Immortal Connections - Chapter 18 preview

Chapter 18 - Yang Mu

The return journey to the central kingdoms of the Middle Kingdom was less enjoyable. It was not, however, quiet for Yang Mu chose not to retrace her steps but forge new paths and new connections. Passing through new cities and towns, meeting new clans and sects and cultivator groups; she forged connections all across the jianghu(6). It was part of the reason she had been named the Silver Merchant, the other part being that her mother was the Platinum Merchant, one of the two Platinum Sages of the Inn. 

A little part of her was annoyed she wasn't the Golden Merchant, or a name of the form; but mostly she understood that it would just have gotten confusing. After all, there were three individuals with that name - one inherited in the central plains, one legitimately won and storied from a half millennia ago and one newly forged in the east -  and another half-dozen or so who claimed the title but had yet to receive widespread approval.

No, better to be the Silver Merchant and not be confused or mixed up with other, potentially besmirching, stories. 

However, the process of making friends and allies, of forging new connections was not entirely for mercantile reasons. It was useful, but mostly, she did it to advance her own dao. Even now, it was a too complex topic and burden after decades of pursuit; but it was a challenge that she could no longer put-off.

The Dao of Connections was too broad in itself, though its uses were as manifold as one might imagine. It was not a physical dao, not one of joinings and glues, or mortar and gum that a crafter might seek; but of connections between individuals and, yes, items. Not exactly karma, but close to it. She sought not the burdens between individuals, but the way they blended together, like the colors of a sunset.

Yet, connections - and the kinds and types and the variety and how these connections affected another, all across a kingdom and across kingdoms into the lands around - was a complex topic. To understand it, she needed to interact - to make such connections herself, pursue changes and manipulate their joining. Separating some, binding others, mixing together individuals or items.

Or, at times, watching from afar. Doing nothing, hiding like a cike(7) herself, a ghost in the night so that her very presence, the very act of her interaction did not alter what was there. A newly blossoming relationship might be altered forever if an intrusive parent were to meddle. She, the cultivator, in turn must stay away; watching in silence. Soaking in the blossoming changes.

Learning.

Not that she needed to do that now. She had more than enough time to study others when she was with Wu Ying, on their desperate journey to finding him a cure. Now, she was back doing what she did best, searching for and making new connections, putting individuals and resources together.

“A dozen Yellow Blossom Clear Mind and Soul pills, for your granddaughter as requested. Pristine level, of course,” she said, holding up the pill bottle to display the maker mark on it before depositing it on the table. “And for your son, the Lu Yen sculpture of the Li Tseng Gorge.” 

Sometimes, you never knew what would turn a man’s heart. In this case, the sculpture was not a work of great art by the sculptor, being one of his earliest pieces. It was, at best, passable with small indicators of the master that who would emerge eventually. 

Yet, it had been the son’s foremost demand. A desire to finish the son’s collection, to help showcase the journey of a great sculptor. 

“Thank you, Cultivator Yang.” The old man bowed a little, reached for the pills and the sculpture only for her to block his movements by interposing an opened fan. “Cultivator?”

“Rumor has it that your son has already begun planning a showing of Lu Yen’s works, starting from his most base works to his eventual mastery.” 

“Ah, my son… well. It is his life’s work, you see.” 

“Of course. And I would not want to stand in the way of such things.”

“Good, good.”

“But for me to hear of it, he must have begun preparations and have sent out the invites before I arrived.” Her brow furrowed. “Tell me, what if I had not been able to acquire the sculpture? What would he have said then, to those who traveled far and wide.”

“I-”

“Perhaps he’d blame me, for my inability to acquire something that was never guaranteed. Perhaps he might not, but rumors of why the piece was missing would flow.” She snapped the fan shut, moving her hand back to her side of the table as she continued. “You understand why I might be upset, for my reputation is one closely guarded. Built over many decades.”

“We never meant any insult, Cultivator Yang. And the statue, it is here, is it not?”

“And still mine.”

Now he understood and the old man frowned. He touched his storage ring where additional tael and silver coins lay, where spirit and demonic stones – the more common currency of cultivators – lay. Yet his minor movement just brought about a slight shake of her head.

“What do you want, Silver Merchant?”

“Nothing too onerous. Just some aid,” she said. “For now. And a promise of further aid, in the future.”

“In what?”

Now she had him. The moment he started asking for specifics, the negotiations had begun in earnest. It was but a matter of details now, of how much she could push him to utilize his resources and connections. A tricky business that, for it was easy to speak empty promises. Push too hard, and all that she would receive was empty platitudes. 

Yet, in this moment, when negotiations occurred between the pair, as a deal was struck and forthcoming intentions were expressed, the ebb and flow of the future danced before her eyes, painting swirling and expansive events before her. She could sense the connections that arose between them, that opened and shut as they spoke, and it was here, as she wove the two factors between, her dao thrummed.

Was it wrong? Or unfair that she utilized her own dao in these negotiations, that it allowed her to sense when to push or retreat, what to ask for or when he might have allies that might aid her? Perhaps. Yet, in this, she kept in mind one important aspects.

Her enemies had found her, in the farthest reaches of the western kingdoms. Her parents were incommunicado, taking action themselves against their shared enemies. Those she sought to beat were both a realm higher than her and with greater connections.

Most of all, she remembered one thing.

That her sister, she who had stepped away from the path to immortality, who had exited the jianghu to live a peaceful life of mundanity with her husband had been hunted down and killed. Her enemies had left no stone unturned in their desire to destroy her and her family.

How could she do any less?

Footnotes:

6 - Jianghu – technically mountains and rivers. It’s the term coined and used to describe the martial (and in this case, cultivator) world; a separate society that lives alongside mundane society with its own rules and precepts.

7 - Cike (cìkè) – Chinese term for assassin. In wuxia works (and A Thousand Li) they are generally depicted as the Chinese equivalent of ninjas.