Yu sat at the head of a long dinner table, smiling at the group before her and to the equally full tables to her right and left. Her faction had grown quite a bit in the last few years. At close to two hundred outer sect disciples and twenty-one inner sect disciples, the faction’s expansion had occurred for two main reasons.
First, was, of course, the reputation of Yu being the sect master’s direct disciple. It was impossible for that not to be a factor in her existence at the sect, and thus her faction’s as well.
The second was Yu’s personal power. She was ranked seventh in the outer sect currently, and only that low because the others above her had compressed enough of their Qi to cause her problems from a sufficient distance that she did not wish to challenge them. Their talents were fine, she just did not want to risk losing again.
Her master had not been pleased at her loss at the six thousand twenty-first rank challenge. That it had been a setup with a Metal Warrior who had “won” the spot the day prior due to some underhanded moving about of ranks, did not in the least bit matter to the leader of the Black Dragon Sect.
That particular Warrior, who Yu had been unable to prepare for, had a very strange non-standard manifestation of Metal Qi. It allowed him to create highly absorptive steel on his body which sort of swallowed Lightning and Fire Qi, Yu’s most destructive and favored offensive weapons.
So he had – quite cleverly Yu had to admit with the benefit of hindsight – covered himself in layer upon layer of hard reflective steel which continued to absorb more and more of her attacks. Eventually, he could absorb no more and the steel exploded outward.
Not only did it succeed in throwing her out of the ring resulting in her loss, but she had also been peppered all over with pieces of burning hot and electrically charged steel. Sure it contained some other affinities since Yu had tried a few to see if they could get through, but her main offensive skills at that time had been Fire and Lightning.
Needless to say, the outcome was unpleasant. She had spent a week healing, which – given her body’s natural abilities – meant the wounds were bad. Worse in her mind, it meant she had lost a placement challenge as well as a week of practicing her skills, earning points healing or hunting, learning with Bai, rune crafting, and just overall growing as a cultivator.
And her master had not been pleased at all. Yu still shivered at the remembered consequences of his ire. A week of working on her, frankly, poor gravity control by trying to push against his own gravity pressing her over glowing hot coals was not fun. The fact that repeatedly being buried in said glowing hot coals could not actually physically harm her was irrelevant… in her mind at least. It had hurt like the burning hells to her. He, on the other hand, seemed to believe it was the best training ever.
Well, she had been extremely motivated from both the loss and his lessons. The first steps she took to avoid a repeat were to increase her offensive capabilities quite a bit, mostly in width rather than depth – meaning offensive skills across more affinities rather than focusing on fewer, stronger skills.
That said, points were finite, even for her, so she had made the sacrifice of not going to class the entire two weeks following her recovery. Instead, she had turned it into day after day of earning points through either hunting in the marsh or healing extra shifts when she needed a break.
It had all worked out in the end. Upon reflection, it was probably for the best that Yu experience such a thing in the sect where her life was, theoretically at least, not at great risk. Learning how to deal with capabilities of the nature that that Warrior brought was probably a net-positive experience after all was said and done.
As far as trying again was concerned, the solution had been found when she brought the problem of reflective skills to her Fire Warrior instructor. He told her that that type of Qi manifestation was well known and absorbed only a portion of the Qi and that it could not absorb the actual pain, which meant he had to still fully take the suffering all into himself. Her teacher also told her that her opponent had almost certainly been using some sort of alchemy to assist him in dealing with the pain. Not too strong because it would have effected her opponent’s mental faculties, but he figured it had been just enough to take the edge off and allow that Warrior to last long enough to build up enough energy and cause the explosion.
Yu had been… angry.
That her opponent had cheated, that the whole thing had been a setup to serious hurt or even kill her, and that her master had punished her quite badly despite those two facts, had made Yu almost furious enough to attack the true culprits, the imperial nobles, outside of the arena. But thankfully her recovery time had helped her gain control. Instead, she challenged the Metal Warrior again as soon as she was healthy.
Of course, she had changed her approach to one of solely melee attacks and defensive skills. His special Metal Qi was useless as an attacking method beyond him being able to launch her own power back at her and standard Warrior powers, at which he was average. So she avoided or dealt with those using her own skills and limiting the Qi usage of violent affinity types.
Truthfully, Yu had lost her temper a bit during their contest. She ended the fight only after breaking sixteen of his bones, starting with his jaw, which prevented him from resigning. The judge, a woman elder Yu knew only from the arena, had declared Yu the winner once she had had enough of the young mage’s anguished screams.
After the high of the combat and vengeance had vanished, Yu had spent the night throwing up. She couldn’t believe she had done that. She had felt that acting in a such a way was a stain on her honor, and a poor showing for herself and her clan. And just plain cruel, which was something she had never wanted to become.
However, her master had been pleased. Thrilled really.
He had used that even to “help” her learn from the experience. Specifically, he kept her occupied with horrid training until she accepted that she needed to change. As a person and as a fighter, he insisted she needed to change.
First, at a technical fighting level, she learned she needed to be more flexible and broad in her Qi skills. She purchased a number of attacking skills in Wood and Earth. Darkness and Water remained a bit of challenge because they weren’t great at attacking prior to compression, but she was not as focused on only Fire and Lightning.
And the second and final lesson from her loss and its outcomes was that her opponents had watched her achieve her revenge. They looked on as the young main cried out for mercy through a shattered jaw as she broken him into pieces.
That was the real lesson that her master had wanted her to learn.
At first she denied it. It was a one-time thing, she had insisted.
His response was as painful to hear as her wounds had been.
“Do did you enjoy losing?” her master had asked her after she refused to physically punish her opponents because she felt it was dishonorable. “Your refusal to do what is necessary is nothing but pride and arrogance! Do you think you are the first to think you’re so much better than the rest? That you can keep to some code? That honor matters most? Well, you know where the people who thought that are? Dead! They are beneath the dirt or ash on the wind.
“So I ask again, did you enjoy that experience? Do you want a repeat of being blown across the arena with slivers of molten metal embedded throughout your body? How much was your honor worth when you were bleeding out on the sand? How does battling with honor serve you when your enemies will not follow the same rules? Or do you wish to die before you reach twenty summers? Will honor have helped your rotting corpse when it is returned to your family?”
Then he had looked down at her and jabbed his finger in her face.
“I have put too much into you to see you fail because of something as pointless as some faulty moral code. Decide before our next session whether your honor is more important to you than your life. If it is, I will put no more into you and we are done! You will have failed, and I will find another. They will be lesser by far, but at least they will be alive.”
Yu had spent days thinking about what he had said. She thought about it while hunting, healing, training, eating, and especially when she was alone at night. She had just looked up at the ceiling and tried to figure out what and how much her honor meant to her. She even cried in frustration, wishing Grandma Huan had been there to help her work it out.
Yu’s beliefs about honor had always been something she had felt made her who she was. She believed that her honor guided her actions, and her honor told her that physically damaging another young cultivator enough to hurt their future was just wrong. She believed that the youth deserved a chance and stopping that went against everything she wanted for herself, her clan, her own future, and the future of humanity as a whole.
But… his words had compelled to ask herself what would happen when she was forced, again and again and again, to battle those who would act against that goal – or worse, do the same to her that her master was guiding her to do to them. Should she respond to them in the same way they responded to her? Could she?
If not, then she had to accept a harsh reality: she would likely die defending her personal honor.
And what good would that do her? She had to face the harsh reality that her master had been right. What good was her honor to her corpse? To those in her faction that she had promised to teach and support and protect? To her family and clan and city that she had sworn to one day defend?
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
The only answer she had come up with was… none. None at all.
“So where does that leave me?” she had asked herself.
And the only answer she had come up with was alive. Alive but, if not unguided, certainly less so. She just had to hope that she would not fall victim to her flaws, of which she knew pride was her greatest. It had led to her loss. To Li and Lu’s imprisonment. To most of her failures in her short life. So she had to hope her pride would not ruin her and her lack of honor would not turn into what she hated.
Instead, she had decided, she would use that lack and make the others see her pride in her fighting.
And so Yu had accepted what she had had to do. She put aside her honor and broke her opponents, taking their pride and dishonor for herself. And in doing so, she crushed them.
At first she had felt a pain deep in her heart. She felt it like her soul weapon was stabbing her and draining her of her honor like it drained blood. But, she found, after a while, that it hurt less. The third time she sent an opponent off the ring in screaming agony, it hurt less than the first. And after the sixth, it hurt less than the third. And by the twentieth, it barely hurt at all.
And she felt relieved. Because it had become easier. And because it had worked.
After a while, miraculously, none of the major clans could get anyone to fix the challenges anymore – at least, as she had later learned, not without forcing them to pay an exorbitant amount in compensation for the inevitable loss.
To date, eighteen of her victims had left the sect either voluntarily or because they were unable to make the payments anymore due to injuries she have given them. Eighteen youths losing their future because of her.
And she was… satisfied.
For a while at least. Until her enemies tried again, but from a different direction. Because of course the empire’s elite couldn’t allow her, a verger girl from the back end of nowhere, to get away with beating them at their own game.
So they went after her faction instead. Her members would come back from hunting hurt in ways a demonic beast could not cause; or they would exit the arena with broken bones and other severe injuries beyond what was normal.
Her enemies believed they had found a way to get to her. And they were right… in a way. But the result was not what they had hoped.
Yu had demanded honor challenges of each and every disciple who had been responsible. As a result, she had had at least one extra fight almost every challenge day, week after week, for months. Those going after her had believed she would give up. Get tired. Run out of patience. Or simply not care enough about people they would have viewed as peons in her place.
So with all the doubt driven from her by their very own actions, her enemies had learned how wrong they were. And they made her stronger, smarter, and a more capable Warrior and Mage with each attempt. They tried many methods. Sending various affinities after her, limited her skills by controlling the challenge, tried different manifestations.
It turned out that her master had been right from the very moment she had arrived at the sect. Their hatred of Yu had forced her to grow. Because after each and every duel, win or lose, she improved – her Qi more refined, her skills perfected. With every flaw they found and used against her, she fixed for the next. Every hole in her skillset that they exploited, she closed.
Their pained screams had become a constant music in her ears, its discordant tones ringing throughout the arena day after day, month after month. Their suffering, their pride, their futures, had become hers to do with as she pleased, and she broke them.
She had become a destroyer, and they came to fear her.
And due to that fear, eventually attacks on her faction stopped as well. No outer sect disciple was willing to attack her or her people. This left only the inner sect, which wasn’t as effective as her enemies had hoped either, as evidenced by earlier that day.
Those wearing red would only go after her, not her people, and only unofficially. Her faction was safe because of the difference in sect level and power. After all, only the worst of the worst would be willing to take on juniors and really hurt them for no reason.
Yu found their logic laughable. They had refused because it would be a terrible dishonor and shame to them and their clans. The hypocrisy was astonishing to Yu, but she had simply accepted it and moved on because it was to her advantage.
Even more satisfying – thanks to the new rules in the sect caused by Yu’s experience in her very first week there with an inner sect disciple named Shishi – outer sect disciples were protected from their seniors. And Yu used those rules to push the vice leader to be very attentive to her… complaints. In the end, many were punished with fines or horrid duties, or just expelled.
It was all within the sect laws. Laws that were changed because of an inner sect disciple attacking a junior. The irony rang as a karmic truth to Yu. As she knew she was close to ending her time in the outer sect, things had finally come full circle.
So, for the last half-year or so, things had been peaceful for Yu and her faction for the most part. Yes, the idiots who attacked her about the spirit realm were a pain, but she was protected from the truly strong and thus, in general, things were good.
Yu was happy – proud even – watching her faction around her, enjoying the power, opportunities, knowledge, and protection she offered. And she was thrilled to provide it. Yu believed these young men and women could be the future of humanity. Some might even work directly with her at some point, joining her after they left the sect as members of her clan or team or whatever. She knew she would still need help from more than just her clan after she left the sect.
Especially with what was coming. Well, what might be coming – she still had hope. Yu glanced down at the forearm hiding the tattoo of a Roc, its eyes glistening gems of red and violet.
Be wrong, she thought desperately at it.
As always, Gui Ai sat next to Yu and she tugged lightly on her sleeve. The girl had this gift that Yu did not understand, but appreciated greatly. She always knew when Yu was struggling with something.
Yu smiled at her quiet friend and tilted her head to Ai so she could whisper in her ear.
“Lu told me,” Yu replied with a nod. “Dumplings, Day 6 dinner before the auction.”
Ai looked into her eyes, sending the message only Yu understood and she winked. Ai blushed and went back to eating, not letting anyone see her face, causing Yu to sigh quietly.
It had been quite a few years since the incident where Ai had been kidnapped because of her relations in the royal family. But, even after all this time, she still showed only minimal sign of recovery. Ai barely spoke to anyone except Yu, the twins, Lei in calligraphy class, or her own brother, Gui Zihao. But she did very occasionally speak to others in her faction, which was meaningful improvement. She had also opened up a bit to her fellow calligraphers about their craft, something that thrilled Yu and their friends.
However, Ai would still not cultivate at all, and the only thing she had to do with demonic beasts was playing with her bonded Illusory Fox, Si Fei, and Yu’s own bond, Bai.
Ai still had not shared what happened to her, although Yu had gained a few pieces of insight, which made her nearly apoplectic with rage. Even more so than what had happened with the twins and their forced rune binding. That was as much guilt as anything else; but with Ai, it was white hot fury like the burning sun in the heavens.
Yu reached over and gave Ai a side hug, promising herself yet again that one day, when she grew strong enough, the ones responsible would pay.
“Hey Yu, have you heard the rumors going around?” someone called from the table to her right.
Yu let out a breath, and with it her anger. Then she looked over and saw one of her faction’s Darkness Mages and smiled.
Budong was something of a gossip monger, but he also gathered intel like he was born for it, which, given his affinity, could be true. In fact, he kind of reminded Yu of her uncle, Zhao, back home. Budong, handsome as most male cultivators were, was not as free with his affections as her uncle, but was still a highly sought after companion. He was also nearly as goofy and lackadaisical about life. Yu privately wondered if it was part of the personality of strong Darkness Mages.
None of that mattered to Yu though, as long as everyone was happy. What did matter to her was that Budong was a great leader of her small number of Darkness cultivators. And he had a good support structure as well. Next to him was the much quieter but gargantuan Nang Po, who acted as his second and a kind of guide to stay focused.
Thinking on his question, Yu shook her head. “What is it this time? You know I don’t really keep up on all the local gossip. I’m kind of busy. And that’s what I have you and your sneaky friends for anyway.”
Groans inundated Yu from that table and a roll came flying at her from her left. She caught it without looking and bit into it, not taking her eyes off of her source of sect news, gossip, and well, scandals.
“Sho?” she asked with a full mouth, although she covered it with the hand holding the roll.
Silence followed as everyone wanted to hear what Budong had to say.
“The rumors and my sources say they’ll make the announcement in a few days. Maybe on or by our next Day 1.”
Yu surreptitiously looked down the center table with her eyes. Only a few seats from her sat one of her faction’s leaders, the only other person at the sect not from the Bao clan guaranteed to get into the spirit realm besides herself, and a member of one of the five major clans of the Gui Empire, Fan Ran.
He very subtly shrugged, but there were even more groans from throughout her faction tables.
“How do you know it’s real this time?” someone asked loudly.
“I know. Isn’t this like the tenth time that rumor’s surfaced?” called a second.
“And it’s always wrong!” exclaimed a third.
“I swear, I’m right this time!” Budong claimed with raised hands and desperate to prove he knew what he was talking about. “Even the elders are talking about it. They said the tournament’s going to start in less than a month and entry into the spirit realm will happen a month or two after.”
“Why wait so long after the tournament?” someone asked.
“Preparations and travel time,” Fan Ran answered. “The various factions will be providing support for their entrants, and everyone has to be able to get there from throughout all three empires; some have a long way to go.”
Yu nodded. That made sense to her.
“Well, if it’s true this time, I expect I’ll be able to confirm over breakfast on Day 7 at the latest. So make sure you’re awake.” Yu looked directly at Jao Li when she said that last sentence.
Li gasped dramatically. “I don’t sleep in anymore!”
Everyone at all the tables laughed because Li had been known to have the bad habit of sleeping in, which caused Yu to have to wake her up for their pre-dawn training. Fed up with it, Yu had started doing so by practicing her Qi skills in Li’s room. Right next to her bed. Or on her bed. It depended on her mood and the skill. The water skills were especially fun.
Even Ai giggled a little.
Li’s twin, on the other hand, laughed louder and harder than anyone, very much enjoying those memories. The sisters had a strange relationship.
“Anyway, I need to head to my healing rounds. I seriously hope I don’t see any of you until lunch.” And she stood and leaned her fists onto the table. “Before you go, I just want to say something.” Silence fell among the tables and she had all of their undivided attention.
“We’ve all been preparing for this moment, some of you for years now. I won’t be around to protect you soon, but we’ve built up a strong team who can hopefully take my place. If Budong is right, you have a few weeks to a month at most for you to take advantage of me while I’m still around. Use it – use me – while you can. I’ll try to free up some extra time.”
She stood up straight.
“As promised, I’ve coordinated with the vice leader and he’s approved it. We’ll be reserving a corner of the dining hall and a bunch of Qi-infused food for one big get together with the entire faction over a feast just before those of us heading to the tournament are gone. So you have until then.
“Please provide what support you can for those participating. Trying to get into the spirit realm is as much a challenge as it is an honor. Help them how you can. And for those of you making the attempt, don’t do everything alone. Faction members help each other as much as they are helped by the faction. And like I always say, don’t waste the opportunities before you. Work hard and good luck.”