How does one fight above one’s realm?
A simple question, with too many different answers to name. But of course, not every answer held equal truth. As one’s realm was elevated, so too was their entire being; the strength of their muscles and tendons, the resiliency of each tissue from sturdy bone to jelly-like brain matter, the functioning of the organs in their various tasks. One became not only faster and stronger, but more dexterous and quicker of thought. The spiritual sense grew, imagination and willpower increased, and injuries healed more quickly.
How could a man fight another, when the latter was twice as strong across the board, let alone twice again, and again, until a young Elder stood a thousand times stronger than any mortal?
Again, too many answers to name. Poison, attacking from stealth, threatening a loved one… A numbers advantage, use of a higher realm treasure, temporary power via alchemy… Formations, spells of all sorts, even just simply cultivating until one’s realm matched their opponent…
But all of those answers were incomplete, failed to answer the question in its entirety. No, there was only a single answer that could satisfy, one simple truth: to kill a stronger man, one needed to attack their weakest point.
Tai Sho is a man of cunning and manipulation. A classical heroic figure, skilled with spell and sword. What weak point could he possibly have? I cannot compete with him in spellcraft, in alchemy or formations or martial skill. I’m not deluded enough to think I can outsmart him, and there isn’t anyone I could possibly trust to fight him with me – not now, not ever again.
His pride wouldn’t allow him to let someone else share the credit anyway. So what? There had to be a solution. There had to be a seam in his armour, somewhere.
Bull, fifteen and nursing a shattered spirit, had sat down and pondered the question. He discarded many dozens of answers, both simple and complex, until he hit on something workable.
How does one defeat a man whose being is elevated above you? Simple: work until your baseline is fully double his.
Some might call it the answer of a muscle-headed beast, but it was the only thing that Bull had to hang on to. He was a poor spellcaster, had little patience for tactics, and the wrong personality for manipulation. His body was all he could rely on. The only point where he was stronger than his enemy.
And so, he trained.
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The deep forests of Ar’rai were a very different experience on ground level.
Icy Winter Blast! Gotoh’s Four Elements of Earth! Ack- Space Ripper!
Lu evaded the massive dark-brown blur as it smashed through the undergrowth, another round of spells building out in his mind as he held his breath. [Lan, are you free yet?]
The reply came staccato, as though the man’s thoughts were being interrupted several times a second. [Not quite, Sir Lu. It seems these bears hunt in family groups.]
Two of Lu’s scent illusions winked out in quick succession, and he flung himself up to the lowest hanging branches just as the spirit bear came around again. He hit it with a spear of stone, which bit deep into its back, but the monstrous creature didn’t seem to care all that much.
Stupid, stupid. Why did I insist on coming in at night? Moreover, why did I suggest splitting up, and why did my friends listen to my idiotic suggestion? I should have camped out ‘till morning when the predators thinned out, but it appears I don’t value my life very highly at all!
Dual streams of energy entered his muscles as he braced, and then he was flying through the air towards a massive trunk, the branch he had been resting on a moment before turned to splinters by a massive paw.
What is it, sixth realm? Greed for the core, worth several months of valuable cultivation time, warred with self preservation. A mortal brown bear was already massive; the creature turning its head to inerrantly follow his movements was more comparable to a furry Junk Dog the Immense than any terrestrial animal he had ever seen. It’s killable, theoretically. Not nearly as troublesome as a cultivator of the same realm. But can I bleed it out before it catches me?
A spray of Light Rays scoured the beast’s left eye and it bellowed, but that did little to change its trajectory as it hurled itself higher. Or before I run out of qi, for that matter. Lu was forced to dodge with another movement technique, valuable energy he would really prefer to use to cover more ground. I’m resentful of this thing’s ability to manoeuvre through the air. I know you live in a forest, but this is a bit much!
“Go, Lightning Palm!” [Are you even able to kill these things, senior brother? If you’re fighting more than one, perhaps we should withdraw.]
The words returned by Telepathic Bond were of a more natural cadence this time. [I think I can manage. But if you’re having trouble, then yes, we should go. There’s no reason to risk our lives for such petty gains.]
Lu’s lips thinned. Dancing Blade sent his crystalline sword out to hack at the monster, but even with its incredible sharpness it was like attacking a human with a sharpened pin – anything less than a targeted vital strike was basically pointless. [Any tips? My standard elemental spells are doing poorly, and I don’t want to use all my qi slinging around mental attacks.]
[Entropic Blades can drain their vitality just fine. I’m a bit surprised; I assumed you’d be doing better than me, with your mastery of illusions.]
Thanks for the advice, senior. Entropic Blades! The bear bellowed again, a sound that might have made him cover his ears if he hadn’t been in Stingy’s intermittent presence for the past two days. He ducked behind a tree, going even higher. [They’re too fast, and have some sort of esoteric sense I’m unable to fool.] As if to illustrate his point, another three of his scent decoys disappeared within the span of a second – then it was closing in on him again, his concealing illusions enough to divert its attentions only briefly. He struck the bear with another round of Light Rays as it rounded the trunk, its claws letting it climb almost as fast vertically as it could move on the ground. An ice spell attempted to send it tumbling back to earth, but the beast had too firm a grip. It leaped, and Lu prepared another Space Ripper before pausing,
I wanted to try this under more controlled conditions, but I suppose this is as good a time as any. His mouth opened, ki seeming to bubble up like frothy foam. A moment of tension, and then it exploded out. “You Can’t Fool Gravity!”
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Time seemed to pause as he felt ripples in space echo out, as though his voice were jostling reality by the shoulder, reminding it of some rule it had forgotten. Then the bear went down, faster than it’s massive muscles had been propelling it forwards, and struck the ground with a tremendous – and tremendously wet – sound.
Lu coughed, tasting something ephemeral on the back of his tongue. The bear attempted to stand, but it was a poor effort; Lu sent his sword down to saw through its spinal column and put it out of both their misery. [Ah, I managed to get mine with a gravity spell. Do you need backup?]
[I don’t believe so; Sir Bull has appeared and is- ah, and there it goes. That was the last one.]
The bear’s eyes continued to follow him as he descended to the ground, despite its severed spine. “Resilient thing, aren’t you?”
It did not reply, only continuing to stare with its beady black eyes until it’s organs finally shut down. Lu could feel the exact moment of its death as an expulsion of qi, the energy held in its tissues releasing all at once. He held its lifeless gaze for another moment, allowing the mild discomfort that witnessing its last moments brought pass through. This is the sort of thing people would have worshipped as a living God, back before cultivation. It is, truthfully, a majestic thing… And I’ll be using it as nothing more than a shortcut, a convenience to multiply my cultivation speed.
His thoughts melancholic, he stuffed the massive corpse into his purse – they could deconstruct it later, in a safer location. [What direction are you, Lan? Mine chased me a ways south.]
[I believe I’m west-by-southwest. I crossed a river at some point.]
Space folded, and a map appeared in Lu’s hand. It wasn’t the piece of parchment that Tai Sho had bought, but rather a copy Lan had made on better paper. River… Ah, there it is. [I should be there in a minute. Are the bodies intact?]
[For the most part. We should be able to get cores out of them, at least. Shall I send up a flare?]
Lu eyed the dense canopy above. Very faintly, he could hear the buzz of insect wings – which was significant, since the lowest bounds of the leafy coverage was still over ten metres above his head. [No, let’s not attract any more attention to ourselves. A family of high realm bears would logically keep a wide territory to themselves, but let’s not tempt fate.]
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The first night, they killed the five bears, which yielded two sixth realm cores and three fourth realm cores, as well as a truly staggering amount of meat and organs. Stingy and Tai Sho collected a large number of first realm cores from a wing of bats that had accosted them, while Cobo and Jiendao returned to camp covered in dirt, dragging the body of a single fourth realm vole.
The remaining four found only a handful of prey, which bolstered their number of first realm cores up to the three digit mark, and some common spirit herbs; a good result, but not the best.
The best pickings will be even further north, Lu thought as he did his best to cleanly separate a deer’s skin from the underlying muscle. We’ll have to stay well clear of the breach site, of course, but that still leaves an entire forest to trounce about in.
The mood in the camp was fairly high-spirited. The Salt folk were glad to be somewhere with natural cover, and Bull’s unnatural exuberance hadn’t diminished overnight. Lan seemed to be less stressed than he had been on the trip over, and Jiendao was pleased for the opportunity to test her growing consumption while also gathering resources.
As for Lu himself, he felt… Pleased, I think. Yes, I’m pleased at the progress we’ve made so far. While the killing and butchering bits were unpleasant, it was more than worth it for the result. Other than Cobo taking a bite wound, we haven’t run into any trouble. Had to spend a few spirit stones to recover from the bears, but that’s nothing to worry about. Everything is going well, as long as I discount…
Lu shut the thought down before it could effect his mood. No, it was better to just let nature take its course where those two were concerned. The point where I could change anything is long past, and I’m not certain I even want to.
Lu abandoned his attempts to skin the deer the old-fashioned way and let Dancing Blade take over. A minute later the task was done, and he got down to the slightly bloodier business of preparing its organs to be used in alchemy.
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The next two days were less eventful than the first had been. They would hunt, taking the lowest-hanging fruit available – which tended to be the curious pair of small herbivores and apex predators – before moving on. Occasionally there would be minor injuries, but the greatest setback they encountered was a towering buck, each of its horns branching to nine points to match its realm. They carefully snuck past that one; not even Bull wanted to tangle with something a full three realm above him, regardless of how valuable its body would be.
But on the fourth day, they encountered something more controversial.
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“It’s a rabbit, Lan.” Lu tried to keep any petulance out of his voice, but it was a struggle. “Even at eighth realm it’s barely larger than a pig. I refuse to believe we can’t kill it.”
The man adjusted his spectacles. His expression was a mix of embarrassed and stern, as if he knew his position sounded silly but couldn’t think of a better way to word what he knew in his heart. “I’m not saying we can’t, Lu. Obviously we’ve faced animals with greater strength already. But think about it:” He widened his hands, palms up, beseeching. “Have you ever seen just a single rabbit in an area?”
“I think we should go for it,” said Jiendao. “You’re thinking of it like a field rabbit, the kind that live communally. Forest rabbits are more solitary, they aren’t herding animals or pack hunters. There shouldn’t be more than a half-dozen of them in the area.” She crossed her arms. “Even if there’s a higher realm doe around, it’ll probably be skittish.”
Lan frowned, remaining silent, as Stingy voiced her own opinion.
“It doesn’t look very threatening. Is it really that strong?”
Bull wobbled his hand in a so-so gesture. “In terms of physical ability, I’d say either me or you alone could take it. Or any two of the others.” The rabbit, oblivious to their presence, continued to browse on the edge of the clearing. It was a squat thing, its brown fur both rough and fluffy, with much shorter ears than Lu was used to seeing. “But it probably won’t fight. It’ll spot us, and either bolt or call out to alert its siblings – and high realm pests do tend to stick together more than mortal ones.” The last bit had been directed at Jiendao, who shrugged with a flat look.
“So send me and Lu and the other guy,” Cobo replied. “We have plenty of people who can do stealth. I don’t see the problem.”
They argued quietly for another minute, but in the end Cobo’s suggestion won out. Lu, Tai Sho, and Cobo crept forward under a truly excessive number of illusions, including some horrid oily-feeling thing that Cobo called Chaotic Second Skin. Ugh, it feels like egg whites being drizzled down my body. I won’t be able to stomach this for long.
The rabbit, unlike the bear from days ago, seemed to lack any illusion-penetrating senses – or, more likely, it was Tai Sho’s higher realm arts pulling their weight. Lu prepared a Spacial Freeze, Cobo placed his wrists and fingertips together to form a ring, and as they got within ten paces of the creature he aimed his technique through the ring and let loose.
The technique left his oily aura only to be enveloped by an even stronger one between Cobo’s palms, and as it sailed outwards it disappeared from Lu’s control – a disturbing sensation not unlike having a limb go numb.
Within the next second, a number of things happened. First, the spell struck true; the rabbit froze as space was rendered solid, its body subtly vibrating as it strained against the hold. Then Tai Sho went in, his sword sliding forward with almost liquid smoothness. His cover slid off as he pierced the Freeze, a shiver going down Lu’s back at the apparent ease his technique was overcome, skewering the oversized rodent directly through the eye and killing it instantly.
But before Lu could relax a small darting shape erupted from the bushes less than a metre away, grabbing the dead rabbit with one stick-thin limb and reversing in an attempt to disappear back into the underbrush.
Wait, is that- Spacial Freeze! Spacial Freeze!
The envelope of chaos burst as he exceeded its capacity, and the sharpie screeched as it suddenly had a second pursuer to worry about. It ducked one Freeze, then took the second right to the face – its jaws closed with a snap, the technique disappearing down its throat. “Damnit!” Disorienting Vision!
The wide-area illusion fared better, and the ungainly thing failed to dodge Cobo as he reached in and grabbed it around the neck. It struggled, but either Cobo had done this before or he was lucky; he was holding it in such a way as to leave its snapping teeth harmless, the dagger-like things catching only air.
Ah, perhaps it’s some sort of instinct, like a mother cat picking up her kittens by the nape of their neck. “Good show, Cobo!” But what is… Oh, damn it. Damn it!
This is going to cut short my hunting trip, isn’t it?