Category: Novel

The demon’s head sailed through the air and landed with a wet thud on the paving stones. The light in the eyes of the few remaining undead shuddered and faded away: now their masterless malice could be snuffed out by a low-ranked disciple.  

Yue Fengjian blew qi through his sword, scattering the demon’s black blood. Lian Zhidiao looked over his shoulder: the protection array was still in place. Hu Baitian either had not yet registered that the demon had been defeated, or he was too focused on his healing to care. 

“Yue Fengjian!” This time it was Yue Yaosa that called to him from a distance. She and Liao Kuaiyu dropped into the middle of the street next to him.  

Liao Kuaiyu checked him over—eyes, limbs, hands, feet—like a new mother counting the fingers and toes on her child. “Not hurt?” 

“No,” Yue Fengjian replied. He settled a hand on Liao Kuaiyu’s shoulder. “That was a big fireball.” 

“It did what it was supposed to do, didn’t it? Drive him to you,” Liao Kuaiyu said in an artificially light tone, but his shoulders sagged. Using that much of the qi in his golden core would leave anyone tired.

“It worked,” Yue Fengjian replied, giving his shoulder an affirming squeeze. Next he looked to Yue Yaosa. “Are you alright?” 

“None the worse for wear,” she replied, but her face looked a little pinched. “You got the kill this time. That’s twice in a row.” 

“Better work faster next time,” Yue Fengjian said wryly. Yue Yaosa lifted her fist like she might punch him, but lowered it when he nodded to the array up the street. “Hu Baitian is still seeing to Shipei.” 

Yue Yaosa gave Yue Fengjian a quick bow, and blew past Lian Zhidiao in a full run, Liao Kuaiyu hot on her heels. They pressed their faces up against the barrier like looking through a window. Liao Kuaiyu smacked it a few times, trying to get Hu Baitian to let them in. It sounded like hitting the bottom of an empty pitcher. 

Something about the sound defused all the tension in Lian Zhidiao’s body. He drifted up the street toward the market doors, letting out a deep breath. He’d survived the night. Ahead of him, he could make out the Lin magicians, including Lin Zhengchun and Lin Jingjing, still hard at work. Relieved of the immediate terror of a demon in their midst, they were picking off the stragglers and shepherding the deviates toward the southern gate for cleansing. The lion’s share of the fighting was done, and the rest would all be over soon.  

But his feeling of relief was arrested by the sight of Yue Fengjian standing next to the demon’s body. As Lian Zhidiao watched, Yue Fengjian knelt next to the body and punched his hand into its lower abdomen, close to where the dantian would be on a human. He wrestled with the slip and slide of the demon’s guts before pulling out something round that fit in his palm: at this distance, Lian Zhidiao couldn’t make out what it was. A trinket of some kind? Or something else? He dropped whatever it was on the ground and crushed it underfoot. Then, to Lian Zhidiao’s surprise, the body of the demon began to collapse in on itself, and he knew at once what had been done. 

Of course. He destroyed the demon core. 

A demon core was a physical object in a demon’s body that held all of that demon’s reserved demonic energy. In most webnovels, a demon’s power could be taken by anyone that found it, demon and human alike, if one consumed the demon core. But Supreme Warlord of the Beast World had been written with a more rigid system: rather than an item that boosted the victor’s power, consuming a core was only beneficial if it was part of the same energy management system. Cultivators and celestial beasts used correct qi, and demons and monsters used deviate qi. Like called to like; consuming deviate qi from the core of a demon would poison those that followed the correct way. The same was true for demons: correct qi was poisonous to them. But without great leaps in strength from defeating demonic enemies, the world had just moved too slowly for most readers. In the rest of his novels, Chen Jiajian had scrapped this system in favor of having villains and heroes manage their spiritual energy in more conventional ways: humans and demons both using the same qi as feedstock for their climb to power. Being able to gain a level from killing a fellow human being made for bloodier, more interesting reading, or so the comments claimed. 

Destroying the demon core meant that no demons could consume it and grow stronger. Yue Fengjian stood over the corpse until it was all rendered to ash. It wasn’t a moment of respect for a dead enemy. It was making sure the deed was done.

Yue Fengjian finally walked past Lian Zhidiao to join Yue Yaosa and Liao Kuaiyu as they harangued Hu Baitian to drop the barrier.  Lian Zhidiao’s eyes were drawn to him as he walked past. 

Did anyone else see him do that? 

“So that’s the power of a first-rate Yue magician.” Zhou Xiangu scoffed, interrupting Lian Zhidiao’s thoughts. “Well, if you throw that much fire at anything, even water would turn to steam.” 

“Jealous?” Zhou Xianzhi’s voice came from just inside the threshold; he’d been hanging back, where Lian Zhidiao couldn’t see him. 

“No,” Zhou Xiangu shot back. 

“Good,” Zhou Xianzhi replied. “It doesn’t do to be jealous of those with inborn talent. Knowledge, in this case, isn’t everything.” He paused. “Isn’t that right, little one?” 

Ah, they caught me eavesdropping. 

“I’m sure Liao Kuaiyu has worked hard to be able to spin magic like that,” he answered cautiously. 

“Oh.” Zhou Xianzhi stepped out into the street, his blue robes melting into the darkness. The setting moon was making way for the approaching dawn. The weak light from the market lanterns barely showed where he was. When Lian Zhidiao heard his voice again, it was much nearer and had a lower, intimate tone. “You’ve changed since we last talked.” Soft fingers brushed his hair back from his face. Lian Zhidiao jerked backwards, only to hear a small giggle from Zhou Xianzhi. 

He… touched my hair? Lian Zhidiao reflexively tucked it behind his ear. What kind of talk did Lian Zhidiao have with him before? Unable to come up with an appropriate answer, he grunted in agreement. I could try to press him for information, but he might already have information about Lian Zhidiao that could hurt me. And I’m tired. 

“I need to check the blood pit,” he stammered, changing the subject. 

“Of course,” Zhou Xianzhi replied in a melodic voice. “If the pit isn’t isolated, let me know.” 

Lian Zhidiao thought he could feel Zhou Xianzhi’s eyes between his shoulder blades as he walked away. Zhou Xiangu unfolded his arms and straightened up as Lian Zhidiao walked past.

In the market, the air was slightly more chilled than before. The blood pit didn’t look any different, but verifying that the gate was closed seemed to be something that earth-seeing was suited for. In order to do that, earth was needed, of course. It wasn’t long until Lian Zhidiao found a loose stone at the edge. A little bit of work with a piece of broken wood, and it came up. 

Lian Zhidiao looked up to make sure that he wasn’t being watched. But the Zhou twins had stopped hanging around in the doorway, and walked out in the street. Promising himself that he wouldn’t lose himself in the earth, Lian Zhidiao knelt and pressed his hands against the exposed ground. 

The stench of rotting food and stores faded away as Lian Zhidiao pushed his awareness down into the ground. He immediately discovered three things. 

The first was that the earth here was still crawling earth. He’d hoped that defeating the demon might do something to purify the land—that’s the way it worked in video games, after all—but no. The earth was just as polluted as it had been a few hours ago. 

The second was that seeing into crawling earth not only was more difficult, but impossible to do without feeling the deviate qi attempting to enter his body. It pushed at him like a writhing mass of worms, thousands of hungry little snouts trying to dig into him and eat their way through. A constant use of qi would be enough to keep the deviate qi from touching him, but it was easiest to do right in front of him. Turning his attention in different directions allowed some of the deviate qi to push at the imperfections in his defenses. Tentatively, he looked below where Yue Fengjian had smashed the demon core into the ground. It wasn’t any more or less crawling earth there: the demonic energy from the smashed core had become completely incorporated into its tainted surroundings. 

The third was that the visual resolution of his earth-seeing was much better the closer he was to targets. He could easily see a cage of ice extending down around the blood pit, grown like a lattice with the holes closed up later. With a high water table, there’d been plenty of ice to work with. The ground was frozen for about a foot in every direction from the surface of the pit, making it a bowl of ice. To test its soundness, he looked for deviate qi squirming its way in through any holes. But even in the middle of the sickening pulse, he couldn’t see any of it moving beyond the frozen earth.

It should be enough to keep demons out until we can fill in the pit. Probably. 

He also couldn’t help but notice that the thing buried near the well was now crystal clear to him.  

It was a cow. 

They buried a statue? Or…could it be a jade beast? Neither one made a lot of sense. But the only way to find out was to dig it up.

On coming back to himself, a wave of weakness overcame Lian Zhidiao. A little more deviate qi had slid into him without him noticing, like not noticing the hem of your pants getting soaked in a puddle in a public restroom. He could try to expel it, but the idea of having his mouth raked with the pain of acid or needles wasn’t something he looked forward to. He didn’t want to be seen with his mouth drooling black and be taken for a deviate.  

Lian Zhidiao looked inward and found that the deviate qi from the cleansing the cow in Shuangwan Village had found a low point in the other core. His golden core was fine, but the other core had a feeling of rancid filth when he looked at it, like an oil seep. 

But having deviate qi in his other core hadn’t affected his ability to spin spells, or his ability to fight. And at least for the time being, it didn’t seem to hurt him either, as long as the deviate qi wasn’t allowed to destabilize his golden core. 

With so many other cultivators around and the situation still so tense, carrying it seemed the best choice. Lian Zhidiao manipulated his meridians, holding back correct qi to open the path to the other core. He pressed the back of his hand to his mouth, smothering the nausea at the feeling of something cold and crawling inside him, burrowing down to his dantian. The deviate qi fell into the other core and all but vanished, but the sickening effects remained. 

It wasn’t much deviate qi. It was barely any at all in the grand scheme of things. 

But no matter what I did, a little got in. No wonder the Wa sect has a higher rate of qi deviation. Every time they use earth-seeing on stained or crawling earth, they poison themselves.

“Are you alright?” Yue Yaosa’s voice echoed through the empty market. She quick-stepped to his side and knelt next to him, looking him over. 

“Fine,” Lian Zhidiao croaked, shaking his head. “Don’t worry about me.” 

“Hu Baitian has almost finished his treatment. I’ll let him know you need—”

Hu Baitian’s scowl when asked to treat him rose up in his mind like a spectre. “No! No,” he said waving her off. “It’s nothing serious.”

“Did the smell overcome you?” Yue Yaosa looked sympathetic. “It is quite strong.” 

The discomfort of his insides squirming against themselves was fading away. Lian Zhidiao seized on the excuse. “Yes,” he answered quickly. “I’m not used to the smell of rot.” 

Yue Yaosa extended one strong arm to help him up. “You Wa cultivators all set such store by your perfumes and incense. It doesn’t do you any good when you have to fight.” 

Lian Zhidiao took her hand and felt like his shoulder was being pulled out of its socket. He was on his feet again, but at what cost? “It would be the mark of a better world if there was less fighting to do.” 

Yue Yaosa stared at him. 

“Did I say something strange?” 

“A little,” she answered, a quizzical look on her face. “What would the world be like without fighting?” 

“That’s what Yue Fengjian wants, isn’t it?”  

Yue Yaosa’s brow wrinkled. “What?” 

Oh no, has Yue Fengjian not divulged his plans to them yet? These events should already be within the framework of the novel itself, so the main party should already know, shouldn’t they? Lian Zhidiao shook his head. “Forget I said anything. More importantly, we need to find some tools and dig up the square next to the well.” 

“After the night we’ve had?” Yue Yaosa gave him an incredulous look. “Any reason?” 

“There’s something in the earth next to the well,” Lian Zhidiao said slowly. “It could be a jade beast.” 

“A jade beast, huh?” She gave him a short nod. “I’ll see what we can find.” 

With the help of the Lin cultivators, a storehouse was opened and picks found, but after that, there was still work for the Lin sect to do. The sun was rising as they pulled back the stones like scaling a fish, and began to dig down. Yue Fengjian took to manual labor easily. Zhou Xiangu was volunteered for digging by his brother. He and Yue Fengjian developed a rhythm, their picks rising and falling. Hu Baitian and Liao Kuaiyu pulled baskets of earth out, mounding them up on the side of the hole, which was about two meters long and almost three meters wide. 

“Can’t you make this go any faster?” Hu Baitian’s white robes were stained with gray sand, and a few flecks of mud had gotten onto his face as well. 

“Not until I know what’s in the hole,” Lian Zhidiao replied.

“We’re just as likely to chip it with our picks,” Zhou Xiangu snarled, his eyes like blades at anyone who dared to talk to him. 

“Just a little bit further,” Lian Zhidiao said. Then he heard the telltale sound of metal hitting stone. 

“Got something here,” Zhou Xiangu said in an irritated tone, tapping it with his shovel. 

Lian Zhidiao scooched to the edge of the hole and dropped in to take a look. They weren’t quite down to the water table yet, but the earth here was slightly damp. With both hands he cleared the mud away. 

“Getting pretty used to seeing you covered in muck,” Liao Kuaiyu offered from the top of the hole. 

“Hazards of the job,” Lian Zhidiao grunted, pushing the earth aside. There was a softly curving piece of stone still obscured by a layer of mud, but the weak light at the bottom of the hole couldn’t quite reveal what kind of stone it was. He stood up. “Is there some water?” 

“Certainly,” Zhou Xianzhi said. He spun a small globe of water from his spindle and then dropped it in the hole on the muddy surface Lian Zhidiao had uncovered. Sweeping water over it to clean it, it was clear in a matter of moments that the stone was jade green. 

“It’s a jade beast.” Zhou Xiangu let his shovel rest in the earth, leaning on it. Some of his ire at being forced to dig seemed to have cooled. “Why did they bury a jade beast?” 

“The deviates that are able to recover should be interviewed,” Hu Baitian said.”If anyone important survived, they may know what led to this, or when it happened.”  

Yue Shipei winced his way to the side of the hole and looked down at them. “It doesn’t look like it’s alive.” He addressed Lian Zhidiao. “Is that something you can fix?” 

“You mean by kissing it?” Liao Kuaiyu had an impish curl to his lips.

 “It’s not a kiss!” Lian Zhidiao had had about enough.

Liao Kuaiyu snickered, and Yue Shipei laughed once before holding his hand to his side and groaning. 

“What is it then?” Yue Fengjian rubbed his sleeve over his forehead, wiping away sweat. 

“It’s… a technique.” He didn’t really know what to call it, but he couldn’t really explain that he’d come up with it based on a book and a weak understanding of qi and CPR. Lian Zhidiao started to dig away at the sides of the cow with his hands. His broken nails hadn’t had the chance to heal after he’d awakened in this body, so he was likely just making things worse for himself later, but healing a jade beast was worth it, wasn’t it? 

Yet as they dug the cow out, he couldn’t shake the feeling that this hadn’t been in the original story. Digging up the jade beast was a brand new event happening within the timeline of the novel. Lian Zhidiao was all too aware that such actions, even beneficial ones, could have unforeseen consequences down the road. 

The sun had risen above the horizon, peeking above one of the three hills that gave Sancha its name when Lian Zhidiao got the beast’s head free of the sandy soil packed around it. Yue Shipei was right: the cow was completely frozen, as the one in Shuangwan Village had been. The cure ought to be the same, right? 

With a small noise of regret for the filth he was about to crawl into, he wedged himself down in the dirt. With his sleeve, he rubbed the cow’s nose and mouth clean. Just as he was about to lean forward, he realized he had a bit of an audience: everyone, from Yue Fengjian to the Zhou twins, was watching him very closely. Yue Yaosa was the first to recognize that he was hesitating at being watched. 

“Come on,” she said, herding the others away. “Especially you two.” She reserved particular suspicion for the Zhou twins, who dragged their feet as much as they could. It wasn’t that Lian Zhidiao was all that concerned with anyone seeing the technique itself. But it was embarrassing to even look like he was kissing a cow. 

Lian Zhidiao looked inside the cow and gave it a small breath to see what was happening. The jade beast’s time in the stained earth had concentrated so much deviate qi in it that some was beginning to condense into dark scale lining its meridians. 

Lian Zhidiao did the same as he had done before, but this time, surrounded by crawling earth, he had to draw entirely on the qi in his golden core. A breath to loosen the dark scale of deviate qi, a breath to light the fires, a breath to stoke them to a white-hot storm of energy. He drew the deviate qi and demonic energy through the cow up to his mouth and spat it out to one side, his mouth like fire and poison all at once. To his horror, the black fluid that bubbled out of his lips wriggled as it fell into the dirt and then rooted into the ground and disappeared from sight.

The jade cow lifted its head out of his hands.  Lian Zhidiao wiped his mouth again, rubbing the black stain away.  The cow mooed at him and butted her head against him. 

“You’re happy too, huh?” Lian Zhidiao let out a shaky breath and rubbed her head. Then there was the sound of footsteps at the top of the hole. 

“See?” Liao Kuaiyu folded his arms over his chest. 

Yue Fengjian’s eyes darted from Lian Zhidiao to the cow and back again. “You fixed it?” 

“Mm,” Lian Zhidiao replied. I don’t need to say more than that; the work speaks for itself.  

Dumbfounded, Yue Fengjian stared at him. “How?” 

Yue Yaosa couldn’t hold back a laugh. “Well done, Lian Zhidiao! It’s not everyone that can leave shige speechless.” 

Yue Fengjian shot her a frown, and seemed about to correct her when Hu Baitian pointed at the sky. 

“There!” 

In a few moments, the blue sky overhead was filled with cultivators in green robes, their emerald sleeves fluttering: reinforcements from the Lin sect had arrived at last.  

---

Previous Chapter < Chapter 10: Scalding Blight
Next Chapter > Chapter 12: The City of Fragrant Wood

Lian Zhidiao swallowed hard.

Hey, hold on a minute… This body has technically died once already. The original Lian Zhidiao’s spirit might still be lingering in this world. If someone can speak to the dead, it would be quite easy for someone to find out that I’m not actually the real Lian Zhidiao. “Talking to the dead,” he repeated woodenly.

“It’s possible the Quanlu magician is a Speaker.” 

Panic speared him through the heart. I don’t remember any of this! 

It was true that the Quanlu Yuan, the sect that specialized in metal magic, had been very involved with law and order, but he’d never written anything like this. Was this another example of the world growing naturally from a seed he’d planted?

Lian Zhidiao took a calming breath. “The Speakers… How do they talk to the dead?” 

“If we knew that, then anyone could become a Speaker,” Yang Meihua quipped. “It’s not like they let just anybody see it.” 

“But how do you know they can really talk to the dead?” 

“The crimes that have been solved speak for themselves. Especially those with subterfuge or assassins involved.” Lin Jingjing spoke with the authority of one who had seen these Speakers catch a criminal.

“The Speakers come in and find a patch of roaring earth, and then the next thing you know, a weapon is found in someone’s home, or their brother confesses when confronted with the evidence.” 

Lin Jingjing nodded at Yang Meihua’s words. “They may be members of the Yuan sect, but their fairness and dedication to members of all sects is beyond reproach. The Xideng Wa and Tuhuan Zhou sects will send a messenger to them if their skills might be needed, even with relations between them as they are.” Her dark eyes pierced Lian Zhidiao. “Even you couldn’t find fault with their methods.” 

Even I, a Wa magician, could benefit—or not—from their investigations. So it seems they are something like police, or at least private investigators. Lian Zhidiao pursed his lips slightly. It’s probably a good bet that their expertise isn’t limited to solving murders. 

Suddenly there was a sound of running feet out in the courtyard in front of the hall. Lin Jingjing looked up just as there was a small knock and then a crack appeared in the door, showing the pleading face of their young servant. Yang Meihua rose to her feet and stepped outside the Inner Hall, leaving Lian Zhidiao and Lin Jingjing alone. In a few moments, Yang Meihua returned, and with her was a strapping man with thick eyebrows, dressed in green robes.

Lin Jingjing’s eyes widened and she rose, bringing her hands together and bowing courteously.  “Shixiong.” 

He made the same gesture, and seemed about to speak until his eyes lit on Lian Zhidiao as the latter got to his feet. Suspicion played over his features and he lifted his chin. “Shimei, I did not know you had company.” 

Lian Zhidiao bowed, his hands together in a salute. “I am Lian Zhidiao, of the Xideng Wa sect.” 

The bigger man’s eyes scraped over him, catching on his plain black robes, his waist, and the jade spindle which hung from it. He gave Lian Zhidiao the smallest bow that he could manage and still be called courteous. “Lin Zhengchun, of the Youlu Lin sect.” 

The pleasantries made, he turned back to Lin Jingjing, walking across the room. “Forgive me for not taking more time, but the situation is quite urgent.” From a fold of his robes, he produced a wad of green silk, handing it to Lin Jingjing. 

Lian Zhidiao watched intently as Lin Jingjing unwrapped the silk bundle. In the center of the cloth lay an egg of cloudy green jade. Lin Jingjing looked up at her martial elder brother and then lifted the jade egg to her temple and closed her eyes. 

Lian Zhidiao watched Lin Jingjing like a hawk, but she gave no indication as to what was happening other than a crease in her brow. Lian Zhidiao glanced at Lin Zhengchun, only to find that he was being watched intently. Once caught, Lin Zhengchun lowered his eyes to the ground and then looked back at Lin Jingjing as her eyelids fluttered. She cleared her throat. 

“That’s quite a lot.” She folded the silk back over the egg. “How soon do you need me to be ready?” 

“Tomorrow. We’ll leave at first light.” Lin Zhengchun received the egg back from her. 

Lin Jingjing looked at Lian Zhidiao, and then looked back at Lin Zhengchun, her mouth tight. “You may as well let him see it,” she said, letting out a small breath. “If things are that dire.” 

“A Wa magician?” Lin Zhengchun kept a steady voice, though his eyes flicked to Lian Zhidiao.

“He’s here, closer than a group from the capital. He could help.” Lin Jingjing paused. “For that matter, there are members of the Xinxue Yue sect in the village as well.” 

Lian Zhidiao’s voice was timid. “What’s going on?” 

“You’d better look for yourself.” Lin Zhengchun offered the jade egg to Lian Zhidiao. 

Jade. Lian Zhidiao’s eyes dropped to the jade egg. A jade tool like the spindle, and the jade slip. He took the egg and then pressed the cool stone against his temple. 

A moving image—no, an entire sensory experience—sprang up in his mind. Immediately, he understood why Lin Jingjing had closed her eyes: the overlay of one world on top of the other was disorienting. The ‘video’ played in his mind, but he could smell something rotten and sharp, like a lightning strike over a landfill. The field of view swung around him: there was a town, or what was left of one, with baskets abandoned in the streets. Flies blew around the fruit peddlers’ carts, and duck carcasses hung up near the butcher’s stall, swollen and green. 

The person carrying the egg couldn’t control their breathing at all; they huffed in Lian Zhidiao’s ears, wheezing, on the verge of crying out. The field of vision swung again, and for an instant, Lian Zhidiao could see clearly down a dark alley. There were people propped up against the wall, their skin white and grey, legs stretched out. Standing in the middle of the walkway nearby were other people, stock still. The image stilled for a moment, and then slowly, slowly, one of the standing people began to turn. 

Lian Zhidiao couldn’t see clearly at first, but the person making the recording bit back a scream, and then every part of it was cast in sharp relief: the skin made soft by decomposition, sliding off the face like a mask, exposing the tense, gray-green muscle and rancid fat underneath. Worst of all was the smell: sickly sweet and thick enough to coat the inside of his mouth. The video changed, shaking wildly between heaven and earth, and all he could hear was the sound of someone whimpering as he ran away in a mad panic. 

Lian Zhidiao pressed his fingertips against his mouth as he lowered the egg, placing it almost absent-mindedly into Lin Zhengchun’s silk-draped hand. 

“It’s quite bad,” Lin Jingjing said in a quiet voice. 

“It is,” Lian Zhidiao mumbled. All of it had seemed so real: the smell, the sounds. His heart rate was up, and he hadn’t even been there in person. “Is this far from here?” 

“Sancha Town. Further up the river.” Lin Zhengchun tucked the jade egg back into his robes. “We received this yesterday from a young disciple who had gone home to see to a family illness. When he ran away, he ran this way instead of towards the capital. I’ve sent someone by sword to the capital, since the route overland runs through Sancha.” 

Lian Zhidiao couldn’t shake the suspicion that was creeping into his mind. He only vaguely remembered the outline of Supreme Warlord of the Beast World, but there had been some kind of trouble in the lands of the Lin sect in the beginning. Solving it was how the protagonist was able to establish favor among Lin cultivators and magicians. Knowing that the protagonist was one of the Xinxue Yue sect members in the inn across the village square, he could now say with certainty that he’d been dropped in near the beginning of his novel. 

As he remembered it, there was a protagonist of the Xinxue Yue sect, fighting against demons that threatened his home, and he sought help from the rest of humanity. He had necessarily needed the unflagging loyalty of the sects, and, as he’d written it, this loyalty had been acquired through seducing the most beautiful or powerful women in the sect. The first one had been easy enough to write, but by the time he’d worked through the other sects, just sleeping with a Beauty wasn’t enough. So weddings came to be more frequent, and honestly, as the unmarried writer, he had been more than a little embittered by having to write repeated wedding scenes. 

Still, the protagonist needed help from all the sects to fight demons. If nothing else, a world without demons was easier and safer to be in than a world with demons. 

Lian Zhidiao got to his feet. “It would take a few days for help to come from the capital.” He looked between Lin Jingjing and Lin Zhengchun. “We should ask the Yue sect members for their help.”

Lin Zhengchun’s jaw moved, as if he was chewing on the inside of his cheek. “I agree,” Lin Zhengchun said at last. He leveled a steady gaze on Lian Zhidiao. “We could use them, if you can get them to come.”

There was a weight on the last part of his words that made Lian Zhidiao look at Lin Zhengchun more directly. It wasn’t quite a challenge or an insult, but a guarded expectation in his voice that set Lian Zhidiao’s mind to work in suspicious ways. 

But he made a salute to both of them and left the hall. Certainly, more than anyone there, he might be able to guess what to say to the Yue magicians to get them to agree to come with them. 

The rain had cleared away, and the afternoon remained cool and overcast. The lively sounds of the Mountain magicians floated out into the air. Being in a crossroads town, the inn was nice enough to have a small courtyard, though Lian Zhidiao had to walk around the outside wall with the stables to get to it. He waved away the serving boy that came to take his things, and drifted unnoticed into the courtyard, toward the voices. 

Seated around a table near a wall were the party of Yue magicians and cultivators he’d met that day, along with the red and white riders. All together, that made five people who might be useful in fighting… well, undead, possessed, whatever was wrong at Sancha Town. 

In the light of lamps on the table, he could make them all out clearly: the slim jokester that had cracked wise while he was covered in mud, as well as the woman whose strength looked enough to rival two men. There was also the broad-shouldered man who had been drawn in by the jokester’s laughter. Then, the latest additions to the party. It was the first time Lian Zhidiao been able to closely examine the last two. 

The white-clothed rider was not wearing just any gleaming white. The ambient light and the light of the small flames around them bounced off of his clothes, which seemed to be woven in part with shiny threads. Whether it was a product of their make or an enchantment, the white rider seemed touched by the shine of gold or silver, except for the single black stripe trimming each sleeve. His hair was only half-up, and his face had sharp features. He leaned forward, engaged in whatever topic was being discussed. He might be of the Yuan sect, but he clearly already had some rapport established with the other Yue magicians. 

This left the solitary red rider, the lion who rode in with the white rider from the east, along the same path Lian Zhidiao himself had taken. He looked to be almost the body double of the other well-built man, but where the well-built man had handsome, if plain features, the red rider left him far behind. He was blessed with a noble, masculine face and phoenix eyes, framed by a few locks of hair that weren’t pulled back into his thick ponytail. As Lian Zhidiao hovered in the entrance to the inn, those eyes glanced up and pierced his. 

There was no moment of recognition between them, just a brief, sharp regard wherein Lian Zhidiao felt as if his worth was being weighed. Every atom of him felt seen, measured, although he had no way of knowing whether he’d passed muster. 

Then the moment was gone. The Yuan magician leaned over and whispered something in the lion’s ear. Those eyes like awls looked away, and a shiver ran down Lian Zhidiao’s spine. 

Is this what was referred to as killing intent? No wonder you can feel it across the room.

Slowly he became aware that the conversation at the table had died down, and all five members of the group of Yue magicians were looking at him. Their expressions varied in warmth, but all of them seemed expectant. His heart rose up into his throat as he walked toward them. Lian Zhidiao had made every one of them what they were, and seeing them in the flesh—real—suddenly put his spirit in a tumult.  He bowed and brought his hands together in a salute. The three he’d met before looked slightly amused; the red rider and the white rider were more reserved. 

The slim man inclined his head, with a smile around his lips. “Done playing in the mud for today?” 

You had to bring that up!

“For today,” Lian Zhidiao answered. “There are more pressing matters. Someone from the Lin sect has just arrived and spoken with the village head. It seems there is…” The horror from the egg flashed in front of his eyes, and he blinked it away. “…A situation, which with your help might be easily resolved.” 

“Some of your work get out of hand?” The Yuan magician spoke up: his voice was firm, but his face betrayed his distrust. 

The lion remained silent, with a fierce expression, but one of his eyebrows lifted slightly as the man next to him spoke. 

Lian Zhidiao opened his mouth to protest, but a chuckle from the slim man cut him off. “It’s not like that. He’s not a threat, but he’s definitely not all right in the head. Caught him kissing a jade beast this morning, covered head-to-toe in mud.” 

The awful spectacle from the morning dogged him even to this point, the moment when he was to meet the protagonist. But remembering scenes of the insolence of young upstarts from nearly every wuxia novel ever, Lian Zhidiao gave them a deep bow, mindful of the imposition he was making. A man should not come to ask a favor and not give his name. “I am Lian Chanjian, courtesy name Zhidiao, of the Xideng Wa sect.” 

The broad-shouldered man gave the slim man an indulging look, but stood up and bowed to Lian Zhidiao. “I am Yue Zhezhong, courtesy name Shipei, of the Xinxue Yue sect.” 

Glad to see that someone still has some manners! 

As Yue Shipei stood up, the only woman stood up as well. She was also broad-shouldered, especially for a woman, and was only a hand’s width shorter than Yue Shipei. She bowed to Lian Zhidiao. “I am Yue Yaosa, of the Xinxue Yue sect.” 

His two companions having determined that at least on a first meeting, some decorum must be observed, the slim man got up and gave Lian Zhidiao a short bow and salute. “Liao Zhaoyou, courtesy name Kuaiyu, of the Xinxue Yue sect.” 

As Liao Kuaiyu stood, the lion stood up as well, and last, the Quan magician. The lion brought his hands together and gave Lian Zhidiao a bow, his ponytail half-sliding over his shoulder. His voice was deep, and his manner brusque, even though he spoke as politely as any of the others. “I am Yue Hanqi, courtesy name Fengjian, of the Xinxue Yue sect.” 

He IS the protagonist! Outwardly, Lian Zhidiao gave no sign of his emotions, but inside, he was pumping his fist and congratulating himself on correctly remembering something in this otherwise forgettable book.  

The Yuan magician was last, but where Lian Zhidiao thought he’d detected lazy contempt before, he found that the White magician was suddenly keen, his eyes razor-sharp. “Hu Nianzu, courtesy name Baitian. Of the Quanlu Yuan sect.” 

Yue Fengjian sat back down first and everyone else followed suit. He gestured to a place at the table opposite him, but Lian Zhidiao shook his head. “I’m afraid it’s quite urgent.” 

“Spit it out, then.” Hu Baitian’s eyes bored into him. “If it’s so urgent.” 

“There is a situation with Sancha Town down the river. A Lin sect disciple found the town deserted, except for… some things.” Lian Zhidiao looked around at the group, but his eyes pressed on Yue Fengjian. “Not people. At least, not anymore.” 

“You speak confidently of things that others only whisper,” Yue Yaosa said, her lips twitching. “Do you have some experience hunting the undead? Or demons?” 

“I do not,” Lian Zhidiao confessed. Just a long history of watching movies about killing zombies or demons. “But the prowess of the Yue sect is unsurpassed, and getting more help from the capital will take time.” He straightened his shoulders. “I will be helping as well.” 

“If you didn’t raise them to begin with,” Hu Baitian muttered. “The Wa sect is capable of sweeping up large numbers of corpses—say, from a nearby graveyard—and setting them to all sorts of nasty work. And you’re asking us to risk our lives to clean up your mess?” 

Yue Shipei nodded slowly in agreement. 

Yue Fengjian’s eyes narrowed, making his stern face look all the more harsh.

The words ‘cannon fodder’ unfurled in Lian Zhidiao’s mind, as if on a large banner flapping in the breeze outside a discount or damaged goods store. Here he was, in front of the main adventuring party whom he himself had created, yet they would not even give him the time of day. It wounded him, but he might have expected that, being a cannon fodder character from a sect that was directly opposed to the Yuan and Yue sects. 

Without a sword to force them to take him seriously, Lian Zhidiao’s only option was to try to appeal to reason, or their better natures. 

“It’s not my mess, I only arrived in Shuangwan Village yesterday. Lin Jingjing, the village head, has been asked to help with investigating whatever is happening at Sancha Town. She has shown me courtesy, and I’ll repay that debt.”

Hu Baitian stared at him for a little longer and then snorted softly and sat back. But then, to Lian Zhidiao’s surprise, Yue Fengjian’s eyebrow twitched. 

Lian Zhidiao looked at Yue Fengjian, meeting that dark, winnowing stare. I know you. You’re desperate to have someone, anyone, listen to the plight of the Yue sect, which has been fighting demons in its lands for decades, if not centuries, and all completely on their own. You want the other sects to step up and help in the fight. You’re not expecting a Wa magician in shabby robes to be any help to you at all, but I know exactly what you need to hear that will convince you.

Lian Zhidiao folded his slim arms over his chest, gesturing with one hand. “The Yue sect knows what happens when you leave demonic energy to its own devices. Failing to work together in the face of such strength only ensures our defeat. Allowing Sancha Town to stay as it is means that whatever demonic energy is there will grow in power, unchallenged. ” 

Maybe he hadn’t recalled it perfectly, but that was a line directly from Yue Fengjian’s appeal to the Lin sect as he tried to sway them into helping the Yue sect. Lian Zhidiao tucked his hand under his arm, waiting. In the periphery of his vision, he saw Liao Kuaiyu and Yue Shipei turn their heads to look at Yue Fengjian. 

“You may be a Wa magician, but you seem to have some understanding of the world.” Yue Fengjian stood up, glancing at Hu Baitian next to him before turning back to Lian Zhidiao. “We’ll meet Senior Lin and see if we can help with this matter at Sancha Town.”

---

Previous Chapter < Chapter 4: Lian Zhidiao, Half-Drowned Housecat 
Next Chapter > Chapter 6: It’s Difficult To Stand With Both Feet On A Sword, Isn’t It?

Even the cool mud sliding down his back couldn’t relieve the hot embarrassment rising in Lian Zhidiao’s cheeks. The laughter slowly died back into quiet snickering. 

I was so focused on what I was doing that I didn’t even hear them coming. 

With a heavy sigh, Lian Zhidiao sat up in the mud. He slung some of the black muck off his hands and heard a whole new round of sputtering laughter rise up behind him. Steeling himself for another wave of laughter, he got to his feet and turned around. 

Three horses stood in the road, their tack trimmed with red tassels. The riders weren’t all men, but one woman and two men, one slim, one muscular. The slim man had high cheekbones and his hair completely smoothed back, his eyes sharp. The muscular man wore his hair half-up; it cascaded over his broad shoulders, softening what might otherwise be a stern visage. All of them were dressed in robes the color of red earth, even down to red leather trim on their boots. The broad-shouldered man was biting his lower lip and trying not to smile. It was clear that the slim man’s infectious grin had sucked the other man into his laughter. 

“Are you two finished?” The woman wore her hair pinned back in a severe fashion, with no ornaments at all. She was nearly as broad-shouldered as the bigger of the two men. When Lian Zhidiao saw her pretty face and striking eyes, he knew instantly who he was looking at. She was Yue Yaosa, the Beauty of the mountains, destined to become one of the Supreme Warlord’s wives. 

Lian Zhidiao took advantage of Yue Yaosa’s words and turned a cold look on the other two members of the group. Drawing himself up as tall as he could, and ignoring the way the warming mud on his skin was beginning to stink, he tried for as lofty a tone as possible. “I did not expect such behavior from the Xinxue Yue sect.” 

“Nor we from the Xideng Wa sect,” the slimmer man cracked. “Is it so lonely in your swamps that you are given to kissing cows?” 

Is this sect that looked-down-upon?!

Lian Zhidiao squared his shoulders. “No, this is my first time. Maybe you can give me some pointers?” 

The slim man bristled and then it was Lian Zhidiao’s turn to hide a smile. It was at this moment that Lian Zhidiao heard a splash behind him and whirled to face it. 

The jade beast lifted its front hoof out of the mud with a sucking sound. The mountain cultivators forgotten for the moment, Lian Zhidiao held out his hand, trying to encourage the cow to follow him. The jade beast let out a sonorous lowing, and then walked forward. With squelching noises, it ambled ponderously to the side of the rice paddy. 

“Hey, are you controlling that thing?” The broad-shouldered man’s voice was touched with awe. 

“No,” Lian Zhidiao said over his shoulder, watching the jade cow. “I think it’s going wherever it likes. 

But soon enough, green hooves mounted the side of the rice paddy’s berm and the cow stumbled up onto higher ground, still with an obvious line of encrusted filth where it had been standing in the field for an unknown number of seasons. 

“What I was going to say, before you continued poking fun,” Lian Zhidiao said, “Is that I was just helping this jade beast.” 

The cow flicked its ears amiably and mooed again. 

Gathering clouds darkened the sky and the slim man pursed his lips slightly. “Can’t say I’ve seen a trick like that before,” he said, still a glint of mischief in his eyes. “Tell me about it later.” 

Lian Zhidiao nodded to the village. “Are you going ahead?” 

“We are.” Yue Yaosa looked at him, and he felt the distinct pressure of her eyes all over the mud-soaked parts of his body.

“If you could be so kind, can you let Lin Jingjing know I am returning.” Lian Zhidiao lifted one sodden black sleeve, caked in wet black silt. “And that I will need a bath.” 

Thunder rolled overhead, distant but coming closer. The slim man looked up at the sky and then smirked. “You’ll have one before you get back, I think.” He kicked his horse, and they started to trot away. The broad-shouldered man nodded to him without saying anything more, urging his horse after him. 

Yue Yaosa smiled as her horse went past and Lian Zhidiao’s heart skipped a beat. He watched them until the cloud of dust they kicked up hid them from view. With leaden feet, he walked over to where he’d wedged the book inside the umbrella and picked it up, careful to keep the book under the oil paper. As if on cue, the rain started to fall. 

There wasn’t any hurry to get out of the downpour—as had been pointed out, it could only get him cleaner—so Lian Zhidiao took his time. The cow walked along next to him, and Lian Zhidiao rubbed the mud away from the green stone with one hand. But as long as they walked, the cow seemed content to stay by his side, even across the bridge into the village itself. 

The servant girl hovered in the gate of Lin Jingjing’s house, and Lian Zhidiao entrusted the book to her, with instructions to put it in his room. She mumbled something about the bath being ready in there as well, and scurried off. But when he stepped up into the compound, the cow lifted its foreleg and put a hoof on the step behind him. 

Lian Zhidiao paused and then turned in place, looking at the cow. Its jade eyes, carved without irises or pupils, stared into him. 

He stepped backwards, deeper into the walls of the siheyuan. The cow stepped up again, both front hooves on the threshold of the gate, and began to lean its shoulder into the side of the gate that was still closed. 

“No!” Lian Zhidiao rushed forward and the cow bleated once, easing its weight off the door. 

The cow definitely wanted to follow him into the house. 

Rain dripped off the tiled roof of the gate as he pushed on the solid stone animal, trying to get it to walk backwards, out into the road. It balked, stubbornly clinging to the step in front of the gate. Lian Zhidiao put his hand against the side of its head and pushed, hard. The jade beast suddenly reversed, and Lian Zhidiao went sprawling on the slick stones in front of the house. 

For a moment he simply lay there, letting the rain fall on his face. Indeed, anytime one was on one’s back in the rain, it was a good time to contemplate what you were doing with your life. Having the second such soggy opportunity today might be viewed as an invitation to meditate upon his future. But he rolled to the side and lurched to his feet, his long sleeves slapping against his thighs. 

The cow plodded forward, leaning its head into him, and Lian Zhidiao finally let out a long sigh. “Is it thankfulness? Are you thankful to have been revived?”

The cow didn’t answer, but turned its head to encourage him to rub its jaw and ears. He did so absently, sweeping grit off the surface of the stone nose and forehead. At the eastern village gate, the sound of a pair of horses reached his ears, and he turned to watch them ride in. 

The riders wore wide capes of silvergrass, but they were not tied so tightly as to hide the color of their robes underneath: the first rider wore red, and the second, white, revealed in flashes by the gusts as they rode. 

Compared to the red-robed riders from a few hours ago, he didn’t look strikingly different from far off, but as the distance between them closed, Lian Zhidiao was struck by the size of the horse and, comparatively, its rider. If he were to put his hands together side by side and use this as a way to measure, the red rider’s horse must be 16 hands high at the shoulder. And the giant horse was sized to fit the rider, a big man made even larger by the bulk of the grass cape.

The white rider’s horse was three hands-widths shorter, with a stockier bone structure. The white rider was smaller overall, having not been fed on whatever magic beans the giant ate. They cantered down the lane, their tack jingling and tassels flying. 

Hey, this is a town, you know…

They didn’t even slow down as they approached, flinging mud from the horses’ hooves. Lian Zhidiao backed up against the jade beast to avoid being trampled; the muck that splashed the hem of his robe could hardly be avoided. 

Hey, hey, you didn’t even slow down! Have a care for other people! 

The pair reined in their horses near the other large building on the central square: two boys came out to take their horses into the stable, and the two men melted into the darkness under the eaves. They divested themselves of their grass capes and hats, hanging them up outside to dry. The white rider wore his hair half-up, with a silvery hair ornament that glinted even through the curtain of rain that hung between them.  

They look right off the set of a wuxia drama. Well, since I wrote it that way, I suppose that’s exactly what it should look like. 

The red rider’s thick black hair was pulled back in a high ponytail with a golden xiaoguan, only a few stray locks framing his face. Against a painter’s palette of mud and wood, his red robes stood out in the shade as much as the white rider’s stainless ones. Tall and muscular, with a broad chest, he radiated strength and masculinity. 

The door to the house opened, and the red rider paused at the threshold, glancing around, while the white rider went in ahead of him. He looked directly at Lian Zhidiao, his regard like a lance. Lian Zhidiao glanced down at himself to see what the red rider saw: a man with a somber face, slender to the point of being too thin, dressed in filth-flecked black robes, standing in the rain, soaked to the skin. 

It was like a lion looking at a half-drowned housecat. 

After a moment, the red rider went inside. 

The jade cow nudged his elbow with her muzzle. His mind clouded with questions, Lian Zhidiao rubbed the stone cow’s neck before stepping up into Lin Jingjing’s gate. This time the cow didn’t follow him, and he was able to shut the heavy wooden door with a heavy, comforting thud. He saw the servant girl running off just as he was walking towards the door to his room. Just inside the door was a wide wooden tub and a few steaming buckets of water. Put on a low stool next to it were a few orange soaps and some cloths to dry himself with. 

At least this part is familiar enough. 

His clothes would have to be laundered, there was no way around it. He put the pile of muddy clothing outside his door, resolving to go take care of it when he was finished. He took his hair down, finding that it reached his lower back. Soaking it and his body took all of one bucket, but it was easy enough to get everything wet. Then, he had to wash it all, and that kind of repetitive lathering set the wheels of his mind turning. 

Well, it’s something like, they’re the main party, right? I don’t remember a black magician in the main party. They were all Yue sect cultivators, probably. 

He scrubbed at his whole body, trying to get his back the best he could. I can’t even remember who Lian Zhidiao is, though, so he can’t have been very important. But I do feel certain he wasn’t in the main party. So I really am just cannon fodder. 

His hair took some effort to clean and keep untangled, but after a while he worked it out. 

But then the rider wearing white… must be from the sect with its capital city on the high plains, the Quanlu Yuan, I think? If he can ride with them, they shouldn’t have any problems with members of other sects. Especially since the point of the book was for the protagonist to unite the sects. The white rider is probably an early Plains adherent. 

The water was still hot when he started to rinse himself off. Which one is the protagonist, though?  One of the two brawnier ones probably.

He bailed water over himself, standing up to let it run off his skin, and trying his best to remember what this protagonist was like. Was he quiet? Loud? Moody? Come to think of it, people complained about how hard it was to understand him. 

Lian Zhidiao looked down at his body, at the bruises and wounds that still covered his arms and torso. There’s still the mystery of what happened to this body before I got here. Some of them were beginning to change to a less-concerning green color, but there was still a lot of purple-black bruising. 

Yang Meihua’s round shadow passed by the screens at the front of his room, shaking him from his reverie. He crouched in the tub. She paused at his door, and then slipped away, the continuing rain masking her footsteps. He quickly finished bathing and dressed himself in the spare set of robes at the bottom of his bag. These weren’t trimmed with green: just a solid, staid black. Even though he was a somber-looking man, he didn’t want to give himself entirely to the old Lian Zhidiao’s way of wearing his hair. It was too studious, with no flair for the dramatic. He put his hair half up in a topknot, letting some of it hang down in loops to cover his ears. 

No reason to look like such a sour old man. Why even be here if I can’t have fun with it, right? 

His hosts were sipping tea in the inner hall when he joined them. He clasped his fists and bowed to them. They stood to welcome him. 

Lin Jingjing gave him a nod. “Good afternoon.” 

“Good afternoon,” he replied. “May I join you?” 

“We already have a cup prepared.” Yang Meihua gestured to a fine brown porcelain cup on the table. 

“Thank you,” Lian Zhidiao said, sitting down. 

Lin Jingjing put her cup down on the table. “Yang Meihua tells me that you have succeeded in nursing our jade beast back to health.” 

“I believe that I have.” 

“I did not believe her at first. It seems improbable.” 

“But then I showed her the cow outside.” Yang Meihua had a small but smug smile on her face. Lian Zhidiao got the sense that she was not used to being the one in the right and was milking it for all it was worth. 

“It’s something like a miracle,” Lin Jingjing allowed. She folded her hands in her lap. “However, we know that the Xideng Wa sect is not given to acts of charity.” 

A chill moved over Lian Zhidiao’s skin. “If you wouldn’t mind, can you elaborate on that point?” 

Lin Jingjing blinked at him in surprise, and after trading glances with Yang Meihua, the latter nodded and Lin Jingjing pursed her lips. “The Xideng Wa sect currently extracts a sum from Shuangwan village for the goods that pass through the docks. The village was once prosperous, since the jade beast encouraged the growth of rice and other produce, but since it became derelict, the village’s money has slowly been drained.” Her eyes remained firmly on her lap. “I shudder to think of what this repair will take from our coffers.”

Is that all? Lian Zhidiao hummed in understanding. With the black robes, of course they think I’m here on the Xideng Wa sect’s business. The next time a tax collector comes through, they’ll be expected to empty their pockets. Guess I have to take a bit of a chance.

“Madame Lin, as I said before, I am in a bit of a bind, having lost my memory. If you would do me the favor of answering my questions and taking care of my accommodations while I’m here, I could accept that as payment in kind.”  

When he saw the look of shocked relief on Lin Jingjing’s face, he knew he’d made the right decision. 

“Even though we’re such a backwater?” Yang Meihua cut in. “We’re not even aware of the latest gossip from the capital.” 

“Anything would be helpful.” 

“Then we’ll do our best,” Lin Jingjing said, having regained her composure. She smoothed her skirts over her knees and appeared to prepare herself for a hard line of questioning.

Lian Zhidiao took a sip of his tea. “There was a group of riders in red that came into the village today. They are from the mountains.” 

“From the Xinxue Yue sect, yes.” 

Xinxue… The Heart’s Blood. A frown flitted across Lian Zhidiao’s features. “But we are nowhere near the mountains, correct?” 

Yang Meihua and Lin Jingjing traded glances before Lin Jingjing nodded. “Their presence here is… remarkable. I was quite surprised when they left word that you would be returning.” 

“Why?” 

“Why!” Yang Meihua stifled a giggle behind her hand. “Treating unknown cultivators as if they were errand boys!” 

“Ah.” It hadn’t occurred to him that other cultivators might not pass along a message for a colleague. He’d thought of it as a professional courtesy, but perhaps this wasn’t the case? “Another Yue cultivator arrived in town just before I came inside. There was one other man with him, dressed in white.” 

“White?” Lin Jingjing’s voice sounded suddenly thin. “…Just one?” 

“Yes.” 

The soft patter of rain out in the courtyard continued without end. “Members of the Quanlu Yuan sect rarely travel alone.” 

“Yes, but there was a group of them that passed through here less than a week ago.” Yang Meihua’s thoughtful voice chimed in. “They were searching for roaring earth.” 

Lin Jingjing’s eyes flicked to Lian Zhidiao’s face, and then she looked back at Yang Meihua. “Do you know if they found any?” 

Yang Meihua shook her head. “They never came back.” 

“It’s not an indication one way or the other.” Lin Jingjing’s jaw tensed. “But I imagine if a body had been found, we might have heard about it.” 

“A body…?” 

“What else could they need roaring earth for?” Lin Jingjing’s face was grave. “How else can you talk to the dead?”

---

Previous Chapter < Chapter 3: Lian Zhidiao Has Not Unlocked Fast Travel
Next Chapter > Chapter 5: Yue Fengjian, Lion of Yue

‘To whoever finds this: My name is Lian Chanjian, courtesy name Zhidiao, of the Xideng Wa sect. In order to leave notice for my family, I have written this last letter before going on to the far shore.’

Something tickled the back of Chen Jiajian’s mind. There was something familiar about that name, Xideng Wa sect. Something familiar about Lian Zhidiao, too. He read on. 

‘I was cast out of my sect. Two winters have passed since then, and I have had to find other means of support. I traveled with my jade beast, cleansing stained and crawling earth as well as helping maintain immovable jade beasts that fell into disrepair. However, I made a mistake and somehow my jade beast fractured. I have meditated quietly over this for some time, and have decided that I cannot go on any longer.’ 

Chen Jiajian’s heart sank, even as protests rose in his mind. What do you mean you can’t go on any longer? I mean, if you hadn’t died, I’d be in a real bad spot, but that’s not the point! The point is: don’t give up! It’s not as bad as you think!

Is what he’d have liked to say, but it was only a letter from someone that was already gone. 

‘Please do not mourn. I apologize deeply to you, the finder of these artifacts, for the imposition I will make upon you, but I ask that you return my personal effects to my family. They are expecting them to be returned, and for certain reasons, I cannot return them myself. Although my contributions to this world have been small, there may be some lingering gratitude that you can call upon to accomplish this goal I have set before you. As payment I can offer only the silver taels at the bottom of this bag. I hope that this and your honesty will be enough to see them safely recovered.‘

Sorry Lian Zhidiao, but I’m not sending your material goods anywhere. I’ll need them to live in this world. 

Which brought him to the question: what kind of world was he in, exactly? He had his suspicions, but…

Chen Jiajian looked back at the letter, reading it through again. He was still mulling over the name of the sect, when a sudden realization hit him. He looked again at the slashes to his arms and pressed his fingers against the bruising on his neck. 

If you weren’t murdered, then who did all this damage? Won’t they be looking out for a chance to finish the job? How could you leave out important things like who your assailants were? I am the one who has to look over his shoulder because you couldn’t write down any useful warnings! 

Given the damage, the lack of information about the injuries in the letter was highly suspicious. If he had been watching a drama with this kind of twist, he would expect to find out that it was not suicide, but murder. 

With a sound of disgust, he folded the letter up and set it aside to begin going through the rest of his belongings. The spindle with the jade disc he left out to the side, feeling like that was important. The rest of it he took out and inspected one piece at a time. 

A set of black robes and undergarments that looked significantly older and shabbier than the ones he currently wore, along with a few pieces of jewelry. There were a few books of bamboo slips, rolled up and carefully laced shut. Unfastening them and reading the first few slips, he discovered that this was something like a manual for the care of jade beasts. Each slip tersely listed a date and location, along with some small feature noted in very neat calligraphy. 

‘Jade beasts may be used to concentrate magic, but this is not as effective as concentrating qi. 

Jade beasts with an excess of yin may be cleansed with several weeks in the sun.

An excess of yang is rare, but may be cleansed by storing the beast in a river or rice field until cured.’ Small notes were made in silk scraps and glued to the end, noting the successes and failures of various methods. Chen Jiajian unfolded the book a little further. 

‘Jade beasts contain the intent of the Emperor, and tend naturally toward harmony. All energy, including demonic energy, that moves through a jade beast emerges in a small exhale of purified qi. However, too much demonic energy will occlude the beast, rendering it unable to perform this function until the blockage caused by demonic energy is removed.’ 

Chen Jiajian leaned back against a tree. All of this seemed very familiar when he began to read, and now he was sure: this world was one of his own creation, some time very early in his career as a writer. His fourth? Or was it his fifth novel? It hadn’t sold well, earning rude comments from readers: 

This is stupid! The jade beasts have nothing to do with the plot! Is this P*kemon??

Jade beasts seem like they’d be powerful enough to solve any problem, so why not just put them wherever they can absorb demonic energy? The author really has no idea what he’s doing.

Is this supposed to be a harem novel? Shouldn’t we like at least one of the women, then?

Why did I bother reading this? The main character is so one-dimensional, and he telegraphs his attack moves well in advance. The only ones dumber than the villains getting defeated by them are the people paying for this drivel.

Indeed, Chen Jiajian remembered some of the cutting remarks better than his own work. Shortly after this novel–Supreme Warlord of the Beast World, he recalled it now–was published, he’d become like a cheap public restaurant, producing anything anyone wanted. New ideas like jade beasts fell by the wayside, forgotten experiments as he moved toward profitability. Slowly his memory of this world had faded away, supplanted by more traditionally gripping martial plots. 

Yes, he remembered. That was the problem with this world. The overarching story been about cooperation, and no one wanted to read about that in this sort of genre. He’d tried to catch every kind of fetish with the Beauties in his story, and in doing so, had only split his readers between which girl they liked best. The girl he’d intended for the Hero’s true wife had actually ended up the least popular girl, since she was introduced last. Instead of committing to his choice as a writer, he’d wavered, and this had also made reviewers pan the webnovel. Utterly discouraged, he hadn’t had the heart to publish the last chapter, ‘The Red Emperor’s Wedding’, and it had remained unfinished. It wasn’t until the next novel was done that he began to receive praise from readers. 

Of all the worlds of mine to be put into, the cat-emperor chose this one. I couldn’t even be the hero, or anyone significant in the plot. Instead, I’m… Chen Jiajian let his head rest against the tree. I don’t even remember who Lian Zhidiao was in the book. I’ve been transmigrated into the body of cannon fodder. 

The sounds of a galloping horse slowly drew near, coming from the east. Chen Jiajian slunk behind the trees, keeping himself hidden until the rider passed him. He looked around the western tree at the green-robed rider disappearing into the woods. 

Green… Chen Jiajian frowned as he tried to think back to his notes about this world.  Each sect specialized in a kind of elemental magic alongside cultivation, which used qi as the feedstock for spells both simple and complex. It was only available to cultivators of a certain high level, which, given the kind of novel it had been, were rare in name only.. All magicians were therefore cultivators, but not all cultivators were magicians. 

Early in his career, before he’d found his own style, he made it easy to remember different cultivation sects by putting them in different-colored clothes. Green magicians lived in forests, red magicians lived in the mountains, and the blue magicians lived on the coast, or out on islands. Black magicians lived in swamps and on waterways. The white magicians had ended up in the plains, deserts, and high steppes, simply because there wasn’t anywhere else to put them. Like any sect, a student could walk up and ask to be taken under the master’s tutelage, but most students kept to the sects associated with their families. 

Black robes with green trim indicated he was a member of the sect with high knowledge of black magic, and some knowledge of wooden, or green magic. Black magicians worked with earth, poison and decay, and the sect was particularly prone to instances of qi deviation. There was a high percentage of black magicians that went to study with other sects and learn their secrets, like exchange students. Chen Jiajian crisped the green trim on his sleeves between his fingers. So this Lian Zhidiao had been not just a cultivator, but a black magician, with some expertise in wooden magic. 

So, if he was a cultivator—and a magician—before, was that something he could still do? Would this body remember how to use magic? 

Chen Jiajian stared at the books in front of him for a few moments before frowning hard.

It doesn’t seem fair to get transmigrated into a world I made and end up just a peasant. There must be something I’m missing. 

Then his eyes landed on the red bag, and he remembered the slips of carved jade. 

If a member of a sect wanted to protect his secret techniques, of course he’d try to dispose of them when he died…

With eager hands, Chen Jiajian opened the pouch again, pulling out the bamboo slips and setting them out to dry properly. The two jade slips he held in his hands, turning them over and inspecting them more closely. 

One had no carvings. The other was engraved with lotus flowers and dragonflies. 

Well, with a name like Lian, I should try the lotus one first. 

Chen Jiajian picked up the carved slip and held it, wishing for its secrets to be revealed. But nothing happened. Then he shook it a little bit, like a magic wand, and still, nothing happened. Then, at last, he tapped it against the side of his head. 

Information sluiced into him like water into a terraced field, filling his mind as fast as he could take it in. The jade slip fell out of his hand onto the soft moss underneath the tree. His mouth went dry and his eyes rolled in his head as he tried to keep track of all the things that he suddenly knew. The secret sword techniques protected by the Black sect: the Swords of the Myriad Dead. In cultivation, patterns of breathing to isolate and expel deviant qi, and spiritual sense techniques like earth-seeing. In magic spun out of qi, spells like bogflame, choking vines, and lightning—it all overwhelmed him. They were just there, as if he had always known them. 

Perhaps most enlightening, the moment the cool stone had touched his temple, Chen Jiajian became aware of an inward sense, a way of looking into himself that he had not had before. He was aware of his meridians, the pathways for qi that wrapped up his entire body. He knew his dantian, the place low in his body where his golden core would be. Then, like turning to face the sun, he became aware of his golden core itself, deep and full and brimming with power. More curiously, he could sense something ‘else’, something ‘other’ than his own golden core: a vessel without contents, which he could only imagine was the original golden core of the body he now inhabited. 

He had both a golden core and an empty core inside him. 

Was this… worldbuilding that I did? Chen Jiajian couldn’t remember. Ah, but then again, it’s not like I’d ever thought there would be transmigration, so it’s natural that the system might not have rules for that. Wait wait wait! Isn’t there supposed to be a System? Or Status? Or something? It’s like a video game, right? 

But no matter how Chen Jiajian squinted at things in his peripheral vision, or thought about a system as hard as he could, or visualized menus popping open in front of him, nothing happened. 

It seems that there is no System in this world. He closed his eyes again and looked inward, finding his golden core as well as the ‘vessel without contents’. It also seems like the world can compensate for unforeseen circumstances such as this. But it isn’t something I’d imagined to be in the world–so the world is filling itself out in ways that I don’t know or anticipate. 

Suddenly Chen Jiajian began to regret the early days when he hadn’t put much emphasis on making a sensible world that followed well-known and defined rules. Much of his story—well, his life—might now be out of his control. Was this temporary? Permanent until a mission was achieved? What could the mission of a cannon fodder character be? Without a system, it was anyone’s guess. 

Given that I don’t know what point in the story I’ve arrived at, or if I have any plot armor, I should proceed with caution. 

He carefully rolled the books back up and put them away, and turned his attention to the ornate wooden case. It was not locked, and the lid sprung open easily. 

Inside was a green jade cat statue. It seemed to have been carved in an unnatural pose, on its back, like an animal in submission. A messy break completely severed the head from the body. Chen Jiajian ran his finger along the jagged edge; small crystals like green sugar collected on his fingertip. So this is a jade beast… 

This jade beast had been the key to Lian Zhidiao’s livelihood when it was still intact. Broken, it touched Chen Jiajian’s heart in the same way that the loss of any beautiful thing might touch someone. What a waste. 

Is it worth it to cart this thing to the next village? Chen Jiajian looked at the case dubiously, but in the end, it might be better to keep it close for now. Leaving a “dead” man’s things unattended could lead to disastrous consequences. In fact…

It’s best if I adopt this man’s life until I can figure out what’s going on. And so Chen Jiajian cast off his name and became Lian Chanjian, courtesy name Zhidiao. To survive, he needed to discard what was left of his life in his own world, at least for now. His name was the last thing he had that was given to him by his parents. It drifted away from him, as useless here as his original body, lying in a puddle of blood on the concrete. 

A little more rummaging around in the knapsack found a paper packet of dried fruit, and he ate a few of these thoughtfully while trying to decide his next course of action. There should be a village not far from where he was, as long as he hadn’t wandered far afield to die. Most villages were separated by a day or two’s ride, at most. 

What’s more, the people in those villages might already know him or know of him. Being able to remember who the character was would be the most helpful, but leaving that aside, the best thing he could do was at least blend in so well that no one questioned him. 

His eyes fell on the jade ring with its ebony wood spindle. Even though he now knew how to use it, putting it into practice was something that he should try at least once before needing to apply it in a tense situation. He tied the belt around himself, over the cloth belt he already wore. 

He lifted the weight by its silken cord and let it hang from his hand, thinking on what the jade slip had pressed into his mind. 

‘The belt must be made of silk, for a single long fiber transmits qi better than many short fibers. The qi is collected in the hand; the magician is a distaff, and he spins the qi through the silk. It is the transmissive and refractive power of jade that allows qi to be changed into one of the elements.’ 

Lian Zhidiao gathered up a handful of qi and began to spin the spindle in his hand, with thoughts of fire. The jade weight on the spindle bristled as each of the silken cords floated briefly in the air, and then the spindle itself ceased to weigh anything at all. 

‘Changing qi to elemental magic is non-conservative; the golden core is diminished with each spell spun. Repeated use of magic will leave one out of breath and weakened at a rate higher than cultivation alone. It would be possible to destabilize one’s cultivation base and lose one’s golden core entirely through the overuse of such magic, although no one has ever done so. The utility of magic is in providing more tools at the skilled cultivator’s disposal, to allow problems to be solved for the good of the people.’

The tip of the ebony wood spindle floated up, and Lian Zhidiao pointed it at an unsuspecting bush across the road from where he was hidden. With a clipped thought, he released that strand of qi. The spindle spun once more, and then a fireball the size of Lian Zhidiao’s head rocketed out of the wooden tip. With an explosion of flame and smoke, it set the entire bush ablaze. Its job done, the spindle slowly sank in the air until its weight was once again pulling on Lian Zhidiao’s fingers. 

It’s slower than paper talismans, but can be adjusted as conditions change. Lian Zhidiao looked at the burning bush across the road, and his lips twitched at the roaring fire he’d made. It’s also infinite, as long as you have enough qi. 

He raised the spindle’s weight on his fingers again, this time spinning blue magic. Again the spindle floated up in front of him. He guided the magic in the right direction with the help of the ebony stick. The spindle whirled, cords radiant, and then a sphere of water the size of the bush squeezed out of the tip of the ebony wood. It rolled in the air like a runaway parade inflatable, and landed awkwardly on the fire, more-or-less extinguishing it. 

Maybe that could use a little more work. 

Lian Zhidiao let the spindle come to rest again. It seemed like green and black magic would produce similar effects, like shooting vines or raising a hill of earth, but what would white magic do?  He hadn’t actually written anyone using white attack magic in Supreme Warlord of the Beast World. 

He twisted the silken cord. Qi flowed from his forearm into the silk, and again the spindle rose into the air, hovering in front of him. It began to spin, the knotted cords whirling out from the edge. Light collected at the tip of the spindle. Focusing on the burned bush, he let the threads of qi in his fingers snap. 

There was a distinct whistle, and then the heavy sound of something hitting the bush. The spindle fell to his side, hitting him in the thigh as he ran to the other side of the beaten path. Searching through the blackened, wet mess, he found what must be the result of white magic: a black iron bolt, buried in the woody trunk. As he handled it, it crumbled away in his fingers, turning to ash. But the proof was in the deep gash in the trunk of the bush.

Not just archery, but armor-piercing! What fearsome power! 

Lian Zhidiao straightened up, dusting his hands off. That was elemental magic handled. All I have to figure out now is how well I can handle cultivation and–

The sound of a horse cantering along the path made him stop mid-thought. It was coming towards him from the trees to the west.

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