The Tower of Emnu

The last inhabited cell was almost empty, especially in comparison to Modestus cell. It was smaller than most cells and a small, but muscular man sat in a corner of the cell, his eyes lowered, frozen and still like a statue. There were no light screens here, but Aaron felt the buzzing energy of them from Mei’s cell right next door. He cleared his throat, but the man did not look up.

Aaron hesitated and then called out.

“Excuse me.” But the man did not move or seemed to breathe for that matter. He was as still and silent as a corpse, but he did not look dead at all. His skin had still a healthy color and if his chest had moved at all, Aaron would have thought he was asleep. But his eyes were opened, so it did not seem that way. The man looked like he was in shock, staring into nothing. Aaron was about to knock on the iron bars, when Mei interrupted him.

“Don’t. Asura is quite sensitive.”

“Is that his name?” Aaron asked Mei who had come over to stand at the edge of her prison.

“No, his title. It is what he is. He is one of the few that deserve to be locked up in here alongside with the demon and that monster Krish.”

Aaron studied the man with raised eyebrows. He could understand how a guy who eats souls or a cannibal would deserve to be locked up. But this man looked fairly harmless.

“Why?” he asked and Mei sighed softly as she studied the man in the corner.

“Because he is a living weapon. He does not talk, he does not even move most of the time. We are not sure if there is anything, even a hint of his personality left in him, but we know that he is immortal. His body will regenerate itself in due time, even if it is destroyed on a fundamental level. A few days later his naked body will wake up at the spot you killed him at. Asuras are from a different, more violent time where cultivators waged war against each other without limit. We don’t know how they were created or how to kill them permanently. So they are sealed away or locked up like he is. What we do know about them is that when they get exposed to blood they enter a crazed state.” Mei folded her black luscious hair behind her ears and gave Aaron a stern look with her purple eyes to make a point.

“Never let him get into contact with blood. This prison might not hold him in his frenzied state and while he won’t be able to escape the tower itself, he might still kill you. An Asura like him does not discriminate between friend or foe. They just kill anything in their sight. The more blood they get exposed to, their own or others, the stronger they become until they are walking calamities only transcendants can contest.”

Aaron studied the man curiously, but while he seemed strange, he was by far not the strangest occupant of the prison. He got another manastone from his pouch, but before he could do anything with it Mei cautioned him.

“Roll the stone in carefully.”

Aaron raised his eyebrows, but carefully rolled the manastone into the cell. It felt ridiculous and he got the angle a bit wrong as the manastone bumped into one of the metal bars. The sound echoed and Aaron winced.

A sudden weight pressed down on Aaron and it felt like as if the weight of a whole freight train had just appeared on his back. Aaron fell to his knees. His lungs struggled to breathe, his limbs felt frozen and his heart beat out of his chest. His entire being shuddered in primal fear and it took all of Aaron’s willpower to look up to the source of the feeling that screamed mortal danger to his instincts. The unassuming man had literally paralyzed Aaron in fear. The Asura had turned his head and was staring at Aaron. His eyes where pure white and alien looking. There was no pupil and the white of the eyes was strangely milky and just not right. There was no expression on the beings face, no malice, only concentrated force directed in his direction. Then the man’s eyes slid of Aaron and Aaron collapsed outside of the prison cell.

“I warned you,” Mei said with motherly sternness. “Do not agitate him, this was just a tiny hint of his power.”

“What...what the hell was that?” Aaron muttered as he came panting back to his feet.

“Killing Intent. Asuras are masters at intent given form. Many great warriors employ this kind of Killing Intent, but none better than the Asura. It can freeze or get you a moments hesitation from your foes which as you should know is deadly in combat. The reason it affects you this much is because you are weak and the difference in cultivation between the two of you is immense.”

Aaron still shuddered in fear, a bodily entirely physical fear, not a mental one. It had felt like his body had once more not been his body at all. Like something else had taken control of him and he had lost himself in it, had lost himself in the abject terror, stuck in a meat puppet that would not allow him to do anything but cower in fear. Fury beat in Aaron’s heart, but he did not do anything to vent his outrage, his terror. Instead he took a respectful step back. None of the prisoners had attacked him so far, with this one being the sole exception. But if Mei was right then this had not even been a warning, just a reaction to a stimulus. No intent behind the gaze but looking up at what the noise was all about. It was terrifying on an entirely different level, but Aaron suspected that any of the Cultivators in this prison were capable of killing him with the least amount of effort. He turned to Mei who was still standing close by, her prison’s force shield buzzing with high pitched energy, so much thicker than around any other cell. She smiled when Aaron turned his attention to her and nodded.

“Good, you can handle the fear.”

Aaron snorted and nodded.

“I know fear is just in my head. There are dangers fear warns me about and in this case it is wisdom not to challenge or do anything to that thing in the prison. It’s the same mental calculation I have done my whole life. What can I get away with? How can I win? It’s who I am, it is what I do. I just never thought to do that to my own thoughts, to my own body.” Aaron paused and knew he was rambling, but Mei smiled gently and nodded.

“There are many ways people handle fear, some rationalize it like you do, others push it away and bottle it in, others have no choice but to face it and get overwhelmed by it. It is a positive thing that you can remain calm in the face of absolute terror. It is probably part of what the great Master has seen in you. Why he has decided you are worthy of his and my help and counsel.”

Aaron nodded, but he knew Mei was wrong. In his last life he had never feared anything like this. Fear had been a prickling on the back of his neck, followed by adrenaline and excitement. But the fear he had just experienced was different, was visceral. Like all of his feelings, like all of his reactions in this new body. They were different, more intense and debilitating and Aaron felt that at least fear was one aspect where his old body had been vastly superior.

“Well it is thanks to your technique that I am still alive. Wind Steps…”

“10.000 Heavenly Winds of Change.” Mei interrupted him briskly and Aaron almost stuttered and corrected himself.

“Yes, the 10.000 Heavenly Winds of Change have saved me more times than I can count. It’s the most marvelous technique I could ever imagine. Thank you so much for it.” Aaron paused and was surprised at his own words. He really felt grateful and he studied this new feeling. This gratitude. It was new, but not bad, he decided. Vastly superior to his bodies reaction to fear at least. It did not detract from his goals, did not hinder him to be grateful, but would only deepen his relationship with beings that were more powerful than anything he could imagine. So he decided for the time being he could accept this new feeling of gratitude.

Mei smiled and nodded.

“Of course it has saved you, it is the best movement technique in the multiverse in my opinion. Not the most powerful, not the most illusive, not the most versatile, but it is the best if you do the tally, the best overall, especially for people like me with a synergistic set of techniques to back it up. And it will also be the best for you, as the great master will undoubtedly give you techniques that will synergize perfectly with the 10.000 Heavenly Winds of Change.”

“I sure hope so, he did not seem that helpful when we last spoke. I want to learn new techniques, I need to get stronger, get weapons, options to defeat and evade.” Aaron tried to explain himself, but Mei seemed to understand him, even though he had not been able to get across the whole gist of it.

“I see. I am sure he will have a solution for you. Now how has your training been? Tell me about your progress with the 10.000 Heavenly Winds of Change.”

Aaron shrugged a bit sheepishly and told her the truth.

“I have tried to keep up the stretches and the like and I have used the technique quite a lot. But that does not mean I think I have mastered it. I understand more about it now though. For example I understand now that the technique somehow cloaks me in Qi. My whole body is surrounded by a very thin layer while it is active. Which is why my entire body is not affected by shifts in momentum. The amount of Qi required to keep the technique active has also reduced by quite a lot.”

Mei nodded and studied him intently, before nodding again.

“Not quite as much progress as I was hoping for, but it will do. Did Mortag finish the memory cores already?”

Aaron nodded and got one of the modified cores out of the beast core pouch to show her.

“Excellent, come closer and help me inscribe it. I suspect you have made mistakes that I was not able to prevent while you created the pathways for the technique. Besides from the way you walk and stand it is clear you have not stretched and ensured your body is as limber and flexible as possible. So you will require some proper guidance while you stretch.”

“Okay...what do you need me to do?”

“Sadly there is no item box for my cell and I can’t destroy the light barrier. So you will have to help me trick the spell into letting me help you, so to say.”

“Wait, there is no item box for your cell? Why?”

“Because I could escape through it.” Mei said with a smirk showing her rows of shark teeth.“I am the master of movement and a Dao Seeker. Which means I have understood a fundamental truth about the universe and have followed it down a path that eventually will lead me to Transcendancy. In my case it is what you would call the Dao of Space.”

“Space? So what, you can teleport or something?”

“Not quite, but I can do this.” Mei said and raised her arm. Aaron followed the movement and blinked as first her hand vanished, then her lower arm up to her elbow. He thought it was some sort of stealth art at first, but when he looked closer he could see a slight ripple in the air around her arm. It looked like a rumpled curtain, but made out of air, maybe made out of space itself. Light refracted and stretched in strange ways around the distortion and Aaron squinted his eyes, to get a better look. But then he noticed movement from above Mei’s head and looked up. He stared in slight shock as he spotted the origin of the movement. Mei’s hand was waving at him from above her head. Just her arm. Still attached to her body, but somehow her hand had appeared a meter above her head and was waving at him merrily.

“Woah.” Aaron stared as Mei pulled her hand back and the ripple vanished like it never had been.

“This little trick is only a tiny part of what my insights into the Dao of Space allow me to do. It means that it is very difficult to fight or trap me anywhere. These light screens were not designed to keep the great master locked up, but me. A few hundred years ago we all lived in that central prison the great master is still in. But alas we were not able to flee in the end and Emnu wisely separated us all. But that is a story for a different time. Come closer and hold the memory core against the light screen.”

Aaron was really curious about this story and how strong Mei really was, but he complied and reached out with one of the memory cores and pressed it against the light screen. The energy fizzled and there was a lot of resistance as he pushed. The light screen felt as solid as a wall, but when Aaron gave it a bit more pressure the memory core started to slowly sink into the blue screen of light.

“Careful, the light screens let things through from the outside but it is almost impossible to get anything back out. Whatever you do, keep your hand on your side and only let the core cross.”

Which was easier said than done, Aaron realized, because once the core had started to move through the barrier it seemed unstoppable. But before he could make a very costly mistake Mei had reached out and touched the other side of the Memory Core, holding it right in the center of the light screen. It was a bit awkward but they both held on to the Core while the blue energy cascaded around the little artifact.

“Just hold it still like this.” she said.

Mei closed her eyes and Aaron waited. At first nothing happened, but then he felt the Memory Core change under his fingers. Felt power flow into it, first a trickle then a flood until it felt like a small sun of Qi. It did not take long and barely a minute later Mei opened her eyes and pushed against the memory core. Aaron gave way and the memory core popped out of the light screen with a slight buzz.

Aaron caught the memory core and studied it. It did not seem any different than before, but it definitively was. He could sense it still. It had its own unique Qi signature, if that was the right word for his sense impressions. He could feel the Qi, could feel the power, the energy stored in it. But it did not feel wild, it felt domesticated, like a technique. In many ways it felt like a spell or enchantment just done with Qi.

But it also felt entirely different, because Aaron could feel the woman’s Qi who had filled the Core. He sensed a depth that felt boundless, limitless. Free. Aaron blinked and Mei smiled her shark tooth smile at him.

“Go ahead and try it, just hold the core to your head. Once it touches your forehead or temple it should activate on its own.”

Aaron hesitated only a moment before he placed the memory core against his forehead. One moment nothing happened and then Aaron felt himself fall forwards, his stomach lurched and then settled as he fell. The air was frigid and when he opened his eyes he could see an alien world stretch out underneath him. White, black and purple mountain peaks jutted out of the cavernous landscape and the air was filled with dense, vibrant Qi. His whole body was filled with it and Aaron felt how he activated Wind Steps. No, how she activated the 10.000 Winds of Change. The world around her slowed, the wind suddenly gentle as it caressed her body. Aaron felt the technique so clearly and so deeply. It felt so natural, instinctive and yet every single pulse of Qi that moved around her had a purpose. Somehow the Qi was guided by her. Because Aaron quickly realized that he was Mei, was in her body, or much rather was watching her memory.

How she used the movement technique was awe inspiring. How she let herself be guided by the wind, how she used the currents of it to fall forwards. As fast as the fastest airplanes on his world and much more graceful. Mei fell, spun, dove, and moved through the air in absolute control. The deep feeling of absolute freedom, of mastery of the air, the sky, of herself, of himself filled Aaron. And then Mei landed on the top of a sharp peak with one foot as simple and quiet like she had only taken one step and had not just flown through the air at speeds only fighter pilots might have seen on Aaron’s world. The balance it required to stand on the mountain peak alone was absolute, Mei’s control over herself was absolutely blowing Aaron’s mind. And then she took the next step. A force so titanic it felt like Aaron was accelerating in a spacecraft headed for lower orbit launched Mei forward into the air, through the currents of wind until she reached an altitude and wind speed she desired. The longer Aaron watched the more absolute seemed Mei’s mastery of the technique. Because she was not even using Qi. She was just flexing her muscles, moving her body and the Qi surrounding her responded. It was part of her, not something she used, but another limb. The whole jump from start to finish was absolutely mind boggling.

Then the scene changed and Aaron found himself in a compound surrounded by walls made out of intricately carved purple marble. Swirling patterns had been carved and set into the floor. Each groove, each mosaic of multi colored stones meant something. Aaron knew it with certainty. A crystal clear pond was the only other thing of note in the courtyard. It had a bamboo water clock thing, what was their name again? He could not remember its name, but it felt distinctly Japanese and yet not out of place at all. The long bamboo filled with water and rose, depositing its water before falling back with a distinct sound of bamboo hitting a rock.

That was the signal for Mei to begin. Her feet moved, her body bent and Aaron could feel the strain in every single muscle. It felt like dancing at first, before he realized that her feet were following the grooves on the floor and her arms, her hips, her neck followed the colored stones on the floor. This was a carved and built in guide to a kata. Not a kata like Aaron had learned from Sylus, this was entirely about stretching the body, about gaining an absurd range of movement. She did splits that made Aaron wince internally and moved her body in such ways Aaron loathed to repeat from just feeling them with her body. But then she started to jump, to somersault, to turn and move her body in the air without Wind steps. Every step was sure, every flip was perfect. Was muscle memory. This, he realized with a start, was not some mystical technique, some amazing kata. This was just her warm up routine.

The soft snaps of fingers catapulted Aaron back into his own body and he gasped as he found himself standing back in the Tower, in front of Mei’s cage. He shuddered for a long moment as the realization, the reality kicked back in. He had always known it had been a recorded memory, but he had not known he would be her. It was difficult to describe what he felt, how he could summarize the feeling of flying through the air, jumping from mountain top to mountain top. The absolute unfettered freedom and confidence. Taking that away from him felt like someone had taken away a drug he was just getting hooked on.

“Ah, this was your first experience with someone else’s memory. It can be quite overwhelming at first.” Mei said, but Aaron was still too out of it to answer.

“Holy shit.” he muttered and felt his shaking limbs slowly relax. His mind was filled with sensations, with images, with knowledge. He itched to repeat some of the things he had seen. He wanted to return to the air, wanted to ride wind currents and yet he knew he was far away from being able to do that. Mei gave him time to collect himself and when Aaron had calmed down he asked:

“Was that your home world I saw?”

“Yes, that was Esaria you saw in my memories. Just a stroll really, but I did want to show you the world this technique was designed for. It is an amazing technique to fight, but its true purpose had always been to move in difficult terrain and be able to react to wind currents at a moments notice. The weather on Esaria can be very capricious and it is imperative to be able to change the direction you are moving instantly. The memories I have imbued onto the core are in 4 parts. First how the technique was supposed to be used, its true purpose expressed by myself. Second the standard training stretches you need to perfect your ability to express the technique. The third part is an in depth medical examination and explanation on how to repair and solidify the pathways of the 10.000 Heavenly Winds of Change to make it perfect and ensure that if you are injured and the pathways are broken you would still be able to repair it. Once you have perfected and ensured the pathways and your use of the technique will be adequate the 4th and last part of the memory will unlock.”

“And what is that?” Aaron asked, genuinely curious.

“Combat. How to use the technique in combat. If you study the last section in depth you will also be able to copy the stealth variant of the technique. Although all of that will take quite a lot of time and mastery of this venerable technique.”

Aaron eyed the little memory core almost reverently now. In short this little memory core had probably all he would ever need to ensure he could outrun, outmaneuver and pick his fights. He also wanted nothing more than master the stealth variant of the technique. It would make him so much more lethal. And he would be lying if he did not want to replicate jumping from mountaintop to mountaintop himself. But he knew that he was far away from that.

“Thank you, that will help a lot.” Aaron said with a smile and Mei nodded and settled down in the center of her cell.

“It’s fine, go ahead and make me proud. I hope next time you will at least have some rudimentary mastery of the 10.000 Heavenly Winds of Change.”

“I will do my best.“Aaron said and he meant it.

Mei nodded and dismissed him with a wave before settling in and closing her eyes in meditation.