Chapter 12: Unyielding Spirit?

  It had been a year since I reunited with my Master.

  Time passed differently when you were busy chasing after strength. I could still remember that first day, scrambling up the Sacred Hill while Master Song swung his sword like a madman. Compared to those early days, I had grown stronger… or so I liked to believe. After all my diligent work, my Body Tempering had finally reached the early stage. A tiny victory, but a precious one.

  Still, I knew the road ahead was long. If I wished to reach full completion, I would need ten years at the minimum... just like in my past life. Even with all my memories, all the references I tried to squeeze from my former self, the path of cultivation had proven just as cruel, just as steep, and just as unforgiving as before.

  “Nothing good comes easy,” I muttered to myself, standing proudly over the fallen trunk of yet another tree. I had used my Earth Breaking Spade, channeling my meager strength, and this time I cleanly chopped the tree in half. I puffed my chest in pride… until the stump creaked, groaned, and awkwardly toppled over, almost smashing me. I barely managed to waddle out of the way.

  "Maybe... ninety-five percent clean," I coughed, dusting myself off.

  Cultivation was especially tricky for beasts. Stronger beasts the likes of dragons, phoenixes, and qilins could simply devour powerful creatures and digest them like rare elixirs. Their bloodlines opened the way for them. But weak and smaller creatures, say, a squirrel or a dodo bird like myself? No such shortcut existed. Instead, we were forced to walk the human path: unlocking our meridians through sheer suffering, tempering our bodies through harsh martial arts, relentless training, and endless injuries.

  Master Song had been quite clear on this.

  "If you cannot rely on your bloodline or your ferocity," he had said while chewing on a pinecone with terrifying vigor, "then you must rely on your will! Will burns hotter than any furnace!"

  I took his words to heart. I had to. Otherwise, I’d still be flailing around, good only for comic relief.

  I looked around the clearing. It was quiet. Too quiet. Most often, my Master wasn’t with me when I trained. It was the same in the last iteration. He would come and go to teach me, scold me, hand me a peach or a roasted nut, or to spar with me until I squealed for mercy. But he never stayed for long. His nature was like the wind, like the rivers… sometimes present, sometimes distant.

  I swung my stubby wings around, stretching. "Where is he now?" I asked the empty sky. “I wonder what was Master doing right now?”

  Honestly, I had no idea where Master Song had gone this time. Last time, he had mentioned needing to visit a neighboring sect. Another time, he claimed he had to deliver a heavenly debt to some old tortoise hermit. He might come back in a week, or he might come back in a month. It really depended.

  "If only my memory was more reliable," I grumbled, kicking a pebble. "Maybe then I'd remember which day he usually returns."

  But no matter how much I racked my brain, that detail stubbornly refused to surface. Maybe it was the dodo part of me interfering. Or maybe, some things were simply meant to be lived again, uncertain and thrilling.

  I looked up toward the Sacred Hill and the blue skies beyond.

  Well, it wasn’t like I was truly alone.

  Master Song’s teachings, his laughter, his terrible squirrel wisdom… they all stayed with me.

  And besides, I wasn’t about to slack off just because the teacher wasn’t around.

  "Alright," I said to myself, stomping one clawed foot down in determination, "next tree! Let’s see if I can get a hundred percent clean cut this time!"

  Another tree fell with a thunderous thud, the ground trembling slightly beneath my claws. The forest around me shook as if startled by my efforts, leaves whispering their approval or perhaps their pity. I stood proudly before my conquest, chest puffed out, despite my stubby legs wobbling from the exertion.

  I managed to fell roughly a dozen trees today, each one boasting thick, stubborn bark that took everything I had to break through. I felt oddly proud. After all, it wasn't every day that a dodo bird could declare war on a forest and live to tell the tale.

  With a determined grunt, I dragged along the rough rope I had found earlier from the Sacred Tree… an ordinary rope I prepared beforehand. The Sacred Tree, old and venerable, hid many secrets within its hollow trunk, and among the relics tucked away inside was this curious length of rope. A human tool. Odd, but then again, Master Song always collected strange things.

  I paused for a moment, clutching the rope in my beak, guilt gnawing at my chest.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Master Song hadn’t formally introduced me to the Sacred Tree’s inner sanctum yet. If he knew I had slipped inside, found a hidden entrance with my claw, and quietly raided some of the old items… he would be furious. I could already imagine him waving his sword at me, scolding me for "tampering with ancient heritage" or some such thing.

  It hurt, deeply, knowing that I was turning my back on Master’s trust like this. Even if my intentions were pure, even if it was necessary for my training, it still felt like a betrayal. I tightened the rope around the thickest trunk, summoning every bit of boy scout instinct I had left from my Earth memories. I fashioned a makeshift knot… well, a glorified mess really… and tried to drag the tree toward the beach, inch by painful inch.

  The sun dipped beyond the mountains, painting the sky in bruised shades of purple and red. Night descended swiftly, bringing with it a chill that seeped into my wet feathers and bones. I looked at my pitiful progress, barely a few body-lengths dragged across the muddy ground and felt a deep, heavy weariness settle over me.

  Not even one log reached the beach.

  With a frustrated squawk, I abandoned the task for the night. My stomach grumbled angrily, demanding food, so I waddled down to the lake, slipping and sliding over the damp rocks. Thankfully, this part of the forest was safe enough. There were fish aplenty, and not a single dangerous beast prowled near the water. I was clumsy, sure, but after a few faceplants and embarrassing lunges, I managed to catch a few slippery silver fish.

  As I gulped down my meal under the pale glow of the moon, I sighed and looked up at the Sacred Tree standing proudly in the distance. My home. My refuge.

  I couldn’t resist its pull. I trudged back, soaked and exhausted, slipping through the secret entrance I had found weeks ago. The inside of the Sacred Tree was warm, almost humming with ancient life. I nestled into a patch of moss I claimed as my bed, curling up tightly.

  Sleep came quickly, but it was not kind.

  Dreams of hurt and pain swirled around me.

  I dreamt of fire consuming the Sacred Hill.

  I dreamt of Master's fading smile.

  I dreamt of loneliness so profound it felt like the night itself had swallowed me whole.

  I buried my head deeper into my feathers, willing the memories away. I wanted to believe I could change things this time. That this life would be different. Yet somewhere deep inside, a whisper of fear clung stubbornly to me.

  I woke up to the warm sunlight filtering through the cracks of the Sacred Tree. I yawned loudly, shaking bits of moss off my feathers, feeling surprisingly refreshed despite the nightmares that had plagued me. Today was going to be a productive day. It had to be.

  Dragging myself up, I immediately returned to the task I had set for myself… moving those stubborn logs. One by one, with lots of grunting, huffing, and desperate clawing at the ground, I managed to drag the trees all the way to the beach. I finished around noon, panting and collapsing dramatically on the sand, feeling like I had conquered a small country. My legs felt like jelly and my wings hung limply by my sides, but my heart was triumphant.

  After resting, I caught some fish by the sea. The salty breeze filled my nostrils as I clumsily flapped around the shallows, trying to spear fish with my beak. It wasn’t pretty, but I managed to secure my lunch. With a full belly and a heart filled with misplaced confidence, I turned toward my true goal.

  It was time to make a boat.

  I stood there for a long moment, staring at the logs laid out before me, feeling the first seeds of doubt bloom in my mind. Honestly, I had no idea what I was doing. None. Zero. Zilch. My only qualifications were a Fine Arts degree, a spotty memory of high school physics, and a few trivia tidbits I picked up from random documentaries back on Earth.

  "Right," I muttered to myself, pacing in front of the logs. "How hard could it be? It just has to float. Floating is easy. Wood floats. Done!"

  Oh, how na?ve I was.

  The first week was a nightmare. I tied the logs together with the rope using knots that I vaguely remembered from a high school camping trip. Some of them looked sturdy. Others looked like a toddler had been given too much string. When I tried dragging the "raft" to the water, it immediately fell apart like an insult to engineering.

  "Ugh! Stupid raft!" I cried out, flopping dramatically on the sand.

  I rebuilt it, this time remembering something about "cross beams" for stability. I snapped smaller branches to create a lattice, tying them across the logs. It sort of looked raft-like now, though if you squinted, you might mistake it for a failed art project. I tried pushing it into the water again. It held together… for about three seconds before tipping sideways and throwing me face-first into the shallows.

  "Note to self," I sputtered, spitting out salt water, "balance is important."

  Over the second week, I began to see slow improvement. I realized I needed to secure the logs tighter and more evenly. I also discovered that if I sat just right… not too much to one side, wings carefully spread… the raft didn’t immediately tip over. It wasn’t elegant. It wasn’t sturdy. Honestly, it looked like something a desperate desert island castaway would throw together after a nervous breakdown, but it floated.

  By the third week, I could drift out a little into the cove without dying. That, in my book, was a success.

  Just as I was admiring my "magnificent vessel" (and yes, I had proudly named it the Unyielding Spirit), a familiar voice rang across the beach.

  "Disciple Du!" Master Song’s voice boomed, cutting across the crashing waves and screeching gulls.

  I froze, feathers stiffening. Slowly, like a criminal caught red-handed, I turned to see Master Song standing at the edge of the forest, arms crossed, a look of deep, profound disappointment written all over his face.

  "What," Master Song said slowly, each word heavy with the weight of judgment, "is that abomination you have summoned upon this sacred land?"

  "Master!" I squawked, flapping frantically to the shore. "I… I made a boat!"

  "A boat," he repeated, deadpan. He walked closer, inspecting my raft with a mixture of curiosity and horror. His nose twitched. His bushy tail twitched even harder. "You call this a boat?"

  I puffed my chest out in pride. "It floats, Master!"

  He knelt beside it, poked it once with his sword, and watched as one of the cross beams immediately snapped and drifted away into the sea.

  "…It floated," I corrected meekly.

  Master Song sighed, the heavy sigh of a teacher questioning every decision that had led him to this moment. "Disciple Du," he said, voice filled with grim patience, "today you have enlightened me to a great truth."

  "What is it, Master?" I asked, eyes wide with hope.

  He looked me dead in the eye and declared solemnly, "Even miracles have their limits."

  Uuuh… Master Song seemed very angry… I hoped it wasn’t because of me.