Sky Pride

Chapter 13- Common Sense of Humans

Tian blinked, trying to understand what his ‘master’ just said. She looked rather pleased, sitting expressionlessly in the dim of her cave. It almost sounded like-

“Pardon? May I ask why?”

“Propriety. Not that I don’t understand the spirit of your request. I… appreciate it.” Her face was immobile as always, but perhaps one might persuade oneself that there was a hint of softness in the corners of those cloudless eyes. “I will certainly do everything in my power to aid you, including inviting one of my fellow Daoist Masters to oversee the procedure. However, it is simply impossible for me to do it myself.”

“I am thankful, but I’m afraid I still don’t understand why I shouldn’t have asked.”

“You will presumably be naked for the process. Does that give you any clues?” There was a surprisingly arch tone to her thoughts, almost playful, had it come from anyone else. He didn’t feel the featureless cave really leant itself to playfulness, and frankly, it wasn’t the moment for it. They needed plain speaking, not games.

“No? My body is extremely proper, wearing clothes or otherwise, and there is an exception to the sect rules on uniform standards in both private residences and in instances of medical necessity.”

Tian was very clear on this point. Liren had insisted, repeatedly, on the rigid enforcement of the sect rules on clothes, and to keep the peace, Tian hadn’t argued about it.

“A handsome young man, stripping down in front of his much older female teacher, rubbing fragrant oils… you know, even with the mind protecting spell you have active, I can still see that you haven’t the faintest idea what I’m talking about. Which is impossible, given the way you have been gallivanting about with Disciple Hong for years now.”

“Impropriety and propriety are both circumstantial. If I cut someone open and throw pieces of them in a bucket, I’m either a maniac or a surgeon, depending on circumstances.” Tian’s voice was prim, verging on the matronly. Given the circumstances, everything he did with Liren was entirely proper, and therefore irrelevant to the conversation.

“Or both, of course, depending on the circumstances.”

“Naturally. I have noticed that some of the surgeons do get this very intense look when operating, and seem quite mopey when there isn’t anyone who needs their assistance.” Tian could vividly see the scenes now. A picture painted in red, mostly, with some upsetting pinks, yellows, whites, purples, and when a wound had gone really wrong, black. On a few memorable occasions, a surgeon had asked him if the fluid weeping from a wound was “straw colored” or to get his nose closer to the wound, sniff hard, and see if he could tell whether the bowel had been perforated.

It was usually very easy to tell. You didn’t need to sniff hard.

“Oh? I’ve usually seen surgeons while they were working on me. On the receiving end of that potential impropriety that was utterly appropriate under the circumstances. Young man, you might not have a problem with it, but I guarantee your Dao Companion does.”

“Really?” Tian tilted his head to the side.

“Really. How would you feel if a man saw Disciple Hong naked, staring at her for hours?”

“Briefly bad, but then, I am a very petty, very jealous person.”

“Briefly?”

“I’d work through my anger in a healthy, productive, and above all appropriate manner.” Tian regretted his base nature, but it seemed it couldn’t be helped. He had the impression that Cruel Treachery was amused, though she looked nearly catatonic, sitting at the back of her cave.

The blandness of the cave irritated Tian. It was both featureless and undecorated, as though Cruel Treachery had just picked a random indentation in the side of the mountain, threw down a meditation mat, and decided that was good enough for a century or three. He was all for dispensing with vanity, but not at the cost of humanity.

“You would be surprised at how many people share exactly your stance on matters. Though it isn’t universal.” Her thoughts turned wry, then nostalgic.

“No?”

“No, back when I could be bothered to maintain a harem, many of my lovers… why am I telling you this?” The last few words were actually spoken out loud, her blue eyes dimming to a twilight periwinkle in confusion.

“I am a good listener. I think people can tell that I take a real interest in them, so they want to tell me things. I can certainly connect to that desperate need for people to understand you. Master, it really does have to be you because the process will reveal a few of my more important secrets. I’ve always been cautious, and my brothers reinforced that since I joined the Outer Court. I simply wouldn’t be willing to do it with someone else, especially a stranger. I will talk it over with Sis’ Liren and get her approval. Perhaps she could observe with you, if that would aid propriety. It wouldn’t be the first time she has seen me naked, covered in unspeakable substances as my body tears itself apart.”

“It… wouldn’t?”

“Second or third time, I don’t really keep count. That’s just the body tearing bit, obviously she has seen me covered in… foul smelling liquids… many more times than that. Tens or hundreds of times, I don’t know.”

“I am suddenly very concerned about the moral education of the- blood. You are talking about wading through a battlefield and becoming coated in the blood and visceral fluids of your enemies, and afterward when you cleaned yourself off.”

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Tian raised an eyebrow, his muscular control generating a mathematically perfect arch. “What else could I possibly be referring to?”

“Heavens above, it’s like listening to someone burning down a house and expecting praise for getting rid of the spiders. On reflection, almost every longer conversation with you is either a covert interrogation, a polite brawl, or spiraling madness. Disciple Tian, I must ask, who taught you to speak like this?”

Tian spread his hands helplessly. “I really don’t know. I have no recollection of learning to speak. I still don’t know how to speak ‘human.’ I’m just mimicking their calls. It seems to be working.”

“Do you really believe that?” Her eyes dimmed further.

“I have a dao companion and a father and some good friends, so yes, I think I’m doing well.”

“No, that you don’t know how to speak like a human. That you are, somehow, something other than human.”

“Oh.” He paused and really considered it. “I don’t really know the answer to that either. I always defined humans as animals that caused pain for their own pleasure, even if they took a loss from doing so. That is something completely contrary to my dao. Humans are, and always have been, rock throwers, and the people with the rock throwers, pointing and laughing at me. Therefore, even though I am entirely human shaped, I grew up knowing I must be something else. My hope is that if I work hard enough, I can save some from their humanity. Mmm… I will share a memory with you, if you like.”

“Please.”

Tian let his mind slip back to the junkyard, and the years of Grandpa Jun’s silence. The feeling of the burned skin pulling and tearing. How hard it was to breathe. How every move had to be calculated and weighed for its worth in hunger and pain. How his body ached from the loneliness as much as the sickness. How desperate he was for any sort of comfort, companionship, connection.

He remembered the humans standing on the edge of the dump. He remembered them

stooping down to scoop up a rock and throwing it hard enough to tear flesh, to crack his skull open if he wasn’t quick enough. He remembered them laughing, and swearing, and bending over to grab another rock. He hadn’t even said anything to them. He hadn’t even waved. They just saw him, and that was a good enough reason to throw rocks. Again and again and again and again and their faces blurred together and their voices became one voice and they were not people but humans, they were all the humans and he must be something else or why, why, why, why, why would they hurt him like this? Over and over and over and over and over again? Why? What did he do?

“Enough.”

Tian sent his mind away from the memories as he rebuilt his mental defense. Cruel Treachery closed her eyes, the corners tight. He could feel the upset in the press of her emotions.

“Go speak to Disciple Hong, and if she agrees, I’ll do it. Letʼs make you the best version of whatever you are. Suddenly, I don’t feel like defending humans. Or propriety.”

Liren gave Tian a long look and a big sigh after he explained everything. She agreed it was fine, essentially no different than being cared for by a doctor. “Zihao, you are openly possessive of me. Not in a creepy, cloying way, thank heavens, and my ego can use the flattery, but I know you will forget your own name before you forget your grudge against Sweetdove. You can’t possibly be unaware of why this taboo exists.”

“I do, but our teacher is apparently six thousand years old, used to have a harem, and currently sits unmoving in a dark hole in the ground. I will want her to think energetically dense thoughts at me, for entirely appropriate reasons. Maybe it’s too much time working in hospitals, but everyone is being very silly about this. Now, if you will excuse me, I have to combine insanely precious natural treasures in a special bucket and mush them with a special stick.”

Tian had his herbalism manuals spread in front of him as he worked. He knew that more wasn’t always more, but he had accumulated quite a lot of odd herbs, and this was a good opportunity to use some of them up. Particularly some of the more sinister ingredients like blood coral and boneshatter mint, the strange mushroom and so on. Grandpa had said that Earth Milk could affect the earthly souls, and that was an interesting clue about what direction to go in.

He needed to complete a full elemental cycle, and there were seven po souls. Each po soul was supposed to govern certain parts of bodily regulation, as well as combatting specific conditions. They didn’t line up exactly with the five elements, but since each of the elements did correspond to an organ system, he could find correspondences between the yin portion of an organ system and a given po soul. He could then add herbs of the appropriate element and medicinal character to the mix, supplementing the organ and, he supposed, supplementing the soul.

The seven po souls were yin, concerned with the fleshy body. He would have to have some yang herbs on hand for him to eat, to supplement the three yang Hun souls that governed the mind and spirit. Just to keep things balanced. Maybe an incense? It was happy work, mind stretching, slowly creating his own prescription for an ointment that was best suited to specifically his needs.

The resulting ointment, after the grinding, mashing, mixing, boiling and sieving, was the exact same milky white of the Earth Milk, but the watery liquid now poured like warm honey, the clinging viscosity added to its allure. The smell was alluring too, the blend of sharp herbs and warm musk over cool mineral earth. He had to control his urge to stick his hands straight into it. You just knew it would feel amazing.

On the appointed day, Tian carved a trough in the stone ground in front of Cruel Treachery’s cave. Memories of digging a pit and filling it with mashed up snakes, dustless lotuses, and pond water came floating up. It wasn’t exactly like that, nor was it exactly like what happened when he killed those poor people in Burning Flag City. There was an echo of those times, though. The corner of his mouth twitched. Sinking into memory as he lay in a hole in the earth seemed appropriately yin.

“Hold my robes?” Tian glanced over at Liren, who was sitting nearby. They were in the little fold of the mountain which held Cruel Treachery’s cave, rather private, but still exposed to the open sky. He could see it bothered her, but she nodded anyhow, and didn’t say anything.

“Trust, huh?”

It has to start somewhere, and with someone. There is no such thing as something for nothing. If you keep telling people you don’t trust them, they won’t trust you. They aren’t snooping, incidentally. By which I mean the elders and the other human realm cultivators. They are clearly, deliberately, keeping their attention well away. It’s just you, Liren, and your master.

“What a stupid world. This should be done at a hospital, supervised by doctors, not by an old woman without a chair to her name.”

Yep. So?

Tian had to laugh. He sat down in the trough and started slathering on the lotion. It felt as good as it looked, soft, clinging, warming and cooling at the same time. He made sure to cover every inch of himself, even putting a few drops into his ear canal and onto his eyes. That one made him blink hard. He looked over at Liren, and bit back a scream. Where she had been sitting, something monstrous crouched burning, staring at him, unblinking.