Unintended Cultivator

Sen and Lo Meifeng found a back way out of the building and took off for the western wall as fast as they reasonably could in the confines of the alley. After the second time they had to chastise some would-be thugs, they transitioned to the rooftops. They were a bit more obvious, but also moved a lot faster. Sen was happy to note that they didn’t seem to be drawing any meaningful attention, let alone violent attacks. As they approached the western gate out of the city, they dropped back down to street level. As soon as they tried to join the people on the street, though, someone shouted.

“Now!”

Everyone who had been walking toward the gate scattered in every direction, leaving Sen and Lo Meifeng standing alone. As soon as the last of the people got far enough away, a formation activated. Sen cocked an eyebrow at the shoddy work. He thought it was, maybe, supposed to suppress their access to qi. Although, it wasn’t doing that at all. Maybe it’s meant to contain us, he thought. Reaching down, Sen picked up a loose bit of stone and tossed it at the formation. The stone passed cleanly through the formation boundary. Sen was baffled. Anything potent enough to contain them should contain everything else as well. Sen let his spiritual sense expand until it hit the formation, at which point a flood of useful information came back. He’d been right the first time. It was supposed to suppress their qi. It just wasn’t made very well. Lo Meifeng looked over at him.

“What’s the formation do?”

Sen kept his voice quiet when he answered. “Nothing. Whoever put it together was really, really bad at formations. I’m sort of surprised it hasn’t collapsed already.”

“Odd,” said Lo Meifeng. “Should we just go?”

“If you like. I’m kind of curious to see who will show up.”

“Well, it’s not like we’re on a schedule.”

After nearly a full minute had passed, Lo Meifeng sighed. “This is a terrible ambush.”

“Or kill us.”

“Or that. I mean, who shows up late to their own ambush?”

Right around then, a woman in expensive-looking robes finally walked up to the edge of the formation. Men and women with crossbows appeared on rooftops and in alleys all around. Sen waited for a core cultivator or six to show up, but none did. He traded a look with Lo Meifeng, but she looked as baffled as he felt. Sen focused most of his attention on the woman while he cycled up wind and fire qi. She appeared to be mortal, in her early middle years, although holding up well. She wasn’t beautiful, or even pretty, but she possessed a kind of stern gravitas that lent her otherwise ordinary looks interesting. She glared at Sen.

“You are the one they call Judgment’s Gale?”

Sen shrugged. “Sure. Some people call me that.”

“I have to say, that I’m less than impressed. From your reputation, I thought you’d be harder to capture. Still, you’re worth a lot of money to me, so I’m not going to complain.”

Sen stared at the woman for a moment before he whispered to Lo Meifeng. “Do you think this is some kind of elaborate joke that someone is playing on us?”

The mystified Lo Meifeng shrugged. “I have no idea.”

Turning back to the woman outside the formation, Sen asked, “I assume you’re Yeung Fen.”

The woman smirked. “So, you’ve heard of me?”

“Not really,” said Sen, making the woman scowl. “A dead man sold you out.”

“It doesn’t matter, you’re in there and I’m out here.”

Sen nodded. “That does appear to be the case. Idle curiosity. Were you planning to sell me to someone specific or was it going to happen some other way? An auction, perhaps?”

Yeung Fen frowned at Sen, and then at Lo Meifeng. It finally seemed to register with the woman that neither of her captives looked even the tiniest bit concerned about their capture.

“Why should I answer any of your questions?”

“If you answer my questions, it’ll put me in a better mood,” said Sen.

“What difference does that make?”

“Well, in my current mood, I’ll probably kill all of your people in the next two minutes or so. If you answer my questions, I may only disable them. You can think of it as a gesture of courtesy for your cooperation.”

“Even if you could escape, you expect me to believe that you’d just kill all of these mortals?”

Sen let his face go stony. “Judgment comes for everyone.”

“Brave words for a man trapped in a formation.”

Sen sauntered over to the edge of the formation and smiled at the woman from less than three feet away. “Trapped? Whatever made you think I was trapped?”

Then, he reached out and touched the curtain of energy that had “trapped” them. He let lightning arc into that curtain. The formation collapsed almost instantly. The woman’s eyes went as big around as saucers and she screamed.

“Kill them!”

Close to two dozen crossbow bolts flew at Sen and Lo Meifeng. Sen seized around half of them with wind and sent them hurtling back at the people who fired them. Lo Meifeng simply burned the rest up. Sen walked over to Yeung Fen, who looked so afraid that Sen was worried she’d pass out if he moved too fast. He stared down at her as Lo Meifeng did things behind him that caused what sounded like an excessive amount of screaming.

“Who were you planning to sell me to, Yeung Fen?”

The woman swallowed hard and said, “His name is Suen Hai.”

“And who is that?” Sen asked, pointing a finger at a particular dark spot in an alley and loosing a lightning bolt that left another would-be attacker a smoldering heap of ashy bones.

Yeung Fen was breathing so fast that it was a wonder to Sen that she could speak at all, but she found the air somewhere.

“He’s a merchant prince from the capital. You cost him a lot of money when you exposed the demonic cultivators.”

Sen nodded and sent wind blades to cut down three people who had escaped Lo Meifeng’s wrath. Yeung Fen flinched at the wet sounds of the pieces of their bodies hitting the ground.

“Tell me, Yeung Fen. Was this your plan, or did someone suggest this madness to you?”

“It was suggested to me.”

“Interesting. And did they provide you with the formation?”

Yeung Fen’s eyes narrowed. “They did. Why?”

“It just seems that I’m not the only person with enemies. Whoever suggested this to you clearly meant for you to die. That formation couldn’t have held a qi-condensing cultivator for more than a few moments, to say nothing of me. If I were you, I’d take whatever wealth I could find and disappear with it before whoever it is tries a more direct method of removing me from the board.”

“What would you do then?”

“Me? I’d probably just stay gone, but that’s because I really don’t like violence. If you were her, though,” said Sen, gesturing at the approaching form of Lo Meifeng, “you’d probably find yourself a good assassin to take care of whoever sent you down this path.”

“He’s right,” said Lo Meifeng, brushing some ash from her robes. “That is what I’d do, assuming I didn’t kill them personally.”

“Are there any left?” Sen asked.

“There’s a couple of them hiding and,” she cocked her head to listen, “crying, I think. Well, and there’s her.”

“Yeah. Her,” said Sen, tapping his chin. “What should we do with her?”

Lo Meifeng played her part like they scripted the whole thing. “We should probably cut off her head as a warning to anyone else dumb enough to try something like this.”

What little blood had remained in Yeung Fen’s face disappeared. Sen nodded like he was considering it.

“We could. Although, it seems kind of pointless now. Besides, it appears we have a common enemy. Whoever set this up may have thought that one of those crossbows would get lucky and take us out.”

“Maybe,” said Lo Meifeng, although her doubt was clear.

“I say we let her go,” announced Sen.

“If we must,” agreed Lo Meifeng in her most put-out voice.

Yeung Fen sagged in relief.

“But,” continued Sen, “this mercy will not be granted a second time. I suggest you use your time well, Yeung Fen. If you cannot use it well, then use it productively. In either case, it would be for the best if our paths didn’t cross again. Don’t you agree?”

Yeung Fen nodded furiously. “Yes, I agree! You’ll never see me again. Never.”

“Then go and find what fortunes fate sees fit to bestow.”

Yeung Fen ran from Sen and Lo Meifeng as fast as she could. They stood there in silence for a moment.

“She could be a problem for us later,” noted Lo Meifeng.

“I know. She could, but someone clearly wanted us to do their dirty work for them. She knows who it is. I suspect that she’s going to bend most of her efforts to destroying that person. That should have the nice side effect of keeping her and them out of our way for the time being.”

“You are a bizarre man, sometimes.”

Sen laughed. “Why is that?”

“There are times when act exactly the way I expect someone your age to act. Then, there are times when you talk like you’re some kind of veteran of court intrigue. Who taught you to think like this?”

“Uncle Kho, I guess. Well, it was indirect. When he was teaching me to read, most of what he had around were scrolls about history. Most history is about war and political intrigue.”

“Well, that’s a cheerful thought. On the upside, if these are the kinds of threats we’re facing now, I’m a lot less worried.”

“Yeah, me too. I mean, we should still be mindful. Honestly, though, I almost feel bad about this.”

“They would have happily captured and sold us or killed us. These weren’t innocents.”

“I did say almost. Anyway, on to Inferno’s Vale.”

Lo Meifeng’s expression fell. “It doesn’t seem like it’s necessary anymore. I mean, most of the reason to go there was because it’s out of the way.”

Sen shrugged. “So? You wanted to go there to learn things. Let’s go learn things about fire. It should come in handy when I burn down that cult temple. Master Feng can come find us there as easily as anywhere else. Besides, we don’t actually know for certain the real threats are gone, do we?”

Lo Meifeng grinned at him. “That’s the kind of doublespeak that will probably get us both killed by Feng Ming.”

“I’m not going to tell him we knew we were safe. Are you?”

“Hells no. Alright, let’s get out of here before someone official and tedious shows up demanding answers about all of this.”

Sen looked around at the damage the two of them had done. “Yeah, we should go.”

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