033. THIS SLAPS

Ming Shi’s Day Three masterpiece was a magnificent abomination.

It was, generously speaking, a child’s drawing of Chang holding a bowl of congee while emanating holy light. Ming Shi had spent his sleepless hours creating this masterpiece with ink and delirium. The thing was huge. Seven feet tall, four feet wide.

“Elder Brother Chang,” he announced, hanging the enormous scroll in front of his stall where everyone could see. “This is how I see you! Celestial! Enlightened! Everyone, come and see Mount Tai!”

Chang’s glaring, unblinking eyes had transcended normal fury and attained a state of murderous enlightenment. They were glowing. Blazing. Flaming. It was highly probable that they were burning through to another universe where Ming Shi did not exist.

“You,” he whispered.

“Me!” Ming Shi agreed. He spun in an excited, qi-boosted circle.

What happened next would be debated in the gossip pages of the Fragrant Bowl City Gazette for months. Some said they saw Chang’s hair go white and stand on end like a lightning-struck albino chicken. Others said his congee pots began booming like war drums. Still others said they saw a silhouette float out of Chang, like his soul leaving his body—which in turn triggered academic debate about whether or not this might possibly count as a Pseudo-Nascent-Soul breakthrough.

Everyone agreed on one thing: the porridge that erupted from his ladle was propelled by three days of accumulated outrage and moved with pure Slapping-Intent.

It formed a hand mid-air.

The congee-hand slapped Ming Shi right across the face, smacking his mouth open and forcing him into a twirl that lasted three seconds. Disoriented, he let too much porridge into his mouth. There was ginseng in it today.

Oh, Heaven.

The qi-boost nearly knocked him out.

“Thank ... you ...” he wheezed, swaying on his feet as his dantian rotated frantically to process the spiritual tidal wave. “For … the …benef—”

Ping Guoshen vaulted over his stall counter and sprinted to Ming Shi. For the second time that day, a hand fell upon Ming Shi’s face.

At least it was friendly this time. Ping Guoshen had slapped his hand across Ming Shi’s mouth to keep him from pronouncing his last word: benefits.

It would have been his last word, literally.

“Thank you, Ping Guoshen,” said Old Man Zhen. His voice came out three octaves higher than normal. “Thank you for saving my idiot relative’s life.”

“You’re welcome,” said Ping Guoshen. He, too, had attained a sudden soprano voice. It was even higher pitched than Old Man Zhen's. “I just don’t want a warden investigation on this street, you know? Bad for business.”

“Get out of my sight,” Chang snarled, with more venom than Snakespite Stew. “Before I forget the penalties for murder. But mark this, Mortal Cook. I am going to kill you. I. Am. Going. To. Kill. You.”

The world sped past him in an upside-down blur, and the next thing he knew, Ming Shi was tossed into Sister Bing’s stall.

“Sorry, Brother,” said Niu Meiren. “Had to move fast.” She clapped him on the back and Ming Shi realized his means of transport had been the Niu Meiren Express, slung over her shoulder like a leg of lamb.

“What in the Nine Hells’ hotpot?” Sister Bing demanded. Ping Guoshen and Old Man Zhen crowded in. “Why’d you bring him here?”

“You’re the furthest stall from Chang,” said Niu Meiren apologetically. “And out of his line of sight.”

It was true. Sister Bing’s stall held first position on the western end of Riverback Street Market.  She was on Chang's side of the street, well out of his peripheral vision, with ten stalls of buffer zone between them.

“The congee formed a hand,” Tofu Ku marveled, having followed the procession. “In my academic opinion, that level of Intent-manifestation indicates Brother Chang was approximately three heartbeats from committing a criminal offense.”

“Two heartbeats,” rebutted Old Man Zhen, glaring at Ming Shi. “Young man, are you tired of living?”

Ming Shi giggled. The qi-boost was making his thoughts sparkle and pop like oil in a flaming wok. “Why do you think that?” He giggled harder.

His audience suddenly developed a deep, spiritual understanding of the congee-hand's motivations.

“Why,” said Old Man Zhen, his fingers twitching, “would we not?”

“Brother,” said Sister Bing, eying him carefully, “it’s been fun watching you prank Chang, I’ll admit. But the stunt you just pulled went too far.”

“Chang was really this close to killing you, you know.” agreed Ping Guoshen, holding up fingers a hair's breadth apart.

“Not a prank,” huffed Ming Shi—not attitudinally, just exhaling jitters as he frantically folded his rebelling qi into increasingly precarious dumplings. “A bet,” he said. “I was betting, just like the rest of you.”

“On what?!” asked Old Man Zhen, fingers now strangling the air. “On methods of suicide?”

Ming Shi shook out his limbs and took pity on his audience. “Listen,” he said, trying to sound reasonable. Unfortunately, his voice came out a bit squeaky and manic, which rather undermined his efforts.

Can’t help it, he sighed.

"Listen. I calculated the odds. Murder means Penance Pagoda. Penance Pagoda means no cooking. Chang's entire Dao-heart is congee-shaped. He’d fight without thinking, with every instinct of his Dao-heart, against any fate that separates him from his pot. So, I bet his obsession would hold back his Killing-Intent until the absolute last straw.

“And you divined the time and nature of the last straw using what methodology?” inquired Tofu Ku, looking very interested. “Reading stir-fry tosses? Or an oracular mushroom hotpot?”

“Oh,” said Ming Shi, “Neither. That part I could only try to mitigate. That’s why it was so important for it to be breakfast. All those customers lined up for his congee, first thing in the morning, right? They’d remind him of what he stood to lose.

“I figured the faces of his regulars especially would keep his Killing-Intent in check. He’s so possessive of them. How could he risk going to prison and losing them to my flatbread?

“But that’s also why my goading had to escalate daily, to trigger him. I knew his Dao-heart would be on greater alert each time I approached, to resist my threat to his congee cultivation.”

“Brother Ming Shi,” said Ping Guoshen, rubbing his temples, “the real question is: why? We thought it was a bit of petty mischief at first, one-upping him for a laugh. But surely you didn’t risk your life for a joke?”

“No,” said Ming Shi cheerfully. “I risked my life for his congee. I tasted it once and decided I couldn’t do without it.”

There was a brief silence in the stall.

Then everyone nodded. Even Old Man Zhen.

“Ohhhhh.”

“Yes, I see.”

“Okay, okay.”

Good food was worth dying for. This was known.

It all made complete sense now.

But still …

“… Did you never consider just ordering Chang’s congee like a normal person?” Niu Meiren scratched her ear. “Or asking someone else to buy you some?”

“Sure I did,” said Ming Shi, “But would Chang have sold me a bowl if I’d asked? It would have just put his Dao-heart on alert to resist my provocation. As for asking someone else to buy me a bowl …”

That option had never crossed his mind. It would have put a wobble in his larger plan, which he had no intention of revealing. He trailed off, trying to think of a convincing lie.

“Fellow Daoist Ming Shi was being considerate,” said Xiaoye, who’d arrived as Niu Meiren spoke. “He did not want to put others in the awkward position of being a go-between or deceiving Elder Brother Chang.”

Ming Shi nodded at her gratefully.

I hope you know what you’re doing, said her sigh as she handed him a cup of something cool and dun-colored.

“Spirit-balancing tea,” Xiaoye said. “It will soothe over-excited qi and reinforce your dantian to keep it stable.”

Ming Shi drank it down so fast that a trickle spilled down his chin. It smelled of lavender and had a smooth, rounded feel in his mouth, like Solomon’s seal tea from Earth.

Sighbush Bark, thought Ming Shi. A spirit-herb well tolerated by mortals with strong qi and an intolerance for sensible life choices.

“Am I safe to go back to my stall?” asked Ping Guoshen. “Or is Chang about to boil over still?”

“Mrs Lin’s calmed him down.” Xiaoye nodded. “Relatively speaking. She’s still talking to him.”

She looked at Ming Shi. “But you should stay away until tomorrow. I’ve packed up your stall for you.”

Xiaoye slipped a bundle off her arm and Ming Shi realized it was his leaky wallet storage bag. He opened his mouth to thank her but—

A giggle escaped him instead.

One of his qi-dumplings had given up the ghost and burst.

If not for the tea reinforcing his dantian, he’d have suffered some damage.

Shit, thought Ming Shi, as he shook with repressed, hysterical laughter.

His heartbeat fluttered against his ribs like a hummingbird’s wings. Every few flutters, it felt as if something was punching up from under his diaphragm with a blow that reverberated into his throat. It was his dantian, stuffed and straining like a taut waterskin, pulsing as it tried to expel the Movement-Intent of his overstimulated qi.

Over the past three days, Ming Shi’s qi had gone from well-fed and refreshed, to chomping at the bit. It wanted to go places now. But there was nowhere to go.

All the roads were closed.

I was going to be so careful with how much porridge I licked today, thought Ming Shi, as the edges of his vision sparkled. Then I got slapped with more than I could chew.

Chang’s congee slap had forced a large spoonful into Ming Shi’s mouth. Though he’d spat most of it out, the damage was done.

Shit, he thought again.

Colors were too bright now. Sounds were too loud now. The air was too, too ticklish by far.

Hee. Hee. No. Don’t. You’ll burst if you laugh.

The qi-boost from the congee-slap’s overdose was more than his Intent and mortal body could contain. His painstakingly pleated qi-dumplings were beginning to fail.

He felt another one give way with a twang, like a rubber band snapping.

On the upside, he thought, I’ve definitely maxxed out my qi-capacity.

He bit his tongue to keep the damn laughter in.

On the downside, I’ve definitely maxxed out my qi-capacity.

Three of his qi-dumplings swelled rebelliously against their folded edges. One felt particularly tremulous, like it might burst through a too-thin bottom before the pleats gave out. If it burst—when they all burst—the released energy would have nowhere to go except straight through his dantian walls.

Straight through his flesh, bone and skin.

Unless he pulled off his kind-of-suicidal plan.

Time to find out, thought Ming Shi.

“You know what?” Ming Shi said brightly. “I should probably head home early today. Rest up. Let things settle.”

“Meditate,” Old Man Zhen commanded. “For the love of Heaven, work your qi through some meditation exercises.”

“Will do. For sure. But one thing—” Ming Shi tried to sound normal, off-the-cuff. “A quick question before I go. Does anyone know how often a Gourmet can invite a Primordial Element? Without, er … dying?”

The vendors exchanged wary glances.

“Without dying, or without permanent damage?” asked Xiaoye. “Dying happens simply if you let a Primordial Element stay long enough to eat your whole soul, which is not dependent on the frequency of your invitations. Permanent damage happens when you invite it too often, without having recovered enough. Or if you let it eat too much of your soul to recover again.”

“Without permanent damage, then,” said Ming Shi.

“It depends on your cultivation level,” said Sister Bing. “It’s not a power thing, it’s because your level affects your soul capacity.”

“Correct,” said Tofu Ku, “but every Gourmet varies slightly within the known rates of recovery. These variations can give rise to irreversible consequences. Therefore, this Tofu Ku advises against relying on generalizations.”

“I heard there’s a way to check using your Temple token,” Ping Guoshen offered. “It should tell you when you’re ready.”

Ming Shi pulled out his Flame Temple token hopefully. He pressed it, prodded it, poked it. Nothing happened.

“You may need to activate it with your qi,” said Xiaoye.

“Oh, very good,” said Ming Shi, a man unable to channel a single thread of spiritual energy through his ruined meridians.

“Why don’t you check with your Temple?” Ping Guoshen suggested. “They can run an assessment on you.”

Ming Shi caught Old Man Zhen’s slight shake of the head.

Understood. Can’t get a Temple checkup without my injuries going on record—there for any random, powerful uncle to spot, if they’re looking. Ming Shi sighed. Which they are.

“Or ask another Gourmet,” Niu Meiren added. “Hey, we have two ex-Gourmets …”

She trailed off as they all remembered who those ex-Gourmets were: Mrs. Lin and Chang.

“Right, well, they’re probably busy.” Ming Shi saluted them all vigorously. “Thanks everyone! Great betting today! Nobody die while I'm gone!”

And with that, he departed.

You, too, he told himself sternly as he speed-walked away. No dying. We’ve got a plan. Stick to it.

A giggle escaped him.

Fine. The congee overdose deviates from the plan, but we’re still pulling this off, you hear? No dying. Only breakthrough. We shuffle off this mortal coil via immortality, not explosion.

His stupid mouth grinned and burst into laughter.

Let’s give it a shot. Let’s go.