The next six days passed with excruciating slowness for Benton. Creak, creak, creak went the wheels. Followed by another creak, creak, creak. And another creak, creak, creak. Endless, endless creaks.
He missed cars and buses and trains and planes and literally any mode of transportation that moved faster than a oxen-driven wagon on a rutted dirt path, especially ones that didn't creak.
The only possible thing worse than how slowly it took to get from place to place when moving at mortal speeds was the negligible amount of entertainment offerings. One would have thought that cultivators, some thousands of years old, would have created some form of mobile television or something with qi, but they didn’t even really read novels. Cultivation took up all their time.
Ugh!
Worse, in those six days, he’d only gained two measly Sect Points, those from Xun Wu’s wife and son reaching the second minor realm, bringing Benton to thirty-nine. He needed more recruits.
Luckily, they’d be at Vermillion Incomparable Rain Town in four more days, and hopefully, he’d find new disciples there.
Thinking about that eventuality, however, made Benton realize some of the problems with such recruitment. For example, the town had a bad reputation for lawlessness, and there might be rogue cultivators in the town left over from when the Righteous Rain Sect ran things. He wanted to get his disciples in and out of there as quickly as possible to avoid danger.
Recruitment, on the other hand, took time. You couldn’t just snatch people and drag them into your wagon as you passed.
Well, he could. If there weren’t any powerful cultivators around, no one could stop him. Still, he wasn’t quite that desperate for recruits yet.
No, he’d need to find an orphanage and make an offer somehow without sounding like a creep. And he felt bad about using kids young enough to still be in an orphanage for martial pursuits, so it would be nice if he could grab a street gang or two as well. Most of the young people engaged in those types of activities had been driven to it by hunger and desperation. He doubted they were beyond redemption.
He also needed to think about what his sect needed to run efficiently. For example, there would surely be a cafeteria at some point, so he’d need a cook, or more likely cooks, for that work. Maybe that was a day two issue, however. With thirty-six people, tasks like cooking could be delegated as a rotating duty instead of requiring a dedicated person.
Still, Benton couldn’t put off filling all positions on that basis. The fewer openings he started with, the easier it would be to focus on what he needed next. He resolved to keep his eyes open for opportunities to put people in needed roles.
With his desire to spend time in the town firming, the beginnings of a plan stirred in his mind, one that would coincidentally get him off that stupid, creaking wagon.
As far as he could determine, the caravan traveled about twenty miles a day, and they’d left the little village where they’d found Xun Wu ten days ago, so about two hundred miles. The first part of Benton’s plan required him to make double darn sure that no cultivators were following them, and he figured going about halfway back to that village would be about far enough.
On Earth, the fastest man alive ran a bit under thirty miles per hour, but that speed was maintained only for relatively short sprints. Benton figured he could do much better, probably around fifty miles per hour and keep up that pace for most of a day. So, two hours there, two hours back.
A short while later, Yang Xiu and Zou Tian returned to the wagons from training in the woods, and Benton called them over to him. “I’m going to run back a ways to make sure we’re not being tailed. Should take me about four hours. You two stick close to the wagons and, when Yang Ru gets back from his hunt, have him do the same.”
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“Yes, Master.” Hey, their answers were getting more in sync.
With that, Benton took off, smoothly accelerating away from the caravan and reaching speeds that would have required a car back on Earth. It was the first time he’d truly stretched his legs and let loose since reaching Foundation Establishment. It was liberating. It was fun.
It also didn’t take much of his attention. His mind had advanced just as his body had, and processing all the inputs from his enhanced velocity felt completely natural. His feet found sure purchase with every step despite the ruts dotting the path.
That ease allowed him to concentrate almost fully on his spiritual sense, and it picked up nothing. Not a cultivator. Not a spiritual beast. Nada. Nil. Bupkis.
If the sects had sent anyone else after them, either they could somehow hide from his spiritual sense in a way no one and nothing else had been able to or whoever they sent were mortals. His disciples could handle mortals.
When he’d reached a pond he remembered seeing on the fifth day after leaving the village, he turned back toward the caravan. As little of consequence happened on his return to the wagons as had happened on the way to the pond.
That evening, he again called his council into the woods.
“I have two conflicting desires,” Benton said. “First, I want to get the entire caravan through Vermillion Incomparable Rain Town as fast as possible. I want to avoid any trouble with gangs or cultivators or anyone else, and the best way to minimize trouble is to minimize our time spent there.
“Second, I have business I need to attend to there. The sect needs more recruits from outside the Prosperous Gray Forest Village, and a deteriorating, lawless town sounds like a great place to pick up some new people. The sect also needs building materials. Obviously, we have the Orange Vigor Spirit Wood, and there’s plenty of rock and timber near the village that we can collect. I was wondering, though, if anything is left of the Righteous Rain Sect. I know the place has probably been deserted for twenty years, but if I can scavenge or purchase cultivator-ranked materials there, that would give our sect a great start. And honestly, I’d like to find out more about what actually happened to the sect to find out if it’s something we need to be concerned about.
“Obviously,” Benton continued, “there’s a simple solution—I run ahead of the wagon train.”
“Master should go ahead and leave us,” Zou Tian said.
“I agree,” Yang Xiu said.
“What if you’re attacked while I’m away? I’m putting you in danger.” Benton met Xun Wu’s eyes. “I’m putting your kids in danger.”
The man scoffed. “What danger? The most alarming thing I’ve seen is that bear Yang Ru killed, and it was dead before it got within a mile of us. We’ll be fine.”
“Master,” Ye Zan said. “We’ll reach the town in less than three days of travel. Between my guards and Senior Brother and Sister, I can’t imagine anything that could challenge us.”
Once again, Benton felt that he had the best disciples. They were completely right. He was being too much of a worrywart. The twins were in the seventh minor realm and had more qi available than most cultivators at the peak and were highly trained with their weapons to boot. As long as a Foundation Establishment cultivator didn’t show up, Benton felt good about their chances against any foe.
And if any calamity that couldn’t be solved by killing occurred, they had Ye Zan, who was a competent mercenary leader with more than a little real-world experience, and Xun Wu, who was an actual adult who had raised children. They’d be fine.
They also had plenty of provisions, including hard tack to eat for lunch, and water to drink. To the best of Benton’s ability, he’d tried to detect any cultivators anywhere nearby and hadn’t. Not only that, but he’d turn back if he detected any between the caravan and the town, a distance he could traverse in less than an hour and a half.
He couldn’t reasonably think of a likely threat to the group.
His lack of imagination didn’t mean he felt good about it. If only they all had cell phones, he’d feel as at ease with the situation as the first time he and Evelyn had left their oldest home alone when going on a date night. Meaning not at all.
“How about this?” Benton said. “I’ll run to the town in the morning and run back to spend the evenings and nights with the caravan.”
“If that’s what you want to do, Master, but I don’t think it’s necessary.” Yang Xiu was actually looking a bit upset.
Benton understood her pique. He’d raised teenagers. They felt themselves ready for anything the world could throw at them and didn’t react kindly to being protected from it. Parents had to walk a fine line between letting them spread their wings and keeping them safe.
Those kinds of decisions were the hardest to make.
“Okay,” Benton said. “You’ve convinced me. I’ll leave right after breakfast in the morning. See you in a few days.”