Year 658 of the Stable Era,

  Twentieth day of the tenth month

  Ten minutes before the stroke of the 12th Outer Hour

  “Have you secured the last of the sweets?” Chang Hui demanded, stacking the last of the chests crammed full of spirit stones into her spatial ring as she glanced over at her clock. Her spectacled secretary Li Gho materialized in front of her desk, a stack of delicate red paper boxes in each hand.

  As ever, the short cultivator was the picture of grace under pressure. Not a strand of hair in her tight braid was out of place despite the urgency of her task, the only betrayal of her exertion the fact that her glasses were a degree and a half askew. She placed her boxes on the table on a neat stack, two wide and three tall, straightening them and then her glasses before answering the question.

  “Yes,” Li Gho replied, clasping her arms behind her back as she delivered her report. “Three boxes of peach jelly tarts, two boxes of sticky buns, and one box of fruit tarts from Peach Garden Bakery. Zhu Haoyu was amenable to the usual deal of a delay on his debt collection in exchange for preferential service, which I have reported to the Collection Department.”

  “The mooncakes from The Rabbit’s Dream have already been prepared according to your instructions, although I regret to inform you that despite my best efforts the acquisition of the plate went 10 spirit stones over the market price. I apologize for my incompetence, and have paid the excess out of my own pocket as recompense.”

  “Good, good,” Hui said, waving her apology away as she swept the sweets into her ring. “I didn’t expect you to find one on such short notice, so you can file for a reimbursement as an expedience cost. Do we have confirmation on the appointments?”

  “We were able to secure a meeting with the Heads of the Talisman, Spiritual Arts and Sword Division,” Li Gho replied, following Hui as she secured her sword on her back and made her way out of the narrow office. “The Martial Arts Division declined our request on the basis that they quote ‘had even less time to deal with this than the last time you asked’. The Alchemy Division also declined, although they offered us several seats to the pill lecture as a form of apology.”

  “How many seats?” Hui asked, taking the stairs three at a time as they rushed to the bottom of the pagoda. The Alchemy Division always enjoyed their displays of magnanimity, so even their refusal was an opportunity.

  “Five.”

  “Not a bad amount. Remind me to offer them to Den from the Cracked Peak Branch. He was complaining that he couldn’t secure a seat, and I want him to owe me for it.”

  “Very well,” Li Gho replied, blinking twice as she made a mental note of her new task.

  “Any other complications?” Hui asked as they reached the ground floor, arriving at the back room of the Clear Jade Mountain Branch of the Southern Peaks Gambling Hall.

  The cramped room was filled with a quiet hubbub of cultivators at work, as dozens of members rushed about retrieving payments and storing bets from the cubbies that stretched between floor to ceiling. They’d been busier than usual lately with the repayment of the Entrance Exam bets. The boxes had had to have been pulled out of the medium-deep storage rooms, which was why the line out front had been allowed to build to such an unusual size.

  Any other time Hui would have simply reassigned members from less critical roles to deal with the extra demand, but with the Heavenly Wok Competition so soon, such personnel were few and far between.

  “Guan Tie!” Hui snapped, grabbing the attention of the cultivator loafing around in the corner of the room. “Get over here. We’re leaving.”

  With a grin the spear cultivator finished the bao he had been snacking on, following it with the last of his tea. He left the empty cup on the counter for someone else to deal with, jauntily spinning his spear onto his shoulder as he did. It was a testament to his skill that he didn’t knock even a single piece of paper askew, though a passing clerk swore as he ducked under its third revolution.

  “Aye-aye boss lady,” the steel-haired cultivator replied, falling in behind Hui. “Just wanted to grab a bit of a bite before headin out. Wouldn’t want to have the ole stomach rumble during a meetin, now would we?”

  Hui sighed internally at his accent, reminding herself that the paper-member was vital for her negotiations.

  Division Heads were fickle, even by cultivator standards.

  By its very nature, a cultivation sect as large as the Teal Mountain Sect could not run smoothly without bureaucracy. But management was a time hungry thing, shunned by most cultivators due to the fact that it gorged itself on the one resource they couldn’t steal or harvest. They were reluctant to waste valuable time that could be used training or seeking enlightenment on such a “triviality”, despite gleefully guzzling the resources that the sect provided.

  Those that did participate in it did so for various reasons. At the low level, positions were filled by disciples looking for some extra cash, while middle level positions were typically occupied by peaked cultivators content with riding out the rest of their long lives behind a desk rather than on the field of battle.

  But at the top? Well, was a true nest of serpents.

  It was a position that could only be achieved with ambition, as the benefits of being a Division Head—namely the authority to manage funds and the distribution of cultivation resources—far outweighed the work involved. While the simpleminded would see such benefits as an easy way to monopolize precious resources for oneself, the true strength of the position lay in its soft power. The ability to court favor was a powerful thing, and no cultivator achieved the coveted seat of Division Head to the applause of empty palms.

  Only the most dedicated Elders managed to reach such a position, and they were nothing to be trifled with.

  Dealing with them required a high degree of deference. Hui’s gifts were a start, expertly chosen to appeal to each’s well-known tastes, but the quality of her party was equally important so as to show the appropriate level of respect.

  This was where Guan Tie came in.

  The cocky cultivator was a well-known champion of the Teal Mountain Sect, a strong third-stage Inner Disciple that was impressively far in the Body Moulding stage for his age. Aside from his metal hair, he also boasted an impressive collection of inter-sect tournament trophies, as well as the record for largest spirit crab caught in Lake Taiji.

  Guan Tie was a part of the Southern Peaks Gambling Hall mostly in name. His primary purpose was public appearances, as well as the occasional collection job when a particularly powerful debtor was involved. In exchange they provided him a generous stipend, which usually took the form of forgiven debts rather than payments. As skilled as he was with the spear, he was a poor gambler, which had made it easy for the Hui to recruit him.

  Just so long as he kept his mouth shut during the negotiations.

  * * *

  After a ten-minute run the trio arrived at the Talisman Division, stopping before the tall black building known as The Inkstone to many disciples.

  As tall as a twelve-tier pagoda and thrice as wide, the building was made entirely from pure black granite, formed from a spell cast by its establishing Grand Elder centuries ago. Its sparse exterior belied the nature of its interior, full of well decorated staircases connecting a web of lecture halls, study rooms, and research chambers that lined its open shaft. The magic in its walls allowed light pass through them through some twist of space or light, allowing its occupants the benefits of plentiful natural light while preserving their privacy.

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  They approached the building at a more conservative pace, slowing from their sprint so as to not betray their urgency. There were eyes everywhere, and they needed to give away as little as possible.

  Li Gho announced them to the receptionists, and after an exchange of polite bows they were escorted to Xu Xianmo’s office on the middle floor of the building. The Grand Elder’s design choices had been more than a little eccentric—as one could easily tell from the exterior—and supposedly the decision to place the enormous room in the middle of the building was to make it easier for him to walk the shortest distance possible to any other room. As the door swung open Hui smoothed out her robes one final time.

  “Chang Hui greets Elder Xu Xianmo,” she declared, making sure to use his preferred title as she bowed deeply from her waist. Behind her, her companions followed suit, Li Gho making sure to keep their boxed gift perfectly flat as she did.

  “Come in, come in,” Xu Xianmo said, waving an ink-stained sleeve at them as his brush danced across the pages before him. Unlike his face, his long life was on display on his robes, covered as they were in centuries of blots and splotches. The more mundane markings were content to remain still, but those left by the more fantastical of his inks gently swirled across the fabric, taking on vague animalistic forms as they gamboled around each other.

  Hui was certain that some of the marks were far older than she was, preserved only by their wearer’s staunch refusal to replace anything if it hadn’t been worn to shreds. His robe aside, nothing immediately stood out about his appearance—short black hair, light scholarly skin, and slim arms.

  It was only when one looked more closely that his nature became apparent. His skin closer to that of fine paper than that of sun-scorned skin. His hair the color of fine soot, a deep shade of calligrapher’s black that almost seemed to suck the light into it. His eyes were fearsome things; deep, dark blots of bottomless ink, their shape barely held in place by his schlera. Ink and paper, the core of his art, the shape of his soul painted across his physical frame in monochrome.

  “I hope you don’t mind me finishing this up,” Xu Xianmo continued without looking up, his left arm performing a series of weight exercises with a large brass statue as he did. “I’ve been quite busy as of late, to the point that I’ve almost had to work through my breaks.”

  “The Southern Peak Gambling Hall appreciate your willingness to meet with us on such short notice,” Hui replied as she approached his desk, motioning for Li Gho to present him with their gift. She kept her eyes low as she did, respect allowing her to avoid meeting his unwavering gaze. Dealing with a Spirit Formation cultivator never got any easier, the knowledge of his might stripping any comfort that his carefully restrained aura might have given.

  “Please accept these mooncakes as a token of our gratitude. A moment’s respite should never be wasted, and what better than some good food to match good company?” Li Gho held the plate out to Xu Xianmo as he finished his work, setting down his gold-banded pen before taking a bite from the fattest of the cakes.

  “Ah, Lunar Duck yolk and sausage from The Rabbit’s Dream,” he said, finishing the cake in two quick bites before reaching for a second. “You spoil me.”

  “They’re the best mooncakes in the sect,” Hui smiled back. “Or so I’ve been told.”

  Old cultivators, for all their eccentricities, were incredibly consistent in their tastes. Hui had learnt about Xu Xianmo’s preference in snacks a century or two ago, and made sure to always include some of whichever was appropriate for the time she visited him.

  More than a few of the sect’s eateries endured entirely from having caught the attention of an old monster’s tastes, and Hui was sure that Xu Xianmo was unaware that his precious treats were now worth more than five times their weight in spirit stones.

  As for his other tastes…Well, she waited until he ate another two mooncakes to discover it himself. It only took a moment before he did, the remaining mooncakes falling to his desk as he held up the plate with a faint sound of shock. An array carved into the side of the desk caught the falling snacks before they could make contact with the drying ink, glowing discs forming under each of them as its occupant inspected his new prize.

  “Is this what I think it is?” Xu Xianmo asked, wiping off the last of the crumbs so that he could appreciate the details of the depiction of the sect’s founder, Lee Taijin, in all of his glory. The muscular cultivator had been depicted in the act of lifting a boulder, each bulging muscle recorded in in perfect anatomical detail.

  “Indeed,” Hui nodded. “I happened to come across it while I was at the market some time ago, and recognized this treasure under a pile of low-grade spirit herbs. The owner was unaware of its value, so I was able to have it included in my purchase with the barest bargaining.”

  Li Gho’s face remained expressionless as Hui spun her tale, having been the one to spend an hour and a half haggling over the plate.

  “Is it for sale?” Xu Xianmo inquired, returning the rest of the mooncakes to the plate with a wave of his hand. He intercepted one as they sailed by, taking a contemplative bite as he directed his full attention at Chang Hui.

  “For the price I got it for?” Hui laughed, lying as easily as she breathed qi. “I couldn’t possibly. Think of it as a gift between friends. A token of the time we’ve known each other.”

  “Very well”, Xu Xianmo replied, licking the last of the crumbs from the plate. He polished it with a cloth as he walked it over to his display shelf, where thirty-five other commemorative plates, each depicting the sect’s founder in different poses, sat on rosewood blocks. “You know, the design of the 2700th anniversary commemorative plate was always a personal favorite of mine. It truly captured the essence of The Strongest Brain’s strength, and the dynamic nature of the pose was just extraordinary.”

  “I always recalled it being one of the gems of your collection,” Hui said smoothly, giving the shelf a long look that she hoped conveyed the appropriate level of admiration. “And I must say, it is much more impressive complete.”

  “Indeed,” Xu Xianmo said, a dark expression blotting the smile from his face for a fleeting moment. “It will never be incomplete again.” Hui suppressed any thoughts about what had happened to the poor fool that had knocked the plate over while cleaning. It was never good to think about such unpleasant things. It gave her imagination too much free reign.

  “So, I’m sure that you didn’t just come here to present me with this beautiful plate, did you?” Xu Xianmo asked, picking up his brush again as he resumed his paperwork. “What do you need from me?”

  “Well, as you might be aware, our Southern Peaks Gambling Hall is hosting a contest soon,” Hui said, Li Gho unfurling one of the posters for the Heavenly Wok Competition as she did. “A cooking contest, designed to show the visiting sects the prowess of our spirit chefs.”

  Xu Xianmo nodded slightly at this, his expression neutral. The Cooking Division and the Talisman Divisions had no animosity between them, but Hui kept her explanation brief as she knew that he had little interest in any competition that didn’t involve a brush.

  “We have, however, experienced a trouble as of late. A bit of a clump in our bristles, so to speak.”

  “Oh?”

  Hui braced herself for her next words, knowing that entirety of her pitch relied on her next words.

  “Well, there was a bit of an accident at the Formation Division today—”

  “Ah yes, I saw it from my window,” Xu Xianmo laughed. “Damned fools blew up one of their training fields trying out a new attack array or something. You should have seen the smoke.”

  “Yes, well…”

  “Bright red plume, thick as their stupid pagoda,” Xu Xianmo continued, gesturing its approximate girth and height with his free hand as he stamped a signature. Hui carefully let the last of his laughter fade before she continued.

  “Well,” she said, letting a bit of the pain of the bad news seep into her voice as delivered the critical part of her pitch, “unfortunately one of the items lost in the destruction was their Jade Drifting Cloud Eye. It was being used to record the new array’s performance and—”

  “Ah,” Xu Xianmo replied flatly, with such a lack of enthusiasm that Hui almost winced at the sound. “So, I suppose you’re here to ask if you can borrow ours for your little contest?”

  “Indeed,” Hui said, attempting to appeal to his artisan sensibilities. “Without a working Eye we would be unable to project our competition. As you know, detail is integral to such an event, and without the ability to see our chef’s at work, the audience will be unable to fully appreciate their skill.”

  “Hmm,” Xu Xianmo muttered, looking up at the poster a second time before letting out a sigh. “Unfortunately, I will have to decline your request. The Talisman Division has already made arrangements for our Drifting Cloud Eye that day. The Golden Shadow Lotuses of the Tang Jin Memorial Garden are flowering that day, and an old friend requested that I be there to commemorate it with her this time.”

  “I see,” Hui replied, decades of experience sifting any traces of disappointment from her voice.

  “I do wish I could help, but my hands are quite tied in this matter. Now, is that all, or do you have other business to discuss?”

  “No, that was it.”

  Xu Xianmo didn’t reply to this, his attention now fully back on his work.

  “Thank you for taking the time to meet with us,” Hui said, motioning behind her back for her companions to turn to leave. “The Southern Peaks Gambling Hall is grateful for your consideration.”

  “Mhmm,” Xu Xianmo responded. “I wish you good luck on your search, for whatever that’s worth. Oh, and Guan Tie?”

  “Yessir?” the tall cultivator replied, back straightening slightly at being addressed.

  “Good work showing those bastards from the Circling Shoal Sect the power of the Talisman Division! I’m looking forwards to your performance in the Anything-Goes Martial Arts Tournament.”

  Guan Tie hastily thanked the Elder for his praise, and as the Xu Xianmo offered a few pieces of advice for how he could better refine his water arts, Hui’s thoughts were already turning towards her subsequent meetings.

  For the most part this one had been a wash, and while she was quite sure that Xu Xianmo was appreciative of the plate, the favor it had bought her would have to be cashed in at a later date. For now, the Jade Drifting Cloud Eye was the only thing that mattered, and she only had two more opportunities left to secure it.

  The success of the Heavenly Wok Competition was critical to her plans for the Southern Peaks Gambling Hall, and she couldn’t afford to let this opportunity slip through her fingers.

  No matter how much she needed to beg, bow and scrape to make it happen.