After we chased the last two cultivator dudes out of town, the townspeople stormed the mansion that had served as Gentleman Liu's headquarters. A few people even died, because parts of the place had been boobytrapped and apparently there was some cultivator medicine there that was incredibly dangerous for regular people to eat. It was stupid, but crowds of people can be like that.

Big Shilei complained because the townspeople were ruining a fortune worth of things, most of which they didn't really understand - but it was hard to blame them. The Dark Riders had been bullying the town for years, seven fake cultivators basically holding a whole town captive just to enrich themselves, and folks got understandably excited.

Afterward, I accompanied the others in searching through the mansion for anything worth taking that hadn't been nailed down - any money they'd stashed away was long gone, as were most of their cultivation supplies. Some of the heavier furniture was still there and in good shape, but anything else of value that hadn't been nailed down was gone.

After most of the crowd filtered out of the looted mansion, the five of us tiptoed through the mess, kicking bits of broken pottery and torn drapery to the side.

"So I guess we're going to stay here now?" I said.

"Why would you guess that?" Ken asked.

"Because it's nicer than a tent and nobody's living here anymore."

"Hard to argue with that logic," Big Shilei chuckled. "Hmm… look here - something the throngs missed."

It was easy to see why they missed it - the big man had to stand on a makeshift stool to get to the… bundle of preserved herbs. The plant looked familiar… "Is that weed?" I asked.

"Spirit herbs." Shilei handed me a sprig to investigate.

I took a good sniff… and the stuff did smell faintly of good dank, but mostly smelled of spearmint. It was a pleasant smell, and the big man didn't say anything when I pocketed the sprig for later appraisal. After we finished walking through the place, finding nothing of note but about a dozen people passed out from 'qi shock', we carried the injured people out to be attended to by a healer.

According to Ken, supplies meant for cultivators - and I guess some of the guys here hadn't been entirely fake - could be deadly for regular folks. If a 'mortal' (what they call regular people) consumes a substance with a lot of qi bound up in it, their untempered dantian can't take it and it causes a kind of spiritual poisoning that puts them into a coma and then kills if left untreated.

Fortunately, medicines existed to 'settle' the unstable qi so that it would flush out more slowly, leaving the person ill but not on death's doorstep until all of it was gone. And, occasionally, one of them would even awaken their qi and become a quasi-cultivator. Apparently, that's what they used to use before the safer(?) pills became standard…

So we dragged the comatose people out for treatment, at which point the mayor's assistant informed us that there would be a parade the following day and that the mayor himself wanted to speak with us. Apparently, we cultivators were so important and impressive that the mayor couldn't just order us around, though it was strongly suggested that we would find the town's welcome quite limited if we didn't comply.

"Shall I tell the mayor you agree?"

Big Shilei - who had the most regard among all of us since he was the one who'd punched Gentleman Liu's handsome face in - grunted in response. "We will ride in the parade and meet with the mayor. In return, we claim this mansion for our duration in town…"

"Yes!" I said - several of the beds were virtually untouched and looked far more comfortable than anything I'd rested on since coming here, even Lee Dan's bed. Even if I didn't really need sleep, I still appreciated it. "I call the poofy green bed."

"Don't be a child," Ichika said.

"You're just jealous you didn't call it first. Besides, there's a bigger bed right down the hall for you and Yang…"

At the mention of her scrappy, ruggedly-handsome boytoy, Ichika blushed. "Not in front of the mayor's assistant…"

"I… I wouldn’t presume to judge, Mistress Cultivator," the man stammered and adjusted his blocky spectacles. "The mayor will expect you near sundown tomorrow evening."

With that discussion settled, we moved our things (well… I didn't really own much) into the mansion and I claimed the room with the poofy, green, silken mattress. The overzealous crowd had torn it in parts, but I solved that problem nicely by flipping it over and beating the dust out of the other side.

As was becoming my habit, I cultivated for the first part of the night, finding it far easier to spot the little fibers of qi than before but, paradoxically, more difficult to integrate them into the cycling, rotating fabric of the qi tori… basically, my soul donuts. However, I could just stuff them into the empty spots, where they'd sort of waver around and twist into their own weird shapes as long as I didn't put opposite types too close to one another. So I guess the new 'game' I had to play with my inner light was to figure out how to get more kinds in there without my light acting as an axis to stabilize them.

It was a harder game, but still interesting enough that I managed it for a few hours before stretching back with a great big sigh and drifting off to sleep on a comfortable mattress!

The next day was the parade, which stretched all the way down the road running parallel to the river. Practically the whole town turned out to see us - a group of town guards marched in formation in the front, followed by the five of us on the asshole fake-cultivators' horses, followed by a small delegation from the mayor and the city's bureaucracy.

Kids kept on running up to touch us… I guess touching a 'good' cultivator was supposed to bring good luck, or maybe good qi. I offered my encouragement, and even lifted a few of the bolder ones up to ride on my horse with me… but not for too long since that would take them too far from their parents. The whole time, Ichika rode behind me, occasionally chuckling to herself as if she'd just discovered something very amusing.

After the parade, we retired to the mansion and Ichika and I went through our clothing options for that evening's dinner at the mayor's house.

"Nothing too scandalous," she chided me, poking my belly. The way I'd rolled the shirt made it a reasonably-modest halter-top, but I guess that was considered pretty risqué in the empire. "The mayor is the top bureaucrat in the city, appointed by the prefect, who was appointed by an imperial legate, the hand of the emperor."

"I guess they don't do elections around here?"

"Elections for what?"

"Mayor," I said.

Ichika giggled, half-amused and half-scandalized. "Elections to see who 'gets to be' mayor? Can you even imagine such a thing? The people might well choose a donkey."

"Worse things have happened," I assured her.

Ultimately, I had to pass up on half of Ichika's wardrobe options because what was modest on her was suggestive on me, and what was suggestive on her was questionable even by Californian standards. That's not to say I didn't like the half-kimono with the loose neckline, but as soon as I wrapped the sash around my waist, it pulled at the neckline and revealed enough cleavage to split redwoods. Instead, I went with a wrap-around top with enough give to tie in the back without smooshing my chest to bursting. For the bottom, I wore a dark green skirt with little golden tassels that tickled the tops of my sandal-shod feet.

"It's really okay that I'm borrowing all your stuff?" I asked, not for the first time.

Ichika shook her head. "I've been meaning to get some new things anyway… we should go shopping tomorrow."

I nodded, considering that we could probably barter some of the furniture remaining in the mansion and, if not, we could always leverage our status as celebrity cultivators for free or discounted stuff. Appropriately-attired we headed out into the entryway to meet the boys…

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"You're really wearing that?" Ichika scolded Monkey Yang.

"It's what I usually wear…" he said.

"Don't you have any nice shirts?"

"I have two shirts and an armored vest, my flower." He sighed. "What do you want me to do?"

"It's fine," she said in a way that suggested it most certainly wasn't fine. "You're coming shopping with Lynn and me tomorrow…"

The look on Yang's face was very close to horror. "What did I do?"

"You got involved with a woman," Ken said sagely. "This is what happens… insanity."

"Looking presentable is not insanity," I said. "Insanity is not knowing when you look like a vagrant."

"Now there are two of them. Wonderful," Big Shilei muttered. He offered Yang a consoling pat on the shoulder.

"Men!" Ichika snapped.

"Men!" I agreed. The two of us stormed out, leaving the three men to mutter in confusion amongst themselves.

We stopped at the mansion's damaged front door, at which point Ichika called back: "Well? Come on or I'm telling the mayor you lot were too indecent for supper!"

Suitably chagrined, the men wandered out and followed the two of us to the mayor's house just a few houses down from the estate of the late Gentleman Liu.

--------

The mayor was a nebbish man, chubby in the way that cultivators never are. That isn't to say none of the ones I'd seen to date had any fat on them. Big Shilei had plenty of fat - it provided cushioning for his substantial slabs of muscle. He had the build of an NFL lineman, whereas Mayor Shiu had the build of the Pillsbury Doughboy.

When we arrived at his house, he and his wife bowed to greet us while a pair of servants took our sandals and scuttled off. The mayor held his hat in place as he bowed - the big, poofy green hat worn by the high-ranked bureaucrats trimmed with a little band of silver.

His wife was taller than him by a good few inches with another few inches added by her updo and its many jewels. I was a bit jealous of her robe- forest green and silver brocade and as fancy as any that Ichika owned… and her sash had a thin streak of blue on it. The first blue I'd seen on anybody's clothes to date. Ichika had indicated that those who wore blue claimed noble blood, whereas those who wore purple claimed imperial blood (which was even better, I guess). I assume that meant the mayor's wife was a tiny bit noble.

"Welcome to our humble home, honored cultivators! I am Kin Shan," the mayor said with a smile.

Ichika looked back at the men with a scowl, suggesting that their input was not currently desired. She smiled demurely and responded with her own bow, just a bit less shallow than the one the mayor and his wife had made to us. I made sure to copy the exact angle, and I imagine the three men behind us bungled things embarrassingly, but the mayor had the good graces to mostly hide his cringe.

"Thank you for the invitation, honorable mayor. I, Iron Ichika, speak for all of us when I say it is a privilege to grace your home and an honor to oblige your invitation."

"It is an honor to have five such as yourselves in my home," the mayor's wife said. "I am Kin Cui Fen. It has been some time since we've seen honorable cultivators. And this is our oldest daughter Hana, who asks your permission to dine with us tonight…"

With a wave of her billowy sleeve, Fen introduced a slightly smaller, chubbier, younger clone of herself - the girl was maybe fifteen, with the same pale skin as her mother with the slightly-lighter hair of her father, nearly the same color as my own dark brown.

The girl bowed deeply and spoke in a meek voice. "If it pleases the honored cultivators, I request permission to… to…" her brow furrowed, and for a moment I was worried that the girl might burst into tears. "Is it really true that you punched Gentleman Liu's face off? That must have been amazing! I've read everything in Rushing Rivers on cultivators! Can you teach me? I bet I'd be a natural cultivator! I just know I'd be good at it…"

"Hana!" Mayor Shan shouted. "That is enough. Since you cannot keep your insipid thoughts to yourself, you will not be joining us to dine tonight."

"But papa…"

"We discussed this," Fen snapped. "Off with you! The servants will deliver soup to your bedroom."

"Yes, mama…" the girl sniffled. I felt terrible for her - really, what was so wrong about being enthusiastic and having a lot of questions? Nothing at all. I was enthusiastic and often had a lot of questions.

Mayor Shan led us to the dining room, where a pair of servants swept in with bowls of soup and fresh-steeped tea, which they poured in some order of hierarchy known only to themselves, where the mayor's wife was served first followed by Ichika, then the mayor, me, Shilei, Ken, and finally poor Monkey Yang, who drank the whole steaming cup down in one gulp and banged his cup against the table for another.

"Yang!" Ichika hissed. But the servants scurried back in and topped him off right away.

Mayor Shan and Fen took turns delivering polite snippets of local gossip across the first two courses of the meal, at which point they transitioned to gently prodding with questions about what we, the five cultivators who defeated Gentleman Liu and his thugs, intended to do now as the uncontested cultivators of Rushing Rivers. That was a good question - I suppose we could stop pretending to be performers now that everybody knew what we were. Though part of me still thought it would be a great idea to teach yoga and calisthenics to kids…

"…and so we would be content to stay for several weeks before moving on," Ichika finished. I'd completely missed the first part of her response.

Mayor Shan nodded. "You must understand, Mistress Ichika, that after the depredations of Gentleman Liu and his monsters, Rushing Rivers does not have the treasury to pay for the services of freelance cultivators of your esteem."

"Aw, we don't need coin," Monkey Yang drawled. "Let us stay in the big house, we'll scrape for our grub, and everybody's happy. We've got to prepare if we want to take out the rest of the Dark Riders…"

"Ah. That would be agreeable - they've been such a problem these past few years," Mayor Shan said. "Still… I think it would be best if you…"

Just then, a servant shuffled into the room and whispered very urgently into the mayor's ear. I wouldn't have been able to eavesdrop if I wasn't a cultivator but, well, I could. Sorry not sorry.

"Mayor… there's been a problem with tonight's dessert. It seems your eldest daughter has taken the entire pot of dessert congee and absconded into her room…"

"What? Well… can you get it back from her?" Mayor Shan whispered back.

"She's already eaten out of the pot, your honor…"

The mayor cleared his throat and smiled at us uncertainly. "It seems that there has been a problem with tonight's dessert, but I hope we can continue to discuss over drinks? Truly regrettable, but these things happen…"

"I could make a dessert!" I piped in. If they had the ingredients for a dessert congee, I was pretty sure I knew what they also had ingredients for…

"Madam Cultivator, I couldn't possibly ask-"

"It's fine! The kitchen's over here, right?" I hopped to my feet and slid the bamboo door aside. "Great! Be back in a jif!"

"Is… is that normal for her?" Fen whispered.

"Unfortunately, yes," Ken sighed.

"I can still hear you, you know!" I called back while excitedly examining the kitchen for smoothie ingredients!

Dragonfruit! Mangoes! Rice flour! Cream! Too bad they didn't have vegan protein flour or almond milk, but I'd pretty much come to peace with the fact that I wasn't going to be a vegan in cultivator land. I wouldn't go out of my way to eat animal products, but I wasn't going to make a substandard smoothie just because Mayor Shan didn't have his kitchen stocked with vegan goods.

There wasn't a blender, either, obviously - but there was a really big mortar and pestle, and I just knew I could smoosh the hell out of my ingredients with my cultivator power. I chopped up the fruit, dumped it in, added the cream, and then got to smooshing. As the ingredients smooshed out, I added rice flour to reach the desired thickness, all the while wishing they had ice… room temperature smoothies were better than none at all, but perfectly-chilled was…

"Huh…" A thin sheen of frost had formed around the outside of the big mortar. I guess it had a self-cooling option? "Neat."

I sampled a tiny bit of the smoothie creation. It was pretty good - nice and fruity! But it still needed… something…

Then I remembered that I still had some of the herbs that Big Shilei had given me to examine. The ones that smelled a bit like dank, but mostly like mint. I tasted a tiny pinch… they did taste minty! Into the mortar they went.

Like I said, the mortar was big, but not that big. I came out perhaps five minutes later with seven small smoothies, maybe ten ounces to a cup. And they were in tea cups, because I hadn't been able to find any other kind of cup. Smoothies in a bowl just didn't seem right.

"Dragonfruit mango mint smoothies!" I said. "There's some cream in them, so be careful if you're lactose intolerant…"

"Intolerant to what?" Fen asked.

"Um… you know… milk stuff? It's got cream in it."

"It's very good!" Mayor Shan enthused after his first sip. "Minty, and very invigorating!"

"Very invigorating!" Fen added with an enthusiastic nod.

Big Shilei took a sip of his, licking his lips. He frowned. "Lynn? What exactly is in these?" He glanced at the mayor, who'd just downed the rest of his and was excitedly shaking the cup to get the last few drops out.

"It's a secret recipe," I said.

"I really need you to tell me what's in these."

"Fine. Equal parts dragonfruit and mango, a splash of cream, a scoop of rice flour, and some of those minty herbs you gave me…"

"She mixed a cultivation aid," Ken sighed, regarding the blissed-out expressions of Mayor Shan and his wife Fen. "A pretty good one, too… how do you accidentally mix a cultivation aid?"

"Um…" yes, the mayor and his wife definitely looked very high. "Oops? Are they gonna be okay?"

"It's probably not enough to give them qi poisoning if that's what you're asking. It's actually impressively refined," Ichika said, taking an appreciative sip of hers. "Great intent went into mixing this. And a little frost qi if I'm not mistaken? No, I suspect they'll be fine, but further conversation is unlikely to be productive this evening."

"Ohhh…" the mayor groaned. "I hope… I hope you can make one of theeese for the imperial inspector?" He giggled.

Suddenly, my cultivator friends were all very quiet. "The what?" Big Shilei asked.

"The who?" Ichika and Yang said.

"Sent a letter to the inspector," he mumbled. "'Bout the big cul… cultivator fight. If he comes, it's likely to be real… really soon after the letter arrives…"

"And you sent the letter out when?" Ken asked coolly.

"Yesserday… yesterday afternoon?" Mayor Shan shrugged with a giggle. "So he could be here early as ta… tomorrow?"

"Damn!" Monkey Yang cursed.

Ichika stood from the table and bowed. "Mayor Shan… Madam Fen… thank you for your hospitality, but the hour is getting late and I'm afraid we have other matters to attend to…"

"Is this because I accidentally drugged our hosts?" I whispered.

Ichika smirked and whispered back. "In a way… I doubt the mayor would have revealed that information otherwise. It means we're leaving tonight."

"Right," I said. "So… does that mean no shopping tomorrow?"

"Correct."

"Aw."