Data-Driven Daoist

“There’s a villain out there who wants to sabotage the crab’s memories?” Huang Niuniu exclaimed, shooting to her feet.

“Sit down.” Yu Han rolled his eyes. Li Yao burst into laughter but quietened after a glare from the angry cow girl.

“Brother Yu…” Fang Zhao scratched his chin. “You said the crab wasn’t even aware of the pearls turning blue, right?”

“That seemed like the case. Usually it takes a few days for the pearls to be fully blue,” Yu Han replied. Although yesterday the pearls somehow turned blue within a few hours.

“If the crab visited some other person’s dream,” Fang Zhao said, “and lost the blue pearls there, would it even remember? It can’t even remember the pearls turning blue, let alone if it visited another dream.”

That was the problem.

“Maybe it can visit the dreams of other creatures too. Monsters, animals, birds, even insects or fish,” Yu Han said.

“Insects and fish aside, can monsters dream?” Li Yao asked.

“If a crab can, I think fish can too!” Huang Niuniu clapped. “They’re all seafood.”

“Hey now,” Yu Han chided her.“Can trees?” Li Yao asked.

“Good questions. We should think about it later,” Yu Han said, forcefully bringing the discussion back to the main topic. “Suppose it did somehow remember its dreams. Like Huang Niuniu said, I could just tell it not to go into other dreams and to always take back the pearls. But we’re assuming the crab can control pearl creation. From what I remember, the pearls always pop out of nowhere, and sometimes they even surprise the crab.”

“Even if you told it that, would it listen?” Li Yao saidasked

“Sometimes it does listen. Other times it’s willful,” Yu Han said.

“Maybe you should stop being mean to it,” Huang Niuniu said.

“You’re forgetting that it’s a crab,” Yu Han said, poking her puffy cheeks. Huang Niuniu slapped the offending finger away. “Communication with it is hard, woman. Next time, you give it a try. Maybe you can understand its clicks and dances better. Besides, the crab wants to know what’s in the parchment. If we tell it not to visit another’s dreams, that means cutting off the path to its ‘dream.’ Get it?”

“We’re also assuming that the crab can control its visits to other dreams,” Fang Zhao added. “Maybe it’s something it has to do for sustenance. Maybe it needs to visit a variety of dreams? And can a simple Spirit Beast remember to always bring its memory pearls back? As Brother Yu said, communication is hard. One slip, and it might go back into the loop.”

“Memory pearls! That’s a good name,” Yu Han praised.

“If the memories are permanent after the crab brings them into its own dream, then I don’t think it will fall into the same memory-loss loop,” Huang Niuniu said.

“Again, Sister Huang, we can’t assume those memories will always remain permanent,” Fang Zhao said.

“It doesn’t hurt to try! Yu Han, you have to make sure that at least the memory pearls with those memories are placed into its own dream. You can do it, can’t you?” She grabbed his hands. “Can’t you?”

Her eyes were three inches away from his.

“W-What memories?” Yu Han’s mind blanked.

“The ones where you explain everything we discussed here to the crab.”

Yu Han pushed her away. “No promises.”

“It’s a promise!” She beamed.

Fang Zhao coughed. “To me, this just sounds like a problem of convenience.”

“I agree,” Yu Han said. “As long as we somehow convince it to bring the memory pearls back to the crabscape most of the time, the crab’s problem can be considered mostly solved. It’s inconvenient if I have to remind it each time, though.”

“If it remembers that Brother Yu doesn’t know what’s written on the parchment, it might stop visiting,” Fang Zhao said. “So if it forgets to always bring back memory pearls after that, for whatever reason, it’s back to square one.”

“The crab had those pearls in its own dream too, didn’t it?” Li Yao added. “Why didn’t they turn blue? Unless this is all a ‘mirage’ tubs sees. Maybe he’s being haunted by a ghost?”

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Li Yao grinned. “Mirage” was a word Yu Han had taught him.

Yu Han glared at the jokester, but he had a point—not about the haunting. Why did only the pearls in Yu Han’s Dreamscape turn blue? There were thousands upon thousands of pearls in the crabscape pond. None of them were blue, at least the ones at the topmost layer. Who knew if there were blue pearls buried under? Yu Han wasn’t about to dive in there.

The point was, all the pearls in Yu Han’s Dreamscape gradually turned blue, but seemingly none in the crabscape did.

“The pearls are neither a gift nor a trade,” Fang Zhao said decisively. “What if it’s lending them out, without even knowing?”

“Lending?” Yu Han rubbed his nose.

“If it isn’t an exchange or a gift,” Fang Zhao said, “but lending, then it would still belong to the crab. The karmic bond remains, and the crab would still have power over them. This bond might somehow transfer the crab’s memories to the pearls in another being’s dream. It simply doesn’t know about it. It doesn’t even know to gather back all the lent-out pearls, let alone control the process.” He shrugged. “It’s just a hunch, though. Could be anything.”

“It’s good. Fang Zhao, you reason well,” Yu Han said.

The boy laughed. “Just some scattered knowledge.”

The pearls rapidly turned blue after the crab played with them. There’s probably something it can do to control the process. It just doesn’t know it. I could tell it and test it out.

Last time, Yu Han had come back unharmed from the crabscape. He could go in and make it play with the pearls there, see if they turn blue.

Come to think of it, I’m not always in my Echoing Dreamscape either. Yu Han was there only when asleep. While there, he used all his time for his prime purpose: becoming stronger.

Maybe the crab could only enter the crabscape while asleep too? During which, it spent every second on its prime purpose: finding out what was written on the parchment. It would probably tirelessly visit as many dreams as it could, leaving pearls there, and thus losing memories. And because it lost memories, it would never run out of dreams to visit.

“W-What if it really is a ghost?” Huang Niuniu suddenly said. She’d been quiet for a while.

“Boo!” Yu Han said.

“I’m serious. Isn’t it weird that it can visit dreams? I’ve only heard of ghosts and gods doing that.”

“For example…?”

“They say the City Lord’s daytime patrol officers visit a person in their dreams before they die,” Huang Niuniu said, trembling. “The City God sends down edicts with dreams too. Last time, a hundred cows mysteriously died during Father’s birthday banquet, which we then used as beef. If not for the City God’s edict, the Huang Clan would have had to pay a huge fine, because death of draft cattle is a serious matter. Everyone was saying I would die next because of my name. It’s not like I’m a real cow, though, and—”

“Never knew City Gods helped cover up corruption,” Yu Han said with a whistle. My bet is the Huang Clan made up the whole story.

“City Gods and their officials are usually distinguished mortals of the region, granted a title after death by the Imperial and Divine Courts,” Fang Zhao said. “But distinguished doesn’t always mean moral. Though I remember Grandfather saying that unless one is moral, it’s hard to walk the divine path.”

“Can one walk this divine path while being alive?” Yu Han asked. “I assume the Land God of King Earthworm Gorge isn’t a long-dead earthworm.”

“It could be,” Fang Zhao said. “The power of faith and incense is mysterious. I don’t know much about it.”

“Let us know how the whole crab thing goes,” Li Yao said. “I need to practise thinking now. Mind Allocation really feels weird.”

“Wait,” Yu Han said. “Your Level 2 Heavenly Allocation is in Mind? Then Level 1 was in Spirit?”

The taller boy nodded.

“Did anyone bully you? Or throw off-hand insults about how you’re trash and all?” Yu Han asked.

“Are you asking for a fight?” Li Yao rolled up his sleeves. “Bring it on.”

“Remember that Elder Scribe?” Yu Han explained. “He was like that with me because of my Mind Heavenly Allocation.”

“Most cultivators will reach Qi Gathering, even if it takes until the end of their lives,” Fang Zhao said with a forlorn smile. He squeezed the tiger-engraved ring, adding, “Spirit Origin truly shines starting from Qi Gathering. But even in Body Tempering, it boosts the effects of one’s Cultivation Arts. As for Mind Origin, they say only at Foundation Building can you make proper use of it.”

“Damn.” Yu Han furrowed his brows. Those points in Memory really helped his Echoing Dreamscape, so Yu Han didn’t think them a waste. He would allocate them in Memory for the next level too, unless his plans suddenly changed.

But it still sucked knowing that he likely couldn’t get 100% out of his allocations.

“The usual limit of a Refined Talent is Foundation Building,” Fang Zhao said. “For a Common Talent with higher levels in their Mortal Grade Qi Affinity, they may reach Qi Gathering faster. As for whether they can break through to Level 21, only the heavens can tell.”

“We can do it,” Huang Niuniu said. “We will do it.” She looked at Yu Han. Her eyes sparkled.

Don’t. I’ll suffocate because of the pressure. Yu Han turned away.

They talked a while longer, having some more cups of tea. Li Yao and Fang Zhao left.

“I’ll figure out how to be more useful,” Huang Niuniu said. “I’ll learn all the alchemic recipes. We’ll get our Qi Affinity trait up to Elite Grade, certainly even higher. We’ll do the same for our bloodlines, too. Foundation Building is just the start. We can—”

Yu Han pinched her nose.

“—become immortals!” Huang Niuniu finished with a nasally voice, a smile blooming on her face.

Yu Han pinched harder, and Huang Niuniu kicked him out of the hut. They promised to meet in the evening to pick up the Pure Qi Assimilating Elixir.

Yu Han planned to spend the rest of the day before that at home, training. Elder Chang had said that the Law Enforcement Hall would visit.

At night, he’d talk with the crab. Part of him, the Johan part, still thought it was a waste to ruin a potential Memory stat point farm to do the right thing. But Huang Niuniu’s disappointed face was enough to keep those thoughts at bay. For now.

The sky was clear. In the distance, a strange mist rose between the mountains, preparing to melt in the sunlight. Yu Han strolled to his hut, careful not to stain his trousers with mud. The ground was soft, so he tried to use the rock faces peeking out of the mud as stepping-stones.

In front of his hut, a sect disciple stood with arms clasped behind her back. Her armband read: “All Must Submit Beneath the Sky.”