Unintended Cultivator

There was an almost deathly silence around Sen as he marched toward the front gates of the palace. No one spoke. Even the breeze had fallen away, as if it too feared to interrupt was what about to occur. It was only the sound of feet on stone that broke that oppressive silence. There was a heavily sweating servant leading the way and casting near-constant glances back at Sen, Jing, and an assortment of cultivators and nobles. The man who had set this all in motion stumbled along in a hunched-over posture. Every once in a while, he slurred something through his broken jaw and swollen lips. He’d clearly been beaten. Sen hadn’t done it. He wasn’t sure who had or even why. Maybe he tried to escape, thought Sen.

He wasn’t sure that was a folly worth a beating, but it was light punishment if it had been cultivators doing the work. They usually just killed people who angered them. The hypocrisy of that thought made Sen wince internally. What he was about to do wasn’t much better. No, he decided, what I’m doing is worse. This entire exercise was nothing more than a convenient way to bully everyone into doing what he wanted. He might rationalize that it was for their own good. He might tell himself it was necessary. All of that might even be true, but that didn’t make it any less bullying. It was one more thing he was going to have to just live with, somehow.

The somehow of it all was weighing on him. He hadn’t made any distinctions about who to gather up. He’d just said to gather them all. He knew that would include people who were largely innocent of any wrongdoing. There would be guards, servants, and the children. Sen kept trying to tell himself that it was a necessary sacrifice. A comparative handful of lives against the rest of the city. It was easy to think. The reality of it was something else. These weren’t anonymous, faceless strangers in someplace far away. That would at least let him put some emotional distance between himself and the unvarnished horror of the executions he was about to order.

He’d have to look at these people’s faces. That was when his will wavered. He could face the judgment of adult hatred. He could bear up under their fear. Sen just didn’t think he could face executing children. Maybe that made him weaker than he needed to be, but it was a bridge he just couldn’t cross. He’d been that bullied child, helpless against forces bigger and more powerful than himself. He did have history to support sparing the children, at least. He’d let the Xie children live. There is probably some grim irony at work there, thought Sen. At the moment, those children are probably safer where I took them. Not that he expected them to care about that at all. Their parents might, though, he mused.

Sen was careful not to let any of this show on his face, instead choosing to show a mask of cool indifference. It was easier to maintain that expression the longer and more often he wore it. It was another one of those unfortunate necessities. There could never be a visible weakness in him. He reminded himself of that over and over again as they approached the massive gates. Much like the walls around the palace, the gates were as dark as the clouds above. He supposed that was appropriate given everything. Of course, those heavy clouds that looked ready to unleash a nightmare on the earth below cast the world into a dim, false twilight. Sen stopped himself from taking a deep breath as the gates swung open. Fixing his gaze in the middle distance, he marched out.

There was a moderately sized crowd of men, women, and children being corralled in front of the gates by stone-faced cultivators and mortal guards who wore the unease openly. They clearly wanted no part of what promised to be a bloody spectacle. Sen sympathized with them. He’d much rather be back on Uncle Kho’s mountain looking for rare plants and teasing Falling Leaf. Beyond the ring of guards, there was a much larger crowd of people from all walks of life. There were nobles in fine robes, laborers, soldiers, and more cultivators than Sen found comfortable. Strength was one thing, but he could fall like anyone else if enough people were willing to die to get the job done. He felt the collective attention of all those people focus on his little group.

Sen stopped walking and looked around. There was so much fear and uncertainty in that crowd. This was a city under siege. Everyone knew it even if they tried to pretend that they didn’t. There was no hope on their faces. They were resigning themselves to what they saw as an inevitable fate. Sen even had to admit that they might not be in the wrong for that choice. He was just one man. The chances of him effectively turning the tide on all of this weren’t good. He might even die trying to protect this city. Not that all hope was lost. He had brought some tools with him that the spirit beasts were not expecting, but that wasn’t a secret he intended to share openly. As important as hope might be, though, this was not a day for it.

He gestured and the idiot noble was brought over, his slurred words coming more frantically now. That was silenced by one hard look. Sen seized the man by the back of the robes and dragged him along as they ascended invisible stairs made of qi. When they reached the platform that Sen had made at the top, he forced the man down to his knees. The crowd of prisoners stared at the badly beaten man. Some of them looked angry. The children looked confused. The majority of them looked terrified. Sen narrowed his eyes as he stared down at them. Most averted their gazes.

“I am Judgment’s Gale,” said Sen, using qi to carry his voice to every ear.

“You were told that I would come. You were warned,” he said before his voice exploded around the people. “The world has changed!”

A few stumbled back from the raw force in those words. Voices cried out in terror. Most of the people, though, stood frozen in place, their gazes fixed on him.

“Right now, there are countless spirit beasts gathering outside this city. Once, they were satisfied by hiding in the wilds, far from the places of humanity, and far from your thoughts. Now, they come for us all. The world. Has. Changed. The days of kingdoms and politics are over! The days of noble houses and court intrigue are over! These are the days of blood and fear. Some of you, a few of you, have tried to prepare for that change. And some of you,” he reached down, seized a handful of hair, and yanked the noble idiot’s head up, “tried to take advantage of this nightmare. Some of you,” he gave the idiot’s head a hard shake, “sought to become rich and powerful at the expense of humanity itself. This is unforgivable.”

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Sen turned his gaze down onto the gathered prisoners. He saw the dawning horror in the adults’ faces. They understood now just how bad things had gotten and that their lives were being measured in the moments left, not the years. Sen continued before anyone gathered the wherewithal to speak.

“This man threatened to withhold his troops and resources from the fight. He would rather play games than defend the lives of the people in this city. And for that crime,” Sen glared down at the prisoners, “I have sentenced him, his soldiers, and his entire house to death.”

The silence that followed those words was profound. Sen wasn’t sure that anyone even breathed for the span of several heartbeats. The stunned expressions on the faces of the crowd beyond the perimeter of guards were telling. An execution was commonplace enough that no one would have blinked an eye. This was something wholly new. An entire noble house was about to be cut down because one man had made a stupid choice. It told them all volumes about what this new world they found themselves in would be like. It would be a world where mistakes were punished not with imprisonment or fines but with a swift and brutal demise.

“You would condemn an entire house for the mistakes of a single individual,” said a shaky woman’s voice from below.

Sen focused on the woman who had stepped forward. She was doing her best to look dignified, but the ghostly pallor of her skin said it all. She knew she might well be taking her last breath by defying him this way. She hurried to speak before he responded.

“Of course, he should be punished for such selfishness, but you cannot hold us all responsible for his actions.”

“Why not?” asked Sen with icy indifference. “I don’t believe for a moment that he did this independently. I am quite certain that thorough questioning will reveal that most of you knew and approved. After all, poison spreads.”

The woman gaped at him. She had clearly expected that kind of argument to sway him, as it would have once swayed Jing. His clear dismissal of that had left her stumbling for some way to salvage her house.

She found some words and haltingly continued, “Is there…Is there no forgiveness in you? Surely…Surely, there is some way that we can make amends.”

“Do I look like some benevolent god to be moved by empty words and hollow promises? Do you think I’ll be swayed by your offering of things that you no longer have claim to?”

“If not benevolence, my good Lord Lu, then perhaps you will be moved by practicality,” said a very familiar voice.

Sen looked up to see Lai Dongmei descending from on high. She wore robes of purest white that had been stitched with golden thread to create phoenixes on her sleeves. With those robes and her impossible beauty, she glowed against the backdrop of the storm clouds above. She was the very picture of the benevolent goddess come to bestow mercy on the damned. It was everything in Sen’s power to not heave a sigh of relief. He had dismissed her as a possible accomplice in his bid to avoid a mass execution, thinking that their well-known trysts would make her intervention suspect. However, he’d also underestimated exactly how terrified everyone gathered would be at this point. It wasn’t just the prisoners. It was the gathered people from the city as well. His ruthlessness had shaken them all to the core. They were almost as invested in the outcome of this as the prisoners were.

“Matriarch Lai—” started the woman below.

“Silence,” said Lai Dongmei. “I share the opinion that you and your pitiful brood knew, but we face an unprecedented threat. It would be impractical to simply kill all of those soldiers. And it is disdainful to murder children.”

Sen remained silent for what he hoped was long enough to seem like he was considering the matter. It was long enough for Lai Dongmei to descend to the same level he was. She didn’t put herself between him and the prisoners, as one might expect from a protector. Instead, she formed a qi platform of her own next to his. She faced him with a serious expression.

“It is disdainful to murder children,” Sen finally agreed and a band of iron around his heart released its hold. “However, I am not convinced that the rest should be let go.”

“My Lord Lu, I swear to you that we will be the most loyal of servants,” the woman below all but shrieked at him.

He regarded her coldly as he asked, “You wish to serve now?”

“Yes,” she agreed with raw panic in her voice.

“Very well, then. Show me your conviction.”

Sen seized the idiot’s robes and threw him off the platform. He landed in a heap right in front of the woman. She stared down at the man, who might well be her spouse, and the confusion was clear on her face for a moment or two. When she realized what he wanted, she managed to glare at him for a moment. It was a futile gesture that broke when she saw just how much Sen didn’t care what she thought. Her shoulders slumped and she started to gesture to someone only to freeze when Sen spoke.

“No. I didn’t ask to see the conviction of some retainer who has likely killed dozens for you. I said to show me your conviction.”

The hate she felt for him was obvious as she clenched her fists.

“I have no weapon,” she said in a voice that just missed being a shout.

“You have hands, don’t you?”

The woman stared down at her hands and seemed frozen in place. Lai Dongmei intervened again.

“If he is to be executed, should we not make it a swift execution?”

The woman looked up at them with desperation in her eyes. Sen decided it was a small enough concession.

“That would be more practical,” he said.

He gestured and summoned a plain, mortal dagger from a storage ring. He tossed it down to clatter on the stone below. The woman walked over to the wear the dagger had fallen and picked it up. She threw another hateful look at Sen before she walked over to the idiot. She hesitated for a moment, and Sen’s superior hearing caught what she said.

“Forgive me, brother.”

Then, she plunged the dagger into his chest. Her aim had been good, so it didn’t take long before the man died. The woman didn’t rise or throw more angry looks at Sen. She just knelt there. Weeping. Sen ignored the sick feeling in his stomach when he spoke.

“The members of your house and your soldiers will receive clemency. Once. You are hereby stripped of all titles and properties. Every man of age will be conscripted into the army as a spearman immediately. Every woman will be put to work supporting the army as a maid, cook, or laundry attendant. The children will fall under the care of my house.”

The woman’s head snapped up, and she stared at Sen in horror and incredulity.

“What?” she demanded. “What is the meaning of—”

“I spared their lives, as you wanted. You didn’t imagine that there would be no other consequences, did you? You will work. You will fight. If you refuse, the clemency for your entire house is revoked. If any of you try to flee, it will be revoked. If even one of you steps out of line in any way, you will all die. That is my judgment on you,” said Sen before making a vague gesture. “Take them to their new lives.”