Jing turned to look at Sen and said, “This doesn’t strike you as a bit… Isn’t it a bit much?”

Sen cast an appraising eye around. We’ve got huge walls that are vastly ominous with glowing spikes, he thought.

“No,” said Sen, “I think it’s just about right. Oh, before I forget, huge sections of the walls were hollowed out.”

“What?” demanded Jing, his eyes narrowing.

“Yeah. Wouldn’t have taken anything to punch a hole through them. I fixed it, but it’s probably something you’ll want to have someone look into.”

“I will,” said Jing with anger smoldering in his eyes. “I don’t suppose you could tell how recently it was done.”

Sen thought it over.

“I’m not really an expert but probably in the last ten years or so. I think the weather would have exposed it if it’d been much longer than that.”

“I see. Do you know how it was done?”

“I suppose it could have been done by hand. It would have been a mind-bogglingly difficult task, to say nothing of labor intensive. Plus, I’m not sure how they could have kept it hidden. Chiseling away rock is loud, and all that rock would have had to go somewhere, but mortals can be tenacious and inventive. A cultivator could have done it, although I’m not sure why they’d bother unless someone hired them to do it.”

“Or maybe some nice ambassador from the other side of the mountains did it?” offered Jing.

Sen nodded and said, “Or that. But I don’t have even a speck of proof that they did. Nobody else was doing anything to the walls while I was working, and I didn’t notice any qi that didn’t belong there.”

“And there’s nothing to stop them from doing it again, is there?”

“Heh. I wouldn’t worry about that,” said Sen, feeling very smug.

Jing raised an eyebrow and asked, “Why is that?”

“It turns out that there were already some old formations in the walls. They were broken, but I fixed them. Well, I replaced them. I imagine Chan Yu Ming will notice the next time she’s here that the qi is a bit stronger at the palace. The other one is very simple, though. It strengthens the walls, which I already reinforced. Whoever did that to the walls before was just dealing with stone. Now, it’ll be more like trying to chisel through solid metal.”

“But it could be done?”

Sen lifted a shoulder in a half-shrug.

“Sure, it could be done. But not quietly. They’d almost have to break the formation first. People would notice that.”

“Why?”

“Well, for one, it’s not easy to break a permanent formation like this one. The actual formation is inside the wall. It’s not like they can just walk up and pluck a flag out of the ground. They’d have to destroy part of the wall to get at it. And, there’s a lot of qi running through it. It’d all try to race out of the break in the formation.”

“What would that do?”

Sen thought it over and did some quick calculations.

“You’d suddenly get a nice view of a mountain from the palace.”

“What?!”

“Not a huge mountain,” said Sen, holding up his hands. “Just a small one.”

“How much of my city would that destroy?”

“Just a little bit.”

“Would you care to attach a number to that vagueness?” asked Jing.

“I would not.”

The king shook his head slowly and said, “So, the point is, nobody will be able to pull the same trick quietly.”

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“I don’t want to say nobody, but to disable it quietly, you’d need a very strong earth-qi cultivator who is also a very talented formation master. Someone at least as good as me. And, even if that happens, you’ll still know because those shiny spikes up top would start flashing like mad.”

“Why?”

“Because I told them to. I know you can’t keep a direct eye on the formations, so I put something nice and visible up to let you know that it’s working as intended,” said Sen, smiling up at the spikes. “Again, it’s not flawless. Someone with just the right experience and affinities could probably disable it, but they’d also have to mess with divine qi. Most cultivators aren’t going to do that because the heavens get very short-tempered about that kind of thing.”

It took a protracted moment of silence before Sen looked back at Jing. The man was staring at him.

“What?” asked Sen.

“You used divine qi to put up what amounts to some kind of warning lights?”

“They aren’t just warning lights. They also make the royal palace the very visible center of the city, day or night. Very symbolic, wouldn’t you say?” asked Sen.

Sighing, Jing answered, “And that madness didn’t strike you as ill-advised? Aren’t you worried that the heavens are going to strike you down?”

Sen frowned. He supposed it was possible. He tilted his head up to look at the sky. He counted to five. No tribulations appeared. No storm clouds manifested. It was all very peaceful.

“Nope. I think it’s fine.”

“Even for a cultivator, I fear you may be too casual about the heavens.”

“Here’s the thing. If the heavens truly wanted me dead, there’s nothing that anyone in the world could do to stop it. Especially me. On the other side, since I’m not dead, I have to assume that the heavens aren’t actively seeking that end. Which means that they’re probably not going to strike me down for being a little flippant. And it’s not like I tried to use heavenly qi for something evil. It might seem trivial, but I used that qi in an act of creation, which I think is its actual purpose.”

“Is that so?” asked Jing, his scholarly mind clearly interested in that idea.

“I don’t know for certain. It’s not like the heavens are talking to any of us about this kind of stuff. But it was almost stupidly easy to use that qi the way I did. It’s suggestive if nothing else.”

“That’s fascinating. I’d never considered that qi might resist being used in a given way.”

“That’s a cultivation basic. All qi is that way. I’m going to have a much more difficult time trying to use fire qi if, for example, I’m out on the ocean. The whole environment is saturated with water qi, so using anything other than water qi gets tricky. You’re fighting with the basic nature of things, so you get a lot of resistance.”

“You don’t have the same problems on land?”

“You do, but it’s less exaggerated. Certain places are just better for some kinds of qi than others. Ever heard of the Order of the Celestial Flame?”

Jing frowned in concentration and said, “That’s some manner of sect some distance to the south of here, isn’t it?”

“They don’t call themselves a sect but yeah. Anyway, they set up in a place called Inferno’s Vale. It’s this little valley and everything there is just soaked with fire qi or is fire-qi attributed. It’s kind of amazing that the whole place isn’t on fire all of the time. But it’s ideal for fire cultivators. High availability of the kind of qi they need and lower resistance to using it. Send those poor fools into a swamp, though, and life would get a lot harder for them in a hurry.”

“If that’s the case, that would suggest that sects set up in the capital because they also find something they need here.”

“They do,” said Sen. “Visibility and population. With so many people here, they don’t need to go searching for new cultivators. Those cultivators are being born right here. The sects just need to pluck up the most talented candidates.”

“How very practical of them,” said Jing in a dry tone.

“It’s not that different than mortal businesses hiring people who are good at math, or farmers hiring people with strong backs.”

“I know,” sighed Jing. “It would just make my life easier if they were somewhere else.”

“Yeah, I imagine that’s true. It’d make my life easier if they weren’t here if that’s any consolation.”

“Shockingly, I am not consoled.”

“Well, I tried.”

Jing looked like he was about to ask something, but a pack of servants that had been growing increasingly thick by the second seemed to sense the pause in the conversation. They pounced on Jing like a pack of starving wolves.

“Your majesty,” cried out a serious-looking man in an almost pleading tone. “Your majesty, if I could have just one moment.”

That set off a wave of noise as all of the other servants tried to get his attention. Sen resisted the urge to smirk at the put-upon expression that briefly flashed across the king’s face.

“It seems my masters require my attendance,” said Jing.

“Isn’t it supposed to be the other way around?” asked Sen.

“Only in legends. I appreciate the work you did here today. It should quell any rumors. I also appreciate the information about the walls. I’ll see to it that someone trustworthy is tasked with investigating it.”

“It was the honor of this lowly citizen to aid his royal majesty,” said Sen.

With a snort of amusement and a roll of his eyes, Jing walked over to the servants. Sen snickered to himself at the sight, made a qi platform, and flew over the walls. He saw cultivators from all the sects floating at a distance, their eyes staring at the spikes at the top of the walls, naked greed on their faces. Sen almost wanted one of them to try it. But if a bolt of tribulation lightning hit the walls he’d just made, it could do some serious damage. There were also crowds of mortals in the streets who pointed up at him as he appeared over the walls. He heard them saying Lord Lu as he passed. When he arrived back at the manor, he immediately regretted his amusement at Jing’s plight as his own pack of ravenous wolves descended on him. Servants, he reminded himself. They’re called servants. Helpful, dutiful, ravenous servants.