Cultivating Chaos 4 -CH8- (Patreon)

Ash and Hui walked up to the front of the audience chamber. Right where the Dais ended and petitioners would obviously stand. There was a number of such people to the left that were still waiting for their own turn to take said place

“What brings you to my court today? I don’t think I’ve seen either of you before and you have a notable countenance,” asked the man on the throne. He looked nervous and uncomfortable. As if he didn’t really want to talk to Ash, but not out of any hostility.

More anxiety, really.

“As you’ve noticed, we’re somewhat new here. Only recently arrived. We wanted to talk to you about your city and it’s people,” Ash said, placing one hand against the other in a martial salute. “What we could possibly do to help it and you along. There’s much that could be done to ease the suffering of your people.

“Things that wouldn’t even cost an investment other than people caring enough to help themselves. Even if they don’t… well… I’m sure payment could be managed even in the simplest of ways. I’m even willing to consider taking up payment myself for some of it.”

“It’s not needed,” stated lord Hand with a chop of his hand before the man on the throne could respond. “Though I can see that you’re cultivators. We should exchange some pointers some time.”

“Maybe. We can discuss that later,” Ash allowed, looking at the cultivator, than back to the man on the throne. He’d looked interested at Ash’s words, then quickly dismayed as Hand had cut in. “City lord, I haven’t heard your answer. As this is your city, I believe it would come down to your own desires and wishes of what could be done.”

Lord Hand, the city lord, and every person in the audience, held their breath. Staring at Ash as if he’d just proposed that he’d like to spend the night with each and every one of them.

“You… excuse me?” demanded lord Hand.

“You expressed your opinion. You’re not the city lord. He is,” Ash said, pointing at the man on the throne. He had a fair enough idea of what was going on here now. Lord Hand was the trouble-maker. All Ash would have to do is kill him, take his place, and then deal with the Qi-Lord. Given that it was obvious any Cultivator coming down to this part of the prison would be akin to a fish out of water, Ash was confident in his ability to handle them. Even if they were an Immortal. All he’d have to do was bring them into his formation.

In fact, now that I think about it.

Locke. My beautiful wife, dearest heart, lovely one. Could you help me?

“I’d do anything for you, Ashley,” purred Locke. He could feel the entirety of her attention pushing in on him. To the point that it was echoing through the Hall. It made him suspect that maybe Locke was starting to chip her way back into it.

I want to look into the possibility of putting down an enchantment that would climb up the walls of the prison. To slowly spread itself out.

A self replicating enchantment.

Like a virus.

One that would slowly cover the entirety of this prison realm.

“I… yes. I’ll look into it immediately, husband. Of course,” promised Locke.

Great. I’ll be sure to reward you.

A rush of embarrassment and flustered feelings flashed through the Hall like a blast of static, before the impression of Locke was gone.

“It would be the city lord’s approval I seek. Not yours,” Ash said at the same time he’d had his mental conversation with Locke. He was getting better at thinking and talking in different directions now. “You’re more of an ambassador, are you not? Your opinion holds weight, but it doesn’t make the decisions.”

The Hand was unable to be seen given his attire, but Ash could feel a subtle killing intent bleeding off the man. It was reined in for the most part, but Ash was sensitive to these kind of things.

“Ah, yes. You’re right,” the Hand said in a hiss. “I’d love to discuss this more with you at length. In fact, I’d love to have your companion, and you, over for dinner tonight.”

“We’ll pass, though we thank you for the invitation,” Ash said with false kindness in his words.

“I’m sure your companion isn’t busy. She can join me for dinner,” the Hand pushed.

“No,” Hui said with absolute finality.

“It’s no longer an invitation,” rejoined the Hand.

“You’re courting death,” Hui replied in a cold voice and a wide smile. “Please, don’t stop. Hui is hungry.”

There was a tense feeling that was spreading throughout the audience hall now. As if the string of a guqin was being pulled tighter and tighter. The pitch going up with each passing second.

“Won’t you feed Hui?” prompted the beautiful cultivator. She spread her hands out beside herself.

Her left hand began glowing then. A golden aura spreading out across her fingers and covering it.

The right hand became a black-shadowy claw. The fingers hooked with talons and slowly curling inward. They lightly flicked at one another, a noise that was similar to the sharpening of a knife could be heard.

“Feed Hui?” begged Hui, an obvious need coming out in her words.

The Hand was staring at Hui with wide eyes. Ash figured the man had realized now that this wasn’t a fight he should push.

“Arrest them! Bring her to my bedroom!” declared the Hand.

Or maybe not.

Ha.

Despite how long I’ve been here, their motivations make no sense to me still.

Hui let out a warm and rich laugh that stirred Ash’s loins in response. He couldn’t deny he was terribly attracted to Hui and the way she was acting right now didn’t curb that for him.

The men in black gi’s all rushed forward toward Ash and Hui. They were wielding weapons and armor imbued with Qi.

Not quite citizens, but neither were they cultivators. Somewhere in between.

Given the Qi-starved nature of this location, they’d actually be able to do quite well against cultivators down at this level.

That is, if Ash wasn’t here and hadn’t put Qi chains on Locke, Hui, and Rou. They were all being fed Qi just as he’d wished despite their distances.

“Kill them all, Hui. They look like the people who would’ve harmed Song,” Ash commanded. He realized he wouldn’t have to do anything here. This was a good opportunity for Hui to utilize her abilities. She’d memorized them, mentally trained with them, practiced them slowly at a physical level, but never used them.

Not in combat where someone was guaranteed to die.

Crossing his arms, Ash sniffed once and just watched.

Hui threw out her left hand in a swiping motion. Her fingers spreading out as well in the move. Gold beams shot out from her finger tips and struck four of the men rushing her.

Holes appeared where the beams struck. The sizes were easily the width of Ash’s fist. From one side of the opponents to the other.

“Wow,” Ash murmured. Two of the men’s guts started to tumble out of the holes. “That’s rather messy. You knocked their guts around.”

Hui laughed at that, once again her voice ringing prettily in the air in stark contrast to the four men who fell to the ground dead.

“Your weapon thanks you for your praise!” cried Hui, sounding as if she were ecstatic. She put her right hand out and visually clawed at the air.

Long black gashes darted through the air in a wave. They swelled and crashed over the men as they came on. Two were cut in half and a third lost their arm. Several others were clipped and ended up spraying blood out.

More than a dozen survived both attacks and kept moving toward Hui.

“Yes, come to Hui,” crooned Hui, waving both hands in a beckoning manner.

Then they fluttered one over the other. A circle that was half gold and half black appeared between her hands, then was shot forward.

It struck the lead man and detonated, blowing outward and to the sides as if it were a bomb going off. Golden and black chunks tearing through the enemy ranks and gouging hunks of meat from their bodies.

Before the attack had completely finished, Hui had sprinted forward. Her feet now glowed in opposite to their hands. The left black, the right golden. Her attacks weren’t as vicious as Mei’s but they had a force and strength to them.

Hui was quickly going through a series of punches, kicks, and Qi based attacks, one after another. Each of them were strong, but clearly dialed down in strength.

Or at least it was clear to Ash.

At this point he had assumed she was attempting to slow the fight down so she could keep experimenting. Otherwise she could have just flattened them all already.

With each strike, each shift, it was obvious Hui was making changes. Adjusting her body to the new abilities. Taking the knowledge she had and applying it and correcting for a real world usage.

Hui lashed out with her black claw and slammed her palm into a man’s head as his sword swished past her chest. The flat of the blade bouncing off of her front as she turned sideways.

Almost disdainfully, she twisted her claw around and disconnected the man’s head from his neck as if she were plucking an apple from a tree.

Skipping back a few steps she tossed the head to the side and held up her claw above her head. She’d killed a number of attackers and left their bodies where they fell.

Black Qi began to stream out of the dead and pool around her hand. Slowly gaining in size and density. All the while Hui held her left hand up in front of herself, ready to fight anyone that might close on her.

No one did.

Those who’d survived were now in full retreat. Running toward the back of the audience hall.

“Well, that was very well done, Hui,” Ash offered while clapping excitedly. He’d been impressed. While is was against those who were weak, their numbers had been an issue.

Taking out a number of them before they reached her, then juggling their attacks and counter-attacking, all while keeping herself undamaged, took coordination and effort. This wasn’t as once sided as most would believe it to be.

Especially given their Qi-weapons.

Ash hadn’t missed it when a spear-tip had punched right through an impromptu shield Hui had thrown up. Only her rolling backward as well had saved her from catching a stab wound.

“Your weapon thanks you, Ashley,” Hui squeaked out, her black claw clasping shut as the last of the black qi pooled there. Turning, she looked to him with bright eyes and a smile that stretched from ear to ear. “Hui is so excited. These abilities are like nothing Hui has ever seen before.

“They utilize everything you put on Hui. On me. On my back. I can feel it all move about. As if it were fluid traveling through a pipe. Only to come back out the other side. Cleaner and with more power.”

Ash continued to smile back at her but looked to lord Hand.

“We thank you for the distraction,” Ash apologized with a chuckle. Then he turned his gaze to the city lord. “My apologies, city lord. We’ve made a mess of your audience hall. Now could we—”

Before Ash could finish, Hand was racing down the Dais toward Hui.

While he couldn’t be certain it’d put Hui in danger, Ash didn’t want her tangling with this man. There was simply too many unknown variables that spanned from her getting used to her abilities to whatever abilities Hand might have.

Ash launched a Spring Step off and leapt forward. Landing just in front of a very surprised looking Hui. Slipping a hand around her side Ash nudged her behind himself.

As he did so he engaged his Dao and brought everything up to the pace he wanted. As Hui had set the momentum for the previous fight, all he had to do was lean on his Dao gently.

What was Hui, if not his, after all?

Her momentum was his.

Hand stormed right up to him, his focus entirely on Ash now.

A long spear made of shadows appeared in his hand with faint bolts of lightning bolts flickering off from the handle. He held it casually with one hand.

Then it was moving forward toward Ash’s chest. Except Ash could feel it coming before it did. The pace of the attack pushed up against the flow Ash was pushing out.

Stepping inward, Ash moved up along the shaft of the spear. He simply tapped it away with a gentle thump from a forearm.

It was still an attack, and the Qi of it, lashed out at Ash. It left his arm feeling as if he’d been too close to a soup pot for a moment. As if he had a slight burn.

“Feisty,” Ash commented and tapped the newly formed Qi-chain to himself. There was an immediate draw of Qi.

Part of the damage that Ash felt was of course returned back to Hand, causing the man’s eyes to widen partially.

“Let’s continue,” Ash remarked, standing far too close for the reach of the spear to be useful. Summoning his butterfly swords Ash darted forward.

The Hand flashed with Qi as he zipped away from Ash. A crackling bolt of black lightning that traveled halfway up the Dais.

“I’ll kill him,” the Hand said pointing the weapon at the city lord.

“Okay,” Ash said, his speed slowing as he began to saunter after the Hand. “I’ve been here for all of a day. I was sent to this prison two days ago. I don’t even know his name.”

Disgust flashed across the Hand’s face as Qi began to fill him. Going from half-filled to full of Qi in a single minute.

“You don’t even know what you’ve done,” the Hand remarked.

Ash didn’t respond this time, instead he made a casually underhanded lob of a Chained Leech Blast. The ball with a chain attached to it wobbling through the air toward the Hand.

Unsurprisingly, the man swatted it out of the air with his free hand.

Smiling, Ash connected the fresh chain to himself again. There was a slow and gradual draw of Qi being fed to him. Given that he was under a slow bleed of Qi to Rou, Locke, and Hui, this was a rather welcome change.

“Want another?” Ash asked with a laugh and lobbed another Chained Leech Blast toward the Hand. This was also slapped aside, giving Ash a third chain.

Giggling now, Ash stopped at the foot of the Dais and started to throw one after another of his leeching attacks up at the Hand. Always in an underhand way and with no strength behind it.

Enough to be insulting and causing the man to treat them contemptuously.

“Yes, I want them all. Keep at it,” replied the Hand with what Ash felt was misplaced eagerness. As if the man was expecting something from all of this.

Shrugging, Ash dismissed his swords back to the Hall and then began to underhand lob Chained Leech Blasts at the man with both hands. One after another after another.

Unendingly.

I feel like a juggler trying to engage an audience member.

But they’re going full on Karen and won’t participate at all.

“I… yeah. It looks ridiculous,” Locke remarked. “And before you ask, I can’t see it. I’m not in the Hall. I can get a feel for what’s going on though and can kinda peek through your own emotions and Qi.

“It’s weird but… I know what’s happening, even if I can’t see it anymore. I really miss being in the Hall. Especially the beds in the Hall. Last night hurt my shoulders so bad in that rickety piece of crap bed. I begged Rou to heal me and she almost didn’t because I stole you and… I’m rambling. I’m sorry.”

Ash had continued to just throw his Qi attacks at Hand.

The number of chains he now had from the man was easily in the low hundreds by this point. Each of them attached to Ash’s arms so that he could keep throwing as quickly as he could.

Except while the man was certainly losing Qi now, he was replenishing it just as quickly if not faster. Right now, Ash was trying to empty a lake with a cup.

“That all?” asked Hand with a laugh, slapping several more balls out of the air.

“I mean, no? I can keep going. Why. Is it a problem?” Ash asked, still throwing.

“Of course not. You can continue like this as long as you want. You’re just wasting time. The inevitable conclusion will come regardless,” Hand argued.

“Okay. We’ll just uh… keep… going then. Mind if I start throwing them harder? Think you can still slap them away or would you start dodging them like a bitch,” Ash asked. “You gonna dodge? Or can you slap them off?”

The Hand’s eyes widened once again and Ash felt the killing intent from the man this time. He stabbed his spear down into the Dais he stood on and put his hands on his hips.

What the fuck is this shit, ha.

He’s so competitive that’s all it took to rile him up?

Whatever.

I’m going to drawn him in my balls till his Qi is completely dry.

“Lesssgo,” Ash murmured to himself and then began throwing the attacks much faster and overhand now. It was slower, but each one had a lot more impact and power put into it.

He figured it wouldn’t take him even a fifth as long as it would’ve if he kept giving him those T-ball pitches.