Chapter 23

“Back again, Red Rooster? I’ve told you before, the price on those pills you’re after just keeps going up, not down,” Master Poh said when the young man darkened the doorway of the contribution shop.

“I know. Thank you so much for suggesting that I speak with Master Argoth, Poh. He has seen to it that I will not want for cultivation aids for the near future, so I am here to see about manuals or other items that will help me,” Hoten said humbly. Poh wasn’t exactly a friend, but he had given good advice. People who gave good advice deserved to be treated with respect, and treating people with respect was the surest way to ensure that you got good advice.

If Hoten had been more respectful towards Tren Shen …

He sighed. He had only been seventeen when he’d been cursed by the Shen family. It wasn’t a bad curse, as far as things went. Just a bit embarrassing. His hands were literally red, but he had lied to the sect about the reason for it, calling it a birthmark. Nobody knew about the other aspect of the curse.

Nobody in the sect, at least. He was very careful about where he bathed and which facilities he used to answer the call of nature so that nobody would see him. He was known to be unnaturally shy, but that wasn’t such a bad thing, really.

Unfortunately it also meant that he’d been forced to avoid girls. He’d figure out something to remedy the curse eventually, he just needed to reach a certain level of power and then he could demand—no, humbly request that the Shens reverse it. Humility was the key to many things, he had learned. If he were humble, then surely the Shens would see that he was not the impudent boy who had tried to rob them and reverse the curse.

He sighed, pulling himself out of the daydream and picking up one of the scrolls detailing the manuals that were for sale. There were several insight scrolls listed, but not the insights they contained. You had to purchase them based on who wrote them, uncertain what it was you were buying until you’d paid the price. These gacha scrolls were surprisingly popular among Hoten’s contemporaries, with various factions competing to secure the most insightful scrolls from the most illustrious sages on the mountains.

Unfortunately, Hoten was still riding the initial wealth that he’d made when he’d first arrived on the mountain last year. He’d traded a bunch of low-level spiritual stones—ones which retained a sense of spirituality and could absorb a significant amount of Qi, but which did not possess a spirit themselves—for contribution points. He still had thirty two points from that transaction.

Enough for two gacha purchases, or one of the training manuals, or…

He frowned as he heard a familiar voice coming in from outside the shop. His eyes opened wide, and he hid in a closet where the brooms and mops were kept.

“I don’t know, maybe he was just being friendly? I mean, you’re right, Elder Yotu did seem a little weird, but I don’t think that he’d have given us four hundred contribution points between the four of us if there was a problem,” Tan Shen said, and the door opened.

“We don’t know if four hundred is a little or a lot,” Pao pointed out. “He could have just been giving us a handful of candies to distract us like little kids.”

“He offered us his own home while the elders convened,” Ko pointed out. “I think that he respects us. Or our masters, at least.”

“But we didn’t tell them who Tan’s parents were,” Won pointed out.

“Hoten had a token to recommend him to the sect,” Ko reminded the group. “Who knows what it was that Master Tren said, but it was probably something convincing. So when we show up from the same village, it only makes sense that they’d treat us with the respect they’d treat our masters.”

“Oh, yeah, that makes sense,” Won agreed. “Well, let’s see what this place has.”

They were met at the door by Master Poh, who had a stern look on his face. “I’m very sorry, young sirs and ma’am, but this establishment is for—”

“Elder Yotu said to give you this,” Tan said, pulling an envelope from his spatial ring. An act which caused Master Poh to do a double take; the sheer display of wealth that casual action entailed!

“Of course, Young Master,” Poh said, taking the envelope and quickly ripping it apart for its contents. It simply said to treat the children as honored guests of the sect and award them one hundred points each. Poh blanched at the amount—four hundred points was more than most young cultivators earned in two years—but it was Yotu’s neck on the line for this decision, not his.

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“Very well. Would you like to browse, or are you interested in recommendation?” Poh asked.

“What’s good here?” Won asked nonchalantly. “If you had four hundred points to spend, what would you get?”

“Ah, well, if I had four hundred points to spend I’d use it for personal training with one of the elders who is further along my path than I,” Poh admitted. “There are a few trinkets in this store which would benefit me, but for the most part I have either grown beyond the needs of what is available here, or have purchased such a resource long ago and do not require another, such as the prayer mats which I recommend every young cultivator to get when they arrive.”

“Oh? Show us one,” Ko said.

Master Poh complied, bringing them into the side of the store where the mats were rolled up around a block of cedar to keep the moths away. They unrolled one of the mats and the children examined it critically.

“How much is it?” Ko asked.

“Thirty contribution points. It’s expensive, and it often takes a young cultivator months to save up for one, but the cost is worth it. There’s one for each element, this is a water prayer mat, but there’s one for air, earth, and fire as well,” Poh explained. “They are said to increase the purity and rate of Qi absorption by—”

“The mats that Lady Wensho handed out to us when Lord Tren gave us our spirit stones were better than this,” Won said, poking at the mat. “Weren’t they?”

“Yeah,” Ko agreed. She ran a bit of Qi through the gathering focus, powering it for a second, then shook her head. “I mean, it’s better than nothing. But honestly the mats that Tan has in his ring are a hundred times better than this.”

Poh gaped at the casual dismissal of the mat’s quality. He realized he was gaping and shut his mouth, then tried to think of words of what to say. “Well, it is true that the mats are a rather short-term investment compared to a permanent gathering formation, which is what the elders tend to set up in and around their estate for their chosen elements. These mats are for new cultivators, young ones who are still in the initiate’s realm.”

“We are in the initiate’s realm. Except for Tan,” Pao said. “Can I see the one for Earth?”

Poh unrolled the requested mat, and Pao likewise ran a bit of Qi through it.

“Nope. It’s crap,” the boy declared. “What else you got?”

Poh hesitated, glancing at the children’s weapons, then sighed. “The other primary purchase that our young members usually make from our store is a suitable weapon for when they venture into the wild seeking resources, experience, and adventure. However, I can see at a glance that your weapons are superior to anything we have available for points. As such, I would recommend some of our low-quality spiritual stones, or our spiritual insight scrolls, or our technique library.”

“Let’s still look at the weapons,” Tan suggested.

“Your dad just gave you that sword and you’re already looking to replace it?” Won asked him.

“No,” Tan said quickly. “Don’t talk like that, you’ll give it ideas! I just wanted to see what other—never mind it doesn’t matter. It’s sulky now that you said that. Okay, fine. Let’s look at some of the insight things.”

“You should understand that we operate our insight scrolls on a gacha system,” Master Poh said nervously. “You must buy them before reading their contents. They’re very cheap, however, only six points each.”

“Okay, fine. We’ll take four. One each, right guys?”

The other children agreed with him, and Poh retreated to the back, pulling four scrolls out of the case where they were stored. He returned and handed them to the children, who broke the seals and read the contents.

“Mine says ‘To be wise, one must first know that they are not. Or just read a lot of books,’” Pao said.

“Mine says ‘Actions speak louder than words, but you cannot spell an action.’” Ko said.

“Success is failure in reverse,” Tan said.

“A stone may seem unmovable, but water shapes a mountain over time,” Won said.

The children exchanged looks.

“That’s it?” Tan asked.

“It was only six points each,” Ko said. “I mean, what were we expecting?”

“Yeah, okay, that’s fair,” Tan admitted. He turned to Master Poh. “What else have you got?”

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