Shin Ren has not been having a good month.

It started out fine enough. He wasn’t exactly happy to be back from the Imperial Academy, and the trip through the wilds to get home, even in the second ring of the Empire, was arduous and annoying, but neither frustration held all that much weight. Show up, impress the elders, maybe get to just relax and cultivate and not have to deal with a thousand squabbling classmates, some of them strong enough to beat his ass, all vying for some meaningless advantage or another; a good vacation, if not an ideal one. Spend a few months, a year at most, just enjoying the privileges of sect life and the rewards he’s earned for his cultivation, and then head on back a little early to begin the next round of lessons and eliminations in the academy he’d been sorted into.

And while the School of the Tiger isn’t the most prestigious of the war-focused Academies, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t have to rest, prepare, and center himself to re-enter it. Not if he wanted to survive, much less continue his impressive rise through the realms between Heaven and earth.

And then the elders stuck their noses in.

He was certain they would eventually; what is an honorable elder cultivator if not a meddler? But he didn’t see coming how fast it would be. By the time he’d emptied his spatial ring and started setting up new treasures in his old room, he had already received a visit from his grand-uncle Elder Ren, bringing with him a gift and an invitation to speak with the sect patriarch when his responsibilities and rest allowed. A summons, in effect, but he didn’t even need to make it to said meeting to find out what about. His honored uncle, it would seem, could not shut up about the anomaly.

A proven cripple, a former cultivator going by some ridiculous name that sounded more like something the outer clans would say than anything properly Imperial, somehow able to stand up against an outer sect disicple. She’d been working as a servant, had only been allowed in on the passionate support of one Inner Disciple Qen Hou and originally kept as nothing more than an assistant (or, according to rumors, toy) of an apprentice healer undergoing a two-year mentorship. Apparently something or other changed, the cripple was left to work with the other servants, and the aforementioned outer sect disciple took offense and decided to remove her from the sect permanently.

While he was well within his rights to be insulted by her presence, and many, including Shin Ren’s uncle the sect elder, were inclined to look on him favorably, as removing a cripple would gain the sect some of the face lost by having her employed in the first place. Hardly a well executed or proper move, but who would have doubted him, especially as it gave the sect some benefit?

Shin Ren was more uncomfortable with the execution of that attempted “removal”, but it grew to more than that. He looked into it, asked around. Apparently, the cripple had been a cultivator before, and had worked hard and tirelessly, often longer than others, even some approaching the Foundational realm. Taking insult at the horror of someone crippled being in your sight is only natural, but it felt wrong to him that she should be killed for such an insult, especially if she was simply in the course of her duties.

Then, he met the patriarch. Heard the news about a “triumphant showing of the prowess of the sect’s young great talent”, and learned what exactly that would entail.

That pissed him off. He’d come home to avoid the politics, to take a breather using his success as a buffer, to finally be able to relax for the first time since his mother had realized how quickly he cultivated. Instead, he was to be paraded out for the sake of humiliating and then murdering someone who’s only crimes were surviving a wound and fighting back against lethal intent. But she was costing the sect face, especially after she somehow nearly killed one of their disciples, even if it was only an outer sect disciple, even if he was barely worth their attention. Shin Ren had marveled at that when he heard it. To somehow retain so much of the skill she must have had as a cultivator speak to such discipline, such wasted talent. What must she have been like, he wondered, as a whole person and not the lesser thing she’d become? And what willpower it must have taken to hold onto herself, hold onto even her skills and martial understanding, in the face of that horrifying reduction.

So he’d honored her. He’d been honest, and spoken true of what he thought about the whole show. Promised her, as his honor demanded, that he would give her the greatest mercy he could give; a swift death at the hands of someone above her in the heavens and earth. He’d decided it; his own little act of rebellion, and a gift to one that did not deserve so humiliating a death. He would not drag it out, not make a show of it. He would end it in an instant.

And then she’d dodged.

And then she’d hit him.

And then she baited him, and trapped him, and proceeded to kick the shit out of him for all heaven and earth to see, in front of a live audience of hundreds of his peers and mentors and family.

It hadn’t lasted, but to his fucking shame it ended not due to his skill or intellect or martial talent. Really, he could only claim his cultivation had been stronger than a device meant to contain, at most, a late Foundational stage cultivator, not one of the tools designed for anyone near his level anyways. His Qi had simply overwhelmed the device, instinctively, as he blindly tried to use it and tried to get used to fighting without any of his usual senses, trapped in a body that felt like a prison. Before he could make a decision or do anything, circumstance and luck had already negated a hard-fought, hard-won trick from someone who performed very nearly a miracle in the eyes of cultivator society.

And then, in a fit of rage and shame and panic, her every movement slowed to an infinitesimal crawl, his own elevated back to the impossible, lightning-fast movement of adrenaline and Qi infusion, he’d stopped holding himself back.

He’d kicked her legs out from under her, grabbed her by the elbow, and whipped her against the ground.

The first blow would have won it. The rest were a tantrum, a fit of pique, like a child would have, and added to the shame of the battle rather than letting him regain any dignity. He’d looked down at Raika, the cripple, reduced to even less of a state than when she began.

And so he’d tried for mercy again. A quick, cleansing fire. She had earned a death by technique rather than mere blows or blades.

And just like when she dodged his strikes, just like when she tricked him, just like when he turned her legs to pulp and made mincemeat of her flesh against the ground, she refused to fucking die.

The rest of the fight had been more and less shameful, ironically. The shame of being a torturer, a failed killer and blackhearted, cruel thing, to leave her writhing in pain as long as she did, and then the revelation that she had never been a person at all. The moment where everything changed, and the fight stopped being about face or dignity or anything beyond survival as that thing, that charred, blackened husk bereft of any signs that it should still be alive, somehow moved and, at the peak of his power, wounded him.

She had eaten a piece of him. Left him open and bleeding and stabbed and took a piece of him in her mouth and tore it from him in one motion. And then she’d topped even that by eating his Qi, consuming, feeding before his very eyes on the fire that is proof of his cultivation and the depths of his growth and very self.

How could he not surrender? How could he not call for aid, in the face of something like that?

The weeks after passed in a blur. The Empire, of course, did what it does best, and interfered in the business of the sect; the Judge had deemed the execution a “fair trial”, that his surrender had meant his defeat and her acquittal, and as annoyingly obscure and difficult to interpret as their kind can often be, this one was adamant that the ruling was valid. But obviously they couldn’t let her go, and so they didn’t; whatever she may be, she was clearly some form of threat and insult rolled into one, and the thought of letting such a thing simply run wild ran counter to not just good sense, but their very responsibility as a sect.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Then the mutant had stuck its horned head into their business.

By this time Shin Ren had been… well, not exiled, per se. Failure or not, there was the inhuman nature of his opponent to spin things in his favor, and he remains the fastest growing cultivator in the sect, no matter how shameful the defeat. But perhaps… shelved. Proven as a limited tool. He doesn’t know what was said between the mutant and the elders, doesn’t know much of anything that’s going on except that they remain furious about something or other and that the problem hasn’t ended yet. He could take it as a victory, if he so chose; if not over an opponent with such hidden depths, then certainly as a victory for his own peace of mind. The elders are certain to pursue the best interests of the sect, and whatever the mutant might be, the fact it has been taken into the Imperial authorities rather than properly purged means it holds the will of the Emperor in this endeavor. The whole issue is officially over his grade, so to speak.

But he just… couldn’t let it go.

He’d seen her, sensed her, she was a cripple! No meridians, no flow to the strange clumps and stagnant, chaotic droplets of Qi left in her. She shouldn’t have been able to do what she did, he’s heard of nothing that can, not even from the Academies and the level of security clearance he’s been allowed to review.

But then he heard about the accomplice. Or, depending on the rumors, the true mastermind. That very same amateur healer here for a mentorship, who apparently had been stuck on house arrest and close observation after evidence of strange rituals were found in her notes. Apparently she’d been looking into something that had caused some consternation with his uncle, and he’d had her things searched. While Shin Ren hasn’t heard confirmation that she was some sort of demonic cultivator or ritualist, the rumors certainly seem convinced.

So, bereft of the peace he craves and technically should be able to grasp in this moment, he decides to watch her.

Nothing too close; he won’t let himself get obsessive, not without some kind of proof, but it fulfills the urge to do something. He sets an array of his own, assuming (correctly) that no one would bother interrupting him over such a minor matter and that, even though his skill is far below what one needs to make such an array imperceptible, the would-be demonic cultivator would likely just assume that it’s another layer of security.

And eventually… he forgot about it. The exercise was done, array set, he’d know if it worked by whether or not it worked. And then he stewed, for a fucking week straight, because what else was he supposed to do? He runs drills, he cultivates, he examines old texts and tried to find out what the hell he was supposed to do now, with this weight, this flagrantly unsatisfied desire for closure-

And then the array actually went off.

At first he doesn’t even recognize it. He hasn’t ever really done an array before, that was the point. When it went off, he thought maybe it had finally broken down (after only a week running active; a disappointment, even for only a first attempt), but then it just… kept alarming him. It was like an extra set of senses, like being tickled on a part of his body that doesn’t exist, like seeing a flicker of red out of the corner of his eye in weird pulses. A valuable lesson, that; he’d overdone it on the alarm conditions. Easily fixed for next time, and what a fascinating experiment it had all turned out to be.

And then the rest of his idiotic, distracted brain had kicked in, and he’d launched himself at the medical pavilion and melted his way through a wall, ignored the healer as he saw a dozen other cultivators rushing to the molten magma he’d made of her outer wall, and tried to intercept the blur he’d seen leaving her quarters.

And then he’d seen her.

And now she’s gone again. Whole, and alive, and nowhere near the crisped husk of meat he’d last seen, and she hit him hard enough and fast enough to make their last fight look like a joke and then she GOT AWAY.

He doesn’t give them time to get out of his way. There are cultivators in front of him, around him, asking him what happened and if he’s alright and if they can do something for him, and then asking what he might require, and finally, faces concerned and a bit alarmed, asking where he is going. He simply walks past or through them, leaving them to stumble aside and letting the smarter ones learn from the mistake of trying to distract him as he stalks through the halls of the medical pavilion, making a beeline for the demonic ritualist’s room.

And then, when he tries to shove them aside too, someone stops him.

A single hand. Right on his chest. Placed there like a sigil against his flesh, Qi cycling through it as his own reserves flare and burn and alter the world around him closer to what he is, closer to the fire and the mysteries of its color and form and glory.

“May I ask what you intend, honored young master?” asks some fucking nobody.

“And who are you to ask me anything?” he snarls, voice so attuned and vibrantly full of Qi he refuses to contain that he can feel the people around him flinch back away from him, a mix of pain and fear on their faces. Most of the medical pavilion members, a few guards, and a few stray sect disciples all begin to back away and go about their business, letting whatever is going to happen here happen.

But not the man in front of him. “This one is merely a lowly inner disciple, young master Shin Ren,” he says. “And I’m afraid that this lowly inner disciple has been tasked by Elder Ren of the medical pavilion and Elder Kai Shu of the punishment division to watch over the honored healer Li Shu. May I inquire as to the reason why you seem so intent to speak with her?”

Shin Ren pauses at that. He takes a breath. Deep inhale, deep exhale. The flames around him begin to dim, the world shifting from a deep, maroon-red and purple highlight to more natural lighting slowly. When he feels himself a bit more in control, he re-centers his eyes on the shorter, younger cultivator.

“The enemy I pursued came into this room and fled it not long before my arrival,” he states. “As young master of the sect, I’ve taken it under my authority to interrogate her and find out everything she knows about that thing.”

Ok. Maybe not entirely in control just yet.

The smaller figure smiles, but there’s something in his eyes that Shin Ren doesn’t expect. In spite of himself, he feels some of the instincts he’s honed kicking in, experience with others like this “inner disciple” returning. He saw plenty of it in the academies.

This man does not intend to let him pass.

“I understand, young master,” the young man blocking his path says with a bow. “But I’m afraid that while your own might is surely enough to take many things under your authority, this lowly one has orders from our mutual sect elders, and cannot defy them any more than a worm could defy the will of the heavens. I’m sure that merely speaking to them may be enough to find a solution, perhaps?”

Shin Ren… does not snarl. He refuses. He holds himself poised, controlled, every movement falling to stillness until he wills it to be.

“What’s your name, inner disciple?” he demands.

“This one is called Qen Hou, honored young master,” replies the smaller figure.

“Well, inner disciple Qen Hou,” he snarls, his control slipping again; “I am here, and the elders are on their way. In the time it takes them to arrive, I could not possibly act against their will, save to kill the demonic spy in our midst, which I have no intention of doing until she tells me what she knows. So step aside, and know your place before your betters.”

Shin Ren goes to step forward again, and he sees the hesitation in the disciple’s eyes. He sees the moment where he hesitates to get in his way, to find the right angle to end this the way he wants it to go, and steps past him as he does, going for the broken door and the woman who’s Qi he can still sense, scurrying about the room he just melted his way into.

And then feels someone’s hand touch him again.

He rounds on this Qen Hou, the edges of his robe crackling and starting to catch, the air around the both of them turning hot enough to burn lesser flesh. By his wrath, the lanterns that light the hallway begin to shift and writhe, their flames gradually darkening and shifting in hue.

“You dare?” he whispers.

Qen Hou seems to pause, unsure what to say. He almost hesitates more, and then- he grits his teeth and looks Shin Ren in the eyes.

“I dare,” he says.

And before either one of them can say anything else, the sound of the alarm at the walls begins to ring. A massive, tolling series of bells decorate the interior of the walls, calibrated to be able to ring in a dozen different combinations, and this one screams of individual intruders, two to be precise. An instant later the runic array connected to the bells activates, and words begin to manifest in the mind of every disciple and guard and servant of the Purple Flame Burning Lotus sect.

“Unknown individuals leaving the wall without permission. Available guard squadrons, immediate pursuit.”

Shin Ren snarls again, like a fucking animal. What is wrong with him?

Doesn’t matter now, does it? His quarry has been located, and with a new accomplice.

He turns and glares at Qen Hou again, but the inner disciple is already stepping back and away, taking the opportunity (without facing him, without even looking him in the eyes, like he’s been dismissed) to stand more directly in front of the healer’s doorway.

Then, and only then, does he turn from the direction of the bells to face Shin Ren again. “With your permission, young master,” he says, “I’ll remain here to guard the honored healer, so you may have the opportunity to pursue other objectives more suited to your desires.”

Shin Ren glares at him, eyes wide at the audacity of this worthless thing… and curses, turning and sprinting through the halls so fast half the lanterns go out from the speed of his movement.

She will not get away this time.