The moon was high in the sky, with millions of little points of light surrounding it. Grandpa Xu gazed up at the stars, chewing on a long piece of straw. The river of stars in the sky, that strange smattering of light brighter than the rest… Was it yet another reflection of The Way? The next part of the Universal River, the cosmic aspect of Ki beyond the firmament? Such questions frequently troubled Xu’s thoughts. His theories would have to wait, though, as someone was walking up towards his hut.

He-Yue Village was small, all things considered. The population of the whole area perhaps numbered about 300 souls, protected from dangers by various wooden barricades and night-watchmen. Large communal huts watched too, over their plots of precious farmland, all fed from the Ao river that ran down from the southern mountains in the distance. Because of their relative lack of resources, it was a sign of great appreciation that “Grandpa” Xu had a small circular building just for himself, placed in a quiet corner next to a pond he particularly liked to fish in.

“Grandpa, I've come back.” said the man, bowing low. He was one of the village’s hunters, still holding his spear. The upper half, Xu noticed, had been recently wetted down and cleaned, likely just before the hunter had come to see him.

“Catch anything good?” Xu replied, smiling slightly. The hunter nodded enthusiastically in reply.

“We got a large deer, and some pheasants. A better search than we expected. But… no sign of what you told us about. I’m deeply sorry, Master.” The hunter bowed low once again.

Xu scratched his beard, waving his hand at the polite hunter to dismiss his bow.

“Ah… A good haul, even so. It can’t be helped. Even with someone from the Capital Region, we’d have a tough time catching such a creature.”

“Is it… really true? A Ki-beast in our forest?” The hunter asked, voice nearly a whisper.

Xu chewed on his straw, sighing. “I felt the ripple in The Way when it was born. I still cannot discern exactly what form it might have taken, or what its intentions could be. But my senses do not lie. There is a Ki-beast, however small, somewhere in that forest.”

The hunter’s eyes gleamed, excited at the idea. “Oh, and if we could capture such a thing… Think of how much the caravan would pay for a live one!”

Xu slowly reached over, before suddenly smacking the hunter over the head with his trusty bamboo broom.

“Ow!”

“Little fool!” Xu exclaimed, although he chuckled right after, no sense of real malice in his voice. “You’d dump the water in the pot before the tea is brewed? Never let your greed get the best of you, young one.”

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The hunter immediately sank down, performing a full and proper kowtow.

“I’m so sorry, Master! I let my greed guide my path too much.”

“Get up, you’ll smudge your face.” Xu replied, patting the hunter on the shoulder. He knew it was what was expected, but still wasn’t a fan of all the theatrics the young ones performed to him. While they were polite gestures, they also constantly reminded Xu of his advanced age.

“Still…” Xu said, leaning back against the wall of his hut. “A Ki-beast is a strange portent. They can provide much more than money, or cause immense ruin in equal measure. We must be vigilant, now more than ever…”

Meanwhile, a tiny white light glimmered in the black darkness of the nighttime forest. Tong furiously weaved through the branches, as five horrific, chittering creatures flapped towards their newest potential meal. Bats! Each one dark-brown, with fierce and hungry eyes even though they couldn’t see very well. All of the bats frequently let out a chirp, an unsettling cacophony they were emitting to try and get a better bead on Tong’s exact location.

“Blasted things! Get away! Shoo!” Tong yelled inside its own mind, its insectoid body unable to emit anything other than an angry buzzing. The bats, naturally, were not particularly threatened by this mighty display of rage.

Tong might have been little more than an insect, but it did have exceptional speed and spatial awareness. Whipping through leaves, branches, and trees, two of the bats sharply smacked into errant foliage, giving up the chase. The other three dodged haphazardly, with Tong unable to shake them off.

“What do I do?!” Tong cried, buzzing loudly. “I’ve only lived a day, and twice I’ve nearly ended up as someone’s meal!”

Finally, there was a chance at safety. Tong’s antenna twitched, and it noticed a small crack in the bark of one of the trees. Too big for a bat, but perhaps the right size for a moth. The fledgling Ki-beast swerved sharply, making a final, desperate dive towards the shelter. Right as Tong’s small body hit the crack, it felt a sharp burst of incredible pain. The bat chittered in glee, with a beautiful silver wing caught in its tiny maw. Tong felt itself tumbling into the darkness of the tree, and then everything was black.

Breathing. A long, slow, series of breaths. Simultaneously the gentle sigh of a newborn, and the mighty shout of a raging storm. Tong was not awake, but not asleep. Something else had happened, a vital transformation within the mind of the young Ki-beast. While everything around Tong was pitch, dark black, that didn’t mean that Tong couldn’t see. For the first time, Tong could truly see The Way. It wasn’t “seeing” so much as “sensing”, and oh, what a gorgeous vista of sense it was. Both solid like ice in winter, and raging like the rapids, there was something akin to a river. A river both impossibly thin and infinitely wide, as shallow as a drop and even deeper than the deepest of oceans. Lesser minds have shattered from first witnessing The Way, but being created from the very Ki that The Way emitted, Tong was more easily equipped to handle the experience than most. Tong was The Way. The Way was Tong. It was as easy and hard to understand as that.

While in this dreaming-seeing state, Tong felt the wound of the stolen wing. “That won’t do.” it thought. “I need to fly. It’s the only thing I’m good at right now.” One of Tong’s limbs felt around, touching against the wood of the tree. The tree breathed. Tong breathed. The Way breathed. Tong glowed with its silver light, and when Tong exhaled, some of that light released. A thick cocoon of silver strands formed around Tong. And, nestled within this cocoon of Ki, Tong's physical body faded, and the Ki-beast temporarily became one with The Way.

Next Time: Xu discovers an unsettling truth, and Tong realizes more about the power of The Way...