Heart of Cultivation 73. Infiltration (Patreon)

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Jian took another look at the camp, this time with an eye towards infiltration. It looked dangerous, but not impossible. If they could rely on Meirong's stealth techniques, it could be downright easy.

"Will your technique shield us?" Jian asked.

Meirong held her hand out, then wiggled it back and forth. "It will probably let us shed attention, but it does get more difficult if they're on high alert."

Jian nodded. A technique that worked to deflect attention would naturally be more effective against an unsuspecting sentry than against an army on high alert. They'd have to be careful.

"What do you want to find, exactly?" he asked. Much as Meirong seemed to act on her whims, there was usually at least a little bit of calculation behind her actions.

Meirong shrugged. "We need to take a closer look to spot anything out of place. I want you to be able to take a better look at their formations. I especially want to see what they're doing putting a building up smack in the middle of the Verdant Doom."

Jian still felt uneasy at the prospect of breaking into what had to be the most highly fortified section of this highly fortified camp, but he couldn't disagree with Meirong's reasoning. All that they knew right now was that the Huang family was investing a great deal of time and money on this compound. In order to see if they were doing anything criminal, he and Meirong would have to go inside.

Decision made, they settled in to wait for the sun to go down. They took turns napping so that they would be fresh when it was time to move. When it was his turn, it took Jian longer than usual to fall asleep. He hadn't had a full day's walk to tire him out, which made it hard to push down the images his mind kept conjuring forth of what might go wrong in the night.

Accordingly, he spent some time in quiet meditation. Gathering spiritual energy in the Verdant Doom was a challenge. Even when the blood mists weren't present in such strength as to manifest in the physical realm, they still tainted the natural spiritual energy. Cultivators who ingested the taint would actually enjoy a boost in physical ability. Unfortunately, it came along with bouts of uncontrollable rage. A cultivator who ingested too much tainted energy would eventually turn into a mindless berserker. The only way to avoid such a tragic fate was to purge the energy from your system with expensive medicine. Or to be very careful to avoid taking it in to begin with.

The techniques that Jian had honed while in the Devil's Teeth served him well in the Verdant Doom. He was an old hand at drawing in spiritual energy while excluding any foreign taint. It was a painstaking way to cultivate, but it wasn't without its rewards. If nothing else, the unforgiving technique required his entire concentration, leaving him without the mental energy to fret over what was ahead of him.

After about half an hour, Jian had refilled his spiritual energy reserves and was in a peaceful frame of mind. As soon as he stopped focusing on cultivating, it was the most natural thing in the world to close his eyes and drift off to sleep.

He woke to total darkness. The dense mass of foliage overhead blocked out the light from the moon and stars, leaving the jungle floor as dark as a cave beneath the earth. Jian blinked, then looked around once more. On his second survey of his surroundings, he spotted the dim red light shed by the spiritual lantern in Meirong's hands.

Meirong, while talented, was still bound by mortal limits in some ways. She, like Jian, needed light to see. It was said that high level cultivators could navigate a dark room solely by use of their spiritual senses, but even Meirong would need a few more years under her belt before she could reach that level.

For now, they needed light to be able to see where they were going. On the other hand, a simple torch would act as a beacon announcing their presence to anybody in the camp who was still awake. The solution to their dilemma was revealed in the dim light of the carefully designed lamp that Meirong was holding. It let out just enough light for them to see what was in front of them, shining in only one direction. Jian took some comfort in the thought that Meirong had come prepared.

He clambered out of his sleeping sack, carefully climbing up the rope to join Meirong on the limb above. He met her eyes in the dim light cast by the lamp. He could see traces of excitement, anticipation, and steely resolution. Not a hint of hesitation. She certainly looked to be taking this seriously.

Meirong had been studying him while he studied her, and seemed satisfied with what she had seen. She led the way without any further comment.

Once they were on the ground, she placed a hood over her spirit lamp, blocking the light from traveling in any direction except diagonally toward the ground. An ordinary mortal would have considered the night to remain completely dark, but it was just enough for Meirong to make her way forward in safety. By the time she had passed and Jian followed in her footsteps, the light was gone. He had to remember where she had stepped and follow suit.

Their caution was rewarded with an uneventful walk. Neither human nor demonic beast troubled them, and they soon stood at the boundary of the Huang family camp.

Meirong's lamp wouldn't be necessary once they entered the camp. The Grave of Dreams was a natural clearing in the jungle, and the Huang family had expanded it, clearing out the trees that might block the natural light. The moon was a slender crescnet, giving off more than enough light for any cultivator to see by.

Jian and Meirong crouched behind the same bush that they had used as cover early in the day. If they simply charged into the camp, it would be putting far too much weight on Meirong's stealth art. While she could easily blend in as just one more maid at a tea party or one more servant in a busy estate, her art would have a harder time suggesting an innocuous explanation for two outsiders sneaking around in a heavily fortified camp in the middle of the jungle.

Accordingly, they would have to avoid being seen. They waited in the bush and watched as a man walked the perimeter of the ward line, his own powerful lantern in hand. They continued to wait until a second guard passed by. The space between them had been enough time for an incense stick to burn down.

Once the second guard had passed out of sight, Jian made his move. Meirong had entrusted him with the formations disruption array, considering his expertise in the area. He wanted to prove that her faith in him was well-founded. When he reached the ward line, he paused to take a breath. They were in a hurry, but if he bungled the array due to rushing then nothing else would matter. As soon as his hand was steady, Jian threw down the first stake in the array.

He moved at a steady pace, building up the half circle of array stakes that were placed outside the ward. These stakes had to be in place in order for the disruption array to work, but putting them in the wrong place would mean delay rather than disaster. Once he took the next step and began to interact with the ward itself, that margin for error would be gone.

Jian took a moment to double check the placement of the first few stakes. He couldn't see anything wrong. He took a deep breath, hoping that his eyes hadn't failed him. Then he took the next two stakes in hand and drove them down into the ground at the edge of the ward, both of them striking home simultaneously.

He held his breath and waited a moment, but there was no visible failure of the ward, nor any sounding of the alarm. The stakes were doing their job, diverting the energy of the ward around into the outer portion of the array. By sending the energy around, the ward would appear to any Huang family observers to be fully intact. However, the energy passing through the stakes wouldn't actually do anything like sound the alarm if an intruder stepped across.

From there it was just a matter of inserting stakes two at a time, steadily driving deeper into the ward boundary. As he did so, more and more energy was diverted by the array. If Jian had put such an array together for his own use, there was no way it would have been able to handle the load. The Heavenly Sword Sect, though, used only the finest materials and most accomplished craftsmen. The outer section of the array took everything the ward could throw at it and asked for more.

Finally, he was through. Though it had felt like he had been working for an eternity, it hadn't actually even been enough time for a cup of tea to brew. They still had plenty of time. He turned and waved Meirong forward. She stepped forward without hesitation, joining him on the other side of the ward line.

They left the ward bypass array in place as they moved toward the center of the camp. It was the kind of thing that was only obvious to someone who could see the shift in spiritual energy. Otherwise, it simply looked like a batch of stakes driven into the ground, and even they were hidden by the tall grass. If the array was still in place come the next day it would probably be discovered, but Jian and Meirong intended to be long gone by then.

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