Cenotaph of Bones: Chapter 33 (Patreon)

Chapter 33: Onward

Before laying down to sleep, I grabbed a couple of the formation plates that collected liquid qi for us.  With a few tweaks and a few spare scraps of copper, I made something new.  It looked like a set of three concentric rings, with the center shaped like a funnel.  The outer ring had six indentions connected by a solid ring of connected runes, with fittings to hold whatever was placed in the divots in position.  The central ring was an adjusted formation that had a set of runes that would condense qi at a slower pace than our normal collection plates, but I left off the safety features that made it stop once a certain amount of qi was collected.  It was wasteful on our other versions, but this one was different.

The funnel in the center was carved with a spiral of runes that angled down into the spout.  They would make sure that the liquid qi didn’t escape, and it slightly accelerated the qi so it wouldn’t pool up.  At the end of the funnel, I placed a large barrel that the new formation plate fit over like a lid.  I didn’t plan it to be that size, but I wasn’t going to complain.  A few runes lining the inside of the barrel that used to hold lamp oil meant it wouldn’t evaporate.  After getting everything ready, I placed the six normal element focusing stones I had found in the small temple’s altar into the indentations on the formation plate.  A quick flick of my wrist finished the final rune, and I stepped back as it flared to life.

“What’s that?”  Chu walked up, looking over the new device.  “And where did you get the glowing rocks?”

“I found some focusing stones in an old altar.  This should allow us to completely refill our liquid qi to power our formations by the time we wake up.”  I nodded at the swirls of dark and metal qi that were already forming over the top of the barrel.  “The focusing stones can take in all this darkness and death, and turn it into equal parts of the six natural forms.”  I thought about adding the light and dark qi focusing stones, but the risk of forming mana from the perfect ratio mixture stopped me.  That wasn’t a risk I was ready to take.  Also, it might have just given me some insight into why the knowledge of light and dark qi was suppressed.  I swallowed hard at the thought of all the power-hungry people out there who wouldn’t hesitate to use mana in a misbegotten attempt to improve their cultivation.  They might destroy the world more efficiently than I ever had.  My method had taken a long time to finish, after all.  I looked over at Chu and motioned toward our bedrolls.  “We should get some sleep.”  Valerie volunteered to take first watch, and the rest of us laid down after taking off our armor.

After a few minutes of sitting around, my brain finally calmed down enough to allow sleep to come.  My dreams were filled with creatures trying to bite me, and for some reason, I saw Alya.  She was the step-daughter to the Chancellor of the Southern King, who I had killed a few years ago.  Also, a woman in Emperor Ming’s harem that I had a very large crush on long ago.  Several lifetimes ago.

Alya was surrounded by a dark forest, and the trees were trying to grab her as she ran.  The things chasing her were cast in shadow, and I saw flashes of snarling, blood-filled mouths.  But these weren’t beasts, or some kind of monster.  It was people.  The veins of black running across their faces were easy to recognize as the infection I had just fought inside Donny.  As Alya sprinted for a clearing brightened by rays of moonlight, a small darting figure broke free of the pack chasing her.  It leapt off the side of a tree, tackling her just as she made it to the edge of the treeline.  Filtering into the clearing from the other side was a man dressed in the clothes of a ship captain, and I knew it was the captain we had left behind.  He was leading this pack, hunting down anyone not carrying the dark qi infection inside these woods.  Then, the diseased child that had tackled Alya bit her upraised forearm, and she screamed loud enough that I jolted awake.

“What in the stars was that?”  I tried to keep my voice down, but flailing around in my sheets was enough to rouse Jamila, who padded silently over to check on me.  She must have relieved Valerie at some point on guard, because the white-haired girl was curled up against him.

“Are you okay?”  Jamila had a trio of shuriken in her hand, and a flicker of light qi trailed over their sharp points.  “You were really struggling.”

“It was just a bad dream.”  I shook my head, trying to clear the fuzzy feeling that persisted.  “This one was different from the times the gods speak to me.  It felt more like a warning of what could happen, instead of something that was already going on.”

“Could it be a premonition?  Something from inside yourself, separate from the gods?”  Jamila raised an eyebrow.  “Maybe you are developing a new power.”

“I don’t think it’s that.”  I shrugged my shoulders.  “I’ve never shown a talent for precognition before.  This is probably just my fears pushing to the surface.”

“Well, tell me about it.  Another perspective might help.”  She put away her shuriken and sat down next to me before pulling out a flask of spirits.  “Not like we are going anywhere.”

I didn’t have an argument for that, so I told her what I had seen.  She sat silently for a time, so I walked over to check on the barrel.  It was already over halfway filled, so I didn’t mess with anything.  When I returned to sit next to her, she started putting on the armor pieces that covered her legs.

“What are you doing?”  I pulled out a rag to start cleaning my own armor.  There was no way I was putting it back on with the way it smelled.  “We can’t go anywhere yet.”

“If there is any one thing I have learned over the past few years, it’s that we shouldn’t ignore the signs dropped right in front of us.”  Jamila tightened down the straps that held her greaves onto her calves.  “That dream might mean nothing, but it only costs us a little time to check on the sailors.  I think it would be a good idea to look in on them, if only to make sure they understand what the infection really is.  They deserve that warning.”

“That’s… fair.”  I hurried with my own cleaning, before starting to strap pieces of metal to me.  “How were you thinking we should do this?”

“Just you and me, since we’re the fastest.  We make a run up to check on them while Chu and Valerie look after Donny.”  Jamila strapped her sabatons over her boots.  “By the time we make it back, he should be well enough to move on.  This way, we are doing something useful instead of just standing around, staring at Donny.”

“I think it’s a good plan.  Before we go, we should cultivate as much as we can.  I need to refill the batteries on my belt anyway.”  I pointed at where Chu was bundled up on the ground.  “And you get to tell him we’re leaving.”

Jamila laughed at me, and walked off to wake up Chu after she finished strapping on the rest of her armor.  I walked over to the six focusing stones collecting liquid qi and plucked them free.  I started to use them one at a time to refill the batteries, adding in the light and dark qi stones to keep the balance intact.

Since I was able to draw directly on the dark and metal qi flowing by, the batteries were completely charged in less than an hour.  I was more than a little amazed at how powerful the stones were, but I knew they wouldn’t be nearly as impressive once we were above ground and the qi levels weren’t so high.  I also understood how important it would be to not let anyone know we had them.  They wouldn’t give up trying to take them until bloodshed persuaded them it was a bad idea to steal.

I put the stones back in the formation plate so it could finish filling the barrel.  Refilling my own cores would still take some time, but taking too many shortcuts on my own cultivation path would only make the later stages more difficult.  Sifting through the ambient qi using my own cores was the better option.  And, Jamila might choke me to death if she had to wait any longer.  Her impatient glare was burning a whole between my shoulderblades.

“You two be safe.”  Chu followed us up to the door that led into the tunnel so he could reactivate the wards after we left.  “And Jim, make sure you bring my fiance back in one piece.”  His eyes betrayed his worry, and I gave him a sharp nod.

“Don’t worry, we’ll be safe.  And neither of us will be taking off our armor the whole time.”  I looked over to Jamila to drive home the point.  I knew the armor limited her movements more than she liked, but there wasn’t any option given the circumstances.  “Our shields will stay up the whole time, too.  Burning through extra cores is a small price to pay for the extra safety.”

“Good luck then, and I’ll see you soon.”  We both gave Chu a thumbs up, and he sealed the door behind us.  I turned and started heading back the way we came.

“Where are you going?”  I turned to look at Jamila, who was walking the other direction.  “Did you forget the cavern we collapsed back there?  We need to go this way.”

She had been down this tunnel before, so I didn’t argue.  Jamila obviously knew something I didn’t.  After another hour of comfortable silence as we moved deeper, we reached a sharp bend in the tunnel where a narrow tube branched off.

“I take it you scouted this far?”  She nodded at my question, and moved to the small opening.  It was a natural tunnel, carved by water over the centuries, until the mining operation cut off the flow that had run through the area.

“This is as far as I went, but I smell water down here.  If my mental map is anything close to correct, we have been spiraling down.  That means we should be able to climb up through the well that was in the center of the outpost, right into the middle of where the sailors are camping out.”  She didn’t wait to discuss how accurate her mental map might be, and instead jumped into the tube and slid out of sight.

“Wow, great discussion.  Glad we could talk about this before we jump into the dark, scary tunnel that might lead anywhere.”  I let out a mighty sigh as I followed her down the tube.