32. Value

  Hien Ro stood in the library of emotions, walking through the thousands of recording devices that preserved the feelings of mortals and cultivators alike, some of them centuries or even eons old. He paused in front of one shelf.

  Flickering above it, the characters for ‘a father holding their child for the first time’ formed in his native language. Curious, he reached out and took one of the recording devices. He had already evaluated ‘the peace of being alone with oneself,’ and ‘the thrill of victory over a rival,’ but those were fairly generic feelings as far as he was concerned. This, however, resonated with a deeply personal moment in his life.

  He pressed the button that allowed him to sense the recorder’s emotions—the record button had been removed and only the ‘play’ button remained—and was immediately overcome with a sense of warmth and love, of protection and determination, of pride and of worry.

  And it was hollow.

  He struggled to put it into words, exactly, but he exchanged the recorder with another and allowed himself to experience that persons emotions as well.

  He went through a dozen of them before coming to the conclusion.

  These were all hollow compared to the sensation he’d actually felt when he’d held his newborn daughters. It wasn’t a problem with the recording itself, but rather with the person making the recording. As though they had rehearsed the feelings and intended to sell them for profit.

  Which, he supposed, they probably had. He sighed and put the recordings back where he had found them, then turned to the servant.

  “I’m done here,” he announced.

  “There are many further unique experiences for you to study, if you wish,” the man in the tails coat offered. “If you would be interested, there is—”

  “They’re all hollow,” Hien Ro said, shaking his head. “I don’t mean to criticize this world or Count Beailor’s interest in these devices, but compared to the truth of having a child or winning a tournament, these recordings all ring false to me. The negative emotions are more realistic, I admit, but in each of them I sense a feeling of relief. That the pain is being drained away by the device. It’s hollow and empty and I would rather live my life myself than through a hollow proxy.”

  “I see,” the servant said. “Well, we have a more traditional library as well, if you’d prefer to read our poetry or philosophy. Or a technique library, if you feel that you would like to advance your understanding of cultivation by comparing it to the traditions of this world.”

  “What I would really like to do is return home, but I must be a polite guest as well, and so until I have completed the count’s itinerary for my stay I am struck between worlds. I have the count’s offer and I must relay it to my master, but yet I cannot leave until the pageantry has been completed. It’s frustrating.”

  “A curious mix of emotions,” the servant said. “Longing to be with family, duty, and frustration mixed in one.”

  The servant produced a recorder without a word, a silent suggestion.

  “Oh very well,” Hien Ro said, and he took the device, allowing its magic to siphon off the tip of what he felt roiling inside of him, keeping most of it for himself. He had seen the listless servants wandering around and knew the cost of overindulging in these devices too much.

  If one siphoned off all of their emotions, they were left empty.

  If one allowed themselves to overindulge in the recorded emotions, then their own feelings became dull and pale in comparison.

  Once he handed the device back to the servant, the servant unashamedly sampled the recording for himself. He nodded, and said “I shall convey this emotion directly to the count, so that he might understand his guest better. With your permission, of course.”

  “I don’t care,” Hien Ro said. “We have three hours to kill before the next reception, correct? Let’s see that technique library. My elements are earth and fire, so anything that involves those would be of interest to me.”

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  “I shall summon the librarians,” the servant promised. He escorted Hien Ro to another part of the building, then left him in the care of a geriatric woman and her great-granddaughter.

  ~~~~~~

  Emil Beailor took the proffered recorder without question and pressed the play button as soon as the servant presented it to him. He blinked, his eyebrows rising slightly as he evaluated it with all of the care and nuance of a wine taster.

  “Longing for home,” he said at last. “With a touch of duty and annoyance, frustration, and impatience. Curiously authentic, yet only a minor fraction of the whole. Who did this come from?”

  “My lord, I am assigned to be the attendant of the emissary to Lord Little Bug, Hien Ro,” the servant said. “Much of the annoyance you felt was probably directed at me, as I have seen the value in his authentic emotions and have been encouraging him to use the recorder periodically.”

  “I see,” the count said. He placed the recorder in a small pile of ones to retain for his personal collection. Like the connoisseur that he was, he periodically weeded out his collection, adding to it and removing the unauthentic and shallow. So far, every recorder that had passed through the hands of Hien Ro had gone into his personal collection. “How much longer can we delay him, do you think?”

  “That depends on how much impatience you want to taint his feelings, Lord,” the servant said honestly. “He grows increasingly impatient with the distractions I have been contriving. It is only his dedication to his role that keeps him from demanding to be sent home, I believe.”

  “Yes. Well, see if you can help him think more of his wife and children. I delight in the emotions he feels while considering them,” the count said. He made a hand gesture, and the servant took it for the dismissal that it was, quickly vacating the room.

  Emil sat silently for a moment, then took out a recorder of his own. He pressed the record button, then once he had empties his heart of emotions, he picked up the six recorders that had come from Hien Ro and consumed them.

  He smiled. He hadn’t longed for home like this in centuries. Perhaps once this young man was gone, Emil would make a trip to his home world.

  A sudden flare of one of the mirrors into the other dimensions signaled that another Xian lord was attempting to contact him. Annoyed, Emil walked over to the mirror and was surprised to find that it belonged to Duke Loshi. Loshi had been mostly irrelevant since his last bumbling attempt to wave his power before the Emerald Court and demand subservience from his peers. It was only Little Bug’s presence in his realm that made Emil consider taking the call.

  But he did take it.

  “Well, if it isn’t Lord Loshi,” Count Emil said, smiling disarmingly at the reflection of an old man. “How might this humble count serve the duke of an entire dimension, minus one little planet that seems to have escaped his grasp.”

  “The ants are back,” Loshi said. He was not amused with Emil’s little barb, but let it slide rather than addressing it. “The Divine Fate Empire is invading my dimension once more. In numbers beyond their last invasion ten times over. I am requesting the assistance of the emerald court to deal with this threat.”

  Emil’s eyebrows rose. “Oh. I see. I shall convene an emergency session to deal with this threat, of course, but you must understand, Lord Loshi, that your isolationist policies mean that you have very little clout to your name. While we oppose the spread of the Divine Fates in general, if you expect us to—”

  “Save it for the court itself,” Loshi said impatiently. “I have already contacted the others and they have said the same. When we are all gathered, then we will dicker about what this assistance will cost me, not before.”

  Emil grinned. “Very well. I shall see you in court, Loshi.”

  “Yes,” the duke of an entire dimension agreed. “Will Little Bug be there?”

  Emil shrugged. “He is not yet officially a member of the court. He has no standing aside from the invitations he has received and is thus far navigating with skill and cunning. If he wishes to negotiate for our protection, then he must do so on his own terms.”

  For the first time in the call, Loshi’s face broke out in a grin.

  “There is only one thing he possesses of any value,” Loshi said. “And that is Atla itself.”

  “Yes, well, that was true a few weeks ago,” Emil said. “But Duke Doe has changed that recently with his generosity. Farewell, Duke Loshi, and try not to lose control of your dimension before we convene.”

  Emil waved his hand, and the mirror turned back into being a mirror, reflecting the avatar that Emil chose to project into this nexus of his powerbase. With a flicker of annoyance, he contacted his true self and relayed the information that he’d just obtained.

  While he would make certain to turn a profit from the invasion of the Divine Fates, he was most annoyed at the disruption to his games.

  ?