Chapter 6- Cranes Descend on Bluestone City

Tian and Hong went down to the riverbank. The crane was sleeping the reeds, happily full from a productive day of hunting. She didn’t like whatever was going on in the Water Fortress, but it was the instinctive dislike of an animal avoiding a wildfire. She couldn’t explain why it was bad. It just was.

The moonlight was thin tonight. Bright stars, and enough moonlight to see by, but it felt thin. Some nights you could practically scoop the moonlight out of the air with your hands. Tonight, it fell past them like a cold drizzle. Hong sprawled on the grass, arms and legs flopping out with studied ease. It only took seconds for her to lose the relaxation in her body. Her hands tensed, her knees slowly drew towards her chin.

“There is an order to things, in heaven and on earth. A hierarchy, and rituals enforcing that hierarchy. The rituals aren’t exactly law, but they sort of are. Some are religious, some aren’t, but doing the rituals, that is, treating the rituals with absolute seriousness and devotion, is kind of religious. But it’s not religion for you or me or any of those murdered villagers. It’s a religion just for the Emperor and the very top officials.”

Tian spoke softly, because the night demanded it, but with great authority and satisfaction. He pretty much never got to tell people about the secular world, let alone Liren. Usually, she was the one doing the explaining. It was a good time to affirm his authority as the Senior Brother.

“Not really seeing what this has to do with kids being burned alive in iron cages to make ink, Brother.”Hong started curling up on herself.

Tian silently scolded himself. He knew she would be fragile tonight. He damn well knew better, and he still felt like he had to show off and make a point of being the big brother. So much for compassion and humility.

Tian pulled out his heavily thumbed Lives of the Virtuous Ministers of Wu. “‘To rule a land requires not simply the blessings of fortune but a conferment from the Celestial Court. To rule a people is an entrustment, an enfeoffment, a mandate. A mandate that can be lost if the earthly court fails to properly replicate the rules, rites and forms of the Celestial Court. It is for this reason that the Ministry of Rites was established and holds equal rank with the Ministries of Justice, War, Works, Revenue and Personnel.”

He flipped to another page. “To maintain order amongst the people and ensure the blessings of heaven upon the world, the Ministry of Rites establishes the rituals of the Imperial Cult and the State Sacrifices. It ensures the civic rituals are conformed to by the people, demonstrating that the Emperor administers the Kingdom with compassion, and justice, bringing the endless blessings of good governance to his subjects.”

Hong didn’t look at where he was pointing at the book. Her eyes were on the far bank of the river, where it started to widen out into the lake. He could tell she was seeing none of it, lost in her thoughts.

“They felt… no, they were bandits. They were arguing that the earthly kingdom had failed, and the kingdom failed because they failed to obey the laws of the Celestial Court. So they filed a petition to the true ruling power, the Celestial Emperor. Written in the ashes of children. Because nothing says there has been a breakdown in the blessings of good governance like a parody of an official document written in the burned bodies of the next generation.” Her voice was numb, lost in horror and wonder. “That’s not bandit thinking. Someone put that idea in their head.”

“I can’t even begin to imagine why they thought the Gods would give the petition more weight if it was written in an ink made of… evil. If it’s not a heretic scheme, I truly don’t know what is.” Tian shrugged helplessly. “Though I don’t really know the first thing about the Gods. Frankly, they seem mad.”

Liren pulled her knees up, and rested her head on them. “Yes. Yes they do. I’ve known it since I was six years old. But the heavens are too far away for my spear to reach.”

Tian sighed. “This doesn’t have to be our problem, you know. Just because we discovered it, that doesn’t make it our job to fix it. They can’t even order us to. Well, Elder Rui can, but you know what I mean. I certainly don’t want to breathe any more of the mortal air than I have to.”

Liren didn’t respond. Tian suppressed another sigh and began cultivating. She would start feeling better around sunrise. In the meantime, he could be here for her.

The next morning they set off on the Agate. Hong had eaten well at breakfast, and the worst seemed to have passed. Old Master Yu invited them for a chat before they set out.

“I know you took that last job more or less out of the goodness of your hearts, and I’m very glad you did. Consider this a sort of bonus. It seems like something you would like.” The old hero tossed a little pendant shaped like a crossed sword and saber to Tian. It was the length of his thumb, half again as wide, and made of bronze. The texture looked quite coarse, but with close examination, you could see it was covered in tiny writing.

“Academy Master?” Tian looked up at the grinning elder.

“You practice palm arts, right? Well, nothing in my library will be as good as what’s in your dao repository. The best immortal arts in the Broad Sky Kingdom are almost all to be found in Ancient Crane Monastery. Just how it is. However!” He held up a long finger. “What about mortal martial arts?”

“I have no idea. Would they even be useful?”

The old master grinned. “At the Earthly Realm, yes, some of them are highly effective. The very best mortal martial arts require careful management of internal energy, another way of saying qi or vital energy. Of course, we are talking about mortals here, so they would cultivate for twenty years to be able to use one particular blow and consider themselves amazing if they could do it twice in a day.”

“Right.” Tian nodded.

“This is, according to legend, the clue to finding the very best palm art ever devised in the Kingdom, and, according to those same legends, the most powerful unarmed martial art under the immortal realm, period.”

“The clue to finding the martial art, Elder Yu?” Hong asked.

“Well, if I had found it, I’d be using it, wouldn’t I?” The elder laughed shamelessly, stroking his long mustache. “The art was used by a few grandmasters before the current Kingdom was established. Unfortunately, it was just too hard for most people, even experts, to learn. It’s called the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing, powerfully yang but the secret is in the withholding of energy. Or so I heard anyway. This pendant is supposed to act as a key- put it in the right place, and it meshes with something that already exists to reveal the hiding place of the manual.”

“You never found the right spot, I suppose.” Tian looked over the pendant carefully. The ‘writing’ was actually gibberish. Shapes that looked like characters, but weren’t.

“I did not. But since I got the pendant off the neck of Thousand Palms Han after fighting for three days and three nights, I am pretty confident that it’s legitimate. Old Thousand Palms might have been a cannibal and worse, but he was faithful to his martial dao. If he thought the charm was legitimate, it was.”

“Any clues at all?” Hong asked.

“Just this- the family that passed down the Eighteen Palms of Dragon Subduing were part of a mortal martial arts sect that was on the wrong side of the founding of the present kingdom. They had long since lost the ability to use the whole art, but the bits they still could use were enough to make them powerful fighters.”

“They were summarily executed?” Tian asked, thinking of how those stories tended to go in his history books.

“Shot with enough crossbow bolts that you could refeather a goose from the fletching. His Majesty was uninterested in taking them prisoner. But there was no way he’d leave such a powerful art out in the wild, even if he couldn’t use it. Someone in his inner circle must have gotten a hold of more clues. Something worth looking for, as you roam around the kingdom.”

His eyes slid over to Hong, and his grin deepened. “And lest you think your senior doesn’t care about you, even after he recognized your kindred spirit, there is a reason an old saber monster like me went looking for a palm art.”

“Yes, Academy Master?” Liren asked.

“The Dragon Subduing Palms have brutal requirements in terms of yang qi. According to legend, it is impossible for women to learn. That’s mortal women, anyway. I expect you could manage if you wanted. But that’s not what’s interesting. What’s interesting is that the current Imperial Family doesn’t have any particularly impressive arts, nor are they notably yang. They have better martial arts than most mortals and they doubtless have hidden depths, but we’d hear about it if someone managed to master the Dragon Subduing Palms. They’d announce it to the four corners of the world.”

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“Yes… Academy Master.”

He rolled his eyes. “The reason I went looking for it in the first place is because that mortal martial arts sect I mentioned cultivated Sungold Yangfire Oranges. A cultivable spirit fruit, worthy of immortals, as it is a powerfully yang tonic without even needing alchemical refinement. Only, they hadn’t gotten any to ripen before the new Emperor rolled through. It seems the current empire has the same problem. Get the palm art, and you can probably get the orange trees, and I bet you can make them grow. Plant them up on the mountain, watch the qi fill them up. They’d do wonders for your body cultivation art.”

Hong jolted, then bowed. The old warrior just chuckled and stroked his mustache.

The Academy Master entrusted them with a few letters to deliver once they reached a Temple. Tian would mildly abuse his letter-sending privilege with Elder Feng and see to it that they were carried across the north-east of the Broad Sky Kingdom. His own letters would be traveling much further. And the first step of sending them would be going to the nearest Temple.

Tian got everything just so in their fishing boat while Liren settled up a final bit of business with the Academy Master. She returned with a victorious air- at the last moment, a disciple had rushed in carrying the promised Gold Belly Carp. Their dinner tonight was now guaranteed, even if neither of them was much of a cook. Then they were off, racing up the Agate as the bands of yellow and purple stone rushed past.

“Brother…”

“Yes, Sister Liren?”

“You said that this heretical rebellion didn’t have to be our problem.”

“And I meant every word.”

“Then why are we going to the Bluestone City Temple?”

“It’s the closest one, Sister.”

“No it isn’t.”

“It is. It’s on the river.”

“Yeah, but overland we could get to Ashgrove Temple in three days. It will take us four days on the river to reach Bluestone City.”

“Yes, but, counterpoint, we will be on the river instead of running through rice paddies dodging peasants. It will therefore feel faster, and given the enormity and totality of the dao, things feeling faster is basically the same as being faster.” Tian spoke with great righteousness. He might have learned how to “stroll” but damned if sitting in a boat being rowed around wasn’t more comfortable.