The next day, Cha Ming returned, fully refreshed. He calmly sat in front of the second obsidian stele, fully prepared to tackle the next challenge. As before, his surroundings faded. However, he was not greeted by pitch blackness. Instead, he found himself at a desk.
Cha Ming was now in a small room. A dozen young men and women were also seated at strange desks. Their hairstyles were very different from what he was used to—some even had blue or green hair. In addition, they wore clothes similar to what the Custodian had initially worn.
A sliding sound instantly brought perfect silence to the room of chattering young adults. A middle-aged woman had just entered the classroom. She wore a pair of spectacles, which he found strange considering none of the children wore them. Her clothes were simple but well maintained, and her tidy, militaristic hair hinted at a rigid personality.
“Welcome to the first lecture on compositions,” the woman said. “You have all achieved outstanding grades on the vocabulary unit. As you now know, words hold deep meaning that allows us to harness the secrets of the universe.”
It seemed he’d been sent to a classroom for this trial. Would he only have this one chance to learn everything? Also, why would the Custodian send him to learn with a bunch of other constructs? Wouldn’t it be easier to teach him the same way as before?
“I would like to take this chance to introduce a temporary transfer student,” the instructor said, giving Cha Ming a meaningful look. “He will only be here for one month. Please do your best to help him learn while he’s here.”
“Yes, teacher!” the students intoned.
“Very well,” she continued. “First, I will teach you about addition. Different words bear different meanings in combination with one another. Some words combine easily, while others do not. Can anyone tell me why that is?”
A pretty girl with lightly curled black hair held her hand up to answer.
“Yes, Yu Wen?”
“Word compatibility depends on many factors,” the young lady said cheerfully. “First, fueling relationships between elements tend to add better than destructive relationships. In addition, some words are simply well related in an abstract sense. For example, the ‘mountain’ and ‘stream’ characters seem incompatible based on elements, but their underlying concepts are not.
“Second, it depends on the user. A user must be compatible with the words used, and different words are compatible with each other because they are compatible within the user. What is possible for one might not be possible for another.
“Third, it depends on intent. Deep emotions can make certain words compatible with one another. Although this seems closely related to the second principle, it is separate. The second principle involves physical compatibility, while the third principle depends on the individual’s will.”
“Very good,” the teacher said. “Continuing…”
The girl who had just finished speaking, Yu Wen, was seated right beside Cha Ming. Her black curls were in sharp contrast with her pale, jade-like skin1.
Such a pretty student, he thought. If she wasn’t a construct, I might try befriending her.
As though sensing his gaze, she looked at him, winked, and motioned her head toward the three-dimensional equivalent of a whiteboard. There, the teacher was writing out the lesson in midair with a brush containing gray ink. It was a similar gray to what he’d seen before on his qi pathways once all the elements were joined.
And so, he spent the next twelve hours participating in an extremely long lesson. Fortunately, it wasn’t just a lecture. Sometimes, he participated in group activities. At other times, there was self study. When divided in pairs, he took the initiative to ask Yu Wen, who smiled shyly and accepted his invitation.
Soon enough, class was over. Everyone was free to depart to their homes. The students filed out of the classroom, leaving only Cha Ming and Yu Wen. She was no longer studying. Instead, she was reading a book. He wondered at how sophisticated an artificial intelligence would need to be to enjoy simple pleasures like this.
Unfortunately, time was not Cha Ming’s ally. He only had a month to learn as much as he could, and the first day’s lesson had already been extremely overwhelming. He could only grumble inwardly and dip his Clear Sky Brush in the pot of elemental essence on his desk and participate in the optional assignments that he could access by toggling through several of the desk’s menus.
The current exercise was a sort of fill-in-the-blanks exercise. He would fill in the words he felt were appropriate in context. A few easier questions passed in succession before he was finally confronted with a difficult problem. He thought for a while before painting in a guess on the screen, which crumbled and counted as a single strike.
“You should have used the character for ‘acting’ instead of ‘behaving’,” a soft voice said behind him. It was the pretty girl that he had worked with all day, Yu Wen. He couldn’t help but smile when she came over.
“May I?” she asked. Cha Ming nodded, and to his surprise, she grabbed his Clear Sky Brush before leaning over the top of him and painting the character she’d mentioned. “Acting implies deception, while behaving implies knowledge of what’s proper. Both indicate a method of action, but the context of the sentence mandates the other.”
His face flushed as he looked up at her charming face. She leaned over him, her face turning beet red as she realized the awkward position she was in.
“Aiya!” she yipped, scrambling away in embarrassment. “I’m sorry I acted inappropriately. I just love to solve puzzles, and everyone else in the class is so boring and caught up in their own lives. Only you would bother to stay at school and do these kinds of exercises.”
Cha Ming found her embarrassed rant amusing. He chuckled. “It’s no problem, no problem at all. May I have my brush back?”
Yu Wen suddenly noticed the impropriety and handed it back to him hurriedly.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t just grab people’s soul-bound treasures like that. It’s the highest form of rudeness.”
“Soul-bound treasure?” Cha Ming asked, perplexed.
“Aiya, you don’t know?” she asked with a shocked look on her face. An impish smile appeared. “If you forgive me, then I’ll explain it to you.” Her coquettish attitude made Cha Ming blush slightly, and he could only nod while massaging his brow.
Yu Wen ran back to her desk joyfully and pushed it toward Cha Ming. A loud screeching sound like nails on a chalkboard caused him to shiver as it moved. Soon their desks were only a foot apart. She sat down beside him before sighing in satisfaction.
“That’s much better,” she said. “It’s so boring in class with all the desks separated. Now, where was I? Ah, soul-bound treasures. Soul-bound treasures are the rarest of treasures in the universe. They choose their owner, granting him or her many benefits. They tend to grow with their owner as well, provided that they are supplied enough materials.
“Unfortunately, it’s not easy obtaining one. There are only a handful of them in the universe, and only those with a strong destiny can inherit them. They are called soul-bound because they will shatter when their owner’s soul is destroyed, and their owner’s soul will perish if the item is destroyed. Of course, destroying such an item is an extremely difficult feat. Even the ruler of Heaven might not have such formidable power.
“In any case, only the soul-bound partner of the treasure can use it. Having one will surely spark jealousy among many people, but fortunately, most people will just assume that yours is an artificial soul-bound treasure, just like this hairclip.”
She pointed to the back of her curly hair, where a green jade hairclip fastened all but her bangs into a loose ponytail.
“Wait a minute, I’m puzzled,” Cha Ming said. “Didn’t you say that only the soul-bound partner could use it? If you’re so certain this is a soul-bound treasure, how could you use mine?”
“It’s. A. Secret,” she said coyly and buried her face back into her book.
Cha Mi
ng could only sigh.
What an unusual construct. Since his time was limited, Cha Ming continued to study hard and completed a variety of exercises on his desk. He studied all night, and strangely enough, Yu Wen stayed all night as well. She simply sat beside him, reading her book, occasionally correcting his mistakes.
Class resumed the next morning. After receiving several glares from male students in the class and receiving a quizzical look from the teacher due to the proximity of his and Yu Wen’s desk, the teacher launched straight into the concept of subtraction.
Unlike addition, subtraction was used to eliminate undesired properties from words. This could either weaken the word or refine the word. Cha Ming realized that this was much like the concept of purposefully weakening a talisman beyond one’s reach. It was important to draw the weakening character first so that the intent was known.
Similarly, refining was much like the body refining he had suffered under Guo Jia’s pills. After consuming metal, water, and wood pills, the wood, fire, and earth energy in his body had been greatly concentrated and strengthened. The principle took advantage of destructive relationships. Like before, the physical capabilities of the individual and their intent influenced the result.
A week flew by in a flash. Cha Ming spent all his time learning in the classroom during the day and studying at his desk at night. Yu Wen accompanied him and helped him the entire time. No other students in the classroom came to interact with him. He wondered why they were there in the first place. Did it depend on his disposition and preferences? Would they take the initiative to befriend him if it suited his learning style? He had many doubts in his heart, especially after those glares he had received on the second day.
At the end of a class during the second week, Cha Ming felt exhausted. He held his hands on his head as he tried to digest the latest content—geometry. The principle was that shapes, lines, and circles could be used to establish relationships and channel the power of words. There was no limit to the size of these lines and shapes—they could either be the size of insects or span entire cities.
Yet despite their high potential for application in formation arts, talismans, or weaponsmithing, none of these subjects were ever breached. It was as though they were simply teaching concepts and letting the students’ imaginations run wild. It was much like engineering school teaching calculus or chemistry.
“You look positively exhausted,” a soft voice said. Yu Wen’s familiar voice snapped him back to reality, and he looked down at his desk, which was filled with doodles and notes. “What seems to be causing you problems?”
Cha Ming sighed self-deprecatingly. “I’m having a lot of issues learning all these concepts. While they feel simple on the surface, every time I apply them, I feel overwhelmed.”
Yu Wen looked at him with pity. “Of course it’s very difficult for you to learn. Your soul is barely in the Incandescence Realm, while everyone else in the classroom is leagues ahead of you. Quite frankly, I don’t know what they were thinking, arranging for you to transfer to this classroom for one month.”
“Still,” Cha Ming replied, “I am here and can only learn as much as I can. Even if I can’t learn everything to perfection, I can tell that everything here is useful.” An awkward silence followed.
“How about I be your personal tutor?” Yu Wen suddenly asked.
“You understand all this?” Cha Ming asked in a surprised manner.
“Of course,” she said proudly. “I learned all these things decades ago. I’m only here for fun and to pass the time.”
Cha Ming hesitated. “What do you want in return?”
“I just want you to call me Wen Laoshi2 from now on,” she said with an impish grin on her face. “That’s fair, isn’t it?”
Cha Ming coughed lightly. “Isn’t that a bit much?”
Yu Wen said nothing and held her hand in front of her mouth.
“How about I only call you Wen Laoshi after school hours,” said Cha Ming. “This way, I won’t make the teacher feel awkward.”
“It’s a deal!” Yu Wen said. “Now let’s see where you were having problems.”
And that was how Cha Ming managed to power through two more weeks of school.
It was the last day of class. Cha Ming wasn’t sure what would happen once class was over, but he had already been told that there would be no final exam. He took advantage of every moment and continued studying what he was taught. Fortunately, he had managed to stay for the whole lesson segment on grammar. The next lesson segment would be sigils, which he unfortunately would not be able to attend.
Cha Ming regretted not being able to stay to learn more, but he understood that the owner of the library must have had a purpose in limiting class time to only a single month. He guessed that it had to do with testing aptitude or something along those lines.
At the end of class, Yu Wen accompanied him to study. Unlike before, her expression wasn’t as excited as usual. Rather, she seemed sad. Although she was only a construct, Cha Ming had come to see her as more than that. He felt that she was an actual person. As such, he guessed that her sulky demeanor had a lot to do with this being his last day.
After studying for a few hours, she let out a deep sigh. “You will be leaving at midnight. That only leaves us a few minutes together. It was very nice studying with you, Cha Ming.” A single tear ran down her cheek.
He smiled and used his finger to catch her tear. “It’ll be all right,” he said reassuringly. “I’m sure you’ll find some other good friends after I’m gone.” She nodded in response, but it was obvious that she wanted to continue crying.
“Before you leave,” she said in a quavering voice, “I want to play a song for you.”
“Sure,” Cha Ming replied. “What do you play?”
She didn’t reply. Instead, she waved her hand and summoned a guqin3. It was carved out of pure jade. Resplendent silver strings that shone like the moon were draped across the majestic instrument.
Pluck.
The first note seemed to put him into a trance. He felt as though he was lying by a river in the mountains, beneath a tall oak tree. He quickly realized that he had been dragged into an illusion. He did not struggle. He simply enjoyed this illusion.
As the music continued, Cha Ming slowly drifted into a deep sleep. When the clock in the room struck midnight, the music stopped.
“Congratulations on passing,” the excited voice of the Custodian exclaimed. Cha Ming awoke in the usual blue room with a hint of sadness in his eyes.
“What score did I obtain?” Cha Ming asked blankly.
The Custodian, not noticing his unusual mood, made a hand gesture. Instead of dozens of items, a long, blue candle in a bronze platter appeared.
“You scored eighty-two percent,” the Custodian explained. “The prize for obtaining this score at your low cultivation base is ten uses of enlightenment incense. You simply need to burn it, and it will help you meditate on the Dao. It is very useful for creating unique techniques, talismans, weapons. You name it!”
Cha Ming sighed and accepted the candle, drawing it into his Clear Sky World. “Can I ask a question?”
“Of course,” the Custodian replied. “What would you like to ask?”
“Why was a simulated classroom used this time?” Cha Ming asked. “Why couldn’t I have learned from books? The people there seemed so real, and now that I’ve left, I feel a little lost.”
“It had to be a classroom because some things can’t be taught through books,” the Custodian replied awkwardly. “Besides, that wasn’t a simulated classroom. It was a real classroom, with real people.”
* * *
1 Jade is not only restricted to the color green. In this context, the jade is white. In China (as well as several other countries in Asia), snow-white skin is a sign of beauty, and dark skin is considered ugly. In fact, many people carry umbrellas on hot summer days to avoid the sun. Instead of using sunscreen, they use whitening sunscreen that will take away any bronzing y
our skin may have “suffered” in the past.
2 Laoshi means teacher in Mandarin Chinese. Adding laoshi behind someone’s name is a formal way of addressing your teacher. Effectively, you admit the other’s superiority to you.
3 A classical Chinese stringed instrument in the zither family. It is too large to be carried and is played while seated.
Chapter 23: Truth
The truth hit Cha Ming like a sack of bricks. He suddenly felt ashamed at his own stupidity.
All that time that I was in the classroom, all that time I spent with Yu Wen, was real? No wonder she was crying when I left. And all this time, I didn’t know. He didn’t know where she lived or if he’d ever see her again. Then again, it seemed she knew this. She probably knew they could never meet again.
“The reason you could only stay for one month is because the energy stores in the palace are limited,” the Custodian said apologetically. “Your soul was transferred to one of Fuxi School’s classrooms in the celestial realm. If this was a transcendent-grade library, I could have extended the duration. Unfortunately, this library is only in a mortal realm, and the energy available is quite pitiful.”
Cha Ming closed his eyes to calm down before standing up. “Thank you for telling me, Custodian. I need to go rest before the third trial.”
“One moment, young man,” the Custodian said. Three jade slips flew out of his hands, and a drop of blood flew from Cha Ming and imprinted on them. “Your score was exceptional, but not top tier. As a result, you are obligated to teach only three students. You are only required to teach the material which you’ve mastered, which is imprinted on these jade slips.”
Cha Ming nodded in acceptance and went to rest.
Cha Ming’s mood improved considerably by the next day. Unfortunately, there was nothing that could be done—he could not return to the classroom, so he would only meet Yu Wen if fate willed it. All he could do was continue and take care of the task at hand. Passing the trial and obtaining the knowledge in Fuxi’s Library was of paramount importance in saving the villagers. After all, the better he performed on the third trial, the more liquified elemental essence he could obtain. If he could obtain the capital to complete the first cycle of his Seventy-Two Transformations Technique, the task would no longer be so insurmountable.
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