Lunch contained more of the same sort of mixture that had characterized all the meals so far; grain, vegetables, and a supplement. In this case it was beans. The servants brought out bowls to the recruits at their cushions, complete with raised tables, encouraging everyone to eat at their seats. This served as yet another sign that while the early teaching period had many goals, inducing friendship among this newly inducted class was not among them.

  Liao did not mind that. He'd had few friends back in the village and his work had encouraged finding peace during long days alone. He missed his parents, especially his father, instead. This ache was not a grievous one, at least not yet.

  He took solace from Su Yi's declaration that he would be unable to see them for many months. That was a long time, certainly, but it was not forever. Strength could be found in grasping that chord, at least for now.

  Other students, especially the majority who came from farming villages where group congregations were common, seemed to struggle with this silent but forcible isolation. They squirmed in their seats, leaning and shifting as if they wished to creep closer to their neighbors for conversation. One among them, a stoutly built boy with a prominent burn scar that kept the back of his head free of hair, even went so far as to broach this subject with the elder after finishing his meal. “Elder, are we not meant to befriend fellow recruits in the sect?”

  Yu Yong did not seem the least bit offended by this question. The readiness and length of his answer made Liao suspect he'd been waiting for someone to make an inquiry of this kind. “Not here,” the elder replied easily enough. “This place, your provisional status, it is merely a threshold, one I hope you will all leave behind sooner rather than later. Once you fill your dantians and begin to refine qi through the heart meridian, then your time here is finished. After that you will go to one of the twelve pavilions. There, and in nine weapon halls, you shall forge the bonds that matter on your road toward the dao. Not here. And since you will not all be going to the same place or leaving at the same time,” he continued, one eyebrow raised slightly. “Then there is doubly no point. If there is a prodigy among you, they may well be gone by the end of the month. Most of the rest will walk out of this hall sometime in the spring. Focus on yourselves for now, there will be plenty of time for companionship.”

  This answer, from the expressions on surrounding faces, did little to satisfy many of those present. Scowls were as far as it went, of course. None would dare challenge the elder on anything. His concentrated qi could be felt through every motion he unleashed. Silently, Liao processed this revelation by setting a goal for himself. He did not think himself a prodigy, nor did he need to be, but he had not desire to make a home, or to delay at all, within this little hall. Three months, the first day of the fourth month, this would be his final day. That deadline he set for himself.

  It was unlikely such an objective would achieve first place among the eighteen, or even second, but he did not care to win the undeclared race. Placing in the top half would suffice, he knew he would be content with leaving more behind than ahead.

  After lunch Yu Yong took them from their cushions and out into the leveled dirt courtyard. He proceeded to push them through one exercise after another. These were not, the elder was painfully clear, parts of any martial art. “Weapons training, including the implement that is your body, begins in the third week. For now, it is my duty to ensure your bones and muscles can match the demands of those techniques when they are placed before you.”

  He had them run in circles about the courtyard until their chests heaved. Stretches, strange motions claimed to loosen and lengthen the body, followed. A third sequence was intended to build strength, raising, lowering, pushing, and pulling the body against itself. Then they started over from the beginning. Gray-robed attendants, always silent, provided water, tapped out the pace on a small drum, and picked out those recruits directed by the elder to rest on a couch covered in soft mats. These were, after they recovered, put through a slower, more relaxed version of the training.

  “Overwork damages the body,” Yu Yong forestalled accusations from the first harsh glare. “You began in different places, grinding down those whose childhoods were spent indoors serves no purpose. I will make all of you strong, regardless of where you started, and in time cultivation will erase all variation of physique. I will make each of you ready, for every one of you is an asset to the sect.”

  Mostly, such varied treatment had limited impact. Out of eighteen the majority kept to the pace Yu Yong required. Only three struggled enough to be pulled aside more than once: the pudgy merchant's daughter, the waifish girl with the head for sums, and a short boy who walked with a limp on account of the absence of the front half of his right foot. When one of the strong farmer's daughters scowled as she lapped the boy and murmured 'cripple' under her breath, Yu Yong intervened instantly. “Silence!”

  The roar halted all in place.

  “Cultivation challenges the Heavens themselves. You think the limitations of the body at birth matter?” His rumbling declaration increased in volume with each word, until the dust on the ceiling tiles took flight. The recruits buckled, dropped to the dirt by thunderous exhortation. “Grand Elder Onimray was born without eyes. Two thousand years ago she stood in this very courtyard, unable to see the walls, yet now she is an immortal, and can challenge any of the Twelve Sisters in battle, with martial skill only Grand Elder Akiray can match. The circumstances of birth stand as less than dust before the dao.”

  Scowls receded. Onimray of Raining Swords was known throughout the land. Her name was learned by every child, and the temple walls bore her visage, carved the same as the other Grand Elders. That face had no eyes in its head. Recollection of this truth silenced many doubts.

  For his part Liao discovered that he was the best among the class when it came to running circuits. A talent he credited to long treks along narrow trails checking traplines and tracking wounded game. This balanced out against his substandard performance in the strength exercises compared to the robust farm-shaped majority. Endless hauling, heaving, and stacking heavy loads was not something he had experienced. By the time the elder called them back to their cushions for the final session of the day his arms, shoulders, and back ached terribly.

  Thankfully, he was not asked to try and meditate in such condition. Instead the final third of the day was spent working that great slate for the first time. Yu Yong laid out swift notes and diagrams in support of his lecture on the life of a cultivator, the rhythm of days in the sect, and the overall path of cultivation. Much of this, such as the proper etiquette for address between initiates, disciples, and elders, Liao forgot as soon as it entered his ears. His hard-worked mind was in no state to absorb such minutia.

  Certain facts, however, did manage to find purchase on a chunk of consciousness, grabbing and holding against the tide flushing out his memory. He would recall from that first day that there were seven major realms of cultivation, each divided into seven layers, though the names of only the first – Body Refining – and the last – Celestial Ascendancy – stuck with him. Forty-nine stages, not counting the proto-stage he and his classmates occupied. It seemed at once surprisingly few and impossibly many.

  He also learned that, in the Celestial Origin Sect, every cultivator's realm was marked by the color of the belt they wore. They matched the colors of the rainbow, and Elder Yu Yong promised he would give each member of the class their red belts himself once they filled their dantians and began body refining. Beyond the belts they were free to wear whatever they wished, unless an instructor mandated a class uniform. However, the sect provided only the simple white robe outfits. Everything else must be purchased using personal funds.

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  Liao had not brought any money with him. His family did little business in coinage, and he'd guessed that whatever they might scrape together would amount to nothing in the city, refusing all his mother tried to press on him. No explanation was given as to how coin might be obtained, or for that matter, spent. Thankfully, in addition to the basic clothing, food, water, and housing were all supplied, as were certain basic items including combs and razors. No one had cause to complain, and when the round-cheeked girl with a rich merchant father – a fact she'd made known to the entire class after being pulled out of the running line during exercise – tried to act offended despite this, the elder silenced her by merely inclining his head.

  The evening meal featured noodles rather than rice, mixed with tofu and a vegetable medley heavy on onions. It tasted fine, smothered in thick peanut sauce, but four meals made an indisputable pattern, one that prompted Liao to ask his very first question as a cultivator. “Elder, why is there no meat in our food?”

  There was, no far as he knew, no prohibition against this in the Celestial Mother's teachings. Pork and even, when chance allowed for it, beef were served at major festivals, and even the priest partook. The Ascendancy Feast of Orday was no exception, featuring fare similar to that of the equinoxes and solstices. Nor could the sect possibly claim poverty of the sort that caused many to eat meat only on festival days. It was rich beyond his understanding, something revealed by the buildings alone. Portions had also been generous so far, and the hungry youths were allowed to ask for more as often as they desired.

  Several other recruits snickered at this remark, but the elder's fearsome glare silenced them instantly. “That is a useful question,” Yu Yong leaned against the wall as the class ate. “It touches on an essential truth. Qi, you must recognize, is present in everything.” he spread his hands in an encompassing circle. “Everything,” repetition clarified this emphasis and made everyone pay attention. Chopsticks ceased motion as heads rose. “The air, the water, the soil, the stones, there is qi in all these things,” he continued. He did not speak loudly, and his cadence was casual compared to his hours of instruction, but all listened. Several bodies leaned forward on their cushions. “In coming into contact with a substance, the nature of qi changes, is shaped. It shifts to match the nature of its receptacle, takes on the nature of those substances. You are unlikely to know it, but almost everything in this world is made of many things, varied forms combined countless ways. When qi is scattered in this way, it becomes shifted, and your body struggles to absorb it.”

  He moved, suddenly before the slate, and a series of quick motions filled the black space with lines of chalk. White rained down from the sky to strike the earth. “The Celestial Induction Method teaches the absorption of qi radiated from the stars. Orday devised this method from two key insights. First, because this qi is supremely strong and abundant. No other source can possibly compete with it. Water? Wind? Fire? These are intermittent and limited, but light is always there, even when it seems the clouds hide it. Second, just as important, because it is pure. You can take it in and channel it through your dantian immediately, without processing.”

  “This,” he raised his hands and head, looking upwards. “This was the supreme insight of the Celestial Mother. This method is ten times, or even one hundred times, as efficient as prior methods. Learn it properly and you will never lack for qi. You will never need to spend endless hours purifying that which you have taken in before it can be used.”

  For a moment it seemed the elder would continue, his voice rising with each syllable, but he stopped unexpectedly. Swallowing once, he looked back to the bowls in the hands of the recruits before speaking again. “Meat, yes,” it was distracted, almost mumbled, as if his lecture had veered off-course. “Everything you eat and drink contains qi, and you cannot avoid taking some into you in that manner. That qi, it will need to be purified over time, lest it clog you meridians and foul your dantian. The more concentrated, more complex, the qi you consume, the greater the effort needed to do this. Qi taken in from animals is considerably more complex than that of plants. Eating the diet that has been prepared for you, long optimized by the work of the Cooking Pavilion, minimizes this need. A purification pill once each month suffices for a body refining realm cultivator. As your cultivation progresses, this will change, and you will need to be ever more cautious with regard to the intake of impure qi.”

  Liao became aware then of something he had noticed, but ignored.

  Elder Yu Yong did not share their meals. He had not eaten anything all day, and drank only crystal clear water. His following words confirmed this assumption. “A true cultivator survives on qi alone, for it can be channeled to provide all the nourishment the body and soul requires. The Grand Elders have not touched food and drink for centuries.”

  “We're never going to eat meat again?” One of the boys, a tall and heavily muscled young man who physique suggested a great many hours spent chopping wood. “No pork? No eggs? That sounds awful. I thought we were blessed?”

  “Did you think that internalizing a dao and seizing immortality was something easy to achieve?” Yu Yong's eyes narrowed. His manicured eyebrows stood out, sharp as razors. “This is not the easy road, it is the hardest of hard paths. To seek the dao, to cultivate to immortality and beyond, demands a will that defies heaven itself, commitment that cannot be shaken. Food and drink will be the least sacrifices it asks of you.” Suddenly, his words softened, and he leaned back. “But, while the way ahead may be cruel, the sect is not. Understanding, progress, the dao, these cannot be forced. Once you leave this hall, this class, you will face no commands beyond the duties given to all. You will have your own servants. If you wish alternative meals cooked, spend the funds and do so. We cannot shove you toward the stars. Should indulgence speed your cultivation, well, there are countless paths. Only the demons attempt to force one road, and that one holds only failure.”

  Grim anger over took the elder there, and he said nothing more. His mouth clamped shut before them all.

  After dinner they were released. Servants gathered up their things, leaving only the manuals for the students. All were sent back to their rooms at liberty. Elder Yu Yong encouraged everyone to meditate and practice the cultivation art they had been taught, but not to push beyond any limits they uncovered. “Rest is necessary. Working your mind raw will accomplish nothing more than the same obsession would the body. Strength of the soul grows gradually.”

  Having little else to do, and not inclined to wander aimlessly about the sect, Liao did his best to follow this advice.

  Returning to his room, he lit the thick candle, sat gently cross-legged upon the couch, and tried to touch the stars.

  In this he failed, repeatedly. Eventually, after some dozen or more attempts, he grew frustrated with the method and confines of his little box. In the dark, he left the chamber and recorded several circuits of the dormitory, seeking clarity in the cold.

  Eventually, he looked up. This stopped him cold.

  Few lights burned in the sect at night, making it far darker than any village of similar size. He would later learn that few torches were lit as cultivators could see easily in near-total darkness. The lights of Starwall City, to the west, offered distraction in one direction, but to the east, above the wall, truly pure darkness reigned.

  There, the stars waited. They wheeled through the sky in air remarkably clear and clean. Thousands could be seen there, making slow twinkling circuits. Endless lights against the black, as pure a frame as he had ever seen.

  Struck by the moment, he found an empty paving stone with an unobstructed view to the Starwall and beyond and stared upwards. The distance seemed to drop down upon him, bringing the lights close enough to touch despite being so far away that he could not fathom the numbers used to mark it.

  Light passed into him, barred by nothing. He found the act of gathering it, in that singular moment of serenity, almost effortless, as if he could drink in the whole universe at a breath. Centering this essence in his dantian, he drew it in impossibly slow circles, mirroring the dance of the starlight above. He knew those paths, had first seen them as a boy on his father's shoulders high in the mountains. Unchanging and perfect, they were so ideal, so easy, that all the hardships of complexity drained away.

  He need do nothing but stare at the stars and let their power fill him up.

  A drop of qi condensed, pure and brilliant, in the center of his dantian.

  Liao blinked once, and the vision collapsed around him in a storm of color and noise. Despite this disruption, when he closed his eyes again the image of the stars held strong in his memory. Stopping, he paused, made his mind and body go still, and tried again.

  The stars remained, as promised, and their qi, as Orday's ancient insight revealed, was everywhere. Even when he returned to his room, it remained, though attenuated. He felt it in the candle this time, a faded echo. For what was a candle, a flame, save the reflected light of the sun?

  With this realization, Liao sent the night prayer to the Celestial Mother with greater feeling than he'd mustered in years.

  Sleep followed immediately.