Chương 114: 113. Records of the Grand Historian

Jade Crossing City announces itself long before I reach the walls. Farms give way to warehouses and inns large enough to house hundreds of travelers. Irrigation channels run beside the main road in straight, carefully maintained lines. The walls are not especially high, but they are broad enough for patrols to walk three abreast. Soldiers stand above the gates in dark municipal armor rather than sect robes. Several possess cultivation, though none appear to have advanced beyond the middle stages of Qi Condensation.

The cultivators entering beneath them belong to several different factions. Cerulean-trimmed robes appear most often. Azure Heavens is the strongest of the three medium sects influencing the city, supported by several Foundation Establishment elders and a sect leader who seldom appears publicly. Their disciples carry themselves with the confidence of people accustomed to being number one. Two other sects maintain comparable visibility in the commercial districts.

Their disciples use the same roads, buy from neighboring shops, and post recruitment notices on the same public boards. They do not openly quarrel like Silent Moon and Whispering Wind, but neither do they acknowledge one another unless necessary. No faction controls enough of the city to remove the others, and the mortal administration benefits from the balance. Public officials bow to cultivators but do not scurry from their path. Municipal guards question caravan masters openly.

Clerks inspect cargo bearing sect seals instead of assuming those seals end the discussion. Some officers are clearly disciples hired or seconded from the local sects, while others have cultivated through techniques maintained by the government itself. Jade Crossing is not free from sect influence, but it has enough competing influence that the magistrate can still exercise significant authority.

That makes finding information more promising than I expected, even if it does nothing to improve the quality of what the private bookshops sell. The first shop offers three manuals claiming to teach dragon-blood awakening. The Gaze identifies one as a modified breathing exercise, another as an incomplete body-refinement method intended for lizard beasts, and the third as a collection of copied passages joined together by an author who has never seen a dragon or cultivated past Qi Condensation.

The second shop displays a curved bone beneath red silk. The owner lowers his voice when I approach.

"Recovered from the jaw of a thousand-year river dragon." The Gaze identifies it as the rib of an elderly ox. I leave before he explains the price. Other shops produce embellished beast-hunting journals, temple records describing dragons as divine punishments, genealogies purchased by families wishing to improve their ancestry, and forty different versions of the same supposed sighting over a mountain lake. The details change with every retelling.

The dragon becomes larger, the cultivator witnessing it becomes stronger, and the number of dead fishermen increases according to the author's need for drama. By midday, I have found nothing more useful than the herbal almanac I purchased in Crescent Bay. I have spent most of my life treating official records as something governments use to tax, regulate, and inconvenience people. It occurs to me that this is precisely why they may contain information private collectors ignore.

The city administration occupies a walled compound near the central canal. The main hall handles petitions, licenses, taxes, and disputes. Smaller offices extend around it in orderly rows, each marked by painted boards describing its purpose. I release enough Foundation Establishment pressure to ensure I am not directed toward the public queue. A clerk in dark blue robes meets me beneath a side awning. He bows respectfully but does not appear frightened.

"Senior, what business brings you to the magistrate's office?"

"I am searching for historical records concerning dragons, bloodlines, and unusual awakenings. Local histories, river records, imperial decrees, or reports involving spirit beasts may be relevant." The clerk considers the request instead of immediately agreeing.

"Those documents are held in several collections. Some are public. Others require permission from the records office." I place a low-grade spirit stone on the edge of his writing board. His eyes move to it once.

"I would prefer that my research remain unremarkable." The spirit stone disappears beneath a folded register.

"Of course, Senior. The municipal archives can accommodate scholarly inquiries. I will record the request as a review of regional waterway history." Bribery remains one of the few systems that functions consistently across worlds. The clerk provides a stamped wooden slip and sends a junior official to guide me. The municipal archive stands behind the main administrative compound. It is a large rectangular building of gray stone and dark timber.

Narrow windows limit sunlight, and the roof extends far enough to protect the walls from rain. Inside, the air smells of dust, paper, lamp oil, and dried insect repellent. Shelves fill most of the ground floor. Wooden plaques divide them into categories: tax assessments, land surveys, river maintenance, canal rights, mineral claims, sect boundaries, flood reports, population registers, military orders, imperial decrees, beast incidents, and local histories. Several clerks work at long tables beneath hanging lamps.

A thin young man approaches from behind one of the shelves. He appears to be in his early twenties. His limbs are narrow, his shoulders slightly rounded, and a pair of glass lenses rests on his nose in a simple metal frame. The glasses are unusual enough that I look at them twice. They magnify his eyes slightly when he bows.

"This junior is Simu Qian, assistant archivist. I was told Senior requires historical records." I pause.

'Simu Qian?' I wonder whether the heavens have developed an interest in private jokes. He looks up, waiting.

"I am looking for anything concerning dragons."

"Dragons as historical creatures, religious symbols, bloodline ancestors, or reported spirit beasts?"

"All of them, initially." Simu Qian nods.

"That will require several collections. Please wait here." He returns with six volumes and two bundles of tied reports. The first contains forty years of alleged dragon sightings from villages around Jade Crossing. Most were recorded because local residents requested compensation for damaged crops, livestock, or boats. The Gaze dismisses nearly all of them. A dragon seen crossing the moon was a migrating spirit bird. A river dragon overturning fishing boats was likely an oversized eel.

A scaled beast beneath a bridge was described by three witnesses who disagreed on its size, color, number of limbs, and whether it existed at all. The second volume collects flood reports later interpreted by temple historians as dragon attacks. The third preserves religious accounts written more than a century after the events they describe. The remaining texts repeat local stories without identifying original witnesses or dates. I turn several pages, close another volume, and move to the next.

Simu Qian watches from the opposite side of the table. After some time, he adjusts his glasses.

"Senior does not appear to be searching for sightings."

"No." He looks at the books he brought, then at the report I set aside after three pages.

"What are you trying to determine?" The question is direct, though not disrespectful. I lean back slightly.

"I want to understand dragon bloodlines rather than stories involving dragons. Their elemental branches, how their traits pass into human descendants, how those bloodlines awaken, and why some branches remain common while others nearly disappeared." Simu Qian's attention sharpens. I continue.

"Fire and water lineages are most relevant. I also need anything concerning reproduction, inherited physical traits, relationships between dragons and early sects, and periods when their populations declined." He looks toward the shelves for a long moment.

"Give me some time." The second collection comes from five different sections. One history describes the founding of an old fire-aspected sect five centuries ago. Another contains copies of imperial decrees. A third records guardian cults in remote settlements. Two are scholarly commentaries written by officials attempting to reconcile sect traditions with older local records. Simu Qian places the books in a deliberate order.

"Fire dragons appear much more frequently in early regional histories," he says.

"Not always as enemies." He opens the first volume to a marked passage.

"Several major sects claim their founders received instruction directly from fire dragons. Flame circulation, furnace construction, forging, and certain body-refinement methods are all attributed to them." Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. He shifts to another record.

"A few sects settled near established dragon territories and likely exchanged tribute for protection or instruction. Others were founded after a dragon died and built their inheritances from its remains. Later histories often describe both situations as a willing transmission." That is unsurprising. An inheritance sounds nobler than scavenging a corpse. Simu Qian continues.

"Some claims are later inventions. A sect that became powerful through ordinary means occasionally acquired a dragon ancestor several generations afterward."

"For prestige."

"And legitimacy. Dragons were treated as beings closer to natural authority than ordinary spirit beasts. Claiming their recognition could justify control over a mountain, spirit vein, or local population." He opens the copied imperial decrees. The tone changes several centuries later. Fire dragons became associated with volcanic disasters, rebellious territories, failed harvests, and opposition to the reigning dynasty's Heaven's Mandate.

One decree classified them as destructive beasts whose continued presence threatened imperial order: dragon cores, scales, bones, blood, tendons, and preserved organs could be exchanged for military merit, cultivation resources, official rank, or exemptions from certain taxes. Once the state assigned prices to each body part, extermination no longer required much ideological enthusiasm.

"Many were hunted during this period," Simu Qian says.

"The records become less reliable afterward. Some fled beyond settled territory. Others appear to have remained near isolated villages and were worshipped as local guardians." He shows me reports from mountain settlements where offerings were made to beings called flame lords, red-scaled kings, or furnace gods. The descriptions vary, but several were likely dragons living under local religious titles.

"That would explain why fire-dragon bloodlines remain so widespread," I say.

"The survivors remained near mortal populations for generations." Simu Qian nods.

"Guardian families often claimed descent from them. Some of those claims are supported by recurring physical traits or fire affinity."

"Then the dragons must have assumed human form." He looks at me over the rim of his glasses.

"There is no reliable record of a dragon transforming fully into a human." My hand stops on the page.

"None?"

"Lesser dragonkin occasionally possess transformation techniques. Fox spirits, serpents, and several other beast lineages do as well. True dragons are recorded changing size, concealing their presence, or altering limited features. Complete human transformation appears only in later… romantic stories." I look back at the genealogy before me.

'Human families claim dragon ancestry, but dragons cannot become human.' There are several reasonable possibilities. Blood rituals. A dragon altering a child through essence or marrow. Families protected by dragons may have converted symbolic descent into literal genealogy. Unfortunately, the simplest explanation cannot be discarded merely because I prefer not to imagine it. Earth contains entire internet communities fascinated by anthromorphic creatures.

A world containing intelligent dragons is unlikely to improve humanity's restraint. Simu Qian returns to arranging documents and either fails to notice my silence or possesses the judgment not to ask about it.

"What about water dragons?" I ask. His hands slow.

"Direct records are scarce."

"Scarce because they were uncommon?"

"Possibly. There is another explanation." He leaves the table again and returns carrying a large administrative history bound in dark cloth. The title reads Records of the Great Imperial Canal Diversion.

"The project was completed approximately seven hundred years ago," he says.

"Official histories treat it as one of the dynasty's greatest achievements." Major rivers were redirected, tributaries were dammed or joined, and wetlands were drained. Flood routes were stabilized as a result. Agricultural districts gained reliable irrigation, while shipping channels connected regions previously separated during dry seasons. Formations controlled gates, water pressure, sediment, and the movement of water-aspected qi through important sections. Millions of mortals likely benefited.

Simu Qian opens a map showing the older river system beneath the later canal routes.

"Before construction, reports mention river dragons, lake serpents, flood guardians, and aquatic spirit-beast territories regularly. During the diversion, attacks on workers and formations increased." He places a military ledger beside the map.

"The official term was flood demons." The ledger records suppression campaigns, damaged worksites, lost laborers, and materials recovered afterward. Dragon bones. Aquatic cores. Scales.

"They were defending their territories," I say.

"That is one interpretation."

"You disagree?"

"I cannot prove intent. Some attacks may have been territorial. Others may have followed the collapse of nesting grounds, disrupted migration, or uncontrolled changes in water qi." He adjusts the map.

"Within a century of the project's completion, credible reports of mature water dragons almost disappear." Former dragon territories report enormous carp, unusually long-lived eels, horned river serpents, intelligent turtles, and lesser aquatic beasts displaying faint draconic features.

"Do you believe the diversion exterminated them?" I ask. Simu Qian considers before answering.

"Not through one decree or one campaign. The project broke the continuous waterways they depended upon. Rivers were separated from old lakes. Wetlands disappeared. Formations redirected water-aspected qi toward farms, cities, and shipping routes. Dragons that resisted were hunted. Those that survived had fewer territories and fewer opportunities to reproduce." He places one finger on several disconnected waterways.

"The decline begins during construction and continues for generations. Habitat collapse, severed water veins, imperial suppression, and failed reproduction likely reinforced one another."

"And the lesser beasts?"

"Descendants, inheritors, or creatures changed by whatever essence remained. The records cannot distinguish them consistently." I look across the maps and volumes. Two species that once belonged to legend had disappeared through circumstances so ordinary that the scale of their power no longer seemed relevant. It was sobering to think that dragons could vanish in much the same way as countless animals on Earth.

Not through one final battle or some grand heavenly calamity, but through roads, canals, and expanding settlements. Perhaps that should not surprise me. Cultivators speak constantly of borrowing from heaven and earth, though very little is ever returned. Spiritual veins are drained, beasts are harvested, mountains are hollowed out, and every useful thing is converted into pills, weapons, formations, or another cultivator's advancement.

The language differs, but the impulse remains familiar: increase the surplus, reduce the loss, and leave the cost somewhere beyond immediate sight. Even in a world with dragons and immortals, humanity appears to follow the same patterns. I set the broader conclusion aside and return to the reason I came here. The records answer several questions, but they create more problems than they resolve. If water-dragon blood has been diluted for centuries, Ling'er's manifestation is far too strong.

If fire-dragon descendants normally display dominant elemental traits, then the breadth of her abilities makes little sense for a lineage passed down from some isolated guardian dragon. Known awakenings also follow patterns. Scales, heat resistance, flame affinity, altered meridians, occasional physical changes.

'Ling'er possesses too many traits that do not fit neatly into any of them.' The Gaze confirms that Simu Qian's interpretation of the records is accurate. That does not mean the records describe whatever she carries. Perhaps fire dragon and water dragon refer only to the visible expression of a deeper lineage. An Earth dragon might produce a different set of traits. There may be branches unknown to this region, or variants descended from creatures in the Upper Realm.

Given Ling'er's general tendency to resemble a protagonist, a legendary dragon ancestor would hardly surprise me. I close the book.

"You have been extremely helpful." Simu Qian bows his head slightly.

"This junior only knows where the records are stored." That is not entirely true. He did not merely fetch books from a shelf marked dragons. Once he understood the question, he drew from canal surveys, military ledgers, sect histories, temple registers, genealogies, and imperial decrees. Most people could spend years surrounded by records without realizing those documents belonged in the same discussion.

"You know how to find connections between them," I say.

"That is more than just 'knowing where records are stored'." He seems uncertain how to receive the compliment. I glance around the archive.

"Do you enjoy this work?" The question catches him off guard. He looks toward the surrounding shelves before answering.

"I do." There is a brief pause. Then his eyes settle on the open documents between us.

"Most people think an archive is simply a place where old books are kept," he says.

"They expect the truth to be written clearly in one authoritative volume. It rarely is." He touches the corner of another book.

"A local history might claim that a family arrived in the region three hundred years ago. An older tax ledger may show people bearing the same surname paying grain levies there a century earlier. A marriage record might connect them to another clan whose genealogy deliberately omits the relationship." He draws the three imaginary records together with one hand.

"None contains the complete truth. Together, they may resolve a lineage dispute that has survived for generations." His voice has changed.

"Sometimes an official chronicle attributes the destruction of a town to flooding," he continues, "but shipping records show the river remained navigable that year. A temple register may list funerary rites for several cultivators, while an otherwise ordinary inventory records the sudden purchase of hundreds of swords." He reaches for another ledger, though he does not open it.

"Those documents were written by people with entirely different concerns. The chronicler wished to preserve an official explanation. The shipping clerk only cared whether barges could pass. The temple recorded payments for rites. The quartermaster counted weapons. Yet together, they preserve the outline of a battle that later historians misunderstood or chose to erase." He has stopped watching my reaction.

"The truth usually survives in fragments. A clerk's annotation. A copied mistake. An unexplained change in taxation. A name that appears once in a marriage contract and nowhere else." He begins speaking faster.

"There was a property dispute last year between two merchant families. Both possessed deeds, and both deeds appeared legitimate. The matter was resolved through a road-repair ledger written sixty years earlier. One family had been charged for maintaining the eastern boundary wall, which established where their property ended before either deed was issued." His hands move across the desk as he speaks, arranging invisible documents into neat groups.

"Another family claimed descent from two separate ancestors who supposedly founded different branches. They were the same man. One record used his childhood name, another his courtesy name, and a third shortened both incorrectly. The genealogy had treated them as separate people for four generations." The withdrawn young clerk from several minutes ago has nearly disappeared. For a moment, I wonder whether neurodivergence exists in this world, or whether the heavens express it as talents and constitutions.

More importantly, I wonder whether he might be useful. The Coiling Dragon Sect needs records, inventories, contracts, histories, manuals, contribution logs, and someone capable of understanding how all of them affect one another. Shen Qiao can be free of his position as interim librarian. I use the Gaze. Archives Clerk - Mortal Name: Simu Qian Age: 21 Spirit Root: Wood/Metal - B-Grade I blink. That alone would justify an offer. Then another line appears.

HIDDEN POTENTIAL: DORMANT CONSTITUTION DETECTED Constitution: Heavenly War Saint Physique - S-Grade Description: Adapts its bearer toward whatever challenges define their life, permanently refining body, mind, and instincts through repeated difficulty. Cultivation: Mortal Verdict: With no martial hardship to shape it, the physique has instead refined his memory, concentration, pattern recognition, mental endurance, and ability to connect disparate information.

Nascent Soul all but guaranteed if introduced to cultivation and given sufficient time. Content to remain a scholar if his talent is left undisturbed. I stop moving. Simu Qian continues explaining a discrepancy between two canal registries, unaware that his future has just become considerably more complicated. I spent two days walking through villages, clan compounds, farms, docks, and markets, deliberately searching for hidden talent.

The moment I stop looking and ask someone for a book, the heavens place an S-grade constitution behind a municipal desk.

'Oh, you have got to be shitting me.'