Unintended Cultivator V5: Chapter 43 – Travel Plans (Patreon)

It really worked, thought Sen and not for the first. I really am healed. He mentally backtracked from that last part. His body had been modified and improved. It was stable. Yet, he knew that was a temporary situation. It would start to deteriorate again if he didn’t continue with the Five-Fold Body Transformation. Of course, that was less worrisome than it had been. He finally had the manual or, rather, he had a copy of the manual. He actually three copies that he had personally spent weeks making. Two of them were stored in his own storage rings. He’d left another in Falling Leaf’s care. He’d started on a fourth copy to eventually hand off to a scribe or maybe one of those printing businesses he’d heard about. Sen was going to singlehandedly make this one of the most easily-accessible body cultivation methods on the continent. Not that he expected many people would follow him along that particular path, but he never wanted anyone else to face the struggles he had in merely finding someone who had an accessible copy.

Of course, now that he had succeeded in both finding the manual and progressing his body cultivation, the culmination of years of effort, he found his mind turning to other problems and obligations. He still had most of four years left that he owed to Fu Ruolan to learn, well, whatever she decided to teach him next. She’d already told him that she couldn’t add any real depth to his alchemy knowledge, only breadth, not that he’d been opposed to that. There had been countless plants and reagents in her storage treasure. He was perfectly content to learn as much as he could about as many as he could. She had conceded that there was value in that, but that it wasn’t going to be her primary focus moving forward. When he asked what it would be, she had seemed of two minds about it. Ultimately, she said she needed to think about it a little longer. He accepted that with as much good grace as he could. Impatience had not served him well in the past, so he was determined not to let it drive him unnecessarily now that he wasn’t counting every hour out of necessity.

Without the threat of imminent destruction hanging over him, he’d finally let his mind turn back to Elder Bo. Every time the turtle had come up in his thoughts over the last year or two, it had filled Sen with such incandescent rage that he’d been forced to discipline himself against even casual consideration of the divine beast. It was only in the aftermath of success that Sen had been able to think about the turtle in terms that other people might describe as sane, if only barely. There was a part of him that believed that best course of action was simply to forget that the turtle existed and move on. Unfortunately, Sen had the niggling intuition that if he didn’t go back and see the turtle, the turtle would eventually come to him. And it would inevitably be at a time and place when Sen couldn’t afford a distraction. He thought hard about just putting that trip off. He did have other responsibilities. Yet, Fu Ruolan seemed to be dragging her feet about making a decision on what they should do next.

Just as importantly, Sen had another breakthrough coming with his spirit cultivation very soon. He could probably trip that advancement himself with little or no effort. It would take time for him to consolidate the gains from that and his body cultivation. Especially with them coming so close together. A substantial journey mostly through the wilds ought to provide him with the time to get a grip on those changes. It would also let him check in, quietly, on some of the people he’d left behind and send a message off to Master Feng, Uncle Kho, and Auntie Caihong. Between his advancements and Falling Leaf’s advancements, the travel time would be greatly reduced. They could travel during the winter as easily as most people could travel in high summer. Of course, the real problem was that he didn’t want to do it. Sen’s fury at the turtle wasn’t quite as savage as it had been when he’d been suffering and dying a little more each day, but it was by no means gone. Even he couldn’t predict what he’d do when he saw the divine beast. Still, he doubted there would be a better time to make the trip. Sen just had to hope that his anger would be a little more tamped down when they met the turtle.

Sen wasn’t happy as he approached Fu Ruolan’s home. While he might be resigned to the necessity of the trip, he could still hope that the nascent soul cultivator would simply forbid it. That idea perked him up a little. If she said no, he’d be spared the ordeal for several years. For once, he didn’t see her outside training Falling Leaf. In fact, he’d seen very little of either of them in the last few weeks. Not that he could blame them for that. Everything had been about him for a long time. Now that he was out of danger, he couldn’t very well be annoyed that they wanted to focus on something else. He wished he could join them in worrying about something that didn’t involve him. What a novelty that would be, he thought. He knocked on Fu Ruolan’s door, half expecting that she wouldn’t answer. She answered the door, gave him a vaguely curious look, and waved him inside. Sen peered around the common area but didn’t see any sign of Falling Leaf.

“She’s working on her own today,” said Fu Ruolan. “I expect she went looking for something to fight.”

“Why?”

Fu Ruolan gave him an amused smile. “She told me what you were like when you were training with the sword and spear. Hours and hours of drills, every day, morning until night. Not everyone can learn that way. Most people can’t handle the monotony of it. Besides, applying the lessons she’s learned will help her to solidify the knowledge in her head.”

Sen felt a vague desire to defend himself, but he couldn’t pin down anything specifically negative that she’d said. It had felt a bit like an insult, but maybe he was just reading a little too deeply into her words. He shook it off.

“Fair enough. That’s not what to talk about anyway.”

“I should hope not. I haven’t decided what should come next, yet, if that’s what you’re here about.”

Sen waggled his hand in the air. “It is, sort of. How much did I tell you about that encounter I had with Elder Bo.”

Fu Ruolan fixed him with an intense look. “Precious little and most of it through clenched teeth. It didn’t seem like a subject that I should ask many questions about.”

“Yeah, I have some anger to work out there. Here’s the slightly less abbreviated version of the story.”

Sen told Fu Ruolan about his fight with the demonic cultivator in Emperor’s Bay, the escape on the ship, and his encounter with Elder Bo on the beach. She had heard bits and pieces of the story over the last year, but Sen didn’t particularly enjoy revisiting his past. There was a still a lot of pain and loss in those memories. I need to ask Auntie Caihong about Lifen when I write to them, thought Sen. She may not want to see me again, but I owe it to her to at least make sure she landed somewhere safe. He finished up with his tentative agreement to go back and see the divine turtle after reaching core formation. Fu Ruolan leaned back in her chair and considered Sen for a long moment.

“So, you want to go see him now?” asked Fu Ruolan.

“Want? No. Not at all. Not even a little bit. It’s more that I don’t want him to just turn up at some random time and place.”

“I’d like to say that he wouldn’t do that, but Bo would do exactly that. He’d think it was funny to put another layer of pressure on you during a time of turmoil. He’d say it was for character building.”

Sen shook his head. “Lucky encounter, my ass.”

“Well, you did survive. You are stronger than basically anyone else at your cultivation level courtesy of that body cultivation method.”

“Yeah, but that survival didn’t happen because he helped make it happen. He didn’t even warn me that I would die if I didn’t do the next step within a certain period of time. I’m not sure it would have changed anything, but it might have.”

“Perhaps,” conceded Fu Ruolan. “You’d leave immediately?”

“That’s the plan.”

“And will you take Falling Leaf with you?”

“Well, I sort of assumed that she would go, but it’s her choice. If she wants to stay, I’m not going to make a fuss about it. I've traveled alone before.”

Fu Ruolan drummed her fingers on her leg before she answered. “This doesn’t change the amount of time you owe me.”

Sen shrugged. “I didn’t really think it would. I’m just trying to prevent a problem before it becomes a problem for once.”

“Have you considered that traveling might not be as easy for you as it once was?”

“What? Why? I should be able to travel faster than ever.”

“I don’t mean that physical act of traveling. I mean that your reputation hasn’t dimmed in the time you’ve been away. You may find more enemies waiting for you than you expect.”

It wasn’t a problem he’d given much thought. He knew he had enemies out there. Whatever remnants of the demonic cultivator cabal that survived would likely hate him forever. Given a chance, they’d attack him. He hadn’t left things on good terms with Chan Yu Ming. She might attack him on sight. Then again, he hadn’t really planned on seeing her. Who knew what the sects and noble families in the capital thought of him. He’d left enemies at the Clear Spring Sect. In the end, though, those were potential threats, not active ones to his knowledge.

“There isn’t a lot I can do about that. I doubt the situation is going to change if I put this trip off for another year or even four years.”

“You’re likely right about that. It’s just something to bear in mind. I suppose that this is as good a time as any to take a break. You’ve been under a lot of pressure. The trip will give you a chance to settle your mind and consolidate your gains. When you return, though, I expect you to be focused.”

Sen stood and gave her a formal bow. “Yes, Fu Ruolan.”