Control. So much in cultivation depended on it. Without it, strikes would not find their mark, or be turned aside with ease. Without it, one could shred their qi channels to uselessness. Without control, techniques could run out of control. That was a lesson Sen had learned the hard way. Seeing the destruction he’d wrought in that abandoned town with his poorly controlled use of Heavens’ Rebuke had very nearly convinced him to swear it off altogether. Even as he directed the sa technique at the thrashing, howling, impaled demonic cultivator, he focused on control. He would kill this man, Sen promised himself, not vaporize half a mile of forest. Yet, for all that cultivation called for control, for all that cultivators relied on it, there had to be room for the unknown, for the unpredictable, for the flower of strange fortune to bloom in their lives. Sen had been the recipient of that as well. Yet, in the mont, the blooming of that flower could look like a hideous, terrifying loss of control.
That was what Sen experienced as, in the barest sliver of ti before Heavens’ Rebuke flew from the spearhead, sothing he didn’t plan for happened. To his horror, a tiny thread from that ribbon of strange qi flew free and lodged itself in the heart of his technique. There was no ti to stop it, or even consider what it ant. There was only ti for one brief upswell of uncertainty and fear as Sen felt the technique fundantally change. Then, it was loosed on the demonic cultivator. While Sen expected the lance of purple-hued blackness with lightning crackling around it, what he got was a beam of iridescent light wreathed in that purple-hued black lightning. Sen was at a loss to even understand what happened next. While he hadn’t intentionally aid it that way, that beam punched into the demonic cultivator dantian. Sen flinched when he heard the man’s core shatter.
That alone was enough to end the fight. That man would likely never cultivate again. Yet, it seed the technique wasn’t through with him. That iridescent light seed to suffuse the man from the inside out. That was when the man opened his mouth and started screaming. Foulness the likes of which Sen had never seen was pushed out of the man’s body only to be hungrily consud by the purpled-hued black lightening that wreathed the man. The lightning left nothing behind, not even ash. When it seed that the light had pushed every last trace of corruption out of the man, it faded away, only for the lightning to shoot into the man and take its terrible due. Without the benefits of an intact core to support his body, the lightning acted more like a pack of ravenous animals than anything else. It simply consud the man from the outside in until nothing remained but a few charred and smoking bone fragnts.
When it was over, Sen found himself staring at those bone fragnts. He had done that. Sohow, soway, that technique had been born inside of him. He didn’t have words for what he felt. He wasn’t sorry that the man was dead. He wasn’t even sorry for how he’d killed him. Sen was absolutely certain that the man had gotten off easier than he deserved. Only countless acts of utter depravity, cultivation with components that no sane person would use, could possibly account for the corruption that had poured from that man’s skin. No, the problem was that Sen was all too certain that technique would have similar results on normal cultivators as well. What he’d just done hadn’t been killing. It hadn’t even been an execution. He had destroyed everything that man had ever been. And he’d done it in seconds.
The full weight of what he’d done descended on him. The danger of it blood fully ford in his mind. No one could know about that technique. Not that Sen planned to ever use it again. It seed that every ti he did, it got more wildly, insanely dangerous. Still, if word ever spread, if people ever found out that he could shatter their cultivation with one technique, he’d never be able to stop running. No threat of vengeance from terrifying nascent soul cultivators would be enough to shield him. Entire packs of core cultivators would hunt him down and destroy him. He’d never be safe again. Just as that realization struck ho, a powerful hand seized his robes and spun him around. Lo ifeng was staring at him, her eyes wild, afraid, and confused.
“What in all of the countless hells was that?” she scread, jerking him back and forth by the robes. “You aren’t so random cultivator that Feng Ming picked as a hobby. You tell who you are! You tell now!”
Sen fird his expression. “Stop.”
Lo ifeng looked like she wanted to yell again, then seed to realize what she’d been doing. Her face blanched, and she hurriedly took a step back. While she took a mont to visibly get ahold of herself, Sen looked over to Lifen. He struggled to pin down what her expression ant. It wasn’t fear, for which he was enormously grateful, but it was definitely sothing. It was a jumble of things. There were hints of awe in there, which he needed to put a stop to as soon as possible. There was also consideration in her eyes as if she’d thought she understood him and was reevaluating that. There were other things in there, too, and Sen didn’t have the experience or the ntal resources to devote to sorting it all out. He did find it odd that, after her initial shock and horror at the bloodshed, she seed calr about all of it than the much more experienced Lo ifeng. Maybe that’s the difference, thought Sen. Lo ifeng has the experience to understand how bad this could all get.
“I apologize,” said Lo ifeng, her face a calm mask. “I let my surprise get the better of . Still, the questions stand. What did you just do?”
“It never happened,” said Sen.
“What?” asked both Lifen and Lo ifeng at the sa ti.
“It never happened. We will talk about it here, now, once. Then, I will have an oath from both of you that you will never discuss it with anyone without my express permission.”
“Why?” asked Lifen.
“Because, if knowledge about it spreads, his death becos a certainty,” answered Lo ifeng. “Every core stage cultivator on the continent would be baying for his blood.”
Given that clue, Lifen's face lit up with understanding, and then imdiately went dark with a different kind of understanding. She considered all of it for a mont before she gave Sen a hard look.
“You don’t trust us to keep quiet.”
Sen shook his head. “I trust you to keep quiet in normal circumstances. I need that oath to ensure that no one can force the information from you.”
Lifen didn’t need any help connecting those dots. She grimaced, then nodded in understanding. “I can see why you’d think that was a possibility, given everything.”
“Yeah,” said Sen, more than a little bitter, before he looked at Lo ifeng. “I’ll start with your second question since it’s easier. I’m no one.”
“Seriously, I’ll add it to my oath.”
“There’s nothing to add. I really am no one. I was living on the streets when Master Feng found .”
“What about before that?”
“What about it? I’m not so lost prince or the scion of so great noble house if that’s what you’re thinking. Or, if I was, no one ever ca looking for .”
“That you know of,” offered Lifen.
Sen grudgingly conceded that point. “Yes, that I know of. But, really, even I know that’s just sothing that happens in stories. Can either of you think of a single ti that sothing like that happened in the real world?”
Both won thought hard for a mont. Lifen shook her head.
“No, I guess I can’t,” said Lo ifeng.
“Exactly. I’m confident that if soone managed to find out where I ca from, they’d find out that my parents were just peasants who died young. Or they were peasants who abandoned . Or so variation on that.”
“Fine,” said Lo ifeng. “I’ll accept that, for the mont. Now, explain exactly what it is that you just did that man.”
So, Sen laid out the essentials, which didn’t really take that long. Of course, there were lots of questions, most of which elicited shrugs from Sen. He was short on useful facts about the technique. When he’d answered, or failed to have answers, for all of their questions, he extracted oaths from them both, sworn to the heavens and on their cultivation to never reveal any of what he’d just told them. After that, he looked out at the surrounding forest and sighed.
“What’s wrong?” asked Lifen.
“There’s a chance there’s still a few of them alive out there. I should go finish them off.”
“I can do it,” said Lo ifeng.
Sen shot her a grateful look but declined. “If they’re alive, they’re probably half-mad or catatonic. I did that to them, so I should be the one to finish the job.”
With that, Sen walked into the trees to finish what he was trying very hard not to think of as a massacre at his hands.
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