A claw blade split past Tsem’s shoulder, a poor throw. Thankfully the ascended bladebear wasn’t accustomed to the stone near the stream. That combined with its focus being split between catching up to him and skewering him from afar were all that kept him alive. That wouldn’t last long.

  Beneath all his newfound speed, the site of his fight against the pinfish was already lost from sight. Up ahead, not too far, the stream seemed to suddenly grow wider. Not that it would help him.

  Even burning every scrap of qi he had left in his meridians and stomach, Tsem couldn’t outpace the beast. His leg cried out with each step, and his chest felt like it was on fire, the injuries dealt him by the gold pinfish were getting in his way. It didn’t matter. He had to keep going, he had to.

  The thrown blade was no isolated event. A storm of blades soared at him from behind, the beast now apparently able to regenerate as many as it pleased as fast as it pleased. Tsem frantically looked around, hoping to find some way to survival, some glint of hope. Perhaps a cliff to the side which he could climb, or some randomly placed cave he could hide from the larger creature in. There was nothing.

  No, not nothing. Where it widened, Tsem could see a great basin in the stream ahead. Inside, beneath the flow of the stream itself, the water somehow parting around it, was a ruin. They were common in the area around the mountain, though this one was larger than any Tsem had come across before. There was a rule Kanuk had imparted on him, one of the few warnings he had given. Do not go near any of the ruins.

  For all the time Tsem had spent in the forest hunting, he’d always followed that rule. When the odd interella had wandered too close to a ruin, he had let it go. When no ghalri raptors had appeared for him in those early days, he’d known the ruins were almost always surrounded by blue sap trees, prime food sources for ghalri raptors, and an easy hunting ground. Tsem had never once taken the chance though. Kanuk’s warning had been emphatic.

  Then again, there wasn’t much choice. Tsem sped along, the air feeling more real than ever before, the powerful qi in the air could no longer be ignored as a possible illusion or trick of his senses. If he had to go near a ruin, he would not have wished it to be one on the mountain itself. He passed next to it.

  Another claw blade flew by, inches away from taking his whole cheek off. Tsem dove into the river. There was no more time to hesitate. He’d just have to accept the unknown risk of the ruins. It was better than the known certainty of death behind him.

  He was never more glad for his years of swimming in the river near his old village than he was now. As the bladebear hesitated on the shore, trying to skewer him in the water, Tsem paddled for his life, the absolute last of his qi winking out, leaving just his own physical strength. It didn’t feel like enough.

  The stream here was somehow wider than it was downstream, so much so that it looked almost like a proper river. It made no sense. The rapids here too, were intense. Water splashed into Tsem’s face. His nose fought against it to keep breath flowing through him, his eyes gave up their battle, closing tightly to keep the spray away.

  If he were a weaker swimmer, or if he had even a single meridian less purified, he would’ve been swept away and crushed on the rocks. As it was, he just kept using all his strength, adrenaline driving him desperately onward.

  It wasn’t long before the current changed. Like he’d suddenly moved into a different body of water, the stream stopped shoving him downstream and started yanking him in, towards the basin of dry land that the ruins rose from. All too suddenly, Tsem understood why there was a proper river upwards and only a large stream on the other side. The ruins were pulling the water in, somehow absorbing it into the stone.

  The current pulled everything nearby in. A piece of driftwood slammed into Tsem as he tried to stay above water, sending him underneath. Here, he was sent down, no longer able to hold out against the whirling pull of the ruin below.

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  Tsem held his breath as best he could, deciding to move with the current since there was no going against it. It didn’t take him long to be thrown out, gasping onto the small, wooded area that surrounded the ruins proper. A mere foot behind him, the water slammed into the stone foundation. Not a drop splattered on him. The stone drank all, the water appearing to almost just disappear.

  A sensation overwhelmed Tsem with strength. It was just like those few times that Valesin had chosen to speak with him through impressions in the divine sea, only it wasn’t some slight shift in the currents, the sea itself altered entirely, forming the feeling of words.

  “Welcome to the Mountain’s gate, Seeker.”

  Tsem collapsed to his knees, screaming from the feeling, the absolutely overwhelming sensation of the world’s reality bending to the will of some entity, powerful and ancient beyond words.

  “Apologies, formation builder.”

  The impression was much fainter this time, but Tsem couldn’t forget the divine sea moving so completely. How strong was this entity that spoke to him? An immortal, no doubt. Valesin was only a few short steps away from basic immortality himself, and he’d shifted the currents only slightly.

  No further instructions came, leaving Tsem to give his deepest bow, thanking the mysterious entity for its guidance. No response came. For a while, he stayed bent over, frightened that he might be smote where he stood for a slight show of defiance.

  Nothing further came, and eventually Tsem moved from his bow. He had been welcomed. It didn’t seem like he was unwanted here, at least. He decided to make use of the hospitality, removing his pack from his back. He took the final pill Kanuk had given him, popping it in his mouth. He didn’t want to be injured here, and his escape had done plenty of harm, his leg likely infected, his chest feeling like something was broken inside.

  He set up camp, moving cautiously around. His hopes of leaving were poor, the water around was crashing mercilessly down on all sides, leaving nothing to climb. Even the ruins didn’t reach so high. A problem for another time.

  Before anything else came along, Tsem needed to recover his qi. He sat in the middle of his makeshift camp, legs crossed, feeling the qi around him. He’d never been good at breathing qi from the outside world into his body. Usually, he just waited for it to recover on its own. Here though, it was simple to suck in qi, the world seemingly suffuse with it.

  It all went to his stomach, where the bulk of his qi was stored. A yin qi practitioner might store their qi in their heart, at least until they opened their middle dantian. Tsem’s yang qi though, gathered naturally in his stomach, a source of power that he could spread throughout his meridians and burn as he needed.

  It took perhaps an hour for him to fully restore his qi, a much faster rate than the half-a-day or so, it took for him to recover it naturally. With that, Tsem had little to do but explore.

  He kept well-clear of the ruins proper, choosing to scout around the perimeter of the little sunken island he found himself in. The place was a grove of blue sap trees, and he saw plenty of ghalri raptors flitting through the trees.

  That was good, but he’d left the spiritual herbs he needed for his cultivation method behind. That too, after further exploration, wouldn’t be a problem. Instead of the normal undergrowth he was used to seeing in the forest, this island had spiritual herbs in the thousands just growing here.

  Tsem was able to identify the herbs he needed, picking them and realizing they were even more potent than what he was used to. They would do. Again, Tsem looked up at the water all around him. How far would he need to advance to escape. Would he be able to, even with six purified meridians? He doubted it.

  An angry snort pulled Tsem’s attention from nearby, a large hoof smacked against the ground. He looked up frantically, finding a demonic beast glaring at him, its eyes gleaming white. He could barely feel its demonic qi, so powerful was the qi in the air around him. Tsem pulled his spear and net up.

  The beast looked like a boar though its tusks were far larger and more intricate than a normal wild pig. No, this was a boartubko. Tsem had heard of them from Waska and Kanuk. They’d both hunted such monsters before.

  He racked his brain trying to recall what they’d told him. He wasn’t exactly given much time, the demonic beast was already rearing back, ready to charge. Tsem burned qi for speed, peeling off to the boar’s left side. As it charged, wind pulled into gaps in its hollow tusks. The effect of a basic wind qi technique no doubt. That made the creature a grade 2 beast, capable of using external qi just like the bladebear and the gold pinfish.

  Tsem managed to move quickly enough to escape the charge, but he recalled too late what he’d been told of the beast. As he pulled around the boartubko’s side, the wind sucked into its tusks unleashed in an explosion, blasting forth from little bits of hollow bone poking from its side.

  Tsem was blown off his feet, and sent tumbling into a nearby tree, a stream of blue sap sticking to his hunting leathers. Rattled, he got back to his feet only to find the boartubko already charging again. With even less time to react, Tsem hyper burned his qi, partially running and partially climbing up the trunk he’d just smacked into.

  He tossed his net beneath him, capturing the beast even as its momentum shook the tree. It seemed it wasn’t just the herbs that were strengthened by qi around here though. The tree, despite the impact of the grade 2 demonic beast, held.

  Tsem jumped down on the other side, burning strength and plunging his spear into the boartubko. It turned, blasting out a weak blast of wind with the motion, hoping to put Tsem back under pressure. He managed to switch to burning for durability just in time though, enduring the hit. Strength again. His spear thrust even deeper, finding something critical this time.

  Tsem breathed easier as the beast died. He’d been lucky. If that tree hadn’t been there, he wouldn’t have been able to escape the charge. The boartubko had relied on momentum, keeping him under pressure. If it had been just a little smarter, ambushed him in a clearing or such, he’d never have been able to recover.

  Tsem knelt down, taking the carcasses hide. He might not have meant to fight the creature, but he wasn’t about to let contribution points go to waste. He looked at the watery prison all around him. He didn’t even know when or if he’d get a chance to turn in said materials.