Tian tossed another pair of heads onto the pile. One of the seniors was going around incinerating the bodies. Tian just wanted to save him an extra stop. That senior was busy enough.

  These heretics, even the Earthly Realm ones, had all sorts of vile tricks. Poison was the least of it- some cultivated gu inside their bodies, or plagues. Burning was the best way to deal with their corpses. Anything that survived the fire was worth further investigation. Anything that didn't survive wouldn’t have been worth picking up in the first place.

  “It has been a hard few days.” Tian muttered. He glanced at the ring he was supposed to deliver. The arrow was pointing at an exhausted looking woman leaning against the warehouse wall. Tian walked over and bowed. “West Town Outer Court Disciple Tian Zihao greets the senior. Just to confirm- you are Quartermaster Wu?”

  “Eh? Yes? Young man, you are naked!”

  “No, I am Tian Zihao, Senior. Delivery for you.” He held out his hand. The ring lit up with a gentle golden light.

  Quartermaster Wu blinked, then started laughing. Tian thought she had a nice laugh. “Alright, you are Tian Zihao. I have received your delivery.” She removed the ring and put it in her pocket, then replaced it with a new one.

  “You have twenty-four hours to rest here at the base before making the return trip. Use the time to take a shower and find some pants. Being covered in blood and organ meat is not considered an official uniform, even if it does seem to be the tradition of our West Town Outer Court.”

  “Senior?”

  “I’m one of Senior Sister Bai’s. Even if she is technically my junior now. You must be one of Mad Dog Fu’s brats. You have his style. You really never noticed you were naked?”

  “I wore that on my trip in.” Tian pointed at the rotting carcass of the giant hawk. Then added, in a fit of honesty “I also just don’t care. I mean, I’m naked, so what? If there is one place propriety doesn’t matter, surely it’s the middle of battle.”

  “Don’t let Senior Sister Bai hear you say that, she’d tan your hide! You really are one of Mad Dog’s. Go quickly. You stink. The showers are in that building there.” She waved him away. “Oh and Junior Brother? Don’t worry about your battle merits. Your ring will have recorded some of them, and you have plenty of witnesses. You won’t be short.”

  “I didn’t think of that, Senior. Thank you for your care.” He bowed and turned towards the showers. The blood was starting to dry, and it was pretty uncomfortable. He was a little surprised to find the showers were full. It seemed a lot of people needed to wash off.

  Dressed, clean and with his wounds tended to, Tian sat on a step, watching the cleanup. It had been a major raid, and came frighteningly close to succeeding. Had it not been for the sudden weakness of the demonized hawk, casualties would have been much worse. They might even have lost the base entirely. Some of the heretics had run, but didn’t get far. Their suits were ruined in the fighting. The wasteland soon claimed them.

  Tian checked himself over. He had inhaled some of the rock particles. He would have to slowly clean them out. His hands were shaking. He looked down. Why were his hands shaking? His eyes were going blurry too. Was this poison? Had he been cursed?

  You survived things that should have killed you. Endured terrible pain. Killed people. Watched people die. You also have what people persist in calling a mild concussion, but let me tell you there is nothing ‘mild’ about concussions. The physical wounds will heal as you cultivate. The mental wounds… will also heal. But it will take longer. Grandpa Jun’s voice was gentle.

  “Did I make you proud, Grandpa?” Tian’s voice cracked.

  You always do, Tian. You always do. Tian felt grandpa’s hug, and he was right back to the junkyard, starving, sick, weak, but surviving. Grandpa’s hugs were the best thing in the whole world then. Sitting on the step, Tian wrapped his arms around his chest. Tried to imagine hugging Grandpa back. Tried not to shake.

  “Would Brother Fu be proud of me?”

  He is. He is.

  Tian was only thirteen years old.

  ________________________________________________________________________

  There was no escaping an interrogation. Two Inner Court members had seen him come crawling out of the demonized bird, and more had seen him charging through the battlefield stark naked, waving his rope dart around.

  The situation frustrated his interrogator enormously. Had Tian been a demonic cultivator, everything would have been quite straightforward. Simply behead him, and then go for a well deserved sleep. But the young man plainly wasn’t. There wasn’t the vaguest hint of demonic qi about him. They checked, repeatedly. In detail. Excruciating detail. In fact, Tian smelled faintly of lotus and something earthy.

  Lotuses are known for their purity. This young man wasn’t an evil cultivator. But his story was also plainly nonsense.

  “You survived being dissolved in the hawk’s stomach.”

  “Yes, Martial Uncle.”

  “Dissolved in yin acid.”

  “Yes, Martial Uncle.”

  “By transforming it into a medicinal bath.”

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “Yes, Martial Uncle.”

  “You understand that’s horseshit, right? Complete horseshit.”

  Tian shook his head. “I don’t know much about horses, Martial Uncle.”

  “You can’t just dissolve and call it a medicinal bath because you cultivated in it!”

  “Oh. Sorry. Oh, Martial Uncle.”

  “Oh, OH? What do you mean, ‘Oh?’”

  “I didn’t know I couldn’t do that. So I did it. The alternative was dying. So I just did it. Martial Uncle.”

  An Inner Court disciple knocked on the door and passed his interrogator a note. The senior read it, and burned it to drifting ash with a glare.

  “You are free to go. Expect a reward. And I may beat the shit out of you one dark night for violating every sane law of existence I know. I’m putting it down as “Had a fortuitous encounter,” which is our catchall for this kind of thing. But the beating is still very much on the table. For now, you get to walk away on two working legs.”

  “Thank you Martial Uncle. Is there a bed I can sleep on?” Tian sleepily noted the phrase “this kind of thing, but was too tired to pursue it.

  “Knowing you? The incinerator is that way.”

  Something happened and it was the middle of the night. He fell asleep at some point. He knew he did, because he woke up. He had been sleeping on the floor. Apparently he had used his shoes for a pillow and the sky for a blanket. Nobody had bothered him. He saw Quartermaster Wu walking past and nodded at her.

  “Junior, how did you sleep?”

  “I don’t know, Senior. I just woke up here. I really don’t know how I slept.”

  “Heh.” She shook her head. “Gods I’m tired.”

  “Would you like a cup of tea, Senior?” Brother Fu had taught him to offer it often, especially to senior brothers and sisters.

  “You have tea?”

  “I will make some, Senior. Sorry, I’m not very good at it.”

  Tian set out the tray with the teacups, teapot and the enchanted hot water pitcher. He warmed the teapot with hot water, then poured it out again. He added the leaves to the pot, then carefully poured in more hot water. He tried to do everything like Senior Brother Fu showed him, but knew he got some of it wrong.

  “We have to let it steep now. Exactly four minutes.”

  “En.” She nodded softly.

  Tian felt restless, but forced himself to wait quietly. That’s what Brother Fu did. He just sat quietly and waited for the tea to be done. At exactly four minutes, he poured. He tried to make the pour as smooth as possible, serving first his senior, then himself.

  The tea was a little bitter. A little smokey. And at the end, there was a hint of jasmine and sweetness. He could see Brother Fu sitting across from him, showing him how to appreciate the tea. His eyes blurred. He was crying.

  “Sorry, sorry.”

  “Don’t be. Senior Sister Bai told me this- Don’t be sorry if you weep after a battle. Be sorry when you stop weeping.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

  She sighed. “You will.”

  Quartermaster Wu lifted her teacup and drank slowly. “I can’t help but think of Senior Sister Bai, and the other sisters I had in the Outer Court.”

  Tian nodded. “I know I have to leave so I don’t let everybody down, but living there for the rest of my life sounds good too. Maybe one day I can be the next Brother Fu.”

  “I thought the same. It would be an honorable life, being Senior Sister Wu, raising the youngsters like Senior Sister Bai did for me.”

  “Yes.” Tian nodded, and took a sip. The tea transformed as it cooled, some flavors fading, others coming forward. It was the way of things. Nothing stayed the same. Enjoy it for what it was while you had it. That was another one of Brother Fu’s teachings.

  “I left, though. Once I reached the peak of Level Nine, stepping across the threshold into immortality seemed as easy and obvious as stepping out of my cell. I knew nobody wanted me to stay. They would have all been bitterly disappointed if I did stay. But, sometimes, not often, I wonder. What if I hadn’t taken that single step?”

  Quartermaster Wu took a sip. She silently added some biscuits to the tray and waved Tian towards them. He ate one. It was pretty good. A little bland, but very buttery. It went well with the tea.

  “Junior, what do you think immortality is?”

  “I really don’t know, Senior. I don’t mean to offend you, but I don’t think anyone really knows.”

  “Eh?! Explain that.”

  Tian shrugged awkwardly. “An immortal is someone who hasn’t died yet. But everyone dies, right? The only way to really be an immortal is to live as long as the universe, and I don’t think anyone has managed that. At least, no one I’ve heard of.”

  Quartermaster Wu laughed bitterly. “Hey, it’s okay if you say that to me, but my Brothers and Sisters in the Inner Court might just kill you if they hear you. I’m not joking around here.”

  “Senior?”

  “Little Brother, we all know that. But to be a cultivator, to step across that chasm between mortality and, yes, immortality, is always an act of arrogance.” She slowly bit into a biscuit. Her face relaxed as she enjoyed the flavor.

  “Such arrogance. I am immortal. I have found my meaning of immortality. I will pursue my dao. Wild arrogance. Do you know why we are interrogated after every mission, Little Brother? Because cultivators want to run wild. They want to pursue their dao, and damn everything else!”

  Tian refilled their cups. He could understand that desire. Heavens knew he wanted to escape his books to go adventuring often enough. The tea warmed him. He didn’t want the conversation to end.

  “I see the sky, Senior.”

  “Pardon?”

  “I look up at the sky. I don’t know if I look at it more than other people, but I keep thinking- one day, I will be up there. One day, I will look the hawks and eagles in the eye. If anything is eternal, I think it’s the sky. It’s there if the clouds cover it. It’s there even if it’s nighttime.” He shrugged, not knowing exactly where he was going with that, but knowing it was the truth.

  “Maybe you are a little arrogant too.”

  “Probably.” Tian nodded. “Brother Fu said tea is good for calming the heart. I think I’m pretty calm though.”

  Quartermaster Wu slid him a look, then started chuckling. The chuckles devolved into chortles, then muffled laughter as she covered her mouth with her hand.

  “Kid, you charged stark naked out of the belly of a demon and into battle, because your brothers and sisters needed you. Your first thought, after killing your way across the battlefield, was to deliver your package and finish the mission. You are even sitting with a pretty Auntie and discussing life and dreams over a cup of tea at midnight.”

  Tian nodded. Quartermaster Wu was, in fact, quite pretty. Most of the Inner Court dripped charisma, one way or another. He had another sip and looked at the stars. A few hours ago, he was covered in blood. A few hours ago, he had been fighting for his life in the belly of the beast. But now, here, he could sit, have a quiet moment, and drink his tea.