Chapter 11- Sowing Fate

The anemic human-looking expert summoned by the White Peacock strode forward first. “Junior Stormblossom, I carry the honor name Wine Ghost, but you know me as Yimeng. Willing to learn?”

The human who had accompanied Daoist Brightheart collapsed to his knees and kowtowed. “Willing! This junior is very willing to learn whatever the great elder is willing to teach!”

“Good! Follow me!” Stormblossom scrambled to his feet and left with Wine Ghost, a look of unconcealed joy on his face. The toad and the… whatever it was… glanced at each other. The goat-sheep-monster-thing stepped forward first.

“You won’t have heard of me. I know you, though, girl. I can feel the rage boiling in you. All that fire. The urge to pierce through the lies, the obstinate foolishness, and the sheer hatefulness of vile people. Even people who don’t know they are vile. The urge to trample them, crush them, as you force them to confront their truths, and do better. Such a powerful urge, and it fires your blood like nothing else. You fear it. Hate it, even as it gives you strength and meaning. Sickened by the knowledge that your love of that fire outweighs your fear of it.”

Hong cupped her fist and bowed. Tian didn’t have to see her face to know what it looked like.

“Me too. After all my thousands of years, the fury only burns brighter, not dimmer. I will not accept you as a disciple, for the same reason I wouldn’t accept a baby as a disciple. I will, however, teach you a few things. How to rule your emotions while still feeling them, and an art to separate truth and falsehood. I will also provide a good cultivation environment so your journey to the peak of the so-called Earthly Realm is swift. My price is that you use what I teach you honorably and well.”

The monstrous head seemed to leer at Liren, the combination of fangs and palm sized human teeth even more distressing than the horn extending from the beast’s head.

“It’s a high price. One you might even find cruel, though you don’t think so now.” He paused. “Willing?”

“Your student is willing to learn.” She started to bow, but froze in mid air.

“Good. I am called Merciless. In time, you will see how true the name is. Don’t genuflect to me. I do not accept your worship. I demand your obedience. Now, follow.”

Tian looked over at the toad. He controlled the urge to offer his respectful greetings, the Lark’s warning still fresh in his ears. The toad nodded slightly.

“Good. You would have been sent out of the Holy Land if you had said something. You may greet me.”

“Ancient Crane Monastery’s Tian Zihao greets Venerable Voidcatcher.” He cupped his fist and bowed deeply.

“Mmm. Rise. We have fate together.”

It was news to Tian. He waited for Voidcatcher to elaborate. He did not. The two stood there, unmoving, for forty minutes. Eventually Voidcatcher spoke.

“I give you permission to speak to me even if I haven’t specifically asked you a question.”

“Thank you, Elder.” Tian bowed again.

Silence descended once more.

“No comments?”

“On what, Elder?”

“Fate, our connection, what I might intend to teach you?”

“None, Elder.”

Tian thought he could detect a current of humor in the toad’s voice, though it might be his imagination. “Comfortable with your ignorance, are you?”

“Confident that I will learn what I should eventually, even if it’s not the answer to everything I wondered about.”

Voidcatcher nodded at that. “A very yin sort of man, though with strong yang vitality. Patient yet curious, holding both mercy and malice within you. How toad-like. I won’t transmit any arts to you. Instead, I will teach you medicine. Herbology, medicine compounding, and a bit of acupuncture if you learn quickly enough. I will also provide a very suitable cultivation ground, since I can tell you are the sort to cultivate every moment you can.”

“And the price, Senior?”

“I’m not sure. My instinct says that you are already paying it, though no matter how long I meditate, I can’t figure it out. We have certainly never met, and my only disciple was murdered years ago. I have no children I care about, nor could you have met one of my teachers. I truly do not understand.”

Tian didn’t either, but he wasn’t about to agree to anything blindly.

The toad glanced at him. “At my level, I trust my instincts more than I trust reason. I won’t ask too much. What can you offer? And you know better than to offer your little material wealth, I think.”

Tian thought about it for a few minutes, before answering. “I won’t use your teachings in a way that troubles my conscience, and will use them in a way that is true to my dao path, as I come to understand it.”

That had the toad rocking back on his hind legs. “That’s it?! Boy, a village midwife wouldn’t teach you to cry for that kind of price!”

“Forgive me, Elder, but what can anyone promise other than that? If I promised obedience, I would be obedient until I wasn’t, now or ten thousand years from now. If I promised service, I can’t promise my service would be useful, or that I would faithfully serve if I thought matters were no longer fair. My skills and possessions are not worth mentioning. The me that stands before you has no value that is worth your time and teachings. I can only say that I will do my best with what you teach me.”

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The toad looked at him for a long moment. “If I wasn’t sure to the middle part of my bones that you had already done me a significant service, I really do think I would turn you away and have you sent down the mountain. Lucky for you, eh?”

Tian could only bow again, feeling a bit aggrieved. What more could a teacher reasonably expect, beyond their student not being a scumbag and doing the best with what you taught them?

“The Medicine Ancestor elder of the Pure Leaf Alchemy Hall offered to call me granddaddy and change his last name to mine if I was willing to teach him how to compound my Three Mercies Draught, let alone transmit a deep education on herbal medicine! And you are offering, what? To be a decent person and not do wrong… no, you aren’t even promising that! You are just promising not to betray your conscience and your dao!”

Tian kept his mouth shut. He was pretty sure he didn’t have anything useful to contribute.

“Well? What do you have to say for yourself, boy?”

It seems he was wrong.