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Unintended Cultivator Vol 11: Chapter 46 – Uninvited Guests
🕑 Added 2025-03-04 06:07:46 +0000 UTCSen only allowed a little of the wind to pass through the curved shield of air he’d put up. He liked to feel the wind on his face. Left to his own devices, he would have let it strike him without obstruction. He doubted anything short of crashing through a mountain or fighting another nascent soul cultivator would be enough to hurt him at this point. Unfortunately, at least one of the other two people on the qi platform didn’t enjoy that kind of durability. It was possible neither did, but he wasn’t sure. He refrained, again, from eyeing either of them. He hadn’t planned on bringing anyone with him. That idea had been crushed swiftly and with brutal efficiency.
“You’re going to see your daughter,” said Grandmother Lu in an oddly flat voice.
“Yes.”
“And then you’re going to march off to war.”
“Yes?” Sen half asked.
“And is there some particularly reason why you haven’t already invited me to go with you on this excursion?”
“I—” Sen started to say.
“Given that I haven’t had a chance to meet her, yet, and that you’ll be gone for years, and that I’ll be required to stay in the capital to deal with the affairs of House Lu, it only seems proper. Don’t you agree?”
Sen didn’t need anyone to tell him that there was one, and only one, correct response to this line of questioning.
“Of course. Would you like to accompany me?”
Grandmother Lu gave him a beatific smile and said, “Why, yes. I would love to come and meet your daughter.”
“I’m—” Sen hesitated before saying, “I’m so glad.”
“As you should be, boy.”
He’d assumed that would be last adjustment he needed to make, but Lai Dongmei had approached him after the ceremony installing Jing as Governor. There had been a look in her eye that didn’t quite make Sen afraid, but it had been a closely-related feeling.
“So,” she’d said in an overly-sweet tone of voice, “when are we leaving to visit this sect of yours?”
He’d almost made some excuse about why she couldn’t come, but some instinct warned him that would be a very terrible choice. What Sen couldn’t understand was why she wanted to come in the first place. It wasn’t as though there were hidden luxuries to be found in, Sen suppressed his usual shudder at the name, Gale’s Bastion. Even if it had been growing steadily in his absence, it was a very new city. A fact that came with a host of problems he’d never even considered and very little in the way of amenities. It had been a small town, practically a village, not that long ago.
Its people weren’t sophisticated. Yes, there were former sect cultivators there who would know how not to offend a sect matriarch but that just wasn’t the case for the original townspeople. Nor would it be the case for most of the refugees who had steadily expanded the population. That group had been made up largely of displaced farmers and some tradespeople. Beyond that, it was the occasional merchant who had discovered they had no home to go to or no chance in the thousand hells of getting back to whatever home they had left from.
Sen had adopted a very liberal policy for mortals about who could stay and try to make a life for themselves. In fact, it had been much more liberal than the one he used to decide if cultivators could stay. As long as it wasn’t patently obvious that someone was a criminal to the bone, they could stay with the assurance that no one would dig to deeply into their past. The condition attached to that seemingly lax approach was that there would be no second chances for any adult. Children could be forgiven their trespasses because children might not know better. Just as importantly, children could be taught better ways. Sen expected adults to know better.
He was happy that he hadn’t been called on to expel anyone from the town personally. However, he’d learned that Sua Xing Xing had been forced to take that drastic measure on a few occasions. That had likely been a difficult thing for her to do, made even more difficult by her unwillingness to stray too far from his explicit orders. He had told her to exercise her best judgment, but she seemed to have adopted an his-word-is-law mentality. Something he grudgingly had to accept was now a fact. Nor was it just in his own sect or that small city but throughout the kingdom.
“Sen,” said Grandmother Lu, snapping his out of his own thoughts. “What is that unburned area?”
Sen glanced ahead and smiled a little to himself. A smile that became a frown as his spiritual sense swept over the area. Damn it, he thought. I did not need this today.
“That is a sanctuary I created for the spirit oxen. At least, that’s what it’s supposed to be,” said Sen in a hard voice. “Lai Dongmei, will you take over the qi platform please. There’s something I need to go take care of.”
He glanced over at her. The matriarch’s eyes went a little wide at whatever she read on his face. She nodded, and he felt her qi move to replace his as he transitioned to flying. He streaked forward toward that pristine stretch of forest, his jaw clenched in a swiftly growing fury. A voice in the back of his head reminded him that nature was not kind and that this was the way of things. That voice was drowned out as Sen felt the presence of other spirit beasts. Ones that shouldn’t be this close to the capital. Ones that should be fleeing from this kingdom in a desperate bid to save their worthless lives. He had no idea how long they’d been here, but it had clearly been too long. Some of them had brazenly cornered one of the ox calves.
When he landed, he made sure he came down on top of one of the spirit beasts. There was an explosion of blood and bone that he made sure didn’t touch the calf. The other two bear-cat spirit beasts were impaled multiple times by the bones of their former ally. They both let out ear-piercing shrieks of pain and shock as they stumbled back. They turned furious eyes toward whatever had dared interrupt them and froze. Sen stared at them.
“I warned you,” said Sen in a voice that shook with fury. “Years ago, I told you what would happen if any of you crossed my path again. It seems you have forgotten.”
Sen loosened the absolute control he kept on his killing intent. The bear-cats started convulsing almost immediately as he walked over and gently stroked the trembling calf’s head. The calf let out a soft moo and pressed its head against Sen’s stomach, seeking comfort or solace. He enclosed the thrashing, howling spirit beasts in a bubble of air to silence the noises they were making, since he was certain they were upsetting the calf. Growing tired of waiting for them to die, he made do with ripping the cores out of their bodies. That put a swifter end to their suffering than he would have preferred, but there more spirit beasts in the sanctuary that didn’t belong there. He wanted to make sure that none of them escaped.
First, though, he needed to get the little one back to the safety of the heard. He was tempted to simply carry it there on a qi platform, but he worried that would simply terrify the young ox. He’d have to take the slow path this time. He walked the calf through the trees until they found the herd. There was a moo that Sen interpreted as one half angry and one half relieved. The calf tried to hide behind him as one of the oxen came thundering over to them. She paused long enough to give Sen a grateful look before turning her attention to the calf, who seemed to be intently studying a rock on the ground.
Confident that the calf was in safe hands again, he made his way over to the herd leader he’d met here before. He didn’t have time to do more than greet the large female before Lai Dongmei and Grandmother Lu descended to the ground nearby. Both of them eyed the herd warily, while the herd eyed them with equal suspicion. Grandmother Lu looked from the oxen to Sen, her expression stunned.
“Sen. I know you said you’re on friendly terms with the spirit oxen, but I never quite imagined,” she gestured around, “this.”
“It never seemed like something I’d need to explain in depth,” he answered. “Let’s just say that we have an understanding.”
He proceeded to explain to the herd leader who Grandmother Lu and Lai Dongmei were and that they wouldn’t hurt any of the herd. He gave them both a meaningful look.
“Isn’t that right?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Grandmother Lu after a long pause.
“Of course,” said Lai Dongmei, addressing the herd leader with a respectful nod. “This is your place. We will not act against you. It would be unseemly.”
The herd leader gave the two women a long look that Sen read as dubious but inclined her head.
“She understands us?” asked Grandmother Lu.
“She does,” says Sen. “She might even talk to you if the mood strikes her. Please stay here for now.”
“Why?” asked Lai Dongmei. “Why did we stop here, at all?”
“There are uninvited guests infesting this place,” said Sen. “I mean to see them on their way.”
Comments
ReadingObsessed
That was adorable and vicious.
Captain Nuclear
Damn, it hugged sen 😭
Trevor Mergen
Thanks!
Kanyau
To be fair... he did warn them.
Tim Johnson
fuck them bear-cats. Spirit Oxen are best.
