Chapter 2: Deadhead (2)

Life was cheap in this world, but it wasn't free. Cultivators wielded great power to reshape the world around them, but at the end of the day they did live in a society. Most cultivators could get through the day without indulging in a murder spree.

There were plenty of cultivators out there who got away with murder, of course. Muchen just counted himself lucky that the Qianzhan Continent at least wasn't the sort of place where any random cultivator might slaughter a whole city if one of the locals offended him.

Practically speaking, the driving force behind all the little injustices heaped on the ordinary people of Qianzhan Continent was the fact that any cultivator accused of a crime would face trial at the hands of their own sect. It wasn't a total sham, but the scales of justice naturally tended to tilt in their favor. Any punishments dished out had more to do with whether the disciple's actions had harmed the reputation of their sect rather than any abstract notion of right and wrong.

For Muchen, the bottom line was that it was possible to do business with a cultivator without getting himself killed, but he did have to be a little clever about it. Basically, he needed to keep in mind that on his counterpart's internal balance sheet, the cost of "murdering the mortal and taking his stuff" was six months to a year of imprisonment, give or take. So he just had to avoid showing up in front of a cultivator carrying the kinds of riches that made that cost look acceptable.

Be polite. Offer up a win-win transaction. Don't make it seem like robbing and killing him was worth the hassle. Simple enough. Not easy, necessarily, but simple.

It helped that he knew his target. Steward Fu managed a small group of outer disciples for the Cloudy Peak sect. While outer disciples occupied the lowest place in the sect's pecking order, the man put in charge of overseeing their day to day activities didn't enjoy much more favor. Steward Fu was guaranteed a comfortable life as part of the sect's administrative apparatus, but it would be almost impossible for him to climb the ranks any further or to make any more progress along the path to immortality.

Some men in his situation would redouble their efforts in an attempt to defy fate. Steward Fu was more the sort who took the absence of an obvious path forward as an excuse to stop walking.

His duties left him idle most mornings. While there were no facilities catering to mortal vices on the sect grounds, the nearby settlement was not so constrained. The small mortal town had been built up over time to provide for the sect's need for mortal products. Naturally it had also expanded to indulge the appetites that sect members couldn't satisfy up on their mountaintops.

Not that the whole town was a den of debauchery, but it wasn't hard for Muchen to find the intersection that hosted the four largest drinking establishments for miles around. He suspected that at least one of them also played host to an underground casino. Finding a place to gamble would have been a little dangerous, but fortunately there was no need: Steward Fu had a table to himself in the second bar Muchen checked.

Noon was still a couple of hours away, but it looked like the steward had already been drinking for a while. With any luck he'd be feeling pleasantly mellow rather than full on blackout drunk, but it was hard to judge that kind of thing when it came to cultivators. Muchen suspected that even a low level cultivator like Steward Fu could shrug off the effects of alcohol in an instant, should he feel threatened.

It was just as well that Muchen wasn't very threatening. He approached Steward Fu's table with a bottle of wine held out before him like a protective talisman.

Steward Fu looked only mildly perturbed at the interruption. At least, Muchen decided to interpret his raised eyebrow as an invitation rather than a death threat.

"I have been told this is an excellent vintage," Muchen said, "My taste is not refined enough to confirm the truth by myself."

He set the bottle on the table. Steward Fu took a casual glance at it, then fixed it with a more intent look. Muchen suppressed a smile. His target had taken the bait.

As well he should. That single bottle of wine had cost over fifty taels of silver. And that was on the southern coast of the Qianzhan Continent, hundreds of miles from the Cloudy Peaks Sect. The fact that a teenager had managed to make such a trip without losing the bottle somewhere along the way was nothing less than a miracle in its own right.

Steward Fu opened the bottle with practiced ease, then poured a small measure of wine into the porcelain bowl in front of him. He lifted it and savored the scent for a moment before taking a sip. He held that position for several breaths before carefully lowering the bowl back to the table.

"Good wine!"

He looked at the bottle for a moment, then moved with some reluctance to push it back over to Muchen's side of the table. Muchen held up his hands to stop him.

"Please," he said, "good wine deserves to go to somebody who will appreciate it."

Steward Fu studied him for a moment. His hand was honest, though, drawing the bottle back into a protective embrace. "I suppose you're right."

Muchen smiled. The bribe had been delivered. Now it was just a matter of cashing out the favor he'd purchased without overstepping his bounds and getting himself killed.

It was all about striking a balance. A bottle of wine was nothing special on the scale of the Cloudy Peaks Sect, of course. Nor would it be particularly impressive to the higher ups. That flying cultivator he'd seen the other day would never have bothered to land and pick up a bottle even if he saw it lying unattended in a field. But for somebody like Steward Fu, stuck on sect grounds without much cash income to speak of, the gift of wine ought to create a reasonable sense of gratitude.

Still, that would all amount to nothing if Muchen failed to strike while the iron was hot.

"I've long admired Steward Fu's capability," Muchen said. "The disciples under your hands must produce tons of spirit rice every year."

Steward Fu smiled politely at the praise. "More than you could count in a month."

"I imagine it's difficult to keep track of just how much," Muchen said, then sighed. "I've often dreamed of carrying such precious cargo, even though a single mule cart could hardly haul away enough spirit rice for you to notice."

"Oh?" Steward Fu asked, raising an eyebrow as he poured himself another bowl of wine.

"I have been saving for some time," Muchen said. "I wonder if one hundred taels of silver would be enough to buy two thousand pounds of spirit rice. Low grade, of course."

There was no wholesale market for spirit rice. Not really. The Cloudy Peaks Sect didn't trade with mortals on any kind of large scale for any products. They received a steady stream of silver by virtue of their place as one of the five hegemons in charge of the Qianzhan Empire. That silver was more than the sect would ever need to buy any mortal trinkets that caught their eye.

There was no need for the sect to grow cash crops for mortals. Muchen assumed they were more active in buying and selling crops that were useful for cultivators, but low grade spirit rice hardly qualified on that front.

That wasn't to say that it was useless. Even low grade spirit rice was a blessing for mortals and low level cultivators. Eating it fed the body with a small supply of spiritual energy in its most gentle form. Without active direction, the spiritual energy would nourish the body. A single meal was enough to blunt the edges of most chronic mortal ailments. A week's supply was enough to cure most any nagging problems that might trouble an ordinary man.

The Cloudy Peaks Sect grew the stuff for its own internal use. They didn't need to make money by selling it, but they did aim to nurture even the lowliest disciple, at least to some extent. It was also impossible to grow the higher grades of spirit rice without planting large fields of the lower level crop.

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If there was one reason Muchen had considered following through on the original's plan to bribe his way into the Cloudy Peaks Sect, it was the food. Eating spirit rice for every meal would help disciples of even the lowest aptitude take the first steps along the path of cultivation. In the end, though, he'd decided that the loss of freedom wasn't worth it. Not to mention that he could procure his own spirit rice.

Steward Fu took a sip of the wine, a calculating look in his eyes. "One hundred and fifty taels."

Muchen winced. After parting with that bottle of wine, his entire life savings had been reduced to a hundred and sixty taels. He'd been hoping to hold back a bit more silver so that he'd be able to get back on his feet in case this business venture didn't work out. After all, he knew spirit rice was valuable, but he'd never actually sold it to consumers.

"Perhaps a hundred and twenty?" he asked. "Spreading the benefits of even low grade spirit rice across the land would be a benevolent act."

The Cloudy Peaks Sect at least gave lip service to the idea of earning merit by helping the people. Muchen didn't think that karma had any active influence on cultivation progress—at least, the powerful cultivators that he'd heard of didn't restrain themselves much on account of any moral qualms—but there was no harm in trying to appeal to Steward Fu's vanity.

Steward Fu responded with a wry grin. "Benevolence is benevolence, and silver is silver. I'm not the only one guarding the storehouse. One fifty."

Knowing that Steward Fu wouldn't be pocketing all of the silver for himself took some of the sting out of it. Muchen still felt some reluctance at the thought of staking nearly all of his life's savings on one roll of the dice.

"It's a little difficult for this one to take out so much silver all at once."

Steward Fu shrugged. "One hundred taels for a thousand pounds of spirit rice. One fifty for a ton is a bargain."

It was hard to see it as a bargain when he was paying more than ten times the price of ordinary rice by weight. Still, it was obvious that Steward Fu had no intention of bargaining on the price. One of the hazards of paying a bribe just to get a meeting was that it was hard to walk away just because he was unhappy with the price on offer.

"I suppose I can scrape a hundred and fifty taels together after all," Muchen said, mustering up a professional smile. "I can hardly afford to pass up a bargain, after all."

Steward Fu smiled. "Good. Come with me."

He stood. The wine bottle vanished, no doubt tucked away safely in his voluminous robes. Muchen followed as he led the way outside. It was gratifying that the man considered their business important enough to put off his day drinking, at least.

Steward Fu paused once they were outside, giving Muchen time to unhitch his mule cart. The cultivator disdained to ride on the cart himself, instead leading the way through the town on foot towards the Cloudy Peaks Sect. He didn't appear to be moving at anything other than a casual stroll, but he had no trouble staying ahead of the cart as Huichen trudged forward.

Steward Fu might have been a minor functionary within the sect, but he was still a cultivator. Muchen tried not to dwell on the question of just how easy it would be for his body to disappear once he was inside the walls of the sect.

They weren't headed towards the grand entrance of the Cloudy Peaks Sect. That was only opened on special occasions, or to welcome important visitors. An ordinary man like Muchen could hardly expect the sect to roll out the red carpet. Instead, Steward Fu ushered him through one of the side entrances.

Muchen only had a general understanding of how the sect was run. Basically, there was a two track system: talented recruits and fortunate outer disciples could be promoted to inner disciple status, and from there to various prestigious positions as elders of the sect. Outer disciples who weren't so lucky could by dint of hard work get themselves into lower level administrative roles.

The least favored administrators had to work in the Qianzhan Empire's bureaucracy, dealing with mortal affairs. The most favored worked directly for the sect's elders, offering a glimmer of hope of further advancement down the path of immortality. Steward Fu was somewhere in the middle, but possessed at least enough prestige to see Muchen pass by the guards without more than a cursory inspection.

They continued down the road for only a moment before turning onto a smaller trail, then to another path that was barely wide enough to accomodate Muchen's cart. Steward Fu moved at a steady pace, showing little interest in small talk. Muchen kept silent as well, not wanting to risk screwing up the deal at the last minute. After perhaps half an hour of walking, they arrived at a small outbuilding.

Muchen unlocked his cash box from his cart and carried it as he followed Steward Fu inside. They continued through a small antechamber into a modestly sized but well appointed office. Muchen took a seat as directed and waited as Steward Fu disappeared through a door at the back of the room. He only had a few moments to admire the calligraphy mounted on the wall before Steward Fu returned.

"My workers will load the cart," he said. He sat behind his desk and pulled a set of scales from a drawer.

Muchen passed over his money box. He wasn't going to quibble over weights and measures at this point. His whole plan depended on Steward Fu finding it beneath his dignity to kill and rob a small-time merchant, after all. He'd also have to trust that he'd find it too undignified to short him on the rice or silver.

Steward Fu worked the scales with a deft hand. After counting out his hundred and fifty taels, there were some nine and a half taels left over. It was enough to cover Muchen's living expenses for a while, but it would be difficult to start over if he lost the spirit rice for some reason.

Muchen shook his head, dismissing the negative thought as he stood. He'd be leaving here with a cart full of a genuine luxury good. Spirit rice, even the low grade stuff, practically sold itself. All he had to do was make sure he brought it to the market that would give him the best price for it.

"Perhaps we can work together again in the future," he said.

"Visit me the next time you have such a fine bottle of wine," Steward Fu said, passing the cash box back across the desk to him. "Little Chen will see you out."

Muchen kept a smile on his face, even if he felt a bit awkward at Steward Fu's request. A bottle of wine that good was not something that could be whistled up on demand. Well, perhaps he'd be able to come up with a consistent supply of quality booze if he could build his own distillery, but he wasn't going to have the capital for that any time soon.

His cart was piled high with sacks of rice. To Muchen's eye it certainly looked like about a ton. It was heavy enough that Huichen had to work to get the cart moving, at least. Steward Fu's subordinate showed no interest in conversation as he led the way out of the sect, which suited Muchen just fine. It was all that he could do to hold a straight face, not betraying the anxiety that he felt as a mortal trespassing within the Cloudy Peaks Sect nor the relief when he exited its gates.

Part of him was still waiting for the other shoe to drop as he drove his cart down the road. He looked around warily as he passed through the mortal town, and again every time the road wound its way past anything that looked like a good spot for an ambush. It wasn't until he reached his campsite for the night without any trouble that he allowed himself a congratulatory fist pump.

He did it! He made a deal with a cultivator and came out of it intact! He'd made his first step along the road to wealth and managed not to stumble over his own two feet. Surely this was just the beginning. Someday soon he'd be rich beyond the dreams of avarice, and then he could work on bribing his way to immortality.

He was pulled out of his dreams of swimming through vast piles of silver by a noise from the back of his cart.

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