Unintended Cultivator

Sen wasn’t given very much time to think about what he was going to do about the flying demonic cultivator before he was forced to worry about his own survival. While there were fewer spirit beasts floating around, that didn’t mean that there were none. And while some of them had seemed to make common cause against the demonic cultivators, because everyone hated demonic cultivators, that didn’t make them all friendly to Sen. It was a lesson that he very nearly paid with his life to learn. One second, he was glaring up at the demonic cultivator in the sky. The next, his every instinct was screaming at him that danger was incoming from behind. Sen dove forward. Even so, he felt several sharp lines of fire as claws opened wounds across his shoulders. If he’d been a heartbeat slower, those claws might well have taken his head off. He sent a fireball back because that was what he happened to be cycling at the moment. There was an angry roar and the stench of burned fur filled the air.

Sen had a new appreciation for his body cultivation as he felt the wounds on his back closing up, but he didn’t let that distract him. As soon as he completed his diving roll, he did another in a different direction. His spiritual awareness informed him that whatever it was had landed in the spot he’d just vacated. Although, the massive tremor he felt in the ground could have provided the same information just as easily. Betting that the spirit beast couldn’t change directions quite as quickly as he had, he let the roll carry him up onto his feet, then launched himself up and at an angle. His left hand seized a thick branch high up in one of the rare, undamaged trees, and he planted his feet on the trunk, stabilizing himself even as he hung off the side of the tree at an almost horizontal angle.

Just like a Sen-shaped branch, he thought. He shook off the random thought and focused down on where he’d just been. Oh, come on, he whined mentally. What is it with these bear-cat things? Is the entire species holding a grudge? After a moment of consideration, though, the thought sounded less ludicrous than it had. The oxen all seemed to know who he was. He supposed that word could have gotten around that he’d killed that bear-cat back on the road to Tide’s Rest. Then again, it was also possible that they were all just jerks. He had been attacked by every single one of them that he’d seen so far. While a swift backhand had dealt with the last one he’d fought, he didn’t think that was going to work with this one. It was very, very big. It was also more powerful. He was actually better at figuring out the relative power levels of spirit beasts than he was with cultivators, and this one was at least as powerful as he was. Wait, he thought, no, as I was.

Even so, that meant he was probably dealing with something he should treat as an equal. He considered what he might do if his prey had climbed a tree, and then immediately launched himself off the tree. A bare second or two later, the lower portion of the tree simply exploded as the bear-cat swiped at it. While most people would probably have concerned themselves with where they were going to land, or even how they were going to land, Sen had been trained by people who considered being airborne nothing but an opportunity. Sen considered and discarded a few possibilities before he settled on something he’d done back in Emperor’s Bay. He cycled shadow and metal and forced them together with his will. It came a lot easier this time, although he didn’t have the luxury of examining why. He aimed the technique down at the bear-cat and launched it. A dozen spears of metal-infused shadow bore down on the spirit beast like malevolent meteors. It dodged a couple and batted away a few more, but the anguished noises it made told Sen that at last some of the spears had struck true.

Content that bear-cat would be preoccupied for at least the next few seconds, Sen turned his attention to the problem of falling toward the ground at high speed. He added a wind qi cycle to his collection and let a tightly packed column of air catch and cushion his fall. He didn’t make the column of air so thick that he floated down. That would just make him a target of opportunity. He just let it slow him enough that he was able to roll with the impact and not worry about pesky things like shattering his legs or spreading his brains out across some rocks. He came to his feet, only to find himself surrounded by a small pack of wolves. Enormous, black-furred dire wolves with eyes that sparked yellow with lightning in them. Sen lost his patience at that point.

He unleashed his killing intent but focused it on an area that only included him and the wolves. Three of the wolves let out terrified yips as blood poured from their ears and mouths. Those three bounded away into the forest in terror. The last wolf, maybe the alpha of the group, was apparently tougher than the other three. It crouched low, ears laid back, but even it wasn’t immune to Sen’s killing intent. Blood trickled from around its eyes and from its nose. Sen stared at it, trying to decide what to do. The wolves hadn’t actually attacked him. He’d landed in the middle of their group. Deciding that he didn’t actually need another whole species of spirit beasts angry with him, he decided to take a second and try diplomacy.

“I have no grievances with you,” Sen said, releasing his killing intent. “If you wish to go, go. I won’t stop you.”

No longer beneath the crushing force of Sen’s killing intent, the wolf straightened back up to its full height. It eyed him warily, seemingly looking for the trap or the lie. Then, it cautiously took a step backward. It paused, never letting its gaze leave Sen, before it took another step. When Sen did nothing but look at it, the wolf took a few more cautious steps away. Then, turning, it bounded into what was left of the forest. Sen watched it for a moment before he turned his attention back to where he’d last seen the bear-cat. He marched in that direction, determined to finish it off if it wasn’t already dead. He could have saved himself the walking, though. The thing was well and truly dead. Sen spread out his spiritual awareness to ensure that nothing else snuck up on him and turned his attention skyward again.

Sen didn’t know if the demonic cultivator outclassed Lo Meifeng, or if she was just running on empty the way that Lifen had been, but she seemed to have taken to acting defensively. Well, that won’t solve the problem, thought Sen. Sen once more weighed his options. Lightning hadn’t worked so well against the demonic cultivator. Since he was already cycling metal and shadow, he decided there was no harm in trying that. He took careful aim and then sent a barrage of shadowy spears skyward. He was amused to note that they glinted here and there in the sunlight. The demonic cultivator either wasn’t paying attention or hadn’t considered Sen a threat, because those spears very nearly ended him. It was a last-second dodge and fast work with a dao that saved the man. Since he had the man’s attention, he sent another barrage. Then, Sen felt the vast swell of the man’s qi above him. He could feel that it was earth qi, but he wasn’t sure exactly what it was going to do.

Not wanting to find out if the demonic cultivator was about to break his technique, Sen released it and activated his qinggong technique. There was no benefit in making himself an easy target. Plus, running around on the ground at speed might help keep the man distracted. While Sen had hoped that Lo Meifeng would take advantage of the distraction, it seemed like she was mostly taking a moment to catch her breath and down something. Sen made a mental note to ask what it was. He’d heard about things like qi restoration pills and even been fed them by Auntie Caihong a few times, but he’d never made time to examine one up close. If he was her, that’s about the only thing that he’d take time out from a fight to choke down. Then, Sen had to focus on surviving again.

What felt to Sen like an endless supply of stone spikes started shooting up out of the ground. That wouldn’t have been so bad, but the technique seemed to be attached to him somehow, so it was everything he could do to keep one step ahead of the spikes. As he raced across the forest, dodging and weaving, he searched his body and his energy for whatever the demonic cultivator had used to target him specifically. When he finally found it, he was impressed. It was subtle, the tiniest little hook of earth qi. It was so small and so fundamentally not dangerous in and of itself, that he hadn’t even noticed it. Once he’d found it, it was easy enough to dislodge. Of course, that distraction on Sen’s part let the demonic cultivator focus on Lo Meifeng again. She seemed to be doing better. She was launching offensive strikes, rather than fighting entirely defensively, but Sen understood how pills and elixirs worked well enough to know that it was a short-term fix. Best case scenario, Lo Meifeng had bought herself five or ten minutes of extra fighting time.

Sen knew that he could end that fight. He had the means at his disposal, but he wasn’t sure he dared to do it. Even before his advancement, he hadn’t understood what was happening with Heavens’ Rebuke. Now, he had a core and a whole new kind of energetic ribbon in his dantian. He shuddered to imagine what he might generate if both those ribbons of energy decided to jump into the technique at the last minute. Still, he might have to do it. If it came down to a choice between letting Lo Meifeng die or using a technique that frightened him, he’d use the technique. But he still had a minute or two to at least try something else. A glance upward showed Sen that the demonic cultivator had dismissed him completely in favor of concentrating on Lo Meifeng. Time to get creative, Sen told himself.

He'd had some success fusing qi types into something more deadly than single qi techniques usually provided. If he could do it with two types of qi, could he do it with three? Of course, it couldn’t just be any qi types. He didn’t want to use earth, since the demonic cultivator was strong in earth. Metal and fire didn’t mix well, so that was out. Sen hesitated at that thought. They didn’t mix well because fire tended to damage metal, but a technique typically only lasted a few seconds. What would he get if he mixed fire and metal with his wind blade technique? Sen started cycling for wind, fire, and metal. He could tell that he was pulling hard on his reserves at this point, but it wasn’t going to matter soon. Forcing the fire and metal qi together with the wind qi was profoundly more difficult than fusing shadow and metal. Still, he kept at it, bending his not inconsiderable will to the task. Slowly, grudgingly, almost angrily, the qi fused into something that felt wild, unstable, and ridiculously dangerous to Sen.

He didn’t stop to examine it. He just looked up and launched the technique. The demonic cultivator tried to counter the blazing curve of metal, fire, and wind that hurtled toward him, but the technique was so unstable that it exploded in the cultivator’s face. Even on the ground, Sen heard the demonic cultivator’s screams. When the smoke and light cleared, Sen could see exposed bone and seared flesh. When the demonic cultivator fixed him with eyes driven mad with pain and anguish, a cold shiver ran through Sen’s entire body. Fortunately, Lo Meifeng had been ready that time. A lance of fire punched through the demonic cultivator’s chest. For a long moment, the demonic cultivator just hung limply, suspended in the air by that fire. Then, with a scream driven by hate and rage and exhaustion, Lo Meifeng burned the body to ash.

As relieved as he was that Lo Meifeng had survived and that she had finished the man off, Sen was most relieved that he hadn’t needed to fall back on Heavens’ Rebuke. Lo Meifeng slowly drifted down to land by Sen. She looked him up and down, then sniffed. She didn’t look quite as bad as Lifen had, but she still looked ready for a week of sleep. As if to punctuate that thought for him, Lo Meifeng sagged a little and took a few halting steps over to a tree. She put a hand on it to steady herself.

“You took your sweet time waking up,” she said.

“You know how it is when you’re having a nice dream,” said Sen with a shrug.

The older cultivator glared at him and said, “I will stab you.”

Sen held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Sorry. We should probably go find Lifen before some spirit beast sees through the formation I hid her in.”

Lo Meifeng nodded and, with words that seemed to make her want to cry, she said, “Then, we need to get the hells away from here.”

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