V5C4: The Qiang District

That was not the first interruption, but it was the only one to give her the fur – and whole body – of a beast in the third realm, so the rest were of far less use to her. Some more beasts slain and a bandit dispatched far more easily than she had expected, given that he had been in the third realm but only survived one hit, resulted in little personal progress or earnings.

Nonetheless, she proceeded on and sought out the Qiang District, and after a little while, she finally came up to another set of lanterns on poles that were half-buried in the ground.

As this seemed to be the universal method of guiding travellers within the southern regions, especially those that looked to endure a constant snowstorm with no traces of beginning or end, she followed them while remaining cautious of any further bandits and beasts that might be interested in pouncing on her. The long journey hadn’t quite exhausted her, but she knew that if she was to face too much physical stress during one day, her regenerative process wouldn’t be assisted by it in the slightest, although it might yield greater results when she has enough planar energy to constantly course it throughout her body and take advantage of the injuries to rebuild those parts more quickly.

In this case, the long-term was not as significant as the short-term situation, so she made sure to not walk into any ambushes that she might come across on the route that she was taking, although there were none that she personally noticed.

During the walk, the sky had gone from being slightly lighter to being slightly darker than before, so she was able to conclude that the equivalent of night must have come. With that in mind, as she approached a larger source of light than the lanterns she had been walking past so far, she knew that she would be best off heading back to an inn or some other place to stay for the night. There was still no need to sleep, but she had a feeling she might never refuse a hot bath after this, not for quite a long time.

The source of the greater point of light was a series of lanterns that were hanging next to one another from a wall, right above a gate that almost blended in with the wood around it due to their materials being the same and both having endured an endless amount of snow falling upon them, leading to the originally dark wood fading into a pale, almost marbled white, with only small specks of dark brown showing through.

Nobody stood at the gates, nor was she able to sense anyone standing on the wall above them, but there were traces of some inscriptions near and within the gate that would alert anyone to any attempted intrusions, with that being the full extent of the capabilities that she was able to observe for the moment. Considering just how many channels there were in the structure as a whole, she was almost certain that there were dozens of other functions that were accomplished with it, but as she did not have the energy to digest the structure in full, she could only shove it into the Ascendant’s Library and wait until she had the time to understand it.

From her understanding of the south, there weren’t many districts or families focused on the development of the great arts, at least none that were as dedicated and generally as successful as the northern districts like the Ning District were. The inscriptions in the gate were, as a result, unlikely to be of much use when it came to the study of inscriptions as a whole, but it wouldn’t stop her.

On one hand, gaining more knowledge was never bad, since it was random knowledge that had given her most of her powerful techniques, but dismissing any information purely due to its origin would be stupid. While the inscriptions may not the best, most advanced, or anything else of the sort, the fact that they are in use in one of the most stressful environments in the entirety of the Planar Continents was enough. Anything that was able to endure the constant snow would need to have at least one element that was done well enough to prevent it from being damaged by the cold, which was a far more dangerous thing to inscriptions and arrays than one might image.

Just as the heat at the north was sufficient to melt certain artefacts, the cold at the south was able to destabilise the channels within an inscription and prevent the energy from flowing along them correctly.

This was what set them apart from artefacts made via blacksmithing methods, which had the energy flow directly through the material, hence causing her planar energy to overwhelm the material itself and prompt its explosion. Inscriptions were able to endure her energy, as were arrays, while talismans likely lasted for less time in exchange for far greater effectiveness due to the intensity of her energy burning through the ink or blood used to draw the talismans significantly more quickly than regular planar energy might. When it came to pills, one’s own energy primarily determined refinement, not the actual material of the pill, and so there were no issues in that regard, which was slightly unfortunate as having her energy be able to detonate pills and other items in the hands of others would be an incredibly useful move at this time.

Back onto the original topic, however, when inscriptions were faced with the intense cold, the resonance between materials and the channels carved into them can be disrupted if they were made poorly, or if no steps to prevent this were taken, and so it meant that the southerners had at the very least figured out a way to do this with all of their inscriptions. She wasn’t able to detect separate inscriptions for this purpose, and so the method had to relate either to the construction method or the materials used. Either way, there was a lot to learn from this.

Against enemies like the Great Families, it was easy to predict exactly how they will attack and how to endure it, with the most variations in their tactics occurring during her first and last encounters with them, and this would be maintained against the Primordial Deities. However, when facing the amalgamation of an element or concept given form and a malicious will, knowledge needed to be tempered with power and the appropriate preparations to ensure that their power wouldn’t overwhelm the method used to combat them. Whether or not the Primordial Ocean was able to call upon the might of ice to obliterate her Armour Forming inscriptions, if those ever began to work again, there were still plenty of forces that could threaten and be weakened by appropriate preparation.

‘And while my head is thinking less quickly than usual, stopping and standing around for so long makes me look like I’ve fallen asleep while walking, so I should proceed, even if I don’t see any guards standing around.’

She took a few steps forward and stopped right before the wooden gates, waiting to confirm that there was no response of a hostile kind before proceeding to knock several times. Although it seemed like any sound was lost within the thick wood, she did notice that it activated an inscription whenever she came into contact with the door, and so she took a step back after a few knocks as to allow whoever received the warning to come out.

It took a little while, but she heard footsteps coming from the top of the wall, and so took a few more steps back to be able to look at the person standing above her.

Just like most people in the south were likely to be, this person was clothed in a thick layer of fur, and beneath it she was able to see traces of metal. Given that plate armour was supposedly highly popular due to giving masters of the great arts plenty of space to inscribe various temperature regulating inscriptions into the metal, this was also to be expected, and she was at the very least able to conclude that she had come across a settlement where life still existed, unlike that residence and the many lanterns that looked to remain since ancient times, perhaps when the snow was lighter.

“Who are you?” the man asked, his voice as gruff as gravel.

“I am searching for a place to rest, preferably within the walls of a district. Have I come to the right place?” she asked back, unable to determine the exact shape or structure of what it was that she had approached, forcing her to go beyond simply requesting permission for entry.

“You are in luck then, outsider. This is the Qiang District, home of the Qiang family. If you misbehave, you will be thrown in the mines, and you will be made to work, so keep that in mind,” the man said, looking her over as well as he was able to from the distance and through the snow, “Are you from one of the northern districts, woman?”

“Does it matter?”

“Are you from Yi City, or are you a savage that needs to be taken care of?” he changed his question, his hand blatantly moving to a weapon on his side.

“I am, from the Yi District.”

“Hm… Alright then, you can go inside.”

He looked to have listened to someone else while they were deciding what to do with her, and so she was able to confirm that there was likely a guard captain or otherwise some higher-up that he needed to listen to on the matter. With the stricter security than the open gates of some northern district, this much was to be expected, although she was curious to learn whether there was some situation that made them more wary of the nearby nations or if this was their standard approach at all times.

If the other nations were more hostile at the south than at the north, or if they perhaps had more power than their equivalents on the other side of the continent, then she was going to be rather concerned regarding the possibility of obtaining the spatial stabilisation point in the Qiang District.

She was obviously able to simply proceed through the districts and return to the Lan District in order to find the nearest stable gateway to the Kong Prison Realm, provided that it was still active after she had lost her connection with it, but that would be a complete waste of a journey. At the moment, the Greats were likely unaware of her state and location, and so they would have a hard time tracking her down with any accuracy, so if she kept quiet and grabbed a few spatial stabilisation nodes while they weren’t paying attention, she would benefit greatly. All of the nodes could be linked to the northern region and lead to the total benefit to her strength doubling in one go.

While it may be quicker to rush off to one of the districts under her control, it would also be more likely to lead her into the arms of the Greats, as they would be likely to remain around her territory.

Given that she had already stepped back, the gates could be opened easily enough, with the two halves opening outwards in order to grant the gates themselves the greatest possible endurance against attacks and significant stress, like that caused by high quantities of snow. On the other hand, the doors in the southern regions looked to primarily open inwards, likely due to the latter reason, as it would be difficult to open a door into the snow if there was a lot of it, but easier to shut a door if a little bit of snow got into the building.

The gates opened just enough for her to walk through without touching the side of either half of the gate, and she promptly walked inside just in case they decided against letting her inside for whatever reason.

Once she got in, however, she quickly found that things were very different inside of the Qiang District than on the outside. The constant snowstorm that barraged the walls was far weaker on the inside, and with every step she took, it was as if the weather was heading for the better, with only ten steps allowing her to see a scene that was affected only by the occasional bit of snow that flew in and landed softly on the ground.

In smaller quantities, the overbearing snow was far less threatening and more beautiful, allowing just a thin coat of snow to coat the rooves the buildings before her. The ground was kept mostly free of it, however, due to a combination of a powerful array that she was able to feel beneath the ground, and a few people that she could already see walking through the streets and swiping away the loose snow in both solid and molten states to keep the streets clean. Most of them were making use of simple techniques to accomplish this, although she could see a number of purely physical implements scattered around for the same purpose.

Whether this was to be used by the people to clear up their own streets, or if there were some that were specifically made to do it, she couldn’t know for now, but the open streets were enough to provide her with some basic guidance towards a place of interest to her.

With the sky revealed to her, the Ascendant was able to tell that her previous observations of the slight changes in the colour of the sky were indeed related to the time of day rather than the weather, and that she had arrived just at the night began. All of the lanterns around the district were enough to keep the district lit up as if it was still day, and so it was incredibly easy for her to search out a place that resembled the establishment that she had previously encountered in the village. Their architectural styles were highly similar, and so she only needed a few minutes.

None of the people she came across had any interest in speaking with her, as she expected, but just before she had the opportunity to enter the inn, she saw that on the opposite side of the stone road, she found a small store where a large number of furs and items made from it and leather were visible on display. Given the fact that every single person had worn something made of fur in a prominent place, she had no choice but to enter and find out whether or not her impression was correct.

There was nobody at the front of the store, so she took a little time to look over the things that the owner had put on display, finding that while most of the items were rather simple in nature, with some being cloaks whereas others were simply the furs of beasts trimmed slightly to make them easy to put on one’s shoulders. Still, they were well made and lacked any obvious flaws that she could observe, which was about as good a compliment as she could give to anything while being highly unfamiliar with the process of creating and using it. With knowledge of either one, she might have a number of complaints regarding every minor detail of the items, at which point she might have been dissuaded from visiting the store.

For now, there was none of that, and she had little time to consider further as the owner returned.

Contrary to her initial impression of the southerners being a purely male community – she had met only one woman so far, so it seemed to her that most of them didn’t go out into public for one reason or another – the owner of the store was a tall and well-built woman, with defined and clear muscle that was still in line with the natural shape of her body, and thus hidden well underneath a thick layer of leather and fur that she wore over most of her skin.

It didn’t do much to hide the presence of a sizeable bust, nor was it covering her hands, which were dirty but not calloused or dry, contrary to what one may find on the usual craftsman.

“Need something?” the owner asked, her eyes looking through two gaps in long brown hair. Most of the hairs at the front were cut to loosely end near the tip of her nose, while the hair at the back was tied into ornate braids that resembled certain drawings of traditional southern hairstyles that she had seen in some of the books she had read regarding the south.

“Do you accept commissions, or is this all that you sell?”

“You’re a northerner, correct?” she inquired, looking her over a few times, “Did you want to fit in with the rest of us?”

“It would be ideal not to stand out too greatly, yes. I know of some southern traditions regarding fur clothing, but I cannot say that I am familiar with them. If there is some reason that I cannot purchase these, or obtain your services, then I can leave.”

“No, if you have the materials, then I can make whatever you want. The key is that the beast you wear must be hunted by you, and ideally by you alone. The more powerful it is, the more you can be respected as a hunter and a member of society,” the owner explained, looking at the various items on display, “These are just to show that I know what I’m doing. Most of the furs are of first realm planar beasts, so even if you put all of them on at once, you would be laughed at.”

“I see. What about a third realm wolf or two?”

“Hm, with your realm… Should be fine. If you are at a lower realm than the beast you hunted, and you can prove that you had done it, then you deserve much respect, but once you go higher, you aren’t necessarily required to go out and hunt another, stronger beasts, although many do. Now, you got a wolf like that?”

Wei Yi simply nodded and reached into her pocket while turning away with her body, so that the action itself was more obstructed, and simply called upon the House of Gold and brought out the wolf carcass.

With the common nature of shrinking bags, it should be the natural assumption that someone would make regarding the origin of the wolf body, although she would have still hidden it had she had the spare bodily capacity to make use of the Dao of Law to force thinking in that direction. Without it, all that she could do was be as subtle about it while disguising as much of her movement and the wolf’s body as possible so that nobody was able to witness the wolf suddenly appear out of thin air, a clear manifestation of a spatial storage method.

From a single glance, it was difficult to tell what the highly reserved southern woman was thinking, but even if she made the more accurate assumption, she couldn’t do much about it.

“I’ve got another one, but hat one is in an inferior state, so I don’t think that you’d make as good a product out of it. How long would it take to make something basic for me?” she asked to quickly change focus to literally anything else.

“It’ll take a few minutes. I have a lot of practise, so if you want to stick around, you can do so.”

“Then I will accept that offer, if you do not object to me viewing the process. I’d assume that it would still be ideal for me to make my own items out of fur, even if few people will actually know who created it,” Wei Yi said, heaving over to a wall and leaning against it, nearly attempting to make use of her left hand to do so a little more smoothly before she was forced to make use of her other hand instead.

Whether the previous issue was noticed by the owner or not, this was certainly picked up, as she stopped in place and shook her head.

“There’s no reason to go beyond your abilities in this regard. With one hand, I don’t see how you intend to make your own clothing, even if it is only something as simple as this,” the woman said frankly, turning away and heading over to work surface, “You should also check the wound out to make sure that it hasn’t been infected, since that would be even worse for you in the long run than simply missing an arm. Alternatively, it might have frozen over and been frostbitten, in which case…”

“Well aware, thank you. What makes you think it’s recent?”

“Don’t think I didn’t see that mistake on your part. Left-handed, aren’t you?”

“I was, certainly. My left hand was highly useful, and it just tended to be where most of my powerful techniques were used from. Perhaps if I had lost only the hand, I would have still attempted to make use of the rest of the arm, but without that, I have had some difficulties with adjusting to all of this nonsense.”

“Is it not fresh? The wound, I mean.”

“Depends on how you define that. What’s the date?”

The woman took a little while to recall it, then stated, “The twenty-second of the sixth month, if I recall correctly. Don’t make me mention the year, or else I will be incredibly concerned for you and throw you to an alchemist instead of making something for you.”

“No, no need to mention the year…” Wei Yi muttered, considering the date of when she had gotten into the fight with the Greats and comparing just how much time had passed, ‘That means that, if I awoke two days prior, that I had been unconscious for eighteen days… Shit. That is not what I would have hoped for, but it has helped me with resetting the internal clock, if nothing else… I may need to be quicker than I had initially estimated, because the majority of a month is more than enough for the situation in the north to be changed greatly by the Greats and my Arbiters fighting, whether directly or not. I hope that they haven’t done anything stupid, either one of them, or else I’ll be mad.’

By the time she returned to the north, whether she took her time or not, she would possess as much strength as she had prior to the Reality Severance, even if she would only have one hand to use her abilities with, and so she would still be able to make her dislike of any actions taken by either side clear. It was not what she was hoping to do upon her return, however, so she was hoping that the strange figure that had appeared in the Kong Prison Realm would not run off after the first use of the Four Cardinal Beasts array.

‘Come to think of it, who exactly was that? Why were they helping me? Were they helping me? Was it a human being, or was it some kind of natural force, like the Primordial Deities? Could it be a Primordial Deity?’ she had a lot of questions for herself and that figure, but with the lack of connection to the prison realm, she could only put them away for now.

Seeing that the Ascendant wasn’t continuing nor providing an answer to the earlier question, the owner of the store focused on her work and quickly took apart the wolf with clear and practised precision. Her technique used a lot of careful planar energy manipulation, and so she was able to avoid coming into contact with the fur with her hands for the majority of the process. In that way, the pristine appearance of her hands, the dirt aside, made a lot more sense. Even if she wasn’t the usual owner of the store or something of the sort, she certainly had the skills to act as them in front of someone with minimal understanding of the process.

Even if there was anything unusual about the woman, it didn’t really matter to her so long as the fur was processed correctly, as everything after that would be dependant purely on her and no-one else.

A few more minutes passed until the store owner was done, and what she was able to deliver was a white fur cloak, made up of the majority of the beast’s fur. It was bound at the front with a simple metal clasp which she would certainly need to process with the Red Shaper’s Grasp if she wanted to have the cloak last any of the fights that she often got into. The fur at the end of the cloak was cut off to prevent the fur from the limbs of the wolf from dragging along the ground while she walked.

“Need help with putting it on?”

“I’m not that useless yet, so no need for that. Is it best to leave it exactly as it is, or does the south not mind if I change some things about the fur for my own personal preference?”

“So long as it’s recognisable, we don’t care. None of my business, I know, but you should take care of that wound anyway. It would be a shame if your body deteriorated as a result of it, given that you seem strong enough.”

“Noted. That being said, my body will be fine. I’ve taken a few terrible injuries in the past, so I will make it out alive. You wouldn’t happen to know whether the establishment across the road has a hot bath available to its customers, would you?” Wei Yi took the opportunity provided by the store owner, who decided to keep talking to her for whatever reason.

“Every inn and place that offers a room for the night has a hot bath in the south, as it is simply too cold outside for anyone not practising a fire or ice-type body cultivation method. The only difference is whether it is in your room or in a shared communal space. That place has the former,” the woman said, rising from the seat she had taken to work and headed back to the door through which she had previously entered, “If that’s not what you want, there’s a place three streets to the left that makes it very obvious what they offer. Anyway, I’m busy, so go away.”

The ending of the conversation was rather sudden, but given the rather direct nature of the southern people, the Ascendant just shrugged and exited the building, adjusting the fur cloak slightly before proceeding to the inn.

At any other time, like when she was in her best state and had both her arm and the spare time to do what she liked, she might have visited the other place she had been informed about and checked out the open baths, but now wasn’t the time. There was little chance of her being able to fully appreciate the baths, and she doubted that others would appreciate someone with a severed arm and a wound that looked like it should still be bleeding – which it was, being kept in only by an energy barrier and her control over her body – entering the waters shared by more than her. Even if she was a dragon, whose blood was known to be able to empower a person due to the case of Chao Jianhong, albeit with terrible side effects that included eventual death, most would prefer to stay away rather than collect the blood.

For that reason, she entered the first inn that she had come across, requested a room, headed up to it, and found the bath on the inside. It was larger than the one in the village, but not significantly so, giving her enough room to lie down in the hot water and relax once she removed her scale armour again.

With a little bit of practise from last time, she was a little more confident in removing the armour and putting it back on, although she did attempt to make use of the House of Gold to do this for her, without as much success as she would have hoped for. Taking it off was still easy enough, but she was unable to remain still and consistent enough to return into the scale armour safely. As such, she temporarily put that down the list of priorities and just took a bath normally.

After a few hours in the hot water, she moved to the bed and laid down to focus on her cultivation and mental energy.