Tantra is staring at the moon, panting as she lays on the grass, she doesn’t need much sleep anymore, perhaps four for the sixteen she passes awake. She knows her progress is insane in speed, and that her muscles can handle the strain of Qi admirably, but she doesn’t have a body forged to use that to her advantage.

  It’ll come, with time, so long as she keeps to her exercises, and the need to escape her thoughts has proven sufficient motivation from the need to see her family.

  She knows it’s probably not the best idea, but it’s working wonders, the need to escape responsibility and sorrow overwhelming in its necessity.

  She’s pathetic.

  Kisrin lost everything and he managed to pull himself back, she’s just avoiding, for fear it would crush her. But still, between the training, there are moments of contemplation.

  Which is why she doesn’t leave any space between training.

  Taking one gigantic thread and splitting it into three smaller threads, she slowly covers her body with Qi. Scales is a challenge, even for her control, but it presents the best defensive option amongst the beginner techniques in her manual.

  It’s meant to be more segmented and spontaneous, the cultivator forming the scales just before the point of impact, what she’s doing, a full body perpetual suit is only possible because of her control, and it’s only the first challenge.

  Just floating Qi under her skin isn’t going to do anything, she has to push it with intention.

  She gives reality two orders, to make the Qi construct something that enforces her muscles with the concept of a bulwark, and for each scale to support the other, multiplying its defensive utility.

  That’s the crux of this technique, its strength increases exponentially with each scale. Qi is something between physical and spiritual, so it doesn’t share all the traits of either.

  Rather than a scale supporting its surrounding brothers, as normal scale mail would, instead each scale provides support for each one present, despite the distance between them.

  She pushes her intention and…it doesn’t work.

  Another failure.

  She sighs, what is she doing wrong? The concepts of defence and support aren’t so complex that they’re above her will, she can tell, and her Qi doesn’t drain so it’s not that.

  She’s missing something.

  But what?

  She sighs and stares at the moon, she can’t really move considering how hard she went with her burpees, so she guesses she’ll be sleeping on the grass tonight, which is fine.

  Her robes will clean themselves and it’s an excuse to bathe one last time before she’s officially…no longer part of the family.

  She has a sigil of iron to replace the one of jade, it essentially gives her the privileges to take rudimentary work under the Jade Sol.

  She’ll have to give it back once she leaves.

  Her body starts to weep blood as Tantra pulls on five threads at once.

  -

  The halls of house Farlagh are quaint compared to the Sol estates' ostentatious splendour. Tasteful paintings hang on walls of redwood, placed alongside vases filled with flowers. The rug on the floor is an obsidian black with intricate embroidery of gold decorating its periphery.

  The lamps are Qi constructs, feeding off the Qi in the air to provide illumination.

  The fact they’re using Qi lamps instead of blueflame says a lot about their finances, but then again, the Jade Sol is a titan, or they just don’t care for presentation, who knows? She isn’t about to call her employer cheap to their face.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Still, the paintings are nice.

  She’s looking at one depicting the oasis rumored to be at the center of The Hanging Dunes, in the painting multiple spirit beasts graze and drink from the oasis’s waters in peace. There’s a big red thing in the middle Tantra thinks is called a hippopotamus, skin glistening from the sun’s glare. Whoever drew this has probably never seen the oasis, it is, afterall, the biggest foci on Testhim. The Expanse is bigger but it’s a collection of hundreds of mediocre foci’s working in synergy around the Dead God rather than one.

  “It’s a surprisingly peaceful interpretation of the Dunes,” Synthia says, “I’m more of the inclination that grand Godbeasts live at its center.”

  “Despite Okham-Khal having never endured a beast tide from within?” Tantra says

  “It’s grand enough that the frenzied retreat of beasts would peter out by the time they reach any form of civilization.”

  “Perhaps,” Tantra comments diplomatically.

  “Perhaps indeed,” Synthia muses, “do you think anyone's been to the centre? There are plenty of immortals in the sultanate who might survive the journey.”

  “I don’t know the musings of immortals, but if the centre has a Qi density anywhere near that of the Dead God’s then it would require someone who's survived millenia.”

  “That does cut the candidates down quite a bit,”

  “There’s the man on the mountain,” Ezra interrupts.

  “That’s just a rumor, besides I don’t remember giving you permission to speak,”

  Ezra rolls his eyes but listens to her order, it’s almost comical watching someone near Tantra’s age commanding a proper cultivator she assumes has anchored.

  He’s at least touched the dao, if the smell of wet earth was any indication.

  “Do you ever plan on visiting the Dunes?” Synthia asks.

  Tantra blinks, “not particularly my lady.”

  “Why not? You’re lifespan will surely exceed mine by centuries, might as well see some of the world before rejoining the cycle.”

  “I’ll think on it,”

  “See that you do.”

  -

  He walks through the trail of nature, luxuriating in the sounds of chittering bugs and singing birds, this forest is home to a thousand thousand lives, all fighting to thrive in an ecosystem designed to enslave them, and who are the greatest of slaves but the ones at the centre?

  Dousou doesn’t understand the reverence others give to such things, they have the power to rule the world, and yet they don’t, why?

  Simple, because the foci is their lifeline, they depend on it like an addiction, fighting every decade in a futile attempt for dominance over a piece of dirt that ultimately proves futile. Dousou has seen them die, multiple times, they always come back.

  Like an immortal, except they should be strong enough to destroy souls, so there must be another reason, some secret path only these primordial bastards know.

  Still, their continued survival makes for a lucrative bounty, if one is willing to go to the center of the DarkWoods, not a safe journey by any means but he has his methods.

  Like SILENCE.

  The world reverberates as he calls upon the dao, enshrouding his steps in the ambiance of his surroundings as he continues down the trail. Some scoff at simple dao’s like his, pointing towards their limited utility, but dao is a thing of comprehension, and even the most unassuming can be made into something powerful.

  NO ONE SPEAKS UNDER THE EDGE OF MY BLADE.

  Such a simple mutation, from how it sounds it’s almost useless, but there are so many ways to speak beyond words.

  Like communicating with reality.

  Such an integral part of a cultivators arsenal, stripped away.

  Suddenly it doesn’t seem so useless does it?

  But foolish mortals will always tout the elemental dao’s. Only seeing the flashy displays of cultivation with little understanding of its intricacies. But he’s not really one to talk, silence is the only esoteric dao in his arsenal, so focused he was in his younger days on the stereotypes.

  One of his greatest shames.

  Still, he’s strong, not nearly strong enough to face the divine beasts and wraiths that roam the center, but he’s done this enough times to feel confident in his chances of making it back to the Serpent’s Fang without injury, all he has to do is tread carefully and he can get the resources so crucial to his advancement.

  That’s always the drive these days, finding some kind of shortcut to the arduous task of cultivation. Once you get to his state, resources become almost necessary to combat the glacial pace of progression.

  Sure he’s stronger than he was a century ago, but not much of his progression has been from training. Sure, forging is meant to be resource intensive, and refining is dangerous to rush, but it gets to a point where it’s just ridiculous.

  He doesn’t train his foundations anymore, not really seeing the point, unless he drained a quarter of his core he won’t feel much exhaustion, and he doesn’t get into fights where that would be necessary, and the physical benefits don’t really appeal to him as far as he is.

  Have to be judicious with your time after all, pursue everything and you’ll have time for nothing.

  He walks silently down the trail, musing on his cultivation along the way.