87 Escape

A cloud of dust burst out of one of the mining tunnels, forcing out the majority of the miners. Amidst the sounds of coughing and wheezing, a muscular figure waited for the cloud to settle before deciding how to proceed. This was a reasonable course of action, and well within the confines of his instructions. At this stage of the mining process, proceeding without care was tantamount to suicide.

This was the fourth tunnel that Cha Ming had almost mined to completion. They liked to use him for these final excavations because his resiliency didn't lose out to a demon beast's. He was a veritable human cockroach, and ideal for surviving potentially fatal cave-ins.

As the dust started to clear, Cha Ming walked forward and stealthily stole several large spirit stones, placing them in his Clear Sky World. Inside this spatial dimension lay a small mountain of spirit stones. Failing anything else, it was a piece of fortune that would never land in the bandits' hands. They were also the resources he would rely on to break through after making his escape.

Over the past several months, Cha Ming had completely remade his qi pathways and meridians. His new set could accommodate eight types of qi, seven of which he had at his disposal. He had undergone several additional inspections by Wei Chen. Fortunately, Wei Chen's plots were no match for Cha Ming's cunning. The vice leader had no way of confirming the truth of Cha Ming's statements with inquisitors, as they abhorred injustice and would never stoop so low as to aid a bandit group. As such, Cha Ming continued to mine while Wei Chen's suspicions eased up little by little.

One of the bandits assigned to guard him approached. "What do you see, Cha Ming?"

Cha Ming could tell where the guard was both by sound and through his superior soul. He noted that the guard did not have his weapons drawn as he once used to, as it had been nine months since Cha Ming's last outburst. They now assumed that he was tamer than a farm animal. The guards walked past him leisurely and began inspecting the surrounding passageway.

In this latest collapse, it appeared that a large cavern had been cleared out in the tunnel. It was roughly a hundred feet wide and tall, and it led to eight other passageways. These were existing pathways that they had not excavated.

Could this be my chance? Cha Ming's heart jumped. He was under no illusions that he would be kept alive. The bandits had hinted as much in the many conversations they held near him. They assumed that he was only a workhorse, one that they could slaughter at their leisure. In order to gain an opportunity to escape, he had played the part of the grunt to perfection.

It's time, Cha Ming thought.

In Cha Ming's mental space, his incandescent soul opened its eyes. It looked down at the slave sigil and grinned as its hand grasped it, shattering it like a porcelain vase. In the outside world, the black slave sigil on his forehead also disappeared. He willed the Clear Sky Staff into his hands, and before any of his guards realized what was happening, he used his Swift Staff Art and immediately appeared beside one of them.

Crash.

Bones broke as he unleashed months of pent-up fury, smashing the man's neck with 1080 jin of brute force. Then, using the recoil from his blow, he struck another guard in the face. A sickening crunch rang out as he crushed the man's skull. Then he channeled the power of wind to rapidly strike the remaining four bandits in succession. It only took two breaths' time. All the bandits guarding him were crumpled on the ground, dead.

***

Wei Chen was cultivating in his tent when a dull throbbing on his arm caused him to focus on it in annoyance. He lifted his sleeve to check what was happening, and he only just caught the disappearing traces of Cha Ming's slave brand.

"I was right all along," he whispered, feeling vindicated. He had always suspected the shrewd boy despite his numerous examinations. He sighed and exited his tent, preparing to head into the mines to execute Cha Ming, the misbehaving animal. He only hoped the damage Cha Ming had caused wasn't too extreme.

"Vice leader, the life slips for six of our group have crumbled!" a bandit yelled from a few tents down. The man was in charge of supervising a room filled with jade slips that contained a trace of each bandit's soul. These slips would shatter upon the death of their owners.

"Stop panicking already," said Wei Chen authoritatively. "It's just that vicious slave again. It's time to put that suffering dog out of his misery."

With these words, he summoned his archaic sword from his bag of holding and quickly flew up to the mines behind the waterfall.

***

Cha Ming wasted no time after his brief fight, not even bothering to loot the guards' bodies. He knew that Wei Chen would be arriving soon, and his only chance was to make a run for it. He looked at the eight different passageways, approached one of them, and using earth qi, caused a thick wall of earth to rise from the ground and block it off. It wasn't perfect or flush, but breaking it down would cause debris to cover his tracks.

Such a technique was completely unsuitable for battle, as each wall took five breaths to erect. After setting the first, Cha Ming sealed off six other passageways before heading down the eighth remaining one. He turned around to seal this entrance as well, using ten breaths this time in an effort to mimic those formed from the outside. Thankfully, his incandescent soul was strong enough to penetrate the earthen barrier he erected, and the task was completed without a problem.

After finishing his hasty work, Cha Ming gripped his staff and ran down the passageway at full speed. He didn't know what he would encounter, but it was far better than staying behind and awaiting his death. His tunnel branched multiple times, all while leading him in a downward direction before finally leveling off.

That was when he heard a blast from behind him.

Shit, they've found the right tunnel this time. He used his Seven Cloud Steps to move at maximum speed.

"You think a pitiful worm like you can escape me?" Wei Chen yelled, not far behind him.

Unfortunately, Cha Ming could only continue advancing along the straight pathway. Soon, a flying sword came hurtling at him, forcing Cha Ming to defend blow after blow while retreating.

It looks like this might be the end of the road. Dodging another sword blow, Cha Ming continued down the pathway, which finally opened up into a large black cave. Even while using light crystals, he could barely see the end of it. The small ledge leading into the cave ended in a sharp precipice, revealing a world of darkness below.

Gritting his teeth, Cha Ming threw down three of the light crystals he'd salvaged from the mine. They fell rapidly, shrinking as they went, before finally vanishing. The pit was clearly too deep for light to escape.

"So you've finally met a dead end, my little dog," Wei Chen said, his voice echoing in the tunnel. He appeared fifty feet away from Cha Ming, floating on an ancient-looking flying sword. As Wei Chen stepped off it and onto the ground, the sword danced around the man's body before aggressively pointing itself at Cha Ming.

"I admire your tenacity," the vice leader said. "If you surrender now, I can make this quick and painless. I'm a man of principles, after all."

"What principles?" Cha Ming replied coldly. "You're just as bad as that turncoat subordinate of yours, enslaving an entire village just because you can. How could this possibly be the actions of a principled person?"

"Well, I obviously can't let them go until I'm ready to leave," Wei Chen replied. "Otherwise they would expose this place's secret. It's already extremely benevolent that I didn't slaughter the lot. I had sufficient reason to do it, but I didn't."

"Didn't, or couldn't?" Cha Ming retorted. "I saw the lightning in the sky. You swore a heavenly oath, and since then, not a single villager has died. I'd wager you made an oath to spare the villagers. Do you dare kill me?"

Wei Chen chuckled. "Yes, I did swear a heavenly oath not to kill the villagers, and to leave them here once I'm done retrieving the minerals. In fact, it was the mayor's negligence that enabled me to enslave them in the first place. I would have agreed to not enslave them and to bring in external labor. Everything was on the table, if only I could obtain the location of the mineral vein.

"However, you seem to be mistaken about something. You and I both know that you aren't one of these villagers. You're just a man who washed up here and is staying temporarily. So I can kill you without violating the oath."

Cha Ming chuckled dryly. "I figured you'd say that."

"Any last words before I kill you?" Wei Chen asked.

Cha Ming pondered for a moment, thinking of the black abyss below. Suddenly, the fall into the unknown didn't seem so bad.

"You better hope the fall kills me," Cha Ming said coldly before flinging himself backward.

But Wei Chen had noticed Cha Ming's intent, and he sent his ancient sword out at lightning speed. Cha Ming had barely left the ground when the sword came piercing toward his heart. Unfortunately, he had no time to block, and evasion was impossible mid-jump. Or was it? Cha Ming's mind quickly determined the best course of action before he poured his incandescent force into the Clear Sky Staff. It elongated rapidly and struck a wall in the cave, causing him to swerve and barely avoid the flying sword in the process.

The rapid acceleration caused Cha Ming to plummet into the darkness. The flying sword, seemingly unsatisfied with his retreat, adjusted its trajectory. It entered his shoulder, barely avoiding key organs as Cha Ming plunged into the darkness. Wei Chen had no choice but to retrieve his sword and could only glare at Cha Ming's falling figure.

Darkness enveloped Cha Ming as he fell into the unknown. Before long, he saw a pale blue light approaching him rapidly from below. It was a relief to see that the chasm had an end to it, but he wasn't very optimistic about his chances of surviving the fall.

He waited for the impact for a hundred breaths, the blue speck growing as he fell. Unfortunately, the glow was too far away, and he could no longer adjust his trajectory. Seconds trickled by, and just when he thought he would impact the ground, his body swiftly decelerated. To his surprise, his fall was cushioned by what appeared like a soft cloud of intangible energy. Then, due to the blood flowing out of the vicious wound on his shoulder, he fainted.

***

Cha Ming woke up some time later. His wound had partially healed over, and the blood no longer flowed like a small river. In the center of the massive black pit, he saw a tall building made with light blue stones that emanated soft light. They were the same ones he'd seen while falling. There was flat ground beneath him, so he stepped off the soft material that had cushioned his fall. It dissipated as soon as he set foot on the cold, hard ground.

Having nowhere else to go, Cha Ming approached the blue building. The massive structure was a strange sight compared to the traditional Chinese architecture of this world. It looked futuristic, even by Earth's standards. Despite its advanced appearance, Cha Ming could instinctively tell it was positively ancient. It emanated an archaic aura that spoke of a time far removed from the current age.

The details of construction slowly grew clearer as he approached. Before long, he was able to see the individual blue stones in detail. Each one was engraved with a complex runic pattern. To his surprise, he didn't recognize more than one in a thousand. Those few he did were written in the same runic script that he had learned while crafting talismans.

Seeing no exits in the cave, and bedazzled by the building before him, Cha Ming continued advancing. He walked forward carefully, his staff in hand, admiring the building as he circled it. It took three hours to fully travel its perimeter, and to his surprise, there was no entrance to be found. He returned from the place he'd started, which he assumed was the front of the building. Where a door should have been, there was only a large blue wall that, unlike the rest of the building, was empty of runes.

Perplexed by the peculiar construction of the building, Cha Ming approached the stone wall until he was only two feet away and could make out the characters more clearly. They were pure white, much like the creation qi in his dantian and the characters that Sun Wukong had painted to craft the circle of protection. Each rune emanated a profound sense of meaning. One character in particular caught his attention. When he saw it, he immediately felt refreshed, as though he had just finished cultivating beside a mountain stream.

He reached out to touch this character, and when he did, it felt like cool spring water. Images flashed through his mind, as though the rune yearned to convey its name to him. It seemed to contain some sort of spirit or truth.

"Amazing," Cha Ming whispered.

Only a single character on a single stone in this massive building gave him this feeling. He felt that by comprehending this character, his water techniques would improve by leaps and bounds, and so would the water-related talismans he drew. He sat down in meditation before the building and pictured the character in his mind. To his surprise, he couldn't imagine the shape he'd clearly seen on the wall. Instead, he only saw a blurry image in his mind's eye.

What if I try picturing a small part? he thought. The character seemed to be separated into four distinct pieces, so he focused on the first piece, which gave him a massive solid feeling. An image came to mind as he imagined one piece of the character, that of a small forested mountain in the wilderness. The more he focused on this image in his mind, the clearer the piece became.

He continued to study it until he could no longer bring further clarity to the individual piece, which was still slightly blurred. Then, moving to the next one, he was overcome with a strong sense of tranquility and focus. In his mind's eye, he pictured himself in meditation. His soul couldn't help but sit cross-legged in his mental space and imitate what he saw.

This piece must symbolize meditation.

This realization brought instant clarity to the second piece of the character. Further, his understanding of the first piece increased as well, clearing it up even more. He realized that it wasn't just the pieces that held meaning but their combinations. Following this epiphany, he quickly moved to the next part of the character, where the picture of a stream appeared in his mind. Specifically, it was a mid-sized mountain stream, filled with fish struggling against the current in an effort to reach the pool of water that bred them. As his understanding deepened, the first, second, and third pieces of the character materialized even further.

Finally, he looked at the last piece. Instead of a picture, a feeling came to mind. He felt thoroughly refreshed, as though new life had been breathed into him. It was the refreshing feeling one felt in the spring, just after winter, when a draft of wind rapidly cooled the new warm weather.

It's a cool spring breeze. The combined character represents that feeling you get when a cool spring breeze brushes past you as you meditate near a mid-sized mountain stream. What a profound character!

As soon as he finished this thought, he noticed that his mental image of the character was now clear and substantial. Then, looking into his mental space, he also noticed a character hovering around. It was simply there, waiting for him to use it. He felt completely comfortable with the character, to the extent that even painting it with only his qi would have some sort of effect.

He yearned to try out this hypothesis, but before he had a chance, the wall before him began glowing brightly. He stepped back cautiously, only to see that many runes had lit up on the blue stone wall. They traveled upward and downward, forming a straight line.

Twenty feet away from him, another character began glowing, and another line parallel to the first began appearing. Finally, a much thicker line of characters began glowing up above. It lit up brightly, forming the outline of a doorway. And then, the blue stones in the middle of the doorway vanished as though they had never been there in the first place.

At the top, he saw characters that he could instinctively read in his native tongue.

"Fuxi's Library," he whispered in awe.