Chapter One Hundred and Twenty Five - The True Wandering Cultivator

Wandering cultivators were not the norm and were in the few. There were many smaller reasons for this, but the main would always do with cultivation resources. Not such as wild herbs to forage or beasts with which to fight in order to temper oneself, to tame or to kill for its treasures, those sorts of things were scattered all over and often one would have to seek them out. However things such as karmic sites in which spiritual energy gathered or libraries filled with several hundred millennia of knowledge, these seldom or never moved, thus young apprentices and youths that which to seek enlightenment would have to go to them.

Ren Zexian and Chang Min both had roots in sects that were housed upon thick spiritual veins (though in the case of the latter, this had been exhausted many centuries past), seeking enlightenment through elders and their knowledge.

Bai Yan was different. The man he'd sworn to, his Master, had been a wandering Cultivator and thus he had naturally followed in his Master's footsteps. This type of thing, never lingering in one place, living by wits, beneath the elements and often with empty pockets, this should have been detrimental to a cultivator's development, but Bai Yan's Master was nothing if not resourceful. He also happened to be close friends with the man who'd taken a youthful Ren Zexian beneath his wing and Yu Zhang, their junior brother.

When his master had finally ascended, Bai Yan did not accept Ren Zexian's Master's invitation to settle, but carried on journeying, calming the itch beneath his feet and his insatiable need to see new sites, taste new, exotic foods and to learn about new things that simply could not be described well in a book of text. And just as his Master had always reunited with Ren Zexian's Master, he visited Ren Zexian from time to time.

Ren Zexian was some several of thousand years his senior, but there seldom seemed a gap of years when the two men discussed matters in a warm, atmospheric room with a new, interesting variety of tea that Bai Yan had discovered on his travels. By this time, Ren Zexian's Master had followed his own and ascended and the sect that the man had helped support for longer than his own master had wandered, was being to weaken in strength and reputation.

Ren Zexian was renowned for his knowledge in cultivation methods and ability to progress despite his overall lack of talent, but his fame alone could not prop up the sect. The other sect masters at that time were greedy, wanting more resources for themselves, wanting more power, perhaps wanting to be the Sect Leader. They would state that they were righteous, but heart demons had already taken a hold inside them, stunting their growth. Ren Zexian had remained aloof, even shutting himself away from the politics of these people. Bai Yan had even suggest he leave with himself, but Ren Zexian's heart was with the sect and until the day it finally fell beneath the swords of another righteous sect under the name of 'cleansing out the demonic taint', he did not leave.

However, though said righteous sect were eager to recruit Ren Zexian into their folds for the knowledge in his brain, they also feared that he would not be loyal to them and he naturally would feel the barrier erected between them. How could he research in peace when all of his actions were held beneath scrutiny and greed for his works? And how was it when he was unable to see and speak with his old wandering friend without a chaperone come 'apprentice' forced into his care?

One day, the sect would discover that Ren Zexian had simply left the mountain that he had lived upon for more than six thousand years without said apprentice and without anyone else's awareness. This would be the first time that Ren Zexian stepped on the path of a wandering Cultivator.

The pair travelled to another famous sect first. This was the home of their former Masters' junior brother, Yu Zhang.  That man seemed to be a mysterious hermit living within the outer sect, yet the Sect Elders and Seniors were ever so respectful to him, thus the outer and inner sect apprentices followed suit. Otherwise, they just kept their distance from the raggedy, scruffy looking hermit. They did not know that he was actually a most prominent alchemist, hiding in the shadows of the sect so not to be discovered by those who sought his talents for their own gain. It could be said that his fame was definitely no less than Ren Zexian.

Has to be mentioned that at this time, Yu Zhang and Ren Zexian were amongst the two handful of so most senior of cultivators left on Eld Dein. Yu Zhang had been at the peak of nonary cultivation already, but unable to pierce through the veil into the mysterious Soul Tempering Stage, due to his love of his homeland thus unwillingness to ascend and then unable to ascend at all.

The spiritual air had already become thin, a cultivator's life expectancy had become stunted that a millennia now seemed the equivalent of immortality. Ren Zexian, Bai Yan and Yu Zhang were the stuff of legend and people who neared their ends desperately sought these legends wanting their help, wanting their life blood, wanting their cultivation. But one was reclusive, one was as slippery as an eel and the other had disappeared from the realm so long ago, it was said that he no longer existed on this realm, had he ever.

In reality, the three had been researching how to turn their realm from its clear end, with very little to show for it. They knew how to stall it, but that required their deaths so that their spiritual cultivation returned to the earth, however this was by no means a cure and they were admittedly selfish; cultivators such as themselves had reached the true boundaries of immortality and could not look back.

After much discussion, Bai Yan left to seek a mythical spiritual plant that Ren Zexian had once read about and the sect gained a second mysterious hermit for a short period of time... until someone figured out who he was and he was forced to leave on his own journey. Bai Yan would continue seek answers in the wilderness, Ren Zexian in the words of old texts and Yu Zhang in his cauldron for the next thousand or so years until they reunited with high spirits; Bai Yan had actually the luck of discovering old, treasured seeds in the tomb of an ancient king thanks to Ren Zexian's distant guidance.

Bai Yan used a invaluable spiritual water to soak the dry seeds in and a special potion to accelerate their growth and a small sapling would eventually appear. However, their hope turned to dust, the small sapling did indeed produce a little spiritual energy from its delicate golden leaves into the atmosphere, but it certainly would not be enough to reverse a landscape that had become parched to this extent. They calculated into this whether it would be worth their own sacrifice in addition and realised even then there was too little chance of saving the realm.

Think on it, although this little sapling could produce some spiritual energy, it still needed abundant amounts of the same to germinate and begin its growth. If they ended their lives, they would give more saplings the chance to establish themselves, but in the end who would protect the saplings from the greed of other desperate cultivators? The ancient king had certainly not cared for the likes of others or this land when he had gathered up the last of the saplings seeds to keep them even in death out of the hands of others. And also, this little sapling could never compare to the spiritual veins that had sustained the realm for beyond billions of years. Eld Dein was simply an arrow at the end of its flight. They could only mourn its passing.

They separated ways again, coming to terms with the situation over a couple hundred years or so, before reuniting to discuss how they wished to proceed. Although they had to give up on Eld Dein, they did not want to give up on themselves.

Yu Zhang's former great sect had crumbled to ruins by then, just as the righteous sect to destroy Ren Zexian's original home was also no longer. Only a few stubborn sects still remained, lingering on the breath of exhausted spiritual veins, sucking the life out of spiritual springs and the cores of the last great spiritual beasts. Yu Zhang still resided in his hut that appeared untouched despite the changes around them and this time, he was no longer alone. A tiny girl child was living with him. This was Long Wenwen.

It was decided to converge ways, carve out a path together in desperation. They were not the only ones. Small wandering groups would sometimes join them, sometimes leave them, few remained until the final group of twelve took the gamble to trust Ren Zexian's final research, Yu Zhang's final decision and leap to a new home. Even if it meant the death of all of them.

Bai Yan had been amongst the number who'd survived. This had been his fate, had been Yu Zhang, Long Wenwen's fate and it had been Ren Zexian and Chang Min's fate. Bai Yan had wandered across this new world to find his old friend and it seemed that they would once more be able to sit around in a room with a warm atmosphere and drink tea together.