Chapter 51: growing cores

As evening came, ushering in cold winds, Bai Wee-Zee looked out over his valley. He had prepared well for Winter and was satisfied that all his provisions were packed and ready. Yet his fingers betrayed his restlessness as they played absently with his white beard.

He had not spoken to his son Bai Bo-Xue in 2 years. And no, he would not capitulate now to his demands.

It had been Wintertime then, the day of the first snow, when fifty men from the “House of Zah” descended upon the village—a day of blood and pain.

Shiau Yongshi had started a fight with a member of their faction when he was in Weihou, visiting his cousin. It turned out that the member was high up and did not take kindly to a lowly off-worlder acting above his station.

They quickly put pay to any defenses the village had and corralled all those they found in the village square. Men, women, and children were all made to kowtow, and those they thought able were dragged off, never to be seen again. Yongshi had got off lightly. They flayed him, then dragged him through the village tied to a horse. Linlang tended his wounds for two weeks, using all her herbs.

As far as Bai Wee-Zee was concerned, there was no village anymore. So he had stayed in his hillside cave, daring any to come and challenge him. He would die before submitting to such an insult. His sons were cowards, and Yongshi should have died before bringing further dishonor to their door.

Why would he use his powers to save such a useless welp?

So Wee-Zee sat and huffed, even though he had felt a presence in the valley and wanted more than anything in the world to investigate. But, no, he would stay and be dammed with them all.

Shiau Yongshi could not believe his eyes when he looked at the transformation. Where before was a small shack now stood a large dwelling, completed seemingly all in a day? And when Adam said he didn’t play any part in the proceedings, he was even more dumbfounded.

There were many secrets here, and Che Gonghui was letting nothing slip; even Zhang Wang-Sheng, Linyang’s mother, was tight-lipped. They just all kept smiling and praising the kids.

Linyang was also perplexed but knew her mother would take her aside to tell her all later. So she kept quiet also.

Later when their guests had left, Ash told them the story of the house built in a day, and afterward, the children took turns bowing and receiving applause. Adam was most interested in the symbol arrays and let Libby have a look at them all with her mana field.

Libby cracked the code after Ash let Adam look at all his symbol scrolls. Libby and Echo saw many possibilities, using the arrays function as a mana leech. But now Adam needed to spend his first session absorbing some of the mana from the beast cores: cultivating.

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He sat just inside the storeroom where no one would disturb him and tried to follow Libby’s instructions. But it was challenging, frustrating, and hard going. So instead, Echo and Libby together came up with another method. First, Libby used her mana field to isolate the beast core then Echo used his version of acclimatization.

Echo initially felt it was like a catch-22 scenario; they couldn’t absorb the energy without energy until he hit on the idea of just absorbing the energy constructs containing both the acclimatization and absorb abilities into himself. This allowed him total control of the power and complete understanding. His GTAs could then do the job of both abilities within Adam’s body.

Libby transferred the beast cores Adam could not swallow directly to his stomach, an Ore Beasts stomach. Then Echo used his GTAs to refine the core at a more incredible speed and by directing it through the channels of Adam’s body.

They managed to empty six of the forty-odd cores Adam had saved up before the night was up. Fortunately, Adam had not needed to be conscious and had slept soundly enough.

Before the sun had risen in the valley, Libby and Echo had gotten Adam to implement their strategy. First, he dug and placed the six used cores on the plot of land near the storehouse, then created arrays for each seat.

It was easy to create the arrays as Huba gave him a ghostly image of each symbol to follow. Then, he just had to trace them with a stick in the earth carefully. Then Libby decided it was easier to use her mana field to manipulate the world into hardened rock containing the symbol arrays. That way was quicker and didn’t involve worrying about protecting the arrays from the elements.

Adam was just left with the task of erecting a small fence to keep out animals. He didn’t need to worry about the children as he would tell them to keep well away.

Echo monitored the cores; the energy absorption seemed slow but steady. They did not know whether they would need to keep moving the bodies due to the depletion of mana in the area or place them further apart. They would need to do some testing to find this out.

Adam left three children to guard the plot during the day while they carried on weaving more bamboo for the main plot’s roof. The other children started their daily chores as the day before, eagerly slurping down their meager breakfast and running off into the village.

Adam had decided to hunt further afield as it now seemed their energy problems might be over for the time being. But was stopped on his way out of the village by Linyang. Linyang had heard from Gongnui that Adam had traveled far the day before. So she asked him if he could help her collect some herbs she needed if she gave him descriptions.

Adam, of course, could do one better than this. He asked her to show him the herbs, as Adam said he was not very good at remembering. As Linyang showed him each herb, Adam scanned it for energies, and Libby used her mana field to record each herb’s physical characteristics.

As Adam ran through the forest, he could pinpoint each herb he encountered while running at nearly enough full speed. Libby’s mana field could also capture each herb without him even needing to stop. This was way more fun than yesterday, thought Adam.

The day before, he had to be careful with each bit of mana he used; now, he felt he could relax a little. As long as he did not expend the equivalent of more than six beast cores in energy, it was all good. Fortunately, they would soon build up an excellent stock of empty cores, even if he did. However, Echo and Libby had told him they had achieved greater efficiency with each core absorbed, meaning he should be able to absorb three times as many tonight.