Monday [09/02/2019]

Drake wasn’t sure if it was because it was Labor Day, but the lack of spirits roaming Staten Island’s streets that night was both a surprise and a disappointment.

“I thought Mid-Island was supposed to have more spirits than the South Shore,” he said while dodging an angered spirit’s swipe at him.

It was a geist – a class of spirit born from the spiritual residue of the deceased. They constantly absorbed the spiritual energy around them to remain in the Earth Realm, and when their hunger grew too severe, they would feed off the spiritual energy of the living. To many, a hungry geist attacking them was of great concern. It might have been for Drake too had he been an ordinary pedestrian.

But for a cultivator, dealing with geists; especially ones with Colorless souls, was trivial thing.

With chi coursing through his fist, he threw a hook just below where the spirit’s soul was knocking it several feet into the air before flopped down behind him. It hissed before disintegrating into spirit particles. Its vanquisher took a deep breath and absorbed the spiritual energy into his essence. He then exhaled and felt the new energy infuse itself into his core.

“…Man, this sucks. Trying to cultivate off spirits this weak ain’t worth the trouble,” he said.

“So, what? You just called us out this late for nothin’?”

The brunette glanced over to where his friend CJ had his back to a tree. He had yet to move once since they arrived, but he had gone through a few cigarettes in that time. How he managed to smoke so much without the smell getting in his dreads, Drake never knew. He also couldn’t figure out why their friend Skylar, who sat perched on a branch of the same tree, never complained about the smoke rising into her face.

“You know I didn’t call you guys out here for nothin’,” Drake said.

“Then why are we out here past midnight, man?”

“To knock some geists back to the Soul Realm and cultivate! Y’know, that thing cultivators usually do? C’mon, school starts back this Wednesday.”

“Just how much progress you expect us to make by then? Only a crazy bastard stays out all night fighting spirits. Me and Skylar; already got our cycles in for the week.”

Drake clicked his tongue. “You’re still using those old boring-ass cultivation methods they taught us in junior high?”

“Those ‘boring-ass’ methods don’t magically become trash just the second we become high schoolers. Yo, Sky. You tell ‘em too.”

Skylar ignored him completely while tapping away on her phone. The only response she gave was a giggle at something a friend had sent her.

“Oh my God! I can’t believe she posted that! There’s no way she’s not getting dumped!”

CJ sighed and pulled out another cigarette.

“Look, CJ. I get where you’re coming from, but you gotta understand that this ain’t gonna be middle school anymore. Starting Wednesday, we’re students of a Jungle School – cultivation schools that adhere to the Darwin’s Law Act. After tomorrow, we’ll be more than cultivators. We’ll be Warriors who have to climb the---“

Skylar rolled her eyes. “Oh, look… He’s going into ‘speech mode’ again.”

“Told ya he would,” CJ said while lighting his smoke.

“Don’t just blow me off like that! I’m being real right now! For a Warrior, the best and most efficient cultivation method is fighting; plain in simple. Whether it’s fighting other Warriors or fighting the spirits that fill the streets at night.”

“That’s real cool and all, Drake, but… you still gotta do those ‘boring-ass’ cycles, man. You don’t filter out that old spiritual energy it’s gonna mess with your chakras, and your meridians are gonna get swollen. Good luck climbing to the top after that happens.”

Skylar snickered while running her fingers through her lengthy blonde hair. Drake grumbled, feeling a bit disheartened now. Perhaps it was for the best that he just call it a night? He had barely encountered any geists, and ones he had weren’t worth the effort. A non-cultivator could have scared most of them off with some spirit warding you could pick up at the local supermarket.

He sighed. “Alright, fine. Let’s just---“

He felt it. So did CJ and Skylar. Suddenly, a striking spiritual power was sensed by them. Together, they looked up and saw a geist perched on a street light. In its chest was a colored soul – bronze. Normally, a bronze soul was nothing to stir about, but this geist’s soul was burning so radiantly, it outshined the street light beneath it.

“That’s… That’s a Blazing Bronze Soul geist, isn’t it?” Skylar nervously asked.

A drop of sweat fell off Drake’s brow. Usually, Bronze Soul geists weren’t much worse of a threat than the Colorless Souls, but a Blazing Bronze was a very different beast. A geists power correlated not only with its soul’s color but also with how brightly its soul shined. A Blazing Bronze Soul was considerably stronger than a plain one.

“So… you still feelin’ up to this, Drake? A soul that bright could be too much for a D-Rank to handle,” CJ said.

There was initial reluctance but Drake eventually slapped some moxie into his head and treaded toward the street light where the geist was perched.

“Hey, you! The blazer up there! Get down here and show me what you’re made of!”

The spirit gave a hiss in response. It then flew off in the opposite direction.

“What the…? Get back here and fight, dammit!”

With his temper flaring, Drake leaped atop the street light in a single jump. It was too dark for him to spot where the spirit had gone. He couldn’t even spot it burning soul. Still, Drake could vaguely sense the trail its spiritual power left behind.

“Yo, Drake. Don’t go doing anything stu---“

Before CJ could finish, Drake leaped away. His friends just shook their heads.

“He’s always doing whatever the hell he wants…” complained CJ.

“Can he even handle that geist by himself?” Skylar asked.

CJ wasn’t keen to wait and find out. After stamping out his cig, he quickly gave chase after Drake’s trail. Skylar finished texting her friend back before doing the same.

After jumping from dozens of roofs, they finally caught up to Drake. His head was whipping in every direction while he tried to make out where exactly the geist had fled.

“It hasn’t gone back to the Soul Realm yet. I wouldn’t be able to sense it if it did,” he said. “That means it’s definitely close. But I still can’t…“

A loud demolition-like sound interrupted him. Drake and his friends looked in the direction from whence it came.

“The hell was that?” CJ asked.

“Maybe the geist?” Skylar suggested.

Curious to know, the trio leaped off in that direction. When they reached the site of the sound’s source, they spotted no spirit. They found a group of six on the street below instead. There was an entourage of five consisting of two girls and three boys, with one of the latter standing before a small crater in the ground. From debris still sprinkling from his fist, it was obvious that he was the one who created it. The last of the six was a bespectacled boy who lay on the ground on the opposite side of the crater from the other five.

“Still wanna pretend you didn’t insult my tech?” the debris-knuckled one asked before blowing on his fist.

“I didn’t say anything except that it’s a waste to fight weaker spirits that way…” the boy on the ground said nervously. “Wasting all that chi just to kill a spirit of that class is---“

The boy was kicked in the stomach so hard he rose a few feet off the ground before landing back down. It was a miracle his glasses remained on his face.

“You think you in the position be givin’ out advice? You’re too scared to swing back, but you wanna mouth off?”

The boy coughed with his pressed to his stomach. “But I didn’t even…”

“Hey, Deontay. Maybe you should test your new Martial Technique on him,” one of the girls glibly suggested. “Show him how ‘necessary’ it really is.”

A dark grin flashed across Deontay’s face. He raised his fist and quickly amassed his chi into it. His essence flowed from his fist as it let off a vigorous glow.

“H-hey, hold up…” the boy entreated.

Deontay only took a single step toward him before Drake swiftly dropped down in-between the two. He had become more annoyed than he thought he would while watching. His friends stayed up high, unsurprised looks on their faces.

“We’re not helping him just so you know,” Skylar said. “I didn’t plan on getting sweaty tonight, and that’s not changing just because Drake can’t chill out to save his life.”

“Fair ‘nough. Doubt he needs help with guys like this anyway.”

Deontay kept his fist aglow as he asked: “Who the hell are you?”

“None of your business. Now put the lights out on that hand and walk away, and we can just leave it at that.”

Deontay blinked. He and his friends erupted into roaring laughter. One of the girls even pointed a finger at Drake while she cackled.

“This dude really thinks he’s a superhero or something!” she blabbered.

Drake’s eyebrow twitched. He was never a big fan of being laughed at.

“Fine. We can do this the hard way too...”

“What? You wanna take the other dude’s spot?” Deontay asked, still chuckling. “Hey, I’m not gon’ stop you. Just don’t expect me to---“

“Man, just hurry up and use your cheesy- technique.”

The smirk dropped from Deontay’s face, and a glare took his place. With his hand still gleaming, he shot after Drake with his fist raised. Just as he swung it, Drake’s own fist surged with chi in a faster yet identical method that Deontay had.

A white, hot fash was born from their clashing chi when their fists collided. They were equally matched for only a brief moment before Drake overwhelmed Deontay, and sent him flying back to his friends’ feet.

The defeated scrambled to stand, a shocked look on his face. “You… You copied my tech!”

“Pfft… It’s just Furious Power Strike. I had that move down pat back in the 7th grade. I stopped using it as much in my last year ‘cause I thought everybody in a higher grade already knew how to counter it. Guess I was giving you high school cultivators too much credit... I mean, you are in high school, right? Hard to tell just based off your moves.”

A bitter look sprawled across Deontay’s face. His essence started to surge about him once more. It stopped when one of his friends grabbed his shoulder.

“Hold up, man. I don’t think this dude’s a high schooler...”

“And? So, what?”

“So… if he’s not at least in high school yet, he’s not a Warrior. If you fight him, and he isn’t the one startin’ it, that’s breakin’ Jungle Law. You really wanna catch any trouble like that right when school’s about to start back?”

Deontay wore his bitter look in silence for a few moments. Eventually, he snatched his arm from his friend’s grasp and started down the street.

“You better hope this is the last time I see you, bitch. Next time, I’ll kill you for real!” he hollered back at Drake.

The Warrior left without another word, his entourage in tow. Drake watched them go right up to when they turned the corner.

“Those guys were Warriors, but going off that one guy, I bet they barely pass for E-Rank. Un-friggin-believable… Is this really the best Mid-Island’s got?”

“Hey, man. Can I get a second?”

The boy behind Drake finally managed to catch his attention. Despite having helped him, Drake looked none too enthused to speak to him.

“What d’ya want?”

“Just want to say thanks. I was in a seriously bad spot just now.”

“…Ain’t you ashamed of getting bullied like that when you’re a Warrior yourself?”

“You know I’m Warrior?”

“No shit, genius. That dude I scared off was dumb, but even he wouldn’t use Martial Techniques on some regular cultivator. Warriors fighting non-Warriors for any reason outside of self-defense is Jungle Law 101. …Don’t tell me you didn’t know that?”

“…Well, I---”

Drake clicked his tongue. “Man, for an Asian kid with glasses, you ain’t as bright as ya look. And what was that about you being ‘too scared to throw a punch'? Did you seriously not try to fight back at all?”

“I mean, yeah. But there’s a reason why I’m reluctant to---“

“Bro. You’re a fucking Warrior. Fighting other Warriors is what you’re supposed to do! Do you know anything about Jungle Schools?! Where the hell are you from?”

“Uh… Kansas.”

Drake blinked. Kansas was consistently in the bottom fifteen states when it came to chi research, education, and cultivation.

“Shit! Now I’m pissed…” Drake hissed. “I shoulda let your ass get pummeled.”

“W-why are you so mad?”

Drake’s friends sighed again from up above.

“Here comes the speeches again…” Skylar groaned.

“If you were just a regular cultivator, you’d still be pitiful but at least you’d have an excuse. Cultivators don’t actually have to know how to fight. That why they don’t have Martial Ranks like we do. They’re farmers. Foragers. Herbivores. But Warriors… we’re predators. Hunter. Goddamn carnivores. We cultivate our chi and refine our chi through combat. We have to fight to ea, dammit!”

The Warrior blinked.

“Look, don’t misunderstand. It’s not that I don’t know how to fight. I wouldn’t be out at night when the geists are most active if that was the case.”

“Fighting spirits don’t mean anything if you can’t fight another cultivator! Cripes, how’s someone like you even get this far in the first place? Just what school did you go to?!”

“Oh, uh…” The Warrior looked extremely unsettled by the question for some reason. “You wouldn’t have heard it. It’s some small cultivation school in the middle of Kansas.”

“Kansas? So you’re just a country bumpkin then?”

“It’s not like I don’t get any cultivating done. In fact, I go through my cycles everything every week, and---“

An awful look came across Drake’s face that shut the Warrior up.

“Man, I feel sick. I shoulda just let that dude beat your ass,” he said. “Let me make this real easy for you to understand since you ain’t from around here: Here in New York, Warriors don’t play around like they do in Kansas. If you can’t find it in you to climb to the top of the food chain, your gonna get eaten. You follow me?”

The Warrior nodded. “Y-yeah. Sure. I follow.”

“Hey, Drake! You done preachin’ yet, or you gonna force that guy to listen to your sermonize all night?” CJ shouted down from up high.

Drake looked up and shot him a finger. It then that it occurred to him that he still had yet to find the geist he was chasing from earlier. He up his spiritual senses for a moment to try and locate it, but he could no longer sense its power.

“Shit! It must’ve gone back to the Soul Realm…”

He spat at the ground while cursing himself.

“Can’t believe I let a blazer get away…” he muttered while jumping back up to join his friends.

With a bitter fleeting glance back down at the bespectacled Warrior, Drake took off with CJ and Skylar. The Warrior, after dusting himself off, headed off as well.

“Man… What a rough night. I almost had to---“

He couldn’t make it to the corner before he sensed a strong spirit’s presence. It swooped right down before him. It gave a sharp hiss while its bronze soul burned furiously in its chest.

“Ah. Another geist,” the Warrior said calmly. “Can’t believe I missed one. I really was a rough night for me.”

The spirit hissed and rushed him faster than Deontay had rushed Drake.

It wasn’t enough.

The moment the geist came close enough, the Warrior’s arm moved in a blur and knocked the ethereal being’s head askew. It gave a final hiss before disintegrating into spirit particles. Taking a deep and steady breath, the Warrior absorbed the particles into his essence. Once finished, he stared at his hand expectantly.

“…Still not enough, huh?”

The Warrior pushed up his glasses and continued down the street. The rest of his walk was a pleasantly quiet one.