13. Attunement

Hien Ro and I raided the contribution stores before we left. I purchased the highest quality short sword that the shop possessed, while brother Ro purchased as many pills as he could. We were given food for the journey for free, and I insisted that we both pack up as much as we could carry, which for me was six bags of rice and for him was four. He was slightly older, but I was two stages ahead of him in cultivation now, and only the bulk prevented me from carrying even more.

Aside from those items, we had basic camping supplies, a change of clothes, and a small pup-tent that we’d be sharing. Were we not cultivators, we’d be quite heavily loaded down.

Instead, we dashed away from the lands of the Six Mountain Sect at a sprint, journeying for the entire day without ever getting winded. Ro asked where we were going, and I informed him that we were heading to the jungles of Ker’tath, to the south. Like the lands surrounding the sect, the jungle was the center of a vast energy gathering array which siphoned off large amounts of Qi and shipped it off-world. Unlike the array claimed by the Six Mountain Sect, Ker’tath was unclaimed by a single sect. Instead, there were dozens of smaller sects which were constantly warring with each other, as well as hundreds of rogue cultivators who were seeking to dominate their rivals.

“Why do we have to go to such a violent and unfriendly place?” he asked me, sounding unhappy with his decision to follow me for the first time.

“Because the Six Mountain Sect is a greenhouse, and true cultivation doesn’t take place in a greenhouse. The Jungles of Ker’tath are the true wilds. We’ll need to avoid any silver path cultivators, and fortunately all gold path cultivators move off-world in this part of the cosmos. But I need to challenge as many bronze path cultivators as I can after I finish tempering my body,” I explained.

He frowned at me. “Wait, you’re going there not just to cultivate, but to fight? ”

“Of course. If it was just cultivation I was after I would have stayed in the sect. I need to challenge myself against opponents who are stronger than myself if I hope to grow into the god-killer that I need to be,” I explained. “If you want to turn back, I understand. Otherwise, I promise I’ll do my best to protect you.”

“I’m staying with you,” Brother Ro insisted. “Where you go, I go.”

With that decided, we sprinted across the continent.

As we traveled, our packs grew lighter. We hunted during the day for small game to supplement the rice we were carrying, and we stopped to buy beans at one village. Then, when we were out of rice and low on beans, we bought oats from another. And then rice again from a third.

Ro watched in horror at my voracious appetite, eating twice as much as he was. There was a very simple reason for it: I needed to grow up as fast as I could. While before I had fully awaken I had been content to allow my body to grow to it’s full size naturally, now that I realized I was on the clock before the return of the Nadia, Empress of the Divine Fates Empire, I knew that I needed to rush nature along.

I gained mass. I forced my body to grow in height, and I put on both muscle and fat. I grew nine inches in the six weeks that it took us to pass through the null zone between the Six Mountain Sect’s territory and the isthmus which would lead us to the jungles of Ker’tath. Once we passed into the zone of Qi concentration, I was 5’9”, and I decided that it was time to progress my cultivation again.

Finding an isolated cavern in the hills which would turn into mountains the further south we went, I explained the cultivation technique I was planning to use to Hien Ro in more detail than I ever had before. He filled an entire scroll, front and back, with notes. The entire time, he looked at me like I was mad.

Qi Purification was the final step of the common path and marked the ascendance to the bronze path. It was the first step in which external control of Qi, controlling the energy outside of the body, was required. Depending on the method used for cultivation, it was also the step in which many cultivators developed their aspect.

The simplest method to purify Qi was to filter it. If you push your Qi through a block of wood or earth or water to purify it, it would come out purer, but it would change the nature of the Qi. Air and fire also worked, although they were both much more difficult.

I wasn’t planning on aspecting my Qi to any of those elements. I was planning on aspecting to all of them. Plus several others. The only aspect which I was not planning on taking into myself was blood.

As for Hien Ro, he was in the energy gathering realm. He was using the Peach Blossom Dream technique, which I had taught him, supplementing the pills that he had purchased for the lack of Qi condensation chambers and his generally lower level of control compared to myself. The method was still a vast improvement over what he would have learned at the sect before I arrived. He would eventually build up a resistance to the pills, but it was unlikely that they would harm him. Most cultivators in the Six Mountains Sect used them in addition to the concentration rooms, but that was prior to the introduction of my techniques.

I had avoided pills during the year I’d spent in the energy gathering realm. At the time, I’d simply found them uncomfortable, but now I knew that the avoidance was due to the toxicity that later high density spiritual pills would cause. The low level ones that Ro were made of common herbs and infusion methods and had low toxicity, but low wasn’t zero.

Now that I was fully awake, I viewed pills as a crutch, to be avoided unless I found myself at a bottleneck that I couldn’t surpass without them. Having breezed through the foundation realm and energy gathering realm, I was confident that I wouldn’t need them.

I began by aligning my spirit to the earth. This was a rather simple process, as I simply needed to cycle my Qi through a series of rocks to filter it. The trouble was finding the correct rocks to use, and we spent six days searching for the ones that I required. Quartz. Flint. Iron ore. A dozen different minerals which I could identify based on my previous lives. Hien Ro dutifully wrote down every one that I selected and described it the best that he could. Once I had all of the rocks that I required, I began to cycle.

I didn’t just filter through the rock. The cycle was a full body whirlwind, traveling counterclockwise through my entire body, concentrating in my right hand before filtering through the rock and into my left, then into my body again. More than that, I was spinning the energy in my core and in each of my meridians, allowing the alignment to settle in and take hold. I continued in this manner until each rock turned to dust.

Wood was next. This was trickier. Although it was relatively easy to have an earth/wood alignment, as the two natures are closely intertwined, the process requires living plants for optimal results. The process also kills the plants in question unless great care is taken, resulting in less than optimal results. Using the cave we had been staying in as a base, we traveled through the jungle and I cycled using the same technique I had with the rocks until I found a species of tree which seemed to accept my Qi without much issue. I continued to align my spirit to this tree until the alignment was equal to my earth alignment.

Water was next, and this was easy. There was a small stream nearby. I simply stripped down and sat in the water, cycling. The technique I used was different, however. Rather than spinning it through my body, I ejected my Qi into the water and cycled it in a whirl externally. The result was that I sat in the middle of a whirlpool, exuding and reabsorbing the Qi once it was properly aligned. The tri-aspected Qi snapped into place and developed a homeostasis from which it would resist additional elements, but I wasn’t finished yet.

Using my new earth and water alignments to seal up the entrance to the cave with rock and mud – both were like putty in my hands now – I spent two weeks cycling in darkness. This closed door cultivation method aligned me to shadow and darkness, which wasn’t actually the goal. That process was simply necessary for what came next. On the night of the full moon, I broke out of my isolation with Hien Ro’s help and spent the night pondering on the moonlight. Then I did the same with the sun. For an entire lunar cycle I contemplated the moon and the stars at night and the sun during the day, sleeping little, until my spirit once more accepted a new alignment.

I had, at this point, attuned myself to Earth, wood, water, shadow and light. This was the extent of what I could accomplish in the foothills. I needed ice, which, this far south, meant that I needed mountains. Unfortunately, that meant traveling through two hundred miles of jungle.

We had completely exhausted out stores of grain at this point in our journey as well, and when we stopped to trade for more we learned that the locals on this side of the wastes spoke a different language than they did in the north. That was also when I received my first challenge.

It was the fires of the village which lured us in. We walked in openly, but we were not met with a welcome. Rather, the children ran indoors, the women stood and watched as the men rushed to collect spears. Frustrated, we raised our hands in a gesture of peace, but the men continued to threaten us with their bone and stone weapons. However, none of them was particularly strong; I don’t think any of them were beyond foundation stage four or five. Simply by exuding my aura I was able to push them back.

Until the chieftain arrived. He carried with him a macuahuitl and a shield, and his face was covered with a mask. When I washed him with my presence, he answered back with is own.

He was on the bronze path. I couldn’t intimidate him into backing down like I could with the others, this was going to be a fight.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

I drew my short sword, and he charged at me. He swung his weapon at my head, trying to either brain me or cut my head off with the macuahuitl, but I didn’t stand still to allow him to simply have his way. Using a movement technique, I retreated twenty feet in a single step.

“Brother Ro, get out of here. You’ll just be in the way,” I said, uncaring how the older boy would take my words. The village champion rushed forward again, clumsily compared to my Silent Wind movement technique, but while he lacked refinement, he was still a stage above me in cultivation, which made him very fast. Unable to see if Ro followed my advice or not, I slashed at the champion, only to have him catch my steel blade on his shield while he returned my blow with a swing of his own weapon.

Once again I retreated, and once again he charged. This time, he caught my sword on the wooden haft of his macuahuitl and slammed into me with his shield, knocking me aside, but I had recovered and once again vanished backwards with Silent Wind.

This time, I also left behind an illusion, and he wasted a second first trying to block and then slashing through an after-image of me thrusting my short sword at his throat. I couldn’t see his expression due to the mask he wore, but he approached more cautiously after that, knowing that his eyes might not be as reliable as he was accustomed to.

I pulled on the shadow and light aspects of my spirit, bending the light around me to make myself appear three feet to my left and a second copy six inches to my right. My illusions charged the man, while I continued to retreat. He slashed at each of them just to make sure that neither of them were real, costing him another few seconds before he could charge after the real me again.

We had, at this point, left the village proper and were in the jungle outside. Theoretically this would have given him the advantage, having grown up in this forest and limiting my options to move with my Silent Wind movement technique. However, this was the very gambit I was counting on to survive the encounter.

When he charged me again, vines from the tree above dropped down and wrapped around him. Roots from beneath the ground emerged and pulled him down into the earth, which opened to accept him down to the waist as though it were quicksand. Which, for a moment, it had been.

I hadn’t been certain how much control I would actually have over the forest, but the actions of controlling the flora had been far easier than anticipated. I’d spent more energy on the illusions! While the village champion continued to scream at me, I began to turn my attention away, trying to figure out who else was in charge.

This was a mistake, because as soon as I looked away the village champion whipped his arm back and threw the macuahuitl at me. I had only a second to react, but the champion had made a mistake as well. His weapon was made of earth and wood, and my aura resonated with it. It would have remained a deadly implement while it was in his control, but having thrown it, I was able to influence it the same as I could influence light and the plants around me. I raised a hand and willed the weapon to stop.

It slowed, but still slammed into my palm. However, rather than severing my hand, the sharp obsidian blades only scratched my skin, which I had been reinforcing with Qi. The macuahuitl clattered to the ground.

Unwilling to simply accept defeat, the champion picked up a nearby stone and threw that at me as well. The stone met the same fate as the macuahuitl; I used my Qi to slow it until I could block it without harming myself. I flared my Qi further, and he was pulled deeper into the dirt until only his neck was above ground. I picked up the Macuahuitl and examined it.

It was a curious weapon. It resonated with my Qi. The wood was long dead, the dead wood still accepted the Qi that I ran through it as though it were alive, and as I willed it the chips in the obsidian blade faded, the uneven surfaces becoming smooth and clear. It felt heavy in my hand, but not much more than my short sword.

The champion continued to scream at me from where he was helpless, but I ignored him.

“That was incredible!” Hien Ro exclaimed, rushing over from where he had been hiding behind a tree. “You have truly mastered so many valuable techniques!”

“I only used three. The Silent Wind movement technique, the Wrath of Gaia, and the Aegis of Ang’makor,” I countered. “And I had to lure him out of the village in order to use Wrath on him. If I had truly mastered it, I would have been able to summon the roots the moment he began challenging us.”

I passed him my short sword. “Here. This is yours now. I like his weapon better; it suits my path better than a lump of metal.”

Ro hesitated, looking at me and then the sword. “Are you certain? You paid a lot of contribution points for it.”

“Just take it,” I said. I returned to the village clearing, just in time to chase off the curious villagers who were emerging from their houses to begin rummaging through the pack that I had slipped off of my shoulders when the champion had appeared.

The champion, who, now that his defeat was undeniable, began shouting obscenities in whatever language it was that these people spoke. I sighed as the village men lowered their spears, and I got ready for a charge.

“Stop!” a voice called, and then words were spoken by that same voice in the other language. The voice belonged to an old, hunched woman, who rushed through the woods into the clearing from the opposite side as Ro and I. She made good time despite the faint limp.

“I apologize, honored warriors. The others have confused you with raiders from a distant village. Have you lost your guide? Why have you not followed the road, and why did you not come in through the front gate?” the old woman demanded, her accent thick and musky. In the other language she said something just as long as I formulated a response.

“We are wandering cultivators from the north,” I answered. “We have no guide. We saw no road. We saw no gate.”

“The road is a league that way. The gate is on the path from the road to the village,” she explained. “All peaceful visitors and traders are expected to make an offering at the shrine at the gate before they are welcome at the village. That you did not pass through it was seen as an insult to the gods and a challenge to our warriors.”

“We did not know of these customs,” I admitted. “I apologize for the offense I have caused.”

Truthfully I didn’t give a damn, but the apology cost me nothing, even as I made signs of contrition. The woman began speaking rapid-fire in the villager’s language, and finally the others began to relax. The men began to return their spears to their resting places, and the women stepped outside. The children, however, remained indoors.

“I am Belqee,” the woman introduced herself. Hien Ro and I responded in kind, and she shook her head. “It has been ten years since I spoke this language. Not since my husband died. He came here fleeing from the Six Mountain Sect. If you have come after his bounty, then you have made the journey through the wastes in vain.”

“We have come to strengthen ourselves, not to collect a decades old bounty,” I said. “I do not even know your husband’s name. I would ask the name of the fool that I buried, however.”

“That is Coatl. He was not born in this village, but married the chief’s daughter five years ago and slew her father on their wedding night. Unfortunately we need his strength in order to protect the village, and despite the violence with which he claimed his position he has been a fair chieftain. I would ask that you do not kill him when you leave,” Belqee said.

“I’ll leave him as he is,” I promised. “Your village can vote whether to dig him out or leave him as he is for yourselves.”

“Thank you. Now tell me what I can do to make you leave,” she said sternly.

I glanced at Ro, then at my pack on the ground, which was much lighter than it should be. “We require food. As much as can be spared. We are willing to trade. We have silver or gold coins, as well as a large number of spiritual herbs which we have gathered in the jungle forests, and three spiritual salamanders wrapped in wet cloth.”

“Your coins are worthless here,” she informed me. “If you are not planning to make a return journey to the north you had might as well throw them away. I will examine your spiritual treasures to see if they are worth anything to us.”

I nodded, and pulled several pouches out of my pack. Unrolling them, I presented the herbs I had gathered, as well as the wet bag which I had sealed the salamanders inside. Her eyes went wide when she saw my bounty.

“I will trade the lot of it for as much Quinoa, salted venison and fish as you can carry,” she informed me.

I shook my head. “I am interested in trading for those amounts of those items, but that is not a fair trade. You may pick one of the pouches I have collected for the Quinoa, venison and fish. Because I am feeling generous and I do not wish to keep them, I will throw in the salamanders. Otherwise, each pouch counts separately.”

“Eight items,” she bartered.

“Four.”

We settled on giving her a small pouch filled with a combination of our bounty, but only if she was allowed to mix and match. I had been sorting them all by species, and she quickly filled one of my empty pouches with her selections, which gave me insights into which of the local spiritual herbs were most valuable. I had the feeling that she took some measure to cheat me and disguise some of the true values of the items I had gathered, but I was confident I saw through her. She also took the salamanders, which surprised me not at all.

Satisfied with the exchange, she began barking orders in the native language, and the other villagers began pulling out barrels and sack bags. Once Brother Ro and I were once again laden down as thoroughly as we could manage, we set off towards the gate, vowing to make an offering to the shrine on our way out to make up for our failure to do so on the way in.

When we reached it, I tossed in one of the ‘worthless’ silver coins I had been carrying, then we followed the path the rest of the way to the road.

The road was twelve feet wide, and it was well built. Impressive, actually, considering what I had thought I’d known about the state of the lands to the south. It was centuries old, but the massive paving stones would have taken dozens of men to quarry, transport, and place. And that was excluding all of the effort that had been put into cutting a path through the rain forest.

The villagers had promised us that the road led south all the way to the mountains, and that if we followed it long enough it would raise us above the clouds, to the snow-capped peaks of the Re’tath mountains. With the goal set in mind, we headed out at the pace of two young cultivators, barely feeling our burdens as we sprinted over the ancient road.

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