Chapter 7—Unpaid
Johan slammed open the door to the greenhouse. Dad was there, watering the carrots.
“Why did you sell the mansion?” Johan demanded.
“For capital. The company needs funds,” came Dad’s low voice, as if he hadn’t ruined his life’s work on a whim.
“Then why did you give that capital away?”
“It was salary, not a giveaway. The employees built the company. They deserve proper pay.”
“If you had fired some of them, then we wouldn’t have to—”
“Johan, listen,” Dad said, and Johan stopped. “Even without the mansion, we can live. But the factory workers, their families, would starve without the pay.”
“You’re their employer, not their caretaker. This isn’t rational,” Johan said. “You’re breaking apart our family to save some strangers! If Mum were here, she would never agree to this.”
Dad sighed. Johan felt a pang of guilt in his heart for bringing up Mum. But he didn’t back down.
“You’re right,” Dad finally said. “If I sacrificed the employees, we could get out alive and unhurt.” But there was no guilt in his voice. He stood firm in his convictions. “But that’s not how you live.”
“And why is that?” Here he goes again, being all sentimental. Johan pressed down on his temples, feeling the throb.
“It’s a lonely and boring life. Even if you succeed, there will be no one to enjoy that success with you. It’s all meaningless,” Dad said.
“Nonsense.” Johan walked out.
More than a decade later, Johan admitted Dad was right.
***
+1 True Qi
+2 Arts True Qi -> Deep Sleep
+205 Arts True Qi -> Echoing Dreamscape
“You okay, Tubs?” Li Yao shook Yu Han.
The headache was agonising. It was as if someone had hit him with a hammer.
“Dad?”
“This Father Li Yao is not your dad.”
Red and blue spots fluttered in Yu Han’s vision, and he groaned. It felt like a hangover dialled to eleven. What the heck happened?
His hand instinctively reached for the dagger.
“Stop that. Did you hit your head or something?” Li Yao pried the dagger from Yu Han’s hand and set it on the bed. “Go to the doctor.”
“Get away,” Yu Han slurred. His vision slowly focused.
Li Yao shrugged, then pointed at Yu Han’s nose and ears. Yu Han touched them. His fingers came away with red flakes. Dried blood.
“I’ll go,” Yu Han said. He got out of bed in a haze.
“You need help, Tubs?”
Yu Han said something, but he didn’t know what. Nor did he know how he stumbled his way to the doctor.
“Did you overuse your art, young man? This is why young’uns are…” The old doctor trailed off, clicking his tongue. “You need to be careful. Your head qi is completely depleted.”
“Uh, is that so?” Yu Han said. The hangover feeling was fading. What remained was a dull throb. He brought up the status screen.
Name: Yu Han (Johan)
Level: 0
True Qi: 1/110
Pure Qi: 50/110
“Do you mean true qi?” he asked the old man.
“Not that. But the spiritual energy every being possesses. You cultivators can control it, but we mortals…” The old doctor shook his head. “As for true qi, this old servant can’t mention sect secrets. Be patient. The masters at Verdant Blade will teach you when the time is right.”
Verdant Blade? What’s that?
He gave Yu Han three more pills and some exercises. Yu Han left without asking about pure qi and tribulations. He needed to know more about the unwritten rules of the trade before sharing anything that might be a secret. After all, he had got pure qi by killing that creature.
While he was going up the stairs, the voice of Qiao Jinhai echoed.
“Every disciple shall gather on deck within the burning of an incense stick.”
How long was that? Wouldn’t it depend on the make of the stick?
Yu Han trotted up, holding the guardrails. A thick rope was coiled at the bottom, running along the edge between the stairs and the wooden wall.
Arts:
[Deep Sleep]
Type: Bloodline
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Grade: Mortal Level 1
Mastery: Initial Step Level 1
True Qi: 2/200
[Echoing Dreamscape]
Type: Auxiliary
Grade: Mortal Level 9
Mastery: Initial Step Level 2
True Qi: 5/300
Was the headache a side effect of staying “conscious” throughout his sleep or head qi spiritual energy depletion, as the old doctor had said? Or was it that green meteor? The moment Yu Han thought of the meteor, the headache worsened.
Leave it for later! After a few deep breaths, he could think again. Let’s go back to numbers.
He’d barely earned any true qi for Deep Sleep. But Echoing Dreamscape had a mastery of “Initial Step Level 2.”
Since Deep Sleep started at “Initial Step Level 1,” and his true qi for it was 2/200 after gaining two arts true qi, it was a safe guess to assume that Echoing Dreamscape also started at Level 1 with 0/200. And after he gained 205, 200 went into levelling up, leaving five extra.
So true qi is like experience points in an RPG? Yu Han covered his face with his hands. The sun was too bright. The chatter hurt his ears. The wooden deck under his feet rocked in an unsteady rhythm. He thought he might vomit.
Qiao Jinhai sat cross-legged at the front of the deck while the recruits formed neat rows. Behind him was the Branching Dragon River, with other far smaller vessels moving out of the way like scurrying ants before an elephant.
On the horizon, the silhouette of a city.
Echoing Dreamscape started with the grade “Mortal Level 9.” The grade of the art didn’t show any changes despite the art’s true qi gain, nor did the grade have a progress bar.
On the other hand…
[Deep Writhing Clam Bloodline]
Grade: Mortal Level 10
True Qi: 0/1100
For this trait, there was a true qi progress bar under the grade.
Does it mean I can level up the grade of a trait, but not an art? For art, the only thing I can level up is the mastery? Other than the semantic meanings, what are the actual differences between grade and mastery? Or is it just the semantic meaning—one is the quality of the thing; the other is how well I can use the thing?
And from Qiao Jinhai’s words previously, his Deep Sleep bloodline art was connected to the Deep Writhing Clam bloodline trait. But despite the art gaining true qi, the trait hadn’t changed.
Why?
Too many questions, and all he had were conjectures. Not enough answers. There was a pattern in the numbers, though. And patterns made Yu Han greedy.
He rubbed his temples and closed his eyes, trying to visualise an Excel worksheet. The status window was open too.
Would be nice if I could use Echoing Dreamscape while awake.
According to the status screen, to level up the Deep Sleep art from Level 1 to Level 2, he would need 200 arts true qi. And for Echoing Dreamscape, the requirement was 300 arts true qi from Level 2 to Level 3.
So, the levelling up requirement for each level is roughly the next level times one hundred? This means that for each consecutive level, it increases by one hundred.
Something else followed this pattern. The Deep Writhing Clam bloodline, which had the grade of mortal Level 10, showed a true qi progress of 0/1100. The level after ten was eleven, and a hundred times eleven was eleven hundred, which checked out.
There was an issue with this hypothesis. The level under his name, assuming it was his “character level,” was zero, with the true qi showing 1/110.
The next level would be one, and one times a hundred was one hundred. Where did the extra ten come from?
Yu Han had overlooked something. What was it? Coming from an era where he had the answers to all questions in his pocket, it was frustrating that he simply couldn’t Google a solution.
“I’ll never take tech for granted again.”
“What’re you muttering about, Tubs?” Li Yao appeared from nowhere and patted his shoulder.
“Numbers,” Yu Han said.
“You need better hobbies. I plan to check out the training floor after this. Join me. I’ll teach you how to use that dagger,” Li Yao said. “The dagger owner’s little brother eyes you wherever you go, like a hungry mutt. You might need it soon.”
Li Yao pointed at Bushy Beard’s brother, who stood with Sima Yan and the Grand Marshal’s son. Their eyes met.
Yu Han shuddered.
“Daggers are for stabbing. Knives are for slashing, right?” Yu Han asked the taller boy. Or teen. “How old are you?”
“Seventeen. And yeah, daggers stab. But no one said you couldn’t slash with it.”
“I’m older.” By either one year or a couple of decades. Was he a wizened old uncle or a fat little kid now?
“You want me to call you Senior Brother?” Li Yao got into line behind Yu Han. “I’ll wait until Qiao Jinhai is done, then we can fight it out.”
Was that a joke? Yu Han patted his pocket full of pouches. That was a joke, right?
“Quiet,” Qiao Jinhai said. He levitated to his feet. “Before we reach the next city, I will announce the rules you must follow. The disciples recruited earlier than Riversong already know this, but it is worth repeating. Failure to adhere to these rules means punishment, if not death.”
He walked between the rows of recruits like a drill sergeant.
“One: No conflict within the ship. The Ver”—Qiao Jinhai coughed—“Stormy Reef Sect has yearly tournaments. All disputes shall be settled there. Understood?”
“Yes!” A deafening chorus rang out. Yu Han was slow to reply, as were Li Yao and the rest from Riversong.
Qiao Jinhai continued. “Two: The sect has its own cultivation arts, which you will receive when we reach the sect. No other cultivation arts are allowed! If we discover you have studied something else, the lightest punishment would be the crippling of your cultivation base, am I clear?”
“Yes!” This time, the recruits from Riversong City replied in time.
“Three: The ship has formations to gather the natural spiritual energy. Just by being on the ship, your body will assimilate the it into true qi. Many of you must have earned some by now. Those from Riversong, report your true qi gain with your name, one by one. If I find out that you have lied, I shall cut off your tongue. You.” Qiao Jinhai pointed at the first recruit in the row. “Junior Brother Sima, start.”
“Three. Sima Yan,” Sima Yan said.
“Two. Pang Jiming,” said the Grand Marshal’s son.
“Two. Ma San,” said Bushy Beard’s brother.
“T-two. Guo Yexi,” said the girl with the pigtails.
“Two. Chen Da,” shouted the kid with the shaved head.
“…One. Yu Han,” Yu Han said.
Sima Yan and Bushy Beard’s brother whispered to each other.
“Four! Li Yao!” Li Yao shouted out with a grin.
The murmurs rose, and Sima Yan’s relaxed look changed into a scowl.
As did Yu Han’s.
“What? No need to be jealous,” Li Yao said. “If you beat me in a fight, you can be the senior brother.”
Yu Han corrected his expression, while Sima Yan pursed his lips as if he had eaten something sour.
“Four: Only those with a true qi gain of one are allowed to disembark, though I highly advise against it. In the path to immortality, insects like you will need every advantage you can get. Especially during the first year in the sect,” Qiao Jinhai said. “If you still want to disembark, you must be back on the ship before I am. Or I shall count that as desertion, and the punishment is capital. The same if any with a true qi gain over one disembarks. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” The agreement was accompanied by laughter, as a few people hid their faces. They were grouped together near the back. Were they fellow ones? It seemed not many were even qualified to disembark.
“Okay, now disperse—” Qiao Jinhai stopped. “I’ll need one of you to come with me. Decide amongst yourselves. You have five minutes.” Qiao Jinhai sat down and closed his eyes.
“You good enough to train, Tubs?” Li Yao asked. “What did the doctor say?”
“No large movements. But I’ll train. I—”
“Hey, Fatty.”
One large boy with a cleft lip approached Yu Han. “I heard you had a gain of one despite having a bloodline?”
There were some stifled laughs.
“What do you want?” Yu Han said. Jerks.
The boy strode to the group that had looked embarrassed when Qiao Jinhai mentioned who could disembark.
Wait, are they…? Yu Han had planned to rest up as the old doctor had advised. He had a bad feeling about this.
“Senior Brother Qiao, we have unanimously decided that Junior Brother Yu Han shall join you,” Cleft Lip shouted.
“I didn’t—” Yu Han said.
“Big One,” Qiao Jinhai said. “Report back at the gangway in an hour.”
What could he do? He sent a venomous look at Cleft Lip. “I’ll do as Senior Brother says.”
Qiao Jinhai clapped, and the sound waves spread out in visible ripples. “That is all. Disperse.”
