Chương 46: B2 Chapter 8

"It turned into stone." Outer Disciple Ma Bojing repeated.

"Effortlessly turned multiple blows from a magical weapon that is clearly beyond Wu Yingjie's own level of cultivation. How do you not see how impressive that is? Most daoists cannot perform such techniques. None of us could hope to. Elemental transformations are considered to be an art on the same level as true flight. They're practically the signature trump cards of the Azure Mountain's elders. Elder Lu, Elder Xun, Sect Master Ren, they all have one."

"Yes." Outer Disciple Pan Ai agreed. He spoke slowly, as if explaining a complex idea to a small child.

"But when Elder Xun transforms his body into a nightmare of blades, he can still walk under his own power. In fact, rumor has it he not only does not slow down, but grows yet faster."

"Stone is stone." Ma Bojing insisted.

"Yes, and mobility is mobility. Don't mistake me, it is an incredibly impressive achievement. It must be a product of some latent bloodline. But it is clearly an incompletely cultivated technique. If he tried that against me, he would not survive allowing me a single moment to line up Break the Rocks. Mere stone is not durable enough to be worth such immobility."

"Yes, but he's not facing you. He's facing other initiates. None of them will be in the eighth stage of Qi Condensation."

"The blocks and choke only worked because the Wu boy is slow." Pan Ai continued.

"Telegraphed attacks, too slow a response to the monkey's all or nothing grapple. The more skilled initiates won't make the same mistakes. Now that its technique is known? They'll never let it close to such close range with them."

"If they place it against another no-name third stage, I'm taking that." Ma Bojing said.

"Easy money, none of them are landing a telling blow against that sort of defense."

"Surely the odds won't be anywhere close to even now." Outer Disciple Peng Shanyuan cut in.

"Disciple Yang and the Xiao scions are running at well past 40 to 1 for their early matches. For some fights, there's not even enough people betting on the cold door to have a pool at all. There's more money to be made betting on whether or not their opponents will surrender, or how many blows they'll withstand."

"Look at this crowd." Ma Bojing said, gesturing.

"Not even one in twenty members of the outer sect came out today. Fully half of them will start coming once the imperial retinue arrives and the main stage matches begin. Rumor only carries so far, the odds on the monkey will certainly be worse going forward, but there'll be money to be made."

"We'll see." Pan Ai said, a dubious expression on his face.

"You'll see how full my pockets are." Ma Bojing retorted, smiling like he was already planning how to spend his coming windfall.

"This is why we watch the early matches."

"Damn you. Damn it all." The words were quiet. Barely audible over the thundering tongues of the audience. Orange-crest knew daoists could have terrifyingly sharp senses. Still the monkey doubted any other than the three of them upon the stage heard Wu Yingjie speak. And the inner disciple said nothing. His eyes as sharp, and his tongue as still, as the blade at his side.

"Was good fight." Li Hou offered.

"You are strong." He still didn't understand why men were so stingy with their compliments. Kind words were an excellent way to convince someone to like you. They cost a speaker nothing, and sometimes reaped great benefits.

"You don't get it, monkey. I had to go farther. To show them all. This tournament, this duel, it mattered." Oh. It was one of those man-things. Wu Yingjie was now going to act as if this duel had not been important to orange-crest and his master. Speak as if this life they all shared was his dream alone. Orange-crest sighed, still clutching Wu Yingjie's back. He shifted, pushing the larger disciple's weight off him so he could breathe more easily. Well, he pushed, and Wu Yingjie shifted.

Moving the big disciple's bulk was a little beyond him if he did not cooperate.

"Everything matters." The monkey told him.

"But you aren't dead. Tomorrow comes. It matters too." Wu Yingjie rolled fully off the monkey, wincing as he tried to rise to his feet. His knee was still more colorful than the average sunset, despite the healing pill he'd taken. He'd put too much weight on during those final charges.

"Go away. Nobody expected anything of me, yet they'll still manage to be disappointed. I can already hear the snide comments. Losing to a monkey a stage my junior. My aunt will be unbearable."

"Yingjie the Ogre is a good name. Will remember. Will use."

"Please don't. I don't know what I was thinking when I said that."

"Hmm. Maybe big-muscles then?" Orange-crest mused, ignoring him.

"Or, big-disciple. Daoist Big Shiny has bigger muscles." Wu Yingjie sighed, and did not respond. His face whitened, as he forced his damaged leg to bear his weight, but he did not flinch or stumble as he walked across the arena to retrieve his weapon. Orange-crest followed him at a distance, not yet done talking.

"What weapon is that? Who made it? Why does it scream?"

"Yingjie the Ogre is fine." Wu Yingjie said, heading toward the stands.

"It is better than Big Buttocks, at least. Now leave me alone. I have sorrows to drown."

"Ooh. Want to drink with me?"

"No. Even I am not so low in my family's esteem I cannot afford to indulge my own vices."

"Tchuk." Orange-crest clicked his tongue against his jaw wetly, as he turned to leave. He repeated the noise twice more. He still didn't have the right words. Not to build a bridge between them, nor give voice to his own feelings. He needed to learn more. Maybe then humans would understand him. As far as he was concerned, he'd offered enough peace-fruits to Wu Yingjie. The human had started the strife between them, but orange-crest had been the first to escalate it into violence.

He'd hoped more violence would bury their grudges, but it seemed it'd only bred deeper rancor. Orange-crest did not want to kill Wu Yingjie. He didn't want to kill anyone, really. He had a feeling it would make living among the humans of the Azure Mountain complicated and unpleasant. The man had already come for him once. Only formless-gleam's aid had allowed the monkey to so easily turn the tide against his hunters.

Orange-crest did not think he could afford to leave Wu Yingjie alive if he came for him a second time. He was dangerous now in a way he was not six months ago. But it took two wills to settle a grudge with words, and only one to do so with blades. So he walked away, heading back to his master.

"Monkey!"

"Its name is Li Hou."

"Li Hou!" Orange-crest looked up, mildly surprised to see disciples speaking to him, instead of about him. These were not even former-initiates either, many of whom knew him through sparring or passing rumor. They were what his master called proper outer disciples, men grown who had spent years with the Azure Mountain sect. Even from a distance, their power was obvious. Though they were not actively calling upon their qi, there was still a sense that emanated from them. Proud eyes and sharp, confident, movements.

They reminded him of some of the lonely wandering monkeys that sometimes visited Mount Yuelu. Worldly beings who had seen danger, and found themselves equal to it. Far weaker than his master, but some of them stronger than even Disciple Chang.

"Li Hou!" The first speaker repeated.

"What technique was that? I've never seen anything like it in the sect archives. At least, not at any level you could access. Is it a bloodline power? Or something your master taught you?"

"You can't just ask that!" The disciple who had remembered Li Hou's name protested.

"He's a monkey. And he doesn't have to answer."

"Still. It is not done. One does not pry into a fellow daoist's techniques."

"Well? Will you satisfy your senior's curiosity?" The first speaker asked. Li Hou straightened, despite his own injuries. He shifted to his proper-voice, the one he used when he sought to act like he belonged among men.

"This disciple's master, Daoist Scouring Medicine, is an expert alchemist with skill in bodily refinement baths. I found a powerful natural treasure. He made a bath from it."

"Hah! Pay up, Pan Ai! I told you it wasn't from a bloodline!" The first speaker crowed.

"Quiet, Disciple Ma." The third outer disciple said.

"Li Hou, this bodily refinement technique your master taught you. Does it have a name?"

"No? Is new. I am only one." Li Hou paused. He was lapsing back into his usual register. He focused more carefully on the very particular ways humans expected words to fit together.

"My master did not name the bath he created. It was designed for my particular constitution, and the rare treasure I found. This disciple calls it the Stone Monkey's Body."

"The Stone Monkey's Body. Interesting. I wonder if we'll see copies of it in the Hall of Dawn in a few years."

"Don't think you're getting out of paying me, Brother Pan." Ma Bojing said.

"I told you, I have a nose for this sort of thing." Orange-crest bowed, paws clasped. The third disciple, the one who had protested when Disciple Ma asked him directly about his techniques, nodded at him. This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work. He left, returning to his master's side. Li Xun had watched the whole matter take place. He wore a small smile on his face. An expression so small one might miss it, if they had not lived with him for a whole year.

He'd wanted rumors. These outer disciples seemed like the talkative sort. Orange-crest smiled back at him, his own grin as unsubtle as the rising sun.

"There is a stop we should make, before the Administration Hall." Li Xun said suddenly.

"Your next match won't be decided for a few hours yet anyway."

"Oh?"

"You reached the third stage of Qi Condensation a few months ago. Before the incident. Do you understand what that means, in the Azure Mountain Sect?" Orange-crest thought about it.

"Mostly?" He ventured. His master liked explaining things, and he did not dislike learning them. Li Xun nodded, before continuing to speak.

"It would matter more, if I had not already declared you my disciple. In the Empire of Xiao, the third stage of Qi Condensation is considered the bare minimum one must attain to truly call themselves a cultivator. The Azure Mountain Sect expects initiates to attain it in their first year. Anyone without at least that much talent is not worth teaching. It is also the period the sect uses to evaluate the aptitudes and morals of this year's initiates.

We allow them free rein over the mountain, let them struggle with their peers or risk their lives as they wish. Many initiates will spend that whole year without meeting a daoist or elder more than once or twice. Yet, though they will not see their seniors, their seniors will keep close watch upon them. This is one of the few secrets that is considered a serious matter for an outer disciple to disclose to an initiate."

"Ah. You spy on us."

"Nothing so crude. We evaluate you, or the other initiates rather, to determine where you are best suited to begin your true career with the sect. And to see if you are, for reasons of talent or morals, suitable for cultivation at all."

"Morals?"

"The patriarch laid down many rules for the sect when he first founded it. We learn and teach many sorts of arts here, some more orthodox than others, but there are lines that we do not tolerate being crossed. Some disciples push grudges too far, or explore practices they should not. They are offered a single, subtle, correction. If they persist, they are removed from the sect."

"I'm good?" Li Xun chuckled.

"Yes. You are good. I don't think you could imagine the sorts of arts that earn that punishment if you tried, and despite your curiosity, I would prefer to keep it that way." Despite his master's words, orange-crest thought about it. What might be so foul that even humans, who tolerated such violence among their own, would ban it? Maybe something that upended the social order they so strictly enforced. A terrible cultivation-whisper that turned men against each other.

If orange-crest was in charge, he would ban cultivating the power of tigers. Any monkey who did that would definitely turn into an untrustworthy cannibal. Would men ban that? Maybe. Ooh. What about an art that made men only speak the truth? That would definitely be forbidden. They would all kill each other in a day.

"You're thinking about forbidden arts now, aren't you?"

"No?"

"I suppose I have only myself to blame." Li Xun said, taking a turn down a path they'd never walked before.

"We have strayed somewhat from my original purpose. Let it suffice to say, after reaching the third stage of Qi Condensation and acquiring a more permanent position with the sect, new outer disciples are granted certain privileges. I'd intended to show you this after the bath, but events conspired against us." Orange-crest smiled. See. That. That was why men couldn't handle a truth-forcing art. They kept saying things like 'events conspired against us'.

"Behold. The Hall of Dawn. The technique repository of the Azure Mountain Sect." The building that rose up before orange-crest was one of the largest he'd ever seen. It covered space enough for half a dozen mansions, easily the size of four of the smaller arenas in Godsgrave Peak stacked side by side. And then it rose up, building after building stacked on top of each other. The Administration Hall stretched to two floors in many places. At its center, a third floor rested, looming over the rest of the complex.

It was the largest structure orange-crest had seen to date. The Hall of Dawn had seven floors. It was like a mountain in miniature, made by the hands of men. Each floor was painted one of seven colors, rising from black at the bottom, to white at the top. Orange-crest understood why they called it the hall of dawn. It almost looked like a sunrise. He'd just never seen a sunrise that featured both purple and green alongside red and yellow.

A powerful aura emanated from the building, a sensation like the breath of a hibernating bear. It waited patiently, half-asleep, but terribly vigilant.

"Technique repository?" The monkey asked. He knew technique, but the other word was new.

"It is where the collected learning of the Azure Mountain is stored. This is where Daoist Guarding Thunder learned to command lightning, where I first began to study alchemy. Almost every famous technique of the sect has, or once had, a manual here. There are copies of the first level of Elder Lu's Scripture of the Golden Order, and copies of the recipe for my Quaternary Heartfire Pill. Even the patriarch left behind a pair of techniques, though even with my cultivation, I am not qualified to know what they are.

To be forbidden even to me they must be Nascent Soul level at minimum. There are rumors Sect Master Ren is attempting to cultivate one now." Orange-crest stared up at the building, lost for words. This, this was a miracle. Even the Monkey King could not know as many secrets as a building this large might contain. With a foundation like this, he could see why humans were such a powerful type of animals.

"And... We can go in? And read things?" Orange-crest could not believe it. There had to be a catch.

"Every full outer disciple is granted the right browse techniques below the fifth stage of Qi Condensation, as well as the right to borrow a single technique of that level from the repository. Full daoists can pay a sizeable fee to borrow more, or contribute manuals of their own discoveries." Orange-crest drew himself up to his full height. He clasped his hands and bowed to his master.

"You are best master. Let us go read many books."

"Not too many. We need to pick up your next bracket and prepare a meal before dark falls. Daoist Enduring Oath said he's almost finished with his forging. He plans to join us for dinner tonight. I'm sure he'll appreciate a retelling of your bout with Wu Yingjie."

"Is odd." Li Hou noted.

"Seeing you less happy about reading than me."

"Most of the techniques in here take years to cultivate. Your next fight is in a week."

"Hnn. I'll learn fast."

"The Heavenly Dao is a canvas, let your soul add its own color to fate's brush. All spaces are surfaces of revolution. Volume is merely another dimension to bear color. If you can see the curves around which the world turns, your brush can sunder truth from falsehood, creating a space for true creativity. Do not seek to see in order to paint, but paint in order to see. Truth will offer itself up before your unseeing faith. Only in surrendering your art can it take root in a deeper canvas." Orange-crest blinked.

His master had said this was a manual about illusions. About painting illusions onto things that were not paper. The monkey understood illusions. Well, he understood them a little. None of these words bore any resemblance to the trick formless-gleam had taught him. They hardly even explained what he was to do with his qi.

"This makes no sense." The monkey complained. His master looked over from where he was browsing a herbarium. He was turning the pages rapidly, checking for plants he did not immediately recognize.

"Which? Ah, the Art of the Unbound Painter. I hear the original Foundation Establishment manual is much better."

"Can I read that?"

"No. I don't know who has it now, but it was in the hall for scarcely a day after Daoist Thousand Eyes returned it before some inner disciple picked it up. He's probably the one making those summary manuals for outer disciples."

"But... Why not copy the original? Or give it back when he's done?"

"It's not that simple. Let's see here..." Li Xun said, rising. He stalked down the crowded shelves, before selecting a particular scroll.

"The first level of the Scripture of the Golden Order. Elder Lu's cultivation technique. Take a look." Orange-crest opened the scroll, and the world fell away. He fell into a dream, darkly gleaming. Words of greed and glory slipped through his mind, hinting at ideas he struggled to fit within the confines of his head, great beasts the size of nations hiding in plain sight. Predators more perfect than any he'd ever known, growing fat off the labor of others. Orange-crest blinked.

His master had taken the scroll back. Li Xun stared down at him, amusement in his eyes.

"That one is almost Foundation Establishment level. Even letting you view it is a small violation of sect rules. You're not qualified to borrow it, and I wouldn't let you cultivate it if you did. Can you even remember anything you just read?" Orange-crest's brow furrowed. He'd just read that. It felt so... Profound. So correct. There was a truth there, great and terrible.

"Money is... Gold is not money. Gold is the shadow we see when true money moves." Orange-crest paused.

"Or... Money rots when it doesn't move? Maybe? Something about money moving." Li Xun's eyebrow rose.

"That's more than I expected you to retain. But that's why you can't read a copy of the original Art of the Unbound Painter. True cultivation manuals are more than mere words. Fragments of will and memory are often embedded in their characters and illustrations. The inner disciple who wrote that copy might have learned the Art of the Unbound Painter, but he doesn't have the expertise to set it to paper as well as the technique's creator did."

"But why does he keep it? Isn't he done learning?"

"Few cultivators are ever truly done with a technique manual. A good one is a precious treasure, one they will likely continue to reference until they outgrow a technique, or abandon it."

"Bah."

"Bah indeed." Li Xun agreed.

"But we live in the world we live in, not the one we'd like to. Truly excellent manuals are rare treasures, and neither men nor beasts are inclined to share those. Take a few more hours, to see if anything speaks to you." Orange-crest browsed through manuals rapidly. He wanted to see everything. There were so many different arts. Movement, breathing, weapons, spells, craftsmanship. Men had written about everything. But even though everything intrigued him, nothing called to him.

A small pile began to form on the desk his master had occupied, his candidates. If he could only take one, they might be good enough. One was a cultivation technique that let men take on the powers of other animals. Another was a martial art for imbuing one's staff with elemental power. The last was a movement art that was supposed to be very sneaky. They all seemed good. But he didn't have enough time to know if they were great for him. And then orange-crest found it.

It was a paper book, with many liquid stains on it's front cover. It smelled vaguely of rice wine, even though it'd been on the shelf long enough to accumulate a great deal of dust. Li Hou paged through it. Then he skipped back to the start, and scanned it more thoroughly. He didn't realize he'd been reading for the better part of an hour until he jumped when his master placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Is that the one?"

"Yes." The monkey answered with certainty.

"The Drunken Phoenix's Breath." His master read over his shoulder.

"Interesting." Li Hou looked up.

"You're not gonna say anything? I thought you wanted me to learn more illusions."

"Your weak fire roots will likely do you no favors with that art. But I've learned to trust your instincts. If you think it's the best of the arts we've seen for you, then I believe you."

"Is the best. Very monkey. Sort of like the Monkey King's ring of fire. Plus you can use it with alcohol." Li Xun sighed, but helped his disciple officially borrow the manual. Li Hou read the whole way back to the Administration Hall, already engrossed.

"Heaven save me from ambitious monkeys and drunken masters." Li Xun muttered, as he reached over to guide his book-drunk disciple away from walking into another tree.

"Wait here." He told the monkey, as he stepped inside to pick up a copy of the roster for the next round. Li Hou hardly seemed to notice his momentary absence. Li Xun joined his disciple in reading, as they began walking back to his home.

"That fucking bastard." Orange-crest stopped. He'd never heard such language from his master. Li Xun sometimes smiled quietly when Li Hou used it, like when he'd splashed hot oil in his face trying to make one pan soup. But he'd never used such words himself, not even during the weeks after burning himself.

"It is time." His master said quietly.

"You'll be fighting with your back to the water now. I know a little about his techniques, but not as much as I would like. The rumor-brokers all say he's not been pushed hard enough in sparring to ever show anything beyond mere spearwork. We have one week. We'll not waste a moment of it. If you can win this, you'll be all but certain to reach the semifinals. If not, I'll take other measures. I can hardly believe Elder Lu did it, after that last fight. He must have paid someone off with favors to force it through."

His master held out the sheet of paper he was looking at it. Li Hou scanned it for his own name. He found it quickly, near the top. His eyes drifted over to the name of his opponent. Yang Wei.