Old Ning Kelai set down the rope of his sledge and unwound the latch on his chickens. Finally, he’d arrived.

  The lower quarter of a broken arch towered before him in the snowy plain as if abandoned for centuries. In reality, it had only been decades. Legions of eager hopefuls had picked the place clean hoping for a remnant of the Great Dragon’s flame.

  Ning knew there was nothing left, and magical creatures meant little to him. Being here at all was a symptom of his lack of talent; he would never be a prodigy and probably fail to reach average. No point in chasing unattainable dreams.

  Exhaustion caught up with him. Displacing a sack, he rested on the sledge a moment, removing his hat and cloak to release the heat. Frigid air rushed in.

  It had been a week’s journey on foot from Shivering Reach and his last restock of supplies. He’d warded and slept light to avoid the demons. His rations were healthy, and he was pleased to see space for the seeds. The ground here was always frozen, but even Ning’s small ability would be sufficient to help them grow. A small patch was all he’d need.

  The chickens were already exploring, pecking at the snow in their fluttering red ribbons. Ning grunted and replaced his hat before hefting the sack from the ground. Late afternoon already. No time to rest yet.

  Snow covered most of the ruin. A few old flags still hung here and there, ragged and faded. He spotted no footprints on the ancient stairs. No current visitors. Good.

  He crunched his way up to the arch, treading with care. He was over two hundred years old, after all. Not the worst compared to some. But his lifespan had entered its downwards phase, and he found himself wanting to hold on to it. It wasn’t enough.

  From the arch, half-buried flags sloped to the entrance cave. There were meant to be stairs, but the snow had covered them over. He picked his way down using the sack as a tester until the snow became slush on the rock below.

  The dragon’s hall still bore traces of its former glory. All but one of the supporting columns remained intact. Most of the carvings had been chiselled away, but a few decorative strips had stayed. Nothing that might be a map or story.

  That was fine. He hadn’t come for treasure. What mattered was that the hall was well-lit and free of snow, except for drifts tens of metres below the windows where it piled up in flurries. The empty expanse was vast, long, high and cold. He’d shutter them up. Include hinges for the light.

  For now, tomorrow’s problem. He set down the sack near the entrance and went back for a second. Eight more followed, ending with the regathered chickens. The emptied pine sledge he pushed easily down the entrance slope, too dangerous to leave outside. Bandits or demons – both threats he’d be unlikely to survive.

  Light snow had fallen the entire time, which he trusted to cover his prints. Scouting a spot behind a pillar, he laid out his bedroll and furs, and stored his gear behind another.

  He’d half-expected competition; others to be set up well before him. But it seemed they’d been focused on the dragon and its treasure. It suited him well. How did one hide something immovable? By making every alternative nearby seem better.

  That, and the venue was no place for living. He’d have to fix that before winter.

  No cooking tonight. Ning scattered grain for the chickens and pulled out some dry meat. As he chewed, he unstoppered the gourd at his hip and poured a helping of its contents onto the large stone slabs around the edge of his camp. Mugwort and sweet flag. He’d been sparing with its use on the journey; now, he was more liberal. Mortal men might not yet share his suspicions, but he wasn’t so sure about demons.

  The mirror hanging down his back he removed and placed facing the door to capture any spirits. Near his bedroll he scattered pine needles for winter resistance to substitute for the peach-wood pin in his hair. Once upon a time, he would have bowed thrice to the Tortoise, heavenly guardian of the north. But he no longer dared. Especially not here, in this place.

  His major concerns were visitors and demons. The former he couldn’t prevent. The latter were almost worse, having few other distractions. Before the dragon fell, there had been many animals in these parts, the weather warm and mild. After its death, the region had plunged into deadly winter which only the long-lived demons survived.

  Cultivators and their greed. As powerful as dragons were, their hearts were a shortcut to immortality. It had only been a matter of time.

  Now, starving, the northern demons turned on each other and travellers for food. They were becoming cannier at infiltrating human settlements. Shivering Reach, once a humble village, had become a strategic outpost. To make it past, he’d had to turn back south a day and detour around the road.

  What just world and what kind of gods rewarded such behaviour? It stemmed from the top; strictures mandated by heaven. Those in power benefitted and didn’t speak out. Everyone else simply found themselves reset on the endless wheel, memories gone as if they never existed. Over and over, many lives down, until they, too, joined the powerful. Maybe never.

  There were other, darker, ways, and Ning found them no worse or better. It was the same effect in the end, just sincerer. He rejected them all.

  Changing anything required defying the heavens. But not by becoming them, as official teachings practiced. By planting one’s flag firmly in the mortal realm and defending.

  To do that, one had to build one’s strength, a difficult task by traditional methods. Power attracted attention.

  But Ning would never be powerful, nor probably even average. It forced him to look at tasks differently.

  It was his greatest strength.

  Completing the protective round, he took out his pin and unwound the top layer of hair, placing his outer furs on top of his bedroll. This time of year, the sun here never set – supposedly a relic from the dragon. For a while he stared at the desecrated carvings far above his head. What little was left.

  Eventually, he slept.

  ---

  Nothing arrived while he dreamed. He only had to repeat it.

  Before scouting the hall, he fed the chickens and re-pinned his hair. One of the birds had pecked at its ribbon until it nearly untied; he fetched a replacement. After that, he checked on his own; dozens of ties in protective red up his forearms, many adorned with talismans. He hid them with furs of the same colour, less overtly suspicious. The dye was expensive but worth it, and coins were no use to him here.

  He chewed salted meat, retrieved the bronze mirror and slung it across his back. Out of his pouch he pulled his compass – a small plate and spoon – and tested his path. The handle swung erratically, with a very slight bias. As expected, the dragon had been precise with its lair.

  Retesting deeper in eliminated the bias, though the centre of the hall wasn’t hard to find. Something had once stood here the scavengers had dismantled, marked by the roughness of the stone. He marked it with a bamboo rod and retreated to the entrance to check the above-ground equivalent.

  Snow had covered his footprints overnight. He trudged new ones to the top of the ruins, unsurprised to discover a mound at the site. This would be the dragon’s dais, where it had greeted visitors. None but the worthy had once been allowed below. It was covered in snow, so he left it for now.

  Underground, he returned to the site.

  This was the moment he succeeded or went home. He needed calm, but his heart pounded. With great difficulty, he forced the anticipation from his mind and focused on reading energy.

  His own came to him first; the easiest for any cultivator to find. Ning’s meridians were few and narrow, their flow barely more than a trickle.

  Beyond them were others: trickles even weaker than his own. Hundreds of thousands of them, converging on this very point. Coating the hall in a gossamer web. Had he been stronger, even a little, his own qi would have drowned them out.

  The issue was, of course, known – but not viewed as a problem. Sects were nothing if not prideful, loathe to admit weakness. Anything below their notice was thus deemed insignificant and hollow. And the more they heard it repeated, the more the people believed.

  Mostly, they were right. Those lacking sufficient qi could easily be detected by enhanced physical senses. Crushed in an actual battle.

  But to reach the dragon’s lair, one usually needed power. First to survive the weather, and then to make it past the demons. Those who had power couldn’t perceive the secret, and those without it, if they made it at all, wouldn’t know what they saw.

  Ning glanced down at his compass. It was all about currents. Qi flowed through them in the body – but it wasn’t the only example, no. An old mentor of his had used magnets. Principle holding true, slowly but surely the world’s background energy – as befitting a giant magnet – must then also cycle through each of its bottlenecks.

  He now had proof.

  That no sects had moved in immediately after the dragon showed how little they’d cared to notice. He’d have to ensure it continued. But Ning was as much interested in the path back out as its convergence inwards. Siphoning large volumes of energy from chokepoints was beyond his slight capabilities. Even if he’d been able to contain it, the act would be quickly found out.

  He started instead by clearing some soil away from a niche in the ruin. It wasn’t a perfect hiding spot, since he expected some seekers of treasures. But it wasn’t immediately visible, which might buy him time he needed.

  By the time he tired, it extended four by four metres. The first quadrant he seeded with radishes, triggering each seed’s growth in his hand. Gai lan went in the second; wheat for the chickens in the third. The fourth he split between calamus and mugwort for his tincture. Lastly, he warmed the soil as best he was able.

  Thus depleted, he returned to bed, fed the chickens and renewed the protective ritual. No demons arrived.

  Fresh snow fell overnight. He cleared it, re-warmed the soil, then repeated his exercise from the previous day. The new patch contained bamboo, plum and pine.

  On the third day, he replenished his qi meditating under the dais.

  On the fourth, he tested his theory.

  Having been through standard assessment while young, Ning had quickly learnt he lacked elemental affinity. Only after reaching his fifties had he learnt about non-elemental types, ironically more common. Too numerous and varied to test for, they were frequent but rarely identified.

  Ning’s affinity was for affinities themselves; specifically adaptation. In the hands of a powerful cultivator, it might sow chaos, augment abilities and send opponents’ techniques awry. Ning was less impressive.

  But not useless. With a bone shovel, he dug a short trench a handspan deep along the radishes’ south side. In it he planted two bamboo rods strung together with several red ties. Using the structure as a frame, he moved his qi to create a filter for passing energy, transmuting its environmental type. Ice into fire; one basic element to another. Not too much, or the seeds would still die.

  Anywhere else, the filter would do nothing. Here, qi moved constantly south to north along the planet’s meridian lines. He spent some moments watching, then filled in the evidence.

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  Not only did no snow cover the seeds the next day, but the subsequent snowdrifts had melted all the way to the dais in a distinct measurable line. He fixed the mistake with a secondary filter, set up the second seed bed the same way, and celebrated.

  Such a small action. Any decent practitioner would have scoffed at its scale and lack of refinement.

  Here, it would change the world. One strand of qi at a time.

  Caution would be imperative; his line in the snow made that clear. Rushing would lead to disaster; missteps dramatically magnified. Even with his most careful efforts, Ning had to assume he might only have one try.

  He retrieved his axe from the supplies. The terrain made chopping easy; dead wood poking through snowdrifts for miles.

  Nothing grew here; not anymore. The forests he’d crossed had been desolate and windswept, embellished with slanted snow blown sideways into ice. Their trees no longer had branches, and splintered with just a few swings. He carried the timber back on his sledge, building a stockpile in the hall.

  Smoke would attract demons, so he didn’t build a fire. With his remaining bamboo rods, he instead built a filter around his camp, integrating it into the protective weave. He drove it through the gaps in the flagstones in a makeshift fence, rationing the salve running low.

  Even so, he was surprised there had been no demons. There were few other places travellers would visit nearby.

  With the wood, he began building shutters, slotting crossbars into whittled notches tied off with string. As he worked, he thought about his plan. He was onto the second by the time the first visitor came.

  Ning barely had time to dismiss his filter as their feet crunched the snow at the entrance. It was a woman; small, slender and young in appearance, possessing the aura of a cultivator more powerful – but not absurdly so – than he. She might have been a hundred years younger, or thousands of years older. Her furs were light grey to match the ice and designed for elegance more than protection, and on her back she wore a sword in a silver scabbard. The insignia on her belt and hairpins marked her as a low-ranking member of the Imperial sect. Not who Ning had expected to send seekers.

  She seemed only mildly surprised to see Ning’s camp, fixing him with a severe glare. “What are you doing here?”

  No greeting or etiquette for the likes of him.

  “Me, master?” Ning replied humbly. “Why, for opportunity, like everyone else who journeys here.”

  The visitor’s eyes swept towards the reaches of the hall, past his expanding camp, then back to his growing setup with disdain. “‘Everyone’ doesn’t generally make plans to move in,” she observed. “This territory belongs to the Red Emperor.”

  Ning gave her a half-smile before returning to his whittling. “Are you sure about that, master?” he asked. “I believe it’s been claimed by demons.”

  “Not for long,” the Imperial said. “And you’re doubly a fool for staying. Talismans and rituals are barely a deterrent, and there’s nothing here to claim. Unless you have found something.” Her eyes narrowed.

  “Not that kind of opportunity,” Ning elaborated. “I know my place. Actually, I plan to start a business selling to travellers.” He looked up from his work briefly. “One that pays its taxes. What brings the Empire here?”

  The woman opened her mouth as if to retort, then closed it. Clearly she knew the law, and Ning was grateful she respected it. “This site is marked to be cleared of demons,” she stated matter-of-factly, offering no further information.

  A scout, then. “I’d be appreciative,” Ning replied. “But I’d have thought those resources would be better spent towards settlements.”

  The woman moved further into the hall, eyes drawn by the chickens. “On that we agree. But the Red Emperor’s decisions are flawless.”

  The Red Emperor, Ning suspected – as did most of the Empire’s population – wasn’t nearly as powerful as propaganda made him out to be. The Imperial sect's role was mainly symbolic: part-truce, part-excuse to keep the real powerhouses from warring. All the more obvious considering its leader was pushing five hundred and still in the mortal realm. No surprise there; all the good bloodlines were dormant or extinct. Any active descendants tended to ascend to higher realms faster than they could spawn children.

  And never came back.

  “I don’t suppose you know when that’s due to happen?” he asked.

  “After winter, at the ebb of demon activity. You’re foolhardy coming unprepared when it’s about to begin. More for expecting client activity. What would you sell, even?”

  “Oh, vegetables. Ingredients,” Ning evaded, aware his position was weak. “But ultimately conversation. The value is less important than the feelings. Seekers out here won’t be hurting for money, master. They’ll appreciate a friendly ear.”

  The scout’s brows rose in clear scepticism. “I’ll tell you once: Leave. If somehow you’re still alive when we return, perhaps you won’t be evicted. Your customers may be worse than the demons.”

  She left him to explore the rest of the hall, moving quickly and gracefully with a vigour Ning envied. She didn’t appear to notice the funnel at the centre. He breathed a sigh of relief. Dismissal had kept him alive, but he’d been lucky. Subsequent visitors mightn’t be quite so pleasant.

  ---

  Eggs replaced meat as the days ran by and shadow crept into the night. His furs began to feel baggy around him. The radishes were ready within two weeks, accelerated by his qi, with the gai lan not far behind.

  In the cities, the sects would demand a fee. Qi-grown goods were a valuable service, they’d say, and cultivation wasn’t cheap. He’d first need a licence, and then to pay taxes – only to sell at a price no one needy could pay. Meanwhile, the taxes never made it back to the streets.

  He boarded up the hall’s entrance and windows with fragile wood shutters, doing his cooking during the day. The smoke from his pot rose to the top of the hall and he let it out gently, gradually easing it away.

  That was his mistake.

  He woke to a tapping at the entrance.

  Rolling into a crouch, Ning held his breath and checked the ritual circle, white hair loose around him in a cloud. The last of his tincture had been growing thin.

  “I smelt your pot,” a voice called from outside; soft, inhuman and gravelly. “It’s cold, and I’m bone and skin. Won’t you let me in?”

  He’d bound the shutters with ribbon; a minor demon wouldn’t break in. He thought it was minor. Major demons had been known to play the part, leading the overconfident to believe they could win.

  He held his breath longer. Soft clucking came from his chickens.

  Shuffling sounded from outside the door. “You’re a seeker,” the voice called again. “Let me in, and I’ll lead you to the dragon’s treasure.”

  Like all words out of a demon’s mouth, it would be true but deceptive. No doubt he would be led to an item long since scavenged into someone’s vault and then devoured. Or devoured first and his corpse posthumously delivered. Regardless, he wasn’t interested. Ning’s lungs ached.

  “I know where you are,” said the demon. “Let me in or I’ll return with my kin.”

  Demons, as a rule, didn’t like to share. Much like cultivators in that regard. This one must have been desperate to consider splitting a find with its brethren.

  Pleading. Bargains. Threats. He stood less of a chance against a pack of them. He’d known discovery would likely come, sooner rather than later. He could fortify his protections and resign himself to living under siege.

  And yet, that desperation.

  He breathed in and smoothed his beard. “I have a counteroffer,” he declared.

  The shuffling ceased, followed by a long, long pause.

  “Gracious traveller,” wheezed the demon.

  “You want my soul,” Ning said bluntly. “Or others’ I can help you retrieve. I believe the standard arrangement is three in return for my life. Correct?”

  “Three is not sufficient,” the demon breathed, no longer pretending. “Promise me twelve human souls, one for each month of the year and delivered before month’s end. Then I will leave you be.”

  It was a poor arrangement; the terms protecting him from only one adversary. He would have to return to a city, or at minimum Shivering Reach. The demon must badly need to feed.

  “I have breeding chickens,” he called through the door. “Promise not to harm me in any way, and I’ll give you one straight away.”

  “You insult me,” rumbled the demon. The shutters rattled, sending the red ribbon fluttering. But they held.

  “That’s not the full proposal,” Ning said. “That’s just to keep your immediate starvation at bay. I plan to feed you the souls of my enemies.”

  A low hacking sounded beyond the shutters. It took him a moment to realise the demon was laughing. “Wicked. Shameful. Offering immortal parts of your mortal kin; sentencing them to permanent annihilation.”

  It was trying to make him feel bad; change his mind to make him give up more easily.

  “Is it?” he asked. “What if they didn’t belong to mortals? What if I offered you souls from the heavens?”

  “It is not possible.”

  “It is,” Ning argued. “Who made you how you are, requiring you feed on souls? Who could have undone your curse at any time but left you to rot in the mortal world, shunned and hunted by its natives? How many gods would it take to come back and change the shape of your whole existence without lifting so much as a finger?”

  A long silence sounded from the other side of the door.

  “One,” said the demon, finally. “One soul.”

  “Then that’s my offer, plus an interim supply of chickens. In return, I would like your protection, confidentiality and help. If in one year no divine soul has been turned over, the bargain is off.”

  “And how do you, ambitious traveller, plan to achieve the impossible?” the demon wheezed.

  “I won’t do it alone. There’s me. There’s you. And everybody else.”

  “How many is everybody?”

  “All of them,” Ning answered. He stepped across the tincture boundary and shuffled to the shutters, hanging the resting mirror back over his neck. The talismans on his arms glittered. “I’m opening the door now.”

  On the other side stood an enormous brown deer, antlers almost scraping the floor. It had four bloodshot eyes with barely a spark of chilling glow. Its neck drooped under the weight of its horns, and it was horribly, terribly thin, with fur caved dramatically inwards. Inscriptions covered its hoofs and antlers, dulled and worn.

  He’d had little to worry about, Ning realised, even as it hungrily stared at him. The situation was worse than he’d thought.

  “Let me get you that chicken,” he said, and stepped back from the door.

  ---

  The hall contained plenty of space for demons. Ning insisted on it staying at the far end away from his bedroll, and harvested a fresh batch of sweet flag and mugwort.

  The demon looked slightly less wretched since consuming the chicken – albeit more likely to murder him in his sleep – but he trusted the agreement would hold. The problem was that he suspected he’d still been had, since he now had an ongoing drain on his chicken supply with little immediately obvious return.

  “The plan is this,” he told it the following morning after sleeping badly. “With the reminder you’re bound to discretion. We don’t reduce the flow of qi in the world. That would be noticed somewhere. The planetary meridians must travel away to somewhere from here.” Reaching inside his pouch, he drew out the compass spoon and used it to point towards his shoes. “Channels run through the inside of a magnet as well as without; it probably ends up down there, out at the other Great Dragon’s lair.”

  It made him uneasy; he had a base idea of what human cultivators were capable of and much less idea about dragons. As far as he knew, the southern dragon was still alive and would notice a disruption to its nest. Worse, intercept it.

  “I think we capture qi here and send it out in reverse,” he continued his explanation. It was nice to put a voice to his ideas, even if the demon had no idea what he meant. “But instead of the typical aimless cycle, we target it. Imagine, demon. Every person who can receive qi… does. A portion of the planet’s supply, which is not insignificant. Do you know what separates the mortal realm from the heavens?”

  “Its inferiority in every way,” the deer haltingly replied. It sat on the slabs with its legs folded under it. Compared to the previous night, its voice was a little clearer. Head a little higher.

  “The level of ambient qi,” Ning corrected. It was basic sect training, back when he’d thought that dream could still fire. “And do you know what creates that?”

  The demon blinked one set of eyes after the other and did not reply.

  “Cultivators,” Ning answered for it. “Well, the humans.” He wasn’t sure about demons, who consumed more than provided. “Cultivators generate qi from within as well as their environment. The stronger they are, the more they provide.”

  The mortal realm had always been the weakest of the realms, but historical records clearly showed a downwards slide as its stronger practitioners ascended.

  “It’s solvable in small doses,” he said. “Concentrated qi can unstop blocked meridians. Stimulate new ones over time. Speed up refinement. Spur on breakthroughs in a fraction of the usual duration. The issue is one of scarcity.”

  There were pills the sects restricted, much like the taxes on radishes, but far more limited in supply. A single pill could purchase a marriage, alliance, or closely-held technique, usually to benefit the scarce few in favour at the time. Alchemical knowledge was closely guarded. Sects fought wars over the findings.

  The deer snorted through its lips in reply. “You can’t throw unfiltered qi at an average human and expect they’ll survive. Your little bodies are fragile.”

  “No,” Ning agreed. “So we tailor them.”

  “Pah,” said the demon. “How will this subdue the divine?”

  Ning answered indirectly. “Two global cycles,” he announced, holding up an equal number of fingers. “The first proceeds uninhibited. We filter qi in this hall subtly, altered to record the personal maps of every soul it touches. That information will soon make its way back to us.”

  “How demonic of you,” the deer said dryly. “You’ll turn the whole world against you.”

  “Only if they notice. Or listen to the people who do. The second cycle will be less subtle, because of how it’s designed.”

  “To break people open.”

  “There’s no hiding it,” Ning said. “I’m aware I might die in the backlash. In which case, you can have my soul once I’m done with it. I don’t see the point if I won’t remember my lives.”

  The demon stared at him.

  He continued. “So we don’t try to hide it. We embrace it. Present being strengthened as the blessing it is, but at an individual scale rather than the agenda behind it. That’s the gift we send in reverse, back along the surface. Back along the lines. The ambient qi stays constant because it’s still travelling out in the world. Nothing is stolen, only put to better purpose.”

  That was his only hope at making it stick. He couldn’t make his realm strong enough to withstand the heavens on a single try. It would need several iterations at least, each one building on the gains from the last to improve the results each time.

  “There are obvious problems with this,” declared the demon.

  “Oh?” Ning deflated somewhat. “Why?”

  “If you bump up everyone’s power, your strongest humans will ascend. Taking their qi with them.”

  “Only a few,” Ning said, though the sinking feeling he felt made him worry the deer was right. “Overall, more people will be positively impacted by several million times.”

  “And the chaos these presents will bring your society?”

  He stroked his beard, drawing the long strands through his fingers. “Being selective would make them angrier. Excluding powerful players is exactly how I die.” He glanced at the demon. “Let the masters ascend, then, and join the enemy. We’ll focus on the new baseline.”

  “You’ll have to win them over, old man,” the demon rumbled with a toss of its antlers. “They won’t want to fight your battle. Heaven is an aspiration and legends struggle to die. The task you’ve set is primed to fail.”

  But no longer ‘impossible’, Ning noted. There was much work to do before he set it all in motion, and it had to be done before end of winter. The strongest among mortals stood far below the weakest of the heavens.

  It would be hard.

  Still, he would try.

  Written By: Skylark ()

  Writing Prompt: “Santa in a cultivation world starts a sect.”

  Themes: Cultivation, Sect Building