Alice

Alice had screwed her eyes shut. She'd leapt onto Daoist Liang, shielding the woman's unconscious body with her own and covering her face with her sleeves. Cultivators were impossibly, inhumanly durable, but Alice wasn't sure how true that held when she couldn't hear the Story whispering from her.

Liang was unconscious, she decided. At the moment, Alice wouldn't consider any alternatives.

The high pitched clink of shattered glass bouncing off steel operating tables and ceramic plant pots, the light thud of sharp shards finding soft targets in plant specimens and watered flowerbeds, the shuddering creak of the greenhouse's metal frame relaxing as it was relieved of tons of weight in an instant - came together into a wall of sound.

That furious protest of every single windowpane breaking in unison filled Alice's ears and then gave way to silence.

"Outer disciples are not permitted to leave the city of Tianbei before they should form their Cores."

For just a moment, Alice allowed herself to hope that it was already over - that the situation was already resolved. Fairy Guan had lopped off the head of the assassin who'd targeted Feiyan so quickly, his blood failed to even leave a stain on her blade. Kong could already be dead.

Perhaps Kong wasn't truly an immortal. When Alice thought of immortals, she pictured Uncle Jiang. Alice tried to imagine Uncle Jiang skulking around a sect disguised as an inner disciple - she could not.

Why had Kong lured her to some remote greenhouse on the side of Earth Peak that faced away from Tianbei Valley? It was clear - there were people that he wished to avoid. Uncle Jiang didn't avoid people. People avoided him. Even the rain bent to avoid him.

Perhaps Kong wasn't a member of the Ascending Sky at all, but some sort of demonic cultivator who'd been trying to intimidate her.

"A rule as old as the Ascending Sky," said the immortal. "If the sect survives for another hundred generations, there might be an outer disciple who doesn't break it."

Alice opened her eyes, returning to reality. Of course Kong wasn't dead. That was wishful thinking at its finest.

"Good morning, Dao Mother," said Kong Fu. His voice was cheerful, almost enthusiastic. "Have the recent years treated you well? We haven't had tea in many years."

While Alice no longer felt that visceral disgust now that Kong was no longer borrowing her voice, the sense of relief she had allowed herself was also gone. If there was someone Kong was borrowing Daoist Liang's face to avoid, it wasn't Granny Meng.

Alice pulled herself off of Daoist Liang and stood up, turning around. Granny Meng had walked into the greenhouse. She wore a scowl that only deepened the aged lines on her face and sect robes that fluttered from a nonexistent breeze. The robes were white. Like Fairy Guan, she was still mourning the widow.

"Could it be that you don't recognize me?"

Granny Meng examined Kong, who was still seated on the workbench. Alice was slightly startled by just how quiet the whisper of her Story was. There was no trace of Principle coloring her qi, of course - that was a problem only Alice had.

What was curious was Alice's inability to hear the branching narrative of Granny Meng's core. Every cultivator she'd met who possessed a core - ranging from Jiang Tiankong to his immortal ancestor, from the inner disciples of the sect to its Peak Masters - had a telltale echo in their qi that gave it a certain weightiness.

"Or has this daoist earned a stunned silence from the esteemed Dao Mother of the Ascending Sky?"

If she hadn't known better, Alice would have been certain that Granny Meng had the qi of someone new to cultivation. Alice ran her thumb against her nails. Granny Meng was one of the realm's oldest surviving cultivators. Alice found herself hoping that the missing core was evidence of her excellence in cultivation and not the affliction of old age.

"I am indeed surprised."

Alice turned her attention from Granny Meng to Kong, who was still sitting on that creaky bench. He had discarded both Daoist Liang's scandalously short robes and the shape of her face in favor of his own.

"With the way you present yourself as the font of all knowledge, I'm surprised you can admit as much."

Despite his claims of belonging to the sect, he did not wear the black of the Ascending Sky, favoring instead robes of red orchid. A matching cloak of the same color was loosely fastened around his neck with a brooch. The brooch was the only piece of jewelry he wore. The brooch had been carved into the shape of a carp from a pale green piece of jade. A sewn gold stripe the width of a finger encircled his left wrist.

A few beads of broken glass had joined the little purple flower still perched in silky black hair that fell just past his shoulder blades. Most cultivators were beautiful, but there was something more deliberate about the shape of his face compared to most Alice had seen.

A faint, thin scar escaped from beneath an earlobe over his cheek to stop just at the corner of his right eye. His eyes were a distinguished shade of gray that peered over a sharp, noble nose. They were surveying Granny Meng with a deep disdain.

Granny Meng said nothing. She might have been blind, but her glare was unmistakable.

The Dao Mother of the Ascending Sky was old - older than any surviving architecture on earth. By her own words, Granny Meng and Chan Changshou - a few decades shy of his first century - were of the same generation.

Kong had clearly known Granny Meng when he was a mortal. Was he older than her? No, Alice didn't think so - not from the way his lips twisted into the angry sneer of someone who had something to prove.

"You still don't know who I am-"

"I recognized your voice from the moment you spoke to me, Kong Zhixin," said Granny Meng, clearly irritated. "I was struggling with the long-held hope that your reemergence, if it ever occurred, would be an occasion for joy. And behind that, what remains a mystery to this old woman is how the circumstance we’ve found ourselves in has come to pass."

Didn't he say his name was Kong Fu? Did immortals take on new names when they ascended?

There was something almost petulant about his expression, but there was a cold rage in his eyes. "Can't I come home to the dirty little lower realm of my birth and visit my old sect?"

"Ascension is an occasion of triumph, one rarely seen in dirty little lower realms such as these," Granny Meng whispered. Her voice was scratchy and soft, but each word was deliberate and precise. "When failures occur, friends that we've walked the plains with for very many years are lost. Sometimes we mourn them for longer than they had lived."

"That would be the case if I ever had friends here. Despite my heroic deeds, no respect was ever given by my peers. Despite my talents, nothing I learned was offered by the elders of the Ascending Sky. Not a single Peak Master wanted me as their student when I formed my core. I was passed over for every inheritance - how can I be blamed for withholding my friendly greetings when I've outgrown this mediocre hole in the ground?"

"Unloved by your peers?" Granny Meng's lips were set in a disbelieving grimace. "The Fairy still waits for you, still flies into a rage when it's ever implied in her presence that you're dead, still looks into the sky by night and still thinks of what she'll say to you when you appear at dawn."

Her hands shook in anger and, for the first time, the echo of Principle flowed into her voice. "The Fairy has allowed the years to become decades, and the decades to stretch into centuries in the blink of an eye. And she still refuses to Sever, so she can arrive at another outlandish theory on your whereabouts. The Fairy wanders the forsaken corners of her mind, sees clues in every moment you've shared with her. She wanders the forsaken corners of the world, sees your face in every crowd."

Alice was startled - not from learning that Kong was a contemporary of the Peak Masters, but rather from the implication that Fairy Guan could love someone like this. Alice tried to imagine what she would do if David disappeared without a trace and tried not to panic.

Kong's aggrieved disdain had fallen away into amusement. "From the moment we lit our first lanterns, Sister Mei has always been gullible and immature - on one hand, a girl who derives satisfaction from lording esoteric secrets over others and, on the other, a born contrarian."

There was something derisive in his eyes that caused Alice to clench her fists.

"You've never been a good judge of character, Dao Mother. As your senior in cultivation, allow this young immortal to enlighten you."

Kong sat up. His smile widened. "If failure would have left my body part flesh, part ash - she might have worn white at my funeral and said some grim words about the lonely road to the stars. If success would have led me to return and formally sever ties on grounds of tradition, she wouldn't have even attended the ceremony."

Kong tilted his head to the side slightly. "Ultimately, her defining trait is vanity. There would be nothing more appealing to Guan Meiyan than whispers about her tragic past. Anything and everything she's done involving me has been about her. To her, it's fitting that I should meet my end as a tragic memory to frame the story of her life. After all, I began as an orphan with no resources and connections that a girl who's never known hardship could pity when there was no personal cost."

"No personal cost?" Granny Meng echoed. She gave a short, creaky wheeze - laughter, like wind passing through trees. “You’ve ascended to brighter, better things, but you still carry within you that old insecurity of not being chosen to ring the Bells.”

“It is a small wonder you have not invited Heavenly Tribulation, if that’s what you’ve taken from what I’ve said.”

Granny Meng sneered. “You must forgive this old woman for her bad memory - she distinctly recalls some events that might seem to contradict your immortal wisdom, but I’m sure when they’re brought up, my ignorance will be exposed. Will you allow me to ask a few questions?”

“It’s the least I can do. After all, when I was a disciple, no one would answer any of my questions. I seek to set a better example for the future.”

Alice hated Kong Fu - if that was really his name to begin with.

“When Guan Meiyan stole a Retreating Yin Pearl from Pearl Tree Island, she had not yet resolved a Principle. The theft was discovered almost immediately, and Gentleman Cai, the now-departed First Deacon of the Still Waters, caught up to her at the border of their jurisdiction - where the White River meets the Ming Sea.”

Kong was no longer smiling - it was clear he knew this story.

“Faced with an insurmountable enemy known for his upstanding character, she dug out a fistful of flesh from her thigh to stash the pearl in her own body and then slashed her own throat to feign death. When she returned to Tianbei by light of the setting sun, the Widow hung her over the Sword Platform from the highest bell in the Tower and beat her without pause until dawn. Then, the Widow strolled over to my cottage and asked me if it would be less cruel to simply kill Guan Meiyan outright, because she’d already decided to abolish her cultivation.”

When David had formed his core, the circumstances had led one of the Daoist Weis striking him with the Star-Seeking Palm. The three Peak Masters had gathered in the Sword Platform to acknowledge David as an inner disciple soon after, and after seeing traces of the wound, Master Feng had asked the Sword Fairy if she’d been beating the disciples, as a joke. At least Alice had believed it to be a joke.

“But there were some things that were strange about the situation. What caused the Widow’s inheriting disciple to risk not only the uneasy peace between two historically opposed sects but also her own life for a treasure with no purpose but to survive a tribulation for an already open meridian?”

Kong said nothing.

“Was it because she was young and arrogant, and believed that she could poach a heavily guarded resource from another Great Sect without repercussions? After all, it is in Guan Meiyan’s nature to only show her generosity when there isn’t personal cost.”

Kong’s cheeks had taken on a tinge of pink - frustration or anger.

“Did she tell you she just managed to find one during one of her missions? Something that she didn’t need - and so you could have it?”

Alice felt a touch of embarrassment. She hoped she didn’t look quite like this when Fairy Guan lectured her outside of Sword Peak.

“I didn’t ask her for help with my cultivation,” muttered Kong.

“While this old woman still has the energy to ramble, I’ll put aside my politeness to correct your misguided notions, Honored Immortal,” said Granny Meng. “None of the elders who stood in vigil when you were still a young man reaching for the gates in the sky had any doubt when it came to your talent. And while most of us held the Guan Meiyan in higher regard, the Widow always believed you were at least her equal.”

“Do not patronize me,” whispered Kong. “I am no longer a child searching desperately for a family that would love him without conditions.”

“The Line of the Bells does not select for talent when it comes to its successors,” continued Granny Meng, without acknowledging Kong’s complaint. “Your shortcomings, Kong Zhixin, have never been related to the process of cultivation.”

Granny Meng took a few steps to her right and sat down on a little bench to face Kong, so deliberately that Alice wondered if the old woman was truly blind, or if it was for show.

“An inner disciple of Earth Peak lays dying on the ground in her carefully maintained greenhouse, having hosted her immortal ancestor. He has stolen three things from her - the entirety of her voice, the majority of her primordial yin and a portion of her fate.” She sounded tired, disappointed.

Alice thought of a pretty boy on a boat who’d insisted his fate was a gift that had been stolen from him - what did that even mean?

Kong threw a glance at Alice, and then at Liang Dadu, who was still motionless by her feet.

“No,” said Granny Meng, soft as the whispering wind. “Your problem has always involved the content of your character.”

An impossibly thin needle, just longer than the pin Alice wore in her hair, glinted from between Granny Meng’s forefinger and thumb.

“And today, I’ll be providing you with a solution.”