And now an exhausted and completely naked, if much cleaner, Alex realized there were no less than half a dozen Kitsune females and a handful of others, including Hao Chan herself, that were gazing at him with looks that ranged from awe to outright disbelief.
“Um… Alex?”
“Yes, Hao Chan?”
“You do know you are… um… naked, right?”
Alex blinked in consternation, looking for the word that had been on the tip of his tongue before the world seemed to topple over and soothing blackness claimed him at last.
3
“Heal him! Please!”
Hao Chan’s voice. Alex, presently floating in soothing darkness, was almost certain of it.
“That foolish boy pushed himself too damn hard! He was riding his breakthrough like a madman!” hissed Lady Feng Huang.
“Please, mistress, you have to help!” Hao Chan sobbed.
“I’ll do what I can, girl. Water may be my element, but I am the least of our Academy healers. Worse, those bastards struck me with an infernal artifact! I can only give him so much without risking that damned infection claiming me as well.”
“The way he flew through the air… it was like he was already a Silver!” enthused Yinzi, the strikingly beautiful girl with the brilliant silver-white hair who was unique in being able to claim two of the deadliest Jianghu assassins as mothers, and whose sire might just be Silver Fox himself. “And the way he struck that rotten wujen cultivator pinning us with sickness, it was like he had transformed himself into living thunder, bowling everyone over before getting up without a scratch! You never told me Silvers could do that before, Mother!”
“That’s because they can’t,” said Ning Jing in a curt voice. “What that boy did was flat out impossible!”
“Mom, why are you gazing at him like that? He saved you!”
“I know, love. It doesn’t change the fact that he’s a newly-forged Bronze, with his peripheral meridian channels fried to ash. And how the hell his one forged cord glows like the sun, I’ll never know. But even so, a wounded Bronze shouldn’t have been capable of any of that. Fighting near as well as any Silver!”
“He was embracing his breakthrough into Bronze to the fullest,” Jidihu said. “Expounding on his epiphany, compounding his revelations to an inconceivable degree, no doubt pushed to do so by my former mate, who took such a shine to the lad.”
“That was always his way,” snapped Ning Jing. “Always trying to push you. Always trying to push me! Drove me crazy. I felt like the pair of you were always judging my every move!”
Lady Jidihu chuckled softly. “Come now, dear Ning Jing. We had our differences, but you always had my heart. Even when you ran away from the organization. Even when you ran away from me. But I always respected your wishes; I always sought to give you your space.”
Ning Jing snorted. “Tell me again how Panheu and Zhao Doushi ended up living right next to me?”
“I like keeping the people I love safe. You know that, Jing. The pair of you together were more than a match for anyone at the Academy, and the few fools who dared to sneak in from rival sects, thinking they could usurp my position the old-fashioned way, quickly learned the error of their ways. With you two as neighbors, I knew both my children would be safe.” She sighed sadly. “Besides, I was sort of hoping Yinzi and her brother could become friends.”
Ning Jing cursed softly. “I was trying to avoid having this conversation, Jidi, thank you so much!”
“Wait!” said a breathless Yinzi. “Zhao Doushi is my brother?”
Alex wanted to smile, but the voices grew faint.
“We’re losing him!”
Alex felt himself drifting off into the soothing cloak of darkness wrapping around him like a comforting blanket, washing all his cares away.
And it was only the far-off lapping of waves crashing upon a nearby beach that jolted him free of his daze, the cold terror of knowing that he had already come too far, and his next true death would result in oblivion, not rebirth, that washed away the frigid chill seeking to wrap him in its deadly embrace for all time.
Or perhaps not, he thought with a gasp, convincing himself it was only rapids along a nearby river that he heard, for all that he found himself in a body so wounded that his every movement was an exercise in agony. His peripheral meridian channels had been pushed beyond the breaking point with his ascension. Add to that the desperate battles he had been forced to endure, as well as the use of Qi powers whose true rank he could only guess at, and the results had been all but inevitable.
As horrific a sight as it was, like looking upon a lush verdant forest burnt to ash, it almost paled in comparison to the brooding crimson black smear invading his flesh. An infernal taint barely held in check by his own natural resilience. Yet to purge it, to heal the awful damage, he would need to do far more than rest in a paralytic slumber he sensed was not entirely natural.
For all that it might just be keeping him alive, forcing him to wonder if he had suffered wounds that were far more grievous than he had first realized, after charging into his foes like a fiery phoenix from the sky, daring to think that clever application of a favored ability would be all he’d need to walk away unscathed.
Still, despite his growing dismay as he sensed scores of hairline fractures, perforated organs, and other even uglier wounds he had suffered when daring to take on multiple Silvers, injuries that he truly appreciated only in that moment, he could take fierce comfort in several undeniable truths.
Most striking of all was the fact that he had actually survived his ordeal, and the Silvers that had been so eager for his death and the deaths of his friends were the ons who had fallen. Most by his hand. Which meant that the people he cherished were alive. Must be. At least, he hoped for such, just as fiercely as he reveled in yet another undeniable truth.
He had done it. Even without formalizing the Dual Path eight-element cultivation technique he knew he would one day need, he had still managed to ascend to Pristine Bronze. His first forged meridian channel, linking body and mind, blazed a brilliant gold-white hue, crackling with the intensity of brilliant Light Qi superimposed over a cord of Dark Qi, as if they were two entwined energy states existing in tandem. Though it was the oddest of sensations, gazing at a channel that was both safely contained within him, yet seemed to hold all the potency of the mightiest of rivers swollen with torrential rains, capable of flooding through anything in its path.
Its potential was unlike anything he had ever sensed in another cultivator, brief as those glimpses had been. Elder Panheu’s meridian network had shown with a potency that had awed him, of course, but even so, when Alex had trained under him, the man had been just a half step away from Gold. And with any luck, Panheu had well and truly ascended, and was now the headmaster of the most powerful institution in all of Yidushi. Unless he had perished, and a furious Gold had Alex in his sights even now.
A chilling thought Alex did his best to push out of mind by focusing on the moment, forcing himself to take stock of his seared peripheral meridian channels, broken body, and exhausted mind. He already knew the next step he needed to take if he was to have any hope of healing himself, his Qi Perception making it clear that the gentle blue Water Qi field stabilizing him could handle only physical injuries. The infernal taint and the damage to his peripheral channels were beyond the province of any technique Alex had witnessed during his brief time at Dragon Academy.
Beyond any technique, that was, save his own.
“Madame Feng, the blue glow is gone! What’s happening?” asked a panicked Hao Chan.
“The fool somehow managed to cancel my spell. What is he thinking? It’s the only hope he has of survival!”
“You have to recast it!”
“Calm yourself, child. You can’t begin to appreciate what it cost me to stabilize him in the first place.” She frowned, peering down at Alex. “That’s strange.”
“What’s strange?”
“The blood loss has already stop
ped. Poor fool was fighting for the gods only know how long with a punctured abdomen, but an injury that should have had him screaming in agony seems to have stabilized of its own accord. Hmm. I have ascended a rank since last I was recruited by overworked healers. Mayhap my skills have improved more than even I realized.”
Hao Chan gasped. A hand both soft and far stronger than it had been just months before squeezed Alex’s own. “Alex! Can you hear me? Please, my heart. Your story isn’t over yet, it can’t be! If you’re awake, you already know what you have to do!
“Be calm, my dear,” soothed Lady Jidihu. “I don’t think our Alex’s story is over quite yet. Not by a long shot.”
And all the words washing over Alex’s prone form faded to a dull murmur as pain that had been so well walled off just moments ago crashed over him. He would have screamed if he wasn’t physically paralyzed, only in that moment realizing that the infernal taint was far more vicious and lethal than even he had realized.
Lethal as it was, he still had one trump card left to play, and thanks to his ability to quantize his growth through the remnant of a long dead AI that seemed to be permanently fused to his soul, he would be able to embrace Power Healing like never before.
He tried to push past the pain, focusing on his interface and reading the messages blinking in the corner of his mind’s eye.
You have personally defeated 7 Basic Cultivators, 2 Bronze Cultivators, and 4 Silver Cultivators in mortal combat. A portion of their potency and potential is now forever your own! Additional experience has been earned for every foe you have slain!
Note: you have participated in a Greater Reaving! This Forbidden Practice harnesses not only the life force of a given foe, but all his future cultivation potential for all future lives! You have earned a lesser share of Gold Cultivation Tier experience!
You have elected not to tap into your accumulated Soul Potency at this time.
You have chosen to embrace Eternal Fox Unified Cultivation Technique! As a Bronze-ranked cultivator with Rank 9 in the skill you yourself forged into being, you regenerate a maximum of 0.9 pounds of flesh every 10 hours. Note: peripheral meridian network needed for Eternal Fox Cultivation.
You have begun restoring your peripheral meridians! Saving throw versus Excruciating Agony made! Saintly Aura in effect! Infernal curse has been bested!
Alex declined using his stored pool of what he would always think of as experience points, for all that they were more accurately the spiritual potential of all his downed opponents, much like a cluster of pristine cultivation pills personally tailored just for him. But he had already achieved Rank 9 in Eternal Fox, so that cluster of experience points he would reserve for the greatest of all hurdles to come: forging a Dual Path Light Qi cycling technique capable of incorporating all eight elements. Besides, it had been too long since he had been forced to repair his injuries based on nothing but his own grit and determination. And if he truly wanted to be worthy of the path he had forged, if his technique was truly worth the portion of his own soul he had imbued into his divine manual, then he needed to prove to himself just how far he could go in terms of healing his own injuries.
And the pain he felt as tormented nerves were forced back to life once more, lacerated organs repaired, blood loss staunched, and capillaries mended, was nothing compared to the exquisite hot agony he experienced while slowly regenerating his charred peripheral matrix. For all that it was comprised of thousands of tiny Qi channels that paled in comparison to the power he could already channel through his one Bronze meridian channel, like capillaries compared to a major artery, they were still a part of his power, his potential, that he would do all he could to restore. To say nothing of the fact that they were vital for the use of his own Eternal Fox technique, which used those peripheral channels to regenerate the body as well as control the flow of Qi, and explained why his healing was so much slower than it might otherwise have been.
0.9 pounds of flesh put in the right places would fuse any number of cuts, lacerations, even the deepest wounds, sealing injuries better than any surgeon’s needle and thread ever could, leaving the former injury site in pristine health without even a scar. But Alex had to do far more than simply repair damaged muscles and organs. He needed to restore the countless peripheral Qi pathways leading to every corner of his body, his nerves alight with excruciating pain as he did so.
And it was only now, as he shrieked with pain the Silver instructors knew better than to interfere with, hour after hour, as dusk turned to dawn that in time came to blaze with the midday’s brilliance before turning to dusk once more, did he realize how severe a price he had truly paid for his brutal transformation from Basic to Bronze Cultivator.
He had been forced to endure trial after trial even after his pristine forging, which had force-blossomed his one deliberately-forged channel to a strength and resiliency perhaps unmatched anywhere, for all that his peripherals had been burned to ash in the process. And perhaps even that had been part of his brilliant, if ruthless, mentor’s plan. But whatever the eventual paths taken by most Bronze and Silver cultivators, Alex had every intention of restoring all that had been burned away.
And slowly, excruciatingly, the charred and blackened forest that had once been his peripheral meridian channels blossomed to new life once more. First just the faintest shoots promising the hope of new fecund life, before fresh sprouts blossomed into a vital forest of countless branching Qi pathways rich with life and the flow of spiritual energy once more.
Alex took a moment to gaze anew at the brilliant meridian channel he had forged using a divine technique in a moment of sublime inspiration. As awed and filled with wonder as he was, he knew he’d be a fool to let it become a source of overconfidence for him. After all, he really had no idea how well he compared to any other cultivator of his rank. He had rarely caught more than glimpses of any other cultivator’s potential, far more concerned with reading their flow or sensing their intentions than worrying about how powerful they might be. After all, the last thing he wanted to do was psyche himself out of believing he could win a challenge or a true life and death battle. To do otherwise would be the gaming equivalent of giving his foe a free intimidation check against him.
Now, however, having come so far, he had confidence in his own abilities, in his own potential. For all that his miraculous triumphs might have been more a feat of divinely-inspired Silver-like breakthroughs than what he should to be able to replicate as a first tier Bronze, at least now he knew that he had the potential, and that his forward journey would not be ground to a bitter halt before even his first major ascension, as perhaps it had been countless times before.
Now, he had every intention of using Soul Sight whenever he could while sparring with friends or facing future opponents, so as to get a sense not only of their strengths, weaknesses, and tactics, but their potential as well.
He allowed his mind to race along these lines, rehearsing the perilous battles he had fought and survived up to now, as yet one more distraction from the hideous pain of scorched peripheral channels blossoming with fresh life once more.
“Poor fool, having to undergo such pain. Potent as his one Bronze cord is, I’m surprised he’s even bothering with his peripherals,” said none other than Lady Ning Jing.
Lady Feng Huang, however, gasped with wonder. “I believe… by the five elements, look! The taint… the infernal taint is leaving his body!”
Alex, even as he struggled to cleanse his body of corruption and waste, could sense the intent stares of over half a dozen cultivators gazing at him with looks of awe, disbelief, and in some cases, pleased grins.
“I knew you could do it, Alex!” Hao Chan’s soft whisper was like a warm blanket to his soul, her warm hand squeezing his tight.
“Disciple, what do you know of this?” snapped her mentor.
Alex could feel Hao Chan’s sudden spike of anxiety. “I… please, forgive me, mistress, but I have given my word not to speak about certain topics.”
“What?” snorted Feng Huang. “You call me mistress, yet you cannot answer such a simple question without giving away your boyfriend’s secrets?”
“I… it is so. Please forgive me, Lady Feng Huang.”
Her instructor snorted. “A child’s oath, given to her would-be lover. Why don’t you tell me the nature of this oath? I’m sure it’s not nearly so ironclad as you fear, and the more I know about the strange Ruidian at your feet, the better I can care for him. He’s still unconscious, if you couldn’t tell. Or at least… unresponsive.”
“Feng Huang, best not to push,” said Lady Jidihu. “Our dear Hao Chan feels very strongly about this. And even if there is much flexibility in the letter of her commitments, she would still pay a steep price if she feels she broke the spirit of her oath. It would injure her if she believes she failed herself and the young man she so obviously cares for.”
“But Jidihu...”
Alex could sense the sudden anxiety beneath the confident facade the Silver Water expert was trying to project.
“Be at ease, my friend. Let Alex’s recovery, slow and painful as it obviously is, be a source of inspiration to you.”
“But to purge an infernal taint! One must either be a Saint, or a dedicated healer just a half-step away from Gold to accomplish such a feat!”
“I know,” the kitsune noble solemnly concurred. “So, let’s give our hero the space and peace he needs to do just that.”
Time passed strangely then, Alex neither asleep nor awake, focused entirely upon repairing countless scores of barely-stabilized injuries and bringing to fresh, fecund life the peripheral channels that were vital to his sacred art.
Silver Fox & The Western Hero: Warrior's Oath: A LitRPG/Wuxia Novel - Book 4 Page 3