v7c39: Westward Leading

We left Pale Moon Lake City behind us, heading west. As we left the gates and trundled along the road, there was a palpable easing of tension from the Lord Magistrate and Lady Wu.

“I’m glad that’s all behind us,” Teacher declared, slumping over to rest his head on Lady Wu’s lap. He picked up Xue Ji’s tail, which had been wrapped around Lady Wu’s waist, and buried his face in it. The fox-woman hummed with amusement from where she was sitting, reading a scroll. “To think, I once wanted that to be my life. I would have gone as bald as Bao from the stress!”

We all chuckled at his muffled voice, and Lady Wu patted his head.

“Court politics were certainly… interesting,” I agreed. “But as an outside observer…somebody else can deal with all that shit.”

“The cities produce the greatest of wonders, and the most difficult of challenges,” Lady Wu agreed. “And what about you, Meiling? What did you think of the city?”

Meimei paused to consider the question, gathering her thoughts.

Finally, she spoke. “It was interesting. There were so many artisans in one place; so much fascinating food, wonderful architecture, and just people. All those scrolls in the Archive… it was vibrant. Alive. Even at night, I could feel the energy flowing through the city. It was amazing… and yet at the same time I don’t think I would ever want to live there. It’s too much.”

I nodded, full of understanding. I felt the same way, after all. Even the Rou part of me had come around to country life.

“That, and well, it’s probably childish of me, but I kept waiting for… what happened when I went there last to happen again,” she said, referring to the cultivator that killed a beggar child when she went to the city as a kid. “I kept running it through in my mind, what I would do to stop a cultivator that was inconvenienced by mortals and how to hurt them. How I could intervene. But in the end… well, nothing like that happened. The closest thing were those cultivators who came that one night, but Xue Ji took care of them. I was tense the whole time.”

That, too, I understood. Meimei had been watching the crowds like a hawk whenever we went into the city, her eyes darting around. It hadn’t been anything major, and she had still obviously enjoyed herself… but the memory of that incident must have still been affecting her.

However… there was one thing she hadn’t taken into account.

“But Mei, you did see a cultivator who was inconvenienced by mortals,” I mentioned.

Meiling blinked. “We did? When?”

“When we were walking to pick up Babe and Washy from the gallery Chyou took them to, you remember that kid who tripped over your foot when he darted out from that alley? You caught him and told them to be more careful. When you took off your shoes at our accommodations, you didn’t even notice the scuff.”

Meimei blinked at my words. Her mouth opened for a moment, then closed again.

“Huh,” she finally said.

“It is not what a person is that determines their reaction; but rather who they are,” the Lord Magistrate said, his voice full of sage wisdom… and still hidden behind a fluffy tail.

Meimei shook her head at the sight. “I suppose I was too focused on the fact that they were a cultivator,” she finally murmured.

“Well, cultivators do seem more likely to be assholes sometimes,” I admitted. “But I don’t know if that’s because more are assholes, or if we just hear about the bad things about them more often. There’s no story to tell when a cultivator dodges the person who bumps into them, or just doesn’t care about the interaction.”

I had come to this world expecting most cultivators to be pill-popping nutjobs… and that wasn’t the case at all. Most of the cultivators I had met had been fairly reasonable people—and while there were rotten eggs, there were also people like Big D, Xiulan, Tigu, and that Shao Heng guy. People who were downright heroic.

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

It was part of the reason why I was fine with this entire trip; instead of running away and staying on my farm.

I had been wrong. Not about every cultivator, but about enough of them. I wanted to understand them as more than just characters screaming “You dare!” for the smallest perceived slight in poorly machine-translated novels.

I lived here now. I lived in a world full of people, and not in a xianxia setting where everything ran on tropes.

Hells, I had some stories to attest to that. Tigu had been very disappointed when there hadn’t been any noodle shop fights during her first trip to the Dueling Peaks, and later, Grass Sea City. Though, speaking of Grass Sea City…

“You got a reply from your messenger, right?” I asked, remembering the man they had sent to their son several months ago.

“Yes. He sent a message back to one of our contacts in Pale Moon Lake City when he could not reach us, saying he delivered his letter; and later, when we were travelling south, he said he would be returning to Verdant Hill with his reply. Perhaps we shall meet him on the road? But I would not bet on it at this point. He might even be going up north directly, instead of going back to Pale Moon Lake; we did tell him to test out the various routes…”

“Sometimes children need their parents to surprise them,” Meimei said, with a small, amused grin.

Lady Wu chuckled, an identical grin forming on her face. “Yes, indeed. Sometimes they need a good scare, for making their parents worry so.”

Washy and I exchanged glances, and we simultaneously edged away from the vindictive intent coming off both women.

===============================