ch3: Pressure

Lui Fang sent me a letter. I stood beneath the southern gate, clutching the letter to my chest while staring at the valley below. Villages dotted the winding rivers that divided the mountains far below the bridge connecting the outer court's Mist Mountain to the Alchemist's Smog Mountain. Dark clouds poured from the mountain's peak, flowing further south where powerful beasts were said to roam the planes. They were the source of beast tides.

The supposed poisonous smog catalyzed evolution as a merciless judge that weeded out the weak. Only the strong, the hardy monsters survived to breed more of their kind. My Dragon's body spirit art would find its place in the planes if the monsters didn't devour me first.

A smile played on my lips, a shield against the mysteries surrounding me. The last time I ventured to Honor Mountain, Gou Hao, the puzzling Dao Seedling had ignored me. A potential ally or foe, Lui Fang claimed ignorance of their actions. So, it wasn't her. Did Elder Yu, a figure shrouded in secrecy, say something? The elder was elusive and always working.

When I asked if a cosmic bag could hold Chi, he looked at me until I walked away. One library search later, I was better informed. Apparently, they could, but adding Chi increased the Chi density and eventually wore away artifacts like water on rock. So, the question was, should I send my excess Chi to my soul space? My skull tattoo remained, but it didn't have much of a purpose.

The reason I caged my soul instead of letting it bloat and expand was simple. Souls explode if force-fed continuously like mine had been. It takes humans time to get a feel for the soul, and containing continuously growing mass was impossible for the human mind.

Why did no one else think of it if it was so easy? They probably did and kept it to themselves. If I tried teaching it to others who would inevitably leapfrog over me, what would I gain. None of the young masters who I helped paid me any face. To them, I was no better than any other servant. I was a landscaper here, nothing more. Lui Fang might only love me for my spirit stones.

I smiled in the polished metal of the bridge. One of my teeth was rotten. I needed to pull it and grow another soon. That was another norm here.

Mortal teeth rotted and fell out while cultivators, if they were talented, kept their teeth or regenerated them.

The bridge swayed. It was still 13 days until the new moon. Women were supposed to be at their most potent. Maybe she wanted me to watch her breakthrough into the nascent soul realm. She had been at the peak of her core for a while. I took the other bridge to Honor Mountain and went to the corpse pit.

The bodies floated in a brackish mix of rot and ruin, where devilish mushrooms sprouted the size of small hills. Even geniuses in the inner court eventually found their way here, and sometimes, their souls were devoured by hungry ghosts.

I hopped over numerous mushrooms as I ventured deeper into the miasma-filled pit. A black violin radiating a nascent soul aura sat half-sunk in the mud on a little island of flesh. I sucked in a breath and released it.

My third ability wasn't what I expected. When souls grew in strength, they exuded a pressure that increased with time and further strengthening. It wasn't like cultivation; there weren't jumps, but when I reached a particular strength, my pressure was enough to concentrate and direct.

Sweat beaded down my face as I stared at the creature hovering above a mushroom in the distance. It was a hungry ghost in the low-core realm. Ghosts didn't attack the living, only the dead, unless provoked.

I sucked in a breath and slowly gathered my pressure into a small ball of red and white energy. No technique, not really. It was a ball of concentrated pressure, something I couldn't dream of doing before. The ball felt real like it could hold a solid shape with more effort. My body shook as I stretched the ball of condensed pressure and stretched it out.

Small symbols made from condensing my pressure into mental molds appeared before I looped them around the stretched-out mass of soul energy. My soul shuddered, and pain shot through me, starting at my hip and ending in my rotten tooth.

A smile stretched across my face. My soul pressed against the cage, and I drew it back into its proper shape.

The night before, I strengthened it just in case. Only Nascent Soul cultivators could use pressure for soul attacks. The only others to succeed in the feat were the Psyrens I read about.

No, I wasn't one, but I did something similar to what they did naturally. I couldn't make soul attacks like them, so I had to cheat. One ring wrapped around the somewhat arrow-shaped energy, and when I tried to withdraw some of my attention, the arrow dissolved in places.

So, I spent time crafting a second ring. Some parts of it are still wicked away but slower. A final ring 5 hours later did the trick.

I tried finishing shaping the arrow then, but it couldn't move with the rings attached. When I tried pulling the rings away, the arrow snapped off, and I jumped into the brackish water. A corpse gator swam after me, jaws unhinged until the explosion hit.

When I braced myself, I was expecting something from the jaws to crash down on my shoulder and rip me open to my own power, mulching my insides. Instead, I felt a tooth pop me on the head.

After crawling back to shore and placing a cleansing talisman on my chest, I opened my eyes. There was an explosion near where I fell, but I was fine. Pieces of the corpse gator were scattered across the flesh pit with the grasping corpse hands that made up the bottom and the various corpse gator nests along the banks.

I slowly conjured a weaker second arrow than before and destabilized it. My eyes clenched shut as the arrow exploded, and the ground around me shook, but I was undamaged. The pressure was mine.

…

After a cold dip in the flowing creek near Mist Mountain's peak where, the outer elders watched and meditated on their fragments. My arrow formed above my hand out of pressure slowly before I dissipated it. A client, some 11-year-old once-in-a-generation genius, used heat fragments to break through the second lock. Rising was apparently a cousin to lift, and it showed.

When I arrived in Mist Valley where the sect didn't mind holes in our dimensional fabric being ripped open. Outer court disciples trained against each other using the same eagle claw style I was taught. Some would die from training accidents, beast attacks on sect missions, and some to their fellow disciples for the few low spirit stones they were able to scrounge together.

It was a beautiful day, and I got the smell of corpses out of my beard. Whether other people smelled it or not wasn't my problem.

My arrow appeared slowly as I walked. When it destabilized, I flicked it in the air and let it explode. No sound that was out of the ordinary reached me. Disciples practiced here all the time. A few explosions from something not chi-based wouldn't be noticed.

The trick was that this was my pressure, and I could manipulate it, including tossing it away. If I mastered my manipulation well enough, I hoped I could finally break the second lock. For the fifth lock, I planned to kill one of the hungry ghosts with my arrow. That left 3 and 4.

Lock number 3 was merely powering a fragment to strengthen the self. Lock number 4 was targeting others away from the body with a fragment.

Maybe I was kidding myself when I thought about using my pressure to fly. It was possible, but it wouldn't see me through. My only real hope was to gain a fragment of something the hard way by studying it extensively.

I flipped my newly formed three-ringed arrow as I entered the clearing, where a cute girl in Taoist robes and a long braid nearly to the ground glared at me.

"You're late, but I, your grandmother, will forgive your actions this time." Adults didn't talk like that. Seniority was a thing, and kids like her took it as a system of posturing. The fact that she was trying to puff up and look intimidating was even cuter. The fact that she could tear me apart with a hand behind her back and burn my remains without breaking a sweat didn't bother me at all.

I had soul arrows.

I launched the arrow in my hand high into the air.

A smile spread across my face as I went to work. "I apologize, mistress, for my lateness. There is no excuse; a thousand kowtows would not be enough. But to save some of your precious time, let us get to work. My name is Atom Newman, and I will take care of you," I said.

The girl smiled a little, and her face reddened. "I am Gou Fen. Look away from me. I don't want to see your grey hair. I don't want to catch your forehead wrinkles either." Gou Fen said.

My smile felt a little strained at that. I didn't bother correcting her. I formed another arrow and felt the world spin. The arrow dissipated in my hand. Before the girl could notice, I concentrated on the job.

"What is our budget like, and what do you think is feasible? Tell me what your dream hidden realm looks like." I said.

"Volcanoes and puffy pink clouds with dragons and phoenixes chasing each other while I sit on the golden throne gathering the chi of heaven and earth."

A source of heat chi is very possible with the suitable spirit stones. With a few treasures, a volcano is feasible. How many fragments do you wish to train?"

"All 9, why would I settle for anything less. I will combine them into 3 spirit arts and then combine those three into a sage art. That way, I'll be ready for the 9th lock before facing tribulation." Gou Fen said.

Some people had all the luck. I didn't know about the 9th lock; it was good. Immortality required all 9 locks to be broken. Lock number 8 was needed to reach a nascent soul. Then, a cultivator hits the severing stage, where they sheer off the parts of themselves that tie them down to earth.

Well, that's what some texts claimed. Those same texts claimed that pouring spiritual energy into one's soul would cause it to explode. I put my soul in a cage and learned to increase my spiritual energy.

Unlike me, this girl seemed to have everything figured out. "Did you gain all your fragments from minor ranks?"

"Ha, no, those are terrible for fusing. Finding the fragments that speak to you is the only way to reach sage art and break the 9th lock. Everyone knows that, and you're supposed to be wise. You might as well chop off your beard."

My smile twitched. I was about ready to shave her braid, damn the consequences when it hit me. What do I practice religiously and actually care about? Maybe next time I'm in the corpse pit, I should try to gain a fragment.

"So what do we have to work with."

"I'm a once-in-a-generation talent, so I have 30,000 mid-grade stones to use. Make something worthy of Gou Fen the Great."

At the end of the day, I took pity on the girl, snatched all her money, and built her a small volcano surrounded by pink fire chi-aligned spirit herbs. After 12 hours of grueling work, I finished the seed of the hidden realm.

The girl watched me intently as I funneled peak foundation chi to the energy storage array. For a moment, when our eyes met, my blue to her brown, I thought she caught on. Then her volcano blew its top and spewed molten stone down its side as a superheated ash cloud tore through the countryside. Guo Fen had stars in her eyes and even grabbed my hand.

"Thank you; I, your grandmother, approve of this hidden realm." I patted her head and slowly pried my hand from her ridiculously powerful grip.

"It's my job."

"I must tip you. How does 1000 mid-grade spirit stones sound?"

"Like more than I make in a dozen lifetimes," I said.

"It's a pittance. Core Elder Ryu will give me more stones if I ask. I, his adorable little sister, can ask for anything." Guo Fen said.

I smiled and ruffled her hair.

The 1000 spirit stones could help me a lot. There were elemental soul fragments, but they needed lots of comprehension treasures. I tried them before, but they didn't help much. Only the gifted stood a chance. I had to tell Lui Fang.

…

She stared at the man and the tidy sum of spirit stones he was just tipped by a child. Jealousy raged in her heart. Then, an awful idea struck her. She fluttered her eyelashes and stopped slumping. Once her posture was corrected, she adjusted her robe so only a hint of cleavage spilled free.

"I wish I could be happy for you, but I've heard the worst news about my father." The fool's smile slowly faded, and she knew she had him. "He's been cursed, and my clan's funds are thin. They don't have enough spirit stones to afford treatment."

What would he spend the spirit stones on a few treasures to increase his fragment comprehension?

"Tell me, how much does he need."

There was emotion in his eyes, and did she see anger on her behalf? It didn't matter anymore. She couldn't back out even if she wanted to.

"I hate to say it, but he needs 1000 mid-grade spirit stones."

The man slammed the bag of glittering blue stones filled with liquid Chi in front of her. "This is all I have. I hope it will be enough."

"What about your comprehension treasures?"

"I've been stuck for a decade but can wait a little longer." Atom said.

Lui Fang felt herself grow wet, and a blush rose.

She was supposed to be scamming him, and her mind knew that, but her body and the rest of her brain didn't get the scroll. The messenger got drunk in a brothel when Atom Newman that round-eyed fool stuck in a bottleneck slammed 1000 spirit stones without hesitation.

Her breath caught in her throat as the following words left her mouth. "Stay, we don't seem to spend as much time together anymore. It gets cold at night."

While he wasn't youthful like Elder Yu, his shoulders were broad.

"I'll leave a heating formation for you." Atom stood up, and she felt a weight of the soul settle on her. It was like Elder Yu but different. "I need to figure out how I'm going to gain a fragment to help me fly."

She bit her lip. The math didn't add up what was 1000 mid-grade spirit stones to the 20,000 Elder Yu gave her. For some reason, Atom felt genuine, like he wanted to help her. "My father gave me 8 comprehension pills when I first came to the sect. I have taken 7. If you take one near a place where the fragment you want is present, you are guaranteed to comprehend one that is at least related to it." She handed him a pill bottle with a red silk bow wrapped around its neck.

His gaze softened, and he leaned in close to her. In the dark, under the soft lamplight of her room, Atom cut a figure, a dark silhouette of a powerful cultivator. Lui Fang didn't know why she lifted her chin and kissed him. It brought her a night of confused emotions and regret for the first time since stepping down this path.

…

41,000 spirit stones for a kiss. My mind flashed back to her soft red lips. Damn me if it didn't feel worth it. What was money but time and hours worked? I stored the pill in my soul space and made my way in the dark down toward the flesh pits at the cracked sinkhole in Honor Mountain.

I tossed back the pill as I cultivated atop a poisonous mushroom.

The fragment shined bright, not around me but from within. I saw it was mine.

Pressure a fragment of the element Soul. Of numerous fragments that I could have chosen that made up the greater soul, I chose pressure. The fragment fell into my boy, and Chi nurtured it.