Grandpa wasn’t wrong about how long he was going to last up on the stalagmite. He was tough, but it had been a bad few hours.

“So how do I-”

Tian, I said YOU have to study them and figure it out. I will say that you have the tools you need, and remember it’s not a question of making a spell or something. It’s about understanding. Understanding the Fire, and yourself. Once you do, you can make a home for the fire within you.

“Should I be doing this with all the elements?”

Shouldn’t need to. Metal is going to be a bit of a bastard for you, but you will manage. Earth is a doddle. Water and Wood go without saying. It’s really fire that’s your nemesis.

Tian nodded and stared into the fire qi. Understanding fire as a way to stop it from harming you. He really didn’t see how that could work. He could understand a rock perfectly, and his foot would still hurt if he kicked a mountain. Was fire qi really something you could “understand” your way around?

He stared into the fire, feeling his mood being forcibly elevated by the qi in the room even as he instinctively wanted to feel… afraid. He wanted to feel more afraid than he did. He remembered what it was like living with burn scars. It was part of all his earliest memories.

Every move he made in the junkyard was paid for with pain. He couldn’t stretch in certain ways without tearing the burns. He couldn’t walk without paining them. They looked hideous. He looked so disfigured people thought he was a diseased animal. It wasn’t just the burns that made him hideous, but they were part of it.

A life whose bounds were defined by the pain of burns. Then he destroyed his body and rebuilt it from lotuses and venomous adders. Was that why he was so yin? So quiet and cautious? Every move had a price in pain. It was so much better to remain still.

Except he couldn’t stand seeing his kind brothers dying. And he loved his new body. And he loved cultivating. He loved moving so freely and rejoicing in the open sky. He wouldn’t keep going around and around with tea and snacks if he didn’t enjoy it on some level. He wouldn’t be making friends. He wouldn’t have found his dad. A father who had lit the hearth for him, warming him after he suffered the winds and the rains of the world outside the Temple.

He was scared of fire. He just was. He didn’t trust it and couldn’t forget the pain of it. No matter how delicious cooked food was, or how comforting a campfire could be, or how cozy an oil lamp made a room. There were talismans you could buy that would make light too. Other sects probably had enchanted items that would make light for hours or days, maybe. It didn’t have to be fire all the time.

So could he accept it?

Tian stared into the flickering fire qi and watched the Scarlet Bird zip around. It looked pretty happy. Quite different from the stubborn turtle-snake thing. It couldn’t seem to focus. Always flying, never perched. It seemed a tiring sort of way to be.

Could he really accept the fire into him? Could he… Tian laughed. Could he forgive the fire for all the pain it had caused him? What a silly thing to think. Could the element that made up a fifth of existence kindly repent and show remorse so that Tian could take some satisfaction in forgiving it? After all, everything he had suffered at fire’s “hands” was clearly intentional and premeditated.

How could he even bring fire into himself? He was basically a giant pile of kindling. He had just proven that. The thought made him hesitate. It wasn’t strictly correct. Actually, it wasn’t remotely correct. He already had fire in him. Everybody did. The real question was, could he make something of it? Could he accept it and use it as a bridge to the fire qi around him?

He was tied to wood and water. If there could be a bird made of flame, there could be a lotus floating in the fiery pool of his heart. It was supposed to be a yin aspected fire, so why not? He cast his mind inward, trying to piece together the fire qi within him. Mould it according to his will. It didn’t move easily, but it was already concentrated around his heart. He didn’t have to push it far.

He imagined the little flames licking up into the petals of an open lotus. Not a cruel fire, but a warm one. Purifying. That’s a lotus flame- one that brings peace and purity. Not too hot, it’s a yin aspect fire. Not too cold either. It’s still fire qi after all, and lotuses don’t like too much cold. A nice balance. He didn’t have a good feel for what the crimson palace looked like. He tried to imagine the lotus floating in there in solitary splendor, setting down its roots into his heart.

It was a pretty picture. So why did it fill him with dread? Tian couldn’t quite put it together. He stared a moment longer, then with a heavy push, he dispersed the vital energy. Something was very wrong. He just didn’t know what it was.

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Treat it like a disease, or a wound. Diagnose. Where is the injury? At the Crimson Palace, the middle dantian located at the heart. He could only sense it with qi, but visually, in his imagination, it had presented as a lotus made of little flames with a long root stretching down into the depths of his dantian.

Problems? He focused in. The first problem was that he was playing make believe while standing on a narrow stone post in the middle of a cave full of fire. The assignment wasn’t “Imagine a fire,” it was to understand the fire in him well enough that… Things started to click.

“This is why I could tolerate the water room so well, and got instantly burnt in here. It’s not just because of my innate physique or how I cultivate. It’s because I’m consciously rejecting the fire. Clashing directly with it, rather than letting it flow. That was the whole big lesson of the Water cavern.”

Go on.

“I’m fighting with the fire qi. It’s not that it’s harmless. Of course it’s dangerous. It's fire. Same as water. But if I accept it as part of me, if I’m not constantly putting myself in the position of eating it or being eaten, it will at least be less damaging. I won’t be tearing myself up.”

That’s a big piece of it. Try to focus on just one element of… the element. Don’t think you can make something that represents “all fire” or “burning” or “heat.” The concepts are way, way too big. This is daoism. As within, so without. The human is the microcosm of the universe, and the universe teaches you about yourself. That cosmic truth can only be understood through a human lens- you. So think to yourself, what is the aspect of fire that most calls to you? What is the part of it you like best and understand best?

“Hmm. A campfire maybe? Eating the hot food… no. That’s still kind of scary to me.” Tian shook his head. He tried to think of a moment in the fire. A moment where the fire felt comforting, safe, and necessary. A good fire.

He remembered sitting up with Brother Long in the desert, drinking tea with him in the flickering light of a tiny oil lamp. The fading light in the old warrior’s eyes. The fire qi in the tea had warmed the water, let the leaves steep, and the light of the lantern made a warm place in the darkness. Two people in pain, beaten by the world around them, taking comfort in that little controlled fire.

Maybe that was the dao of fire to him. Not a sun that illuminated his heavenly rise or a blazing meteor that demolished his enemies, and not some damned lotus purifying all the sins of the world. Just a little lamp. Just enough for a few people to huddle around, sharing tea and comfort. The joy of that flame was a little thing, but it could reach into every heart. The heat wasn’t much, but it could comfortably warm a tent. And it was safe, trapped in the lamp. It wouldn’t spread and consume him, or those who gathered with him.

It was a nasty, painful, ugly thing, being alone. Tian would never forget the dump. Being alone hurt. Being despised hurt. The rock throwers were throwing rocks because they refused to share the warmth within themselves. They were people without compassion. That was his little fire qi. A light of compassion, not for the world, but for those who would gather with him. A light that would invite, not insist.

“A lotus floats on its pond, only permitting other lotuses around it. Underneath, it’s all venomous snakes, bones and literal shit rotting down into fertilizer. All that death for just a few beautiful flowers and fake purity. That’s not what I want. That’s not the fire that burns in me.”

Tian imagined the camping lamp in his storage ring. A palm sized clay bowl with a pinched spout to hold a bit of cotton wick, and walls that gently curved over the top to keep the oil from splashing out. He had brought it with him from the Temple. It seemed right that it illuminated his heart now. He drew the fire qi together, and lit the lamp in the Crimson Palace, illuminating his heart.

He thought the flame that came out of the spout looked a little purple. Tian smiled. He had no idea why it looked that way. He had never seen a purple flame. It’s just what the fire qi wanted to do, so he let it. The lamp was very stable. It didn’t seem to do much. That was fine. It was a lamp. It just had to be.

The Vermilion Bird flew over to him. Tian reached out his hand as a perch. It was stupid. He would surely get burned. Burned horribly. The bird flew around him and then fluttered off, landing on a stalagmite nearby. Tian hopped off his pillar and walked over towards it. The qi fire was hot. He would be hurt if he stayed too long in one place. But it was bearable for now.

The bird flew off again, moving in roughly a straight line. Tian followed it all the way to the entrance of what he knew must be the null cavern. He smiled up at the bird. The invisible membrane stretched and popped, turning the sea of fire into pure qi.

He stepped into the void, feeling his vital energy wicking away. Feeling the scattered fire qi being yanked off his body. He stood there, concentrating on his lamp. It was still too fragile to risk trying to remove from his Crimson Palace. So he stood there, feeling it radiating out from him.

Standing in the utter dark of the void, Tian felt an almost overwhelming need to laugh. Here he was, in the Six Turns Cavern, setting out his little table and inviting people to visit and have some tea! It started as a way to bribe people and earn favors, and now it was something he treasured. His little network of people, his circuit of friendly faces. People who would gather around him and tell him things. He didn’t have to talk, he could just be there with them.

It was such a painful, ugly, brutal world. Was it so terrible to be the person holding the light?

And if someone didn’t want to come for companionship? If they wanted to snuff out his light? Well. He would welcome them too. Light would hide his darts as well as the darkness. Each one was filled with Sister Li’s care. Imperial Heavenly Swallows was suggested by the diligent Sister Su at the scripture pavilion. His martial arts were trained into his bones by all the brothers who sparred with him. Brother Wong and Brother Fu had taught him compassion, and they were fierce as tigers. The lamp invited others in, but so much of the fuel was the gifts made by the people in his life. How could he let someone snuff it out?

Standing in the utter darkness, Tian found joy in the light of his life.