"How does it work?" I asked Yvonne.

"I mean how does the world essence recognize that I have claimed the land?" I continued clarifying my question.

"Dharmic resonance, is the short answer," she replied.

"When you filled out the notice to claim this territory, the clerk had you inject your Qi into a couple of items that you should have with you. A token, a claiming array, and a territory lodestone.

"The use of Dharmic spells and sympathetic magic create a harmonic between the lodestone, the land, and you. It has been attuned to resonate with this area using the sympathetic ritual. The Dharmic specialists use symbolic names and items to represent the area. Like calls to like. They have learned that there is power in names, and those names can be used to define an area.

"A crude map, a sprig from a tree, a drop of water. These items are used to create a first-level response from the token, array, and lodestone you were issued. They create balance, a vague representation of the land that you are claiming. Once we reach your town, you will need to activate the lodestone, by placing it and using the claiming array to complete the process that attunes and establishes the boundaries of your fief when you name the land and town.

"Names have power, and by naming the town and your territory, the lodestone settles into position, locking the area that you have claimed, while infusing the world's energy with your Qi signature. The formula inscribed on the claiming array completes the process by setting up a feedback loop between the lodestone and the land."

"What stops the lodestone from claiming more territory than I was allowed to claim?" I asked.

"Nothing, it happens all the time," Yvonne assured me. "But you might find you have less territory than you were proscribed as well.

"Sympathetic magic isn't an exact science, so you may get a few hundred hectares more or less than you should. But the world is so large that the Empire ignores what area you were issued and redraws boundary lines based on the boundary that your lodestone created.

"Part of the feature for claiming creates a jade token that clearly shows where your boundaries exist. The Empire will update their information with the updated information from that token."

"There has to be a limit," I thought aloud, "or with a bit of luck or Heavenly intervention, a well-crafted lodestone might claim the entire island."

"It can't happen," Yvonne refuted my idea, "there is a limit built into the lodestone. Maybe if someone used different materials, they might get away with it. But the lodestone is crafted using copper. The area that can be claimed is directly proportional to the item's tensile strength.

"Other items could be used, items with higher strength, but nothing has been found that has the same ability to adapt frequency to match the world's energy. Iron, Steel, Tungsten, even gems like Diamonds. They simply don't harmonize well enough to be used as a conduit.

"Previous Emperors have had specialist try. Stacking lodestones, trying to rewrite or overwrite the array program that defines limits. Placing a lodestone in formations or empowering arrays.

"Nothing works because the lodestones are created with an inbuilt safety feature. Anytime a lodestone has been over-clocked, they shatter. And you can imagine how the Empire reacts when a cultivator comes begging for a replacement lodestone."

"And the reason the land seemed to recognize me already? I haven't placed the lodestone, so any sympathetic magic shouldn't have been triggered," I said.

"No one has been able to figure that out," Yvonne admitted. "Some Dharmic specialists theorize that our Dharmic Body attunes to the area that will be ours when we sign documents and inject Qi. Some think that our inner ocean can recognize what is our and the waters within that ocean begin to change slightly, a type of viral infection that creates a cascading change to our Qi, aligning with environmental cues it is picking up from the sympathetic magic programmed into the token, array, and lodestone."

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We had continued our journey southwest as we spoke. The only difference was that I seemed to know where we needed to go. The town that was mine was creating currents and eddies in the world Qi that I was able to perceive and follow.

Once I showed Storm what I was looking for, she was able to adjust her course and the area she was mapping so that we took a more direct route. There were dense Qi pockets that we ignored along the way, areas that might lead to herbs or ore. Storm marked the general area for those pockets of Qi and saved them to the map she was creating. I decided to leave them a mystery. For now, we would have time to explore later.

Now that I knew where to go, we managed to increase our speed significantly. I couldn't perform the aerial maneuvers Storm could. The twists and dives that she took great delight in performing to show off were beyond me. But the increase in speed was its own type of joy. Storms delight each time I was caught in a tailwind and had to stabilize myself had Yvonne and I laughing in shared joy at her antics.

She had gained so much with her advancement.

The smell of the ocean. The brine of salt, the decay of dead fish, and the odor of raw sewage that was being dumped in the bay was the first hint that we were getting close. Not long after, we saw signs of civilization. Smoke, a lot of smoke. I veered over to see what was going on and found that people were trying to use fire to clear and expand available land.

They were burning the forest, and for no reason. There was no need to create pastures to farm here, the land beneath trees was infused with enough Qi to allow crops to be raised without deforestation. That simply wasn't the way Elves farmed, and I had to wonder why these Elves bothered. This undertaking would destroy the land's vitality, serving no purpose.

"You will have to put an end to that, and fast," Yvonne advised me.

I wasn't sure if she meant the sewage being dumped into the ocean; the forest being destroyed, or something else. It didn't matter. All of it needed to be addressed.

I admitted my knowledge of how a city and territory should be run was limited. I knew how Flowing Water city worked, how the Sect maintained their territory, but I wasn't conversant with the nuts and bolts of kingdom and city building.

But I knew what could happen to a planet when resources were gathered, and environments destroyed with no thought to the future. I would not allow my territory to become the broken dead world that Earth was slowly transforming into.

"Who is in charge here?" I asked as I landed near a group of Elves maintain fires as the forest burn. They had watched Yvonne and I fly in so they knew we were cultivators, and if we were powerful enough to fly, we were probably more powerful than anyone who might be living in the area.

"That would be me, Honored Cultivator," a well-muscled Elf admitted.

"Why are you burning the forest?" I demanded. I thought they were doing it just to clear land, but there might be a valid reason for their actions. An illness in plant or tree that they were using fire to remove, much like a surgeon would remove a tumor.

"Lord Chon has ordered the area cleared," he answered.

"Why?" I asked.

"He hasn't said, Honored Cultivator," he replied, and he and his men would never think to ask why. They were employed to do a job, and that was where their obligations ended.

I decided to put an end to the fire. If there was a valid reason, if the trees did need to be culled, I would burn them down myself, but until I knew that reason existed, I refused to allow this damage to continue.

The Dharmic control over the elements came easier and easier to me since reaching the Qi Gathering Realm. My flight from the Sect giving me, even more, control over my burgeoning power. Calling the winds, I allowed myself to be lifted into the air. Adding a call to water, I began forming a storm.

The water almost leaped to respond to my call, the air saturated with particles from the nearby ocean. As the clouds gathered and grew, I kept control of wind and water, refusing to allow the storm to move, to follow the air currents that churned so close to the harbor.

Once the storm had grown strong enough, I sent a thought to Storm, asking if she would like to create the spark that would release the rains. It was a good idea, her gift for play creating a dramatic backdrop to nature's fury.

She released the lightning, energizing the clouds, ionizing the water vapor that had formed, and unleashing a downpour of rain that quickly extinguished the fire that the gathered men had so carefully nurtured.

To the men and women watching, it must have been impressive, watching as the storm answered my call, and Storm blazed in a shimmer of white plasma as lightning responded to her call and Storm flew with the storm.