Firepine Palace certainly didn’t shy away from their namesake. Every building in their sect had an internal courtyard with a single firepine growing in it. The largest and most prominent buildings had clearly been placed some time before, and John wondered if they were built around already present trees. The buildings themselves were made of some sort of red brick with dark stone shingles, doubtlessly both fireproof. Windows appeared to be covered by shutters of the same material as the roof, able to flatten and seal a room completely or to open and allow air to circulate. Hopefully, something kept out smoke.

A fine coat of ash covered the ground and trees, and John saw lesser disciples brushing the main walkways while the outside of the buildings seemed to be enchanted to repel it. Presumably the windows were enchanted to keep the bits of ash out with the rest of the smoke, otherwise they would be dealing with a massive, constant mess inside- or they would have foregone windows entirely.

As the carriage made its way inward, John felt the spiritual energy of the woman waiting for them before he saw her. She was strong, the late Consolidated Soul Phase, even. Yet that was not terribly surprising, given her age. If Luctus had not had various setbacks, such as was caused by the Tenebach Clan’s empowerment ceremony, perhaps he too would be of a similar cultivation. Even so, it was impossible to say that people such as her were all that common, and the fact that she was only a few ranks ahead despite John only cultivating for slightly less than two decades was more of a factor of something being exceptional with the current generations as a whole. That seemed to apply to a wide variety of people- transmigrated individuals like himself, some reincarnated people, as well as Matayal and some of their peers. Even Bora Kartal had been blessed with significant potential, it was simply underutilized and then he went and made the wrong enemies.

“Greetings, Sect Head Charlotte,” John engaged politely as he stepped from the carriage. “I appreciate your willingness to indulge my curiosities.”

“We are honored to have such an up-and-coming youngster like yourself visit,” Charlotte smiled, her wrinkled skin bunching up around the eyes. Either well practiced or sincere, John was unsure- but he leaned towards the latter. “I will admit to being interested in your growth given your… abnormal cultivation path.”

There was no way John could fight as much as he did and hope to keep his cycle of elements secret, though the actual information anybody had about it was usually more limited. There was only one logical next step, however. “I have found it quite suited, though my results with fire in particular have been less than I might like.”

“You will find out style relies on quite different insights than the Green Sands,” she said, guiding him between the buildings. “We are particularly less inflammatory than your friend Lucanus. It is a delight to watch him bring down those of similarly high temper, but our methods are not the same.”

“I will admit I’ve been somewhat limited in my understanding of different styles within the same element.” Obviously he was familiar with many groups from the Stone Conglomerate, yet they still fell under generally the same style of ‘hit it with a rock’. “Though I have seen someone use fire like flowing water.”

“Yes, the young Yustina. A delightful pair, they make. One would think that should suit you, given your other achievements.”

John shrugged. “I could probably make it work, but I’d rather not settle for anything.”

Just like the Emerging Bamboo Sect, John’s visit wasn’t one purely for his own benefit. Exchanging techniques and training went both ways, but John had little to offer to the Firepine Palace in that regard, unlike the Order of the Amber Heart and the other earth cultivators. Thus, they made a deal where he would assist with some resource gathering excursions in exchange for training and a reasonable share of those same resources.

-----

John held a pinecone in his hands, and he had to say it was the most unpleasant time he’d ever done so, even when he’d pricked his fingers with surprisingly sharp bits of some as a kid. Of course, that pinecone hadn’t been on fire or producing fire.

As long as he didn’t actually touch it, the fire element making the thing seem to be on fire was actually relatively stable, meaning that it didn’t emit much heat into the atmosphere and could stay flickering pretty much indefinitely, even when separated from the firepine and thus dead. Touching it accelerated its decay into pure fire element, and John was trying to not insulate himself from it too much, while keeping his hands from burning. Diamond Defense helped slightly, with the caveat that it was an earth technique and thus inherently less effective against fire.

Ultimately, inspecting a ‘dead’ pinecone provided him little insight. Hopefully he could learn more from studying proper firepines, but they were too complex for him to easily wrap his head around. He hoped that his affinity for fire wasn’t so terrible to end his path here, and that he might still find the method suited for himself.

-----

“What is fire to you, Fortkran?” Sect Head Charlotte asked him.

He had answers for that, of course, but he took a moment to think about how to put them into words. “Fire is destruction and consumption. Heat and power.”

“All true,” she agreed. “But that’s not all. This is not called the Phoenix Forest simply because some of those majestic animals dwell here, nor because it is effectively on fire at all times. It is not just destruction, but the ashes of destruction bring rebirth and promote growth.”

John nodded. He got that, intellectually, at least. However, it was difficult to grasp on a deeper level, which was important for cultivation. He could see the plants growing out of the ashes, but he could also feel smoke and ash entering his lungs, filling him with death. He understood things could be more than just one thing, but to him it felt more like the ash was no longer really fire. Just caused by it. Yet perhaps if that was the case, he could still use it… should he comprehend how.

Charlotte didn’t bombard him with flowery words or really say much of anything else, which doubled down on how important she thought what she’d mentioned was. Perhaps there was some link of understanding she had that she could have shared as well, but it might be better for John to realize it on his own. Or maybe it was so simple that it didn’t even deserve mentioning.

-----

Firepines were everywhere in the Phoenix Forest, as common as any other tree elsewhere, yet more valuable. Their value was not something that could easily be captured, however. Just like their pinecones, the needles and wood itself rapidly lost its fire properties when removed from its source of life, so when used for training they were only beneficial if one could sit among them to absorb some of their energy. Their wood endured, but while it was fire resistant it wasn’t fully non-flammable so it ultimately turned into a medium value wood, valued more for its reddish color than its physical properties.

There were other resources that were more highly coveted for their more widespread usefulness, for use at a later time or trade. Obviously there was spirit fire- it could spontaneously form anywhere with large enough concentrations of fire elemental spiritual energy. The difference from free energy was just like everything else- it was a durable conglomeration of spiritual energy that was easy to use for whatever purposes desired. Spirit fire was a bit harder to transfer than spirit earth or water, but it was still generally a cohesive whole.

John found a few wisps of spirit fire in his first few days staying with the Firepine Palace, but he left them alone. There was only minimal value in small gatherings, and they were more likely to develop further if unmolested.

He was more interested in the various fruits that Firepine Palace served, full of fire element but instead of being hot and dry, shriveled up peppers or the like, they were juicy and delicious. Also kind of warm, but it was the right level to be pleasant, like the filling of a cooling pie. They also had peppers, and John was properly warned about their potency. He took a small nibble of one and was extremely glad he prevented it from actually entering his stomach. He was breathing fire for a few hours, and he did not want to experience it passing through his whole system.

The more pleasant fruits were only minimally laced with the fire element, providing easily digestible energy that John could have integrated into the ecosystem in his dantian if he was in need of more. It was just another way for proper fire cultivators to grow their power while participating in standard day-to-day activities. And some were close enough to delicacies that going out of the way to get them was worth it regardless of actual benefits.

In general, the more benefits a particular type of resource had the rarer it was- it wasn’t just a matter of attempting to cultivate plants, but needing very specific conditions not always able to be replicated in a human livable environment. Thus, the particular plant that John was tasked to help retrieve

-----

As they marched through the forest, John was glad he had experience converting elements to what he needed. Everyone could do something similar to some extent- or at least draw out the background levels of different sorts of spiritual energy- but his level of proficiency allowed himself to make use of water and air to keep himself nearly comfortable instead of sweating and hoping that it didn’t evaporate too quickly and turn him into a mummy.

‘Normal’ parts of the Phoenix Forest wouldn’t cause John to get anywhere even close to fatigued at his current cultivation, but they were heading towards a lake region. And unlike normal, sensible places the Phoenix Forest didn’t define lakes by having water.

In the distance John could see haze caused by some combination of even higher heat than the surroundings and various sorts of offgassing.

“We’re getting close,” Charlotte announced for the benefit of everyone- both those of the Firepine Palace who had not been to the area before and for John and Aydan. “The lake is just up here. Soon we should meet up with our rangers and they will provide us with specific locations of Fire Lilies.”

That was what they were here for. Fire lilies. As an analog to the water lily, one could assume that they grew atop a lake of fire, and that wouldn’t be fully incorrect. But even when massive amounts of fire element could form together into a cohesive thing, there was an easier arrangement to provide similar results. Lava lakes. That technically made it a majority of rock as a base, but once something had become lava it was absolutely fire dominant regardless of if there was more to it.

As predicted, one of the specialized disciples quickly came to find them. “Sect Head,” she bowed quickly. “It is good you have arrived. Though we have staked our claim to this area and the local sects know better than to go against us… we have spotted signs of others in the area.”

“Any indication of who they are?”

“Beyond other fire element cultivators… no, nothing specific yet. They avoided our patrols for the most part, and we didn’t think it was wise to engage with the limited combat power we had available here.”

“A wise choice,” Sect Head Charlotte agreed. “Now that we are here, we will deal with them. We expected some conflict regardless. Now there will simply be more than the lake itself and beasts interested in the same thing as us.”