Treasures Of Heaven And Earth

The next morning, Chún awoke as usual at dawn, rolling out of his nest of soft furs and grasses ast the Mountain planet sang with the rising of the Golden Crow, vibrating like a plucked harp at the fresh flood of Essence washing over the land.

Walking casually over to the cool side of the spring, Chún bent down and washed his face while sending a greeting up his link with Tai.

"Good Morning," responded his locus, "you will be pleased to know that your livestock is only a couple of days away now."

"En…" muttered the teen, "I had almost completely forgotten about that."

"Well, a lot has happened in the last seven days," replied Tai, "are you planning to work on your Essence Forging today?"

"Under Prince Bái's guidance, yes," replied Chún.

"You should probably go and check the 'shrine' we placed at the bottom of the trail before you get absorbed into that. Several requests were left yesterday," recommended the Mountain, "Also, I directed several packs of Essence Beasts to deal with a pair of Consumers carrying the grass cult Essence that were headed for the village. They were stronger than the last one that came through, the defensive Dao Patterns I have grown out from the old mountain site were only slowing them."

Chún sighed into the link, "We expected that. I am actually surprised they had not sent someone else before this. Did you lose any Essence Beasts?"

"Yes, a few were killed," confirmed his locus, "but compared with the explosion in the local population over the last month, hardly worth concern. The victors were pleased with the prize of Essence rich meat."

"Make sure they do not start going after humans," warned the teen, knowing what usually happened when predators got the taste for human flesh, "we cannot afford to attract more attention than we can cope with."

"I have enough connection to let them know the difference between 'enemy' and 'human'," Tai assured him, "besides, by the time an animal has cultivated enough Essence to advance into an Essence Beast, it is usually smart enough to avoid humans outside the Essence Beasts territory unless they have a good reason or overwhelming force."

Lifting his face from the water and sl.i.c.k.i.n.g the water from his face, his eyes widening as he came face to face with Shé Yin who was hanging lazily from the ledge - where the Silver Tree grew - that overhung the pool. He hissed loudly, swinging from side to side in amus.e.m.e.nt.

"He asks if you plan to spar with the braggart this morning," translated Tai, amus.e.m.e.nt clearly fluctuating down the link between them, "apparently the morning is the best time for training and Cultivation."

"That reminds me," thought Chún down the link as he dried his face with cloth he kept near the pool edge for just this purpose and reached back behind his head to start braiding his now long, thick, platinum hair into the queue he had gotten intousing to keep it out of the way of his eyes, "I know you told me a while back that I should keep the depth of our connection secret; I probably should have asked before I told the White Tiger you were my locus."

There was an amused rumble from Tai in the link, "You were slightly indiscreet, yes. But you have not actually told him anything unusual besides the fact that you have a very large locus, it is noteworthy - as shown by his reaction - but you never explicitly stated that I am fully aware."

Chún's hands paused in his twisting of hair into a braid, "I am quite sure I mentioned that you told me various things to the Tiger Prince."

"True," Tai agreed unconcernedly, "but that can easily be understood as the usual sort of connection True Cultivators have to their locus - especially larger and more powerful ones, which as a potential demi-god level Immortal Bái would be quite aware of - as is his Majesty the Flood Dragon, I might add."

"Oh. Yes, he did seem rather knowledgeable," reflected the teen as his hands started moving down his hair again, weaving it in and out with the ease of recent practice.

"There is of course, a completely different aspect here which you are not aware of, however," advised Tai, "as a mountain and a planet, my Guardian Beasts have a similar connection to me as you do. They are my generals in leading the other Essence Beasts - thus there is no need to conceal this information from them."

The Mountain's emotions darkened in the link, "When I advised caution previously, I was referring to other humans, especially Consumers but I would suggest downplaying your locus to other True Cultivators as well, I expect it will cause issues if other Enforcer realise you have the power of a world behind you."

"Especially the Eradicator faction," agreed Chún dryly, "Please remind me in future if I am about to slip up - as a human my memory is still not as good as yours, even as a True Cultivator."

"I can do that," Tai said agreeably, there was a pause and then his locus continued, "I can confirm that the Guardian of the West is in the clearing outside the cave, already doing forms."

"It appears so," Chún replied with rising excitement, "I have never had a sifu before - this should be fun!"

Shé Yin hissed agan and dropped heavily on the young teen's shoulders, "He wants to know what that makes him," relayed Tai.

"Ah… no offence, Yin," Chún answered quickly, with a quick duck of his head, "but I have only just started learning your style. And it is not easy to adapt it to using legs and arms - although I was able to use some of what I forked out to keep up with the White Tiger last time, it would be good to have someone who knows how to move like a human help me learn."

He headed out the entrance passage with the large snake on his shoulders, "between the two of you I should be able to start creating a style I can use as myself, rather than just trying to copy movement Daos."

He emerged into the still dark clearing, with only the first feathers of the Golden Crow visible above eastern horizon. Motes of Essence Sprites drifted down from the mass of the Heaven and Earth Vine as his passage disturbed the vines that fell over the opening, an extension of the colors spilling across the land as the Golden Crow left his nest.

In the center of the Heaven and Earth Vine's clearing, Bái leapt and pounced through slower, more formalised versions of the strikes and blocks that they had used yesterday during their battle in his 'human' form. The Tiger Prince jumped and twisted from one position to another rather than flowing smoothly from one to the next.

The older teenager landed in a crouch, facing towards the West, then straightened into a bow which he held for only a moment before spinning to face Chún with a grin, "Good morning Honoured True Cultivator."

Chún laughed, "Prince Bái. It is indeed. May we join you in your morning exercises?"

The Tiger Prince's eyes narrowed slightly, before he blinked, "You are thinking of melding Monkey, Tiger and Dragon arts into something that fits you, I suppose. Snake is good at connecting patterns, it is true."

Shé Yin flowed off Chún's shoulders, hissing like a teapot on the boil and the Tiger nodded, "It is a good idea - although in your case, I would seek out my fellow Guardians before you make your final choices - portions of the Vermillion Bird and Black Tortoise arts may fit together in areas you cannot reach with simply Tiger and Dragon, even with Monkey to cover the gaps."

The silver snake reared a little, the light of the rising Crow reflecting off his scales in intricate patterns as he shifted and Bái grinned and ducked his head at Shé Yin, "Indeed, as Yin says, The Great Sage might disagree that Monkey Dao cannot make up the difference, but this is one of the strengths of humans - that they can combine arts to produce something new. Personally," Bái patted himself on the c.h.e.s.t, "I have traveled far and wide - us Tigers love to wander, you know - and studied under several masters of human martial arts." He grinned again, "Many of my rivals on Father's mountain disdained the idea of learning from the 'lesser beings' and so I often had the advantage from incorporating the skill I learnt elsewhere."

He regarded Chún sternly for a moment, "When a XuanWu arrives, they will be able to help instruct you better - they are masters of all martial and war arts by nature - but keep in mind it would be deeply unwise to discount human martial and Cultivation arts, regardless of whether from the Consumer, Martial or True Cultivator schools of thought. True Mastery acknowledges no boundaries - beings at that level have often corrected the errors of their initial methods of cultivation anyway and become properly part of the cycle even if they may have destroyed much at their beginning."

Bái fell into a stance and gestured towards the younger teen, "However, I am more than sufficient to instruct you now - my Martial Skills do not lose to the Tortoise's, even if I say it myself. Learning Tiger formally as a human martial art will help you with the forging of my weapon later, so it is of added benefit there as well." He bowed towards Chún, "The Mountain requests I train you as part of my duties, but for now we are not formally master and student - I will be only teaching you the basics of human true martial forms, which should help you assimilate the Movement Daos you have already begun to internalise."

Chún bowed back and took a mirrored stance across from Bái, following his movements, "First - Quiet Standing…"

---

Chún grimaced as he straightened from the Quiet Standing stance at Bái's tap on his shoulder; his body was aching from holding the position over the last shi. Instead of sparring or even going through forms as he had thought, Bái had him hold Quiet Standing the entire time -and- meditate on the flows of Essence and breath through his body.

He was not to allow his attention to be consumed by watching the flows of Essence or his breathing within his body though - Bái and Shé Yin sparred and went through the forms of their respective styles in front of him the entire time and he had to focus on the Dao Patterns that flowed through their bodies as they moved as well and shift his to match, without breaking his own natural patterns.

"I never realised standing and breathing," g.r.o.a.n.e.d the young True Cultivator, "could be so painful."

"Hn - you are untrained," replied the Tiger Prince, "your body may be tempered and you may have Essence to waste, but you have hardly any skill or stamina. There are two types of battles - those that are over in an instant and those that slowly grind away at the participants. If you have a strong body and power you can win at the first - if you are fortunate to get the decisive strike in - but if you cannot last or outskill an opponent, you will lose at the second, no matter how strong or powerful you are."

He regarded Chún disapprovingly, "according to the stories you have shared with me, your battle thus far have been against those much weaker and unaware or battles of pure brute force," he shook his head, "I could have taken you apart any time yesterday if that had been my intent - you are fortunate that you asked me to teach you - Dragon and Tortoise would not be nearly as forgiving."

Bái grinned again, "but you will learn and you have the potential there, so only hard work remains!" He slapped Chún on the shoulder and the young teen staggered and fell to the grass, "Now did you gain enlightenment by watching us spar?"

"Some things are clearer than yesterday," replied Chún from his crumpled position, "I will have to work some of it into my own movement patterns."

"Excellent!" boomed the Tiger Prince, "After that your Essence should be running pure - it is time to forge my weapon."

Chún startled and jumped to his feet, "I am exhausted. Should we not wait until I have recovered?"

"If you were the lead smith on this, yes," replied the Tiger Prince, turning toward the entrance to Chún's immortals cavern, "but you are only supplying Dao patterns today and keeping a delicate constant flow of Essence in the balance I require to the forging. Your Essence flow when rested is normally like a flooding river, all power, barely any control. If I tried to forge with you at full power you would surely flood the working. Now at least, you can provide a more delicate touch - your natural rate of recovery will ensure you can keep the rate of Essence steady throughout. the forging process.

"It will take me years to learn the control, I suppose," muttered Chún, feeling a little hard done by on finding out that the Tiger Prince had set out to deliberately exhaust him for the sake of forging his precious weapon."

"Unlikely," Bái reassured, "your natural abilities as a True Cultivator mean that you will pick the techniques for precisely controlling your Essence when doing delicate work in the fraction that it would normally take for even the most skilled human cultivator - but I want my weapon today, not in three months time," he looked over his shoulder and grinned irrepressibly, "I am not interested in hanging around another guy alone that long."

Chún rolled his eyes as the Metal Heart came floating out of the tunnel entrance to rest in the Tiger Prince's hand. "Come on then," Bái started running towards the treeline, his 'headdress' ears and 'cloak' tail fl.i.c.k.i.n.g and switching back and forth with excitement , "I need you to make the forge to my exact specifications - we can use your workshop clearing."

The younger teen puffed his cheeks out in exasperation and followed behind at a slightly less breakneck pace.

---

Chún was glad that extremes of temperature no longer caused him discomfort, else rather than a marked awareness of the current high temperature, he supposed that he would have been reduced to dying of heatstroke in short order.

The Tiger Prince held the Heart of Metal over a strange wok-like depression that he had directed Chún and Tai to add to a large polished altar-like block of polished granite that he had likewise requested the True Cultivator raise from the ground.

Bái had spent most of a shi setting Dao Patterns into the stone block; or rather, he would spend considerable effort and time to create a particular pattern, set it into the stone, then direct Chún to duplicate, mesh and charge multiple copies of the pattern into specific locations in the stone block.

With the True Cultivator's inherent ability to observe and shape Dao Patterns, Chún was able to complete each copy requested and set them in the time it took for Bái to draw out a single example of the next series - Chún took a little satisfaction at seeing the small tells of envy in the Tiger Prince's expressions.

As the various patterns had soaked into the block of stone, it's own Dao Pattern shifted to incorporate the new patterns and Chún could see new flows of Energy and Essence forming within it via his Essence Sense.

Visually the plain granite gradually turned polished and dark, slowly becoming more angular and almost appearing immaterial as the patterns continued to be added; it looked like a patch of the night sky had been placed in the clearing with sparkling motes of light energy vaguely visible within it.

Several times, Tai and Chún had noted slight imperfections or adjustments to complete the Dao Patterns forming revealed and found themselves drawn to gently brushing them into the better shapes. Bái did not seem to notice, but when the pattern within the forge was complete it hardly seemed something of the material world anymore.

Bái had looked at the completed Essence Forge and shook his head in amazement, "This somehow exceeds the best forges in my Father's Palace - I am reminded of a Forging artifact I had the privilege of seeing used once; but that had over ten thousand years of history making some of the most powerful tools and weapons seen in several worlds."

"I might have adjusted the Dao Pattern to fit together more perfectly into a whole and integrated it with the local patterns," Chún admitted, "I could see what it was trying to become - it seemed wrong to leave it half done or outside of the world's patterns here," he winced at the chagrined expression on the Tiger Prince's face, "Sorry…"

Bái held up a hand, "Do not apologise for creating perfection. You will have merely spoilt me for using any other Essence Forge after this. I am proud to have been a part of its creation."

"I would not have known what was needed without your guidance," pointed out Chún and the Tiger Prince grinned, "that is exactly what I was hoping for when I asked you to help me forge a weapon… I will start laying down the Dao Patterns of how I fight into the Heart of Metal - if you can make sure the Essence remains steady and adjust the patterns into their most complete form possible as I go…"

Which brought them back to the both of them laying down Dao patterns into the molten globe of metal where it hung suspended between them in the middle of the white-hot depression that had formed in the Forge when Bái had started pushing Essence into it over a shi ago.

Chún was only peripherally aware of the heat; both his Essence sense and Tai's attention was consumed with watching the powerful but controlled eruption of Fire, Metal and Lightning Essence that roiled in the depression that the molten metal, now similarly heated to white-hot floated in. The patterns within the Essence Forge kept circulating the energies through it in a renewing cycle - never escaping the Forge - apart from the heat that baked the air dry.

Chún could see the flows of Essence that Bái had started and then given over to Chún to maintain being automatically balanced and shaped in specific, intricate angles, shapes and lines that molded the metal in very delicate ways, that he could never have matched himself even with his skill at molding Essence. The flow of power and Essence carried and laid Dao patterns down into the metal, with the Tiger Prince seemingly in a trance - his eyes closed and body language still - as Dao patterns Chún recognised from watching and fighting with Bái flowed from the Tiger Prince's hands into the forge.

The Forge seemed to work like a governor, smoothing out the patterns the smith provided and laying them down so intricately and tighter than a Cultivator could directly - an unbelievable number of Dao patterns were being added into every háo of the metal without interfering with each other. It also seemed to keep the environment around the material at a very specific temperature and level of power - once the smith had set it, as long as the flow of Essence was steadily maintained - the forge kept control of everything else running with an inhuman smoothness.

The young teen also saw that for every new pattern Bái sent the Forge, it was duplicating and laying down repeats and combinations - presumably in response to whatever end product the Tiger Prince was working towards. So, for every pattern Bái added, the Forge lay down several tens of thousands of tiny copies and variations all meshing into the larger Dao pattern that was being laid into the metal - and he had added over a thousand already.

Nonetheless, Chún could spot occasional imperfections in the Dao Patterns which he would reach out and nudge the Forge to adjust. Each time he did that, the forge would make any similar adjustments to similar imperfections itself from that point onward - Chún could literally see the Dao Patterns within the forge rapidly blooming, flowing and growing in complexity and finesse everytime it received a new pattern, corrected, powered and made each pattern more solid before the Forge sunk it into the molten metal.

Chún was strongly reminded of his own attempts of crafting - his gliding horse in particular - although that was like comparing a child's random scribbles to the work of a master artist.

"This is remarkable," Tai remarked in a whisper in a link, "I am learning so much just by watching this - so many improvements I can make to how my own patterns are laid out. Master Forgers usually conceal their forges, so the Land has little memory of this. Wait… something is happening…"

The Forge gave out a sudden flare of bright, white light. Through his Essence Sense Chún saw strands of Essence reaching out and finding a nearby Living Metal Essence Tree - one of the ones he had replanted and advanced when he had repaired their patterns after the Beast Wave, if he was not mistaken.

The energies from the forge grasped the tree which almost seemed to melt into flow of power and be drawn into the Forge; there was a brilliant flash of Fire, Metal, Lightning and Wood Essence as all the literally hundreds of thousands of Dao Patterns in the molten metal Heart suddenly collapsed/folded/bloomed into a new complete pattern and the familiar sensation of a strong Essence ignition washed over the young True Cultivator.

Chún blinked. The light, heat and outpouring of powerful Essence was gone - as was the flow of Essence he had been providing - although the air of the clearing was thick with wild Essence generated by the ignition and the Forging that had not been recirculated by the Forge back into the patterns it was connected to. Across from a simple block of glossy black stone, Bái blinked his own eyes at him then looked down at the deceptively elegant looking Ji that lay on the surface of the now quiescent Forge.

The Tiger Prince reached down to grasp the haft of metallic looking halberd; the sharp blades that decorated its point and the sharpened curves down a significant portion of its length glittered with deadly purpose.

"Yes," breathed the Tiger Prince as he picked it up and the blades and haft shimmered and shifted into various combinations of length and cutting, hooking, stabbing and bludgeoning surfaces. The White Tiger leapt into a dazzling display of spear forms across the clearing, trees exploding and falling like straw in his wake.

The young teen watched, recognising the same patterns of movement as before - just extended. The halberd acted like an extra limb or claw, intrinsically part of the same movements. There was no division between the warrior and the weapon - and then as the Ji ran like liquid silver up Bái's arms into a pair of gauntlets that became literal tiger claws, the weapon was gone entirely and there was just the White Tiger laying waste to his foes.

Bái remained a blur of Essence attacks, slashes, spear attacks and other expressions of violence for over a Kè, vastly increasing the size of the workshop clearing, before he came slowly to a happy, panting stop and walked slowly back over to Chún and bowed deeply.

"This artifact exceeds my wildest hopes, True Cultivator," he spoke reverently, ��I apologise - I took some inspiration from what I observed of your own staff - I hope that does not cause offense."

Chún clasped his new on the shoulder, "My staff more or less does as it pleases - you will have to ask it if it is offended," he replied humorously, "but I doubt it will care. As for the rest," he indicated the Forge and the gauntlets, "I can claim little credit - indeed I believe I have come out much the better for it with such a crafting artifact available to me now. Indeed I learnt much that I believe would normally be held secret."

Bái laughed, "Well, I work for your locus now. In a very real sense, you are my Boss," he winked, "thus we are family now."

"En," Chún nodded sagely, "I always wanted a little brother."

"Big Bro," Bái called out shamelessly, "I will be relying on you from now on!"

"You, Prince, have a thick face," retorted Chún, looking around at the mess and pushing Essence into the ground through his feet. The destroyed trees arranged themselves into neatly chopped piles of wood, while those that were only knocked over or partially damaged, replanted and healed themselves in an orderly fashion around the edge of the clearing as the wild Essence released by the destruction and creation that had just occurred channeled through him back into the land, ina a a strong burst of purified healing and enriching Essence.

The Tiger Prince snorted, ignoring the rearrangement of the clearing as he started to stalk back towards the Heaven and Earth Vine, "What was your first clue?" he retorted cheekly.