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“Oh, yeah…?” I croaked, my mouth still full of blood. I leaned to the side and spat it out. “Sorry.”

“Come let’s get you inside,” Lysa said. “I don’t know how you did that, but you fainted something awful. Have you eaten much today?”

“Yeah, I had some breakfast.”

I looked over my shoulder and saw the thick tree trunk lying not a few feet from me. I wasn’t quite sure who won the battle, me or the tree—maybe it was more of a tie.

“Must not have been enough,” Lysa said. “Come on. Get into the house. Now.”

I followed her orders and after cleaning me up a bit, Lysa sat me at a table and then popping into her kitchen and returned with a bowl of stew and some bread. When I tasted the stew, it was like heaven in my mouth. Savory and spicy and filled with chunks of meat, I gulped it down, realizing I hadn’t eaten something that tasted this good in ages. Maybe there was even Qi in it. After I’d finished, I felt ten times better and my body complimented the meal with a large burp.

“Excuse me,” I said. “Lysa, that was wonderful. Thank you.”

She smiled. “I’m glad you enjoyed it.”

My eyes grew suddenly heavy then and I felt like passing out again.

“Let’s get you a nap,” Lysa said and before I knew it, she’d led me to the living room and tucked me into a small cot next to the fireplace. I stared for a moment at the flickering flames, my freshly cut wood being put to use.

I was out in seconds.

When I awoke sometime later, the embers in the fireplace were just barely glowing and from the window it looked to be late afternoon outside. Both Lysa and Edrik were there, sitting in comfortable-looking rocking chairs sipping from steaming mugs of what I imagined was tea.

“There he is,” Lysa said with a smile. “How are you feeling, love?”

I sat up, half wondering where I was. I only briefly took notice of everything before in my stupor, but now looking at their living room it was like being transported back in time, to an Earth 12 years ago. The furniture looked all hand crafted and made to a more western design, like something you’d expect to find in a log cabin. Landscape portraits hung on the walls and the wood floor was covered with a thick and cozy rug. I stretched and all the pain I’d felt earlier was gone.

“I’m feeling great to be honest,” I said. “Sorry for passing out like that. Don’t know what came over me.”

“Yep, trying to chop a tree down in one go will probably do that to you,” Edrik said with a chuckle. He then squinted at me. “I didn’t take you for a cultivator at first, but you must be to have done that.”

I should have known this would catch up to me eventually. I probably shouldn’t have tried to push my limits in front of Lysa, but the path was the path. “I’m not really,” I said as honestly as I could. “My friend lent me a book and I was just trying something out. Probably shouldn’t have.”

I gave a smile and they laughed. I wasn’t sure if they believed me or not, or if they simply didn’t care. Either way that’s all they mentioned of it, and I was glad for that. We chatted a bit more over some tea and I asked about the furniture and even the food. Lysa told me she made it all herself, crafted it in the traditions of their homeworld which was a place called Ulm. It had been renamed of course, and was home to some other Yee Princess now. I found that they had bounced between several cultivation worlds before finally settling down on Earth about eight years ago.

“Master Edrik,” I said after a while, “tell me something. How is it you’re able to live like this?”

He raised a bushy eyebrow at me. “How do you mean?”

“Like you don’t seem to worry about following the culture of the dynasty at all. You’ve kept your own. How is that?”

“It’s not easy,” Lysa said. “You’ve got to be willing to sacrifice.”

“How so?”

“Well, we wouldn’t be able to live like this in the imperial city,” Edrik said.

“The imperial city?” It was the first time I’d heard that term.

He pointed to the sky. “Up there. As a citizen that’s where we’re all supposed to be. But if you’re willing to give up some luxuries you can live a simple life according to your own code. Own your own land. Cost us damn near everything to buy this plot, but it was worth it for us.”

I nodded and thought about my own situation. “That doesn’t seem possible for me. For any of us.”

Lysa gave me a sympathetic frown. “I’m sure it’s hard for you and your people. It’s been well over a century for us now, so those old wounds are long since closed, but trust me when I say it. It will get better with time. And I’m sorry we had to come to your world to do it, but coming here has given us hope for rebuilding some of what we lost on our own. I’m sure you can too in time.”

A bit of ire stirred within me. “I don’t think I can settle for that.”

“What do you mean?” Lysa said.

“I mean I want it all back,” I said.

Edrik laughed. “What?”

“You heard me,” I said, making the vow more to myself than to them. “I’m going to take it all back one day.”

Edrik looked at me strangely as if not sure if I was being serious or not. Finally, he just laughed. “Ah, the invincibility of youth. You keep that spark for as long as you can, son. Whatever you need to believe to get you through.”

I chuckled. “I’ll certainly try.”

But I had more than a spark.

I had a Flame.

And I was going to do more than just get through.

I was going to succeed…or die trying.

* * *

I finished the tea and took another glance out the window. There was still plenty of daylight left. “Well, I think I’ve rested enough,” I said. “Time to get back to work.”

“Why don’t you take it easy for today,” Edrik said. “Go home, rest up, finish off tomorrow.”

He was probably making sense, but somehow from that brief rest and food I was feeling better than ever. I stood and felt like I could go on for hours. I wondered then if I’d just had a breakthrough of some kind. The thought made me eager to get back to my axe to find out.

“No, I’m good,” I said. “Plus, I owe you for sleeping on the job.”

They laughed with me as I cracked the joke and then I made my way back outside. Grabbing the axe, I headed back to the tree and began hacking it into man-sized logs about six feet long. There seemed to be a bit more Frenzy stored in my Dantian than there was before and when I used it to pick up the log, it felt as light as a pillow on my shoulder.

“Holy shit,” I said. I must have reached stage two of my Muscle Strengthening or something. Even the smaller logs I had been chopping before felt heavier than this. And this was at least five times their size. I lugged the giant logs back to the house two at a time, enthused by my new-found strength.

I then went to work, breaking the logs down into smaller ones, before finally chopping them into firewood. I practiced my homemade axe techniques with each one and sure enough I was cutting even faster than before, my reflexes perhaps at stage two now as well. When I regained some Frenzy I tried a [Three-Log Chop] technique on the thick tree trunk and managed to cut it over halfway.

Definitely stronger, I thought. But it wasn’t mere physical strength either, it felt like I could actually put more Frenzy behind my techniques as well. I thought back to the excruciating pain I’d felt after executing the [Odds Against Me] technique and wondered if I’d increased my Internal Strengthening level as well. Something was different for sure. But I wasn’t going to attempt another [One-Cleave Chop] anytime soon.

Maybe I should have called it [One-Chop Cleave]? I thought absently. Yes, that had a better ring to it.

“[One-Chop Cleave],” I decided with a nod.

I went back to the forest to harvest more trees when the logs ran out. I chopped them normally, without the use of Frenzy and even with my casual strength and speed I was making short work of the job. As I worked my mind wandered and I thought about what Edrik and Lysa had said about being able to carve out your own destiny. If their lives were any example, it certainly wasn’t something to scoff at. They seemed at peace and comfortable. For me, it was almost like being with normal people again.

“Own my own land,” I pondered to myself.

I thunked my axe into a log and sat down next to it to contemplate the idea for a while. Owning my own land and living free and peacefully like Edrik and Lysa was certainly appealing, but it wouldn’t get me to my goal. Still there was an idea there that might lead me closer to it. To buy land would cost a ridiculous amount of money, but amazingly I had that already. The lightning core had to be worth over a thousand spirit stones. Maybe even more. With that much money, I could buy the whole of D block from our fat landlord, Li Fet, and maybe even Mu Lin’s block too.

It could be a start for us.

As a people, living in our own way, on our own land again.

But there were a few problems too. One, I had no idea how to offload a hot commodity like the lightning core. The world of cultivators was a cut-throat one and that was when they were acting above board. To dip into the seedy underworld of black markets and criminal cultivators was to venture into the dangerous and unknown.

My Flame, not surprisingly, flickered brightly at the idea.

But even if I did manage to hawk it without ending my journey prematurely, I couldn’t just buy the land from Li Fet. Not without becoming a citizen first. I released a dreaded sigh as I fumbled in my overcoat pockets and found the crumpled-up flyer for the Tournament of Mortal Champions. I had loathed the idea of joining the dynasty before.

It was against my very principles and ideals.

But perhaps it was time to become more strategic. I couldn’t just fight my way to the top. At least not yet. Not until I became as strong as Threja, or stronger even. Till then, I had to play the game and get wins where I could. And having a place to truly call our own would be a start to reclaiming the Earth.

I checked in with the Flame.

It seemed to like the idea.

I was still on my path.

I focused on the flyer again and formulated a new goal. Defeating Hein was now just the warmup.

I had a tournament to win.

* * *

When I resumed work, I had a new vigor. I had so much to accomplish and seemingly so little time. My mind was moving so fast formulating ideas that I didn’t even realize how much work I’d done until I packed away the latest batch of chopped firewood and realized the lean-to was now full.

I let Edrik know and when he came by to have a look he let out a long whistle. “I have to admit. When I gave you the job I didn’t expect you to get but half of it done. Looks like I’ll be set for two winters now.”

I chuckled, handing him the axe.

“You keep it,” he said. “The day is done and so’s the job.”

“I still got a day left.”

Edrik smiled and patted me on the back. “We’ll call it a bonus. Come wash up and have supper with us before you go.”

Lysa put on a spread like I’d never seen before. There was more of the lovely stew, plus some grilled pork to go along with more of her freshly baked bread. Edrik then cracked open a bottle of homemade cider, that was fizzy and had a hint of both apples and pears. We laughed and talked while we enjoyed the meal and for the first time in years it felt a bit like home again. I asked if they had any children and they had not just children, but great-grandchildren now spread all over the empire. It was a bit mind boggling to think of it like that, but when you could live hundreds or thousands of years, a family never truly died, it just got bigger and bigger. I suppose that was also why the dynasty had to simply keep expanding. If people didn’t die naturally then what other option was there than to simply grow and grow.

We finished up with a freshly baked pie filled with nuts and raisins and when we were done, Lysa gave me a piece to take with me wrapped in a napkin.

“You take care of yourself, son.” She gave me a warm hug as I stood at the door to depart. “You come back to visit anytime. We’d love to have you.”

“Thanks so much, both of you. You have no idea how much you’ve truly helped me.”

They really had, too. I’d managed to cultivate and break through to new tiers of power, I’d found a new purpose to better accomplish my goal, but most importantly I’d met them, people who made the world worth living in again. I vowed to myself to seed the same kind of peace once I took back the Earth.

But I had a heck of a long way to go before then.

“Here you go,” Edrik said and pressed something in my hand. “Another bonus.”

When I looked, there was a crescent-shaped lump of silver in my palm. “A full Tael?”

“I figured you did about three weeks of work, so with the axe, I say we’re square.”

“Master Edrik, thank you so much!” I gave him a bow of respect but he didn’t return it. He instead held out his hand and grabbed me by the wrist when I extended my own in kind.

“This is our custom,” he said with a firm grip. “You take care of yourself, lad. And if that blade ever needs sharpening, or if you need any smithing done, you know where to come.”

* * *

It was well after dark by the time I started my jog home.

Before I left, I used some rope and a few pieces of firewood to fashion a makeshift backpack of sorts, looping the axe through the rope beneath the bundle of chopped firewood on my back. While the axe wasn’t illegal for me to carry as a commoner, it certainly might draw unwanted attention just holding it openly in my hands. The wood gave me the perfect guise of a woodcutter returning from work with his tools upon his back.

The streets were especially dark and barren as I entered the patch of no-man’s land between the Artisan District and where the Native Housing District began. The Bloodmoon was on the rise, slowly replacing the darkness with an eerie red glow.

I stared up at it and wondered for a moment just what it was. What gave it the power to turn normal animals into monster and demons? I suppose I might never know, but I was going to take advantage of it tomorrow. I had my axe and my newfound strength and tomorrow I was going to increase it even more by killing mon—

A loud thunk! came from behind me and I stopped, wondering what the hell it was. It was extremely close, like right behind my ear. Glancing over my shoulder to the wood on my back, I could see a long, slender object sticking out of one of the logs, like a metal chopstick or pin.

A sudden vip! cut the air and my right shoulder exploded in pain as another pin flew out of the darkness and hit me with the force of a baseball bat. Before I even could react, a shadow sprinted towards me at a speed unimaginable. It was all I could do to raise my forearms in a block as the figure leapt at me. I felt a rib crack as I got hit by what I imagined a speeding car would feel like. I flipped end over end like a rag doll, firewood and axe flying into the air as I landed hard on the asphalt.

I glanced up and saw the figure was now at a standstill some thirty feet away, the same distance that kick had sent me. The person was small whoever they were, covered in tight-fitting black apparel like the Enforcers wore, but this was no enforcer. The face was concealed like one though, their head wrapped in black bandages, leaving only the space around the eyes uncovered. In one hand was a fist full of pins, laced between the fingers, in the other a slim blade that glinted crimson in the moonlight.

I was probably screwed. I had no idea who this was, but it didn’t seem like a pompous-ass cultivator like Hein or one of his flunkies. This was more like one of the Fire Bird members I’d fought out in the wild. A mid-tier Foundation Realm practitioner at least, possibly more. My Frenzied Flame consumed my inner fears as my heart hammered in my chest, but I shrugged it all off with a smile of [Indifference].

“Well, shit,” I said as I spat out a wad of blood. “I didn’t realize you all had ninjas in the empire now.”

I didn’t get much of a rise from the stupid joke. The word ‘ninja’ probably didn’t make sense in Yee anyway. But although they didn’t have a name for them in Yee, martial assassins dressed all in black was an all too common sighting in the bad parts of town. And now one of them had come for me.

“This One heard you had a big mouth.” A woman’s voice, young but authoritative, oozing with confidence. The lady assassin then flexed her Qi, her weapons glowing with a silvery light as she dropped into a martial stance.

“Let’s see if I can shut it for good.”