Druidic Cultivation | Twelve

And so the cultivation is about to begin. Also went back to last chapter and tweaked Aideen's personality just a bit, I think it either helped with the tone shift or made it much worse, but I'm happier with it either way. Big thanks to all the new patrons in the last week!

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Feng Jiao descended from the large carriage that he’d been, for lack of a better term, meditating in for the last couple hours. Before walking over, he looked back at the line of carriages that they’d taken here from Crouching Grass Village and stretched. Each of the carriages stood several feet high and were scaled to the size of the beasts of this world. Not only the carriages, but things like roads and walls were also built taller and wider than one would typically expect.

For example, within the four carriages they’d taken here they were able to comfortably fit two hundred children, twenty adults, trade goods for some of the adults to sell in the city, and food supplies for two weeks. When compared to the towering trees that put his old life to shame, Feng Jiao couldn’t help but be impressed by the scale of this world. From the maps he’d studied, even the continent was several dozen times larger than the one he’d lived on in his past life. Or so Aideen had told him during their idle chat.

He was procrastinating. Feng Jiao knew that, but it was hard to break habits formed from years of isolation, as both a tree and a child. He’d used the excuse of being annoyed with others for bullying or lusting over his looks but, in reality, he wasn’t sure he knew how to make friends, and definitely not the kind of friends Aideen wanted him to make. He was far too young for that anyways, so he decided to settle with just talking to other kids. 

The children were still split into two groups on either side of the fire based on gender. There were a few outliers, like brothers sitting with their sisters or kids who had an arranged, but apparently acceptable, marriage since a young age but, for the most part, they seemed nervous about talking to kids of the other gender. While strange at first glance, Feng Jiao assumed it was because they didn’t see a point in getting close. 

Most commoners would marry inside of their village, but cultivators had longer lifespans and often traveled the world. As such, many would choose not to pursue relationships until well into adulthood or, typically more with the men, would choose to have several relationships in different areas of the world. Another common reason was that they didn’t know if they would end up in the same sect, where they’d spent a large portion of their life, so they’d wait until they arrived there before dating.

Also, they were between the ages of ten and twelve. Feng Jiao was overthinking it, most likely. He decided to blame the separation on culture and hormones and stopped thinking on it.  Looking around he realized he’d probably been standing there for a few moments longer than intended as several people were looking up at him. They cast him questioning glances, hopeful looks, and for some reason, envious looks. Although he was not the most social person in the village, he was not a pariah either. He figured they were trying to find out where he would sit.

‘Well,’ he thought to himself, ‘if a system isn’t broken, there is no reason to fix it. I’ve been grouping with the girls so far and everything has gone greatly. Besides, I do not find the boys pleasant to look at and Aideen said that was important.’ With the decision made, he walked towards the girl’s side of the fire. A few of the girls squinted in displeasure at his bravery but ultimately choose to say nothing as it wasn’t against the rules for him to sit there. Even more girls were excited that he had chosen to come over.

“Senior Brother Feng, over here! Come, come, come! Sit!” A very excited little girl started beckoning him over toward the log bench she was seated upon. She scooted over to the edge and patted next to her enthusiastically. Feng Jiao was cautious of her overly enthusiastic greeting, worried she’d be too excitable to have a good conversation with, but ultimately choose to walk over anyways. From her addressment of him, he felt like she was likely one of those who’d elected to follow him to the God Tree Grove, and he should treat her like a Junior Sister.

She stood only four feet tall, a little short for her age, and had straight black hair that was bobbed, not extending past her jaw. With overly round eyes and a smile that took up a large portion of her face, she reminded Feng Jiao of a fairy. A very spritely fairy, the kind who tended flowers and secretly nurtured martial medicines in the wild. 

“Feng Jiao greets Junior Sister. I don’t mean to be rude, but do we know each other?” She was slightly familiar, but Feng Jiao was fairly confident they hadn’t spoken before. Of course, this was something he’d been wrong about many times in the past, often introducing himself to someone he’d already had a conversation with in the past. It was severely awkward every single time, him either coming off as an airhead or someone so proud that they feigned forgetting about meeting someone, a cruel type of power play. 

“Of course, we do, silly. Your bedroll was right next to mine for most of the trip here from Crouching Grass. You were a bit quiet the entire trip though and only chatted with the older girls, which I found odd at the time. Now that I know you’re actually the Young Lord of the Feng house though, it makes a lot more sense. Ahh, how will others believe me when I tell them that I slept next to Senior Brother Feng for an entire week without knowing he was a man. Say, you weren’t taking advantage of your Junior Sister Duan Cao, right?” She spoke a little faster than most people Feng Jiao had heard before, as well as passionately. If he didn’t know better from the look on her face, he might have thought she was genuinely suspicious of him. 

“Of course not, Junior Sister Duan. I was merely avoiding sleeping near the piggish boys of our village. When you’re as pretty as we are, you have to take steps to ensure your safety.” Whereas he didn’t find the young girl attractive, per say, it never hurt to flatter a woman. She could easily become beautiful as she ages, she was just a bit childish looking at that moment, cute but with a lot of room to grow into a woman. Naturally, his flattery had the desired effect of making her smile even wider. 

“Oh, you womanizer. You were definitely trying to be sly, tricking us all into thinking you were a girl so that you could get closer to us. That’s okay though, you seem alright. Oh boy! I bet everyone is jealous of you, huh? You’re so pretty that the girls envy you and you spend so much time with girls that the boys envy you. Don’t worry though, I won't be jealous of Senior Brother Feng so you can talk to me.” 

“Junior Sister is too nice; the boys don’t envy my looking like a woman and the women wouldn’t envy a beautiful man. On second thought, the girls still might be jealous, but my altruistic Junior Sister isn’t, so I don’t need to worry. Say, I missed the sect requests and I heard a large amount of the village will be attending the God Tree Sect with me. You wouldn’t happen to be one of them, right?”

“Mm!” Duan Cao violently nodded her head, “Junior Sister Cao as well as most of the girls from the village all requested to join the God Tree Sect. With our average talents a mid-tier sect was always the best we hoped for, but with our young lord going as well as that Qian Bei, the God Tree Sect became even more desirable,” The little girl blushed deeply, so deeply that it was still obvious in the campfire light despite her hair covering a portion of her face, “They are sure to rise in power soon and were already wealthy. Many of us who want to pick up a trade had already been planning on requesting to join them, you merely gave us the final push.”

Feng Jiao realized that his action had created a sort of domino effect for the Crouching Grass Village. Not just them either, many other average talents had managed to join the God Tree Sect, or at least receive their sponsorship, due to their large recruiting spree this time. Often in the past, mid-tier sects feigned indifference like the top-tier sects in order to preserve face. With the God Tree Sect having received two of the best three seedlings this time, their face didn’t need to be preserved and mass sponsorship had had the opposite effect, drastically increasing public image and opinion of the sect. Who among the younger generation wouldn’t want to climb the mountain before it raised, reaching new heights with half the effort?

“What a good Junior Sister Cao,” Feng Jiao used a more familiar name, causing her to blush once more and him to smile, “You said most of the girls though, what about the boys? Did they not, too, join the God Tree Grove?” 

“That’s right. Only a few other boys joined the God Tree Grove, due to its reputation of being, umm.” The young girl stalled, as if unsure how to phrase her explanation.  She played with her hands for a few breaths while she looked down at her lap. Finally, she opened her mouth to speak after carefully collecting her thoughts.

“Well, Senior Brother Feng-”

“Please, call me by Jiao.” She was instantly flustered again. Honestly, Feng Jiao didn’t know why he hadn’t started teasing people sooner. Aideen was completely right about it being a lot of fun and her conversational advice seemed to be paying off already, making friends like this would be too easy.

“Ahh! Senior Brother Jiao definitely knows the reputation of his sect. The other boys didn’t want to be in a female majority or run sect, they said they could not kneel to a woman who was not their mother or grandmother. Of course, such a womanizer like you would shine in such a place and a few of the boys decided they liked your way of thinking.” Duan Cao averted her eyes and looked toward the large boar that was roasting, near done cooking. Feng Jiao chuckled as she was unable to hide her eyes while looking away and they, too, were a deep red.

“Junior Sister thinks too little of her Senior Brother, I knew no such thing!” In all honesty, Feng Jiao hadn’t realized that. Although he’d heard that the Sectmaster was a woman he didn’t think that was any reason for boys to avoid the sect, especially so for his Crouching Grass Village. His family, the Feng Family, was the ruling family in their village and was a matriarchy. Something about knowing for sure the lineage of the successor, or something. It was not a popular familial structure, but it wasn’t all that uncommon either. Perhaps that is why the boys were so reluctant to the idea.

“All the better though, I suppose. It just means there will be less boys competing for my Junior Sister’s attention. I never got along with the boys in our village anyways. The ones who didn’t harass me would bully me, and the ones who bullied me often harassed me.” Feng Jiao was sure most of the boys wouldn’t bully him publicially due to his status, that was usually limited to his cousins all of whom were older than him.

“Uhm, if it isn’t too untowardly of me to suggest, I’m sure the other girls wouldn’t mind you sleeping in our carriage, to um, avoid the bullies. You can sleep with me if you want. Oh! Uhm, I mean set your bedding next to mine, like you did on the way here.” With every sentence, the cute little girl dug her verbal hole deeper and deeper.

Feng Jiao reached over and ruffled her hair, neither confirming nor denying whether he’d try to sleep next to her again. He’d planned on sleeping near his father, but it was much nicer to be invited to sleep near his new friend than next to his dad. He tactfully decided to smile as a response and see how the rest of the night went, if he could make a collection of friends, he’d feel more comfortable about imposing. 

By the end of the night everybody was full on roasted meat, giddy about having finished their awakening ceremony, excited about starting their cultivation, and high on joy. Feng Jiao ended up talking to several more girls and one of their brothers, adding to his collection of friends and securing himself a spot in the corner of the girl’s carriage. That night he learned much about the female body from several of the girls, much to his surprise, but did not do the thing between the man and a woman as they were all far too young. Many questions he’d had about the logistics were answered, and many more questions raised for another time.

With both his and the girls’ curiosity settled, they all went to sleep in order to contact their martial spirits for the first time. Likewise, Feng Jiao closed his eyes and drifted off to meet up with Aideen again and tell her all about his night and the friends he made although from what he’d figured out she could see through his eyes while inside his spiritual sea. Mostly, he wanted to gossip with his oldest and truest friend.

How surprising it was, however, when he woke in a dream world and she was actually there, but in her bird form. Apparently, her humanoid form was a perk of the ritual he’d conducted, and she would show in her true form during their natural visits. Communication was much more difficult, but he told her about his night anyways. She didn’t reply vocally, sending emotions of approval or images of things she’d seen that night, several of which made Feng Jiao blush deeply. By the morning, she’d taught him the basics on attracting Qi according to this world’s laws, and how to start opening his meridians.