In the end, however, it was all a smokescreen, as both Cha Ming and Prince Shen knew that with another Royal Seal of Notwithstanding, the other side of the agreement could be made meaningless if push came to shove. Nodding, Cha Ming signed the document. A royal contract mark appeared on his skin the moment he did.
“Here you are, Prince Shen,” Cha Ming said, handing him sheet of paper listing all the materials he needed and their approximate value. “I’ll be needing these as soon as possible.”
The prince winced upon seeing it.
“One more thing before you leave,” Prince Shen said. “It would be best if the prototype and blueprints for Project Breaker be completed in thirty days.”
“That’s an awfully tall order to fill,” Cha Ming said, frowning. They’d been told just this morning that they had four months. “Is there something I should be aware of?”
Prince Shen hesitated for a moment, then nodded. “It’s carefully guarded knowledge, but a threatening creature has been rampaging across the northeastern Ji Kingdom. Thus far, we’ve had great difficulty stopping it. From what we can tell, it’s heading toward the city.”
“Won’t you stop it well before it gets here?” Cha Ming asked, surprised.
“We’re trying, but the creature is difficult to handle,” Prince Shen said. “It’s possible that it may even reach Bastion. We’ve requested assistance, of course, but the war is at a critical point. Every transcendent is accounted for, and two of the three grand viziers are completing preparations for the final push, while Grand Vizier Zhou is currently convalescing from his injuries. We don’t know when he’ll come, but I assure you, when he does come to resolve this problem we’re facing, it would be best if we had the results he’s looking for.”
Cha Ming nodded. “I’ll do what I can.” Not only did he not want to face Zhou Li, but this creature, whatever it was, provided the perfect smokescreen for his escape.
“Good,” Prince Shen said. “Now please, go on ahead. There’s someone else I need to meet with.”
Cha Ming got up, clasped his hands, and bowed. On his way out, he stepped over the body of a man who’d just passed out from intoxication. A woman was robbing him in broad daylight. He didn’t help the man, as helping would have been out of character. Besides, did the man even deserve his help? Both the Trueblood Tavern and the complex relationship between Prince Shen and the Blackthorn Conglomerate were a stark reminder of what mattered in the South: personal interest. There was little loyalty or shared values. Only the strong prevailed.
The end might never fully justify the means, but to save the way of life he cherished and preserve it for half the people on the continent, he was willing to bloody his own hands. Even if much of that blood came from the innocent pawns manipulated by their country and crown.
Chapter 32: Life
Cha Ming summoned an extra layer of defenses when he returned to his chambers. The stone walls, though enchanted and reinforced, were built only to protect the inside from outside intrusion. Their intricate runes could, to some extent, dampen qi emanations from cultivation. But that was in normal situations, and he was about to do so much more. It was time to complete the first half of the Seventy-Two Transformations.
As the formation hummed to life, he summoned a portal into the Clear Sky World. Not only would this further dampen the inevitable power fluctuations, but he could take advantage of the five-fold time acceleration within it. He proceeded directly to the mountaintop, where Sun Wukong was meditating.
“So, you finally got what you came for, did you?” the Monkey King said, peeking through a single open eye from his cross-legged pose.
“That I did,” Cha Ming said, sitting beside him. He summoned the Gold Essence Core, which shone with a golden light. The liquid within it writhed upon sensing his presence, perhaps out of desire to join with him, or perhaps out of fear for its inevitable fate. He took out the Clear Sky Brush and touched its top to the golden orb; the thick liquid flowed out of the core and into the brush, lighting up golden runes all over its surface.
Cha Ming began painting. The runic script this time was 1,080 sigils long, each one containing both power and instructions for the transformation. A longer script was required each time in order to balance the various powers already in his marrow. Further, the transformation sigils needed to force their way into an energy-dense medium, a difficult task given how deep Cha Ming’s vitality reserves were.
In all, the script took a day to paint. The moment the last rune was completed, the script broke apart, allowing the sigils to crash into his bones, where they intruded on his marrow.
Pain. Cutting pain. Cha Ming felt like his entire body was being sliced with millions of tiny blades. Though only his marrow transformed, it made his bones reverberate and sent shock waves of power through his nervous system. His marrow, which had previously contained four colors—green, blue, red, and brown—now began to show signs of a fifth color: gold. It sprouted from within the gooey substance like tiny metallic flowers, each one bringing stability to the marrow and connecting everything together.
Metal cut. Wood grew. Water flowed. Fire burned. Earth weighed. All five components began to stabilize, and in that stability, Cha Ming’s marrow took on additional but predictable colors: black and white. Creation marrow appeared, raw energy that could be shaped for anything. Meanwhile, tiny black specks of destruction marrow appeared everywhere, and instead of destroying everything around it, it coexisted with the remainder of his bones. Gray flecks also began to appear, and
