It was a plum mission. Two days after he returned from his last disastrous patrol, Tian was assigned a courier job moving between Forward Base Redknife and Resupply Depot 4. It was essentially long runs in the desert, which wasn’t fun, but it was an opportunity to earn Military Merits while being, technically, behind the front lines. The ‘technically’ was important- he was filling a dead man’s shoes. The animals didn’t much care where some arbitrary front line was drawn.

  The job was assigned to the Outer Court because it was necessary for logistics management, but the courier was just shuttling routine notices and requests for not-terribly-valuable supplies. Things that it would be overkill to send a Heavenly Person Realm cultivator to transport, even if one could be spared from the front line for the few hours it would take to make the trip. The journey took thirty six hours for a member of the Outer Court. Assuming, of course, that the person in question was Level Nine and skilled with light body techniques.

  “You do have a light body technique, don’t you, Brother Tian?” Tian didn’t know the Outer Court cultivator running the Mission Hall desk, but the fellow looked really pleased with himself.

  “I do, thank you. This will be a good opportunity to train it more. I’m sorry, Senior Brother, I don’t think I know your name.”

  “Jiang Bochang, North Riverside Town. A pleasure to make your acquaintance.” The man smiled. He was as slender as any other cultivator, but he gave Tian the impression that he was fat.

  “The mission sounds simple. Where shall I meet my teammates?”

  The clerk slapped his forehead. “Ah, forgive me. I should have been more clear. You will get a special storage ring for this mission. It is sealed, and only opens with the talisman held by the responsible officer at the Depot. She will give you a similarly sealed ring to bring back. The ring is locked to your body in the meantime, so if you die or become separated from the ring, it violently explodes. It also has a compass built into it which points directly at the unlocking talisman.”

  “I see.”

  “So you don’t really need a team for a job like this. Just a nice, easy run through the desert, tap your ring on the talisman, swap for a new ring, have a nap and a bite to eat, then jog on back. And an easy ten Military Merits will be yours.”

  “Ten, did you say ten merit points?” Tian blinked, then apologized. “Forgive me, Senior Brother Jiang, I didn’t realize how… valuable the job was.”

  “Hahaha!” The mission clerk laughed and fanned himself, managing to look both smug and humble at the same time. “A minor matter, a minor matter! Obviously you are well able to look after yourself.”

  Tian nodded with the best approximation of gratitude he could muster. “Thank you, Senior Brother. I will certainly remember your care.”

  It was an odd sort of complement. It suggested that he was both competent and valuable enough to keep from harm. By himself. In the desert. With murderous animals hidden everywhere. Facing an enemy that despised frontal collisions but delighted in ambushes.

  Tian carefully went over all his supplies, but couldn’t think of something he could both afford and that would be useful to add. Grandpa didn’t have any suggestions either. The way out was through. He didn’t have the right to refuse the mission, after all, and his Senior Brothers were busy trying to keep themselves alive. Tian hadn’t seen Senior Brother Fu in weeks, and missed him terribly. He hadn’t made a single cup of tea since he last drank it with the old man.

  ___________________________________________________________________________

  The ring displayed an arrow. Tian moved his hand around a bit and the arrow shifted to keep pointing in the same direction. Judging by the hazy sun, he was headed roughly northeast. The desert was still covered in black sand, but he had heard it turned to the color of terracotta as you got further north. Perhaps he would get to see it.

  Tian had a moment of dreadful lucidity paired with a sense of drifting dissociation. The job required him to run flat out, as fast as he could possibly maintain, between here and the depot. The job also required him to not die, which meant going slowly and carefully sensing the world around him for threats.

  Grandma Hong got him killed without a word, or even a look. She just had to favor him with a conversation. By saying she would remember him. By specifically noticing the fact that he had saved her granddaughter and asked for nothing. Practically everyone at the base was an old monster with well cultivated perception arts. Some of them, maybe all of them, could read lips. She had made no effort to hide their conversation. She hadn’t even kept her voice down.

  How many people would line up to do Tian favors, desperate to make a connection with the Inner Court? But then, how many favors could he really receive on a forward base? The only people who’s favors might matter were the Quartermaster, the Crafters, and the Mission Office. Grandma Hong wasn’t even killing with a borrowed knife. Her hands were never anywhere near a blade. And if their favors didn’t get him killed? There was always the desert, the heretics, or even herself if necessary.

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  Why she would do such a thing remained a mystery. For now, all he could do was his job. He used Light Body Heavy Hands and tried to find a balance with Advent of Spring. He had a number of false starts, finally leading to the correct conclusion that he couldn’t do both. Trying to manage a cultivation art and a light body art at the same time was just too much for him now, if it was even possible at all. He tried with Counter-Jumper. That didn’t work either.

  It hadn’t worked any of the times he was out on patrol either, but he’d been lucky before.

  He sighed and started running, making sure Counter-Jumper was active. Hopefully the luck would come later.

  Counter-Jumper was an interesting spell, Tian thought. It looked like it only did one thing- improved your perception of the world around you. What it actually did, though, was make your senses more acute and make you more aware of the information you were already getting. In the early stages, which Tian absolutely was in, you worked system by system, raising the floor of your perception ability. Slowly, over time, the gains stuck.

  Right now, Tian was focused on his ears and his vibration sensitivity through his skin. He had learned, painfully and repeatedly, that his eyes alone couldn’t be trusted. On the other hand, neither of those senses were likely to be very useful if a demonized bird silently emerged from a cloud, or if a tripwire was set, or explosive talismans were pasted to a rock. He kept his eyes in constant motion, as well as desperately trying to pay attention to his other senses, as he ran across the trackless desert.

  He managed almost four hours before he stopped. He was on the verge of nervous collapse. The constant anxiety and hyper-awareness were killing him. He found a shady patch next to a rock and sat. He settled in and started cultivating Advent of Spring. Counter-Jumper didn’t use a lot of energy, but it used some. He might as well top up and calm down at the same time.

  There had been some animal threats, but he had spotted them and avoided them. Mostly they were things like beetle swarms and a tall two legged bird that could both run across the sands faster than a mortal, they could also smash their head through a cultivator’s chest. Their beaks were almost perfectly diamond shaped. Optimized for body piercing. Fortunately, they weren’t pursuit predators. He ran flat out for two miles, and eventually the bird gave up.

  Not too dangerous, but best not to fight for as long as he could avoid it. Ripping his suit would be bad, especially this early in his run.

  Tian breathed in and out, letting the energy cycle through him according to the manual. The Qi here wasn’t as pure as it was at the foot of Ancient Crane Mountain. It was definitely harder to cultivate, but there were hidden advantages to be found. The earth qi was rich to the point of toxicity, and the fire qi literally was a toxin. Tian thought he was in for a world of suffering, but Grandpa was able to point out a path to progress.

  Well, Grandpa emphasized certain words loudly as well as reminding him of a few books Brother Wong made him pack, but the intent was clear.

  Tian’s cultivation largely favored wood. Wood was generated by Water but it overcame Earth. Earth, of course, was generated by Fire. There was very little water qi in the Wasteland to generate wood, and pure qi was even scarcer. So what’s a cultivator to do?

  If it doesn’t exist, make it.

  The Advent of Spring was, much like wood itself, seemingly gentle but ultimately domineering. The Earth qi was drawn in and subjugated by the Wood qi, obediently, if slowly, transforming into usable vital energy. The Fire qi was used too- the waste Earth qi was fed into it. The Fire exhausted itself against the Earth, and the earth was calcinated again by the flames. What was left was then easily crushed and absorbed by the Wood qi circulating through Tian.

  The process was finicky and slow. But just like Brother Fu promised, it was very steady. The Advent of Spring could not be stopped by mere dry earth and the remnants of ancient fire. In exchange for his efforts, Tian felt his qi becoming more dense and more pure.

  There was something going on under the surface, he felt, there were some other actors at play. He hadn’t mastered inner sight, but he tried to feel how the qi moved inside of him with as much detail as he could.

  The first oddity he noticed was right in his lungs- the exact point at which the qi entered his body and moved into his meridians. Less earth qi than he would have expected was absorbed. There was a subtle filtering effect. The rougher, less pure earth qi was rejected by the meridians, sent back into the lungs to be refined by the fire. Only after it had been refined and reached a certain standard of purity was it accepted.

  “The Dustless Physique and the Natal qi. Grandpa mentioned those years ago, after I rebuilt my body. But they didn’t do anything so I forgot about them.”

  Didn’t do anything? DIDIN’T DO ANYTHING?! Hey Grandson, do you remember how, somehow, some inexplicable way, you managed to keep up with the only cultivator descendant of a Heavenly Person? Someone who certainly would have gotten her a cultivation art at least as good as Advent of Spring as well as any medicinal supplements as she might need? Any thoughts on what your edge might have been? Could there possibly be a secret to your rapid advance?

  “Sorry Grandpa.”

  Don’t apologize to me, apologize to yourself! You were the one who forged that excellent body of yours. AND you have only figured out part of it. Keep introspecting, this is important.

  He followed the qi through the path laid out by Advent of Spring until it landed in his lower dantian. When it rose out again, the qi was very subtly different. He tried to figure out what it could be. It felt purer, once again. Mabe… more lively? He didn’t have a better way of describing it.

  “The natal qi?”

  Exactly. But explaining what exactly it is doing would be prohibitively expensive. I’m saving up for an emergency, or, happy thought, a big splurge if the opportunity comes up. Keep an eye on it. The more you learn about it on your own, the cheaper it is for me to explain. Just don’t do it right now. You are a busy man. Places to go, things to do. It will keep.

  Tian immediately switched from cultivation to Counter-Jumper. Faint vibrations, and there was a soft hissing noise, the sound of something moving very quickly over sand. Tian jumped up onto the rock and looked around desperately.

  The spot where he was sitting a moment before exploded in a spray of sand. Rising out of it was a centipede three times his size. Tian had a wonderful view of fangs the length of his forearm dripping venom, just as the centipede came crashing down on him.