A soft wind blew, cold and brisk. The flakes began to fall, dancing like airy crystals under the pale silver light of the moon. The cold wind blew from the mountain high where the eternal cold lives, and with the wind descended the maiden of winter, the daughter of ice. With a train of purest...
2021-09-20 20:57:49 +0000 UTC View PostThe area set for guests below the stage was an open floor with a high ceiling surrounded by balconies where more people could stand or sit as they liked. Staff carrying trays with refreshments moved quietly to and fro, providing for the guests. Given the size of the hall, the number of people att...
2021-09-18 23:13:27 +0000 UTC View PostThankfully, it hadn’t come to that. Hanyi was pretty quick when she was trying, and Sixiang was naturally good at teaching. Ling Qi was looking forward to seeing the finalized performance tonight.
<Ah, you’re too kind. Hanyi put in most of the work. I just had to poke her in the righ...
2021-09-16 23:07:23 +0000 UTC View PostOn a high mountain peak, a soft wind blew, whispering through glittering teeth of hanging ice. Below slept a valley under cover of snow, blanketed in purest white.
Peace, whispered the wind, stirring snow as light as powder. Crystals of ice danced in the air, tracing fanciful s...
2021-09-13 21:54:15 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi had not been idle on other tasks while working on the garden. Each morning, she would either attend sparring with Wang Chao and his group or perform some private cultivation, further refining her new combat arts.
Starless Night’s Reflection continued to come easy to her, and she s...
2021-09-11 20:14:31 +0000 UTC View PostThere were more pieces of advice, both from Xuan Shi and from loaned books. Avoid assuming their intentions, clarify her own, cut idioms out of her speech where she could, be observant, and try to decipher body language as well as speech. In the end, it mostly boiled down to being mindful and obs...
2021-09-09 20:26:50 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi held her new earrings in her hands, watching how they glimmered in the workshop's light. The Dusk Wind Studs were silver, relatively plain in make, but each was set with a dark blue gem which darkened to near purple at the center. Peering at them, Ling Qi could see the shimmer of the sky ...
2021-09-06 21:55:52 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi closed her eyes as she caught her breath. The dirt of the training field was warm under her feet, and the crackle of the small fires and patches of ice throughout the field loud in her ears. She was no Gan Guangli, but there was a certain peace in physical exertion, a comforting simplicit...
2021-09-05 00:01:32 +0000 UTC View PostIt was a frightening thing to have the attention of the court of Emerald Seas. It was a pressure weighing down on her, a static skittering across her mind, and a prickling on her skin. It made her wonder what in the world had possessed her to want to speak here and why Cai Renxiang had agreed to ...
2021-09-02 21:16:34 +0000 UTC View PostThe medicine hall was a hive of frantic activity. Disciples rushed back and forth with supplies and equipment. Potent medicinal energies suffused the air, filling it with conflicting scents of flowers and spices and blood.
Ling Qi stood in the entrance hall, one among many. On the wall befo...
2021-08-30 22:19:17 +0000 UTC View Post“Junior Brother Yan, you are in charge of completing the stabilization arrays,” the core disciple said distractedly. “I have been called to assist the front line.”
“Yes, Senior Brother,” Yan Renshu grunted, keeping his eyes fixed on the smoothed stone in front of him. Already, t...
2021-08-28 22:38:05 +0000 UTC View PostA spiderweb of fractures spread out from the central crack. A sickening unlight radiated out from them, and to Ling Qi’s alarm, she felt a disquieting sensation as if she were dispersing herself to hide, but involuntarily. Ling Qi seized control back of her own qi just as her fingertips began t...
2021-08-26 19:49:24 +0000 UTC View PostYou are well out of your way then,” Gu Xiulan replied, not letting her suspicion color her voice.
Zheng Nan chuckled. “Ain’t never been an adventure that came to a man traveling in a straight line. I’d insult my teacher, making light of my first journey like that! You gotta take the...
2021-08-25 20:25:12 +0000 UTC View PostA hurricane of wind ripped through the broken wall of the caldera, and it was everything Linq Qi could do to not be blown away. She stared out through the gap at the rising cloud of smoke and debris, a tall pillar with an expanding cap which rose from a blackened crater where a valley had once be...
2021-08-23 22:09:31 +0000 UTC View PostBei Yongrui was not a warrior.
He did not wish for war the way many of his comrades did. He did not glory in battle or death. Building things, building people, and helping others rise, those were his talents.
Yet, with the single mote of attention which was on the caldera below rather...
2021-08-21 23:05:49 +0000 UTC View PostThere was only one reason that Ling Qi could think of for why the barbarian had approached her like this. The proof was in the rime spreading across the bleached stone at their feet and the cold howl of the wind under the pressure of their respective domains.Standing so close, meeting the woman...
2021-08-20 02:28:41 +0000 UTC View PostThe most effective thing Ling Qi could do would be to keep the barbarians' attention until the reinforcements arrived while Cai Renxiang duelled the shishigui envoy. Ling Qi’s eyes flicked upward to where the barbarian musician was turning, reorienting on Cai Renxiang as her saber met a fluid w...
2021-08-16 21:07:45 +0000 UTC View PostThis was a mistake.
For the hundredth time since Ling Qi had begun reporting back, the thought flitted through her mind, a stray thread in the loom. Continuing this operation in its current form was the incorrect choice. That was not to say that seeds of alliance being planted should be all...
2021-08-14 23:43:26 +0000 UTC View Post“Do you believe yourself to be prepared, Ling Qi?” Cai Renxiang asked as they approached the departure point. The forward part of the assault group was hidden in a shallow cave, while the main body waited in a river valley some kilometers back. The moment the signal was given, they would go l...
2021-08-13 00:20:53 +0000 UTC View PostThe pavilion where the meeting was to take face was filled with third realms, around two scores of Inner Sect disciples. Most, Ling Qi judged, were from the lower ranks with cultivation in the first or second stage of the green realm and bronze physique. Ling Qi nodded politely to a few who she r...
2021-08-09 21:13:43 +0000 UTC View Post“Thus, the quality of the water is as important as the provenance of the leaves in achieving the proper flavor,” Cai Renxiang explained. As she spoke, she poured heated water into the teapot over the waiting leaves.
Ling Qi had to admit, the rising fragrance was pretty nice. However, sh...
2021-08-07 23:30:00 +0000 UTC View PostWhen the world was young, we feared the stars.
The battle of the Unnamed was fierce, and the Mother weathered many blows defending her children. Their poison coursed deep in her veins and so when the world was wrought, the Sun blazed bright in defiance against the mocking stars, but his sis...
2021-08-05 22:38:11 +0000 UTC View Post“Can’t believe you lost again,” Sun Liling jibed. She leaned back against the wall of the closed carriage, her hands behind her head. “The hells do I even keep you around for?”
“Tch, you’re the one who told me I was probably gonna lose,” Ji Rong scoffed. “You can’t rile ...
2021-08-02 23:48:54 +0000 UTC View PostAs the core disciple overseeing the match raised his hand to signal the start, Ling Qi briefly reviewed her plan. Ling Qi had considered trying to beat Ji Rong at his game, rush him down, freeze and defeat him before he could build up a charge, but that was not what she had spent the month practi...
2021-08-01 00:53:54 +0000 UTC View PostWith the end of the month looming, Ling Qi soon turned her attention to one last art. Ephemeral Night’s Memory was a subtle little art and not something she had made great use of since she had begun cultivating it earlier this year. It was an art for muddling and snatching fragments of memory, ...
2021-07-29 20:45:16 +0000 UTC View PostThe wind screamed in her ears as she plunged downward, and Ling Qi’s heart pounded with it. The walls of the ravine blurred by, and the cold stone below beckoned. This was a dream, but dreams were real enough in their own way.
The Grinning Moon was many things. It rejected constraints, al...
2021-07-26 19:06:32 +0000 UTC View PostIt was nothing extravagant, this celebration. Biyu awoke to her nanny’s smile and the fond expressions of the household. For breakfast, the cook made jianbing, one of Biyu’s favorites, and they ate together as a family. The wheat flour crepes and their simple fillings were certainly not made ...
2021-07-24 21:31:20 +0000 UTC View PostIn her head, she felt Sixiang wince, and her own expression froze. “I would call him a sibling, as you well know.”
“Is the adult sibling who raises the infant alone not a parent? My experience says that it is so,” the other girl replied with a shrug. “Perhaps I am wrong, but to me...
2021-07-24 17:23:46 +0000 UTC View PostThe Argent Peak Sect had long vanished behind them. More than a year of battles, trials and effort, gone like the sun sinking below the horizon. It was almost hard to believe that so much had happened in so short a time. Her heart still burned with miserable indignation at Han Jian’s total reje...
2021-07-21 19:55:24 +0000 UTC View PostBy the time the first spark was fading, Ling Qi had raised her flute to her lips and released her grip on her domain.
The Mist flooded out, even as the lonely tones of Spring’s End Aria flowed out, calling the frozen chill of an unending winter to the subsonic background beat of Implacabl...
2021-07-19 23:49:18 +0000 UTC View Post