Chapter 208 - "Special Physique" (Patreon)

After this it is IMMEDIATE bedtime! But also, horray! I made a new chapter! Makes me happi.

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The walk through the city is strange, to say the least. For all that the term Fortress-City is always used when speaking of the installations guarding the fourth ring, she hadn’t expected it to be quite so literal.

Her senses, in a calm, meditative environment, can provide fairly accurate data on several miles of space through scent, sound, and sight. While moving about, or in a particularly loud and messy space, that gets reduced proportionally to the chaos and the level of activity, even with a sub-mind dedicated to her sensory data. Here, in fortress city #180, just four north of the East Bastion, her sensory domain is reduced to maybe 500ft, 152 meters, or 45 and a half zhang, to use pre-Industrial measurements. 

And every fucking moment of it is full of people.

The central fortresses and the far side of the fortification-maze are kept exclusively for soldiers or other official Imperial workers, but the back half, facing into the Empire, is a bustling metropolis. Walls of stone and fortified enchantments are drowned beneath constructions of wood and alchemical materials made to be shaped and harden quickly, making for an almost fungal growth of structures. The gatehouses, command pavilions and guard towers are all kept well cleaned and well clear of any encroaching civilian infrastructure, but the horizon-spanning, byzantine structures meant to confuse and confound enemy forces and pen them in between great and powerful walls isn’t as safe. There are places where tunnel systems have fused into open spaces below the walls, using old Imperial sapper-rooms as additional space: there are areas where buildings are half-grown, half-built, their organic structures making that particular hallway of the trenches crowded and packed full of a fungal scent: there are spaces where official-looking buildings holding merchant or sect markings are erected, growing entirely out of place amidst the chaos.

And it’s the most living beings Raika has ever encountered at one time.

Maybe the mines of Cragend might have compared, but seeing as she never visited directly, was never packed like sweating sheep amongst an ashen herd in the elevators or the mineshafts proper, it’s simply not the same. Every moment feels like someone or something is touching her, every movement inundated with the smell of breath and food and sweat and blood and perfumes, everywhere she looks blinded with color and varying styles. 

For the first time since she started her training, she turns off her synesthesia, assigning her logical sub-mind to just… process.

She’s yet to expand her main repertoire much, but since their travels through the wilds, she’s settled on three sub-brains, each in their own semi-flexible tanks of nanoscale plates and reactive matter. The first one, her synesthesia, is right near the base of her spine. The second one, her “logic” brain, is three brains in one, all mimicking a frontal lobe and sitting slightly behind her eyes and above her jaw, acting to speed up her thinking, reinforce her memories, and helping to maintain multiple ideas at once, though not quite multiple strains of thought. The last one, her “sensory suite”, which allows her to process all the data her synesthesia provides, is actually at the base of her throat, where it can’t overheat as easily and isn’t affected by neck movements.

She switches her logic-brain fully to processing, keeping stray thoughts down to none and all her focus on pushing back the glut of people all around. Not since she survived her first tribulation has the overstimulation been quite this bad.

The variety of the people doesn’t help either.

Tall, short, skinny, fat, walking on six legs or two, horned and antlered, bright and dull, and of every color in between. Some Imperials stride by on some sort of platform with stick-like legs descending from it which dodge amongst the crowd, never disrupting those above while ensuring ease of movement, while down below, the few foolish enough to bring carts find themselves mired in the mess of people all around.

The variety and controlled chaos of the Empire, all trapped in a miniscule microcosm that also spans a hundred times larger than any village or town ever could.

And they have to walk through an hour of it.

Li Shu is too polite for her own good, and halfway through her sixth apology and all their growing frustration, Raika just picks her up. Jin darts among the crowd practically unseen, and if a few pockets come away a bit lighter she won’t be too annoyed, but she ends up having to basically muscle her way through the crowd, carrying their bags and Li Shu on the platform on her shoulder. 

It’s not hard, per se. She’s strong enough to literally break rocks by accident with weight and musculature alone, so the press of the crowd is more a psychological block than a physical one. There are so, so many people, and they all stink.

And fucking Hells, it is not helping with her appetite problems.

Unplanned though it may be, it does end up reinforcing the image they’re trying to build. Li Shu, the honorable healer, carried above the unwashed masses by her giant-kin servant. The fact that Li Shu would rather be down on the ground (evidenced by her constant squirming) checking on unique physiques and all the different peoples she could be seeing from up close isn’t nearly as obvious from up there.

She keeps an eye on Jin, on everyone who immediately touches her, and on their destination. Her logic-brain works hard to block out just about everything else. Even still, just touching someone is enough for her senses to absorb their age, health, heartbeat, whether they ate recently, how fit they are, all without synesthesia to blast that information into sight, sound and taste as well, and that’s not even to speak of the Qi.

Most of what her new processing power does is just reduce the strain, keeping the only scents she pays attention to to Jin’s, Li Shu’s, and that of Imperial alchemy and artifacts. Everything else is getting filtered the hell out.

It’s a struggle, but they do reach the Command Pavilion.

This led to the discovery of a second and far worse horror of the Empire’s madness-

Lines.

In a central area cleared of any real infrastructure, a single building stands, built into the walls of the maze. On the other side, one assumes, is a second Command Pavilion, identical to the one before them with its sweeping columns, white-and-grey coloring and carved, meticulously maintained statues and reliefs. The courtyard in front of them (or pavilion, perhaps) is kept clear of passers by, with a small contingent of Imperial soldiers standing guard in grey and black armors, ensuring that the only movement in and out of the cleared space is from those petitioning the higher authorities within.

This, apparently, extends to every civil complaint in town.

By the time they arrive at the front of the line, Raika’s had to actually partially open her skull twice, just to vent the heat buildup from how hard she is not thinking about the people everywhere.

Finally, hours after they arrived and barely a mile into the city proper, they make it to the exhausted-looking cultivator sitting at a desk in front of them. Considering the scent of his Qi, somewhere in upper Foundational realm, the thought of how long he’s had to sit here to develop bags under his eyes must be truly haunting. The poor kid looks like he hasn’t slept in days, and even with a cultivator’s general decrease in bodily messiness as they evolve, he smells a bit of sweat in his armor.

“Greetings, and welcome to Command Pavilion 388, how may this lowly Hi Rou assist you.”

Li Shu gives a polite bow, and Raika knees Jin in the spine to get him to do the same.

“Greetings, honorable Hi Rou. This one is Li Shu, a healer of minor talents and renown. I come hoping to offer my services to the Empire, and act on the Emperor’s will to keep hale and hearty those who do his bidding on the frontlines of battle.”

Hi Rou blinks at that, waking up a bit. He leans over the desk he’s sitting at, looking down at Li Shu more carefully from the elevated semi-podium.

Raika can actually see the way that his brain starts ticking boxes. Well-dressed, check. Healer’s colors, check. Qi, Foundational Realm cultivation, check. Two servants, one possibly an apprentice, and enough bags an ox would struggle? Check.

He blinks, coughs politely, sitting back down in his seat (which, Raika notes bemusedly, only puts him at eye-level with her).

“Yes, I can see your dedication and earnestness, junior sister. Unfortunately, all volunteers need to be tested before they’re accepted into service, and your talents will determine where you are placed. Do you have a family name or crest?”

Li Shu shakes her head. “I’m afraid, senior, that I am from a mortal family, and was originally trained by a mortal master. It is my sincere hope that by aiding the Empire, I might also gain some meager skill in my art.”

Raika tracks the way his scent changes at the slight disappointment. A mortal-trained healer is hardly going to match a cultivator’s specialized training, but from the looks of her, it’s obvious that Li Shu might still be from some rich family. The whole look strikes a well-maintained balance of potential competence and likely disappointment. Still, it’s enough, and he nods.

“Understood. May I have your name and that of your servants?”

She smiles and nods, waving down to Jin (who is massaging his aching back with a grimace). “This is my apprentice and medical assistant, Jin, and behind me is my martial servant Raika.”

“No family names?” 

She can smell the way Jin’s Qi stirs at that, but he just shakes his head. She shrugs instead, staring down the Imperial cultivator.

There’s just something about his scent that’s making her antsy. Just a bit. Besides, better to play the brute when it’s expected, lest she let someone do her the disservice of estimating her properly.

He frowns, his hand moving dizzyingly quickly over a series of forms, more of them shooting out of slots as his Qi interacts with the desk. “The medical assistant is fine, but I’m afraid we don’t allow personal servants or… ‘martial servants’ in with just a healer’s recommendation. We’ll have to test her as well.”

Li Shu blinks. “I… well, she’s been a close aid to me, and-”

“What kind of testing,” Raika asks.

“I can’t sense any Qi from her, so she’ll hardly be placed anywhere dangerous,” Hi Rou replies, ignoring Raika in favor of talking to Li Shu. “Since she’s clearly some sort of beastblood or giant-kin, added to lack of cultivation, she’ll be tested for technical skills and physical abilities. If she passes and receives the same utility level as you, then it will be no issue to have her assigned to wherever you end up.”

Li Shu looks up at Raika, worry evident.

I’ll be fine, Raika tells her with a slight shrug and a little eye-roll.

Li Shu throws back a slight huff and a frown. It’s not you I’m worried about, she’s saying.

Raika grins a bit, but shifts her hand against the supplies she’s carrying. It’ll be fine.

Li Shu just sighs, before turning back to Hi Rou. 

“Very well. Where do we need to go for the testing?”

“Take these forms, one for you and one for your servant. Your assistant can go on your recommendation. Take the hall to my right, follow it down two flights of stairs, and your testing will be down the hall to your left. Your servant will be tested through the double doors straight ahead.”

Raika makes sure to smile at Hi Rou as she walks off with her papers. He flinches a little bit as her lips go a bit too wide for a human face, the teeth exposed just a bit too sharp.

Heh.

She’ll remember his name. Rude little shit.

They split ways easily enough, with Jin and Li Shu beginning to head off down the hallway. Raika, still carrying all their supplies, goes straight for the double doors.

And is stopped by Jin politely kicking her shin.

She turns to him, eyebrow raised.

“Yes, brat?”

“Not a brat,” he says with a cool look on his face. “Just trying to remind my idiot master not to kill anybody.”

She rolls her eyes. “I’m not going to get us caught this early just because a few idiots are rude to me. If I killed every idiot that was rude to me, I wouldn’t be able to walk five feet without killing someone nowadays.”

He frowns at her, his expression a mix of mature reproach and childish stubbornness. “That’s not what I meant.”

She tilts her head, but- ah.

Killing someone and not getting caught is technically viable with the way she phrased it.

Jin, of course, is still looking up at her expectantly,

She sighs. “Fine. To the best of my ability, unless it’s completely necessary, I won’t kill anyone.”

He nods. “Ok.”

“Now if you’re done babying me, I have some idiots to talk to who don’t really need that many limbs.”

She can smell the mixture of annoyance and amusement on him as he kicks her in the shin again before hurrying off to Li Shu, who’s been watching the whole exchange with an annoying smile.

Ugh. Idiots.

She walks through the double doors into the testing chamber for the not-so-gifted.

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“Surely you must know something about your bloodline.”

Hearing the question repeated for the fourth time, Raika just sighs. “Born to mortal parents. Got bigger when I got older.”

The man in front of her is visibly frustrated with the answer, but her annoyance is a bit mollified by the way she can feel his heart beating just a bit above resting pace.

Behind him is a significantly damaged number of arrays, weights, and manual exercise areas.

Two of the training dummies, meant to withstand blows from a lower-Foundational realm cultivator, are in distinctly separate pieces, chunks of wooden shrapnel decorating the floor around them.

A series of weights are being stared at by a few Imperial soldiers, their eyes on the number of plates and on how the bar between them has warped into nearly a U shape.

There’s a running track that has a few new indents and scratches from where she put a little more ‘oomph’ into it.

It was a bit annoying having to do it all while pretending to be one-handed. The weight feels a bit off with her Blacksteel arm absorbed back into her body.

She can see the testing supervisor in front of her overcoming his concern with the sheer force of annoyance.

She can’t blame him for it, honestly. If she’d known quite how much paperwork he’d have to do (evidenced by the stack being delivered to him by another soldier) she might not have tried as much.

Or she might have tried harder. It is rather funny watching his face turn redder as the same soldier brings back another dozen slips of paper.

Eventually, he just sighs.

“It would seem that you have some kind of… special constitution,” he says, his voice dripping with something she might call loathing. At first she’s almost offended by the sheer distaste with which he says it, but then she gets it as the same soldier, eyes wide, rushes off, one would assume to procure far more specialized papers to fill out and sign. “Possibly your giant-kin blood had some effect on your cultivation, turning Qi into bodily energy. Or maybe somebody experimented on your bloodline a millenia ago. Or maybe you’re just big.”

Raika shrugs unapologetically. “I am pretty big.”

She luxuriates in the sight of one of his eyes beginning to twitch.

But then… ah. Then she sees it. The hidden reserves of will. The bastion behind his eyes as his mind retreats to a power far beyond his own will.

“It would seem that you’ll have to wait a few hours longer for your results,” he says, his expression somewhere between a grimace of early-onset frustration and the vicious grin of the bureaucrat visiting his own hell onto another. “I’m afraid we’ll have some forms for you to fill out shortly. And possibly a second round of testing, just to confirm the results.”

She narrows her eyes at him, watching as he signals a second soldier to go and fetch some more paperwork and a quill.

Well played, soldier. Well played.