Cultivation of a Wild Man in a Wild Land
Chapter 1
Sun Shui
The waters were too dangerous for a craft of their size to traverse, the shoals and shallows around the wild land teeming with all manner of beast that could rend apart the unwary or the unwise. Nay, their flying ship, smaller than the vast crafts that often took to the skies nearer the greater cities, soared with purpose above the waves, the underside a color matching that of the clouds above to avoid detection from below.
Her stance steady, her eyes following the errant flock of birds skimming the ocean's surface, Sun Shui bit back a gasp as a dark shape followed their shadow far below. Gargantuan, easily as large as their own ship, it swiftly moved through the ocean at a pace best described as leisurely.
"An abyssal sea beast," a voice beside her said. Glancing to her side, Sun Shui relaxed, if only barely, at the arrival of the ship's captain, a gruff and experienced man of their clan. "Likely a younger female, dwelling within the territory of a large male. It is not rare to see them come so close to the surface to investigate, as they must yet draw breath unlike sharks, but do not let their appearance fool you, junior sister. For all that they seem like large reptilian dolphins, they are as cunning as they are powerful and could rip apart our ship as easily as they would a large fish."
"Hence our need for flight," she finished. "Honored captain, this land to which we sail, have you ever set foot upon it?"
The captain, blessed with a tawny complexion earned from a life at sea, rubbed the gray beard braided at his scarred chin. "Twice before, junior sister, as part of a convoy for one of the Great Clans who enlisted our aid in massive supply runs to establish their fortresses on the Wild Land It was indeed a... learning experience, one that has come to aid in our clan's rise since those days."
Sun Shui controlled the tremor that ran down her spine but felt it all the same. Even after centuries of attempted exploration and conquest, the great landmass that had been first discovered well over three thousand years ago remained nearly as untouched as it had been for all its history. Scholars knew not how it came into being, with rumors abounding it was the result of a hidden realm breaking its bonds and forcing itself into their own reality. Others postulated it had always been there, simply undiscovered due to its inherent danger likely killing any that drew too near, or the wild Qi that flowed through it bringing low any foolish enough to draw close.
The Wild Land was exactly that; wild, untamed, and utterly impossible to predict, with Qi pumping out from within the deep earth in such vast quantities as to saturate the entire area. Clans over the centuries had attempted to lay claim to vast tracts of the realm, only to find themselves ruined by Qi-enhanced disasters, the costs of attempting to supply such colonies, or from the dangers of the creatures that dwelled in and around its shores. More than one clan in the past had met its end on such an endeavor, even with cultivators many, many levels greater than her.
Continued attempts to do so had been declared foolish, though in time a new method was bound to be attempted, and after a decree by the emperor himself, such newer ideas were put forth. No vast lands would be colonized, for mortals perished swiftly on that dark continent, and even cultivators were at risk from creatures never seen in other lands. Instead, great fortresses were erected, where efficiency and ingenuity were prized greater than mere brute strength and iron will. Vast tracts of land were replaced by hidden realms, in which many supplies for the fortress were grown and harvested, with running costs covered by the rich and new resources that could be harvested from the surrounding wilds. That which could not be grown or found, however, was brought in by great convoys of flying ships, many of them vast and filled with all manner of goods.
"What brings you aboard my ship, junior sister?" the captain asked, the great sea beast beneath them peeling away, likely having lost interest in their shadow.
"This one was chosen to serve as a member of the scouting party, honored captain," she replied. "It is thought that exposure to lands teeming with such Qi will aid in my… delayed progress."
"I see," the captain replied. He motioned towards the growing speck on the horizon. "Best prepare yourself for the initial scouting, junior sister, the less time we must spend on the ground before beginning construction, the better. There is no telling what our presence may attract before we are prepared."
Nodding, Sun Shui retreated from the edge of the boat, returning to her fellow scouts. The only woman amongst them, she paid them little mind, and they returned the sentiment. The youngest among them could not stop pacing, but any words of wisdom died in her throat when she heard the captain call that they were approaching land.
The waters before them grew brighter, from a deep blue to a foamy mix of turquoise and emerald, the shallows bordering an untold number of jutting rocks, sandbars, and reefs likely exposed at low tides. It was no wonder a normal ship could not navigate these waters, lest they tear themselves asunder upon such obstacles. Passing over a shallow bay, her sharp eyes spied the top of what may have been the ruins of a fishing boat's mast, the fishermen aboard long since victims of this savage land.
Up and over the coast they soared, ignoring waterfalls amidst jungle canopy and great expanses of salt marshes. The jagged rocks eventually gave way to flatter lands, within which rested the wide mouth of a river, the breadth of which rivalled a small bay in and of itself. Thick canopies of trees lined the shorelines and continued deep into the interior, the great trees beneath dwarfing those she knew from home. From their high vantage point she could see further afield, where the sharp banks of smaller rivers gave way to rolling hills of mixed trees and lower plants. Even more distant mountain peaks glowed brightly, their snowy caps a stark contrast to the lands around them. Great forms moved along the banks of the twisting rivers, occasionally obscured by colorful flocks of birds and other flying beasts. There lay not a single sign of civilization, in a world so wild and so filled with Qi that even this high above the land, it made Sun Shui's hair nearly stand on end. It was as intoxicating as it was strange.
"Your first target is to be south of the copse of tallest trees, five hundred paces from the river's edge," the captain called, his voice booming over the rush of wind. "We are to clear a spot there and determine the suitability. Should it prove unsuitable, we shall move on to another spot further upstream. Cultivators, unleash your flames!"
Along the other side of the ship, a row of men and women of the coastal branch of the Sun Clan repeated forms they had practiced for years, and in an instant, fireballs streaked from their open palms, lancing towards the ground with thunderous roars. Trees and ground exploded in great showers of debris from the impacts, further cleared by another volley from the scouring team. Further volleys followed suit, erasing much of what remained, and as the smoke billowed, her fellow cultivators retreated to conserve their Qi.
Peering over the side once more, Sun Shui watched as the brisk wind swept away the smoke, revealing a smoldering landscape. What few trees somehow stood were broken and charred husks, and everywhere else the ground was scoured. In some areas, burnt stone was present, a sign that the soil had been stripped away completely.
"A good sign," one of her fellow scouts said, steadying themselves as the ship began its descent. "No great tracts of mud, no beasts rising to meet our righteous fury, and the elevation seems relatively level from here. With luck, our first attempt need be our only."
Sun Shui nodded but did not reply, preparing herself for the coming task. The ship drew low enough that the highest elements of the further trees now stood taller than them, their greenery blotting out the sky around them. This close to the ground, she could see the smoldering remains of creatures amongst what little debris remained. A small sting flickered in her heart, but she smothered the pain, as her uncle had taught her to do after the deaths of her parents.
As the last vestiges of smoke cleared, the ship came to rest above the ground, floating high enough that most creatures would be unable to reach it by jumping, even those so infused with wild Qi. "Scouts, prepare the site," the captain called, and Sun Shui leapt with her fellows, gracefully landing amidst the carnage. Immediately, she went about her task, utilizing her proficiency in lightning to see what mere eyes could not. Where the Qi flow was the roughest was an indicator where the impurities within may lie, which could then sabotage the foundations of the coming fortress. Of this and more she made note of with a colored stake, brighter colors signifying easier issues, and dark noting those that would take a much more skilled cultivator to manage properly.
"Sister Sun," a voice said, and it was only Sun Shui's training from her uncle that made her not jump. She turned from her task, noting the quality of the robes before her and the pendant that hung from his neck.
"Zou Kang," she replied evenly. Of course he would seek her out now, when most of their fellows were off on their own tasks.
"How progresses your tasks?" he asked, his tone light, though the focus of his eyes gave her anything but ease. He'd always taken it upon himself to advise her whenever he thought it necessary, as much as she felt she didn't need it. Some called it charity, and others guidance; she called it opportunism wrapped in the guise of kindness.
"Well enough," she replied evenly, driving another stake into the scorched earth. From her sight in this quadrant, she had found no Qi faults within the rock, indicating solidity and strength enhanced by the flow of Qi. It would be a solid cornerstone for the foundation of the fortress' innermost ring. "How fares your task?"
He made a derisive noise. "There are no creatures for leagues after such a blast. Why, one might think it a strike from the heavens, or the devastation of a volcanic blast. Not even wild beasts would be tempted to linger in such an area."
Sun Shui felt something inside her twist at his words. Was he not taking this seriously? It did not matter how high he was within his clan's ranks, nor how quickly he had progressed through his foundation. Their task was a dangerous one, far too dangerous and equally far too important for lower-level cultivators, let along mortals, to be tasked with. The fact she'd managed to be recruited for this mission alone was of great honor.
"Besides," he continued, propping a foot on the corpse of a fallen beast, the smoldering scales giving off a sickly-sweet odor. "Once our initial scouting is completed, there will be some time before the first foundations are laid. The company of so many juniors is tasking for someone of mine own strength, as it would be for yourself. Might I speak with you on such matters over dinner?"
Sun Shui held back the urge to simply walk away. Whilst her uncle had taught her a great degree of patience over her years of training, others in their clan were often not so trained, and she felt Zou Kang was one of them.
Yet before she could reply, a scream broke from the edge of the clearing. She turned to see one of the other cultivators, one a level higher than her, dragged into the underbrush by an explosion of claw and feathers, his screams cut short in a gurgling instant. Forms burst from the undergrowth, their fearsome teeth and claws flanked by dizzying patterns of wicked feathers, and all around the clearing, more screams and shouts rose.
In the moment it took her to turn back, Zou Kang had already leapt into the air, directly towards the ship above. Others followed suit, but the beasts leapt after them, more than one trying to pry one of her fellow scouts from the side of the ship with their wicked talons, receiving spear and sword strikes to their faces to drive them off. She too made to leap, but the ship, at what must have been the captain's orders, rose sharply into the air, faster than she could ascend. Several of her fellows, too far to reach safety, made to leap into the tallest trees, likely to then jump towards the ship. The beasts followed suit, swarming the area even as they began to feast upon the dead and dying, and with that, her only route to safety was gone. In moments, a figure blurred towards her, its guttural screech freezing her blood even as she made to dodge. The swipe of a claw impacted her side, and even as a bright burst of red filled the air, instinct and training kicked in. Righting herself in an instant, she did the only thing she could do.
Sun Shui ran.
Her only sense of direction was the sun overhead, the wild and untamed lands offering no familiar landmarks by which she could navigate. Towards the river mouth meant certain death, as not even she could leap across its wide bank, nor run across its surface as she had seen greater cultivators accomplish, rendering it a dead end. Instead, she moved towards what she believed to be the open and hillier country she had spotted before.
The thick tropical undergrowth quickly gave way to a more temperate one, still filled with all manner of rainy plants and beasts that scattered before her. The feathered fiends behind her kept pace, a few dropping out of the chase to pursue the creatures stirred by her flight, but still three remained on her tail. The tallest of the trees, whose diameters rivalled buildings from her home, did little to slow the creatures down.
Agonized gasps tore at Sun Shui's lungs, swift feet carrying her over logs and streams, through grass and shrubs, and across rocks jutting from muddy ground beneath the canopy. Her pursuers leapt from surface to surface with an ease only the heavens could grant such ferocious creatures. All around her, Qi flowed wildly, unpredictably, saturating this landscape so richly that if she were of sufficient rank, she might have flown purely from the Qi around her.
At her current pace, in which she could feel her lifeblood slipping away with every step, Sun Shui did not know if she would survive to regroup with the others. These beasts, fierce feathered creatures with jaws lined with jagged teeth and eyes that bore a cruel intelligence, traced her every hurried footstep. Still bleeding from that glancing slash from one of their massive claws, she did what she could to staunch it, even as she continued her flight.
The beasts kept pace, occasionally screeching or letting loose low growling barks to one another, communicating in a tongue only devils would know. Clearing the edge of the trees, an untold distance from the attack, she burst forth into the hillier terrain, closer to several mountains. She had seen these from the sea, their greatest peaks capped with snow and hills bereft of trees, with only errant stumps and patches of grasses and flowers greeting her. Hill after hill she crested before she saw movement out of the corner of her eye. Danger sense, training and desperation intertwined to ensure she twisted out of the way, just in time to avoid the claws of the beast pursuing her from puncturing her neck.
Her equilibrium disrupted, the beast tumbled in the dirt as she rose again, a wide river on the downslope barring her path. Jutting from its dark waters was a large boulder, tall and weathered with small patches of moss across its crown. With a great leap, she soared across the gap and landed upon it, managing to find purchase before throwing herself again to the far side with all her might. In a tumbled heap she lay on the riverbank, for a few daring moments, before she stumbled to her feet. Back across the dark river, the beasts snarled and gnashed their fearsome teeth. She had seen them use their feathered arms and tails to glide across small ravines in their pursuit already, and from the top of the hill, such an aided leap would be almost certainly possible.
Yet they did not continue their pursuit. They screeched and clawed at the ground, digging furrows between earth and stone, yet did not try to cross the river. Was there some magic upon the waters that prevented them? Was this the edge of their territory, and crossing risked reprisal from another flock of such creatures? Or did the waters contain something fierce, something whose notice she had escaped, but would now be watchful for unwary or reckless prey?
Her bleeding continued, slowly, as she caught her breath. The accursed creatures stopped their screeching and clawing, all heads turning towards something behind her, something she could not see when tracing their collective gaze. Without another sound, her pursuers beat a hasty retreat, vanishing back over the hill from whence she'd come.
Safety was momentarily hers once more, now she needed only get a bearing on her surroundings-
A dark shape exploded from the water and rushed to her before she could react. Massive jaws, nearly as wide as she was, slammed down upon her thigh, dragging her to the ground. Hot pain lanced through her leg as conical teeth clamped upon her, and it took all her strength as a cultivator to prevent herself from being crushed by this new monster. It bore a striking resemblance to an alligator from the mainland, but far larger, fiercer, with a wide snout and a bulk that rivalled fishing boats she remembered from her youth. Her screams of pain were knocked from her lungs as it began to retreat towards the water, and it was then that she felt as helpless as the day she'd lost her parents.
A shape blurred past her, too quickly for details, and in a moment, a horrid groan came from the beast. Its massive teeth left her leg, the pain nearly rendering her insensate, yet surely she must have been imagining things. A man stood beside the great beast, powerful hands working in tandem to wrench the creature's jaws open as it struggled against his impossible grip.
Impossible. Not even a powerful mortal could pry the mouth open of a hungry alligator. A Qi-infused beast like this was beyond the capabilities of a cultivator even stronger than her, and yet… he was holding it in place, a beast so much larger than he. With a sudden sickening crunch, she watched the violently struggling beast's upper jaw snap backwards onto its own head, before the man twisted sharply with his powerful arms. The muffled crack rendered the struggling beast still, and without a word, he let it fall to the ground with a loud thud, the tongue lolling out as its death rattle seemed to whisper to her very soul.
It was then, as the man turned towards her, his features alien and unbelievable to Sun Shui, that she lost conscious. His foreign words, unintelligible and rough to her ears, were the last thing she knew before the darkness took her.
A/N: something new and original I'm trying whilst both taking a break from and trying to muster inspiration for other stories of mine. I also know very little about Xianxia and cultivation in general (outside of reading some interesting stories), and I will GLADLY take into consideration any critiques or helpful suggestions sent my way. Consider this a rough draft of sorts in that regard, as I refuse to use AI for writing my stories or as an editor (I'm too old school for this shit).Last edited: Jun 15, 2026 Like ReplyReport Reactions:Kirikllz909, Rokkag, Kaiserprydain and 370 othersAbramus5250Mar 31, 2026Add bookmarkView discussionThreadmarks Chapter 2 View contentAbramus5250Not too sore, are you?Mar 31, 2026Add bookmark#2Chapter 2
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There was no time between falling asleep and waking to make sense of it. From a soft bed inside a quiet home, to mossy ground underneath an extended log, the remnants of a tree long since uprooted. The landscape was alien, the creatures within like those I'd only seen in documentaries and in my childhood books, and the ever-present sense of danger that struck me nearly stopped my heart.
I still had no sense of where I was, even now, with a wounded woman in my arms, the first person I've lain eyes on since arriving in this strange world. It has been… fourteen years now? No, fifteen, with this last winter having finally come to an end a few months ago.
She seems different, not just in what I might called pseudo-Chinese appearance, what with the strangely off-reddish hair color and eyes that seemed grey, but the feel of her as well. Much like this world did, brimming with an energy I can't quite describe, not even after all this time, she too felt… more, in a way. A combination of a wildness that has, for all I knew, only known my own touch, and a world that brims with possibilities I can't yet fathom. Yet even then, I know I am no longer a 'normal' man, much as this world cannot be 'normal', for what should have taken days of walking with this woman in my arms took only an hour.
My strength and swiftness would put any human to shame, the biomechanical oddities of both defying all manners of physics and likely threatening the worldview and sanity of countless scientists. My endurance and durability would see entire nations arrayed against me on Earth for fear of what I might do.
Everything about me had slowly become… more, as I survived in this world.
Not lived, not thrived, and most certainly not conquered.
Survived.
The struggle at first had been overwhelming, far too quickly at that. Unable to fish near the river due to the beasts that dwelled within, and unable to hunt or forage near the forests for fear of the creatures that dwelt in the shade, I'd retreated to a small sliver of a cave, the crevice barely large enough to function as somewhere to sleep and store what few supplies I could gather. Alone, terrified, and constantly looking over my shoulder, I broke. Whether it was the fact I'd never see my old life again or the exhaustion brought on by limited sleep, for fear of the creatures that could kill me with or without intent, my tears broke my tough façade after running out of food and going hungry yet again. I raged against the unfairness of it all, of what I had loss, how everything I had known was torn from me, how I was forced to scavenge from the kills of larger predators while they slept, failing at least half the time and only just barely managing to escape with my life. I screamed every curse I knew, I cried until my voice grew hoarse, I bashed my fists and feet against rock wall and floor until they were bruised and scuffed. I'm not sure how long I stayed in that cramped little crevice, crying and screaming and wishing to die again and again and again.
Something fundamental within me shifted as I lay sobbing on my uncomfortable makeshift bed of tightly bundled grass. Whatever it was, whatever change had come over me… perhaps this woman might be able to explain it, should she survive.
Putting aside such thoughts, my swiftness brought me to my outermost stone wall, twenty feet high and constructed from the slabs of rock I'd chipped, crushed or excavated over the years. The latest of the projects I'd created, if only to give me goals to stay the madness that was surely welling inside me, it formed the newest outer perimeter of what I had claimed as my own. A homestead, well over ten years in the making at this point, one which gave me much greater comfort than the old crack in the wall I'd originally dwelt in.
Leaping over the wall with the same effort I used to take a single step, I landed softly amidst the crushed path I'd made along its inner face. With swift steps, I flew past all that I had built since that fateful night so many years ago.
The outermost fields, of small trees and shrubs intermingling with dizzying arrays of flowers and grasses. My small herds of beasts I had taken for my own, grazing, a few looking up to watch me pass by, to then return to their foraging or resting.
Closer to the heart lay my fields, within them what few plants I had managed to find were edible and easy to grow. Some I recognized, having seen things like them in my old life, but others I had come to find through simple trial and error. They lay bare, not yet ready for planting, but soon they would be.
After this stood my rows upon rows of bushes and trees, their fruits nonexistent yet this early into spring, yet their flowers blossomed beautifully amidst the soft breeze. All of these I recognized, all for the edible fruits and nuts they would bring me come the end of summer.
The nearest to my home were the barns and sheds, their original haphazard structures torn down and replaced with sturdier, more efficient designs over the years. In here I stocked whatever materials pests could not ruin, and whatever feed my beasts needed during the colder winters, when snow grew too thick for foraging. The largest and sturdiest barn, built onto the side of a jutting wall of stone, served as shelter for my beasts in the worst storms, be they summer, winter or otherwise.
Finally, past all of this, lay my home. Carved into the rock that had originally formed the mouth of the cave, where I had taken shelter from beasts trying to crush or devour me, stood my home. Formerly wooden walls now erected with brick, stone and mortar, it sheltered me from the worst weather and gave me the space to live, not merely survive.
I brought my guest into my bedroom, the only one I'd bothered to make. What would have been a spare bedroom, built in case I'd come across another lost soul years before, had slowly but surely become just another storage space. Fuck, I'm going to have to dig out one of the bedrolls. I'd thought I wouldn't need one of those again until the next big excavation nearer summer.
Stripping the light leathers from the bed that served as my sheets, I laid the woman upon it. From what I could see, the wounds on her were starting to heal, miraculously so, but then again, she was like me, wasn't she? It wasn't every day that I saw a human get chomped by what could have been a Deinosuchus and live longer than a few seconds.
The marks on her side though, those were not from the giant alligatoroid. No, I'd recognize those from anywhere.
Dromaeosaurs.
They tend to stick to the jungles and deeper forests nearer the coast and the big river mouth south of here. Was that where she had come from? Some unfortunate boat that had stranded itself or landed on the shores, and she'd been unable to return to it for safety? Or had they overwhelmed the stricken ship, as he'd seen them do with mud wallow-trapped dinosaurs, and fled in any direction she could?
At least they'd stopped coming near the river I'd saved her by after I slaughtered, like, a hundred of them or so over the years. Probably more, I'd lost count after a while and while they tasted okay, it wasn't worth the effort to hunt them. As it was, they were more of a pest these days to keep away from my herds. I've seen those bastards glide from trees or hills in ways something their size shouldn't be able to. Must be more of this world's weirdness that I don't yet understand.
After stopping the bleeding, I retrieved what I needed from my storage and got to work. Poultices and salves didn't seem to store for long whenever I made them, but they did the trick well enough when made and used as freshly as possible. I'd have had a lot more scars if they didn't do the job. As for how I knew which plants served best as a source for healing?
"Open personal codex," I muttered, and a floating series of lines appeared before my eyes. Not a screen, mind you, but what I could describe as a magical length of paper, complete with tassels and those little rollers they fastened to protect the edges. Depending on what I asked of it, it would either unfurl horizontally or vertically, though it never bothered to become much larger or smaller. As far as I could tell, this thing only appeared in my vision, as summoning it over water produced no reflection that I could see. It also opened on a number of different phrases, but I'd chosen codex for simplicity, and the unlikelihood I'd say it when I shouldn't be distracted.
"Injuries, puncture wounds, treatment," I muttered, and correspondingly, the codex flipped through to a page that gave me the necessary information. The annoying thing with this magic bullshit, however, was how direct I had to be, and how direct it was in response. Intent and general information were never taken into account, nor did it magically produce anything from some hidden random inventory. It simply showed me the information I asked for, nothing more, nothing less. Asking for my location, for a map of the land, for anything like that was also an exercise in futility. The only places it showed me on a map were places I'd already been, with the names of these places being those I gave them, and these locations were never up to date.
"Recipes, healing, poultices, puncture wounds," I muttered, the codex changing again to show me exactly what I needed, and in what quantities. Mixing what I needed and making a charcoal note on some birch bark about restocking some ingredients that could be dried and stored for later, I soon had what I needed. Carefully, so I didn't reopen any wounds, I cleansed the wounds with some boiled water as best I could and applied the poultices on her side and legs. Gingerly, I added more bandages and set her to be as comfortable as I dared set her in my bed.
I'm still not entirely sure she's real, and that instead of treating the wounds of a woman I've saved, I'm instead just suffering from my extensive isolation. The fact I speak to myself and my animals all the time, even if most of them don't respond, is probably the only reason I still know how to talk at all.
Putting my things away, I turned back to my hovering codex. This was the first time I'd brought it up since winter, when I had far less to do whilst keeping my barns and house warm and animals fed.
"Total skills and attributes," I said, taking a seat on the bench I'd made for my dinner table.
The lists that generated were not very helpful, considering what I could recall of other such magical bullshit devices from half-remembered stories and dreams. Yes, it showed every skill and attribute, as well as what levels they were at, but never showed anything else. No relationship between skills and attributes, ie how my strength affected my crafting skill, nor how each skill was progressing. I'd never seen a skill drop in proficiency, not that I could remember, nor would it show how much progress I had left before this skill reached the next 'level' of proficiency. Most of the time, the only way I could tell if I'd gotten better at, say, throwing a spear, was how much less effort I needed to nail a target at greater and greater distances.
Still, I kept a small journal of my progression over these past fifteen years, made from bound pages of birch bark. Retrieving it, I compared myself to my previous levels, of which I'd only started recording after trying to remember them every year proved too annoying. Overall, everything had progressed, some barely such as speech, and others quite a bit, such as strength, speed, crafting and building. Animal husbandry, farming, all of these had risen quite a bit, but hunting and fishing not nearly as much as they had in my early years. When I could grow a greater degree of my own food, I didn't need to hunt or fish nearly as much as before, and even less so when I had animals I could butcher instead.
Swiping the screen away, I went to my newest storage room, formerly the spare bedroom, and retrieved my bedroll. Setting it up as I could feel the sun beginning to set beyond the horizon, I realized I'd neglected my pre-dinner chores to care for this strange young woman.
"Well, fuck," I muttered. "Bessie ain't gonna be happy I'm late with her dinner. Bug zappers'll have to be happy with whatever rats and other pests they can find out in the fields tonight. At least it's warm enough that the shaders won't need feeding, what with all the insect hatches coming out from the riverbanks."
I glanced at the door of my newest workshop, functionally attached to my house like a garage would be, but with no vehicles save for a large sled I'd managed to build. As strong as I was, I couldn't always haul my biggest loads, and Bessie isn't built for that kind of work either. Goddammit, Thor's saddle still needs repair, that was on the docket for today too.
"One little thing and my whole schedule is all kinds of fucked," I muttered, rubbing my face. "All right, go feed the animals and Bessie, no, Bessie first, then the other animals, then dinner, and only then I'll get to work on Thor's harness. Just'll have to check on my guest before bed to make sure she didn't die on me already."
A/N: I haven't decided yet on a name for our MC, but in time he will get one. Don't expect him to sound very smart or informed, he's had a hard time of it surviving what basically amounts to a combination of Primal, Skull Island (2005), Tarzan, cultivation and Wild West frontier homesteading all rolled into one horrible ball.Last edited: Mar 31, 2026 Like ReplyReport Reactions:Kirikllz909, Rokkag, Kingdonut and 387 othersAbramus5250Mar 31, 2026Add bookmarkView discussionThreadmarks Chapter 3 View contentAbramus5250Not too sore, are you?Apr 6, 2026Add bookmark#22Chapter 3
Sun Shui
Sun Shui's eyes opened with graceful swiftness, upon which she immediately glanced down towards where her wounds should be, frightful recollections of horrid creatures and massive beasts giving her a sense of urgency. Her hands found fresh bandages upon her side, with similar bandages upon her legs, along with residue of whatever poultice was rubbed into her wounds. Gingerly, she moved her limbs, and felt no protest when she slowly sat upright, her Qi flowing clearly and cleanly. She had healed well, all things considered.
"Curious," she muttered, inspecting the room. It was no mud hut, certainly, with the light provided by squat and roughly formed candles mounted against a rock wall. The temperature was slightly cooler than she'd expected, with smooth rock forming the ceiling and two walls of the room, with the floor and remaining two walls made of solid wooden construction, as was the only door. Her bed was of simple but sturdy construction, with the mattress regaining its shape quickly. Gingerly, she reached out to examine her bandages, as whatever the cloth was crudely woven, and the poultice beneath had not been refined at all.
Yet, they had accomplished their tasks, as the cloth and poultice had not only aided in healing her, but they had also been potent enough to prevent scarring.
This was strange to Sun Shui. Scars had defined her ever since she'd begun cultivating, the few she bore a mark against her beauty in the eyes of many of the clan's members. Being stuck now for three years in the earliest stages of Qi Awakening had only contributed to marks against her by the others. Shaking her head at feelings long since buried, she made to rise from her bed, only for the sound of the room's sole door opening drawing her attention. A bowl entered first, large and carved from what may have been the knot of a tree, followed by the hand supporting it. The rest followed, the man entering the room unlike any she'd met before.
His body was not that of any cultivator she'd known. Too broad, too thick, too shaggy, like an old tree trunk that had decided to sprout limbs and grow an equally bark-like beard. Said beard was roughly shaped, the denseness deep and the edges bearing a wild cut, much like the hair on his head. Understandable, if the strange man lived alone, he would have none that could cut his hair for him in a proper fashion. Said fashion did not extend to his clothes, as they seemed to be entirely stitched hides of a mixture of leather and scales. Add to that his oddly shaped eyes, their irises a curiously lighter shade of brown, facial features lacking or standing strong in odd ways, and hair that could not decide if it was light brown or a dirtied gold, he was most certainly the strangest man she'd ever seen.
His garbled speech may as well have been the grunts of hogs and the sloshing of muddied boots to her ears. Whilst not a scholar, especially not in the art of learning languages, Sun Shui did not understand a single word the man spoke. Most other parts of the fringes of the Empire had at least some linguistic drift between barbaric tongues of their neighbors and that which was considered proper speech, as she recalled, but this was something else entirely.
The man said something again, though softer, as if speaking more to himself. Whilst the words were unintelligible, her sharp eyes were able to catch some expressions flitting across his odd face, though these too seemed strange. Was it possible he was embarrassed by her lack of understanding? He did not rub the back of his neck, as she had seen junior cultivators do when feeling so, merely offering what she could only hope was a friendly smile.
"I thank you, kind sir, for my rescue," she replied, giving a light bow. His owlish blinking would have elicited derisive scorn in the presence of many of her clan members, but she said nothing of it. It would be rude to be, well, rude to her rescuer.
With some more of his garbled tongue he offered the bowl to her, to which she slowly accepted, her eyes only leaving him when she glanced down. It seemed to be porridge of some kind, the smell reminding her of the oats her mother would make for their breakfast before her father would go into the fields for the day. The small floating chunks of roasted nuts smelled wonderful, though she did not recognize them, nor did she recognize the black fruits floating within. With her strength returning, she was not liable to succumb to foreign foods, but she did hesitate, only to then dismiss the idea that her savior would suddenly try to poison her.
What fascinated her more than the unique food was the Qi she could sense in this dish. She had never felt such a denseness of Qi within any meal, especially not something that could be so easily declared a well-off peasant's dish. Even the bowl itself seemed to be steeped in Qi, and the carved wooden spoon, like the bowl, seemed of a much finer quality than she would have thought the man's rough hands capable of creating. Supposing there was winter this high and far from the coast, it would make sense he would need something to focus his mind on when he was not caring for his homestead or centering on his cultivation.
Gingerly she lifted the spoon, noting it's lower sides before taking a bite of the porridge. For a tender moment, she was back in her parent's home, on a calm summer morning that would usually be followed by her aiding her mother at their market stall. Then she was back here, those memories buried once more, where the residual loss and pain could no longer hurt her.
She gave a small smile to the man, who seemed to relax as she continued to eat. The nuts were nothing she'd ever had before, being rich and with a buttery taste, and the fruit! At first she had thought it was a strange mulberry, but no, the fruit's tartness tickled her tongue pleasantly despite the tiny seeds each contained in abundance. Some were soft enough she need not even chew them, simply crushing them with her tongue against the roof of her mouth.
Soon enough, her bowl was empty, and the Qi-rich meal sat pleasantly in her stomach, filling her with a sense of ease and contentment. Her rescuer said something when she offered him back the bowl, but took it anyway with a smile and nod. As he departed, she had the thought to rise and follow, but even with her healing nearly complete, something about this situation gave her pause. Instead, she lay back down, her body willing her to simply lie there and enjoy what she had eaten.
Sun Shui knew it was so unlike her to relax like this. She should have been thinking of how best to continue her cultivation, even as she continued healing. She could have been trying to establish contact with her clan, if they remained where she had last seen them, to try and return to them. The mission was far too important to abandon to chance, especially since her uncle would be so terribly worried if he did not find her amongst the party when his portion of their clan arrived.
Yet… she did not rise again from the bed, her eyes closed whilst her mind drifted from one thought to another. Curiosity, as she had found, was a useful herb in one's 'garden', but could become a noxious weed if it was not pruned consistently. Whilst she desired answers about this strange man for the benefit of her clan, and for the benefits of her loving uncle, there was a part of her that simply wanted to learn for the sake of it. Where had he come from? Why was he alone? Was he unable to sense her cultivation, as she could sense his, despite her most polite attempts to not do so?
Why was his cultivation so… strange? It was so unlike anything she had ever sensed before…
Her thoughts departed as her focus returned to her surroundings at an unknown point. Peering around, she noticed the candles had been changed out for taller ones, and there was a set of fresh bandages on a small table she hadn't noticed before. Or was it possible he had brought that in whilst she'd been so deep in her thoughts?
Shaking her head, she looked over her old bandages. They seemed fine enough for now, but she would replace them before bed. "What time of the day is it?" she muttered. With the candles serving as her only source of light, it was impossible to tell. Shuffling to her feet, her gait somewhat unsteady but her body no longer flaring in pain with every movement, she moved towards the door.
On the other side lay a large hallway, a mixture of stone walls and floor interspersed with the same wooden slabs from before. In one direction lay a few openings and doors, similar to hers, whilst she could sense the other led deeper into whatever this rocky outcropping had originally been. A cave perhaps?
Deciding against going deeper, she ventured slowly towards what felt… lighter, the rooms she passed being empty or with closed doors. One such doorless entry seemed to be a joint kitchen and dining area, with a large brick and mortar chimney situated over a large stone-rimmed pit. Across what seemed to be a preparation area was a small table, big enough for perhaps two, and the bench beneath it was built into the stone wall itself.
All incredibly rudimentary, to say the least. Did her rescuer have no access to metals or tools by which to make something better?
Another door, larger and sturdier than any other she'd passed, lay around the corner from the kitchen. She could smell a spring breeze leaking in from around its edges and after fiddling with the odd handle that served to lock it, she was able to push it open. A late afternoon greeted her, the lengths of the shadows corresponding to what she could recall as to spring in these wild lands.
The first thing that struck her was the amount of Qi flowing around her. It was as it had been during her flight from those terrible beasts, but this was less wild, more directed in a way, and yet no less potent. Stepping down onto the earth, she could feel the grass beneath her feet sway with the currents of Qi, wrapping around her like a blanket. It flowed freely into her, like wind into the sails of a ship, and for a brief moment, she thought she might be swept off her feet with the gentleness of pollen caught by a breeze.
Yet she stayed firmly rooted to the ground, and as if her eyes had been opened for the first time since her uncle had taken her into his home, she saw the world around her with a renewed sense of curiosity and childish wonder. The house from which she had emerged was built into a hillside, portions of rocky face still exposed to the elements from whatever cave the brick and mortar now concealed. More than one chimney spouted from the top like a broken stump, the design inelegant yet sturdy and suited to its purpose. She saw no windows, though on the sunward sides of the house were sprouting tall shoots of what may one day be wildflowers.
Turning her attention away from the cottage, she saw further buildings, the likes of which somewhat mirrored the former's construction, but the design of which was markedly different. Longer, wider, with a stouter build and with fences around their perimeters, leading further afield towards more distant pastures, these must have been for livestock. She could see no pigs or horses, draft cattle or dogs, and not even chickens running around the area. Why would he need barns for livestock she could not see? Was he only using them for storage, or had all his animals died? The buildings seemed newer, given they had not yet faded with time.
Turning away and taking a few steps towards a line of trees, the blossoms just starting bud out but not yet blooming, a sudden noise brought her to a stop. Deep, guttural, the likes of which made the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Fear freezing her stride as well as he heart, she turned slowly to find herself staring death in the face.
Not ten paces from her stood a beast so like those that had pursued her, but this was so beyond them. Larger than any horse or oxen she'd seen, with terrible hands bearing three sharp claws and a maw lined with sharp teeth, atop its elongated head stood a crest whose color mirror that of deep arterial blood. Large round eyes stared at her, containing in their depths cunning and curiosity in equal measure. Were it to stand up from its crouch, it would easily be taller than her, perhaps somewhere between half again and double her own height.
She should have stayed in the cottage. Even in her early stages of Qi Awakening, as with the beast from before, there was no hope of her doing battle with such a foe. Frozen, she could feel the Qi radiating from this feathered beast, the silver and white feathers in the process of shedding for a thinner coat of rusty browns and darker reds amidst streaks of black. It was studying her, cocking its head to the side slightly, as if trying to get a better measure of her, all the while letting out rumbles from its throat that she could feel upon her very skin. Curse the loss of her weapon in the attack, at least then she might have been able to somewhat defend herself despite her limitations!
Another noise somehow drew her attention, to where he rescuer had seemingly appeared from behind the creature, carrying with him what could have been a large saddle. With his foreign words, he… walked up to this beast, this monster in all but name. Did he not see how large this beast was, and could he not sense how the Qi flowed from and through it?
He… patted it on the side of the jaw, like one might do with a large dog or horse after a long day in the fields, and the beast, it… it… rubbed its head against him?! He glanced back to her, continuing to pat the beast alongside the head, and smiled at her as if this was the most normal thing in the world to be seeing.
Sun Shui felt her head grow light before her body was falling. In an instant, she drifted away, the last memory that of her rescuer catching her before she hit the ground.
A/N: more to follow soon. Questions, comments and suggestions are always welcome, especially when it comes to cultivation and the like. Hopefully I can find a bit better way of showcasing the different writing styles between the MC and Sun Shui, among others, as writing such different kinds of dialogue from such foreign and alien cultures (literally, in this case, the MC isn't from this universe) can be tricky.Last edited: Jun 10, 2026 Like ReplyReport Reactions:Kirikllz909, Rokkag, Kingdonut and 369 othersAbramus5250Apr 6, 2026Add bookmarkView discussionThreadmarks Chapter 4 New View contentAbramus5250Not too sore, are you?Apr 16, 2026Add bookmark#34Chapter 4:
Sun Shui
The world greeted her like an exasperated mother, and for all that Sun Shui had trained mind, body and soul, she could not help but feel a strange sort of disconnect from where she lay. Had the previous bout of consciousness been real, or had she simply been witness to a healing trance-induced feverous dream? Rising as she had before, she looked over her wounds, the bandages the same as before, and her injuries were even less evident. How long had she been asleep this time?
Glancing around, the room appeared exactly as it had the first time, though now her rescuer sat on a chair, a small desk of sorts by his side as he watched her. Grumbling something she couldn't understand, he retrieved what seemed to be a sheet of tree bark and a small length of charcoal wrapped in leather. Upon the white bark he etched something for some time, then offered it to her.
Gingerly, she accepted the papery bark. Crude pictograms of some kind greeted her gaze, and although anything that might have been letters or symbols to her were a complete mystery, the pictures were mostly decipherable. A man standing alone, then chased by some crudely drawn beast into a cave. Man appears angry, then seems to build a house. Phases of the moon change, as do seasons upon a landscape, with flowers followed by fruits, followed by falling leaves and then snowflakes. The man seems to grow beard and long hair, looking rather wild and untamed by his cave house.
If her interpretations were correct, it would seem this man was brought here somehow, possibly against his will. Sun Shui was not certain what to make of that, but there were fifteen dashes and lines next to the pictogram of the changing of the seasons. Perhaps it represented the number of years?
She glanced back up at the man, who seemed to be pondering over another piece of this papery bark. Was there more to his story than he originally let on? Or perhaps he was simply trying to decide on how to draw out more of what he had gone through? Half of what she saw on this impromptu parchment was impossible to corroborate or decipher, so there was a great deal of detail and context she remained oblivious to.
Gingerly, she coughed, catching his attention to then hand back the bark to him. "I believe I understand what has… transpired," she said, the man's nonplussed look confirming her suspicion he knew nothing of the proper speech of the Empire. Still, despite their lack of ability to communicate, she was very appreciative of his hospitality. It would not be long before she was healed and ready to try to return to her clan's first attempt at a fortress.
After a few minutes of silence, or so she believed, her rescuer rose to his feet and motioned for her to follow. At least, she believed it was that, as he seemed pleased when she did just that. From the room they ventured back towards the front door, Sun Shui noticed the land was not enshrouded by the dim lights of evening, as she might have expected, but that of mid-morning. She had slept through the night after her fright!
"Damnable beast," she muttered. Hopefully it was nowhere-
A large snort greeted her, and it was all she could do to not latch onto her rescuer in surprise, instead grabbing him by the forearm in barely restrained surprise. Turning, she felt her gaze drawn upwards, the beast from before staring down at her with the same inquisitive glare, feathers slightly ruffled. How it had appeared so quickly and quietly before them, she knew not, but her rescuer, chuckling at either her reaction or the beast's sudden appearance, placed his hand fondly upon the underside of its snout. A snout, by chance, that was part of a set of jaws that were large enough bite her in half.
The beast… bowed down somewhat, the large, feathered tail behind swaying slightly from side to side as he scratched it's chin. Of the words he mumbled out, what stood out to her seemed to be that of a name.
Bess Si.
It was what he said when pointing at the beast. Was that this type of creature? A Bess Si? She had never seen or heard of anything called a Bess Si before.
Turning away from the beast, he motioned for her to follow him again, and wary of the Bess Si slowly walking beside them, Sun Shui followed. Away from the house and past the barns and similar buildings stood the same trees she had seen previously, though upon closer inspection this was clearly an orchard, as trees tended not to naturally grow in such neat rows. She could not identify the trees therein, though she suspected some of those in the clan with affinities for plants might have deduced their identity. There must have been at least five or six varieties present based upon the differences in bark alone. Further along were shrubs that once again she could not identify, with some covered in thorns and bristles whilst others had smooth or knobby bark.
Whatever words her rescuer used to describe these trees and shrubs were completely lost on her. Sun Shui was torn between trying to see what he showed her, but also keeping a firm eye on the Bess Si that followed them with startlingly quiet footsteps. A beast significantly larger than a horse should not be moving this quietly, even with the bountiful Qi flowing within it.
Beyond the shrubs and trees were something she was more familiar with. Though not the rice paddies she had grown up with, even she could recognize fields yet to be tilled and planted, the earth not yet furrowed by plow and beastly labor. Was this Bess Si the creature that would do so? Such a strange task for an animal that was so clearly meant to hunt and consume rather than just pull a plow. Yet the saddle that sat upon its back did not seem fit for such a task…
At that very thought, the creature called a Bess Si turned to look up, eyes following a series of shapes flitting through the morning air. Unable to ignore the beast's gaze, Sun Shui followed, seeing only a small series of specks flitting about as they flew towards one of the larger barns. These dark shapes that somewhat resembled bats, though not like any she'd ever seen, must have abhorred the light for they seemed to completely vanish within the uppermost loft of the barns, retreating to the darkness within.
A noise made both her and the Bess Si look back to her rescuer, the strange man seemingly amused by their lack of attention. Quickly catching up with his steady pace, Sun Shui came to a large wooden fence, built from solid logs slid into one another and driven into the ground for great support. Here, having crested over a small rise through which she supposed excess rainwater flowed, given the small wooden bridge across it, she saw a great pasture stretching out towards a line upon the horizon, intermixing with copses of trees and fields of brush along small streams whose sources she could not see. Large gray boulders errantly dotted the landscape as well, their coloration reminding her of weathered remains of crumbled cliff faces. Several herds of animals freely mingled here, their variety as dizzying as their appearance as they focused on eating the vegetation within, sleeping, or interacting with one another.
Massive deer-like creatures whose antlers alone could have graced the halls of many powerful lords and ladies, a pair of which she saw fall to the ground with nary a sign of distress from the buck in question. Was it their season to shed?
Reptilian beasts of strange proportions and flattened heads chewed incessantly whatever they had foraged upon, their braying calls an odd combination of oxen and geese.
Beasts similar in oxen, only far larger than any she'd ever seen, with horns that put such beasts from her homeland to great shame in width and length. Calves peeked out from near the cows, their small size and fuzzy nature urging Sun Shui to rush in and pet them. The fearsome appearance of the nearby cows and bulls, however, disabused her of such an admittedly childish desire.
Other creatures mingled amongst the herds, their sizes and shapes a whole wondrous menagerie of beasts she had never seen before. From smaller birds and lizard-like beasts wading through what looked to be ponds that had been dug by hand, to larger birds with titanic legs and wings far too small to fly, to armored turtles with squat bodies and clubbed tails moving about in the shorter grasses, it was an impressive sight to be sure. Far off in the distance were indistinct shapes, their forms suggesting movement, but the details of their size or even identity were too fuzzy even for her sharp eyes to see.
It would seem her rescuer was not simply a hunter. He grew orchards and planted fields, many of them a size too great for any mortal to do so on their own. Many of these creatures were of such a size that surely only a cultivator could have the strength and will to tame them as well, as strange as the Qi within him was to her senses. Indeed, the creatures did not seem overly anxious at their approach, even with the Bess Si by their side. Leaning against the fence, she watched as her rescuer called out to one of the creatures, the name nonsensical to her ears, and after a moment of relative silence, it answered in kind.
From one of the great boulders, a head leisurely rose from the longer grass and turned towards them. Thickly serpentine and undeniably powerful, with a small head at its end, it gave a low rumble that she felt beneath her very feet. Then, amazingly, this serpent rose, the great boulder rising with it.
No, it was no rock upon the landscape, but the body of an animal larger than any she'd ever seen. The lengthy neck was complemented by an equally long tail, ending in what could have been a whip lazily swishing in the morning breeze. Titanic patches of scales shimmered across the body as it shook off a deluge of morning dew, the massive legs comparable to the trunks of trees as they slowly approached, all the other animals hastily moving out of their way before they went back to their business.
The massive head lowered, much like that of a horse, placing itself just before Sun Shui's rescuer. He fearlessly placed a hand upon the underside of its great chin, smiling as he did so, and thrummed out a series of grunts and rumbles as he rubbed the length of its head. The titanic beast responded in kind, the noise shaking the ground once more as this living wall of flesh, this mountain of muscle and scales, stood before them, as easily summoned as a prized herding dog yet larger than most mortal homes.
Sun Shui was stunned when her rescuer guided one of her hands to the beast's snout. She was just as stunned that she allowed him to do this, and that the beast rumbled softer when her hand made contact. She could sense the Qi within this beast, within all these creatures and plants and the like, an overwhelming sensation that would have left her giddy were she not so entranced. This giant, whatever it was, was no mere animal, but likely bore an intelligence that only Qi could provide. Had it ascended, as some beasts were wont to do after attaining a significant amount of Qi and age within their bodies? Surely there could be no other reason. Her years of cultivation had never trained for this kind of encounter, and all of this, from her flight to her rescue to everything she was seeing, it was… beginning to overwhelm her.
Sun Shui blinked away tears. No, she did not see a spark of something flicker in the eyes of this titanic creature, she was merely seeing things in the morning light. The beast, looking back to her rescuer, rumbled again before turning away, moving slowly but surely through the field towards some distant point on the horizon.
Her rescuer chuckled. With how often he'd repeated the sound, she surmised this giant was called a 'Thor', though whether it was anything more than an animal in his pastures remained to be seen. Whatever the case may be, this 'Thor' creature was certainly impressive, and if those other boulders in the distance were more of its kind, then surely her rescuer had great difficulty in ensuring enough food for these beasts. At that, an unbidden thought flickered through her mind. Almost all creatures under the heavens had those that hunted them, and this 'Thor' would have been too large even for that titanic alligator to prey upon. If such beasts in these lands could grow to this size, then… how large were those that preyed upon them?
Her thoughts were interrupted by the Bess Si pushing her with its large snout. Giving it as powerful a glare as she could muster, which must not have been very terrible given how the beast only snorted at her, she turned to find her rescuer moving down the path towards another distant hill, the size of which was at least that of the many large and rolling hills the paddocks enclosed. At the top of this hill, perhaps the tallest for several leagues and only just tall enough she could still see the man's home in the opposite direction, she spied a distant horizon, across which flowed what may have been the very same river where she had almost been devoured by that titanic alligator.
Succeeding in not trembling at the thought of that day, she turned to her rescuer, his eyes questioning as he pointed towards that distant horizon. Was he asking her of her origin?
"Yes, I came from that direction," she said, knowing full well he did not know her speech, but at least happy some of her frustration with her situation, as small as it might be now, ebb away just a touch. She smiled, unsure if that might work, and then frowned when he pointed in the wrong direction. At least he seemed to understand what smiles and frowns meant in this case, a consistency she could appreciate, as he then smiled in return before motioning to the Bess Si besides them.
"What?" Sun Shui asked, nonplussed, looking to the saddled creature, who seemed interested in simply following where her rescuer's hand was pointed.
In an instant, the man hopped up onto the back of the beast, sliding into the saddle with a practiced ease. The Bess Si reacted with a sudden look of what could have been excitement, as Sun Shui had seen with dogs that knew they were about to be let off a leash to chase a rabbit. The man looked down to her, reach and offering his hand.
"You wish for me to ride this creature?" Sun Shui asked, looking between man and beast several times. "How can- what is- we're so far- eeee-!"
Apparently, she had tried her rescuer's patience, as he simply grabbed her by the scruff of her robes, and with the dexterity of a scholar picking up an errant scroll, lifted her up and onto the backside of his saddle. Indignant at this suddenly barbaric treatment, and more than a little shocked, she clung to his back entirely against her will, her hands feeling the strength beneath his flesh as he made a noise to their joint mount.
With a throaty gurgle that Sun Shui swore was a chuckle, the Bess Si immediately took off, moving swiftly at what it must have thought was a leisurely pace. With a swiftness greater than most cultivators she had had the honor of witnessing, the creature left the homestead far behind, moving past an untold number of fields of grass, flowers, shrubs and clusters of trees, never leaving the wide earthen path as it did so. In these fields and forests, other animals flocked and grazed, a mixture of what she had already seen and even more strange animals whose forms were unlike anything her eyes had witnessed. Eventually, the Bess Si came to a great wall of stone, stretching unto the horizon in either direction, but lacking any kind of gate. Had they come to a dead end? Surely it was piled far too high for such a beast-
Sun Shui did not scream in surprise when the beast carrying her leaped into the air and almost soared over the stone wall with the grace of a crane, nor did she wince when they landed with a softness that would have been easily missed were she not riding the damn thing. Her rescuer, seemingly unbothered by this rapid journey or the clear power of the beast he had claimed for a mount, kneed it in the ribs and directed it towards the horizon.
Sun Shui held on as they ventured onwards, heading into the wilds and, hopefully, towards where she had come from.
A/N: will be soon updating the image index for "Bess Si", "Thor" and some of the other described creatures. As for the story, let me know what you think. Despite writing for about 15 years now, this is actually the first 'original' work I've ever put out and am curious how it is now that I'm trying for a different style compared to what I usually write. Like ReplyReport Reactions:Kirikllz909, Kaiserprydain, Kingdonut and 336 othersAbramus5250Apr 16, 2026NewAdd bookmarkView discussionThreadmarks Chapter 5 New View contentAbramus5250Not too sore, are you?Apr 29, 2026Add bookmark#40Chapter 5:
Sun Shui
The homestead's outermost walls vanished quickly behind them, the horizon an ever-moving line as they traversed a landscape Sun Shui had only gotten glimpses of in her escape days before. For a moment the river she had nearly died along blocked their path, but with incredible ease, their mutual mount leaped over the river, landing without breaking a stride or a sign of discomfort.
Soon after, the rolling hills filled with groves of trees intermingling flowers and shrubs gave way to flatter lands, their slopes gentler than before and the resulting flora growing denser. Here the trees grew thicker and taller, with some bearing a glossier sheen to their leaves and with vines beginning to weave their way between branches and along trunks. The understory grew thicker as well, and the air grew heavy, denser with mist and buzzing insects. Sharp turns in streams left overhanging banks, the mud along them spread by the tracks of countless animals.
As they passed over countless small streams, the trees around them became massive, their trunks almost wider than the length of Bess Si. These gargantuan pillars were the very same ones Sun Shui had used to avoid the attacks of the feathered beasts during her first day in these lands, and it was only now that she could appreciate their sheer size. The occasional ravine blocked their path, but the Bess Si either simply leaped across or ran along a large tree trunk that had bridged the gap, their pace as steady as their unlabored breathing. Truly this creature was like the 'Thor' at the homestead, for no mere mortal beast could move so swiftly or steadily without some level of greatness in its bloodline.
The landscape around them, even as it changed, swarmed with all manners of creatures that either avoided or ignored their passing. Titanic beasts like the 'Thor' that reached high into the canopy to devour leaves, small flyers that were neither bat, insect, or bird flitting about the tall trunks, and uncountable numbers of beasts both great and small moving about the forest floor. Some bore great spikes upon their backs and tails, waving threateningly as they passed by, whilst others dove into burrows or hollowed tree trunks.
Some of the scenery was what she could remember, in a general sense, and pointing towards one of the larger ravines, one which she had witnessed the feathered beasts glide across with cruel ease, she heard her rescuer give the Bess Si a command. Without missing a beat, the Bess Si dove over the edge, eliciting a scream from Sun Shui at the beast's sudden and sure-to-be fatal folly. Instead of plummeting to their deaths, or riding along the winds as the other beasts had, it ran straight down the ravine's wall before reaching the bottom. Without so much as a misstep or pause, it jumped across the raging rapids at the ravine's bottom and ran up the opposite wall, taloned feet gouging the rock all the way up.
Her rescuer gave her a smile at her shocked expression, to which she scowled at him as they crested the top and resumed their journey. "That was unnecessary," she said, hating how foolish she likely looked. She was a cultivator, a member of a powerful clan of the Empire, and here she was acting as a fool, like a mortal who could not comprehend that which happened before her very eyes.
At the very least, he couldn't understand her words and thus could only guess at her shame. Turning away, he guided the Bess Si further towards where she guessed she had come from, the landscape continuing to change. Here, the trees grew somewhat shorter, but much closer together, with the canopy completely disappearing above a layer of vines and orchids that seemed to grow upon every surface. Darkness grew thicker, the rays of sunshine rare and stark compared to the rest of the green-tinted gloom. The air grew heavier, hotter, and the smell of decay of the leaves beneath them began to permeate her senses once more. Yes, this was becoming more familiar, surely there was only-
Their Bess Si came to a sudden stop, just as the gloom of the understory gave way to a wall of daylight. The faint scent of smoke tingled in her nose, and Sun Shui looked past her rescuer towards a great clearing. Where there had once been charred ruins of trees and animals, and soil burnt cleanly to bedrock, there were great stone walls in a great square, nearly the height of the trees around the clearing. Said clearing was larger than she remembered, the distance from fort walls to forest edge at least triple that which the clearing itself had been after the bombardment. She noted there was no gate upon this side, the sheer walls carved from Qi-enriched stone and with skills no mortal could hope to possess. Craning up past the perfectly inlaid stones, her sharp eyes detected the movement of figures across the battlements up high, further above which floated a familiar shape.
The ship! It was still here, slowly circling around the top of the fortress like a shark, though not in search of prey, but as a defender of this bastion of the Empire. The hidden fear of being abandoned, of her clan having left her to her grisly fate, evaporated in her chest. They had held firm despite the setback, and already the innermost portion of their coming fortress city was built.
Several figures appeared atop the battlements and leaped into the air, gliding down to the ground without so much as a wisp of dust. The guards of the coastal branch of the venerated Sun Clan had not come with them for the initial scouting portion, which meant that if they were here, then surely-
"Speak, before we end you where you stand," a familiar voice said, before a man she knew well emerged from within the ranks.
"Uncle Jin!" she cried, and with as much grace as she could yet muster, given the remnants of her wounds, she slid from the back of the Bess Si and strode forward, remembering the confidence this man had instilled in her during their training. "You are here!"
For the briefest of moments, she saw several emotions flicker across his face. Grief, surprise, joy, before he settled into a serene neutrality, as was his norm. "Shui," he said, swiftly taking her into his arms in the same embrace she remembered from years before. "You… survived the clearing."
There was more than a question in that, but such talk would have to wait until later. "I did, uncle, though not without assistance," she replied, the hug ending as quickly as it had begun, as too was the norm. Even all the way out here, there were standards that had to be met, even amongst close family. She gestured back to the silent man and his mount. "This man saved my life from a beast even more terrible than those that pursued me, and then treated my wounds whilst I recovered."
Her uncle looked over her savior, eyes calculating as he took in the man's appearance, that of his beast, and what lay deeper still. "You… have my sincerest thanks, stranger," Sun Jin said, bowing politely, but no more than what was needed to avoid offense.
"Uncle, he does not know our tongue," Sun Shui whispered.
Her uncle gave her a sidelong glance of surprise.
The wild man seemed to understand the thanks, at least, for he nodded in return and, without another word, turned to leave. The Bess Si gave Sun Shui one last glance before letting out a snort, and then vanished, along with its rider, back into the undergrowth from whence they had come.
"For being a barbarian who knows not the tongue of the Empire, he seemed to understand my appreciation for your safe return," her uncle said, stroking his short white beard in intrigue. "Are you yet injured?"
"I am yet recovering from wounds received, but I should be hale shortly, dearest uncle," she muttered. The guards, their own cultivation only a touch lesser than her own, produced a flag and waved it upon a staff. Almost immediately, the circling ship above began to descend towards them.
"If you are well enough to speak, then there is much for us to talk of, dear niece," Sun Jin said. "Come, let us return to the safety of the high fort, and there, perhaps over a pot of tea, I may hear of your miraculous return."
The fortified manor atop the walls occupied nearly half of the available space, with the remainder set aside for the barracks for the guards and as a courtyard for the loading and unloading of flying ships. With the manor rooms divided between living quarters for the clan, the servant's quarters, the various needs of the residents and storage for their supplies, it was any wonder to Sun Shui that her uncle had secured for them both one of the rooms situated nearest the roof. Here, high above the rest, they were graced with a view of not only the courtyard and barracks below, but also the wild lands beyond their speck of civilization, stretching far and wide towards the horizon.
"So, even from this height, you cannot see the barbarian's homestead," Sun Jin said, sipping his tea. It invigorated the soul even as it soothed the aches of her journey, and it had been a favorite of his ever since he'd taken her into his home. That it aided with cultivation was merely an additional note in its favor.
"Not even the lands before that, or the ones before that, dear uncle," Sun Shui said. "Indeed, from here I can just barely detect the change from the lands around our fortress to that of one with towering trees amidst mist and deep ravines."
"Yet you say his beast could clear these ravines with little effort," he replied. "A most curious creature, one I have never seen before, nor have I ever read of one from the circulating journals of those clans whose fortresses yet stand upon the isolated islets, peninsulas and raised reefs along the shores of this wild land." Theirs was perhaps a first, one meant to be one the mainland, and not upon whatever pocket of isolation they could claw from the surrounding sea and rocky shoals. Perhaps theirs would outlast those that had tried too far inland in the past.
"He is a most curious man, uncle, given what little I have already seen him accomplish. Beasts in his paddocks and pastures that rival anything from your stories, scores of orchards and crops I have never seen before, and buildings that do not resemble anything I can recall from my travels through the Empire."
"So you say," he said, setting his tea aside. Her uncle tended to be a man of few words, always mulling over details and avenues that she could scarcely keep track of. "Did he seem to be alone?"
"I saw not many rooms in his cottage, nor did I see anything else that might be a bedroom. If he gave me his room, then I know not where else he may have slept."
"If he is alone, then it is all the more curious as to everything he has accomplished… assuming it was he who did so," Sun Jin said. "Yet given the strange architecture of what he dwells in, I suppose it is unlikely he has simply moved into an old fortress long abandoned by the clan who tried for one so deep into the interior."
"In both my flight to his doorstep and our journey back, I saw no signs of another clan's fortress, abandoned or not. Given what little we were able to communicate, I believe he has been here for fifteen years, which would put him as arriving almost forty years after the last clan to attempt a fortress further from the coastline ended in disaster," Sun Shui said. "If that is the truth…"
"Then he presents a unique opportunity, one our clan cannot afford to simply pass us by," he finished. "With such a time somehow alive and seemingly thriving in this wild land, he will undoubtedly be a source of knowledge for plants, animals and other things in these lands. What comparatively little the other clans have returned with during their greater expeditions often bring about great fortunes and advancements in their cultivation, and allow for the fortress to not drain the coffers of the clan as they have others. Here, deeper into the interior, there is no telling what this man might have discovered, that we might be able to use for great effect for the clan as a whole." Turning to her, he looked her over, his gaze peering into her soul, not with authority as one might gaze upon a young disciple, but as her uncle, ensuring she was well. "Do you grasp what I am saying, dear niece?"
"I agree that his knowledge would be invaluable to our operations, uncle, but given what I have seen, it would do well for those who make the decision to treat with him to do so lightly and fairly, even with the short time I was in his care allowing us at least some means of established connection. I shudder to think what he would be capable of if driven to anger, as strange as his cultivation is compared to our own." Conflicts between clans and lone cultivators was rare, but every clan worth their cultivation knew that even a singular cultivator was not to be underestimated, especially one that was unknown. The first emperor's rise was proof enough of that.
"I will keep that in mind when I contact the clan elders, as the ultimate decision will lie with them, not I. As for your disappearance, it has been two weeks since you were last seen."
Sun Shui blinked. "Two weeks? I did not think it had been so long, uncle. For me, it seemed to be only a matter of a few days."
"Then, as per what you have told me, you must have been asleep for much of that time, which tells me your injuries must have been great, to need so long to recover. I had hurried here as swiftly as the ship could carry me, upon receiving news of the attack, but had begun to lose hope that I would be able to pick up your trail in these wild lands after my arrival. Yet here you are, alive, safe, and with even greater success to your name than when I last saw you."
"Uncle?" she asked, somewhat baffled. "Whatever do you mean?"
He smiled. "Your meridians… the blockage that has stifled your cultivation… it is gone."
A/N: slowly worldbuilding this is fun, but trying to then write it out without being a wall of text/a character talking at the reader will forever be a challenge. More to come soon, might also make a worldbuilding index of sorts that catalogues everything mentioned in the story in a sort of 'semi-historical' document or Wiki format for greater context.Last edited: Jun 15, 2026 Like ReplyReport Reactions:Kirikllz909, Kaiserprydain,