I stood and looked at my troops. We had forced them through a brutal training regimen, one that would have any pampered sect disciple or noble brat running home to daddy or their Grand Master over their ill treatment.
Luckily Li Sung Won was a good Sgt and both led by example and punished any weakness with the sort of innate sadness and disappointment that let the punished feel the shame of letting down the whole unit by giving up. He didn’t do it on purpose, it was just his innate nature.
Bubbles was a thousand time worse. She was one of the smallest, yet she was also second only to Li Sung Won in physical strength, she had been a pampered noble daughter until seducing Li Sung Won, yet she was already both their best archer, and one of the top two swordsmen. She carried out the training with the sort of cheerful informality that demonstrated how easy it all was, and was always looking for new ways to make it more interesting. At the first sign of protest about the training, she would eagerly agree that the current training was boring, and shouldn’t they maybe make it more interesting like doing it suspended on ropes over a thousand foot cliff, or while juggling death hornet’s nests, just to make it interesting?
The fragment of a god, and the opening of their mana gates had started them on the path of mortal cultivation, and the extreme training was showing them that their body cultivation had turned their very flesh into an elemental furnace, something none of the human training in this world believed possible.
They did not learn a single spell. In fact, the soldiers were becoming convinced none of them would ever be able to cast a spell. They did not feel cheated.
Li Sung Won lashed out with his sword, but I danced back beyond his reach, sweeping my spear to knock aside Bubbles arrow infused with wind with speed allowing it to break the sound barrier with its speed, and infused with wood and metal chi to the point the deflected arrow punched into the stone of the mountain behind me to disappear hundreds of meters down.
I let the wind respond to my will, the tiny spark of my mana infusing the wind chi in my body, calling on the wind around me to answer and swirl around me in a ball of air that left me floating so lightly the simple earth and wood enhancement of my legs let me flash beyond the sweep of Li Sung Won’s sword effortlessly.
Harder was to deflect Bubble’s arrow, it was only by infusing the wood of my spear with water chi that I was able to let my spear flex around the incoming arrow. In martial arts what I was doing was called ju or “go with”. Her arrow was an irresistible force, so making my spear strong would result in a titanic explosion of force worse than an artillery shell of my own world. Instead, I let her “punch water” as my spear redirected the force rather than resisting it, physically bending before it and absorbing the shock through the whole weapon, through my arms, and through my own direction as it deflected me as much as I deflected it. This world focused too much on using opposites to oppose. You do not have to defeat every attack, just don’t accept it.
Li Sung Won had infused his muscles with earth and fire, and he let that earth and fire fill his sword, and as I danced beyond the sweep of his blade he let his earth and fire join with his sword chi to extend a blade of flaming metal and sword chi to cut me in half.
I let the arrow deflection spin my spear tip into the path of the flaming sword chi and I reenforced the metal chi in my spearhead with my own spirit. Sword chi or spear chi is killing intent and the spirit of a weapon made manifest in this world. The symbol of the sword is an idea, and in a world of spirit, the symbol of a thing has power to kill all on its own.
I am a Heathen, and one of our truths is that the best symbol of a sword is a sword, and the best symbol of a spear is a spear. The spiritual form of sword met the spirit infused reality of my spear and was broken. I fed the fire of the fire element imbued in the strike into the metal, and wrapped the spear tip with the air chi that had already been summoned for my defense. Feeding fire to metal and infusing with wind created lightning without any added power of my own. It only required direction. A spear is a wonderful thing, it can strike, block, cut, thrust, and in this moment; point. I gave the lighting a direction and lit up Li Sung Won like a Yule Tree. He sparkled and danced in the lightning, and as his muscles spasmed as he tried to resist my lightning, I hammered him with the flat of my spearhead, blasting him from conciousness.
I dodged another of the supersonic arrows from Bubbles,, but they took too long to charge, and as I closed, she shifted to pure wood infusion. She poured earth and fire into her limbs, fed wind into the wood chi pouring into her bow and fired a Storm of Arrows. A single arrow split into three, then into nine as they flowed towards me. I could not block them all unless I stopped charging.
I stopped the ones aimed at my core, for I could not allow them to pierce my dantain, nor my heart or brain. The ones that hammered into my legs I simply accepted, feeling the pure wood chi of the poison seep into me.
I took the water and wood chi that had already infused my spear and thrust, letting my spear extend to twice its length and lunged, striking far beyond my possible reach, and slap along side Bubbles throat, letting the blade cut her lightly and shock her with the retained lighting imbuement of the spear head. She fell twitching to the ground as I turned and looked at my platoon, the poison turning my skin green as it roared through me with the wood chi inside it.
The teachings of this world were about opposition. Healers used fire to combat the wood of poison, and the flesh simply tried to survive the clash. This was not our way.
I shouted “I am given death, AND I DRINK IT DOWN!”
I let my men see the black veins running through my green tinged skin as the poison ran unopposed in my veins. I fed air chi into my body, as the wood tried to strangle my cells ability to process it. The damage to my body spread, but I did not oppose the roaring wind chi with fire, nor did I attempt to force it out with my own wind chi.
We were to become demon hunters. Death eaters. This was our path. This was about to become “good training”.
I called upon the earth beneath me, and drew it into my bones. I let the wood chi tear at my insides, I felt it try to starve the fire within me by smothering and blocking the wind my body needed to live. I called upon earth to eat the wood, and I called upon water to flow.
“Laguz” I chanted, naming the rune of water, the rune of flow. I let the water and earth chi fill my blood and carry the poison through my body, I let the earth draw the wood chi of the poison and sink it into my bones. I bound it to me, I made it part of me. I let it tear me up inside as I trapped its essence inside me. I let it temper me, only as I made the poison fill my bones did I release the fire to burn off the physical toxins and damaged cells of my body. The wood chi of the poison attack drew wood from the air around me like a vortex. I rooted myself in the earth and drew upon water. Earth accepted the dead flesh of my body, the spent chi of all the elements and from that death wove life. Earth received every body and returned its life to the soil, and from that soil sprang the wood chi of life. The wood chi of the poison had torn through me, been made part of me, and through the earth chi become mine, and infused with my soul to become earth mana which fed into my own wood chi and infused the water chi to flow healing through my body.
I stood before the platoon and smiled as Bubbles killing poison strengthened my body and looked at them.
“Do you understand? We eat death. We eat corruption. We do not resist demonic chi, we feast on it. We do not stand against our enemy's power, we take it, and grow stronger from it.”
Bubbles was grinning, and Sgt Li Sung Won was nodding slowly. They were the best and brightest of the platoon, but I could see the rest of the squad was letting the seed of the idea take root. Given time and training, it would blossom into understanding.
“Is that enough to purify demon chi? Why haven’t the sects done this themselves?” Bubbles asked, having the self-restraint of a tiger in a petting zoo.
I grinned. “Well, I gave you a bit of Odin to allow you to survive, because hey, if it kills you in step one, the other steps don’t matter. The rest of it simply requires something we are going to go and get you tonight.”
Li Sung Won was a sergeant, and therefore constructively paranoid. He asked with due suspicion. “What else do we require?”
Astrella pounded him on the shoulder, in what she clearly thought was a gentle manner but would have shattered several bones in any of the common troopers.
“You have to eat a demon heart. They kind of taste like meat dumplings soaked in really high test alcohol. They taste amazing, but they do give you gas. Ruddy terrible farts your demons. Otherwise, first class feast!”
Astrella smacked her lips and rubbed her tummy in a way I found adorable, but most of the platoon seemed to find terrifying. Well, they didn’t have dates, so clearly their understanding and tactics were flawed. Seven feet of healthy appetites and violence made Astrella the woman of my dreams.
I looked at the platoon and smiled.
“Rejoice, my children, for Odin has blessed us with a feast this night. There was a great battle, and the demons slaughtered tens of thousands of brave soldiers. Tonight, he will send his master vampires and his ghouls to the battlefield. They will strive to raise the slain into slave vampires, or feast on those bodies of the fallen too broken to make good slaves.
We are going to find those master vampires and ghouls, and eat them.”
Corporal Chang Qua shouted out an objection.
“Sir, no one hunts vampires at night. They are at their most powerful, all of their abilities are at their peak and they have no weaknesses whatsoever!”
I grinned. “I know right? That is what is going to make this good training!”
Bubbles and Astrella exchanged a thunderous high-5, and Sgt Li Sung Won was already rubbing his hands together in the sort of anticipation and greed that would have shamed a dragon. The men looked an even mix of fear and almost amused resignation. Like they were in the presence and under the command of the clearly insane, but it was probably not worth resisting.
They were, after all, good soldiers.
