“I know you,” I say, a fuzzy memory of the woman’s face swirling in my mind like a shape in the mist.

  She bows. “Young Master Xian, this one is Pan Cai, servant of your family, and we must leave this place. Now.”

  Yes. Pan Cai, that’s her name.

  This is the first time this has happened, remembering someone from before the Plum, even if only vaguely.

  I guess facing the truth of who I am must already be having an effect on me.

  Intriguing as that is though, now is not the time to be thinking about it, not when there’s a portal spewing Wild Qi into the world.

  “How do we stop it?” I ask Pan Cai, gesturing at the portal.

  “We can’t, Young Master Xian,” she says firmly. “We must leave that for the Suppression Division.”

  “The what?”

  “The Suppression Division, they handle Wild Qi corruption,” Xiuying says.

  The sickening aura of Wild Qi coming from behind us intensifies instantly, a wave of corruption reaching out to swallow us.

  Pan Cai’s qi pours out to meet it, and even before they clash, I already know that there is no version of this where she comes out victorious.

  Pan Cai knows this too, and she has no intent to win, she simply needs to stall the incoming wave long enough to get us away.

  The waves of qi meet like two tsunamis clashing.

  Their contact is volatile, almost explosive but not quite, and Pan Cai’s qi immediately, and rapidly, begins to warp in some fundamental way that hurts my teeth to sense.

  Her qi holds on for a second or less, but it’s enough.

  Dash of The Deer

  The beast rank technique swells up, a weak thing fuelled by cultivation a rank above it, and the world blurs around us as Pan Cai spirits us miles away from the growing eruption of Wild Qi.

  And it is an eruption; unnatural, multi-hued energy spewing into the sky like ash from the vent of an active volcano.

  In some twisted way, it is beautiful. And with the sun gone down it lights up the world in an array of bright, shimmering colours.

  Then the sky cracks. Like a ceiling of safety glass withstanding a hammer swing.

  “What the fuck?” Xiuying gapes.

  I do too, watching as the world literally breaks apart.

  Meng Yi stumbles and I steady her, her shock so great it’s made her knees weak.

  “Young Master Xian, we must leave,” Pan Cai stresses. “Now.”

  Yes, we should leave. And quickly too. But, faced with a catastrophe this great, there’s something that bothers me.

  “How long will it take for the Suppression Division to get here?” I ask.

  It takes Pan Cai a moment to answer, but she says, “Corruption like this must be visible for li around, but getting the right resources here will take some time.”

  “How long?” I ask again.

  “I don’t know, Young Master Xian,” she says, looking genuinely uncertain. “It might take until sunrise. Maybe longer or maybe less, but we must leave now.”

  Meng Yi tenses, no doubt coming to the realisation that I already have.

  “We need to stop it,” I say, staring at the rapidly growing mass of Wild Qi. “Or, at least, slow it down.”

  Barely half a minute ago, when Pan Cai had brought us here, it had been miles away. Now, it’s covered maybe half that distance.

  “Qigang, I don’t think that’s possible,” Xiuying says.

  “It doesn’t matter, we have to, because at the speed that thing’s moving, I don’t think there’ll be a Bloody Fangs Mountain by sunrise.”

  I see the moment comprehension dawns on her.

  “Shit,” she mutters. “We need to move everyone.”

  “In this terrain?” I ask. “How? Most of them are mortals. Then there’s the young, the old, the sick, those who live off the beaten path. How do we reach them all? Where do we move them to? What about their farms? Their homes? Everything they own?”

  It’s easy to forget, but for many, death is not the worst thing that could happen to them in the event of a natural disaster. And I doubt this world is any better than my... than Earth at helping the victims of such disasters get back on their feet.

  “Then what do we do, Qigang?” Xiuying asks. “Because we can’t stop this thing.”

  “No, we can’t,” I agree as an idea comes to me. “I need to try something.”

  Closing my eyes, I focus.

  The last two times I did this, I have no idea how it happened. It certainly hadn’t been a ‘conscious’ decision I made.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Desperation though, they say makes for a good motivator. And right now, I’m particularly motivated.

  My focus deepens quickly, enough that the beginning of conversation around me fades away before I can even pick up what is being said.

  I reach down within myself, sinking easily. Reaching for that place in the deepest parts of me.

  I suspect that this would be much harder, maybe even impossible, if I was mortal, but as a cultivator, one’s soul is rather easy to find.

  Mine is anyway. It literally has a glowing sun in it, after all.

  My consciousness sinks deeper and deeper, heading for that source of heat and light within myself.

  Closer and closer it gets, until—

  “You know, Xian Qigang, for a cultivator who failed to attain congruence, you and I have met much too many times,” The Sun Emperor says.

  As always, he is draped in fine garments, though different than he was wearing when last I saw him less than an hour ago.

  Unlike the last two times we met, he’s neither in his fancy throne room, nor the corrupted forest. Instead, he stands at a high balcony, an army thousands strong, donned in armour of gold and red, assembled on the illogically large courtyard before him.

  They march around in formation, pockets of armoured soldiers flowing around and twisting through each other with preternatural precision.

  “You have an army?” I ask.

  “I am an Emperor, Xian Qigang,” he replies, sounding offended. Like, how dare I be surprised that the spirit of my cultivation, who I’m still not sure if he’s a real person or not, has an army.

  “How much of this—” I gesture at everything, from the palace with the balcony we stand on, to the soldiers stood at attention down below “—is real?”

  “Is that what you’ve come to discuss, Xian Qigang?” he asks in a tone that suggests that he’s entirely aware of what I’ve come to discuss.

  Deciding to drop it, I move to the topic I’ve actually come to discuss.

  “Do you know a way that we can stop the corruption?” I ask.

  “I know two,” he replies.

  That flummoxes me. “Wait, really?”

  “One will kill you. The other might.”

  “Um… okay, let’s discuss the one that might,” I say.

  “A wise decision,” The Sun Emperor remarks, tone dripping with sarcasm.

  I let it roll off me like water on a duck’s back.

  “So, what do I need to do? How do we stop it?”

  “In the same way the abomination you burnt did,” he says. “With his will he held back the Wild Qi to hide. If you want to stop it from running amok, you must go in there now and do the same.”

  I stare at the man. “And this is the option that might kill me?”

  In fairness, I hadn’t expected it to be easy… but seriously? This just sounds like suicide with extra steps.

  Besides— “Would this even work?” I ask. “I thought the only reason he could control Wild Qi was because he was corrupted to the gills with it? I’m not corrupted… Right?”

  “Xian Qigang, Wild Qi is the glue that binds your soul,” The Sun Emperor says. “An inability to command it is the least of your worries.”

  The weight of his words settles in, and I take a moment to consider it.

  “So, if I do this, will I become like him?” I ask.

  “Our connection has helped me gain some insights on resisting the more… perilous effects of Wild Qi,” The Sun Emperor assures me.

  I’m not buying it though.

  “Resistance is not immunity,” I say.

  “No, it is not,” he agrees.

  “So, there’s no guarantee.” The admission feels heavy even as I say it.

  “The only guarantee an Emperor needs is that his will never breaks,” The Sun Emperor declares.

  “I don’t want to be an Emperor,” I tell him. “I just want to keep my friends safe.”

  The Sun Emperor turns his nose up at me. “Power has found you, Xian Qigang, you do your servants a disservice to turn your back on it.”

  “And that’s the problem right there,” I say. “I don’t want servants. I don’t want retainers. I sure as hell don’t want an army either. I’m good with friends.”

  The Emperor gives me a look that’s almost pitiful. Like I’m a child, ignorant to the truth of the world and bound to suffer for it.

  I resist a strong urge to flip him off.

  Deciding to get back on topic instead, both because there’s an emergency to return to, and I would rather not spend more time than necessary around the egotistical Emperor, I say; “So, I go into the hidden realm, hold back the Wild Qi with my will, and try not to die. Anything else?”

  “Yes, hold on to the fire in your heart.” And with those words, I’m forcefully ejected from my soulscape and back to the real world.

  The first thing I notice is that we’ve moved again, putting even more miles between us and the encroaching corruption.

  The crack in the sky is bigger too, and something that looks suspiciously like radioactive goop from a cartoon seeps through the spaces between the cracks, falling down in big, fat drops.

  “Young Master Xian, what happened?” Meng Yi asks. “You… drifted.”

  “I’m fine,” I say. “Just paid The Sun Emperor a visit. He knows a way we can slow the corruption.”

  “You can meet him at will?” Xiuying asks, face twisted in an expression of surprise that I see mirrored on the faces of the other women.

  “Guess so,” I say, then get back on topic. “He told me what to do. I can slow it. You guys go back to Silver Springs, see if you can get in touch with the Suppression Division directly. They need to get here fast, because this thing is speeding up and I don’t think the town has till midnight, much less sunrise.”

  “What are you saying?” Meng Yi asks. “How will you stop that?”

  “Qigang, why do I get the feeling you’re about to do something reckless and very crazy?” Xiuying adds.

  “Because I’m about to do something reckless and very crazy,” I say. “But this is what we have, and beggars lack the luxury of choice.” I turn to Pan Cai, the powerful cultivator watching me carefully.

  “Your mother will have my head if you fall here,” she says, the words uttered with way more calm than they ought to.

  I frown at that.

  I would have thought my mother was more likely to knock back a few drinks in celebration if I got myself killed, but I suppose that isn’t really true, is it? Not anymore, at least.

  I’m not the disappointing embarrassment who was cast out years ago, I’m a proper cultivator now. Blessed by the Heavens and everything. If I were to die now, my family might actually be inconvenienced.

  In fact, Pan Cai’s presence here is undoubtedly a direct result of that.

  She really might lose her head if I die here.

  “Good for you that I don’t intend to die here then,” I tell her.

  The words may sound jovial, but I mean it with every fiber of my being. I have no intention of dying here. Fuck dramatic deaths, when I go out, I fully intend to do it old and fat. Preferably a few days after sending off the love of my life.

  My sincerity must reach her, because she nods, accepting my words.

  “Good. Take them back to Silver Springs, and see if you can’t get this Suppression Division here sharpish. I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hold back the Wild Qi so every second you can shave off their arrival will be appreciated.”

  Pan Cai bows.

  “Qigang,” Meng Yi says before hesitating. She looks like there’s a thousand things she wants to say in this moment, but she has no idea which to start with.

  I know the feeling.

  “I’ll be back,” I promise.

  “You’d better be,” Xiuying says, placing a comforting hand on Meng Yi’s shoulder that the younger woman seems to appreciate. “My oath to you won’t mean much if you’re dead.”

  “Well, definitely don’t want to inconvenience you,” I say, forcing a smile.

  Xiuying forces one too.

  “We’ll await your return,” Meng Yi says, and I nod.

  (temporary) Goodbyes seen to, Pan Cai grabs Meng Yi and Xiuying, and with a flare of her qi, her movement technique activates.

  Dash of The Deer.

  In the blink of an eye, they’re a speeding blur zipping into the horizon.

  Taking a moment to appreciate that they’re safe, I turn to face the approaching wave of Wild Qi.

  What was it The Sun Emperor had said? Something about holding on to the fire in my heart, right?

  …Wait, by ‘fire in my heart’ did he mean like determination, or was he referring to the literal fire of my cultivation?

  …Fuck.

  No time to think about it now, the Wild Qi is almost on me.

  Glory of The Sun

  With a burst of my qi, the fire of my technique flares big and bright, and I charge into the approaching mass of death and corruption.