Abyssal Road Trip - 657 - Setting out (Patreon)

Amdirlain’s PoV - Northern Kingdoms

Throughout the day, more shrines to the four winds rose, spreading far and wide across the northern kingdoms. One she set up at the edge of a wilderness had a spirit beast investigate it first, and the black puma picked up the cultivation technique from the west wind’s statue before leaving. Finally, as the sun began to set, Amdirlain returned to Nán Tiānjǐng, arriving in her forge room just as the last rays of sunlight faded. Drakon and Ling Xi were in the sitting room on the apartment’s first level, chatting about travel plans.

Her brother had taken the sole couch in the circle of chairs.

Amdirlain dropped onto the couch beside Drakon. “Good evening.”

“Welcome back. Did you intend to inspire me?” Drakon eyed her knowingly.

Yeah, so he heard me arrive.

“Nope, but it takes a weight off my mind.”

Drakon folded his arms and gave a mock scowl. “Now I need to worry about you getting left behind instead.”

“You’ve got broad shoulders.” Amdirlain patted his forearm. “I’m sure you’ll manage.”

“What did you get up to while those insights swamped me?”

“I’m really not sure what you mean,” Amdirlain grinned.

“Should I leave the room while you divulge fresh news of chaos, Lady Amdirlain?” Ling Xi asked dryly.

“That’s the spirit, Ling Xi, but I didn’t really do much.”

Drakon groaned, drawing Ling Xi’s gaze.

“To give us some perspective, where does the restructuring of First Peak fall on your activity scale?” Drakon asked.

“A tiny but important piece of work.” Amdirlain’s grin faded. “I hope we don’t run into anything like that soon. We were fortunate that the strongest cultivators opted to live in their aerial fortresses.”

Ling Xi tilted her head, but bit back a question.

“With a bit of planning, it made them easy to sweep from the board,” Amdirlain clarified. “Where do people want to go? Shall we visit Ling Xi’s hometown and work our way onwards, or something else?”

“There are a few remote villages along a gorge I’d like to check on,” Drakon said. “Is everything with First Peak sorted out?”

“I left matters in the hands of Toko’s parents. Though it’s more for her father to investigate, since Xuelian is going to teach near the new town we built.”

“Are you fine with slumming it in the boondocks? There aren’t always decent inns in remote settlements,” Drakon cautioned.

“It can’t be worse than some places I’ve been.”

“Gorge?” Ling Xi frowned. “Do you plan to delve beneath the weeping lake, Master Drakon?”

“Nope. Though we can start there and then head north, ensure the places we visited before are doing okay,” Drakon replied.

“What are they delving for?”

“The legendary remains of a sect fortress,” Ling Xi offered.

Drakon rolled his eyes. “I don’t believe the tales of how the gorge formed, but the fanciful tales are fun. I’m pretty sure they’re just wasting their time.”

“They are?” Ling Xi sat up. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You enjoyed their tales when you were younger; why should I ruin them?”

“I still enjoy those tales,” she huffed.

“Forget I said anything then,” Drakon replied, winking at Amdirlain.

“He is teasing you, but about what you’ll have to figure out.” Amdirlain raised an eyebrow. “Since you have a spot picked out, we’ll head out in the morning.”

“Will you join us for the morning classes?” Drakon asked.

“No. I’m going to be working on a few things in my forge until we’re ready to leave.” Amdirlain waved and slipped from the room. She caught the door before it closed and eased it shut with a soft click.

The carpeting in the apartment corridors rubbed against the hunger and misery from the slums, and the sparse conditions into which she’d resettled people into along the river. That their lot had been improved was scant relief against the salted paper cuts that lashed through her thoughts. Spikes of self-doubt rang sour tones within her mind, but Amdirlain caught the recriminations before they started. As each self-accusation rose, she compared the planted fields and stocked silos against the filth and squalor others had held them in. The potential for growth stood in stark contrast to the oppressive dead-end lives that had previously confined them. Still, a barbed temptation to improve their lives scratched across her thoughts, but she pushed it aside, unwilling to let any dependency between them grow.

The Silver Wall Sect is to arrange traders along the river, which will let them get more tools and things to improve their quality of life. Xuelian will help train some of them, and hopefully that knowledge spreads.

Throughout the night, Amdirlain crafted simple knives, useful for gutting and scaling fish. The utility knives went along with the simple songs of her birthplace that filled the room as she worked, some more akin to chanted poetry than formal music. With no hint of favour, Amdirlain sang each one in order, from the time of her birth.

Drakon and Ling Xi tracked her down straight after the morning class. His fingers rapped against the forge room doorframe as Drakon eyed her questioningly.

“Is there something wrong?” Amdirlain asked.

“I scried ahead to check we weren’t going into trouble. How many shrines did you raise?” Drakon asked. “I’m assuming it was you because of the braziers of primordial flames.”

“You spotted one already,” Amdirlain grumbled.

“It’s not the village I intended to go to first, but it’s along the route. How many?”

“Only a few hundred, so it’s curious you found one so quickly,” Amdirlain said.

“What shrines?” Ling Xi asked, slipping past Drakon to enter the forge, her gaze taking in the array of newly made tools Amdirlain had stacked on the benches.

“I created shrines to the four winds,” Amdirlain explained. “Though I saw a memorial to them atop the summit of First Peak, I’m impressed that the tales of their sacrifice stayed alive so long.”

“On the order of the heavens, all mortals give prayers of thanks to at least one of them on New Year’s Day,” Ling Xi said. “It is said that Sun Wukong declared their stand against the horrors from beyond is never to be forgotten.”

“I wondered,” Amdirlain said. “Right, moving along. How do we want to handle our travelling?”

“Well, if we use devices, we’re going to skip most places, so I thought we’d travel on foot. Ling Xi needs to practice her technique for running,” Drakon replied.

Amdirlain looked at her quizzically.

“I’m fine for short distances, but a marathon might prove too much.”

“Which is why it’s good to practice and refine your control,” Drakon replied.

“We’re not in a rush,” Amdirlain agreed. “I’m glad you’re looking to perfect a technique rather than rely on a device.”

“Would you teach me your techniques later? Master Drakon, said yours make you harder to attack while moving.”

“We’ll see if I can teach them. I’ve got to translate the manuals I learned them from into local terms.”

“If we’ve been there before they’ll remember you, Master Drakon.” Ling Xi said. “An unnoticeable apprentice smith like me is one thing.”

Interrupting Ling Xi, Drakon shrank to take on the appearance of a round-faced man, the same height as Amdirlain.

“Oh, it’s playtime?” Amdirlain cooed, and copying Drakon’s approach, shifted her form. The tips of her azure-furred ears now barely reached Ling Xi’s shoulders, and Amdirlain held a fluffy blue tail in one hand as she smiled up at them. “Do I win the cuteness prize?”

Her aura constricted until only the presence of a low-tier energy cultivator remained. Azure hair spilled past her shoulders, and her cheekbones sharpened as her eyeteeth lengthened enough to show against her bottom lip.

“Please don’t do that, Lady Amdirlain,” Ling Xi protested.

“Lady Amdirlain isn’t here right now,” Am purred. “Might humble Am address your inquiry, Senior Ling Xi?”

A broad grin lit Drakon’s face. “Yes, Senior Ling Xi, ensure you properly supervise your juniors.”

“This isn’t fair,” Ling Xi protested. “I’ll most certainly slip up, plus what sort of name is Am? You could at least make use of a proper name.”

“What would you suggest?”

After a moment, Ling Xi grumbled. “Qīng Lù, between the colour of your tufted ears and hair.”

Amdirlain patted her shoulder. “Do you use an alias, Drakon?”

“No, but I just say I’ve travelled far,” Drakon replied. “Drakon at least doesn’t sound like it’s hunting for a sentence to join.”

“You’re so mean to me.” Amdirlain pouted and held her tail tighter to her chest as Ling Xi deliberately turned her back.

“Is this because I compared you to sparks from a fire?” Ling Xi asked.

With a playful grin, Amdirlain let go of her tail and danced around Ling Xi. “Would I do that?”

As Amdirlain kept circling her, Ling Xi shook her head. “You reject titles. Do you behave mischievously so that others won’t take you seriously?”

“I’m just trying to find something to laugh about after the mess at First Peak,” Amdirlain admitted. “The songs from slaves always grab my heart and squeeze ferociously.”

Ling Xi looked over her shoulder when Amdirlain looped behind her. “Do you need head pats or ear scritching?”

“Ear scritching is taking it too far,” Amdirlain laughed. “Let’s leave those to Sarah.”

The warmth in her laughter had Ling Xi blushing to the tips of her ears. “Are you teasing me?”

“I’m teasing, but it’s also the truth. Cat ears are very sensitive,” Amdirlain explained.

“You’ve no intention of blending in, do you?” Drakon asked.

“Spoilsport,” Amdirlain huffed, shifting to a human form with luminescent white skin; she rounded her ears and changed her hair to black. “Better?”

“You’re going to have so many men asking if you’d have dinner and converse with them,” Ling Xi declared.

“Maybe a raven form?”

“I would like to talk to you,” Drakon grumbled.

“We could talk mentally. Fawning would-be suitors is the last thing I need,” Amdirlain offered quickly, but his discordant tones cut off her protests. “Fine. I’ll crush their fragile egos into pulp.”

“Any cultivators approaching you would have a fairly robust pride,” Ling Xi said. “Which will lead to other issues if you simply reject them.”

“I guess it will depend on what I hear within their theme if I’m polite or bloodthirsty in shutting them down.” Amdirlain swept the knives into her soul void. “Let’s get going.”

The mirage of a gorge overlaid the room’s window, and the polished stone beneath their feet softened into loam as the technique released them in the north. They arrived on a slope between a thick bamboo forest and a deep gorge that a violent force had carved into the earth. Though the forest extended west to the mountains in places, it didn’t approach within a li of the gorge. The rim of the split earth had the black, glassy appearance of granite that had melted and then cooled.

A strong wind tousled their hair and carried a mournful wailing as it ran through a honeycomb of tunnels along the gorge’s sides. Across from their arrival point, a lake leaked twin streams of water into the gorge, and partway down the flows crossed a colossal face carved into the stone. A deep cry emanated from the partly separated lips. Its song prompted her to dig further. Wind through the gorge generated a white noise that thrummed up through the soles of her feet; the residue of the technique that had sliced the landscape crashed atop everything and prickled against her skin. Layered beneath the mix of energy, an orderly, deceptive melody used the cacophony to hide.

“Noisy,” Amdirlain said. “I can feel it resonating in my bones. How does anyone sleep within a dozen li of this place?”

“The locals find it calming,” Drakon said. “Maybe that is why people are sure that there is something special about this place.”

The veils of sound and water that lay across the landscape failed to conceal the cultivator’s expansive tomb beneath the sprawling lake from Amdirlain, but she merely nodded. The strength of the wards around the hidden chambers dwarfed Mùchén’s spirit transformation might.

“Legends arise for many reasons,” Amdirlain said. “No village readily at hand unless we fly to the far side of the lake. Did you want to visit them, or did we come merely for the view?”

“The view,” Drakon confirmed, and pointed northwards. A massive river descended into the gorge at the far end, but dozens of villages lined its course where smaller rivers and streams plunged into it from the west side.

“Sorry, looking down into its depths didn’t instil me with wonder,” Amdirlain quipped.

“That wasn’t what I was aiming for!”

“Then use more words,” Amdirlain chided lightly.

“We see things differently, so I wondered what you’d make of the carving, when right on top of it.”

“Nothing that is too surprising; it’s reinforced with earth and water qi.” Amdirlain shrugged. “Not only did its creators not want it dissolving over the aeons, but once the water makes it down that far, it will carve a full statue free of the stone. Shall we head for the village?”

Drakon nodded. “If someone asks, we came over the mountains from the west and turned north once we hit the gorge.”

“I’m fine with that story. I’ll assess each village we near for trouble or sickness, but you two can decide if we stop." Amdirlain waved Ling Xi forward. “We’ll flank you, Ling Xi; best if you set the pace.”

Ling Xi angled away from the gorge’s edge, qi cycling through her dantian before running down her legs and giving each stride an extra push that hurled her metres ahead. A matching push of qi from her leading foot cushioned the impact and prevented her from actually touching the ground. As they ran, Amdirlain and Drakon adjusted the strength of their own presences to match Ling Xi’s aura.

The first village in sight had a wide crescent of grain fields mixed with orchards to its west, and its only protection was a wall some four metres tall, too narrow to stand atop. The few defenders on lookout stood on low bamboo scaffolding behind the stones. As they got closer, the wind carried the smell of wildflowers, water, and animal musk.

“No indication of wounds from demonic beasts or recent deaths. A few people have a high fever. Do you want healing practice, Ling Xi?” Amdirlain offered to their minds.

“Those sorts of things can spread. I should go in alone so they don’t feel intimidated. Can you provide directions?” 

Illusionary glowing notes, complete with head, staff, and flags, bobbed in the air ahead of Ling Xi; haunting music played to match the displayed score.

“What’s that?!” Ling Xi blurted.

“You wanted directions, so follow the musical wisps,” Amdirlain replied. “Once you’re done with the first house, it’ll lead to the next. Shall we wait on the far side, Drakon?”

Not needing further prompting, Ling Xi ran ahead.

The song played again as its visual accompaniment threaded a course ahead of Ling Xi along an orchard’s edge, skirting a series of fields to the village gates. With Drakon by her side, Amdirlain swung wide, staying a hundred metres beyond the outermost fields. They came to a stop in the thin undergrowth near the gorge, and though Amdirlain could sense the water a couple of li down, she stood at the lip and peered over. The churning white water compressed between the stone walls looked as deadly as it would be for an ordinary person caught in it.

“Was that means of guiding her inspired by fey will-o’-wisps?” Drakon asked.

“Not exactly,” Amdirlain replied. “I duplicated something from a story. It was from my lifetime as Julia, but it’s not straightforward to explain.”

Drakon stepped closer and gently shoulder-bumped her away from the lip. “Was there something you didn’t want to mention to Ling Xi?”

“I don’t know enough about her outlook yet, and she didn’t need to know,” Amdirlain replied. “There is a tomb within the statue, made by someone stronger than me. I caught enough to know that the sound from the mouth is both a veil and a trap.”

“That’s interesting, but whether weaker or stronger, I’m not violating someone’s resting place,” Drakon said. “Though I’m glad to know the purpose behind it.”

She patted his hand. “Is your curiosity appeased now?”

He nodded happily. “Thanks, sis. I wasn’t aware of how much it had been itching at me.”

“No worries.”

He shifted his weight and glanced at her.

“What is it?” Amdirlain prompted.

“Looking for problems in the village ahead of us is efficient, but it doesn’t help me gain experience with people.”

“Oh. We could go back and join her.”

“No, I don’t want to reverse your choice.”

“I guess we have different goals for travelling, so we’ll need to come to an agreement,” Amdirlain said. “Do we wait until Ling Xi catches up and then talk goals?”

Drakon nodded. “I had planned to travel north through the towns on this side of the gorge. They belong to the kingdom of Xīfāng, though most of the country is on the other side of the mountains just west of here.”

A flat boulder near the lip served as a perch for Amdirlain, and she turned her attention to the surrounding wilderness.

Without a prompt, he sat beside her, and the pair settled down to wait for Ling Xi. 

Amdirlain adjusted the trail, leading the apprentice to each household, and finally steered it to draw her close.

“How are they?” Drakon asked when Ling Xi emerged from the trees.

“A spring fever of the sort that spreads, so I’m glad Lady Amdirlain pointed them out,” Ling Xi plopped down before them. “Where to next?”

“That was what we thought to discuss. Drakon, what did you want from the trip?”

“A chance to meet people and experience dealing with normal folk. Maybe reassure them that not all cultivators are egotists who don’t care about them.” Drakon smiled sheepishly. “And time to get to know you.”

Amdirlain offered a reassuring smile. “Ling Xi, what would you like from our travels?”

“Opportunities to practice my techniques away from familiar places, so I don’t know what to expect,” Ling Xi replied. “What do you want, Lady Amdirlain?”

“To help people and give them better chances. With the terrain and communities ahead, I’ll limit what I share so you don’t know what to expect, and Drakon can practice talking to people. He can get them to open up about the local problems,” Amdirlain said. “The next settlement is some distance away, but we should easily make it before nightfall, even with time allowed for training.”

“Is this the type of trip where the journey is the destination?” Ling Xi asked.

“Yes. Since we’re far enough away from the village that you don’t have to hold back with your energy techniques. Let me set up a target for you.”

A yellowish-green ogre rose from the landscape, stinking of blood and sweat; it casually tore a boulder free from the soil. Its opening roar shook the leaves from a host of trees within Amdirlain’s sound barrier. Blade in hand, Ling Xi darted in to test its reach, then backed off when it ripped a tree as thick as her arm from the earth. The ogre waved it around, spraying dirt from the fist-sized clump of roots that had survived being yanked free.

“I said you could use energy techniques,” Amdirlain murmured. “None of the foes I’ll manifest will complain about honourable fights.”

Flames glowed beneath Ling Xi’s skin, and she thrust her free hand forward. Gathered power burst from her palm; a thin beam of primordial fire punched through the ogre’s forehead. The creature’s eyes rolled back as a spray of charred blood and brains stained the ground behind it. As it thumped to the earth, it vanished in a spray of white motes, but the uprooted tree just flopped.

The motes swirled and reformed into a great cat with a pair of tentacles ending in a section of solid bone waving from its shoulders. Before it could take a step forward, Ling Xi attacked. A second beam punched into the ground where the warped feline appeared, even as a weight smashed into her side. Rolling with the blow, Ling Xi came up, eyeing the tentacle that had thrashed wildly at a distance. As one tentacle seemed to attack empty air, a wind whistled under the din from the gorge; feeling the breeze of motion, Ling Xi slashed. The severed end of a tentacle hit the ground metres from where it should have been, and blood splattered her black robes. Ling Xi closed her eyes and listened. The beast sprang forward, and the scuff of dirt and crack of branches shifted her aim four metres left, and a broad fan of short-lived flames roared forth to cook the beast mid-leap. Smoke trailing from it, the corpse knocked a relaxing Ling Xi to the ground.

“Bodies have momentum,” Amdirlain chided, as the motes regathered into the next beast. A giant beetle with a water sheen over its carapace shed the first flame attack.

As she observed each fight, Amdirlain cycled qi in her dantian, drawing on the energy from her three sources.

It was nearly midday and a few dozen foes later when they resumed travelling; though her robe’s enchantment shed the blood and dirt, Ling Xi picked debris from her hair for hours afterwards.