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Once they had passed out of sight of the gate, Yang Mu clicked her tongue and guided her horse beside Wu Ying. Around them, the soldiers who trained, cared for the fortification and stood guard watched the pair with bored interest, the pair having retracted their own auras upon entrance. Wu Ying watched the surroundings with only mild interest, more concerned with the way the wind whispered secrets of those who resided within.

Keeping her voice low and her head rotating, she spoke to him. “You did well, following my lead.”

“It would have been easier, if I knew your purpose.” Wu Ying lips twitched in wry humour. “I doubt you chose to create that scene over some Core Formation stones.”

“A merchant should never take the first offer in a negotiation,” Yang Mu said. “Furthermore, when pressed, Bo Leng was quite informative.”

“And what did you learn?”

“The city is under attack. The need for cores are high, and their ability to cleanse the cores are failing them. I cannot think of any other reason for a cultivator to taint their core with such energy,” Yang Mu murmured.

“I can.” After all, Wu Ying had once met a demonic cultivator. A man whose smell reminded Wu Ying of the taint. In generalities, though not in exactness.

“They are worried about word escaping, though they are not stopping exits. Yet.” Yang Mu mused. “However, that they are requesting such a high entrance amount speaks of the powerful beasts that they face.”

“Nascent Soul level then?” Wu Ying said, curiously. It would explain why they set entrance payments at Core Formation. An Energy Storage cultivator could do little against a Nascent Soul level creature but delay their progress briefly. A Core Formation cultivator could, working together in most cases, fight such a monster.

“Possibly. Still, one would think they would need more cultivators, rather than less. After all, those cannot be the only threat they face.”

Wu Ying guided his horse around a bickering couple who stood in the middle of the roadway, gesturing at an overturned cart of cabbages. He extended his senses a little further, feeling the light drizzle of rain wash against his skin, the scent of those around being carried to him. Hard to call forth the individual, but it suited his purpose now.

“They have enough. Their armies are strong. A lot of Body Cultivators, a decent number of the Energy Storage stage. At least a few hundred,” Wu Ying said, turning his head to eye the simple stone barracks and storage buildings that they bypassed. “Bringing so many upwards, paying for their resources, feeding and training them…”

“You’re thinking they’re desperate for cores,” Yang Mu nodded slowly. “If they are not able to provide enough – or are just struggling to do so – for their army, having other cultivators in would be difficult. But surely they are used to these numbers.” She gestured at the permanent buildings they passed.

“Unless the roadway and supply from other cities are cut-off,” Wu Ying guessed. “Or the city has more such soldiers.”

“And if they are trying not to feed their soldiers tainted stones…”

“They might have reduced their internal stockpiles such that they are looking to constrain the demand among those of a lower level too,” Wu Ying said. “Though… why demand so many Core Formation cores. Is it just to bring in Core Formation cultivators? Or is there another reason?”

To this, Yang Mu had no answer.

The pair eventually made their way out of the encampment, leaving behind the simply built squareish official buildings behind them to cross the open ground between city proper and the fortress. Most of this land, as Wu Ying had already noticed, was made up of rice fields. It not only forced an invading force to make use of the single, wide road to approach the city or risk getting bogged down in the undulating, uneven earth of the farmland in-between, but it also helped feed the population.

Occasional buildings broke up the landscape, residences for the farmers and storage buildings for the goods, along with the necessary supplementary buildings that eased life. In most cases, they were small inns or restaurants, providing alcohol and ready made meals for tired personnel combined with a small trading outpost that carried everyday needs. Nothing too elaborate of course, since passing merchants and the city itself was a short distance away.

Well, short in a sense. It was still a few hours fast walk away, longer if one was burdened by produce. No surprise then that there were merchants and wagon drivers who undertook to transport goods between farmland and village itself, taking only a small cut of the profit in payment for convenience.

Watching farmers work the fields, wading through waterlogged fields to tend to rice stalks and pull out weeds, to care for the fish and prawns that grew within the fields themselves, Wu Ying could not help but feel a pang of nostalgia. His life had been hard as a farmer, long hours with always the fear of a marauding demonic beast or a long drought.

And yet… These days, he was a leaf on the wind, drifting through life but never tied to any location. As a farmer, he had been bound to his village, to the community. Now, the threads that held him tight were more ephemeral, a suggestion rather than the harsh demand of his life before.

Maudlin thoughts, and foolish ones. Life had not been better before, just different. He could not forget how his entire existence had been upset by another’s choice, by the demands of war and the nobles above. It was a fool’s game to regret a past and not accept that that past did not have its own shortcomings.

Early spring days, when the snow had not left and their stores had fallen low, eating a meal of watery chuk and wanting more. Having to duck his head and accept the abuse and harsh words of Yin Xue, as he strutted around, lord of it all.

Ridiculous pinings for a time that never was.

“You’re quiet,” Yang Mu said, guiding her own steed close. “Problem?”

“Just thinking.” At her raised eyebrow of enquiry, he gestured at the farmers working in the fields. “Remembering a past.”

“Ah, yes. You were one of them, no? How far you’ve progressed. Do you regret it? The path you’ve taken and the one you forsake?”

Wu Ying blinked, surprised at how closely her words paralleled his own thoughts. “I miss my friends, my parents.” He grimaced at that, recalling his parents. So few letters passed between them, so little word. Would they still live when he returned? Were his friends well? “The life was simpler in some ways. But I also had less control. The world pushed me around, and I could only endure it.”

“And now?”

“Now, I change the world.” He grinned suddenly, puffing up his chest. “I am the storm that rages, the typhoon that washes away the debris, the cyclone that destroys.”

She burst out laughing in surprise at the sudden change in topic, conjuring a fan to reach out and smack his arm lightly.

“You are a fool, Cultivator Long.”

“But a good looking one.”

In answer, Yang Mu waggled her fan side-to-side in a horizontal manner. Then, she kicked her horse, spurring it ahead of him and leaving Wu Ying to call out, plaintively behind her.

“I’m good looking, right?”

***

Still smiling, the pair entered the southern city, crossing the gated and fortified bridge area on their horses. Now that they were in the city itself, Yang Mu led them through the city as she consulted a small document she had extracted from her storage ring. Twice, she bent low to speak with a passing mortal, tipping them a coin as they provided updated directions.

The city was frustrating to guide oneself upon, for unlike the organized cities of the north, the city’s roads wound about like the serpentine river themselves. More than once, Wu Ying noted alleyways ending in walls, wide streets narrowing without rhyme or reason and multiple roads intersecting one another in a small square, causing untold chaos.

Liang Soong was a city that had grown naturally rather than planned in its construction, and though there were some reasoning for its roads, more such thoroughfares had just been added or blocked on the whims of the mortals that resided within.

Between helpful locals and Yang Mu’s directions, the pair finally managed to locate their temporary abode even as the light drizzle came to a halt at last. The pair had travelled quite a distance by then, pushing away from the river edge towards the inner walls, nearly two thirds of their way there. The neighborhood they stood within reminded Wu Ying more of the structures that he was familiar with, with high walled residences ensuring privacy for those that resided within.

The inn itself was a jarring difference, with its roadside entrance and separate stable beside it. Even as he dismounted, the wind swirled out from around him, returning in short order to provide reassurance that the outer building entrance was naught but a front for the much more expansive series of connected buildings behind.

Yang Mu was in her element as she entered, giving orders in rapid fire to the innkeeper and their servants, sending some to ready their rooms and set aside their – minimal – personal belongings, whilst others unloaded their beasts of burden and set them in one of the many meeting rooms. Another servant scurried out of the inn itself, on the way to carry a series of messages that Yang Mu had already penned to the final recipients of the goods.

The portly female innkeeper was all smiles, even under the barrage of orders, adding her own additional commentary to the instructions till Yang Mu finally ran down. Then, she guided the cultivator to their waiting room to freshen up, while Wu Ying chose to retire to his own room.

He had little enough to do with the delivery, though he assumed he would receive some small share of the delivery fee. If not, it was a small enough price to pay to grasp the nature of his companion. Yet, he truly doubted it would be a concern. For all her mercantile upbringing, Yang Mu was not greedy.

At least, not for taels.

One long, hot bath later, Wu Ying found himself bereft of plans. Tomorrow, he would learn more about the tainted cores. Even face one of those creatures, as he stepped out of the city. Today though, even though the day was late and the sun would set in a bell, he had little direction.

Lips pursed, as he hovered near the door debating if he should join Yang Mu, a memory rose up. Himself, sprawled on the ground after tripping over a bundle of wood, swordtip pointed at his heart. Breathing hard, leg throbbing, as merciless dark eyes stared down at his frail body.

“Always know the terrain you fight upon. Never assume that land you’ve treaded upon has stayed the same. Balance is everything in battle and life.”

Wryly smiling, his father’s words still ringing through his mind, he turned aside from the door and approached the window. A simple movement threw him outwards, a grip on the window sill top allowing him to twist his body to fling himself upwards and onto the roof.

He landed soundlessly, moving to the peak of the roof to view the city from his new vantage point. Wu Ying had spotted not a single flying cultivator, even around the hills and the cultivation sects and assumed that either a formation kept such activity contained or common courtesy ensured that no cultivator flew around.

Knowing that, his placement on the roof was the best that he could achieve for a better vantage point unless he travelled to one of the few temples around. The tallest of these was a seven story pagoda that overlooked the surroundings, but was in the south-eastern part of the city near the river. A backtrack, especially across the labyrinth of streets was not something Wu Ying would envision.

In any case, the rooftop was not just for the greater view offered but to allow the winds to reach him. Crossing his legs, he breathed deep and let his soul perception permeate the winds even further, allowing it to dance across rooftops and down alleyways, to rattle closed windows and sweep dirt from the streets.

The winds swept out from his still form, returning eventually with the scents and smells of the city. Wu Ying filtered out the offensive aromas after sampling them, even as he allowed his mind to build a map of the surroundings. He did not need to see the space to understand its size, its shape.

A crowded road, filled with mortal food stalls and vendors ran straight and long, the air choked with scents and the wind slowed. A walled courtyard, where the air was trapped and a slowly dying mortal lay with his window open, staring at the gardens outside. Another twisting street, empty of inhabitants but the pair of beggars who curled up in the corner, seeking a moment’s rest whilst they feasted on the rat they had caught.

Again and again, the wind flowed, curling around and over Wu Ying, expanding and painting a picture of the city. Scents, smells, the pressure and flow of the breeze around him as he sat on the rooftop. Though the rain had stopped, though streams of water continued to flow through open bamboo sewers by the side of the roads.

Mortal, cultivator, spirit beast and even the occasional tiny demonic rat impinged upon his consciousness. Burning spirit lamps and tightly woven formations kept him out of many locations. Hours passed, and the sun set, till Wu Ying’s eyes flew open at the scent of a familiar, fiery and calm aura.

Brown eyes flew open and Wu Ying stood abruptly, turning in the direction of the surprising presence. A wide smile broke upon his face, as he rushed ahead, darting across rooftops to his new destination even as the night fell, bringing with it a chill that the muggy air had lacked thus far.

Not that Wu Ying cared. For it was time to meet an old friend.