Wuxia -CH1-

Ash brought his forearm across quickly, deflecting the fist to the side.

Stepping inward with the move he drove a strike in towards his opponents kidney.

Except that they were already gone.

“Ha, you don’t actually expect to catch me do you, Ashley?” taunted Lim

The young man appeared at Ash’s side and launched an empowered kick.

Struggling to dodge to the side, to get out of the way, to be anywhere but where that kick was going, Ash practically flung himself away.

So when the kick landed on his hip, he was sent spinning away. Rather than being driven to the floor.

Twisting as he was sent backward Ash lost control of his movements. Bouncing off the far wall, he came back into a defensive stance.

Dust rained down on him from the ceiling.

“Now, now,” said an elderly voice. “You know better Lim. This is meant to be a test of martial arts, not your cultivation. Save that for the examination tournament.

“We all know what the outcome would be the moment you use your cultivation on the citizen.”

It wasn’t a new admonition. Nor was it the first time Ash had heard it today.

In the Spark’s Jump sect, this was a common every day occurrence.

“Oh, of course elder. I forgot entirely,” Lim said, bowing politely to the middle aged elder of the outer disciples.

“Yes, yes. Try not to let it happen again. Good work,” said the elder.

Gritting his teeth, Ash let himself fall into a neutral pose and clasped one fist in the other, bowing to Elder Shin.

“While I don’t expect much from a citizen, you should at least strive to be able to win these simple matches,” scolded the elder.

“Of course,” Ash said through his teeth.

Turning away from the Elder, Ash saw Lim sauntering off.

Lim and Shin shared a relation, and both looked eerily similar to Ash. He’d bet on them being uncle and nephew at this point.

Not that it’d matter.

Nepotism was a way of life here.

The young man and adult both shared a dark brown hair coloring, cut quite short, with brown eyes the color of dog shit.

Ash walked off to the edge of the mat and fell into a kneeling position.

Thankfully, his humiliation was at an end for the day. He’d already been used as a practice dummy for every other student in this class.

“Don’t worry about it,” said Jia on his right. 

Showing a smile that was more a grimace to Jia, Ash could only nod his head.

He was a slim young man, with dark black eyes, and hair as dark as midnight. His face was pretty to the point that the women fawned over him.

When Ash had first met the man, he’d sworn he was a woman.

Or so Ash thought. Then again, his standards of beauty was from twenty-first century America.

Not here in Xing city.

“Sooner or later, your dantian will develop,” Jin continued.

Uh huh. You keep on with that positivity bud. After this year’s examination, I can leave this place and help out at home.

There’s no reason to stay here.

“Of course. Why would I worry about it, I’m sure it’ll be exactly as you say,” Ash said.

He only had to wait long enough now for Elder Shin to award those who performed well today, and Ash could escape.

Escape and get some peace and solace.

Where no one would bother him, and he’d be free to pursue… nothing.

Nothing other than simply enjoying the peace and quiet of silence.

***

Ash sat down in the ruined building, crossing his legs underneath him.

Looking around himself, he found it was the same as ever.

Two walls, shattered columns, and a whole lot of nature quickly taking over the destroyed structure.

He was only perhaps thirty minutes outside of the small city in which he lived.

And yet it felt as if he were light-years away.

As if there wasn’t a single hint of his life here. That the only thing that existed here, was long gone.

Breathing in through his nose, Ash let out a slow breath through his mouth.

“Only a bit more and I can call it quits. Get a job, and just… live. No more school, no more elders, no more Lim,” Ash said, his mouth screwing up into a bitter grimace.

Shaking his head, Ash did his best to quickly dispel the negativity he’d just dumped on himself.

It would do him no good to bring it here. Here where he sought solace and an escape.

Growling to himself, Ash hung his head, trying to curb his feelings.

Getting up he padded over to a wall.

With his emotions already in a knot, he couldn’t simply sit there. He needed to just walk around for a moment. That’d help him calm down.

Pressing his hands to the wall, he leaned up against it and let his head sink down. Closing his eyes, Ash focused on his breathing and his heartbeat.

Struggling to find the inner peace he’d known in his previous life, Ash could just barely find the fringes of it. A smoky thread of what it had once been.

Except that life is gone now.

Replaced with this one and… and all of the people and… and…

Ash grunted and then slammed his fists into the wall, his anger spiking and getting the better of him.

A sharp pop sounded from the wall, and then a grinding noise.

At the same time, the wall started to crumble into itself, the bricks and mortar failing after withstanding the march of time for this long.

Chunks and bits of the wall sprayed out as the whole thing gave out, collapsing on itself.

Turning away from the disturbance and holding up his arm across his face, Ash stumbled away from the area.

“Holy shit,” Ash said, coughing as the dust and dirt flew around him.

A few minutes seemingly lapsed before the debris in the air started to settle.

Peering at the wall, Ash fanned at the air in front of his face, his other hand holding his sleeve to his mouth.

Amongst the shattered ruins of the wall, Ash saw what looked like a small wooden chest.

No bigger than the width of his hand and no taller than three fingers across.

He would have overlooked it completely if it hadn’t been shoved out of its crevice by a broken stone.

Hmm?

Ash squinted at the box, not quite wanting to get close enough to inspect it, but wishing to all the same.

Taking in a deep breath, and holding it, Ash rushed over to the curiosity.

Nearly tripping over himself in the rush he got his hands on the wooden box and darted away again.

Getting back to where he’d been sitting to begin with he let out the breath he’d been holding.

“Now why would someone bury a box in a wall?” Ash asked, flipping it over end over end.

There were no engraving, no markings, it really was just a simple box.

Pressing his thumbnail into the latch he flipped it open and then peered inside.

Sitting there was a simple black training ring.

He’d seen the like on a number of trainees. They were common place. Nearly every family had at least one.

For his own adoptive family, it’d been given to the oldest blood child. Which was Jing, a boy two years younger than Ash.

Pulling the ring from the box he gave it a cursory inspection. Training rings were common enough that one wouldn’t need to hide them in a box, in a wall.

Rolling it around in his palm he studied it.

“Is it broken?” Ash asked after noticing there was a hairline crack that went from one side of the ring to the other.

Straight through the band.

Sighing, Ash could only smirk at his luck.

He slipped the ring onto the ring finger on his right hand and looked at it to inspect the fit.

“Its not ugly, at least. Some of those rings always look so-” Ash’s words fell away as his consciousness was ripped away.

Only to come right back.

Except he was in an entirely different location.

Looking around himself, he immediately realized it was the ruined building and grassy courtyard he’d just been standing in.

Except it was no longer ruined.

It was a simple building with cracks and fissures all throughout the walls.

There was a splintered door hanging from a single hinge, creaking back and forth.

“The fuck?” Ash asked. “Am I in the ring…? Is this the training environment?

“Most stories I heard said it was a library… not a ruin.”

Frowning Ash made his way over to the door.

Grasping the rope handle he gently pulled it open towards himself.

Only for the door to literally pop free of the hinge and clatter down at his feet. Ash let go of the handle and stepped in through the doorway.

“Shit, whole place is falling apart.”

Inside the room were rotten bookcases and broken furniture.

All around and throughout were the signs of age, misuse, and rot.

Moving through shelves, Ash kept his eyes moving. Looking for anyone, or anything that could give him an idea about this place.

Or something to take.

Stepping out from the last shelf, he found himself in an open area at the center of the room.

Three large balls of what looked like blue electricity were circling one another there.

They crackled and flared as they neared one another, only to spin away and go on another revolution.

“What in the-”

Before he could finish the sentence, the orbiting lightning came to a stop.

Tilting his head to one side, Ash wasn’t sure if he should be here anymore. No sooner had he finished the thought, than the blue crackling balls of death shot toward him and smashed into his stomach.

Crumpling to the ground, Ash curled up around himself in the fetal position.

Groaning at the sudden pain, he squeezed his hands into fists and felt like his body would break.

His skin felt as if it were literally on fire, and that his spine was being pulled out of his mouth.

Then an overwhelming strength flooded through him, and the pain fell off in a rush.

Panting on the ground Ash tried not to move. His body twitched and spasmed all on its own. Without any wish or desire on his part.

After hat felt like forever, he could finally form a coherent thought.

Shit.

Blinking away at the tears that were welling up from the memory of the pain, Ash managed to lever himself up to a sitting position.

Pressing a hand to his forehead, he leaned on his other arm, trying to get his brain moving faster.

He felt it then.

Energy, pure and untarnished, flowing through him. From what felt like his lower dantian.

Closing his eyes, Ash immediately dropped himself into the space he’d been able to find so often that was empty.

The Qi sea inside of himself.

What had previously been a barren and dusty stretch of desert, was now a small lake.

A lake of energy that was his cultivation.

“Hello,” said a rather chipper voice from nowhere.

Ash’s eyes shot open and he looked around himself.

“Hello?” he asked.

“Looks like you got yourself open to the energy of this world. Not really sure where you’ll end up, but hey, one place is as good as another, right?” asked the voice, continuing on as if it hadn’t heard him.

“I don’t understand,” Ash said.

“Regardless of where you ended up, congratulations. You’re actually ready to go out there and help out.

“And to do that, you’re going to need some power, some instructions, and a guide.

“All of which I can’t provide you, since, if you’re getting this. I’m dead.

“Well, not dead but… not living?” said the voice.

“You can’t hear me, can you,” Ash said. It wasn’t really a question.

“Anyways. Let’s just call me immortal since I’m neither alive nor dead.

“You’ll need to find either my counter-part, or whoever that was I saw them grab when I grabbed you.

“Huh, well, if they’ve made it at least. I mean, there’s always the possibility they died, right? Ha, that’d be pretty awful.”

Ash could only nod his head, not really following along but agreeing that this was rather awful.

“So! Since I can’t do much of anything for you, and I don’t know what you’ll need, I offset everything I had left into that little thingamajig you had in your hands.

“Ended up turning it into bits of nothing in doing so, so I had to wedge myself, and what I’ve become, inside of you.

“You might even be able to feel me now!”

Ash turned his senses inward, and did indeed feel something abnormal.

Right above his lower Dantian. Where all the energy would have to pass through to reach it.

“I put myself there so I could leech a bit of energy and provide you with what little support I could,” continued the voice.

Son of a bitch. That’s why I couldn’t do anything? It was siphoning everything away?

“-ch isn’t much I admit, but support is support. What I did is I took your device and used it as a rapid blueprint on how I could help you.

“I’m not sure what it was, but it felt oddly like a spoken story from my youth. Though the mass of numbers, tables, and descriptions for everything didn’t make much sense.

“I mean, do you really need to know what a fireball will do if you attempt to cast the rune, and how much it’ll cost?

“Whatever, anyways. I did that. And… I think this is the part where I die. Or at least… stop living.

“Good luck!”

Ash sat there, waiting for the voice to continue.

Hoping it would.

Slowly, with ever increasing volume, he heard what sounded like a whispering buzzing noise.

Right when it got to a point that it almost seemed painful, it stopped.

Then the ruins around him fractured into motes of dust, and rebuilt itself.

All around him everything was destroyed and restructured.

Even himself.

When it all settled down it seemed as if nothing had actually changed.

“Uh,” Ash said aloud. “Hello? Are you still there?”

“Chosen one has attempted to access the data base. Would he like to see the interface?” said a voice somewhere inside his own head. The way it said chosen one almost sounded mocking.

The words felt audible, but wasn’t at the same time.

“Yes?” Ash tried.

A series of blips sounded, and then small windows started to appear next to everything around him.

Looking to one side, he focused on a jumble of wood.

Rotten Bookshelf

Rotten Book

Destroyed Table

Raising his eyebrows at that, Ash licked his lips.

“Uh… everything is destroyed, but it doesn’t look like a table, bookshelf or book,” Ash said.

“The Chosen one is correct,” said the snarky voice. “The items are destroyed.”

Ok, it’s definitely mocking me.

“Would the Chosen one like to reconstruct the items?”

“Yes?”

“It will cost two measurements of Qi. You currently have five. Do you wish to proceed?”

Ash frowned. That message sounded a lot more process oriented and less alive.

The voice said it merged with my… thingamajig, was it? I only had my portable console with me.

Did it think it was something else instead of a video game?

“The Chosen one needs to make a choice already,” said the voice.

Ash didn’t respond. He was still wondering over this strange gamelike overlay that’d popped up and how it’d gotten there.

“The Chosen one needs to make a choice already,” repeated the voice.

Huh?

“Repeat last message,” Ash said.

“The Chosen one needs to make a choice already,” said the voice.

“Repeat the last message twice,” Ash tried.

“The Chosen one needs to make a choice already,” said the voice twice.

“In other words… you really are and aren’t alive at the same time.”

“Invalid statement,” replied the voice.

“No, don’t rebuild the items,” Ash said.

“Request canceled.”

Getting up to his feet Ash brushed himself off, only realizing then that he didn’t need to.

He was still in the training ring.

“Can you… uh… can you repair the ring?” Ash asked.

There was a pause, as if something were happening he couldn’t see or hear.

“Yes. The ring can be repaired. The cost is prohibitive, but can be paid in increments.

“If the Chosen one so chooses, the basic library can be rebuilt immediately with all the base skills available to the clan,” said the voice.

“What clan?” Ash asked.

“Imperial Clan of the Grassy Vale.”

“Imperial clan?” Ash asked.

“Yes. Imperial Clan of the Grassy Vale, Chosen one.”

“And how many abilities are available?”

“Six-thousand seven-hundred, and thirty-three abilities.”

Ash blinked and felt like he wanted to sit down immediately.

“There’s that many?”

“In the basic library, yes. The intermediate library has fewer, but they are much more specialized and powerful,” said the voice.

“Is there any cultivation instruction scrolls?” Ash asked hopefully. Unfortunately he’d not been granted a cultivation method from anyone, and had been painfully fumbling around in the dark so far.

“There are nineteen-thousand eight-hundred, and forty-two available. Though only three fourths of that number are suitable for you, and less than a hundred would be ideal based on your talent, mental capabilities, and physique,” offered the voice.

“Uh… you can pick out ones specific for me?”

“Yes, Chosen one,” said the voice with a drawl. “A peak cultivation method can be determined for you, though several filters will need to be run to determine the best course of action.”

Ash suddenly sat down, feeling rather faint.

“Then yes… repair the basic library immediately,” Ash said. Sighing he put his head in his hands and gave it a shake. “And… what do I call you?”

“Call me Locke,” said the voice.