Chapter 7- The Second Supreme Virtue

The tea session was a modest success. While no definitive common points were identified across all four scrolls, there was a definite theme. Where, on balance, should ensuring the common good be balanced against the instinct of all people to better themselves specifically? And, following that question, to what degree did it make sense to put the cost of maintaining that public good on a central authority, rather than decentralizing it?

The question was surprisingly fascinating to Tian, once it was explained to him. He really hadn’t spotted the connections beyond a lack of cultivators.

He assumed the correct answer was essentially what the sect did- loads of streams of income and resources funneled to a single central point, then distributed outwards again. But this was, the others told him, often very inefficient when considering things like transportation costs and time, or responsiveness to urgent needs. Sometimes it made more sense to have a regional warehouse and regional distribution that fed into local warehouses and distribution.

All well and good when discussing rice, but what about soldiers? The emperor might very strongly prefer every soldier be raised under his banners, paid by him, trained by him, and loyal to him alone, but that was hideously difficult in practice. An army is expensive. How much better, then, to shove the cost onto the aristocracy. Simply require that, when summoned, dukes appeared with so many trained and equipped soldiers, earls with so many, barons so many, all at no cost to the Imperial Treasury.

Although, regrettably, that did tend to lead to nobles wondering exactly why they were bending the knee and paying taxes if they were the ones with the army.

Same with disaster response. A plague required incredibly responsive, granular, local management that was simply impossible to manage from a distant capital, but it also required people from outside the immediately affected area moving in coordination with the people on the spot. You needed some national power to prevent a local outbreak from becoming a plague.

“The outlier seems to be Sister Su’s polemic on education.” Brother Wang smiled, but his eyes were narrow. “Saying that job training is practically and morally better than a generalist education is… an interesting view.”

“It is a more common argument than you think, and has significant merit.” Sister Su lightly shook her head. She didn’t blink quite as much as Tian would expect. It was a subtle thing, but after a while you picked up on the way she tended to stare directly at things.

“A librarian against education?” Hong asked.

“Never that. The argument is that mass generalized education is inefficient to the point of causing far greater harm than benefit. A case can be made that universal literacy improves efficiency in the labor pool, and a case can be made that it is somehow morally improving for everyone to read literature or understand how to calculate the area of a circle. But no ‘case’ is needed for a farmer to understand when to plant rice, nor how to harvest it, nor how to look after buffalo. A farmer’s son is almost always a farmer. A fisherwoman’s daughter is almost always a fisherwoman. Let them learn those things they need alone. They will spend the extra time more happily and productively.”

“Similar to what we get in the sect. Or at least how I was trained.” Tian raised the kettle and looked around. He got nods, so he made sure the temperature was just right and steeped another serving.

“When I think back on it, all I was really required to learn was a cultivation method and two combat arts. Which says a lot about what the sect considers necessary for every member to know. Other than those things, it was ‘Here is how to venerate the Ancestors, here is how to sweep the temple grounds, here is how we say morning prayers,’ and all that. All the other stuff I learned was from my brothers being good brothers, or manuals that I had to buy.” he continued. Brother Fu had been the driving force there. And Brother Fu was one of only two Outer Court leaders with that mindset.

“Same.” Hong nodded. “Except a lot more of the training came from my family.”

“And me.” Sister Su nodded.

“Me too. And I agree that it’s alarming.” Brother Wang softly rubbed the arm of his wooden chair. “It brings us back into that tension between centralized control and local autonomy. The more knowledgeable an individual cultivator is, the more capable they are, but it reduces both the ability of the center to control them and it raises costs in ways that are not easily recovered. Or at least the profit of the education is not easily measured.”

“Feels like one of those things that doesn’t have one always-right answer.” Tian checked the color and aroma of the steep. It was starting to thin out a bit, but there was still pleasure to be had in the lightening taste. He poured from the lidded cup into the pitcher, then into the proffered tea cups.

They sat back and savored the tea. That was one of the joys of a tea session- the way the tea changed with each steeping. Depending on the leaves, it might be strongest with the first cup and grow progressively thinner. Some teas needed a few cups to fully open up and develop their flavor. The aroma grew, evolved and shifted. Even the color changed. Each little cup was to be savored, as no two cups, like no two moments in a life, were ever quite the same.

“Still not an inch closer to having a, you know, viable idea for the Monastery.” Hong sighed. “Not even sure they are really pointing us towards a question they want an answer to.”

“They aren’t.” Wang shook his head. “It’s only the first day of who knows how many. What they want us to do is wrestle with questions and get used to the struggle.”

Tian reckoned that sounded right. Their specific instructions were to heal and pursue their dao. This could be considered part of testing and understanding that dao. A higher level approach to things than he was used to, but it made a degree of sense when you looked at it from the perspective of the upper management of the Monastery. They never expected the masses to achieve much. Finding the tiny few that could really change things, that was what mattered.

“Out of curiosity, how old are the two of you? Tian’s probably fourteen, and I’m definitely fourteen, but I can’t really get a grip on how old you two are.” Hong asked.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“I’m twenty five.” Sister Su volunteered. Tian wouldn’t have been able to guess. Even for a cultivator, it was hard to pin down how old she was. She felt older than twenty five.

“Twenty six.” Brother Wang spread his hands. “And I believe Sister Su and I are both Level Nine.”

Sister Su didn’t respond. She hadn’t been asked a question after all. Tian had to control a flinch. It took significantly longer to cultivate each successive level. If Brother Wang and Sister Su were both Level Nine in their mid twenties, unless they had several spectacularly fortuitous encounters, each, they were at least first class cultivation talents.

“Hmm. I guess that makes you two the Senior Brother and Sister then.” Hong smiled.

Brother Wang gave Tian a look. “I’m not sure I want the position. Seems like it might be hazardous to my health.”

Tian looked back wide eyed. He had no idea the role was so dangerous. But then, it was a responsible position. “Don’t worry, Senior Brother Wang. Should you fall, I will definitely pick up your bones! I am very experienced in these matters.”

“And that’s where I’m calling it a day. I’m off to cultivate. See you for dinner.” Brother Wang waved airily and shoved to his feet. Tian hid a small frown. They never got the mung bean cakes, and he had wanted to try them.

Ah well. There was always tomorrow.