Chapter 56: Next Steps
Sen never stopped moving. He felt Auntie Caihong’s thrust coming toward his back, even as he saw Uncle Kho come in for a downward slash from the left. His senses told him that Master Feng was a few steps back and, for a precious moment or two, would be out of position. Sen spun away from Caihong’s attack and used the momentum to knock Uncle Kho’s slash just far enough out of position that it would miss him. He used the rebound from the block to carry him around again and drove a slash at Master Feng, who was forced to abandon his attack in favor of defense.
With that threat momentarily dealt with, Sen moved his head a fraction to the right to avoid another attack by Auntie Caihong. She’d closed a little too much, so he sent a short, brutal kick her way. She almost avoided it, but the glancing blow disrupted her forward motion and sent her two steps to the side. That put her in Master Feng’s way. That would keep them busy for two or three heartbeats. Sen dropped beneath a swipe that would have probably taken his head off at the neck, before slamming the butt of his own spear into Uncle Kho’s exposed ribs. Sen was about to launch another attack when Master Feng called the fight to a halt.
“Enough,” he said in a calm voice.
Sen planted the butt of the spear on the ground and let the weapon support a bit of his weight as he took deep breaths. That shocked him. He hadn’t been really out of breath in months. Then again, they had pushed him hard that day. Plus, he’d been fighting them for a while. He wasn’t sure how long. There were hazy patches all over his memory of the fight. It made judging time difficult. As Sen let his awareness of his surroundings expand beyond the nearest ten feet, he realized that it was snowing. When did that start, he wondered. Not that snow was unusual so late in the year, but he’d been wholly unaware of it.
“I think it’s probably time,” said Uncle Kho, a bit of regret in his voice.
“Agreed,” said Auntie Caihong.
Sen gave the older cultivators a suspicious look. They sounded like they were deciding something, but he didn’t know what. Master Feng looked from the others to Sen.
“You’ve taken this exercise about as far as you can, at least at your current cultivation.”
Sen didn’t say anything for a moment. The implications of those words weren’t something he’d prepared for mentally. After he realized that he was just staring at Master Feng, who had raised an eyebrow at him, Sen finally spoke.
“So, I’m done?”
“Oh, well, you’re never done. There does come a point, though, where what you gain from additional practice isn’t really worth the effort you put into it. You’re at that point.”
Sen just let that roll around in his head for a while. “Then, what’s next?”
“I have one thing to show you. I’m not sure if you’re quite there, yet, but there’s no real harm in laying the groundwork for a qinggong technique.”
Uncle Kho piped up then. “I have a little bit more to teach you about the spear. But, really, at this point, what you need is information. So, that’s what we’ll be focusing on.”
“Information? Information about what?”
“The world,” said Auntie Caihong. “You’ve never been away from the town below have you?”
“No,” Sen admitted.
“Fortunately, all of us have,” said Master Feng. “So, we’re going to fill you in on some things you need to know. Places to go. Places to never go. People you can turn to if you need help. That sort of thing.”
Sen frowned. “I suppose now is as good a time as any to ask this. It seems likely that, sooner or later, someone will ask me who trained me. Should I tell them?”
The three older cultivators traded pensive looks. Sen understood those looks, at least a little bit. He didn’t know how far it went, but he knew that all three of them had reputations out in the world. After the way those sect members reacted to Uncle Kho, though, Sen had given the matter a lot of thought. While Sen didn’t care all that much about what people thought of him, he didn’t want to tarnish anyone else’s reputation along the way.
After a moment, Auntie Caihong snorted. “He might as well. People will figure it out whether he tells them or not.”
“Do you think so?” Master Feng asked.
“If they ever see him wield a jian or a spear, they will. They’ll see the two of you all over his style. My influence won’t be so obvious. Even so, there’s no point in making him keep a secret that won’t stay a secret.”
Uncle Kho was still frowning. “Still, it could set him up to borrow trouble. Our trouble.”
“Probably,” agreed Master Feng. “But I expect that’s been true since the day I picked him up down the mountain. Besides, anyone who really knows us won’t be stupid enough to try to come at us through him. Anyone stupid enough to try it, well, I’m not above handing out some object lessons over the next couple of decades.”
Uncle Kho mulled that over. “It has been a while since I last left the mountain. I suppose there’s nothing wrong with a little leg stretching now and then.”
That brief snippet of conversation simultaneously warmed Sen’s heart and chilled him right to the marrow. There was, after all, a certain comfort in knowing that if he was ever in serious trouble not of his own making, there was ridiculously, terrifyingly powerful help out there for him. At the same time, Sen had some understanding of what that help might look like in practice. Uncle Kho had ended the lives of two people simply for issuing a threat to harm Sen. If someone actually took him prisoner or harmed him, Sen had visions of miles of scorched and blackened earth. As for Master Feng, Sen honestly had no idea what the man might be capable of in a fit of anger, but he expected the results would be much the same in effect, if not in execution.
Of the three, though, Sen thought that Auntie Caihong might be the most dangerous in a situation like that. With her knowledge of medicinal herbs, pills, and alchemy, she could very well kill scores of people before anyone knew what was happening. With all of her vast experience, he imagined she could hide it from even the most watchful eyes. The part that truly made Sen shudder, though, was that he didn’t imagine for one moment that those people would be granted quick, clean, or merciful deaths. Sen came to a decision.
“I won’t hide the information. If someone I can’t safely ignore should ask me directly about it, at any rate,” said Sen. “I won’t spread it around, though. Maybe people will figure out that I’m connected with you three, eventually, but there’s no reason to help the information get out.”
Auntie Caihong nodded. “That’s probably the best answer here. It’s not worth your life or even serious injury to keep it to yourself. Beyond that, though, no one really needs to know.”
Master Feng and Uncle Kho nodded their agreement with that assessment. Sen started to ask another question but only managed to let out a jaw-creaking yawn. He felt a little twinge of embarrassment at the bemused expressions on everyone’s faces. Then, he shrugged it off. It had been a long day, and they’d worked him hard.
“Sen, go clean up,” said Master Feng. “Jaw-Long, do you still have a map of the continent floating around?”
“I do,” said Uncle Kho.
“Good. We’ll have to take a look at it after dinner.”
As Sen wandered off to get a bath, his tired mind didn’t make note of Falling Leaf staring first at him and then at the elder cultivators.
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