Cultivating Common Sense In A Xianxia World Chapter 52: The Code

Characters in this chapter.

Pei Liang — Founder of the River Fork Academy. Squad Captain over the cultivators.

Wei Suyin — Head of the clinic.

Fei Liao — Lieutenant of the district.

Pei Hao — Pei Liang’s Older Brother. Great conversation partner.

Xu Bing — Garrison soldier at Hekou.

Wei Bolin — Part of clinic operations.

I wrote by candlelight in the room where Hao lay.

I had carried the small writing table in from the curriculum room whilist everyone else slept. I set the table next to his mat so that when I looked up from the paper I would see his face.

"I am writing out what will be needed," I said to him quietly.

His breathing did not change.

"Fei Liao wants a training regin by the first notch," I continued on. "I thought long and hard about what I’ve wanted, and I have finally settled on sothing."

I began to write and made sure that each brush stroke was legible. "I have developed a code of conduct for our Cultivators, because otherwise we will be no different than Zhu Rong."

I smirked a little at the thought and shook my head.

"I have five in mind," I said to him. "Tell if they sound right to you."

The Five Tenets of the Cultivator.

I wrote the first.

“The cultivator's power belongs to those the cultivator protects.”

"This, I am sure, is sothing we both can agree on," I said out loud to him. "When one cultivates, they can't lose sight that they're doing it to protect those they care for, not for the sake of their own power."

I wrote the second.

“Knowledge withheld is knowledge betrayed.”

"The one I have been trying to put into words for three years," I said to him. "The technique a man keeps in his chest dies with him. The technique he gives to the Academy lives on after he’s gone."

I wrote the third.

“The cultivator who does not know his own heart cannot trust his own hand.”

"You always knew yours," I said somberly. "That was what I’ve always envied about you."

I wrote the fourth.

“A sect that buries its students has failed its students.”

“I want our Sect to be asured by what a Master passes on to his students, not by pushing them to cultivate until they knock on death’s door."

I wrote the fifth.

“The cultivator answers first to the people, second to his lord, and last to himself.”

"The order matters," I said. "A cultivator who answers to himself first is a threat to all. A cultivator who answers to the lord first becos a weapon, not a person. And a cultivator who answers to the people, their people, can be held accountable."

I set the brush down and read all five together.

The cultivator's power belongs to those the cultivator protects.

Knowledge withheld is knowledge betrayed.

The cultivator who does not know his own heart cannot trust his own hand.

A sect that buries its students has failed its students.

The cultivator answers first to the people, second to the lord, and last to himself.

The candle had burned to half.

I turned the page over and began the progression track.

The Three Stages of Cultivation.

Qi Refinent: The entry stage. A practitioner at this stage has opened all twelve ridian pathways and can circulate Qi through them without strain.

The work of a student in the first years of schooling: mastering the foundations. A Refinent student cannot yet draw ambient Qi. A Refinent student cannot yet hold sustained technique. A Refinent student is learning the terrain of his own body.

Advancent standard: Three consecutive assessnts, each one quarter apart, showing error-free circulation across all twelve pathways under pulse reading and light physical exertion. Signed off by the attending instructor.

Foundational. The working stage. A practitioner at this stage has learned to draw ambient Qi from the surrounding environnt, to store that Qi in the core below the sternum, and to release it.

The work of Foundational is the work of application. A Foundational practitioner can defend a village, treat an injury, hold a line, read a field, and discern an affinity. They are the backbone of the Sect.

Advancent standard: One original technique docunted in the Academy record, available to every practitioner at Refinent and above without restriction. Three consecutive assessnts showing ambient draw without channeling error under sustained pressure. Demonstrated beginning work on elental affinity. Signed off by two attending instructors, one of whom must be at Master stage or above.

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Master. The teaching stage. A practitioner at this stage holds full channel control under sustained pressure, has developed multiple original techniques, and has contributed at least one of them to the Academy record. The work of Master is the work of contribution. The work of a scholar completing his life's study: adding to the body of knowledge so that the knowledge exists after the scholar is gone.

A Master who has not contributed has not completed the work of the stage.

Advancent standard: One technique contributed in full to the Academy record, teachable, docunted, available to every practitioner of Refinent and above without restriction. Three consecutive assessnts demonstrating full channel control under adversarial or combat pressure. Certification by at least one Master of an equal or higher practice. Signed off by the institution's master instructor.

I set the brush down and then turned my attention back to Hao.

"All done," I said with pride.

"When you wake, you can contribute to this as well," I said to him aloud.

I banked the candle and laid my hand on his arm until the watch changed at the fourth notch.

Then I rolled the paper, tied it with the curriculum-room cord, and walked out into the cold.

Formation drill work was the emphasis for the day.

The formation was on its feet in thirty seconds and in the training ground inside of a count of one hundred. I stood in the line with the rest of them. Fei Liao had received the rolled paperwork at the first notch. He had read it at his table, looked up at once, nodded, and set it to his right without comnt. That was the only acknowledgnt I would receive. I was a recruit at the third notch now. The curriculum would live or die on its own rits when he read it in earnest, and nothing I did on the training ground would help it.

We were given wooden spears with iron tips, and Fei Liao walked the line with a thin green switch in his hand. He corrected grip, stance, and the angle of the shaft by striking the part of the body that was out of alignnt. A recruit whose rear foot was turned out received the switch across the outer ankle. A recruit whose elbow drifted above the shoulder line received it across the elbow.

I received the switch three tis.

The first was across my left heel, because my weight had shifted too far forward on the third drop. The second was across my right shoulder, because my spear had drifted half a hand above the engagent line. The third was across the outside of my right wrist, because the grip I had developed over three years of dagger work caused to develop so bad habits.

Fei Liao said nothing during the corrections. He’d simply strike and move on.

By the end of the drill my right wrist had a welt the length of my thumb, and the grip was beginning to correct itself.

Load march followed formation drill at the ninth notch.

Packs of river stones were tied to wooden basket fras and given to reach soldier, and a makeshift track was etched out of the compound periter, three circuits, fifteen paces behind the man in front. By the second circuit two recruits were down. By the third my left quadriceps was cramping in the sa sustained waves it had cramped in yesterday, but today I recognized the pattern and drew on the ambient Qi to supply what the muscle could not, and the cramping stayed below the threshold where a body collapsed.

Suyin walked the third circuit behind . Her hands were bleeding through her outer robe where the strap of her pack had cut across the base of her thumb. She did not slow. When we finished the third circuit she set the pack down on the earth before she stood and walked to the water barrel to clean her hands once more.

We were dismissed by the tenth notch of the day, and with that, I decided to go to the clinic to check up on Hao.

Wei Bolin was with Hao and his wrist had begun to show a dark line around it. Wei Bolin was asuring Hao’s pulse and writing the reading down on the record, anwhile, Luan i and a couple of cousins had been walking in and out of the clinic to wipe the sweat off of Hao’s face. Bolin looked at when I ca in.

"You know, Suyin has been writing sothing," he said. "She asked the garrison soldiers if they had any old field journals from the history of the Northern Cao campaigns. There’s been a record passed around of it that date back to when Lord Shen Yue’s father, Shen Bowen, was contesting with the North."

I wondered why he was informing of this, but perhaps it was due to the fact that he was concerned that she had been overworking herself in light of the deaths of her brothers.

"I’ll go check in on her.”

I found her at the back table.

The lamp was low. Her hair was tied back into a small bow, which was normal for her when she had to work in the field or in the clinic.

She had five pieces of paper in front of her, covered in her small careful hand, and three of the old field journals open to pages she had marked with strips of cloth. The Mother Of Healing book was the one closest to her, open to a page that outlined the ridina pathways.

I sat down across from her.

She looked up at and the lamp light revealed that the color was gone from under her eyes and she appeared tired.

She looked up and smiled at , though the smile did not reach her eyes.

"You are back," she said.

I nodded toward her papers. "What has you up at this hour?"

She let out a slow breath and set the brush down.

"Lieutenant Fei Liao has tasked with preparing sothing for him. The first is a field dical guide. I’m writing down everything Mother Pei has showed about dressing wounds with cloth bindings and how to bind a limb..."

She looked at the second stack of pages, and her hand moved slightly before she spoke.

"The second is a herb identification guide for the spring campaign. It’s also a guide on how to prepare the herbs and how to tell them apart from the toxic ones.”

She let out a deep sigh. "I have my work cut out for ."

"It looks like it," I said. She did not look at . Her hand had gone still on the brush, and when she spoke again her voice was lower than before. "I have been writing for what feels like forever, and I keep coming back to the sa thing."

She closed her eyes.

"If I could not save them here," she began in a choked voice, "how am I supposed to save anyone in the spring?"

Her shoulders began to shake.

"Gao Ren. Duan. Liu Jun. My brothers Wei Kang, and Wei Lun, and even Zhao Ping…."

Her hand was trembling on the paper.

"Liang, I am going to fail everyone….I just know it.."

I did not answer. I stood and walked around the table and sat beside her on the bench.

She leaned against my shoulder without looking up. Her hand found mine on the table between us.

After a ti she turned toward with her forehead pressed into my neck. I put my arm around her shoulders and held her against . Suyin breathed in slow and I felt the unevenness through my chest, as if her grief was as real as my own.

I kissed the top of her head, then I planted another kiss on her temple. Then she lifted her face and her lips foound mine.

She tasted of the ginger tea she drank when she was working late, and of salt from the tears she had not let fall. Her hand moved from my jaw to the side of my neck, and I could feel her pulse against my skin, quick and uneven. The lamp caught the edge of her lashes when she opened her eyes briefly and closed them again. I drew her closer to my body as the tension that I had been carrying was released through this one tender mont. I kissed her again, and she made a small sound against my mouth.

When we stopped her forehead stayed against mine, and her hands glided down from my neck to rest on my chest.

"Are you okay?" she asked .

I closed my eyes.

"No," I admitted. "But I am going to have to be."

She took my hand from where it rested at her back and brought it to her chest.

"I am with you every step of the way," she said.

I looked at her hand holding mine.

I lifted her hand and kissed her knuckles.

"Thank you," I said.

She closed her hand over mine.

We sat for another breath.

Suyin reached out and rolled the papers, slowly, as if she were giving herself permission one breath at a ti. She tied the roll with a loose clinic cord and set it aside.

"I need a break from this,” She visibly relaxed after she said the words, and I could feel the weight lift from her shoulders.

Suyin blew out the lamp and walked to the back room where the mat was, and she lay down on her side and pulled down with her, and I lay facing her in the dark with her hand in mine.

Her breath slowed against the space between us. After a while it evened out into the rhythm of sleep, but she did not let go of my hand and I did not let go of hers.

I lay in the dark and listened to her breathe before sleep finally overtook .