Chapter 4: Spirit Rice (2)

It was late in the afternoon when they reached a town. The place was hardly a bustling metropolis, but compared to the tiny villages that they had passed on the way in it at least had a market street and two different inns to choose from.

Muchen arranged for lodging at the slightly nicer of the inns, happily paying a few extra wen to have a warm bath sent up to his room. He double checked to make sure that his cart was locked up securely before he made his way upstairs. He tossed his travel pack on the bed and disrobed before settling into the wooden tub with a satisfied sigh. Soaking in hot water made him feel like he had finally returned to civilization.

"Weren't you planning to sell the rice to mortals?" Xinyi asked.

Muchen started upright, sending a handful of water sloshing out of the tub. He had seen a perfectly inert turtle shell resting on the front of his cart before he made his way upstairs. There had been no indication that he had been followed on the way to his room.

He relaxed after the initial shock passed. One shouldn't use mortal standards when judging cultivators. A woman who could change form to a turtle—or a turtle who could change form to a woman—was accomplished enough that she could come or go as she pleased without tipping off his merely human senses.

Also, now that he had a minute to think about it, his modesty was fairly well preserved as long as he stayed in the tub. At the very least, he figured that if Xinyi had any prurient interest she wouldn't have spoken up.

Still, he took a moment to let his breathing even out before he replied.

"I will sell it, but not here," he said. "In order to get the best possible price, I need to find a place where there is plenty of silver but little spirit rice to be had."

He could sell his wares in this town. He'd even make a profit. But he wouldn't be able to make a killing. Considering that he had only gotten ahold of his cargo through great effort and not a little bit of personal danger, he wanted to get as much silver out of it as possible.

This town was only two day's travel from the Cloudy Peaks Sect. The sect didn't sell spirit rice on the open market, but he expected that a trickle of the low grade stuff found its way into the mortal world one way or another. Also, while a town of a few thousand people would have a few local tyrants ready to splash out on a fancy meal, it wouldn't have the steady stream of rich customers that would make a restaurant comfortable buying his entire cartload of rice for a premium.

He could do better per unit if he were willing to sell one bag at a time, perhaps, but that would be a waste of his time. Not to mention that he'd be left with less spirit rice on hand once he did finally find a rich whale of a customer.

"So you'll be traveling away from the Cloudy Peaks Sect," Xinyi said. "I might as well tag along."

Muchen nodded. It wasn't like he'd get anywhere by disagreeing.

"The sects have claimed the best locations, but the Qianzhan Continent is a big place," she continued. "Once I find a suitable location I will go into secluded cultivation."

Muchen nodded again. It didn't cost him anything to give her a ride. From her perspective, traveling on his cart let her pass smoothly through towns and settlements without leaving any traces for the Cloudy Peaks Sect to find. As much as she disdained the sect, she clearly wasn't ready for a full scale battle with them at the moment.

It was a mutually beneficial exchange.

After that, she remained silent while he focused on rinsing off the last of the dust from the road. By the time he was ready to get out of the bath, Xinyi had retreated back inside her shell. He took advantage of the moment of privacy to dry himself off and get dressed before ringing the bell the inn provided to request assistance. A few moments later, the tub had been cleared away and Muchen was ready to turn in for the evening.

Well, almost ready. First he sat cross-legged by the bed and ran through his breathing exercises. He wasn't sure if he was actually accomplishing anything, but cultivation involved the gradual accumulation of the results of constant effort. His inability to judge his progress made it all the more important that he put in the effort every day.

"Are you... cultivating?"

Muchen opened his eyes and put aside the irritation at the interruption. His frustration at his lack of progress was harder to dismiss, but he made sure that his tone was courteous when he replied.

"I'm following the standard instructions for initiation into the basic mysteries."

Xinyi poked her legs free from her shell and traversed the bed to stand next to him, looking at him with concern the whole time.

"Have things really deteriorated to this point?" she asked.

Muchen bit back his first response, then shrugged. "I can only work off of the scrolls available on the market. The Cloudy Peaks Sect hardly provides personalized instruction for every mortal under their rule."

"Hmmm," Xinyi said, lost in thought for a moment, before leaping off the bed. She jumped again in midair, pushing off of nothing that Muchen could see, then whacked him on the back of his head with a flipper. Before he could even bring up his arms to protect himself she was somehow already back on the bed, looking at him expectantly.

"Hey..." Muchen said, his complaint trailing off as he was distracted by the view.

The air was filled with glowing motes of light. They were in constant motion. Individual dots danced in random patterns through the air, some gathering together in great streams that flowed unhindered through the wall of his room and out the window. Some glowed with a pure white light, while others were red, blue, green... all the colors of the rainbow, and more besides. He could still see the ordinary sight of the room as well, his vision not obstructed by the glowing lights the way merely physical eyes would have been.

"Try your exercise now," Xinyi said.

The most intense stream of glowing dots orbited around Xinyi. The pattern ebbed and flowed, intersecting with her physical form before continuing on, its glow shifted from the moment of contact. Muchen lost himself in the sight for a moment before he understood what she had just told him to do.

He settled back into a resting position and breathed in, doing his best to recall the instructions from that long-discarded scroll. After a moment something clicked, and the lights around him were drawn closer. When the first dot touched his own skin, he could feel the warmth as his body absorbed the energy.

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He couldn't help but laugh out loud. As he did, the points of light drifted away, no longer pulled toward his body. Muchen pushed down the feeling of triumph and focused on his breathing once more.

This time it didn't take as long before the energy in the air was drawn towards him. Muchen kept his composure and kept executing the breathing exercise. Once he had achieved a steady flow of energy he tried varying his rate of breathing, watching what happened as he breathed a little faster or a little slower.

His feelings, too, affected the results of his exercise. A flush of pride passed through him and stalled the energy near his body. The flash of anger that arose after that failure positively drove the energy away from him. Muchen did his best to let the emotions pass through him without dwelling on any one thought in particular.

Just as the scroll said, a calm, focused state seemed to be the most effective. Muchen didn't know how long he spent, adjusting his breathing to the optimal level while doing his best to keep that almost clinical detachment. Eventually the vision of the energy in the air faded away, but he could feel the flush of warmth in his chest that was the result of more than just happiness.

"Thank you," he said, before he realized that Xinyi had withdrawn into her shell and gone to sleep long ago.

He glanced outside at the dark night. She probably had the right idea. Cultivation was all well and good, but this one little success was far from relieving him of the need to sleep.

ooOoo

Over the next few days the weather was pleasant and the road was smooth. Well, as smooth as a dirt track could be. They moved along at a relaxed pace as Muchen enjoyed the firsthand look at the scenery of the Qianzhan Continent.

The countryside was thoroughly developed. He could see wild mountains off in the distance, but the road they were traveling on never ventured into truly untamed wilderness. Every day they would pass by two or three smaller villages as they made their way from town to town.

Small farming villages were the little-appreciated foundation of mortal prosperity on Qianzhan Continent. Each was a small cluster of houses, occupied by perhaps a hundred different households, surrounded by rice paddies. None of the men that Muchen saw laboring away in the fields were ever going to have their names recorded in the history books, but it was the work of those men that provided the surplus of food that kept the Qianzhan Empire well fed. These small villages also produced the surplus of young men that kept the empire's army well filled out.

Of course, while Muchen appreciated the importance of the rural population on the whole, he didn't intend to have anything to do with them on this leg of his trip. Nobody who worked in the fields for a living would be able to afford a single meal's worth of a luxury like spirit rice, let alone a whole cartload of the stuff.

The towns where they spent most evenings were closer to the mark, but still not quite what he was looking for. After all, the main economic driver of those towns was the trade in the product of the fields in exchange for finished goods that the villagers could use. There were always a few prosperous local merchants around, but none of them operated on the scale that Muchen wanted to see.

As the days went by, Xinyi spent most of her time meditating, withdrawn into her shell. She hadn't found the auspicious spot for seclusion that she was looking for, and she seemed to have lost interest in Muchen's affairs. Muchen took it as that he had happened to pick up a fortuitous talisman to ward off bandit attacks and focused on taking care of his own business.

He was diligent about doing his own cultivation every evening. Xinyi didn't offer to enhance his vision again, and he didn't ask. He still remembered what he had learned that night. Every evening he enjoyed a meal of spirit rice before doing his best to replicate that sort of detached confidence along with the correct posture and breathing process. He could feel the energy in his body building up day by day.

His efforts were already showing some benefits. He was a little more energetic in the mornings, and he hadn't woken up with any sort of aches or pains since he'd made progress in his cultivation. Unfortunately, he was still far away from making active use of the energy. According to the scroll he'd read, what he needed to do next was build up energy and then connect to the Great Dao.

The energy kept building up, night after night. He had no idea what it meant to connect to the Great Dao, though. He'd never been much for philosophy back in the modern world. His focus had always been on learning practical skills that would help him make money. From what he'd seen, most cultivators weren't particularly philosophical, so he was hoping that there was some sort of trick to taking that first step into true cultivation.

He was also hoping that Xinyi would take pity on him and share the trick, but so far she was keeping quiet. He couldn't really complain. The nudge she'd already given him along the path of cultivation had already more than paid off any favor he was due for his accidental help.

While Muchen was diligent in his cultivation, for the moment that was nothing more than a nightly hobby. His real focus was on making money. Once they left the rural hinterlands behind and reached the more developed area along the Dahuang River, he could practically smell the silver in the air.

The river was one of the major arteries of trade within the Qianzhan Empire. A dizzying array of goods moved up and down the river every day. Even just driving his cart along the path by the riverbank, he could clearly see the prosperity brought by the waters. The development along the river was on a whole new level compared to the small towns and villages back in the hinterlands.

It was when they reached Heshan Town, the third major settlement they'd passed by while following the river, that Muchen finally got the answer he'd been hoping to hear.

"Best food in town? It's down to the Plum Blossom Kitchen or the Hidden Fragrance Pavilion," the inn's hostess explained. "I'd say the Hidden Fragrance Pavilion is a touch better overall, but at the Plum Blossom Kitchen you can order a dish with spirit rice."

Muchen smiled and asked for directions. Once he'd settled his luggage at the end he dressed up in his nicer set of robes.

"Finally trying out one of those fancy restaurants?" Xinyi asked as she watched him check his appearance in the mirror.

Muchen had been asking about the fine dining options available at every stop along their route, just to check out their menus on his way out of town. This was the first time he'd be spending his own money on a fancy meal.

"I think I may have found my customer," he replied.

"Really?" she asked. "I thought you'd want to keep going to the provincial capital. They're swimming in silver."

Muchen fiddled with his outer robe, trying to get it to drape right. This was his first time trying out the fancy dress of the Qianzhan Continent. "More silver, yes, but also plenty of spirit rice to be had."

Spirit rice was a supernaturally charged ingredient that he'd only gotten his hands on by bribing a low level member of a sect of magical warrior monks, but at the end of the day it was like any other product. In order to get the best possible price he needed to find a market that had an appetite for the product and the ability to pay for it but lacked a steady supply of the stuff.

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