Jiang moved through the trees, his stride steady, breath even. The cold air bit at his skin, but he barely noticed. He had grown up in the woods, knew how to move through them without tiring himself too quickly.

  It was no exaggeration to say he was far more comfortable moving through the forest than he was moving through the bustling streets of Wúyè. He’d never seen so many people in one place in all his life – though considering he’d never actually left his village before, that wasn’t really saying much.

  Either way, once Elder Lu had left, there was no reason for him to stay. Reaching the Azure Sky Sect in three weeks was going to be difficult enough as it was – delaying would only make things harder. The guards at the gate of the Lord Magistrate’s compound hadn’t tried to stop him, so he’d just… left. Walked out the main gates and started following the road that stretched toward the Qingyun mountains in the distance.

  He hadn’t stuck to the roads for long, choosing instead to slip off deeper into the forest. Running straight to the Azure Sky Sect along the roads would be faster, but he had nothing—no money, no supplies, nothing but the clothes on his back, the knife at his belt, and his bow.

  If he stayed on the roads, he’d starve before he made it halfway there.

  The forest was slower, but it would keep him alive.

  His stomach was already starting to remind him that he had barely eaten in the last two days. He would need to find something soon. Winter had settled early this year, and the deeper he travelled, the thinner the pickings would be. Most of the smaller animals had already begun retreating into their burrows, but he could still catch something if he was careful.

  A rabbit, maybe. Or a grouse.

  He pressed forward, eyes scanning for signs left by something moving through the area. A patch of disturbed snow. Broken twigs. A tuft of fur stuck in a bramble. Anything that would indicate the presence of game in the area.

  It didn’t take him long to spot a set of tracks a little further ahead—small, sharp depressions in the snow leading toward a bramble thicket. Rabbit.

  Jiang slowed, breath steady. He stepped lightly, avoiding brittle twigs, shifting his weight carefully. He dropped into a crouch, hand going to his belt as he eased his knife free.

  A flash of movement. A twitch of ears.

  He moved fast. The knife left his fingers, spinning once before sinking into the rabbit’s side. It kicked once, then stilled.

  Jiang exhaled, rising to his feet. Not much meat, but enough for now. He retrieved his knife, wiped the blade clean, and slung the rabbit over his belt before moving on.

  — — —

  He stopped a few hours before dark to give himself enough time to build a proper fire and find a good place to sleep. His cloak was warm and well-made, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t appreciate the added warmth a proper camp would provide.

  Long practice made the process quick and easy, so he used the remaining time before the sun dipped below the mountains to collect a decent supply of extra firewood. The canopy was thick enough that he didn’t have to worry about being buried in snow, so he didn’t bother to construct any kind of solid shelter.

  Skinning the rabbit he had caught earlier was the work of a few minutes, and before long, the smell of roasting meat filled the air. Jiang sat cross-legged near the fire, turning the skewer slowly to ensure the meat cooked evenly. The rabbit wasn’t much, but it was food.

  He ate quickly, wasting nothing. The meat may as well have been tasteless – it was fuel to him, nothing more.

  With the necessities taken care of, he finally settled himself.

  Then, finally, he settled himself.

  Meditation.

  Jiang exhaled slowly, settling into a cross-legged position, hands resting loosely on his knees. He had no idea what he was doing. “Find the Qi within your body,” Elder Lu had said. “Even the smallest amount. Shift it. Move it. The moment you begin to stir it, more will follow.”

  It had sounded simple enough, as most things did before you actually had to try it.

  Jiang closed his eyes and slowed his breathing, trying to focus on the sensations around him. The distant rustle of wind through branches. The faint crackle of dying embers.

  Minutes passed.

  He felt… he felt…

  Nothing.

  His brow furrowed, and he opened his eyes, staring thoughtfully at the trees around him. Maybe he was approaching this wrong. The only thing he really knew about meditation was that it involved sitting in the same place for a long time, thinking about the universe or something. From the few stories he’d heard in his youth, there tended to be a lot of talk about ‘opening yourself to the world’ or something.

  Then again, the characters in the stories were always already cultivators. From what Elder Lu had explained, it sounded like they were trying to absorb the ambient Qi – but right now, he was trying to find the Qi inside himself. So, logically speaking, he should be looking inward, not focusing on the world around him.

  With a – only slightly – frustrated huff, he closed his eyes again and tried focusing inward. On his breath. On his heartbeat. On… whatever Qi was supposed to be.

  Nothing.

  Again.

  A muscle in his jaw tensed.

  He slowed his breathing further, searching for something, anything. He wasn’t even sure what he was looking for—wasn’t even sure how he was supposed to find it. But Elder Lu had said it was there. Had said every living thing had Qi, even if only a trace.

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  He just had to… notice it.

  Jiang grit his teeth, forcing himself to relax.

  And then, just as he was about to give up, there was a flicker.

  Faint. Barely there.

  Like a whisper at the edge of hearing, or a word on the tip of his tongue that he couldn’t quite grasp. It reminded him of the feeling he had gotten when Elder Lu had looked at him back in Wúyè. That same sensation of something brushing against him, but… from the inside. Somehow.

  He focused harder, reaching with a clumsy mental grasp.

  The sensation wavered, shifting like smoke through his fingers. The more he reached for it, the further it slipped away.

  Jiang’s eyes snapped open.

  The fire had burned lower, embers pulsing softly beneath the wood. The cold pressed in at his back, the warmth of the flames keeping it at bay. His hands curled into fists before relaxing again. He had felt something, that was undeniable. It was progress, however slow.

  Jiang tightened his cloak around his shoulders and leaned back against the tree he was sitting by. The only thing left to do was try again.

  — — —

  The days blurred together. Run. Hunt. Gather what little food he could. Try to meditate. Get nowhere. Keep moving.

  His thoughts turned, unbidden, toward his family. As much as he’d been trying to distract himself by doing something, anything, he couldn’t help but wonder if he was making a mistake.

  Jiang had always been the type to act first and think later. After his father died, he’d walked into the forest with his bow and a knife, determined to provide. It had taken three days to catch a rabbit. He hadn’t thought about how his disappearance would affect his mother, hadn’t realized how much it would worry her. But he had succeeded.

  Was this the same?

  Jiang stared into the fire, turning over his decisions in his mind, trying to determine if he’d made the right choice.

  He knew, logically, that his family was gone. Tracking them wasn’t impossible, but it might as well be. The bandits had almost certainly used the river—that was why the cultivators couldn’t find a trail. Four days by boat could put them anywhere.

  Even if he somehow found the right path, where would it lead? A slaver’s den? A market in some distant city? He couldn’t just walk in and demand answers.

  The best he could do was figure out where they had been sold. Someone, somewhere, would have records. If he could find those, then he could find them.

  Then what?

  Buying them back would be the simplest answer. But how? He had no money, and no way to make any. Even if he could hunt, even if he could sell pelts or meat, that kind of money wasn’t something he could gather in a lifetime, let alone in time to help them.

  Which left only one viable option – becoming a cultivator. But how long would it take?

  The entrance exams were only the first step. Even assuming he was able to pass at all, he would have to prove himself even beyond that, and he had no idea how the Sect actually worked. How did cultivators grow stronger? How long would it take before he was strong enough to do anything?

  Jiang wasn’t a fool. He knew what happened to men sold into slavery. Hard labor. Dangerous tasks. Work that killed quickly. His mother and sister wouldn’t have to worry about that—not in the same way.

  Women were used for… other things.

  Jiang exhaled sharply through his nose, forcing himself to stay still. His heartbeat had picked up, anger creeping in at the edges of his thoughts. He shoved it down. He couldn’t afford to get angry at things he couldn’t change.

  This was the best path.

  Without the Sect, he had nothing. No money, no resources, no power. He didn’t even know how the world worked outside of his village. Wúyè had been overwhelming enough—crowded, loud, full of people who had barely spared him a glance. A city would be worse.

  How was he supposed to track down slavers when he didn’t even know where to start looking? The Azure Sky Sect could give him more than strength. Information. Connections. A way to move through the world that he had never had before.

  But how long would it take him to succeed? How long would his family have to wait?

  Jiang set his jaw. Without a goal, without a deadline, he knew it would be easy to become aimless. He’d seen it happen before—hunters who got too comfortable, who lost track of time and let the seasons pass them by. He wouldn’t let that happen.

  Six months.

  That would be his limit.

  It wasn’t long, not really. Cultivators spent years, decades, trying to grow stronger. But he wasn’t trying to reach some grand height. He didn’t care about immortal legacies or powerful techniques. He just needed enough.

  Six months to learn. Six months to train. Six months to gather whatever resources he could.

  Then, no matter what, he would leave the Sect and find his family himself.

  — — —

  Jiang sat cross-legged by the fire, hands resting loosely on his knees. His breath came slow and steady, eyes shut as he tried—again—to focus.

  Days had passed, and he still wasn’t making much progress. But little progress wasn’t no progress.

  At first, he had felt nothing – or, at least, nothing consistent. Now, at least, he could sense… something. It wasn’t inside him, not where he needed it to be, but it was there. A faint presence in the air around him, drifting, shifting, just beyond his reach.

  Qi.

  It had to be.

  It wasn’t strong, just a whisper at the edges of his senses. But as he moved closer to the mountains and to the Azure Sky Sect, it was growing. Subtle, but noticeable. If he focused, he could almost feel the change, like stepping from cold water into warm. Elder Lu had mentioned that the Azure Sky Sect was located in an area of higher density, which gave him some hope that detecting it would become easier as he continued to get closer.

  But it wasn’t enough.

  No matter how much he reached for it, no matter how carefully he tried to grasp the sensation, it never led him to the Qi within himself. Either he didn’t have enough Qi to sense, or he simply didn’t know what he was looking for.

  He felt like he was getting close, like all he needed was a better grasp of what Qi actually felt like, then he could do it. But to get a better look, he needed to find a better source of Qi than just the ambient stuff. And the only source he had was the elixir, which he couldn’t afford to drink until the last moment.

  Jiang paused, a thought occurring to him. Unless…

  Unless he didn’t drink it. The elixir was meant to be consumed and wouldn’t actually give him any Qi until he did, but it should still have Qi inside it. Right now, he didn’t need to drink it – he only needed to detect the Qi.

  Jiang’s hand drifted to his belt, fingers brushing against the small glass vial secured there and pulling it free. He didn’t pop the cork, just held it gently in his grasp.

  At first, there was nothing. Just the smooth glass against his palm, the weight of the liquid inside shifting slightly as he adjusted his grip.

  He exhaled, closing his eyes. Focused.

  The ambient Qi in the air was still there—faint, drifting at the edges of his awareness, barely more than a whisper. But the elixir…

  It was different.

  Subtle, like catching a scent on the wind or hearing a distant sound just at the edge of perception. But the longer he focused, the stronger it became. The Qi inside the elixir wasn’t scattered like the air around him. It was dense, concentrated. Held in place by the confines of the vial, but still shifting, still alive.

  Jiang concentrated, letting himself sink into the sensation.

  The more he focused, the clearer it became. The Qi pulsed, slow and steady, like a heartbeat. No, not quite—a current, flowing in tightly wound loops, shifting and coiling within itself. Each movement was deliberate, precise, following patterns he didn’t understand but could somehow recognize. Like a perfectly woven net or an intricate series of knots.

  It was… beautiful.

  Not in the way he had expected. He had thought Qi would be raw, untamed power, something to seize and wield. But this wasn’t wild. It wasn’t chaotic. It was structured, intricate, and layered in ways he couldn’t begin to unravel.

  And for the first time, Jiang truly understood just how much he didn’t know.

  The stories never talked about this. Even Elder Lu had only explained Qi in simple terms—energy, life, power. But what he held in his hands was more than that. It wasn’t just force; it was something living, something deliberate.

  Jiang exhaled, letting the sensation slip away.

  He had a long way to go. But at least now, he had a place to start.

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