Unintended Cultivator

V12 Chapter 42 – It’s About Vanity

The view of Emperor’s Bay, or rather the wide valley that made up Emperor’s Bay and all of its neighboring farm villages, proved somewhat disorienting for Sen. He’d arrived from the north on his only visit. Then, he’d fled by sea with Lo Meifeng to elude that cabal of demonic cultivators. So, approaching the city from the south gave him a different view of the place. One that was simultaneously familiar and unfamiliar, like seeing a room he knew from a strange angle. That sense of unfamiliarity had only been heightened by the lack of apparent life in the surrounding villages. Where he would have expected to see smoke rising from houses across the valley, there was nothing but stillness.

At first, he thought that the mortals were simply hiding. It would have been the smart thing to do with spirit beasts rampaging across the continent. That notion was quickly cast aside as the army marched through those villages. There were no mortals to be found. Every house, every hut, was as cold and still as a corpse. At least, that held true for the structures that still stood. A great many of them had been destroyed and not very recently. Some homes had burned. Others had been knocked down. Sen didn’t investigate inside of any abandoned buildings, fearing that he’d just find bodies or other evidence of brutal, unnecessary killings. Elder Deng must have seen something in Sen’s expression, because he moved his flying sword closer to Sen’s qi platform.

“Where are the villagers?” asked Sen before the other man could speak.

“Some fled into the city, at least until the gates were barred to them.”

Elder Deng’s face tightened at the look Sen gave him.

“The villagers weren’t allowed to enter the city?” asked Sen.

“That’s correct.”

Sen barely had to consider the reason for that before he said, “You mean that the mortal leadership decided they didn’t want to feed all those peasants, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Do I even need to ask where the Soaring Skies Sect came down on that decision?”

Elder Deng averted his gaze and said, “I objected.”

That was a tidy way to avoid the question while sounding like he answered it, thought Sen. Deng probably had objected to doing such a thing, but only in private, to the other elders, and maybe their patriarch. That clearly left out where the sect had stood. By noting his objections, Deng was trying to give his already doomed sect a patina of reflected compassion.

“You objected, but they didn’t. Is that about the size of it?”

Shoulders slumping a little, Deng said, “That is the case.”

“Was the city running short of food?”

Sen still wouldn’t condone leaving the villagers outside the city walls to die. However, if the prospect of starvation had been looming large in the city, it might soften his view of things. Starvation was a terrifying prospect, especially for anyone who had ever gone hungry.”

“I wasn’t told about the state of the city's food reserves,” said Deng, who continued at a hard look from Sen. “But there were no rumors about shortages that I was aware of.”

“I see,” said Sen. “And what happened to the rest of the villagers?”

“I honestly don’t know for sure. Some were killed during spirit beast attacks. Others fled. I can’t imagine where they fled to.”

“Their deaths,” said Sen. “They fled to their deaths, Elder Deng. How far do you imagine they could have walked in the cold of winter with spirit beasts hunting humans?”

Elder Deng apparently had enough sense not to answer that question. If Sen knew who had ordered the gates closed to the villagers, he would already be writing orders for executions. He knew better than to let himself think about that for too long. That would only lead to him getting angry enough to execute the entire mortal government. Looking around for a distraction, his eyes landed on Elder Deng’s flying sword. He remembered Shui’s question and decided to pose it himself.

“Why ride on a sword?” asked Sen.

The change in subject seemed to catch the other man off guard. Deng fumbled for words for a few moments before he shook his head and recaptured his equanimity.

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“The flying sword is traditional.”

The man peered down at the blade as though he’d never given it any real consideration. Sen would have questioned the point immediately if anyone had ever suggested something that silly to him.

“That doesn’t seem like a very good reason. I understand that not all traditions make sense. That’s fine when they don’t hurt anyone. But a flying sword? It’s less practical than a qi platform. You’re actively inhibiting your speed. Worse, you could have made a real sword from that metal and spared yourself the hassle of having it inscribed.”

“Your teachers don’t use them?”

“Not that I’ve ever seen,” said Sen. “I guess that they might have at some point. They could have such swords stored away. However, I doubt Master Feng would use them. He’d probably think it was disrespectful to the blade.”

“That seems a strangely sentimental attitude,” offered Deng.

“It’s not sentimental at all. For him, a sword is a tool with a very specific function. Taking lives. Putting your feet on it stands in direct contradiction to its intended function.”

“I see.”

The two fell into silence for a time as the city gates slowly grew closer. Sen was the one to speak first.

“So, that’s really the only reason for the flying swords? They’re traditional? There aren’t some hidden benefits that I’m not seeing?”

“Some cultivators see them as a mark of status. You need to reach a certain threshold of competency to use one. Sects will often award them when cultivators reach core formation.”

“Oh,” said Sen, finally understanding. “It’s about vanity. That makes much more sense.”

“I suppose it is,” muttered Deng, directing a complicated expression at the sword under his own feet.

Changing the subject, Sen asked, “So, do you mean to fight if your sect proves as intractable as you expect?”

That led to another long silence. Sen didn’t press the issue. It wasn’t a simple question. Like most sect elders, Deng had taken oaths to the sect. It was entirely possible that those vows were powerful enough that he couldn’t refuse to protect the sect, even if he wanted to. Sen certainly intended to extract those kinds of vows from the cultivators who survived the destruction of the Soaring Skies Sect. Of course, having never been part of a sect, aside from his own, he had no real way of judging. It was one of those things he kept meaning to ask someone and forgetting about until an awkward moment. Like the one he was experiencing with Elder Deng. He was ready to admit that the moment was probably more awkward for Deng than it was for him.

“If I said yes, should I expect to receive the same treatment as Li Jielun?”

Sen blinked a few times as he searched his memory for that name in association with the Soaring Skies Sect. He came up with nothing. Granted, given how often he forgot names or neglected to ask for them, that failure to dredge up a memory wasn’t very telling.

Accepting that he wasn’t going to remember the person, Sen asked, “Who?”

The appalled look that Deng shot him told Sen that he was missing something.

“Oh,” said Sen. “Was that his name? He jumped straight to the insults so fast that we never got around to introducing ourselves.”

“Yes, that was his name,” said a clearly unmollified Deng. “You didn’t even ask before you abandoned him in the wilds?”

“Why would I ask his name when he’d already exposed his character? I already knew everything I wanted or needed to know about him.”

“You weren’t always this unforgiving, Lord Lu.”

“No. I wasn’t. As to your original question, you shouldn’t expect to receive the same treatment as that fool. You’ve never given me a real reason to hold ill will toward you. I won’t even prevent you from returning to your compound. However, you also shouldn’t expect any mercy if you try to stop me from doing what must be done. If I were you, I’d take that opportunity to retrieve Wu Meng Yao and Shen Mingxia.”

“And do what?”

“Find somewhere else to be.”

“I’m surprised that you’d give a second thought to Wu Meng Yao, after what those fools ordered her to do.”

“I don’t care about her, but Shen Mingxia does. She’ll be distraught if I’m forced to kill her teacher.”

“I wouldn’t have thought you’d be particularly interested in Shen Mingxia, either.”

Sen smiled a little when he said, “She still owes me a dinner. I can’t have her dying before she makes good on that.”

Elder Deng gave Sen a look that said the man thought he was mildly insane, but chose not to comment. As they drew close to the gate, there was a contingent of people waiting. Sen vaguely recognized some of them as people he’d met during that flurry of activity between defeating the Soaring Skies disciples and fleeing the city. He turned to look at Elder Deng.

“If you want to go, I’d suggest you do so now.”

With that, Sen flew ahead of the army and landed in front of the contingent of mortals who were waiting. One of them, a white-haired man with a long beard and fine robes, stepped forward. Sen could see the sweat that had beaded on the man’s forehead as he bowed.

“Cultivator Lu. We are, of course, delighted that you have chosen to visit our city again, but—”

Sen lifted a hand to stop the man before he said something he couldn’t take back. That moment was surely coming, but Sen didn’t want to have to kill someone in the first minute after he arrived.

“You are?” he asked.

“I am Hu Ningkai, Magistrate of Emperor’s Bay.”

“Magistrate Hu. I am Lu Sen, also known as Judgment’s Gale.”

“Yes, we are, of course, aware of who—”

“I wasn’t finished. I am also the king of this nation now. The throne ceded to me by the former king, Zhang Jing.”

That drew astonished and terrified looks from everyone who had gathered at the gate to inform him that he was not, in fact, welcome in Emperor’s Bay. Magistrate Hu appeared to be on the verge of vomiting as his gaze shifted from Sen to the army that was still approaching. An army that the kingdom had clearly equipped.

“So, before you make any calamitous statements, such as that this city is closed to me or that it has declared independence, I suggest you take as long as you need to consider your next words. They might be your last.”