribes are not expected to rise very high, and so attuning to a specific color is not important. So, Scribe Chang-li, do you wish to focus on your destiny as a scribe, or on the path of cultivation?"
The question was a challenge. There was only one answer. Still, Chang-li hesitated. He had fought so hard to become a scribe, rising from his peasant stock, passing exam after exam, even to have a chance, and then finally taking honors that won him his role here in the military. And yet, he had come here, to this tower, risking everything for this particular chance.
"I want to cultivate.”
"Good," said Joshi. "The first thing I must teach you is a cycling technique that will let you identify which lux you are most strongly attuned with already. Later, there will be time to attune other lux. But for a start, we must build your foundation. And for that, you will need to pick one color of lux from another. Now, imagine yourself as a stone….”