The pre-amble to the actual discussion went swiftly, as most of those assembled were of a… laconic persuasion. After Lu introduced himself – an appropriately brief few sentences, since he had been the one to call the group together – Lan and Jiendao did the same. Bull revealed only his nickname and that he was a martial artist, while Orou On gave one of the longer ones, as he was a relative stranger.
“Hello. I am Orou On, core disciple of the Steadfast Heart.” The man spoke in a casual manner, completely at odds with both the strict posture to which he held his body, and the severity of his expression; while his voice was warm, not a single speck of it showed on his face. Ah, a classic core disciple. “I know some of you casually, but for the rest, I am a martial artist of the eighth realm. I led the original breaching team into Salt, and was also trapped there with White Knuckle when the Big Sit went awry.” He reached up to brush hair back from his ears – it must have been a nervous tic, because his tight bun hadn’t a single strand running loose. “I spoke with the Metal Tooth and Moving Waters clansmen some, so I hope to be of use. I’m sure we’ll get along.”
Stingy’s introduction was rambling but light on actual information, while Cobo said even fewer words than Bull. Then Bo stood up, his head threatening to dent the ceiling.
“I’m Bo, and this is my son Throw.” The little gremlin didn’t seem particularly aware that it was being introduced, as it simply continued to look around with bird-like jerking movements. It was continually chewing on something dark; Lu would have assumed some sort of flavoured resin, especially as Year’s End was approaching and sales of such things were ramping up, but the occasional crack as the sharpie bit through something hard put the mundane explanation out of reach.
“I’m a warrior from Moving Waters, and I’m here ‘cause I’m Lu’s friend. Thanks for doing this whole thing by the way; the Clanboss was really getting something in his ear trying to figure it out himself.”
Lu’s head rose. “Oh, Still Water was attempting this as well?” I suppose it was a safe assumption to make, but why not..? Well, they are a bit more insular than most humans, so asking for help must not have occurred to them. “Did he see any progress?”
“Nope.” Bo shook his head, the action causing his son to look up. It would have been a cute scene, if the child were slightly less hideous. “Even the sharpies born here can’t use this qi stuff much at all. ‘S just too thin, nothing to grab onto; every time I try, ’s like trying to hold a clump of air while the wind’s blowin’.”
Lu chewed on that for a moment. “I’m sure we’ll make some headway – we have a good number of heads accumulated in this room, after all. On that note, Lady Winter Blossom, if you would round us out?”
The woman sat straighter. With her voluminous robes and uncertain demeanour, she reminded Lu of an assistant librarian; only the slight tang of concoction fumes lingering like an aura around her shoulders broke that illusion, revealing her true profession. “Yes, of course.” The angle between her and Lu meant that her eyes were obscured by the glare coming through his window, but from the way her brows moved he could tell they were narrowed in thought. Ah, fourth realm eyes are on an entirely different level. What level of visual acuity will I be able to reach in fifth realm? Or, dare I think it, sixth?
“Greetings, brothers and sisters. Please call me Winter Blossom; I am a physician by trade, as well as an alchemist and herbalist. I helped to devise the Sixth Reality Purifying Pills, and my understanding of Salt’s qi is, I think, somewhat more advanced than the average.” She bowed, somewhat deeper than Lu would have in her place. “I’m honoured to be part of this endeavour, and promise to work hard.”
Lu clapped politely as she straightened up. “Very good, we’re quite happy to have you. So,” he looked over the room again, “I think I should start with all the things I tried which didn’t work, and hopefully we can move on from there.”
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The room was stifling, in a way that the cramped village hadn't been. Despite not being packed together much at all, Cobo almost felt like the humans were pressing in on him from all sides – which was probably just his Comprehension trying to tell him he was outmatched, but it was annoying, whatever it was.
“I know I have a bias, but I really do think the problem is physical, rather than spiritual,” That was the new woman, Winter Blossom. She looked vaguely familiar, but Cobo wasn’t trusting his own recollection where humans were concerned; she probably just had the same face-shape as one of the doctors who had forced him to stay in bed while he was delirious.
“I’m not certain there’s enough of a difference to matter, senior sister,” Lu replied. Or should that be 'father replied,' his brain whispered. Seeing Bo with his kid was bringing up old memories and plans he had put behind him; it was hard to square the Lu who had tricked him and gotten him made Lonesome with the one who had taught him his techniques freely, who was still teaching him freely. Should I believe it, this time? Or are these feelings just me getting tricked again?
The woman frowned. There was a certain similarity between her and Jiendao’s man, the guy with the high collars sitting to his right. They both liked to tuck their long thin human necks in, like a snail pulling into its shell. “I don’t think that’s true in this case, Sir Lu. We know that… ki and qi can intermingle to some extent within the body, you yourself prove that. But physically, it still needs to be held separate.” Though unlike the man, she didn’t push her glasses up every twenty seconds – and they were actual glasses, rather than pointless empty frames. She’s strong. Stronger than Bull, but not as strong as the other guy. “We need to make a container to hold qi inside their bodies, so that it doesn’t immediately get snuffed out. Trying to have them manipulate qi before building their dantians is doing things backwards.”
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The other new human, who was both the strongest person in the room by far, and only slightly less muscular than Bull, broke into the back-and-forth. “I think that sister Blossom is moving in the right direction.” It was a bit of a shock to hear his voice; the new Junk around his neck was putting emotions into the translated words in a way the last ones hadn’t… and Cobo was pretty sure it was malfunctioning. How else could someone have such a warm tone with such a cold face? “Sorry, junior brother, but I think your experiments the other day showed that there’s a pretty serious gap between their ability to use qi and our ability to use Salt energy. We should be treating them more like spirit beasts – no offence intended.” He nodded towards their group of warriors, the four of them clustered together.
Cobo grunted. “Whatever. Okay, so we can’t use the energy here much at all, because it’s too light and floaty and doesn’t stick to anything. That just brings us back to making a second stomach, which you threw out an hour ago.”
Lan pushed his glasses up. “We didn’t discard it entirely, Sir Cobo. We put it to the side because we have no idea how to do that; even raising sharpies on an exclusively qi-based diet failed to produce results.”
That set off another round of quiet arguing, and Cobo started to tune out. As the buzz of voices dissolved into radio static in the back of his head, his thoughts spread out into a mess of different streams. A minute passed, before a light nudge on his shoulder brought him back in. “Hm?”
Stingy lowered her head, and for once actually managed something worth being called a whisper. “Hey Cobo. We’re not really doing much here, are we?”
He grunted. No, we aren’t. Which was frustrating; even Bo had something to contribute, and he may as well have water sloshing around where his brains should be. Come on, there should be something here for me to do… Lu had gotten stronger again, while he was stuck pushing through mud with no energy to consume. Not just for those guys, but me too. I can only hone my techniques so hard; eventually I’ll need to get more power, or I’ll be left behind.
Like the man had been reading his thoughts, Lu’s voice broke through the background murmur. “Cobo, what do you think? Ki isn’t entirely different from qi, surely?”
His teeth ground together. Fucking stupid shit, why ask me? The frustration coalesced, and he spat out the first thing that entered his head.
“It’s kind of like waste energy, right? Everything mixed together, chaotic and unstable.” Lu’s chin raised in interest, so he kept talking. “Can’t do much of anything with it, without separating it back into the bits.” Unless you’re me. “Maybe that’s what needs to happen? Give it a consistency first, before trying to shove it into your guys.” He shut his mouth. Actually, that sounded pretty good.
Lu put a finger to his lips, his eyes turning down. “Like waste energy..? I dislike the comparison, but…”
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The sit ran for long enough that Lu had to bring out food twice. It appeared from the little purple bag still hot, like it had been prepared right then and there, and Cobo felt a twitch of envy looking at the top-tier piece of Junk.
Beats out my pistol easily. The gun was strong, yeah, but the reload rate was abysmal, and the humans were all pretty good about tanking at least one hit before their forcefields broke.
But for as long as it went, as the time stretched late into the night, the core trio of Lu and Lan and Winter Blossom seemed satisfied. They got a roll of paper out and were taking turns adding shit to a complicated diagram, a sort of lumpy heart-shaped drawing of a thing that Cobo supposed could pass for a spiritual stomach if you looked at it from the right angle.
All at once his teacher seemed to realise the time, because he jolted and looked around with surprise on his face. “Ah, yes. Good work everyone, I think it would be best to give it… a week? No, let’s say three days, for now, to give me time to test some of these ideas. I’m overwhelmed by the level of success we’ve already reached; I’m sure we’ll have clansmen cultivating in no time.” He looked down at the scroll. “In no time at all. So, I hope you’ll all be able to attend again, Heaven willing?”
The various sounds of ascent blended together, and Lu smiled. “Magnificent! I’ll look forward to it. Feel free to take some food on the way out, if you wish.”
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After everyone else departed, Lu was left alone with Bull. The man hadn’t contributed much to the discussion, but Lu hadn’t been expecting him to. I’m surprised how much progress was made. Leaning on the sect really was the correct decision! And it only cost me a few cores; well worth the expense.
Bull was lounging around on a cushion, lazily consuming grapes – his own, since Lu hadn’t included that particular fruit in his meal plan. He swallowed, and wiped his lips with the back of his hand before speaking. “Not leaving a whole lot of time for yourself, are you?”
Lu paused. His brush hovered over the scroll, ready to add a bit of annotation they had missed in the frenzy of ideas. Elementally-aligned energy. Why did it take Cobo's urging for me to think about it? I'm certain I've made the comparison in my head at least once before… “It isn’t as though I’m putting more than a few hours a day into this. And with the cores, most of my time will be spent reinforcing my mind anyway.” He gave a weak smile. “Don’t worry, Bull. You know me, I’m not going to take on more work than I can handle.”
Bull replied to his friend’s smile with a strange look, but after a moment he scoffed and put another few grapes in his mouth. “If you had said that the spring before last, I’d have agreed with you. Now, I’m not so sure.” He wiped his mouth again, staining his hand with wine-coloured juice. “I’m afraid I’m going to walk in here one day and see an actual committed, hardworking cultivator. How terrifying would that be?”