Cultivating Chaos 5 -ch 23- (Patreon)

They were standing on what felt like a floating island.

It only had a space of what felt like half a football field and there were only a few trees on it. There were no bushes, no water, and nothing else.

Additionally, there was a handful of individuals standing about the island.

All of them staring at Ash and company.

“Ah?” said a woman who was near to Ash.

Or what might have been a woman if one only regarded her head.

She had the head of a woman on the body of a snake. Her hair was long, black, and her eyes were a bright brown.

Which made no sense to Ash in any way. It seemed comically impossible, in fact.

Next to her was a man that quite literally had four faces atop his head. As if he could see in every direction.

The third that was closest was a man in rags that looked like they’d fall off him. He had short horns that reminded Ash of a buffalo’s.

He was down on one knee and looked worn out and tired. His eyes had a strange cast to them that made Ash worry about their longevity.

Of the others that were here, they all seemed to be far more human looking than the other three. Dressed in robes and clothes that seemed far out of place as far as Ash knew.

“You… how… why are you here?” demanded the man with four faces from two of them.

“Exploration,” Ash explained simply with a shrug of his shoulders. “We found the Qi and got curious. Discovered the portal and here we are. That’s it.

“Who’re you all though? And why are you here? Did you trap yourselves here to escape the plague?”

“We’re-you’re just exploring?” the snake woman asked in an incredulous way.

“Yes,” Na affirmed, her jade spear held in her hand. “Exploring. Why are you here?”

“The Qi-Curse,” the four-faced man said. “Its… isn’t it everywhere?”

“No. Not as far as we can tell,” Ash began cautiously. “From what we can tell it’s gone, but we’re not completely sure, either.”

“You’re not sure?” one of the people in the back asked.

“We escaped from the emergency bunker,” offered Locke. “Do you know about that?”

“Ah! Yes!” the four faced man said excitedly. “The One Emperor has sent you to find us!”

Everyone stood there, not really sure what to say to this.

With that one statement, it was now clear that these people had sealed themselves up before the plague had reached it’s peak.

They didn’t know it seemed like their realm was dead.

“No,” Ash said when he realized everyone was looking to him to handle this. “No, he didn’t. The bunker was turned into a prison. No one ever escaped it till now.”

“A prison?” the snake-woman asked.

“Yes. As far as we can tell… this realm is dead. There are very few humans alive. Those who are alive, are what we called Demonic cultivators. They use the Life energy of others as weapons. They also seem to kill themselves when threatened with capture or defeat,” Ash stated, getting straight to the point that would likely be the hardest he imagined. “Even this… One Emperor, we’re pretty sure is dead. I found this ring on a different realm entirely than this one. It was nearly destroyed as if it’d gone through a terrible fight. It’s a treasure of the Imperial Clan of the Grassy Vale.”

Ash said it while holding up the ring.

He was fairly certain it was a family treasure of the One Emperor as he was called.

“No,” moaned the snake-woman, her head hanging down and she faced the grass. “No, no, no.”

“You-you did this!” squealed the man with four faces, turning to look at the one with horns. “You! Your selfish desires! Your wishes to expand your own influence and knowledge! To know more and weaponize it! This is your doing!”

Lunging forward to the horned man, the one with four faces began strangling him. At the same time, mighty explosions of Qi began to crackle to life.

The stagnant and ancient Qi blew outward in every direction.

Ash felt himself be knocked down and onto his back. He was left without the ability to stand with the force of the outpouring of energy.

Then he was quite literally ejected from the plane as it was shattered apart.

Screams, explosions, and waves of horrendous amounts of Qi shockingly tore back and forth through the area. It blew Ash further across the ground with each push.

When he came to a stop his right side was burning in pain and he rolled to his left. Inadvertently he found himself pushed up to Siu.

She was laid out on her back and unconscious. Her face slack and without awarness.

Holy shit she just gets more and more pretty.

Her boobs are huge now, too.

When did that happen?

This grass tastes like grass.

I hate it.

Ash’s strange and disjointed thoughts had no bearing on reality.

Putting a hand on Siu he pushed himself up to his knees and looked around.

The rest of his group was around him and spread out.

Chunhua looked to be struggling to her feet as was Locke.

Mei and Jia were conscious but unomving.

Tala and Moira were as unaware of the world as Siu.

Hui was standing in front of them with a shield of Life and Death Qi held out in front of herself. Her arms outstretched as well as her legs, giving her an odd X like pose.

The shield was taking on the brunt of the Qi Waves that were still oncoming.

Splitting it off to the sides and sending it crashing past them all.

Sweat was pouring down from her face and trailing down to her jaw. Dripping from there down into her Bride uniform.

Grasping at the chain he shared with her he tried to push Qi to her.

It wasn’t enough and it was fleeing faster than he could push it to her.

The chain had a limit of how much he could shunt that was fairly incredible.

Hui was simply burning Qi at an extreme rate.

Stumbling to a semi-upright position Ash forced himself to Hui. To reach her before her Qi reserves hit zero.

When he made it to her, he wrapped his arms around her, stuck his head to her back, and began throwing Qi directly into her.

While she prefered to cultivate through him with her hands, he knew that she could receive his Qi from anywhere.

After all, he often gave his wives Qi from the inside without meaning to.

“Ashley!” hissed Hui even as he began to dump Qi into her. Far faster than she was using.

His Qi absorption was pulling in a lot of what she was using as well as the surrounding areas. Pulling it all and pushing it back into Hui as well as using some from his own Qi Sea.

Her Qi usage quickly stabilized and her Dantian began to fill once more.

Ash wanted to look over Hui’s shoulder to see what was happening but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He was quite literally using every point of contact with Hui to push Qi into her.

He had no idea if his upper-Dantian was contributing significantly, but it’s contact point of his forehead to the back of Hui’s neck wasn’t something to dismiss as trivial.

“Ashley-I-Need-To-Circulate-It!” shouted Hui even as he continued to fill her.

“We’ll cultivate after this! Just use my Qi as you normally would!” he declared. He knew she could use it without converting it, it’d just be harder for her to handle.

A lesson he’d learned from Ren, in fact.

Her usage of his Qi had given him insight into that he was more or less the O-type blood with his Qi.

Anyone could use it.

He refused to let her do something stupid and try to sacrifice herself.

To let her damage herself in any way.

Hui’s progress to becoming a normal person, more than even most cultivators could be, had been swift and sure. She was someone who had her own wants and needs.

Knew what she wanted and how she wanted to go about it.

There was no way he was going to let her be damaged or harmed in this moment.

Hui seemed to want say something to that, but instead she remained quiet.

It was obvious when her own Qi ran dry and she began channeling his own Qi. The shield shifted from one of gold and black to a pale translucency.

Ash could see it as it streamed by his feet rather than looking ahead.

The buffeting Qi-waves quieted down further with the change.

Standing there Ash’s thoughts were catching up to where they needed to be.

He deliberately didn’t think about where his hands were right now or where Hui’s rear end was.

Hui shuddered heavily as his Qi flooded out of her, ever being replaced with more. While he was certainly being forced to draw upon his excess, he could easily continue this exchange for a few hours.

Unwilling to let her go, Ash just stood there and he considered nothing other than how to make sure she kept filling up.

As if a candle were snuffed the waves of Qi blasting into them fell away by half, then all together.

Hui’s body slumped partially and her shield vanished.

The air around them was awash with wild currents of Qi going in every direction.

Massive rents in the turf with ten-foot deep gashes in the ground told him that without her shielding them, they most certainly would have been caught up in the storm.

Grass, dirt, and dust spread out in a cloud all around.

It was hard to see much more than fifteen or twenty feet off.

Unfortunately Ash didn’t have the warning to stop so he ended up cramming her to bursting with Qi. He quickly drew back and skimmed off the excess that was pouring out of her.

Strangely, she didn’t resist the extra Qi or when he took some of it back. Her Dantian just assisted him with whatever he was doing.

Her Qi-Sea operated as an extension of his own in that moment.

As he siphoned it off, he felt her Dantian for the first time in a while.

Half of it was filled with a modicum of Death-Qi and nothing else, but it wasn’t dead. It was activating as a Dantian should, it just didn’t seem to hold anything other than Death-Qi.

The other half was bursting with his own Qi as was the rest of her Qi-Sea.

Somewhere along the line, her Dantian had stabilized itself and she was a whole Cultivator once more.

“Thank you,” Hui whispered, her hands dropping down atop Ash’s.

Which were still embarrassedly still placed right atop two places they had no business being on her chest.

“I could feel your care and concern for me in your Qi. Thank you. I agree with your sentiments. I’m my own woman and I’m better than many cultivators,” she whispered, her fingers tightening in his own as if she feared he would pull away. “I’m gratified to know you have such a deep care for my well-being.”

Eh?

Oh.

Qi exchanged emotions.

Maybe I wasn’t in as much control as I thought I was.

I should’ve—

There was a giggling, nervous, happy feeling that Ash felt in the Qi he’d taken back from Hui. A heavy-headed feeling that felt as one might when they were happily drunk and enjoying themselves.

Underscoring all that was a deep yearning for physical intimacy and a faded fear of rejection.

The fact that his Qi had only been in her Dantian for seconds yet it came back with such a feeling made him wonder just how extreme Hui was feeling things at the moment.

“I wouldn’t reject you,” he mumbled.

Hui’s hands spasmed, her back stiffened, and it was obvious that he had spoken the words that had been circling her thoughts.

Not waiting further Hui released his hands

She then gently pulled his hands off her without any force. As if not wanting to take his hold on her away unless he was willing. Her fingers gently peeling his own off her bossom one at a time until she was free.

Saying nothing still, she turned, hugged him for a brief moment, then scurried off for Na. Her Brides uniform swishing as she went.

“Well that was sweet,” Mei murmured in a voice so soft it wouldn’t reach beyond Ash. “I’m glad for it, too. Our Sister is a wonderful strategist and it would be good to bring her closer into the family.”

“Agreed. Hui is a good Sister,” Jia said coming up on Ash’s other side.

“You should all die in a fucking fire and get your hands off my husband,” spat out Locke, sounding a lot like a growling cat.

To which Mei and Jia laughed, the former reaching out to wrap an arm around Locke’s hips.

“Our jealous Sister. I’m afraid this is far too late to be like this. You’re the one who did all this, remember?” Mei teased, even as they all looked ahead. “You admitted the other day you’re the reason Ash is surrounded by women.”

Trying to see through the wildly shifting waves of Qi everyone peered into it and began forming up around Ash.

Except for Na who was engaged in a deep conversation with Hui, though Na had a wide smile on her face as she listened to the other woman.

“They were deities, weren’t they?” Chunhua asked in a rasp.

Qi was flickering across her in strange bolts of energy. Swirling briefly around her and then vanishing.

Standing there she looked to Ash, then trundled over to him.

Without hesitation she pushed herself up against the front of him, pushed her head under his chin, and hung onto him. Her whole body pressed into him.

“The Qi currents are too strong for me,” whined Chunhua uncharacteristically. “I need help. Help me, Ashley. Please help your sorceress. It hurts. It makes my Dao flinch. Please protect me.”

Blinking, Ash immediately put his arms protectively around Chunhua and held onto her. Actively pulling her more closely into himself.

He mentally pushed out with his Dao to encircle Chunhua and strip the Qi from around her and feed it into her without room for any of it to harm her further.

“Hm, well… I hate that,” Locke said cheerfully with a laugh and clapping her hands together. Mei still had an arm around her, though she was also eying Chunhua differently.

Tala laughed and looked to Moira. The two of them seemed to share a joke that made the Owl smile.

“I do think it was deities, yes,” Jia agreed. “Their powers were well beyond anything I have ever even considered. It… itched… just being there to a degree.

“If they were deities though, how did they not stop what happened here? How is it that they hid themselves away?

“There is still so many other unanswered questions. So much that we need an answer for to understand what truly happened here and… and I think we might never get it.

“Even those god-like beings did not know what happened.”

“Maybe the Demonic Cultivators?” suggested Mei, who had pulled Locke’s head down into her shoulder. She was now gently patting the other woman on the shoulder and seemingly comforting her.

Locke was grumbling to herself all the while.

“That’s a very good idea,” Na confirmed as she walked up to rejoin the others. “It would also align with our previous goal. Reaching the Horse tribe. Maybe between the two we’ll have a better answer for it all.”

Hui was staring at the ground in front of her while chewing at her lip.

It gave Ash the impression she wasn’t just deep in her thoughts but damn near unaware of anything or anyone else. Na even had a hand on her elbow and was guiding her along.

“Rou and Xiuying agree with that idea,” mumbled Locke. “They have nothing else to contribute. Xiuying says she’s sorry for not being there.

“Given how extreme her response was to not being there, I’d say she took the right path. It kept her hidden from myself and Ash until she would be most valued, after all.

“I think something would’ve happened if she’d been there with us. Something that wouldn’t have been good for her.”

“Of course, my Cuddly Bunny-Wife Self agrees,” Tala declared, putting her hands on her hips. The clear change in her address, even from the most previous one, left Ash feeling a bit curious about her mentality.

Doubly so when he considered that Chunhua had confessed witness and asked for help and care. They were all changing rapidly.

Ash couldn’t help but notice it co-incided with Xiuying’s joining the inner-circle.

“I must protect my Sisters,” Tala continued. “Xiuying is a treasured family-member to me as I’ve told her many times. As you’ve all told her.

“I’m sure you’ve reminded her of that too, Locke.”

“I have. She knows. She got all cute and bubbly over it. Especially when I just relayed your words. Still, she’s sorry,” Locke answered.

The air cleared away and the group could finally start seeing the area around them. It all came into view and Ash really wasn’t happy about that.

It had opened far more questions than had been answered.

Most of the ruins had been blown apart.

Long dessicated corpses were strewn about.

Or at least, various body parts were.

An arm here, a foot there. There was most of a torso not too far away that was resting in a large furrow.

There were two people who were freshly made into dead, as well. They were people that Ash had seen amongst those hiding in the plane through the portal.

One had their head cleft in two and the other seemed to be missing all four limbs.

“Ah,” Hui mumbled and lifted up a hand. Death-Qi shot out from both of them and landed in her palm. “They were just mortals. These two at least. They were very powerful but… empty of Qi. As if they were once an opulent and overflowing river, now turned into a dried river bed. A boon for me, but nothing compared to what they once were.”

Hui snapped her hand shut and then turned to look to Ash.

Her head stopped halfway and then shot toward the skies above.

Ash followed her gaze.

Above them, six or seven people were battling wildly.

Most notably was the snake-bodied woman bobbing and weaving around the others.

“This whole realm collapsed due to greed and a desire to harm an enemy,” mused Ash. “Sounds awfully familiar to me. Awfully familiar.

“This realm, despite it clearly being more powerful, with greater Qi, and more qualified people, was no different than the others.

“The same mentality persisted here. The same selfish beliefs.”

Not for the first time, Ash promised himself that he would fix all of this.

Drag everyone into his momentum.

Even if it was done at gunpoint.

He could apologize after he gave everyone the chance at a normal life.

“Let’s get moving again,” he ordered. “There’s really no reason to linger here.”

“Well, perhaps no reason to linger long here,” Mei retorted and gestured toward the corpses and open graves. “We do need to search the bodies, tombs, and everything else just to make sure there’s nothing there to take. Their rest has already been disturbed. It wouldn’t harm us at all to see if there was anything for us to take.”

“Oh, yes. We should most certainly make sure,” Jia agreed with a quick nod of her head. “The dead have been defiled. We should check for anything of use, and then rebury them. It is only the right thing to do.”

“Oh, yes, my Cuddly Bunny-Wife Self concurs,” Tala said and began striding over to a body. “It’s the right thing to do.”

Ah… well… still Cultivators, but not in the wrong way.