Cultivators don’t wear armor.

  It would be convenient, but since when did conveyance sway the judgement of a cultivator? No, if the body cannot handle the damage then it is destined to die. So it’s kind of become a way to recognize cultivators from the rest of the chaff, the robes and tokens. Tantra has three distinct reasons for keeping with this idiotic tradition, firstly, her robes both fix and clean themselves, and she isn’t above vanity. Secondly, cultivators are one of the few that can travel Rikidan without the need for permission from a noble house. Finally, armor doesn’t really matter once you face something of Rakan’s level. The bear, for example, would have broken through any simple obstacle platemail might present.

  So, cultivators don’t wear armor.

  Why might this be relevant?

  Well, it meant that when the dual falchions pierced through Rakan’s heart, there was nothing there to even protest its advance.

  All at a speed Tantra couldn’t follow.

  The woman pulls out her blades and Rakan falls to the floor with a dull thump.

  Tantra just stares as blood pools and Rakan doesn’t move.

  “Miki?” says the woman as she approaches the corpse of who Tantra assumes is her sister.

  “No, nononononono.” She cries, “please no.”

  Tantra doesn’t really hear her, she’s staring at Rakan.

  He’s still not moving.

  Rakan’s the strongest cultivator she knows besides the masters, and that one elder. Despite being in purification he displayed a level of skill and strength that proved to Tantra that the realms don’t really matter in the end. Sure they’re convenient boosts in strength, but with the right techniques and dedication, even someone in purification can overwhelm someone in anchoring.

  Which is what she assumes these two are, well, one of them was. She doesn’t have Qi sense, not to a usable degree, but that hint of motion that caught in her sinuses told her so much about the woman.

  The primary thing being that she stood no chance, the secondary being that she was using liquid Qi.

  Only someone in anchoring can achieve that.

  So she stares at the corpse.

  That’s what it is now isn’t it?

  It’s not Rakan, not anymore, just meat and bone and sinew all sculpted together to make something like a person, but possessing no soul to pilot it. Stabbed through the back protecting someone he cares for.

  Tantra looks at the woman.

  She’s bloody, real bloody. Rakan really fucked her up, an eye is dangling out of its socket and her skull looks half caved in. From the raspy breaths and occasional coughs of blood as she cries, Tantra can only assume that her ribs are busted and piercing through her lungs. Otherwise she’s just bloody.

  If they wanted they could probably kill her with ease.

  Where was the honor in this?

  Tantra is just a child, and they are just mercenaries.

  Where are the cultivators?

  He died, a part of her says, in a way that befits a cultivator, at least those from the stories.

  She feels the flames of rage beginning to boil her blood. None of this was necessary, they were celebrating! They were happy! Then these bitches came and ruined the day with their stupid little job that they got from one of her siblings.

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  Because that’s the only one who’d care about someone pretending to be her, and the only one who'd have authorization and receive notification for when the Sol name is used.

  Except the reports from the cities they passed should have detailed her features, and clothes, so anyone who knows her would know she’s no imposter. Which means someone from her family tried to kill her.

  The rage burns brighter and brighter as she stokes the fire.

  She looks at the crying woman, holding the corpse of her sister as she begs uselessly to the world. Her friends haven’t struck her down, presumably because she’s weeping. They’re kind, truly kind, to hesitate to kill scum all because of the heart wrenching sight in front of them.

  Tantra isn’t so kind.

  -

  “Well junior?” A voice cuts through the noise.

  “Hm?”

  The man sighs, “their belongings are yours by right of combat, you can sell them to the sect or take them for yourself.”

  “We’ll take them,” Tantra says absently.

  There is silence as she stares at the corpses on the floor, it wasn’t hard to cave in the woman's skull. Rakan did most of the work already, and she didn’t even resist when Tantra brought down her club, continuing to bawl over the other one. Then there’s the one Rakan killed, half her skull simply gone, exposing pulped brain matter and leaking some kind of clear fluid.

  “Weeell?” The man says, “any day now.”

  Tantra just nods to him, a hint of anger needing to be clamped down at his nonchalance. Her master’s dead, couldn’t spare the energy to be more considerate? But causing problems right now is a bad idea. Technically they don’t even need to compensate her if she chose to give it to them, they could just take it. They’re stronger than her afterall, and strength rules in the end.

  “I’ll take Rakan,” she says to her friends.

  They don’t seem willing to protest.

  Fair.

  She walks over to his corpse and kneels down, rolling him over onto his back. He’s still warm, it hasn’t been that long, but his body’s started to clamp up. Like his joints were stuck in mud. She takes a moment to stare at his face, it isn’t set in a rictus of pain or some such nonsense, it’s actually quite relaxed, lips tilted into a slight smile as he stares at the roof with lifeless eyes.

  She stares at him for a while, she doesn’t really even have to try to find anything valuable. He kept everything he had in his storage artifact, a bangle on his right ankle, covered up by his robes so as to not be noticeable. It’s pretty easy to override an imprint, you just need to chip away at it with your Qi, so most cultivators keep their artifacts somewhere concealed or hard to steal, if they have one at all.

  Artifacts that can hold more than a cultivator's weapons are rare, and require an insane amount of expertise in array scripts to manage. Rakan’s can hold a few extra things, about a bags worth besides his club, most of which is being taken up by the bone jian Tantra got stabbed with however long ago.

  All she has to do is unlatch it from his ankle and take it as her own.

  How convenient.

  She spends a while staring at Rakan, shoulders bleeding freely as her arms hang limp. She needs Qi to move them, that and intent, which makes her think she may have stumbled upon a boosting technique, but that’s…well that’s for later examination.

  Right now she’s doing all she can to memorize Rakan’s face.

  -

  She stares at the token in her palm, she pulls at her Qi and then it’s gone, then she pulls again and it's back again. Having imprinted her Qi onto the artifact she has a kind of permanent understanding of how much space it can carry, and what’s stored inside. Rakan had a few things she didn’t know about, a few technique manuals that she assumes he was going to show her once she got far enough with intention, then there’s the…interesting novels. She doesn’t know when he found the time or privacy to read those but he certainly prepared. He also left a few sweets that she definitely didn’t know about.

  Unfortunately there’s not enough space to store two kanabō’s, so she still has to shoulder hers. Not willing to risk losing Rakan's by having it outside.

  Still she was able to lighten her load a bit from her bag.

  She’s surprisingly calm right now.

  There's a simple reason for that, she has a purpose now, beyond seeing her family.

  She still wants to see them of course, but now she has to find out who tried to kill her, and after…well she doesn’t know.

  The conclusion’s kind of obvious isn’t it?

  But she doesn’t want to kill a member of her family.

  That would be wrong.

  The anger simmers, yes, it would be wrong, It says, leaving out the obvious implication. She doesn’t know if she’s so cold blooded that she could kill a member of her family after what they’ve done, but it’s kind of an obligation isn’t it?

  Rakan died a pointless death in the crossfires of some sort of political scheme.

  She’s understanding cultivator culture more and more.

  Her hatred for it only grows as time passes.