Tian sat and looked out across the wastes. Some instinct stirred in him, and he got up into a crouch and started drawing circles in the sand. For some reason, it always helped him focus. He started connecting things he had heard, seen and been told during his time in the sect.

“Brother Fu, the senior who was recruited before me and made it to the Inner Court in ten years-”

“Eight years, eleven months and four days, actually. Ao Yuanyun. Simply the most brilliant person I have ever met. Arrogant, but when you can understand in an hour what takes others months to learn, and cultivate in a day what takes others years to accumulate, arrogance would be impossible to avoid.”

“Did he become a Direct Disciple?”

“Not yet, but he was elevated directly to Core Disciple on his breakthrough to the Heavenly Person Realm. His breakthrough was, if anything, too fast. He had enough accumulated wisdom to find longevity, but not the dao. I still can’t decide if I failed that boy or not. Telling a genius to suppress themselves to firm their foundation when their foundation is already stronger than any hundred of their contemporaries…”

The old man shook his head. Tian nodded and went back to drawing his circles. Brother Fu patiently waited next to him.

“You told me that deploying the Outer Court to the front lines was the most proper and moral decision, but didn’t explain. Was it this?”

“Essentially. That, and we are actually fulfilling a useful role here militarily.”

“But mostly it’s about finding Direct Disciples.”

“That is my theory. What I can see from my low place and what the Daoist Masters see from high up on the mountain are vastly different.”

Tian remembered how favored the West Town Outer Court was with the sect. They had the highest rate of turning Earthly Realm cultivators into Heavenly Realm cultivators, and had even sent a Core Disciple up the mountain in recent memory. Just for that, they got half again more monthly support than the other towns. And it still didn’t match up to the value of maybe

finding a single Direct Disciple.

“Don’t misunderstand me. Searching for future Daoist Masters isn’t the reason we are at war. Black Iron Gorge has made some moves on some level I don’t understand, and it threatens the interests of most of the surrounding nations. I don’t think their aim is outright conquest, but I really don’t know what they are up to.”

Tian nodded seriously, thinking it over and not coming to any satisfactory conclusions. He remembered seeing those green furred zombies charging towards the Depot walls. He knew, instantly, that he no longer had a place in the fighting portion of the battle. His only role was victim, or corpse, or worse. Even the Martial Aunts and Uncles were being slaughtered. Then Direct Disciple Song showed up and with a single tune, cleared the battlefield.

“When you found me after the battle, you were fighting in a strange way. You said you were moving with the Dao.” Tian spoke slowly. “Brother Fu… what is the Dao? People talk about it all the time, and I still don’t know.”

Brother Fu laughed, loud and happily. “None of us do! The Direct Disciples would be the first to tell you that they have only seen a tiny corner of it, and they don’t really understand the bit that they have seen. The Dao is the path. It is the law, and the energy of the world. It is fate, and nature, and the nature of things. It is every interaction between every type of thing. The dao is universal. It moves eternally, but since it is everything and everywhere and perfect, it is also still. It is what came before the Primordial Chaos, and is the road the universe treads to its end and rebirth.”

Tian blinked. “That… sounds amazing, Brother Fu, but I don’t think that actually answers the question.”

“Of course not. If I don’t know, how can I tell you? The dao that can be spoken is not the true dao. But I can set your feet on the path to the dao. That much I do know.” Brother Fu stood and dusted himself off. “Let’s move our bodies a bit. Let me show you a little something. You remember how I fought those heretics? How they sought their own death?”

Tian nodded. It was hard to forget.

“Come, let’s spar a little and I will show you what I mean when I say I move with the dao. One of the inheritances of our Ancient Crane Mountain is the philosophy of effortless action. Tonight isn’t the time to explain it, but you can start to grasp it with your body first.”

He reached out a hand to Tian. Tian smiled and took it.

The two squared off. Tian settled into his boxing stance, palms out, legs bent. Brother Fu gently rested one hand behind his back and invited Tian to attack with the other. What followed was one of the strangest and best spars of his young life. Every strike missed. Every step he took found Brother Fu standing there first, or had a fist waiting for him to bash into it.

In the beginning, it was frustrating. Maddening, even. It felt like he was being toyed with. Their silk robes snapped and fluttered in the desert winds, the sand whispering as their feet danced back and forth. Tian moved swiftly, struck decisively, retreated lightly, and never once left the palm of Brother Fu’s hand.

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“Just breathe. Don’t think. Don’t try to figure out how I am moving. Don’t use your arts. Cultivate if you like, it might help. Just breathe and move.” Brother Fu encouraged him, still finding time in the spar to stroke his long white beard.

Tian trusted Brother Fu, even if he was monumentally irritated with the old man after being clowned around for ten minutes. He forced himself to calm down and started to cultivate. A deep breath in, circulate the energy, slowly release it back into the world. The art had cycled through his body uncountable thousands of times by now, and it would continue for millions more. His mind paid just enough attention to it to make sure it didn’t have any accidents, and the rest focused on the matter at hand.

“Most, even in our temple, seem to think meditation is something you can only do sitting in a quiet room. Nonsense. You can meditate and talk. You can meditate and paint. You calm your heart and mind by turning a piece of your attention to your breath, keeping it from chasing distractions.” Brother Fu guided Tian’s palm past him, then shoved him into a stumble with a palm of his own to the boy’s back.

“You aren’t fighting the distractions, or suppressing them or preventing them. They appear in your mind. But the part of your mind that would grab them, obsess over them, hurt your heart with them, is busy minding your breath. The rest of your mind watches the thoughts pass like a running horse seen through a gap in a wall. The thoughts are seen, but without emotional weight.”

It was true. Tian had known for a long time that meditation helped stop the sudden bursts of anxiety that saw him hiding in shadows or waking up screaming in the night. The thoughts came, but so long as he was cultivating, they left almost as fast as they arrived.

“My methods share some similarities with that meditative state. The essence of action without effort is not no-action or no-effort, but to move with nature. Water does not strain as it moves along the river bed. If it encounters a rock, it flows around. Eventually the rock will be worn away, but the river remains. Water is formless, adapting to whatever vessel is holding it. Does the water resent the bowl? Of course not. It was poured in, and will be poured out again, returning to formlessness. Nor does the bowl resent the water for its temporary occupation. But for the bowl to be useful it must be empty. So we lay down our burdens and our complicated thoughts. We simply exist, and move with the Dao.”

Their fight had become a sort of play, where Tian was trying to chase the old man, and the old man kept drifting back, only to appear next to Tian a moment later. Never truly gone. The distance was only a dream. At some point, he found himself smiling. His heart lightened, even if the hate hadn’t vanished. He was playing tag with his father, dashing across the desert sand. It was the best night he could remember.

The next morning, Brother Fu was gone. He had been given a night to rest, then was sent back into the field. It seems that was as long as he could be spared. Tian, on the other hand, was told in no uncertain terms that he would be working in the hospital for the foreseeable future. He dropped around the Mission Hall to ask Brother Zhang what the story was, and got a depressing answer.

“The casualty rate when you and Junior Sister Hong go out on a mission together are too high to justify the benefits either of you provide to the teams you are on. We ran the numbers, and while none of your surviving teammates blame you, the fact is that they have to protect you while fighting the enemy at the same time. Your ability to protect yourself is higher than your level would suggest, but it’s not at the same level as a Level Nine. So for now, you are going to be confined to the Depot and will be doing hospital work.”

Brother Zhang spread his hands helplessly, but didn’t bother being tactful. He understood Tian well enough by this point to know there wasn’t any point. Tian wondered if this supported Brother Fu’s theory, or was evidence against it.

“I’m to stay on base until I am Level Nine?”

“You stay until something changes, which it will eventually. Something always does. Sorry, Brother. The decision was made above my level.”

Tian nodded. “I more or less expected to stay on base for a while. Thank you for your concern, Brother Zhang.”

“The good news is that once the rewards from your mission are approved, you will be rather wealthy in merit points. Considerably more wealthy if Martial Uncle Ku returns with a bounty and a tamed beast, but either way it will be quite a windfall.”

“Alas I have just spent all my merit points and spirit crystals and am now completely broke Senior Brother Zhang!” Tian hissed, his eyes darting furiously. One thing he had learned- he was never out of the earshot of his seniors.

“Oh, my apologies, Brother Brokie. I thought you had just come back from a long, dangerous, and highly successful commerce raid where even someone calculating with their elbow could figure out you earned big. I failed to appreciate your cultivation of the Dao of the Bum, the Loser, the Guy Who Never Buys Lunch But Always Orders Extra Side Dishes. Truly, I have eyes but cannot see the Mountain!” Brother Zhang’s eyes rolled even harder than Tian’s.

“Is that a thing?”

“Is what?”

“Buying lunch for other people? Why don’t you just eat in the mess hall?”

“Well, sure if you are on base, but what about when you are traveling?”

“Who’s cooking, the scorpions?”

“Traveling inside the Broad Sky Kingdom, I mean.”

“Huh. It’s never come up.”

“In fairness to you, Brother Tian, as far as I can tell, your only hobbies are making tea and giving small gifts to people. I am fairly sure you aren’t actually cheap.”

“I have been told I don’t understand money.” Tian smiled ruefully. “But I understand having food. Better for people not to think you have anything worth eating.”

“That is one way to look at it.” Brother Zhang coughed. “Unfortunately, you just turned up on a bed of steamed vegetables with plenty of rice in the bowl. You are going to need to figure out how to… defend your deliciousness… when you are trapped on the table.”

Tian looked blankly at Brother Zhang. “I did what? Brother Zhang, do you need another mission to bed?”

“The metaphor might need some work, but I think you get my meaning.”

“I really don’t, Brother Zhang.”

“What I mean, Junior Brother Tian, is that everybody will know you struck it rich, and none of them will believe you reported everything. Even if you let them search your ring, they wouldn’t believe you. There is something about the word “treasure” that stops the brain from working. So be careful. You are about to find yourself surrounded by hungry wolves in sect robes. You might get eaten alive. Not a metaphor, this time. Mostly.”