Tian didn’t speak much for a few days. The heretics were pressing in too deep, collapsing the battle line in towards the north. Forward Base Redknife was now the tip of a narrow blister of notionally Orthodox controlled territory, and its position wasn’t going to be tenable for long. The base was evacuated, and Depot Number Four was expanded and re-fortified.

  The commanders proclaimed that thanks to a series of powerful advances, the heretics were running like dogs and being slaughtered like pigs. Abandoning the forward bases was proof that they were no longer necessary, and the concentration of forces would allow Ancient Crane Mountain to explode forward and crush the last desperate resistance of the already broken Heretics.

  How long you listened to the speeches was generally taken as a measure of your experience. Tian tuned it out by minute seven of his first speech. Most of his seniors were cultivating while they stood at parade rest and listened to all the motivation. Everybody knew they were losing.

  The people making the speeches knew what the people listening to the speeches were doing. But what else were they supposed to do? The Outer Court was one thing- they couldn’t run, and they were all obsessed with breaking through to the Heavenly Human Realm. Tian knew from his conversations with Quartermaster Wu that things weren’t so simple in the Inner Court.

  To break through from the Earthly to the Heavenly was simply a matter of accumulation and inspiration. To break through from Heavenly to whatever came next required considerably more. Treasures, merit, heavenly opportunity, enlightenment, so many things that could only be chanced upon, not manufactured or willed into existence.

  “What comes after the Heavenly Person Realm, Sister Wu? I don’t think anyone ever told me.”

  She grimaced. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Don’t worry about it. Don’t think about it, don’t try to learn about it. Really. After who knows how many hundreds of thousands of years, experience has conclusively proven that learning too much about cultivation levels above your own leads to cultivation deviation. Basically only bad things happen if you know. So we don’t tell you much. Just know that the Inner Court is a viper’s nest.”

  “But why? If things can only be chanced on and not sought after-”

  “No, you have that backwards. Let’s say there was a magic pill that let you break through to the next realm. There isn’t, and thousands of alchemists have ruined their lives and the lives of countless others trying to make one. But say there was. That means there would be a recipe, a list of ingredients, a production formula, specified necessary equipment- there would be a model to follow. You would be able to mine the necessary metals, grow the necessary herbs, whatever. It could be manufactured.”

  “Metals?”

  “Yes. Alchemy, real alchemy, uses things like cinnabar and lead to create a permanent yin yang resonance within the pill and the person who takes it. Very powerful stuff, and managing pill toxins is no joke even at the Heavenly Person level.

  Pill toxins? PILL TOXINS?! Fuck your granny and her pill toxins! This is why you got lead poisoning, some dogshit alchemist’s droppings made their way into your mouth! Are you fucking kidding me with this peabrained system of resonances or whatthefuckever they are calling it? DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT BULLSHIT COST ME?!! Oh hateful Heavens, that I should hear such a thing and not have the arms and bullwhips to deliver the necessary correction!

  Tian had to tune out Grandpa Jun. He had no idea what he was on about anyhow.

  “The point is, even if this stuff was really rare to mine, or only grew once a century in one specific mountain valley or something, you could make a system. There would be a plan, and a quota and people would figure out all kinds of means to get their hands on the pill. There would be some degree of certainty.

  “But there is no pill. There is no single magic treasure that will get you over the barrier into what lies beyond. It’s like inspiration, in that no two people will ever manage it in exactly the same way. You have to go and find your own thing.”

  “Adventuring. The only way to advance is to go adventuring.”

  “The majority of the Inner Court treats our Ancient Crane Mountain as a sort of home base. A place to come and sell unneeded treasures and to gear up for their next great adventure. A place to learn new spells and arts, to get training, to run a business perhaps, if they are some kind of crafter. But loyalty?” She shook her head.

  “I can’t imagine it. The idea of my brothers dying because I was off on an adventure makes me sick.” Tian spoke in a soft voice. He had wanted to go adventuring, before Brother Fu neatly diverted him into being Brother Wong’s herb boy.

  “Oh, you’ll go. You will have to. But there is a reason why Elder Rui has so much say in the Inner Court despite being the Outer Court Elder and his mediocre cultivation. It’s only under him in the last thousand years or so that loyal, unified new recruits have been regularly entering the Inner Court. That merit is really down to his work with the West Town Outer Court. The other Outer Courts aren’t showing nearly as good results, and there is real fear about what will happen when Brother Fu and Sister Bai die.”

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Why hasn’t everything fallen apart, then?” Tian asked, trying not to let the thought of Brother Fu dying knot up his guts. He was a very old man, after all. It would be only natural if he died soon. Tian just couldn’t stand the thought of it.

  “Because even the Inner Court isn’t the real Ancient Crane Mountain. That’s the Core Disciples up in the Monastery, and they are unified. They are strong as hell, too. Even within the same realm, they make other cultivators look like sleepy birds. And the Direct Disciples are the best of the Core Disciples, studying directly under the Daoist Masters. They are practically parent and child. Loyalty doesn’t even cover it. That’s the other thing a sect provides- security. Having a safe place to come home to and having people who will avenge you if you die is a huge reassurance.”

  She waved an elegant hand, flicking away the tangent.

  “Behind the Direct Disciples are their masters- the Daoist Masters. That’s an organizational rank, not a cultivation level, by the way. When you think about splitting rivers along their length with a single sword stroke, you are thinking about them.”

  Tian hadn’t ever thought of that, but the idea instantly lodged itself in his brain and refused to shift.

  “The only way to advance is to go off and do your own thing. We aren’t all heretics or anything. Most of us do have very fond feelings towards the sect. We have friends and lovers here. We have our homes here. It’s a steady source of benefits, a path to progression, and when you see the lousy conditions of wandering cultivators and those third rate minor sects, well. It’s really no comparison. Being in a real sect is better. But sacrificing for the sect?” She shook her head.

  Martial Aunt Wu was beautiful. Most cultivators, particularly in the Inner Court, were good looking. Her lovely face was lost in melancholy, as she sipped her tea.

  Tian finally understood why the sect mission system earned merit points. You were literally earning merits. You were doing meritorious acts for the sect. Instead of taking their teachings and running off to find a legendary sword or some obscure natural treasure.

  So the officers made speeches that everyone knew were nonsense, and everyone listened regardless. Because what else could you do? Anything, no matter how feeble, to reinforce the tissue thin indoctrination and strengthen the spun-sugar morale of the orthodox cultivators was vitally necessary. It wasn’t yet time to offer better benefits. The war had barely begun.

  The courier missions were canceled, naturally. Tian remembered Brother Wong’s advice, and asked for a transfer to the hospital. The staff of the Depot hospital remembered him from the assault, and gave their approval. They would need plenty of assistance, whether it was as an orderly or formulating medicines.

  Word had gotten around about Tian’s little excursion. A level five Earthly Person cultivator coming back with the head of a level three Heavenly cultivator, even one that was ninety-nine parts dead when they were discovered, was worth talking about. And worth keeping out of the battlefield, to whatever extent was reasonable. The Mad Dog’s Pup had a promising future. It would be a pity to see it cut short so soon.

  Tian was quietly surprised to learn that Hong Liren had also distinguished herself on the battlefield. She was being transferred into the disciplinary squad as a trainee. Rumor had it that her Granny had arranged it to let her build a powerful network early.

  Some despised her for it, more envied her for it, but no one challenged it. She was another capable junior, and worth their nurturing and protecting. Besides, Senior Hong was a force in the Inner Court with a powerful network and real personal strength. The rumor was that she had already earned a hundred thousand spirit crystals and vast merits collecting bounties in just the few months of the war so far. No reason to make an enemy like that over a little nepotism.

  Must say this isn’t going quite as I expected, but it could work if they make you a field medic or something. Lots of opportunities for a fortuitous encounter or four in a war.

  “I don’t see much good fortune on the battlefield, Grandpa.”

  No? Take a look at the storage rings you looted. You’ve been sitting on them long enough.

  “Because these heretics are all a bunch of broke bums, and what they do have is awful. The most valuable things are the rings themselves, and the quartermasters will only buy them for merit points. Not even a lot of merit points.”

  Are you sure about that? Thinking carefully about everyone you killed?

  Tian sighed and got to sorting. Household goods like clothes, candles, little conveniences, were all checked over and then shoved into the “trash” ring. Tian grew up in a dump, and certainly wasn’t fussy about second hand goods. He still didn’t want to eat off a plate a heretic had eaten from, or drink from their cups.

  Cultivation aids went into a second ring. Cultivation aids seemed like the tidiest way to refer to chunks of unidentifiable meat, vats of blood, endless insect corpses, poisons of a bewildering quantity and variety, as well as a very few herbs of such poor quality, Tian wouldn’t have picked them if he found them on the side of the road. Herbs were hard to come by in the Wasteland. Blood was plentiful.

  The weapons the Heavenly Person heretic had were rather good- a long dagger and a chakram. He had no interest in either weapon, really, but the chakram would be a ranged option. Unfortunately, without qi to drive it, it was just a sharp circle. At least it would fetch a tidy sum of spirit crystals. That would make up for the crystals he wasn’t looting- this bunch of brokies were collectively richer than Tian, but then, so was everybody. All told there were barely a hundred.

  “Better than nothing, better than nothing,” he muttered. “Oh, now what is this?”

  Tian pulled a little statue out of the storage ring, barely as long as his hand. There was a single body, but two forms- on one side, the sculpture showed a naked man. Strongly muscled, and each muscle stood out in perfect detail. His arms were up in front of his face, clenched fists displayed towards the viewer and his forearms pressed tightly together. On the reverse side was a woman, equally naked and fit, but where the man was covered in rigid muscle, she was soft and inviting. Her hands were spread low and wide. Both sides were covered in tiny writing.

  Their shared head was topped with a lotus crown. Tian squinted and carefully read what was written on it. “Supreme Virtue Hell Suppressing Body Refining Sutra. Huh. Why write on a statue? Did they run out of paper or something?”

  He heard a soft sigh from Grandpa Jun. At last. At long last. I was starting to wonder if your golden finger was one of the ones that got gnawed off. It’s a good sutra, Grandson. It’s really damned good. This should be the moment it starts.

  “What does, Grandpa?”

  Your climb into the sky.

  fifteen chapters ahead on Patreon.