2 The Prepping Table

Practically on the cusp of being healed, Lex realized he didn't know what to do next. The damage he'd taken weakened him. When even the hope for revenge was impossible, he stopped caring. Now that he could finally be healed, he felt numb. The rage that once smoldered in his heart had cooled. For the last year, all he could think about was getting here. But he'd stumbled upon a new chapter in his life and felt directionless.

Now, what was he going to do?

From head to toe, he was covered in needles. Morgan strapped up both of his arms and anchored to the ceiling. They, too, were covered in hands, with even tiny ones lodged under his fingernails. How was binding and poking him supposed to help him heal?

Oh, he could feel it. Each needle opened a new road for his qi to travel. The stress he had felt from his cultivation had eased. The pain the process inflicted on him was like a bunch of kidney stones.

Lex felt like a porcupine covered in Cathay dyes. From the fattest jade needles to the skinny ruby gold needles, Morgan had happily stuck him. Even his lips, gums, and tongue weren't safe. His new witch savior had gone a little crazy with her poking.

From that excessive poking, Lex felt a little gargle in his guts. That was his only warning before black impurities blasted from his mouth. The feeling instantly brought back memories of puking in his childhood. Like then, as with now, his ribs ached, black tar flew out of his mouth like a geyser.

Somehow, Morgan remained pristine while a geyser of waste blanketed the room. It was only then that he saw her secret. With 2000 beady red eyes, a coal-black exoskeleton, and hideous green wings, it resembled a massive black fly, and it fed on Lex's tar-like excrement.

The cycle repeated every two hours. While Morgan remained pristine, the rest of the room wasn't so lucky. The black fly was slow to clean the room. It favored choice parts over a deep cleaning.

The process was all agonizing and horrible, he wanted to move, and he tried to run. Most of all, he wanted the needles out of him. 12 hours was a long time; it was much longer with nothing to do.

So, his mind wandered away from the painful sensation of the needles into his cultivation technique.

The spiral was an uncaring, brutal, and efficient technique. It was an act of nature re-created in desperation. No matter what flavor of raja gathered around him, he cultivated it. Before, when he had no meridians, power gathered in his dantian and fueled his strength.

When his dantian was cut open, that power tore him apart. It almost killed him.

Morgan had saved his life; he wanted to know why. It certainly wasn't out of the goodness of her heart. Witches didn't work like that. From what the stories told, they were all about deals. That's why they got along so well with demons.

"Why are you helping me?" Lex asked. Morgan raised an eyebrow. "No one does anything for free. You had the skills to save my life; that can't be worth anything. I'm fortunate to have met you, but how can I make you lucky to have met me?" Lex said.

Morgan giggled. "That's a great way to say you owe me a debt. Don't worry; I know how you can repay me." Morgan winked. "Let me fill you in. This place is used to make an undead. Now, the undead has a lot of uses; they can be rented out to fill in peasant levies for war, they can be used for hard labor, but necromancers, they're used for cultivation. You can't supply me with that, but not just any undead can be sent out. We have a game here; it's used to test undead and determine how useful they would be in combat. Best of all, any undead you capture will belong to me." Morgan said.

There it was; he knew there was a point to all of this. It honestly sounded like fun. He could punch a few zombies and repay his debt at the same time.

"I only have one question." She nodded and took on a severe expression. "Can you take these needles out of me yet?" Lex said.

"Sure," he waited for her to make a move. Lex thrust his eyes at her with all the feeling he could muster. It was ineffective. But qi wasn't so impotent; it flowed up from the needles like steam from pipes.

When it impacted the ceiling, chunks of dried impurities rained down. Black fly shot across the room, catching every drop with a long, horrible, and barbed tongue. Not a single drop of the black impurities touched Morgan.

Morgan raised her hands in a calming gesture. "I'm going to. But not right now. They need to settle, or you risk losing your new meridians. We need to do your other side as well." Morgan shook her head. "You're so lucky. Most practitioners do only one at a time. They must maintain their breathing technique and focus their qi flow. Opening a Meridian is like breaking a dam; your qi is always ready to burst them. But if you don't eradicate the blockage, it may fall back into place. You don't know how lucky you are; in only 24 hours, you'll have every meridian open." Morgan said.

"Yes, lucky me. If there's pressure on it, then they might not close." Lex argued. It was hard; his gums and his tongue had needles in them. Morgan had been thorough.

"Okay, if you want to take that chance. We can undo all my work and start over. I do have a few more chapters to read." Morgan smirked. "Besides, you only have one hour left."

He thought she took a bit too much pleasure from his pain. While he languished on her operation table, she took notes. With those scanning eyes of hers, she saw inside of him in ways no one else had. It was disconcerting.

Lex felt every single needle; they each have their distinguished heat and filled him with a unique agony. He thought them rip into him while his qi flooded the paths they made. It reached the limit of his tolerance a long time ago. To take his mind off of it, he formulated a new question.

"How many have Jonah Weston opened?" Lex asked.

"Three or four at his age, probably. The Tang standard only requires the opening of the nine major meridians. Once they open, entering the foundation realm is easier. But once a practitioner enters the foundation realm, opening new meridians becomes dangerous. It is like changing the foundation of the building after the frame is half-built." Morgan said.

Lex looked down his nose at the hundreds of needles poking out of the skin. "It seems I have long since surpassed that," Lex said between the needles sticking out of his gums and tongue. Every word was agony, and he tried to shorten his sentences. "Will more make me stronger?" Lex asked. Everyone wanted to be stronger, after all.

Morgan puckered her plump lips and blew at the bangs covering her eyes. Lex saw the tiny swirls of her witch tattoos. He was curious. Some resembled runes from faraway lands, such as the Mangi South of Cathay or the golden Emperor who resided. That is, if the book, tales of Cathay by Giovanni of Carthage is to be believed.

What did Morgan think of such tales? It referenced witches, but Morgan was the first witch Lex had ever met. She didn't seem anything like the witches from the stories. But, what did he know?

"Some qi condensation cultivators are stronger with one Meridian opened than two. It's all about the breathing technique and available raja. For you, that isn't a problem, so I'm going to open all of them." Morgan said.

She stood up and stretched. With deft hands, she plucked the needles out of him. One at a time, she unsheathed them from the first implanted to the last, and she never took an arrow out of order when the last hit the bronze sink; Lex leaped off the table and stretched.

Power flowed through him, bulging his muscles and hardening his flesh. From the smallest of pathways to the vast highways is qi flowed. He held his hand out, and his qi erupted, curling, twisting, and spinning into long winding strings. The substance that once existed only in the center of his chest flowed freely now.

Morgan shoved him hardback on the table and followed it with a large needle. Agony shot through his body anew up through his spine.

He wanted to hate her, to condemn her, and tell her that she was like all the witches from the stories. "I've made a horrible mistake," Lex said instead. Indeed this was worse than in the front. And when he could take no more, there is a knock at the door.

Morgan quickly opened the door to reveal a gray-haired crone. Her nose was long and covered in hair, and her vast pointed hat was set so low the brim almost rested on it. Gray braids enhanced with gilded bones studded with rubies and jade nearly touch the floor. Little white hair sprouted from a mustache on her upper lip waxing, curled upward and twisted at the ends. Strangest of all, she wore a red robe marking her as one rank higher than Morgan's black. Still, she was two levels lower than Jonah's green robe. Her wrinkled lips twitched up into a smile, and then her doughy face quickly turns green.

With a quick bow, Morgan presented herself. "Mistress Vile, my undead isn't ready yet; I thought I had more time." Casually, she placed the needles in the back of his head. His teeth ground together and protest, but he refused to move or call out in pain.

He saw the old witch's ring-covered hand between Morgan's stabs. They were Norse runes from the geek lands except for one band with Cathay runes. He could feel the qi from them as heat, and each was powerful.

"Calm down, Miss Silver. We aren't going to cart you off to the Midlands for finally succeeding, even if it's just barely. It would help if you merely crafted an undead that can move around and throw a punch. I'll be good enough. While raising the dead isn't your forte, any success is good news. I'll convince the Dean of your talents." Mistress Vile said.

Then, she promptly turned her head and vomited before hurriedly shutting the door to the room. He heard her tumble and curse before the woman dragged herself away.

"Is the smell that bad?" Lex said.

"Black fly says it reminds him of home." Morgan sighed. "She's promised to talk to the Dean for years. I can't go home; no one can. Lex, you're my only hope. You're going to have to win every fight." He saw a twinkle in her eyes. "You look poor, so you must have some fighting experience," Morgan said.

"Hey, just because I'm poor, that doesn't mean my life was filled with nothing but fighting. I'll have you know I can read, write, and perform complex arithmetic." Lex said.

She slammed her next needle in his lower back, and his legs jumped of their own accord. Morgan walked around the table, lowering herself until he saw a raised eyebrow. Lex sighed in resignation. "Fine, I've fought two; maybe I've killed a knight before. Are you happy now?" Lex asked.

Morgan let out a breath. "Yes, that makes things easier. The arena can be a free-for-all. It's coven versus coven, and my coven has only one other person. Most of the undead are common zombies, lesser ghouls, and if we're Wights. I might be able to teach you a technique. For strong undead, a technique or two can be used from their master. Have you learned martial arts before?" Morgan asked.

Lex shook his head. She continued stabbing her needles into place. "Is there anything else we need to do?" Lex asked.

"We could weld a link between us." Morgan looked away. "It's a temporary string of communication normally reserved for lovers." For the first time since meeting her, she blushed. "Since your breach is ridiculously high, I'll have to be a little forceful with the link. If you accept it, we should be alright." Morrigan said.

Lex didn't know what to expect from her link. But from the tales he's read, he had some ideas. Maybe it would be like a soft caress of his mind. Perhaps, it would be like a boundless act of trust between two strangers focused on a singular goal. Maybe, it would be like opening their hearts to each other and taking their first tentative steps towards becoming lovers.

No, what he felt was a burning hot poker digging through his skull, and like a maggot, it twisted and fed its way through his flesh. On reflex, he slapped it away with his qi. The pain stopped, Morrigan squeaked and fell hard on her ass.

About ten minutes later, she stood back up with her robe covered in impurities. She ran around the table and stared him in the eye. For his part, Lex hadn't meant to slap her. It had been a reflex, but by the anger in her eyes, she didn't see it that way.

She stabbed the following few needles into him a bit more forcefully than required. He grunted with each new stab of pain until she finally ran out of places to stab. By that point, she had fallen into huffing and puffing. Each breath sounded like the snort of a sow as she breathed in deeply. Once she had enough, she stepped in front of him again and stared him in the face.

"We're going to try that again. I don't care if it feels like your little mind is going to melt out your ears. You're going to let me weld our link." No sooner did she say the words than the maggot returned to digging through his skull. Only, this time it had doubled in size and heat.

Lex reached his limits quickly and howled in pain and anger. His qi came to his command, but he hadn't lashed out yet. A hand made of indomitable qi waited to slap the nuisance away when the maggot stopped digging and rapidly cooled.

"Did it work?" Lex asked.

He felt a brief flash of pain and shock on her end. "Yes, better than I expected; we'll be able to communicate with this." We have to survive ten more hours with those needles in you. Morgan's voice sounded much less confident than before.

He suspected she didn't expect the welded link to make them so empathetic to each other. Her face had long since broken out into a sweat as she continued to glance at the needles stabbing him in a hundred places with their unique flavor of pain. From here, he felt a slight throbbing of the head from the original failed link and a bruised bottom. That hardly compared to the pain from the needles.

Already, he could tell that this link had been a marvelous idea.