Chapter 134: Home Improvements
Chún ambled around the outskirts of the village, using his Essence Treasure Cloak to avoid the effects of the pelting rain while pushing as much Essence as possible through his 'uninteresting/unnoticeable' Dao Pattern without overloading it, making sure none of the villagers would notice a large cloud of mist was drifting casually around the village in a drenching rain.
The rain was being absorbed by his Cloak, which was steadily expanding as it absorbed Water Essence and moisture. From the outside, he supposed the fully released Cloak would simply appear to be part of the Essence Mists that were a byproduct of the mountain's defensive Dao Patterns - a slightly glowing fog bank, gradually increasing in size as it drifted around the village - if anyone did notice it. The young True Cultivator smiled slightly to himself at the whimsical mental image his imagination conjured up.
The benefit of running the Cloak at full strength was twofold; after leaving the village earlier in the day he had pushed his Gliding Horse out of the mountain side gate, into the treeline - until between the heavy rain, mist and trees he was not visible from the village - and then he released the Cloak in a billow of Essence Mist that concealed him completely and absorbed the gliding horse into its spatial storage; secondly, releasing the Cloak in its unrestrained form completely extracted all the moisture from his clothes and body.
As the powerful Essence Treasure expanded from his skin and billowed out for approximately five chǐ in every direction around him, it also absorbed all rain that fell into its fog-like mass before the water reached his skin and pulled the water from the ground around him.
So despite the intensity of the water now falling in almost literal sheets, the sodden soil, sucking mud and puddle covered ground, he remained completely dry and comfortable as the Cloak's Essence Mist pulled the water out of the ground around him before he passed over it. He would have been worried about leaving a dried trail behind him as a giveaway, but the rain was so heavy that the dry area was almost immediately soaked again once he moved on.
"This weather is fairly bad," he remarked into the link to the Hidden Mountain as he passed under a tree whose branches swayed heavily in the strong winds, leaves rustling and sending an additional splash of droplets into the Cloak's protective Essence Mist, causing the billows of mist to swell slightly.
"It is much worse outside the protective Dao Patterns around the original mountain site," replied his locus, "I know you called the storm a typhoon before, but it has not actually gotten quite that severe yet. However, it definitely appears to be building towards it, despite the lack of any large bodies of water."
"It is being sustained by the Essence being generated from the ying/yang point, is it not?" Chún checked.
"Yes, but it is the mass of wild Essence and generally high levels of ambient Essence now present in this area that is allowing it to power up to this extent, similar to how a large mass of warm water will power a normal storm," clarified Tai, "the rain, lightning and wind is actually just a byproduct of the amounts of Essence being sucked up around and converted into all of the Essence types."
The mountain turned planet rumbled with happiness into the link, "the areas the storm passes over are going to go through a rapid growth phase once the storm passes - there is a lot of Wood, Water, Wind and even some Fire - and Lightning Essence, of course - being separated out and spread out over the wider area that the storm travels over. Essence Storms like this are one of the natural ways Planets usually clean and redistribute Essence out across their surface - remember a while ago, I told you that healthy planets had ways of cleaning up and generating new Essence - rather than relying on True Cultivators to step in?"
"Vaguely, but I do not recall ever seeing anything like this storm before," questioned the young teen, waving his hands, "granted, I am only young, but if this is meant to be normal then should it not have happened before in the last decade?"
"Golden Crow has been too depleted in Essence to be able to generate regular, smaller Essence Storms normally across its surface for almost a hundred years - unfortunately, this means that this storm is the result of about a century of Essence stagnation finally shifting," explained the Hidden Mountain pedantically, its earlier happiness fading into sadness as it considered the recent past, "even though I am my own world now - it is still a good thing to see my parent planet has hope for a recovery."
Chún tapped his lips thoughtfully as he materialised his World Tree Staff from the tattoo on his arm and started digging one end of it into the ground at each step, sending out small pulses of Essences down into the soil to examine the echoes bouncing back through his Essence Sense, "you keep mentioning the increase in Essence…" he hesitated, taking one more step before stopping and leaning on the staff while looking up towards the direction of the mountain behind the village, "has the Essence between where the refugees are and here gotten high enough to create a rift?"
There was what the young True Cultivator could only describe as a hiccup of surprise in the link. The connection between Chún and his locus went flat and silent for a moment. He was just beginning to get concerned when Tai's 'voice' came cautiously through the link, "whatever gave you cause to believe I could create rifts?"
Chún scratched his head then sighed and started walking forward again, prodding the ground with his staff at each step, "I take it from that response I am somehow mistaken?"
"Natural Rifts are formed through some esoteric process involving the sheer amount of Essence above a certain level warping space and time, once it passes a yet unspecified and inconsistent set of conditions," responded Tai, "I believe I may have mentioned something similar in the past?"
"I have some recollection of something along those lines," agreed Chún, "that is why I asked if the level of Essence present was enough to…"
His locus interrupted uncharacteristically, "while a reasonably to ridiculously high level of Essence at both endpoints is known to be a constant factor in the formation of a Rift, it is the only one. Further, the exact levels of Essence required at both ends, as well as whatever other factors are involved - are complete unknowns. Dangerous ones."
"You created a Rift between Golden Crow and Hidden Mountain," protested Chún, "and you have moved it around before, as well. And there was the Rift the Devourers tried to attack through."
"The pathway between here and my planet formed naturally as part of the process of transitioning between a location on Golden Crow that first developed into a dimensional pocket and then budded off to form a separate universe," explained his locus carefully, still using a cautious tone of 'voice' in the link, "it is more accurate to say that part of me exists in both locations simultaneously and by traversing that area you can move between the two locations; while it is considered a Rift and technically acts like one it is not the same as a rift between two completely unrelated points."
"You seem," Chún picked his words carefully, still walking and poking the staff into the ground, "concerned by my question?"
"Over many millennia, different Cultivators of different persuasions - including Consumers - have tried to replicate the effects of naturally formed Rifts," his locus replied, "other than some comparatively short ranged successes with linked formations - which is a completely different form of 'instantaneous' travel - every attempt to create stable, usable Rifts has resulted in extremely violent explosions, implosions and other assorted catastrophe."
"Then how do the Devourers…" Chún raised a finger only to be interrupted again by Tai's forceful response, "Devourers more or less focus the entire remaining energy of whatever planet or plane they are leaving to 'brute force' a Rift into existence. It is surmised they have some method to direct the destination, but that is mostly supposition."
His locus calmed as it continued speaking in a more matter of fact 'tone' of 'voice', "most of the time - and by most, I mean anywhere between three and five times out of eight - when a Swarm tries to use a Rift, it destroys the Swarm involved - and it always destroys the place they are trying to leave. But given the nature of the World Devourers, they consider that acceptable odds."
There was a contemplative silence, before his locus continued, "the fact that Devourer Rifts are almost guaranteed to collapse and destroy them half the time is probably why the multiverse is not completely overrun by Swarms jumping through Rifts - although they often travel via more prosaic means as well."
"Huh. No trying to warp time and space then," agreed Chún, before switching subjects at a particularly bright and loud crack of lightning and thunder, "I hope this storm will end up being more constructive than destructive."
Tai's presence in the link seemed to relax from its previous tension, reaching out and becoming distant from Chún for a moment, as if examining something over a wide area, "this Essence Storm is going to be much more violent and destructive than normal as it pulls in more and more stale and wild Essence than such a Essence Storm would normally be able to," mused his locus, "there is also the unusual factor of the yin/yang center which is literally breaking down impure Essence and recreating pure Essence as the storm moves - so it is going to be self-sustaining to a certain extent. That does not usually happen in a normal Essence Storm either."
"Is that good or bad?" asked Chún, prodding the ground as he followed the traces of groundwater revealed by the pulses of Essence he was sending out, moving into a small bamboo forest that rustled, whistled, clattered, hummed, drummed and groaned in a range of different tones as the rain hit the hollow stalks, wind blew through the bamboo or clashed them together like an immense set of wind instruments and clapping sticks, the leaves providing the rushing counterpoint as they were tossed to and fro.
"Mostly good," responded Tai, "of course, some damage is inevitable, but I really hope the storm can push out into the areas that are very Essence deprived. It also will help to further obscure our presence for a while longer. The storm is currently hammering those Grass parasites who are trying to investigate the edge of our defensive patterns," his locus observed with clear satisfaction, "I predict they will turn back soon, especially if they take another casualty."
The teen nodded as he examined the bamboo he was walking through thoughtfully. In Essence rich soil, a particular type of bamboo - known as Essence Bamboo - often indicated the presence of groundwater. Chún remembered overhearing some farmers when he was younger, complaining about regular bamboo dying if there was too much water below or around them - and the extravagant foolishness of some Consumers or rich nobles who deliberately added crushed Essence Stones to their soil to increase its Essence Level, so that Essence Bamboo would grow in the waterlogged soil around their water features and hot springs - in order to make the location meet some rarified aesthetic - although those were not the words they used.
Here though, the soil had definitely become Essence rich, especially over the last few months. The young teen did not remember this particular bamboo forest being present when he lived here - which was another indication that this was Essence Bamboo rather than any ordinary thicket - regular bamboo typically only grew from existing shoots over the course of a couple of months and as far as he knew no one in the village had any to plant.
Essence Bamboo was not particularly rare or unusual - other than its preference for groundwater - nothing like the Jade Bamboo he had transplanted and grown around the hot spring near the refugees hill camp. Jade Bamboo was essentially ten thousand year old Essence Bamboo and thus rarely occurred naturally. But the presence of regular Essence Bamboo indicated an excellent location to shape a hot spring by bringing the groundwater to the surface.
"You will probably have to create another fire seed the same as last time," reminded his locus and Chún nodded in agreement as he replied, "I will just leave the spring water collecting in a small depression, maybe a few rocks to stop it soaking or running away too quickly. The village can build it out how they prefer then… once they find it."
Chún went to one knee in the center of the small bamboo forest where the World Tree Staff indicated the groundwater was close to the surface and dug one end of the black wood into the ground, pulling the Water Essence he could feel upward.
A moment later it burst upward with a small explosion of steam and Chún's eyebrows rose, "Tai did you...?"
Tai rumbled into the link interestedly, "Well, that must be where some of the Fire Essence being split off by the Essence Storm is going."
Chún sent his Essence Sense deeper following the flow of groundwater under the earth and after examining what he could 'see' carefully, shook his head, "maybe, but a segment of the flow of groundwater is moving like a river reasonably close - about a lǐ above - to a fair amount of molten rock about three lǐ down - which is heating the water up. It looks like we just got lucky. I am sort of glad I did not have to create a Fire Essence seed - this close to the village it would seem odd no one noticed it before."
As the young teen Cultivator shifted a few boulders around the nearby soil in such a way to give the new hot spring somewhere to collect before spilling into the bamboo and trickling down the gentle slope in the general direction of the village walls, Tai made a very human 'throat clearing' sound in the link.
After getting over his surprise, it took Chún awhile to stop laughing at the idea of a mountain/planet clearing its throat to get its attention. Eventually he sat on his haunches in a peasant's squat in the bamboo beside the new spring, leaning against his Staff like he used to do with his shepherd's staff/walking stick out of habit, "did you want to ask me something, my friend?"
Tai's response was unperturbed, as if Chún had replied immediately after his locus had tried to gain his attention, "you mentioned making a fire Essence seed to heat the spring - you have not been working with your Essence Fire Seeds or your Medicinal Cauldron and flame control recently."
Chún shrugged, "I also have not been working on my martial skills nearly as much as I should or experimenting with Dao Patterns, working with forging - or casting - Essence Treasures. There simply have been other more urgent demands on my time. In fact, I am probably going to stop making Dao Pots unless I specifically need them from now on - hopefully as the refugees set up their new Sect they will take care of regular management of Essence herbs and selling them to merchants; I will probably sell any useful plants from Hidden Mountain directly to them so I will probably only need to create Dao Pots when I need to transport a plant out of Hidden Mountain to sell to them anyway."
He held up a hand to stop Tai from interrupting - something of an unnecessary, but habitual gesture - while he finished his thought. "Conversely, I have been performing my initial role as a True Cultivator much more often lately - what with the creation of a number of different Essence Treasures and general improvements to the the local area to build the Golden Planet up - including turning a negative influence into a positive one by removing that Yin worm nest and clearing out those Essence Springs. I am only one person, Tai, I cannot do everything at once."
There was an odd sensation from the link that Chún could not quite identify in response, but his locus seemed to be very focused on something so Chún just squatted and relaxed, enjoying the unusual experience of doing nothing while being in a heavy rainstorm without getting wet.
Chún was prodding the ground around the new spring idly with the World Tree Staff, enjoying the sight of curls of steam drifting off the hot water to trail artistically among the bamboo, although the wisps did not get far before being drowned in the rain.
Thinking of the discussion he had just escaped from with the Elders, he wondered what would happen if he cleansed the Essence around the village; if he focused on protecting, improving and purifying the area, it might help fix some of the issues with the dirt roads and poor sewerage systems the village currently had.
All the houses actually did have outhouses - and in the case of the headman and a few of the larger houses, 'in-houses' - that were connected to a rudimentary sewer that dumped the run off into a pit that was regularly blasted with a Fire Essence item several times a week, it was still less than ideal.
Chún wrinkled his nose in the memory of being one of those who had been regularly assigned that task for the measly bronze that was assigned to it - apparently, despite being a critical duty of any town large enough to collect enough sewerage that might lead to Decay Essence forming - it was considered a scut job that was amusing to assign the village orphan to.
"Decay is not an Essence," interjected Tai, his presence in the link having returned to normal, "however large quantities of waste and poison can lead to some very unpleasant Essence Beasts setting up residence. That is likely why any reasonably maintained habitation area has developed traditions around disposing of their waste."
"Have you finished with whatever you were thinking about?" returned Chún in response, not particularly wishing to have a long discussion about waste disposal.
"Yes. I apologise," the feelings that Chún was sensing through their link appeared genuinely apologetic, making him blink in surprise, "it appears that I have been making the mistake of treating you as an extension of myself that was mobile, with more or less identical capabilities. Since I routinely monitor and act on thousands of things at any given moment as a mountain and even more so as a planet, I had assumed your tendency to leave the majority of your efforts focused on one task at a time to be personal choice rather than… a function of your development. Although your capacity for multi-tasking has considerably improved with your Cultivation base."
"You have been forgetting I am only human? Although I agree some of the stories about the high level types seem to indicate that eventually changes, I do not feel I am there yet," Chún felt considerable amusement, "I understand, but I will still have to prioritise tasks. As much as I would like to be able to work on multiple things at once it is probably going to be a very long time before I am going to be operating at that sort of level," he paused as a thought struck him, "actually that probably explains why most Consumers tend to specialise in no more than a couple areas - Body Cultivator, Essence Cultivator, Alchemist, Formations Master… you rarely hear about Consumers being more than two of those… although I think you should know better than me about that."
"Yes," admitted his locus, "I had assumed it was part of having badly constructed and artificial Dao structures forcibly being inserted into their own that limited them, rather than part of being a human."
Chún blinked, not sure how to interpret that and decided to drop it, "it does not matter. I accept your apology. What do you think of my idea of purifying the village?"
"I have no issue with it, although I expect it might alarm the villagers," answered his locus, "I would recommend though rather than focusing on what you feel the village ought to be that you focus on it reaching a perfected form of its own Dao Pattern as you would for any plant or Beast that you were assisting to advance."
Chún snorted, "I could care less about the villager's opinions on whether I should help their home improve, to be honest. Not to mention cleaning up the mess that they have made of the immediate environment, compares to the rest of the forest. The only reason they give my opinions any weight now is because they know I am more powerful than them. If I was still orphan Chún they would not even see me."
He paused a beat, then continued thoughtfully, "besides if you are right about the Dao Pattern of the village itself, I am only going to be helping the village… not them. I did not know man made places had Dao, though."
"The villagers are part of its Dao of course," Tai pointed out, "any place people or creatures live in long enough becomes a living system - Essence flows through it, the intentions of the creatures living in it influence its growth. Is it any odder than a Mountain growing a complex pattern enough to become aware?"
"I suppose not," answered Chún, "so what should I do?"
"Let the village decide as you did once for me - I will help, since it is technically part of me anyway as I have spread my own patterns into and through it," advised his locus.
Chún nodded and let the World Tree Staff dig deeper into the soil, letting his Essence Sense spread out until he was able to identify the village's Dao Pattern. Interestingly it was obvious, once he paid attention that the small bamboo first and his newly encouraged hot spring was part of its pattern, so he just started to channel Essence into it directly from where he squatted rather than bothering to move closer to the village. It was second nature at this point to start cleaning out and re-channeling the wild Essence in the area into the pattern.
Chún watched through his Essence Sense as the large Dao Pattern unfolded, different segments of lines and symbols representing the way the town fit into the land around it rotating into greater complexity and blossoming outward like a fountain even as he dimly felt the wind and rain decrease around him.
There was the clear sound of a gong inside his head and he felt the clear sensation of an Essence ignition pulse through him - something he generally did not notice recently.
Blinking away the slight ache that came from channeling so much Essence and the energised feeling from being exposed to a large Essence ignition he looked around. A bright feather of the Golden Crow was slanting through the thick cloud cover illuminating the area, accompanied by sounds and cries of the villagers - mostly of surprise, happiness and amazement, he was pleased to hear, rather than shock or distress.
The young true Cultivator pushed himself upright noticing his concealment patterns were unravelling from the effects of being hit by the ignition wave, "best to leave the area for a while I think," he observed aloud as he started walking through the bamboo back towards the path up the mountain.
"It appears that the change was fairly substantial," his locus sounded pleased, "it appears that the village has been the center of many hopes and dreams for a long time - possibly generations. It has adjusted itself to reflect the best desires of its villagers - past and present."
"We are lucky it did not change to reflect the worst if that is how something like a village advances," Chún muttered, "I suppose the cleansing element of the purified Essence helped tilt the scales towards the positive," the teen took a breath, realising the ignition had dispelled his Dao Patterns for dulling his sense of smell as well as his concealment patterns, "it definitely smells better."
The crow light behind him dimmed as the clouds moved in to fill the hole the ignition had caused, the wind and rain starting up again although it was much milder than before. He raised an eyebrow as the path up the mountain became visible through the trees; a neatly paved and graded stone path, carefully cut into the mountain with adequate drainage and a textured surface to avoid slipping winding between green grass.
"I wonder how far up this goes?" he wondered in bemusement as he started walking quickly up the upgraded trail.
"The improved path extends to the shrine we sculpted," reported his locus, "all the village's facilities - including village common buildings and the villagers dwellings - have been similarly improved, hence the lack of smell. No more open sewers for one thing - and the tanner has gained Dao Patterns that deal with poor odors added to it. The inn has been completed as well - and anyone in the village that considers it their home just got all their injuries and illnesses healed, if they had any - as well as a small boost to their Cultivation, pushing them to the start of their next Rank."
There was a small paused before his locus continued, "finally, the walls have changed from upright logs into a single seamless stone circle one zhàng high and half a zhàng thick - with Defensive Dao Patterns carved all along its length - guard towers every five zhàng that rise another zhàng above the wall and all the gates are solid Essence Forged Iron. I dare say any future visitors will be most impressed.
"This will probably be more trouble than it is worth in the long run," Chún grinned mischievously imagining the expressions of the villagers who have had their home - and health - suddenly improved around them, "but I can just say it was the village's idea… they better not have the gall to actually complain about it."
"Speaking of the shrine, it has been a while since you checked the prayers there - we need to clear them out as most of them just got fulfilled," announced Tai.
"You can remove the unnecessary ones," answered Chún, "I will collect anything left on the way up."
"You should hurry," his locus informed him suddenly, alarm flaring in the link, "Prince Bái and Lady Bingqiǎo apparently both decided to visit the Heaven and Earth Vine clearing at the same time to visit you."
Chún's eyes widened and he pushed Essence to speed up, going straight past the shrine, in an eyeblink, "Let me guess, neither of them bothered to inquire who the other was before causing some sort of offence."
There was a distinct sensation of frustration and agreement added to the alarm in the link as Tai's attention abruptly shifted and Chún swore as he moved into top speed, flinging himself through the gate to Hidden Mountain.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
WheeledWriter
WheeledWriter This chapter went in unexpected directions.
No, Chun can't make villages and towns just randomly into super fortresses - lots of contributing factors - lots of Essence, part of his locus and the town has been there a very long time dispite its remoteness. Enough to build up a powerful spirit of its own - though nothing like Tai of course.
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