Venerable Sixteenth could not be found within his Autumnal Temple, and for this it seemed that Winter would arrive. Keen to suppress the land in his absence.

  Its retribution was swift, and unyielding, and hence bade a mountain to pierce at the centre of his domain. One finger of peerless ice to claw not only his flaming gardens but the Heavens themselves, for it surged to no less than ten thousand li.

  And truly, his household flew into impotent panic, calling upon his two great disciples for remedy.

  There came ten moons of argument, and ten years of traded blows, reducing their Master’s land to a ruination of blizzards and icy tempests.

  “Kowtow fifty times and remove your arm and I shall forgive your shamelessness!” their cries echoed in similar veins, and so the tithe would grow, devolving into threats of death and impossibility from the likes of which only an Immortal might recover.

  And at the turning of the eleventh moon, both suffered a chill. A shiver that told of their great Master’s homecoming.

  “Venerable Master Sixteenth,” they greeted, and beat their heads into the snow.

  “This daoist is warmed to see his disciples,” he returned, and gained a look of great ponderance upon looking to the mountain. “But it might be asked, why yet have you come?”

  And beneath the sheets of white, it was proved that neither could recall the reason for their visit.

  Lifting a smile to Venerable Sixteenth’s face.

  - “Parables of the Dao,” - by an Unnumbered Storyteller.

  Long held a grim expression as the final handful of Burning Leviathan Sect disciples struggled free of Senior Cheng Rao’s trial. It was one that Fu could not fully discern the motive behind, as he shared nothing of his current thoughts.

  Truly a tightness of tongues had descended upon their area, he mused, because this mood was shared amongst all gathered. Having passed through the trial himself, Fu knew well how it could sap the mind and render speech an impossibility for some time. For even in such a short passing, and in knowing it was some manner of illusion, his soul still quaked at the facade of Yuqi’s death.

  Did these disciples face similar plights? Were those he spied now mothers and fathers, were they sisters to brothers or otherwise? Were they-

  Fu rid himself of such thoughts, for knowing another’s pain was to fish from a boat without a net, an exercise in futility.

  Gaining him nothing.

  Instead he returned his tome into the belt, and put his attention to the conversing Sect Officers.

  The azure glow within Cheng Rao’s eyes had been dismissed for some time, and those same eyes were now filled with a heat of displeasure. Three cultivators spoke before him, where two stood proud with a clear disregard for propriety. Nattering amongst themselves while Fu’s senior darkened over the span of long minutes.

  But the third of this grouping held herself in a bow, and had done so since their arrival almost an hour ago. Paying a respect that carried along to her subordinates, who presented in flawless kowtow at her rear.

  “This daoist wonders on the looseness of lips, and why any judge themselves wiser than what their betters have decreed.” Cheng Rao’s address was spoken as whimsy, toned as one might discuss the weather.

  “The [Spirit Beasts] are one thing,” said the first, softly, a man with such closeness to the Ying that Fu might have mistaken him for the fairer sex were his eyes elsewhere. “But the [Dao Field] of this accursed realm has drained much of our number. Thunder from a clear sky! To march now is folly.”

  The second gave a grievous shake. A woman of mountainous stature with hair of corded braids, in fashion with the imposing [Spirit Bear] at her side. “Senior Fangzhou adds oil to fire where none is needed. But rest easy, if the Blowing Reed Troupe prove to be paper tigers, we of the Burning Leviathan will inspire you.”

  Fu spied the clear animosity between the pair, a deep, rooted thing. Borne of time spent, and fostered over years. Nostalgic in the way it evoked memories of fishermen he had known, and how they clashed over plentiful fishing grounds.

  “Shameless, as always, Manying,” said Fangzhou.

  A growl escaped the [Spirit Bear], though it quailed at the prostrate woman’s snap. “This lowly junior offers her life and her disciples to the venerable Cloudy Serpent Sect!”

  Cheng Rao noted this, gracing her once with his gaze. “A crane amongst swallows. No less than this is required.” His face was soft then, but changed in a breath. “Onwards.”

  ??

  The regularity of marching step delivered the mass of cultivators before the Southwestern Canyon Bastion in a clutch of hours, where all now stood beneath its great shade. To see it so close was unsettling, and to be at the base of such imperious walls was daunting.

  Not least in how they were swallowed by plumes of Blight, or how the structure was mired in corded roots so thick that they appeared as colossal serpents. A truth there, it seemed, for they writhed across the stonework, which itself had almost disappeared in moving foliage of its own.

  Fu and his comrades held in ranks of their Sect, delineated from their foreign allies by the hues of robes and hanfu. The Cloudy Serpent Sect held the majority in black, while lavender, sapphire and a washed grey set about them on the Bastion’s foreground, markedly less in number.

  In all, Cheng Rao stood at the head of several score.

  Or strolled, as was his way, only now reaching the roots that blocked their entrance. An impression came as he stopped, another mote of caution from Hushi. An urging that Fu took heed of, extending his [Senses] as he had before.

  Yet it returned nothing but the Qi of those around him.

  Long’s [Dantian], strangely, showed to be turbulent where many others merely quivered in trepidation. He was by Fu’s right, and noted this search as soon as it had begun. Whispering in place of a scolding. “This is soon to descend into a thing you do not recognise.”

  “Brother Long?”

  There came a forceful crack from their senior, throwing all notions of conversation aside. He had placed but a palm atop the doorway’s roots, those that barred this titan, a li’s worth in height and thirty paces wide, and they were shown to bow before him.

  Folding into themselves to place evident strain throughout the stonework, and have it crumble.

  Cheng Rao led no charge, yet strolled with his subordinates in quiet pursuit before any dust had settled.

  Verdant growth had overcome the grounds, and corded vines draped thick across many of the structures within, dangling from towers, and open-sky pavillions across a great central thoroughfare. A path that passed from this gate to the next, and overseen by a geometric jungle of moss, ivy and foliage.

  At least by that which was not lost in the upper ceiling of Blight.

  Fu was caught between Long’s omen, and the oppressive weight of Qi that lingered here. So chose to first ready his severed chain, and spy for any signs of life within.

  Both Manying and Fangzhou seemed to take umbrage at Cheng Rao’s lack of words, and the latter forced a path to his side to demand answers. “The [Coiling Star Defensive Array] has rested beneath the tallest pavillions within each Bastion, but again we are faced with the Blight. [Summer] has its pattern shift, and it is by the record of experience that I say we wait until it disperses.”

  Manying lifted her nose to the air, which was peppered less towards Fangzhou’s haughtiness, and more akin to a sniff. Her fists clenched, and she paced a slow circuit as though expecting to find something.

  “Blowing Reed,” continued Fangzhou, now in address. “Comb this area, and return here once your pouches are full. Myriad treasures are set behind this greenery, and law states that the weak are prey to the strong! Take this as your tithe, and reward for your contribution!”

  None others spoke through the following cheer. Not until Manying’s [Spirit Bear] uttered a warning growl. “Put on your eyes, fool,” growled the cultivator.

  “Is this not truth?” smirked Fangzhou, and Fu truly had to wonder what lunacy had befallen him to speak before Cheng Rao as he did. Or the pair, in truth, for neither showed him his rightful deference, and this exchange showed well how mercenary, and dishonourable a set they were.

  A pace from the Dragon’s Lair is no place to dance.

  This thought bore fruit in a flash.

  And a rip.

  For an ivory spine penetrated through Fangzhou’s chest to hold him aloft.

  The cultivators tore into action, and the front lines of the Cloudy Serpent Sect flocked in a sea of blades to descend upon a [Spirit Insect] that had begun to materialise. Arachnoid, for its legs numbered eight, and of a size that was double Fu’s height.

  But the true horror came in how its form was yet to be revealed. It surfaced through the air as though breaching above waves, with half a form still hidden.

  However, this did not stop the descent of blades, of jian and Qi, from ravening it.

  Fangzhou near slumped in two halves, his bisection a line drawn from chest to hip through spine and rib. Unnoticed in how he fell amidst a sudden chaos. As more of these [Spirit Spiders] appeared in the hundreds, drowning rallying cries and exclamations with chittering from their perches about the Bastion.

  The space around Fu was emptying, and he would not be caught short. “Hushi,” he said, his Bond already swelling in scale. And they both swivelled at a return through their [Senses], ten vertical strides from a launching beast.

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  Fu rolled from a clutch of legs, those at the fore dripping with [Poison Qi] in addendum to the lethality they brought on their own. The stone and root where he had just stood was pierced deep, and it was no sooner than he noticed than did the [Spirit Spider] recover. Stampeding in a clack of sopping wet chitin.

  The [Wind Phantom Strides] poured out on instinct.

  Fu cut through the air, chain taught around his fist, gauntleted, and his [Control] proved such that he passed through each qiang-like tip without injury. Able to crunch through its eye socket and fell it in a single strike.

  Gelatinous fluid coated knuckle to elbow, and truly it was a grim method of death. But against [Formation Realm] beasts, such a thing was essential.

  He advanced from the corpse, beset on all sides by trunks and the cultivators that faced such a forest of legs. Seven paces saw Hushi splatter a spider against the ground, which Fu leapt upon to deliver swift death.

  Ten paces, another. Fifteen saw two. A third, larger sort, crushed a Burning Leviathan disciple at twenty one.

  Slaughter in disorganisation.

  Lacerations upon his flesh caused Fu’s heart to tremble, not least with adrenaline. These were shallow things, and strangely, no malady passed through the dripping [Poison Qi].

  Though an unsettling thickness of [Dao] was present, muddying his sight in supreme displays, and more Qi joined this in elemental hues. Jade lightning, or crimson ice, [Dao Principles] that stole light, or had it wax, conjured spectres to represent weapons and laws. A true madness of power that he could no more identify than bear to run through.

  Yet he sought the gold of Yongwu Long, hoping that it might be revealed with each passing step.

  Hushi impressed danger from above, coming a half-second too late. As just then a [Spirit Spider] rotated to smash Fu backwards. Glancing, or ill-intended, the force was still enough to drive him back and into the path of another set of descending legs.

  He cursed, and sprung up in somersault to plant a kick against the closest implement, dissuading its course and landing in one motion. The adjustment of course was slight, however, and unable to bring the [Spirit Spider] fully off kilter, and so it made to crush him.

  Mandibles clacked, and-

  [Half Cloud Step].

  - Fu streamed forth with a suffusion of [Air Qi], and went flat in his horizontal leap to brush beneath the beast as it too surged. Expanding the [Dao of Reach] into his chain had it lashing and ensnare legs in passing.

  The beast crashed down when its own force caused the conflicting momentums, the strain, to tear free a good number at the front.

  For a moment it writhed, leaking all manner of foulness, and Fu chose to move on as it could present no further threat.

  He regained a semblance of progress over the course of several minutes, and soon found himself atop the closest set of stairs. A wide and mighty sort, and the first to branch from the main thoroughfare.

  Here saw more melee, holding orderly shape.

  Cheng Rao strolled, in his way, no haste about him in his ascent. Taking but a single step at a time, and his path fraught with not one peril.

  As in opposition to the tide of [Spirit Spiders], the Cloudy Serpent Sect swarmed like tumultuous clouds. Myriad cultivators, and myriad Bonds now a dome about him, unwilling to succumb to the dishonour of his intervention.

  Even holding Xianyi on the periphery.

  In three bounds Fu met her, and more so, the end of her qiang. “Sister!” he exclaimed, weaving below it and casting his [Dao] infused chain to grant a moment to breathe.

  “Fu,” she returned, now at his back.

  Thus they fell into slaughter, for their goal was as chopping nails and severing iron. Mundane in simplicity.

  Yet in this there proved an irregular sight, for the passage of time carried them into the true midst of their Sect. Seniors, Officers, and their own Hopefuls. The disparity lay in the ratio, tracked by uniform.

  Fu felt foolish to speak while facing peril, but firmed himself at the end of a blow. A smaller breed of [Spirit Spider] flying from his inverted kick. “Sister Xianyi-” he called, and found himself cut short by further swarms.

  Long holds more talent in this.

  This staircase, the third ascent they since fought on, did not lend to sureness of footing, and so he launched into the air. Xianyi plunged her qiang through the space below, [Spirit Fireflies] clad upon the haft.

  Fu’s eyes streamed as the [Air Affinity] he had known them to hold plumed into an ivory smoke, and a powder next, allowing his sister disciple to scour the spiders in one fell cut.

  A handful, [Formation Realm], or no, were cleansed of flesh and chitin under a swathe of ash.

  Fu rid the rest, bleary as he was, crashing a cloud of ash around him. Seconds were granted, but he required more, spilling out both his [Intent], and the [Dao of Suffocation] in a single pulse to further stall any assailants.

  It swept somewhere north of ten paces to prove fateful for his concerns. The irregularity. For his [Intent] was such that it held harm for [Spirit Spiders] alone, and staggered many already embroiled in combat.

  Pockets of lavender robes, or sapphire. Well bloodied, and striking air.

  “See there-”

  But Xianyi flourished in rage. “Our Cloudy Serpent Sect must be the only thought.”

  Fu saw a knowing look there, for he would not be the only one to notice how the disrespectful flailed and died. How eightfold legs went unparried, undodged, and unseen. Or how their jian struck space, and podao swept emptiness.

  The pair danced to the top of their flight, twenty paces from Cheng Rao’s ascent. A corner between outer wall and inner tower, where thin lines of cultivators clashed on tightropes of vine above.

  Tangles of web steamed between them, both aged and new, and Fu saw here the full territory of the [Spirit Spiders]. Revealed in the recesses of the Bastion. Their foes were not hundreds, but teemed in their thousands, arriving from distant corners across their network of webs to dwarf the allied forces.

  Naturally, a curse flew from Fu’s lips. “Xianyi, above!” he then called, foregoing any words of the other Sects.

  The woman’s head turned from wall to wall, and then to vine. “This is not my strength, Fu. But yours.”

  Fu cursed again, calling for Hushi as he leapt.

  With such growth as clung to the walls his grip found purchase with ease, and he climbed with haste. Something practised upon rigging, that now excelled with [Might] and [Control] to deliver him atop the closest vine. Varied things, of a thickness no wider than his foot.

  Though his balance…

  My weight does not carry over any side.

  He followed an instinct in his stride, and rushed along its length with a perfect preservation of balance. His feet were sure, and no amount of jostling from his arms seemed to shift, or threaten him into falling.

  This lent well to his following strike, where he flew to stomp through the hind bulb of a smaller spider, and leapt again. An opening step in the dance that followed.

  Fu sprung from vine to vine, and web to web, a touch of his sole all that was required to navigate this aerial maze. For every leap there came a breakage of spiders, a knee or fist delivered to smash into their sides. Their hold was such, so arachnoid and preternaturally firm, that their rigidity worked against them, absorbing all of Fu’s blows without rebuffing.

  Though they showed their superiority in movement.

  Scuttling below, or sidelong across these perilous cords to take many unaware. A trouble that pushed the Cloudy Serpent Sect into tighter confines, and those few that had deigned to join them.

  Perhaps an hour had passed since the fray’s inception, two at the most, and still Fu danced through the air. His [Affinity], and that of Hushi’s, returned more feelings of comfort than the devastation that should grip the pair.

  Up here with currents and breeze, both felt natural and invigorated, and his octopus’ prowess amongst the clutter of vines was a sight unto itself.

  So much so, that it drew a whistle from nearby.

  Fu now clashed upon a higher strata, shared by women in washed-grey hanfu. A bolt of the same hue obscuring much of their faces. “Forgive me,” one called, and released a fan of blades into a larger [Spirit Spider] between them.

  It tumbled, and Fu expanded his [Dao of Reach] infused chain to stream across the empty space. The head wound tight around another’s hind legs, and he yanked so that this woman might fell it.

  “A dragon, returning to the sea,” she clarified, nudging her head to Hushi above.

  “Gratitude, senior.”

  The woman’s eyes went wide, and of all things, she knelt. Willingly ignorant of the [Spirit Spider] springing up from below. “This junior of the Cloudy Shadow Sect is unworthy of such face.”

  Fu dropped amidst a blink, and [Half Cloud Step] conjured a platform to grant solidity with which to kick from. It had him barrel down into the face of the incoming beast, but he had developed precision over these hours, bypassing its legs to stomp between four eyes. Doing so with enough force to leap again, returning to the vine above.

  “Cloudy Shadow?” and again he was drawn into the trap of conversation. Truly, he was a fool beneath the Heavens. He bid the woman rise, and quickly. “We must face our foes,” finishing these words in the face of another swarm.

  Hushi writhed along the vines moments later, and his reach was so vast that he touched upon many at once. The coil at the tip of each [Air Qi] wrapped arm, a fulcrum, and one that gave him unprecedented control over his direction.

  But his form reduced in a span of seconds, and he shot to Fu to latch upon his neck.

  [Half Cloud Step] subsided at the cultivator’s command, and he poured out his [Intent] to grant the octopus spare moments to ready himself.

  Fu could not equate their current height to mortal standards, for he had few experiences outside of the Bastion that could describe it. Stories, perhaps. Five lengths of a storefront, or twenty times as tall as his boat. Certainly less than the Cloudy Serpent Sect’s flying warships.

  Regardless, the [Air Qi] was dense, and even partial meditation would see a return to their supply.

  So his movement fell to a weaving sort, and Fu retracted from the bulk of combat to trace a route through the lower vines. Without the suffusion of his [Art] it was a slower process, yet one he could manage with attributes alone. [Control] and [Might], his true strengths, navigated him into the folds of his comrades.

  Two of the Serpent, one of the Shadow, and one of the Burning Leviathan.

  They were of the acrobatic sort, holding grace where he held pure momentum, and seemed ethereal upon the vines. Slight movements. Underexaggerated to display the higher rank of [Prowess], where a backstep, or half-twist would see them from the safety of myriad legs.

  Fu crunched down gracelessly, embalming his chain-wrapped fist into a spider’s eye socket to great effect. “Brother,” said one, curt and polite.

  “Brother,” he returned, and left no address for the Cloudy Shadow cultivator for fear of a repetition. Nor would he distract the Burning Leviathan, as she required each mite of attention she could muster.

  Her qiang thrust out with sloppy, maddened strikes. Again hitting the space between spiders, fruitless. Fu bounded past her, spinning an axe kick into a smaller foe at her side and having it launch at the woman’s Bond.

  A swollen shark of maroon, now struck in the rear by this [Spirit Spider].

  The reaction that followed had Fu grimace, as this kick had not destroyed the creature, and rather gained it an unaware target. Eight legs wrapped, and a jettison of web flowed from its spinneret to ensnare it.

  So rapid that no defence could be mounted.

  The flesh of the shark bulged between tightened web, drawing blood, and a shared horror in the cultivator. Who now choked, and constricted as though her own body was entangled in this [Poison Qi] rich string.

  With a guilty step Fu blurred forth to end the attacking beast, and whirled to see if this woman was free of his infliction. “Apologies,” he might have said, if a [Spirit Spider] had not then staked her through the heart, much the same fate as Fangzhou had suffered.

  It was descended upon in moments, and felled in less. One of his comrades, a [Spirit] cultivator, released his [Dao] to infuse a [Spirit Serpent] with teeth of shimmering orange. The bite rid their foe of fluid and mass, and it shrivelled to a brittle husk before falling.

  That is another death to add to my name. The list… the list. What length of scroll will I need by the time my children are free of debt?

  Commiserations were due. Apologies, and judgement in turn. Thus Fu made to dip his shameful form, stopping when some cruel smile was spied upon a comrade. In truth, it was no different than any other. Toothy, and pleasant, worn by those under the granted mirth of a good joke, or a tale told by hearth.

  To see it borne from… this. Fu could only move on and re-enter the fray.

  His chain smashed, his foot cracked, and he leapt, thinking that this was all his routine encompassed. Over the course he would gain a scratch, or a tear from a spider’s leg. He might stutter on swaying vines, and feel the heat of Qi as those on the path of [Mind] instructed the spiders of their power.

  Oblivious to the quiet component of this cycle.

  “Hushi,” he called at a height higher than sense would dictate.

  The octopus surfaced, well aware of his thoughts, and in place of comfort warned of the distant shapes far below. Of Cheng Rao and his ascent, having Fu firm his jaw under the recollection of what Long had whispered to him.

  This is soon to descend into a thing you do not recognise.

  Which was a truth lost on Fu, for he could not fathom how he had known, and brought questions he had no time to parse. For neither Heaven nor spiders would spare him should his thoughts flock to absurdity.