After a brief talk with everyone regarding my plans for Taizhou, I set my eyes towards Cao Chen. The boy stood in the back, his arms and chest broad and sturdy with dirt coating them in a way that somehow only added to him.

I’d barely interacted with Cao Chen in all the time I’d known Su Lin. Now that I thought about it, the same went for Zhang. Even with everything I’d done, I barely knew the boy himself, or how Su Lin and the rest of them had come to swear each other as brothers.

Cao Chen looked at me, dipping his lightly. “Do you need something?” he asked, hauling over a large bag that looked to be filled with dirt.

“No,” I replied, shaking my head. “I was just curious, you see. For better or for worse, all of you are involved with me and my plans, and I am involved with you. But I realize that outside of Su Lin, I don’t really know the two of you too well. Like, say how you came to the seventh peak or the cloudy peaks sect and became sworn brothers.”

Cao Chen looked at me for a moment, glancing briefly towards Su Lin and Zhang.

“If you don’t mind sharing, then I’d like to know more.”

“The heavens will strike me down if I refuse after everything you’ve done Lu Jie. But I’m afraid there is not much to be heard in this story like you seem to be expecting,” Cao Chen said, putting the heavy bag down with a thud.

I eyed the bag momentarily and the ease with which he moved it around. For a second realm cultivator, he may very well be close to being pure physical strength.

“Where to even begin…” Cao Chen trailed off walking closer and taking a seat and I followed along. Zhang and Su Lin looked at each other once, before they too settled down on the floor with me.

“Wasn’t it Su Lin who stole from me when we met?” Zhang said and Cao Chen laughed as Su Lin looked around feeling a bit embarrassed.

“Well, ya’d challenged him to a duel and lost in five blows,” Su Lin countered back as Cao Chen’s smile slipped and Zhang laughed even harder.

“Well, I will say that the spar was a lot closer than you may think. Cao hits hard, I just was at a higher realm,” Zhang said in a consoling voice and Cao Chen folded his arms.

“Don’t you say that brother. I accepted defeat for what it was, there is no need to try and chalk it up to anything but a lack of skill.”

“Seems like you guys just made trouble for each other,” I said with a smile as the three brothers laughed out loud.

“Ya have no idea how right ya are Lu Jie. No idea at all,” Su Lin said as Cao elbowed him and the boy grinned.

I smiled to myself as I watched the brothers bicker amongst themselves, feeling as if I’d finally been let in on a group I had never truly been a part of.

“How’d you meet Granny then?” I asked curiously.

“Su Lin stole from her, got caught, she beat him up and he agreed to sell her pills to the underground market for more money if she let him go,” Zhang said with a chuckle and I burst out laughing at the image of the old granny beating up Su Lin, and the surprise on a cultivator’s face from being beaten up by an old woman.

“We’d all come from different parts of the Empire. Su Lin was born here in the city, I lived in a village to the east of the seventh peak and brother Zhang came from much further south. It’d been a strange turn of fate that we met, and if brother Zhang hadn’t been there, none of us would’ve stuck around with each other,” Cao Chen said, turning to look up at me.

“You have no idea just how much it means to all of us that you brought him back to us. I’d almost lost hope and-” Cao Chen’s voice began to quiver as I stared. In a hurry the boy wiped his eyes as he looked up and smiled.

“I well and truly mean it when I say, this is a debt we will never be able to repay,” Cao Chen said, and I shuffled awkwardly.

“You can actually,” I replied looking at Cao Chen. “As I mentioned before. I need help to do what I plan to do. I want to bring change, but to do that, I need people to help me with it. You can help me with that.”

Cao Chen nodded, looking up at me with burning eyes. I glanced at Su Lin who nodded as well and I nodded back.

“I want the two of you to cultivate again.”

Su Lin and Cao Chen stared at me in surprise. “You want us to? Why? We’d tried and we’d failed, the two of us will never reach the third realm, much less beyond that. It’d be pointless.”

“I‘ve to agree with Chen here. That’s a fool’s game Lu Jie.”

“No it is not. Now that Zhang is better, granny can help you out with pills and herbs, you’re in a village with a Qi vein nearby and naturally growing spirit herbs, and I also plan to start a spirit herb farm here if I can. There are a lot of ways to increase your cultivation. I plan to completely fix Zhang’s core as well so this might be the only chance you will ever get to catch up to him. Do you truly intend to let this go to waste?” I asked, looking at the two boys.

Su Lin looked up at me, his face scrunched up as she stared. Cao Chen glanced at Zhang, before he turned to look at me. “Very well. I’ll do it.”

I smiled at the reply, turning to look at Su Lin who sighed. “Fine, I’ll try.”

“Thank you,” I said with a smile as the two of them waved their hands. I turned to look at Zhang, my smile still remaining on my face.

“Now then. It’s about time I inspected your core as well, don’t you say? Can’t fix what I can’t understand after all.”

Zhang nodded and I moved closer. Closing my eyes, I felt the spirit anchor I’d set in his core. Qi pulsed through the flower within, spreading outwards through little channels of roots that spread through his pathways.

The flower was the core, tied to his spirit, and coiled around it. I sensed the fraying shards present in it, the cracks in his core that despite the blossom, remained just as broken. I would need to find a way to heal those.

I spread my senses through Zhang’s core, channeling my Qi through it as I felt a tug at my own spirit come. Surprise rose within me, as I felt the pull on my spirit even without Sheldon around. After a moment’s thought, I let myself be swept as the world twisted around me, before darkness covered my sight.