‘‘What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck?‘‘

Zhang Cai fell on his bottom, legs dangling from the cliff, hands pressed on his lips. Each word came out as a whisper. Seven-floored mansions all had Xian in them. Those with golden scales, Threshold-level ones, and inside the Silver Sun hanging from above stood nine drakens.

Not dragons, but drakens. Named dragons, with cultivation equal to Spirit level, and scales of blue diamond. They harnessed themselves with dragon-made armor; plates of gold covering their short hind and forelegs, gleaming under the radiance of their sacred horns. The scene was alive with a religious zeal, and none of the other Xian dared to pass by the Sun. They basked in its radiance, absorbed it into their own, and in turn turned silver as well.

‘‘How are they hiding here? How did they hide here? Is this a forward base? A secret realm? The mountain wasn‘t big enough to hold this much space inside!‘‘

And he was sure of that assumption. To contain dozens, hundreds of Xia Empire‘s dragons they needed adequate lodging and enough Qi to sustain their breaths. They could not live in Qi-drought lands.

‘‘...are those nine providing the Qi?‘‘

Spirit realm was something mythical. A realm on its own, not belonging to the step before or after it, it contained an essence unknown even to those inside it. And they were exempt from the laws of the world. This meant the nine drakens did not need Qi to live. And they did not need to eat or sleep or drink, and thrived through their own existence.

For them to supply this army of Xia would be hard alone, but nine together...the spectacle was clear enough of an answer.

Averting his gaze, unsure of how avid his presence was, Zhang Cai sneaked back into the cave. The radiance sealed the sight before him, and now he was back inside the shadow-cast darkness.

He rested his back and thought of what he could do.

‘‘No way. There is no chance or miracle that I can go through there.‘‘

A rocksmote Xian had sharp enough senses that he could not sneak ten meters near them. Threshold level could sense Qi, and the Spirit realm...he had no idea how capable they were.

His gaze turned towards the hole he came from.‘‘Then...‘‘

It was not exactly impossible...but!

‘‘But how? I had the force of the fall, the fire pillar‘s air pressure, and my own wings of wind to break through. The road should already have collapsed inside...right?‘‘

He used one pull of Qi to accelerate. What about thirty pulls?

‘‘My body can‘t take more than three at once.‘‘

He could control five, but any more than three struck him more damage than the enemy would receive. Using in succession...perhaps it would work.

‘‘What if the mountain collapses on me?‘‘

What a frightening fate would it be. Either he would die in an instant, unaware, or he would be stuck between it and starve to death.

‘‘No, don‘t think like that. If master came this way, he knew I would be able to go through!‘‘

Of course, that had to be the case.

‘‘There is no problem! No problem! I will just go through there, straight back up! And if that slithering worm is still there, I can run away again! It is all okay!‘‘

Zhang Cai shouted in his heart. ‘‘It will be alright! I will catch up to the master soon!‘‘

Of course, if not for such obstacles he would have caught his master faster.

‘‘It is all alright...‘‘

Pounding at his chest, Zhang Cai listened the un-nerving beat of his heart. The damn thing did not know how to shut up.

‘‘Just...calm the fuck down!‘‘

Fuck this journey. Fuck enlightenment.

‘‘...I have to act now.‘‘

If not, he would never have the chance to do so again.

While fastening the bag tighter than before, Zhang Cai thought of digging through the opposite side of the radiance. But he had no idea where it led. If there was another space like it, he would be doomed. There very-well might be another place, or just nothing else. But he could not take that risk.

Between a risk containing certain-doom and one that he knew would be the same sort of danger, he would choose the one he knew. He always chose what he knew. It always saved him from trouble.

Unknown risks were not worth taking in any case.

Tying the bag around himself several times with another rope, Zhang Cai cast his eyes to the hole above. It was somehow clean and smooth, but no light reached inside. The deep deep darkness frightened him. Beads of sweat on his forehead, he climbed inside.

For a while, hearing nothing but his heart‘s beating, he proceeded without trouble. Though the shield carved a smooth path, it was slippery. He had to dig his fingers a little to keep going, and after a few minutes his fingers started losing their touch again.

The further he climbed, the colder he felt. Unlike the warmth of the radiance now-below, the hole gave him company with a dangerous chill. He kept going. He climbed up and up, and at a certain point it was no longer smooth but rugged, rough, and patches of earth started narrowing it down.

Zhang Cai broke a few of them, punching the rocks to pebbles, and the area around him shook as if it would collapse. The mountain threatened to bury him for a few seconds, and when he charged his legs with three pulls of Qi it disappeared. He let go of it, and the Qi returned to his dantian.

He rose and rose. The dark did not cease. Silence was his onyl friend, and the beat of his heart to remind him that he lived. He lived. He survived many years by himself, begging and eating rotten food and fruits and vegetables, and stealing from those that perhaps needed them more than him. And he survived. He survived many greenhorn cultivators as well, and baby Xians and adult Xians and cultivator Xians.

Now, he was alive here.

Darkness was a most intriguing place to be for a cultivator. Whenever he meditated, Zhang Cai‘s master would abstain from light. He would prefer a silent, dark place. It did not need be deep inside earth or high up a mountain, or a hut with Qi formations. Darkness was a friend of the cultivator. It was a point of existence that they all dreamed to reach, he said.

Zhang Cai did not know what that point was. What kind of existence was it to stay in dark? When it turned nighttime, he would crawl under river-beds and bridges to sleep. He always feared the night and the dark. He did not understand why his master yearned to be in that state. Was it so special? Was it because they did not know how terrifying the world was? How he could sleep, and in his sleep one could easily slit his throat and take his money.

Like he did to those bastards years ago.

In the path he took upwards, now forcing himself through narrow spaces and cracks, Zhang Cai felt himself on the brink of an epiphany. He felt as if he could find a meaning, and he could be closer to that answer his master reached long ago.

Or did not reach. Was it an answer his master searched for?

His heart restless, his back drenched in sweat, Zhang Cai had a premonition.

He should not think about this. If he realized it, he would not be able to survive.

All thoughts went away, and came the boredom of loneliness. And his fear of the dark. And his heart now beat again in the same rhythm, for his path was blocked and he had no choice but to take the radical path.

Two pulls of Qi, one to each foot, flowed through his hips to the heels. He did not create wind, but fire. And in his front, his head dizzy from the abundant flow of Qi, came to be a cylindular metal shape like the end of a spear. It was larger than his head and wider than his shoulders.

He clapped both feet together, and they exploded.

His body shot forth, crackling storms of fire spread through the mountain. The metal head spun and spun, and it pierced with ease through the mountain. In but a few moments, he felt that he had gone further than before, and then the Qi disappeared, and Zhang Cai found himself stuck.

‘‘Fuck, no.‘‘

He repeated, and flames went off.

Earth ripped apart again and again, he got stuck again.

Then again.

After fifteen pulls of Qi, Zhang Cai saw a gleam at the endo f his vision. Through the collapsed tunnel, between the brown pieces of boulders and moss came a beam most brilliant. The gold, refreshing ray of light hit him over the nose and the face, lighting up the dark dirt on him in majesty. The end was in sight.

His feet clapped, and fists raised high, the firestrom shot him out. Earth collapsed, mountain shook, and through the way he came he flew.

‘‘FUCK YEAH!‘‘

Up in the air Zhang Cai punched at thin air, welcoming the aquamarine blue sky with a peal of laughter. ‘‘Hahaha! I knew I could do it!‘‘

Then he cast a look down, and at the edge of his vision saw bronze scales move out of sight.

Slowly, but very surely, his head tilted down.

The same golden gaze of the last night looked at him.

Then the Xian‘s fangs smiled.

‘‘But fuck you-‘‘ Three pulls of Qi went to his feet. Flames expldoed the same, a tornado of them revolving and burning the clouds.

And like an arrow he descended.

‘‘ROAR!‘‘

‘‘-you fucking worm!‘‘

The Qi dispersed, and another three went to his fist. From his knuckles rose the illusiory image of a clawed fist. It gleamed and reflected the sun, and the metallic sheen of it even startled the dragon, for the claw radiated the aura of sharpness.

‘‘I have Qi now, bastard!‘‘

Zhang Cai swung it down.

The dragon, gently, flapped its wings and evaded.

‘‘...you are unfair!‘‘

High mobility on air meant it had free reign of movement. Not that claw would injure him seriously. If they fought on land and Zhang Cai had all thirty-two pulls of Qi, then they might go down together.

That was the horror of Xian. Even if matched, they would go down together. And the one before him was most likely a fourth-step Glassmade like him.

But they met in the air, and he had no way to put it down. As they had low pain tolerance, he hoped it would be stunned for a few moments enough for him to slow his descent and escape. Now it failed.

‘‘Oh well,‘‘ He smiled. ‘‘This is much better than that place.‘‘

The dragon dove in, and Zhang Cai used two pulls of Qi to blast himself away. The fangs missed the marks, and the Xian moved forth to lunge.

‘‘I used fifteen inside, six above, two now...nine left?‘‘

Using one more, the winds beneath his feet shot him down, accelerating the fall.

His dantian felt more empty.

‘‘I used three before that fifteen as well, and one now...five? Fuck.‘‘

He swore his week‘s profanity quote today. What an interesting day it was.

The dragon came at him, and one pull of Qi moved him out of its way. Then a flash of red came, and heat blew over his shoulder. A ring of fire exploded behind him, searing the skin and burning the flesh.

In agony Zhang Cai roared, and from the corner of his eye saw the earth much too close. He would hit down in seconds.

Two pulls of Qi to his feet, and winds of the sky bend to his feet. They revolved and evolved, creating whirlwinds of their own, and his speed grinded to a halt. Five meters above earth he stopped, but the price paid was his ankles cracking under pressure.

The Xian descended maws open, jaw full of terrifying fangs.

Zhang Cai, before the winds disappeared, directed one to the Xian, and one to his left.

In their last moment both exploded. The wind pushed him out of the way, and the Xian closed its maws to not tear apart its organs. Then the earth came to its view, and the sorry creature dove nose-first into the boulders donning the terrain. A terrible crack came from it, but Zhang Cai did not care for it. The only thought in his mind was to escape, and he escaped at top speed.

The last pull of Qi went to his back, as his feet hurt too much to graze the ground, even. And he flew and flew, until he hit a high rock and toppled, breaking more with his sturdy bones til he rolled around in dust and rock and his blood. Sun cast on him, peering through the clouds and his dust storm, revealing layers of gold and silver. And under that warm Sunlight Zhang Cai felt free and alive.

He was most certainly alive. But hurting, wounded to a point he had no strength to lift one finger. But he was alive!

Alive!

He survived.

That was all that mattered for now. And he was tired, exhausted. The somber feeling of achievement went away on its own, and before his eyes shut he thought of his master and his own state.

A groan escaped from his lips.

No, the pain did not let him rest. His feet, past burned, and now broken, screamed at him to consume the miracle drug again. But he had none, and he would not consume one this soon. They were addictive and corruptive in large amounts. But the craving kept craving, and his body howled for relief.

After some five minutes of fighting against his body, Zhang Cai managed to push his body up and sit. From his bag, now safe, he took out a salve. Unlike the box of the pill, this one had no mechanism. He twisted the lid and took some on the tip of his pinky. He spread it on his feet, and his shoulders, and the remaining bits to his upper back.

The pain settled, but nothing healed. These wounds needed serious examination, especially his feet that burned and charred and broke in the span of a whole day. Or two. The time he spent inside the mountain was ambiguous.

‘‘...don‘t I actually have a way to find out?‘‘

He took out the map and laid it on the floor.

The red dot representing him stood much near to the last mountain, and his master had doubled the path already.

‘‘...doubled?‘‘

He looked over again. His master was at least thousands of kilometers away from his last destination. Not a distance he could traverse in a month, or even a few months, by walking alone.

‘‘How long...fuck, fuck, fuck. What the fuck did I do?‘‘

‘In my past life!‘‘ he omitted.