Chương 142: Who... what are you?

.. what are you?

Having another consciousness wake up inside your head is an interesting experience. It wasn't the same as having a conversation with Azure, he exists as a distinct presence inside my inner world, and it wasn't like communicating with Yggy either since its thoughts always come across as impressions and emotions instead of words. This was more... imagine if your own reflection decided to start talking back to you.

"Hello…? I know you can hear me. Who... what are you?" The young master's mental voice sounded hesitant and almost timid, which was different from that fierce determination I sensed from him when he was busy fighting for his life earlier. Then again, having your body hijacked by some mysterious entity would make anybody act cautious. I considered my response carefully, first impressions mattered, and people always say honesty is the best policy, that didn't apply when you were stuck in a cultivation world.

"I'm the reason why you're not bleeding out inside some alley," I directed my thoughts over to him.

"My name is Ling Zhuo." The name translated to Wandering Spirit, which gave him something to call me without me having to reveal anything about my true identity to him. If this really was someone's inner world, I didn't want to leave any traces behind that might lead to who I was since you never know when information might come back to haunt you.

"So, Ling Zhuo," he started, and I could feel him testing the name out, trying to get a read on me.

"I'm Han Renyi, I thought... I thought you were a messenger of the Celestial Sovereign. Or maybe a demon." He took a small pause.

"I'm not sure you're not." I couldn't stop myself from chuckling.

"If it helps you feel any better, I'm not a demon."

"Then you're a dead Rouqin, aren't you?" Renyi's mental voice carried this mix of awe and apprehension in it.

"One of the ancient cultivators from before the decline? That would explain your strange techniques..." That was an interesting assumption for him to make. He wasn't wrong either. I was technically dead; I just wasn't dead in the way he was thinking.

"What makes you say that?"

"The way you fought those mercenaries," he replied.

"I was... aware, sort of. It was as if I was watching it through a fog. You used techniques that I've never seen before. And that healing ability! No one's been able to do anything similar since..." he trailed off.

"Since the Celestial Sovereign disappeared?"

"Yes." The word carried centuries of cultural weight behind it.

"The stories say he could mend wounds, cure diseases, and he could even regrow lost limbs. But now since we are without him?" I know Han Renyi would have been shaking his head if he had any control over his body right then.

"We're lucky if rouqi can speed up our natural healing." I filed that information away for later. Every piece of context helped me build up a clearer picture of what this dying world was.

"Tell me about the Celestial Sovereign," I said.

"The stories about him must be fascinating." But instead of answering my question, I felt him trying to move and take control over his body. His attempt was clumsy but it was determined, almost as if someone was trying to open a door using a key that didn't fit into the lock anymore. After a few moments went by, he gave up.

"I can't..." his voice sounded strained.

"This is my body. Why can't I...?"

"Right now, I'm the one who is keeping it alive," I explained.

"My energy is what sealed those wounds and kept you from bleeding out. If I leave..." It wasn't true that my presence was the only thing continuing to keep him alive, it was better than him trying to regain control. My answer made him quiet for a moment. I could feel him thinking about it, and weighing options and possibilities in his head.

"If you wanted to harm me," he said, "you could have let me die. Or you could have taken over my body without..." he took a pause, searching for the right words to use.

"Without leaving me aware this way."

"Exactly." I gave a nod, the gesture was more mental than physical.

"We made a deal, remember? Right before you passed out, you agreed to accept my help. I intend to honor that agreement."

"The deal..." He seemed to be trying hard to remember it.

"You said something about power and revenge?"

"And helping your family," I added.

"But why?" I'm sure that if he had any eyes to use, they would be narrowed hard at me right now.

"What do you get out of doing this?" That was a fair question to ask. I considered my answer carefully, absently checking the area by using my connection to the local plants. We were alone inside the overgrown garden, I could sense some people moving along the streets in front of us. The first reason, which I kept to myself, was simple practicality, his body had somehow accepted my soul when I needed a vessel, so I owed him for that.

The second reason was equal parts practical but more forward-looking since a dying world with weaker energy had plenty of opportunities if you knew where to look. I just needed to find them.

"Before we get into that," I said, "do you want to tell me what kind of mess we're in right now? Those weren't ordinary mercenaries trying to kill you." It was a subtle shift so I could turn the topic back onto him and gather the information I needed. I felt him weighing his options, he was trying to decide how much he should trust me. His necessity won over his caution.

"Those mercenaries, they worked for Elder Zhou Shentong from the Three-Leaf Clover Sect," he explained.

"He's been... pressuring my family lately."

"Tell me everything," I said.

"The more I know about it, the more I can help you." And so, he did. The story came out in tiny pieces, with every revelation painting a clearer picture of a family's decline and a predator who was patiently stalking them. Stolen novel; please report. The Han family had once been prominent merchants who dealt in silk and jade, they had trade routes that stretched all across the realm.

But as the generations went by, and the world's rouqi continued to thin, trying to maintain those trade routes became more difficult. Having fewer cultivators meant having fewer guards who were capable of protecting the caravans from bandits and wild beasts. So, the cost of hiring whatever qualified protectors were left kept rising higher and higher.

"Father says that back in grandfather's time, you could easily find Tier 2 Rouqin working as common caravan guards," Han Renyi explained.

"But now? We're lucky if we can find someone who's reached late Tier 1, and they always charge ten times what a Tier 2 would have charged back then."

"And this is all happening due to the lack of rouqi available…"

"Yes, breaking through to Tier 2 used to be something that any dedicated person could achieve by their twentieth year. But now?" He mentally gestured his hand over to himself.

"Father spent almost everything we had to get me the resources I needed for my breakthrough to Tier 1. And I'm considered talented."

"And this Elder Zhou? Where does he fit into all of this?" The surge of hatred that I felt coming from Han Renyi when I mentioned that name was impressive.

"He's been taking over all the smaller merchant families for years now. Those who decide to cooperate get to have a small position in his organization. But those who resist..." he trailed off.

"Have some unfortunate accidents?" I guessed.

"Or they find themselves unable to hire guards for their caravans. Or they discover that no one will buy their goods anymore. Or they have their warehouses burned down to the ground." The deep bitterness in his mental voice was palpable.

"He's not subtle about it, but he's powerful enough that he doesn't need to be. His sect controls most of the trade routes now anyway."

"There's something else that you should know," Han Renyi added sounding hesitant.

"It's about Zhou's interest in my family. It's not about the business only. He... he wants my sister. He wants to add her to his collection of wives. Qingyi is barely eighteen! And that old bastard... the terrible things they say about how he treats his other wives..." I caught some fragments of these rumors through our connection, they were stories about broken women locked away inside Zhou's private quarters, and about servants who disappeared after they witnessed too much.

There was nothing concrete enough to prove anything, but it was more than enough to justify Han Renyi's protective fury. It wouldn't surprise me if Zhou was this world's equivalent of a demonic cultivator.

"And now your father's been summoned to meet with him," I mused, putting all the puzzle pieces together.

"So those mercenaries were supposed to deliver your corpse as a message, which would show him what refusing Zhou's 'generous offer' would mean for his family."

"Yes." The word was heavy with dread.

"Father went to meet with him this morning. I tried to go, but..."

"But he ordered you to stay behind and protect your sister," I gave a nod.

"He is a good father, who is trying to shield his children even if it means he has to face the tiger all alone. So how long ago did he leave?"

"Just before dawn," Han Renyi replied, sound worried.

"The meeting was supposed to be at Zhou's private residence." Dawn had been two hours ago, and my encounter with the mercenaries had happened shortly after that.

"Those men were sent to kill you while your father was meeting with Zhou," I noted.

"Which suggests they weren't expecting the meeting to go well."

"Or they were trying to make sure that Father would be motivated to accept whatever terrible terms Zhou offered," Han Renyi suggested darkly.

"Nothing encourages cooperation quite the same as knowing your son's life is in danger."

"Now those mercenaries are dead, and no one's delivered your corpse over as planned." I couldn't help myself from smiling slightly.

"I imagine that's going to complicate negotiations somewhat." The young master's consciousness stirred up with hope.

"Then we have some time? We could save him?"

"Maybe," I said.

"But first, I need to understand what we're up against here. Tell me about Zhou, what tier is he?"

"He is at Mid-Tier 2. He is one of the strongest in the city, but that doesn't mean much these days."

"And what about his residence?" I asked.

"Are there security measures, a layout, or anything unusual that we should know?"

"It's in the eastern part of the city. It has three main buildings that are surrounded by gardens, and they are all protected by formation arrays." Han Renyi's voice took on a frustrated tone.

"I tried to gather more information a few days ago, but their security was tight. The best I could do was bribe a servant so I could get a rough description of what the main hall's layout was."

"That's quite impressive," I said.

"Most people wouldn't have gotten even that much. So now, about these formation arrays, what do they do?"

"They're standard protection formations," he replied.

"They alert the guards when anyone unauthorized tries to enter, they strengthen the buildings, and other similar things."

"And they're all powered by rouqi, right?"

"Of course they are. What else would they use?" If the formations here were some derivative of the cultivation world, then with my Level 2 Formation skills, I might not be as disadvantaged as it originally appeared.

"What about guards?" I asked.

"There are usually a half a dozen Tier 1 Rouqin."

"What do you know about the techniques he uses."

"His main technique is called the Verdant Binding Art," Han Renyi explained.

"He can control multiple vines at the same time, and uses them to crush anyone that opposes him. They say he once squeezed a rival sect elder to death right in front of his own disciples, just so he could make a point about respecting territorial boundaries." I thought about Yggy and my own skills and I had to suppress a smile. He was a fellow wood cultivator, which makes for an interesting matchup.

"Master," Azure interjected, "a mid-Tier 2 cultivator in this world would likely be equivalent to the eighth stage of Qi Condensation in terms of raw power. Are you certain about confronting him?" I noted that Han Renyi showed no reaction to Azure's voice. So, it seemed he couldn't hear my inner world spirit's commentary, which was convenient.

"If this were the Azure Peak Sect," I thought back over to Azure, "I wouldn't be confident going up against someone who was two sub-stages above me. But here?" I considered what we'd seen of this world so far.

"Even if his raw power is equivalent to stage eight, his combat capability is closer to stage seven. And since I'm using the Primordial Wood Arts, I have a natural advantage against other wood cultivators anyway."

"But we shouldn't underestimate him," Azure cautioned, "especially since we're busy adapting to this body's energy system." He had a point. I'd defeated Tier 1 assassins earlier, but I had the element of surprise and Yggy's intervention. If I was going up against a Tier 2 cultivator, it would require control over both my techniques and this body's rouqi.

"What's the plan?" Han Renyi's voice broke through our conversation.

"How are we going to save my father?" After we rescued his father, he would be more open to answering the questions I had about this new world, so the other questions could wait until then.

"First," I replied, "I need to recover my power before we can make any moves against Zhou."

"But we need to go now!" I could feel his anxiety spike up as his consciousness brushed against mine.

"As we are right now, rushing in would mean walking to our death," I explained.

"Tell me, are you sure that Zhou would kill your father? He seems way too calculating to pull a crude move like that." There was a long moment of silence as Han Renyi processed this.

"You... might have a point there. Zhou is power-hungry, but he's not stupid. Killing Father would create attention and scrutiny that he doesn't need right now. He likes to appear righteous even as he strangles the life out of us."

"Exactly. Which means we have time to do this the right way." I could feel his grudging acceptance over the logic.

"So, is there somewhere safe where I can recover?" I asked.

"Somewhere Zhou's people won't think to look for us?"

"There's an old storage facility over in the industrial district. It used to belong to my family before. It's abandoned now, but I know a way to get inside. The foundations are solid, and there's enough residual rouqi inside the walls to mask our presence."

"Perfect." I stood up and brushed the dirt off our robes.

"Show me the way."