Cultivating Chaos 4 -Ch 20- (Patreon)

Sighing, Ash stood up and then held out a hand to the Bride.

Taking his hand, the Bride levered herself up and stumbled a step forward. Ash caught her at the elbow and shoulder. Holding onto her.

“Do you need a pill or something else?” he asked, peering at the veil. He knew that they preferred wearing the veils by and large, but he tended to dislike not being able to put faces to names and actions.

“I have my rations, Husband. I’ll take one shortly. Please, prepare for the next group. I’ll tend to myself,” pleaded the Bride.

Rations?

“Yes! It’s a normal doctrine I slipped into the updated manual. Everyone is expected to requisition their own medical needs from the Sheng mercantile arm. Then keep them on hand as needed for use. They don’t pay for these, these are expected and supplied to Brides as a benefit,” Locke explained, though she sounded sheepish. “Maybe I might have been setting up the Brides to be taken over by me? Or at the very least, be more in line with what I want. Which is in line with what you want.”

You’re hired for the house wife position. Hired, hired, hired.

“I’m aware! Already working on it! You’ll be happy when you get home, I think.”

Ash turned and looked to Moira in the air. He followed her with his eyes.

“Do we reach out to the other group… or pretend we never saw them. I feel like… maybe this isn’t the right time to make contact,” he murmured aloud, before glancing over to Hui and Siu.

“Your weapon doesn’t care,” Hui admitted with a wide smile. Dark black Qi was bubbling up from the corpses and the dying and being sucked into her palm. Vanishing into her flesh. “Hui only wants you to use her effectively. Nothing else matters to Hui.”

The black death Qi finished draining into her and she closed her hand with a light pop. Then Hui looked back to him and gave him a radiant smile.

“Thank you for the meal, Ashley,” Hui said. “I grow ever stronger with you. I’m easily back to where I was previously if not more so. Not to mention… I don’t feel as weak in a hand to hand fight. I’m quite confident.”

Ash smiled at her, nodded his head. He really wasn’t sure how to take someone thanking him for killing people.

“Maybe it isn’t time to meet this other group,” Siu allowed, gently wiping a cloth across her fan. Getting the blood and viscera off the metal blades. Pulling the cloth across the fan several more times she snapped it shut with a flick of her wrist. The click was louder than he’d expected. She met his eyes and then smiled widely at him, slowly tilting her head to one side. He felt an indescribable pulling sensation at his groin, unbelievably. “Maybe we should make it last? Drag things out? Let it bubble for a time? There’s no reason to go straight to the release of the tension here.”

Her words felt like a warm breath caressing his ears. It made him feel a odd. Like his eyelids were too heavy and his head felt stuffed full of wool.

Her smile grew and she licked her lips before finally looking away from Ash. He felt like an iron rod that’d been poked between his eyes was suddenly removed. He could look away from Siu again.

Then she looked back at him and it felt far more normal.

“Sorry, Husband. I’m still getting used to my new… abilities. That wasn’t intentional. As to what to do with them… I say we collect our corpse, bag a few more medium sized ones, and then leave,” Siu suggested. “There’s really no reason for us to linger and no reason for us to meet them. It isn’t as if they seemed eager to make contact.”

I… wait… what?

Holy shit!

Siu had seduction powers or something?!

That was intense!

“I… yes? Yes. She does. It was the best suited to her temperament, mental ability, and talents. It’s a blending of Spiritual Qi as well as Qi typically associated with women. Or Yin Qi. She has a great deal of that. Most people are fairly balanced so it really wasn’t a consideration previously.”

“Also,” Hui interjected quickly. “Also, there was that piece of fabric stuck to the boar. I’m not entirely convinced that it wasn’t sent at us intentionally. Perhaps it was goaded, prodded, or induced into coming our way. To be fair, it’s quite likely if we’d sent out a smaller hunting party, or one that was the normal group that came, it’s unlikely they’d have survived.”

Ash hadn’t considered that or even Siu’s disposition. Given how she’d flipped her personality in seconds to fit, mentally work through his own goals, as well as dealing with her aunt, it was no wonder she was a bit different in comparison to the others.

“Hui, if you’re my strategist, answer your own question. Why would they want to send the boar after us?” Ash asked, glancing over to the woman.

She paused, frowned, turned her eyes to the ground, and looked thoughtful. Then she blinked, smiled, and turned her gaze back to him.

“The weaponry. The hunting parties often use the weapons to hunt the monsters. In other words if our assumption that the beasts are needed to make weapons, the weapons kill the beasts, then the simplest answer for why they’d want to kill a hunting party is the weapons,” Hui summarized and shrugged her shoulders. “They didn’t even known who we were. They just assumed we were a normal hunting group and wanted our equipment. Sent the boar at us thinking it’d do the job well enough. In fact, perhaps it has in the past. When we return, we should ask if there was disappearances of full hunting parties or if they encountered a large boar.”

Her answer felt incredibly plausible given the situation. Gnawing at his lower lip he made his choice. They’d return back to Wahst.

“Alright. Send out some scouts for us to get the best route back and pick up some more beasts on the way. We’ll gather some more information before acting,” Ash murmured while looking between Siu and Hui. “Moira will catch up with us, there’s no need for us to signal her or anything. Those eyes of hers will show her that we’re leaving before we’d finished signaling her.”

Siu turned, gestured to some of her Brides, then lifted her fan up and tapped it to her chin. The second one was in her other hand held to her waist.

“Mmm. Well. Let’s make the best of our time then,” offered the woman with a wide grin, her eyes sparkling as she watched Ash.

He had the uncomfortable feeling that she was thinking over something he wouldn’t like. Somehow he tore his gaze away from Siu and went to go talk to Tan.

She had a matureness to her that left him wanting more. He couldn’t quantify it well.

“She’s only a few years older than you, you know. It’s not like she’s an older woman,” grumbled Locke. “I’m older than she is, technically. I can be far more mature. I just enjoy being your sex kitten.”

Ash didn’t respond to that as he was about to talk to Tan.

Responding to anything she said wouldn’t put him in the right frame of mind to talk to Tan.

***

The Brides took care of everything. When they re-entered the city Ash let Siu know what he was doing, and then slipped away from the group. Moving into the city and putting distance between himself and the others quickly.

Moira would have tried to catch him in a corner to cuddle. Or more likely, get him into a bed.

Hui would have wanted to cultivate through him. Which would also be in a bed, but would end up with him cultivating instead.

Either of those situations involved him being pinned down for hours and not able to move about. Considering his evenings almost always consisted of one of those situations, followed by going to bed, he wanted his free time.

Ducking into a small alcove, Ash swapped his clothes out. Putting on something that wouldn’t single him out in Wahst as either rich, or poor. He was just one amongst the many now.

Moving back onto the street, he began to casually walk along the streets. Looking a lot like everyone else who was out and about right now.

In only a handful of minutes there was a change that he couldn’t ignore. A feeling that hadn’t been in the streets when he first arrived.

To him, he could only describe it in terms of how it related to the momentum of the city. As the city was directly part of something that he could exert control over, he felt the flow of it. The direction everything was shifting in and when it was and wasn’t against the momentum of the city.

Right now, there was a movement that he could feel that felt fresh. Like a breeze moving through a stuffy room that had a bad scent in it.

All around him people were moving with a purpose and what he could only guess was “hope”. There was a visible change in the people of Wahst.

While it still felt rough. That going to the wrong part of the city could end up with you being robbed or worse. There was a general feeling of positivity.

Now that he was paying attention, Ash took in the whole of the city as one momentum. One flow. That it existed as a whole and each street was part of it and fed into and out of it.

Ash felt himself being pulled along the street now without him choosing the direction. That he was walking somewhere that the flow of the city was carrying him.

Quickly, he realized that he was heading for the markets.

An old plaza that held people who either wanted to buy, sell, or trade. It could be in anything and the deals were always different.

It also served as a place of communication and social activity. People would discuss events and situations while going through their deals.

Ash suspected it was where they also gathered to discuss the previous Hands complete lack of regard for the citizenry. To discuss it and likely how to circumvent it as well.

His pace slowed as he reached what apparently was a destination.

It was the dead center of the market. All around him were men, women, young, old, all talking about current events while also making trades.

There was one word that came up in every single conversation.

Except it wasn’t a word at all.

It was a name.

His name.

Every single person here was discussing “Ash” the new Hand in one way, or another. Every single discussion.

From Rou the Kind, who healed anyone and everyone who came into her cleric for nothing. Here only because Ash brought her and told her to set up a clinic.

Bold Hui, who walked about the city nearly all day every day unless she had other duties. Often proclaim her status and offering assistance to anyone who needed it. Especially those who had been wronged and sought justice.

The most frequent topic of these conversations were the Veiled Brides of Sheng. Cultivators who went out on regular patrols at a fast walk. Enforcing security and law according to the City-Lord’s decrees.

Here and there were whispers about the new Sect that would be opening. That Tan and Song had both vanished inside of it and had yet to be seen again.

All of it always carried his name.

Even when mentioning the Sect, the disappearance of Song and Tan, there wasn’t any negativity to it. The worst that came was they were concerned for the children, but that was the end of it.

“I’ll make sure Song is very visible in the court today. She’s going to be working with the city-lord’s wife! A sort of… lens… for her to view the lowest of the low in the city from. It’ll help bring change. It was her own suggestion to hire Song. I had nothing to do with it,” proclaimed Locke. “Tan… well, I’m pretty sure he’s with Luan training right now. She was eager to begin teaching the first Sect student.”

Smirking, Ash wondered if Locke had weaseled herself back into the Hall after all. She was responding to his thoughts far more quickly and with more accuracy to what he was feeling.

“Uhm, no? No. I don’t think so? I can feel it now though. I can feel the Hall and I can communicate with the part of me that’s still there? Yes. Kind of? I’m sorry, it’s really confusing,” Locke explained. Or tried to. “It’s like I have a bad flashlight in a dark room. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. It’s getting better. No, I don’t know why, before you ask.”

Clicking his tongue, Ash grinned and shook his head. Turning his attention back to the city, where he was, and how it felt, he was struck by a sudden realization.

A striking one that caused him to mentally stumble away from what he’d been doing. Physically, he ended up falling on his rear end, sitting down right in the middle of the plaza.

“Oh, are you alright young man?” asked someone.

“Goodness, are you okay? Should we take you to Rou the Kind?” a second person inquired.

Before he could respond, an older woman pressed a hand to his brow.

“You don’t seem to have a fever? Did you trip? It gets a bit crowded in here,” she said with a laugh, smiling at him.

“I’m… fine. Thank you. I’ll just… yeah,” Ash levered himself to his feet. Everyone gave him a second glance, then went back to their conversations. They seemed satisfied that he was okay, which meant there was no need for them to intervene further.

During that small exchange, he’d felt the proof of the thought he’d only just had.

The city was no longer a city.

It was more akin to a living being with a Dantian, meridians, and a Dao.

He was at the center of the market, which was where everyone came and went from. It served as the Dantian and Qi-Sea. Everything started here in one way or another.

When he’d tripped at the center, there’d been a rush that’d passed through the momentum of the market. It had reminded him of when he’d worked to iron out something that didn’t belong, or to repair something that did.

Once he’d asserted he was fine, the flow in the market returned to normality.

When he’d put his attention back to the city he’d seen it as a whole, rather than the individual parts. As if he were looking at his own body.

The streets were the meridians. Guiding people to and from the center. Exchanging and refreshing itself as Qi would in his own Dantian.

In this case though, the Qi was the will of the people. A will that had been gathering itself behind him. Their perceived beliefs of who and what he was was rapidly solidifying and becoming whole.

Him and the Sect were the belief of what should and shouldn’t be part of the city of Wahst.

It only took Ash a moment to check and he found what he expected. The Sect itself was acting as the middle Dantian.

The perceived self and wish of what it wished to become based out of it’s emotions and feelings.

Except the citizens had no idea what it was, or what it would be, only that they believed it should and would be what the sect proclaimed.

From that, it was a simple jump to what he assumed was the Upper Dantian. A vague and nebulous feeling that was near to where the city-lord’s residence was.

Focusing on it, Ash could feel a great many needs coming from it. Needs that the city wished for and wanted to spend energy to correct.

Carried by the feet of the citizens and given to the court by their mouths, after traveling through the meridians as streets to do so, after receiving information from the market that was the lower Dantian.

“It’s a being,” Ash whispered as it all connected for him.

Wahst was now a being.

The moment that realization became full, then Ash felt himself connect to the city of Wahst. His Qi fled him and rushed out into the city. Flooding down the city streets, gathering up any free floating Qi on the way, and rushing onward.

Gritting his teeth, Ash began to unload Qi from the Hall. Pushing it into the city as his Qi-Sea grew perilously empty.

As fast as he pulled Qi free from it, the more he needed.

And more.

And then even more.

Until he felt he was at the last third of the Qi he’d stored in the Hall and was hesitant to pull out any more.

Then he realized that the Qi that’d left him, that’d moved out to the streets of the city, was returning. It was rushing back down other streets and coming back to the market.

Amongst all that Qi was everything it’d gathered as well.

A surprising amount of unpure unrefined Qi.

I… ah… am I about to have the Black Day for the city?

“I think so. Yes. That’s… don’t put it into yourself. That’d just kill you outright.

“Siphon it off into the Hall. The Hall can handle all of it and will hold it until you can purify it later!”Locke advised quickly.

The citizenry were all staring at him now. In fact, it was as if the city was holding it’s collective breath.

That much Qi rushing about was unmistakable even to those who couldn’t feel Qi. Where he’d felt was was similar to a breeze clearing out a room previously, now it was as if a fire-truck had rolled up and had turned on it’s water cannon.

The city was being purged of impurity.

All of it rushing toward the young man at the center of the market. Realization had dawned on many of their faces as they stared at him.

Perhaps someone had recognized him or deduced who he was. Either way, word was spreading that Ash was here amongst them.

Then the wave of unpure Qi slammed into him.

Through him and straight to the Hall.

His stores which had been running low were quickly refilling.

Refilling and quickly.

Rather than treating this as a windfall, Ash was going to treat this as if it were indeed a being. A living being by the name of Wahst.

All of the pure Qi he had he exchanged with the impure. Running the pure Qi back into the city and letting it flow through it’s meridians. To travel freely within it’s boundaries. The walls of the city it’s skin and keeping it all contained.

When it was all said and done, after he’d made the exchange, he found he had lost roughly twenty-five percent of his stored Qi in total. There hadn’t been as much impure Qi as what he’d siphoned out, but it hadn’t been that terrible a loss.

Given that the city would now act as a cultivation center for him, this was a reasonable down-payment so to speak. That what he spent now would return to him many-fold in the future.

“Lord Ash,” breathed the woman who’d put her hand on his brow. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to dare to touch you I just-I just wanted to help!”

Blinking, realizing that he could now actually interact with the world again, he turned and looked to the woman. It reminded him very much of his mother.

He smiled at her and shook his head.

“Don’t think anything of it. I appreciate your kindness and courtesy. Wahst must be kind to itself,” he replied while still smiling at her. “Kind to itself and caring for itself. We’re alone and defend ourselves at every junction from those who would take what’s ours. What are we, if not Wahst?”

Ash then left, but his words traveled faster than he did in fact.

Words that were rapidly carried down the streets, out to the fringes where it was spread throughout. Only to travel back to the market and be confirmed there later in the day

Confirmed and attributed to the Sect that would be opening tomorrow to all who would attempt to apply. An opening that would be done in tandem with sponsoring major reconstruction of the city. That the Sect wanted everyone to attend who wished, and to that end, a suitable home would need to be available to everyone.

This was announced by the city-lord.

That after hearing requests for assistance he and Ash would be working hand-in-hand to help the community and raise it up.

The Gutter would be demolished and rebuilt completely in blocks. To knock down the death-trap shacks and lean-tos that were there, and replace them with actual homes in the same day. One home at a time over a period of a week.

The Brides would be doing the work themselves.

Those who lived in the Gutter would be forcibly relocated into a better home than they’d existed in previously. Bring them up to at least the level of the poor, rather than the desperately poor.

Wahst was beginning to grow.