“Well, that certainly could have gone worse,” said a cheerful Master Feng.
Sen nodded and said, “I didn’t have to kill him, which should help secure the willing assistance of his sect mbers. If only that would work every ti.”
“Appreciate the victory you have in hand.”
There was a chiding quality to his teacher’s words that made Sen hesitate. He really hadn’t given that small but aningful victory its due consideration. All of his other current and future concerns had crowded his thoughts the mont Wu Yong surrendered. He’d only paid enough attention to the other man’s vow to the heavens to make sure all the right parts were in it. Sen supposed he could be forgiven for that lapse. He did have a great many things weighing down on him, not the least of which was the fate of those three scouts he’d sent out. He hadn’t given them a fixed ti to return, just a loose comnt that they should aim for around a month.
It had felt like enough ti for them to move ahead and get so information, if there was any information to gather. At the sa ti, he hadn’t wanted them to feel compelled to travel if their situation was precarious. He’d done enough hiding in his life to understand that, sotis, the best and only thing you could do was sit still and hope not to be noticed. It wasn’t an ideal strategy, but life didn’t always hand people the option to employ the ideal strategy. Now that the month he’d given them had co and gone with no sign of their return, it made his stomach clench whenever he thought about it. Sothing that wasn’t helped by the looming prospect of marching again. Unfortunately, hesitation would only leave to more problems.
“We’ll need to leave again soon.”
“Is that always true?” asked Master Feng.
“It is, but—” Sen trailed off.
“What?”
“I don’t know. I don’t like that the scouts we sent ahead haven’t co back.”
“That is concerning, but isn’t that why you sent them? To provide a warning? If they haven’t co back, that’s a warning in itself.”
“Yes, but a warning of what? Danger? We already suspected that. It’s the ignorance about the nature of that danger that worries . It might be an army. It might be one extrely powerful spirit beast. It might be both. It might be sothing else entirely. I can’t prepare for every possibility.”
“That is, unfortunately, the nature of war. You plan for what you can. Seize the montum where you can. The rest? All you can do is react with a steady mind, the sa way you would if you unexpectedly faced another cultivator.”
“Yes, but I actually know what other cultivators can do. In general, at least.”
“Hmmm. There is that, but you understand my point.”
“I do,” agreed Sen grudgingly.
“If it makes you feel any better, these are the sa complaints made by every general on every long campaign. Probably since the beginning of ti.”
“Shockingly, that does not make feel better. What does make feel better is that it looks like the other sects in the city are going to follow Wu Yong’s example.”
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“Did you expect anything less?”
“You never know.”
“I think, sotis, you may underestimate what a frightening man you are when you fight soone one-on-one. I would have been shocked if they didn’t all fall in line after that display.”
Sen glanced at his teacher. He wasn’t sure what to make of that comnt. He hadn’t been trying to do anything particularly nacing, but it seed he’d done it anyway. Food for thought at so mythical ti in the future when he had the luxury of idle thinking.
“I need to go into seclusion for a day or two,” murmured Sen.
“Why is that?”
“If there is a big fight coming, I don’t want to go into it with the qi reserves I have now. I need to replenish them. Well, no. That won’t happen in a day or two. But I can increase them a little.”
Master Feng nodded in understanding and said, “Because you never know when a little can be the difference between life and death. Speaking of life, have you spoken with Ai, Shui, or Caihong recently?”
“A few days ago. At this point, I’m always just relieved that Ai hasn’t found so new beast out of legend to take in as a pet.”
“Is that dragon still pretending that he’s her pet?”
“Apparently. I honestly don’t understand what that’s about, but Auntie Caihong says that he’s behaving.”
“Dragons are dragons. They do what they want. Why they do the things they do is beyond our understanding.”
Sen gave his teacher an amused look and said, “You know, I’ve heard you described in almost precisely the sa terms. More than once.”
Master Feng extended an arm and, rather ostentatiously, pulled back a sleeve.
“No scales,” he said. “I guess I must only be half-dragon.”
“I suspect that’s more than enough dragon for most people.”
“Probably so. I suppose I should take it as a complint, but I’ve t a few dragons. They are truly sothing apart from us. As far removed as nascent soul cultivators may seem from mortals, dragons are that far removed from soone like . That makes them unpredictable and dangerous, but they aren’t malicious as a rule.”
“Then, what are they as a rule?”
“The closest word is indifferent. It’s not quite right, but I don’t think we have a word that is right. None of us lives long enough to need such a word.”
“That’s unsettling.”
“As it should be,” said Master Feng in a serious voice. “I can’t begin to guess why that dragon has chosen to associate with little Ai, but it’s almost certainly nothing obvious.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because anything obvious is sothing that would make sense to us, which ans we could guess it. Dragons are linked to the heavens in so fashion. Sothing more direct than our connection to the heavens. So, it could be sothing as obscure as a twist in karma. Or, there’s a mont of fate that needs to proceed in a specific way, and the dragon is there to make sure that it does.”
“I don’t know how I should feel about that,” said Sen, suddenly very worried for Ai’s future.
“To be fair, it could also be sothing as obscure and unimportant as Ai having a particular kind of bird in her flock that the dragon finds interesting.”
Sen opened and closed his mouth a few tis before he shook his head.
“I’m always surprised when I find out that you aren’t sure about sothing. You know so much. It’s easy to think you know everything.”
“Don’t be silly. You almost certainly know more about alchemy than I do, the sa as Caihong. Kho knows more about formations. Song Lan probably knows more about the intricacies of fire cultivation than anyone else alive. My biggest advantage is that I’ve been around so long that I’ve seen more than most people. That makes hard to surprise. But when it cos to dragons, there are no experts except the dragons themselves. Truth be told, that lone eting you had with one makes you more of an expert than almost any other cultivator.”
Sen gave his teacher a horrified look and said, “That’s a terrifyingly low threshold for expertise.”
“Isn’t it? But you should rember this conversation when people are surprised in a few centuries when you don’t know everything.”
Sen thought that over for a mont before he huffed out a little breath of amusent.
“What an oddly roundabout way to make a point.”
“I hope you were taking notes. It’s a surprisingly useful tactic with brighter students.”
“And here I thought you’d given up on teaching .”
“You’re about two thousand years too early for that.”
“You know, that actually made feel better, old dragon,” said Sen with a smile.
“Truly, I am mighty in many ways,” said Master Feng with an air of such grandiose pompousness that Sen burst into laughter.
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