Much to Sen’s simultaneous relief and annoyance, the trip back to Uncle Kho’s home was a much less exciting time. While the beasts of the mountain didn’t fear Sen or didn’t fear him as much as he might have liked, they apparently lived in naked terror of Master Feng. Sen didn’t so much as sense a spirit beast aside from Falling Leaf on the return trip. Not having to fend off daily attacks did a lot to improve their speed. When Sen asked if there wasn’t a faster way, Master Feng gave him a knowing look.

“You know that there must be. How else could I have beaten you to that cave?”

Sen offered up a shrug. “I didn’t want to put you on the spot if it was some kind of secret.”

Master Feng mulled that over for a little while before he finally answered. “No, it’s not a secret. Well, it’s not exactly a secret. The fastest way to make a trip in this kind of environment is with qinggong techniques. They basically let you fly.”

Sen’s imagination lit itself on fire with speculation. “You mean those parts of the stories are true? How can I learn to fly?”

Master Feng held up a hand. “Easy, Sen. I personally know dozens of qinggong techniques. I suspect there are hundreds. You’ll have to wait to learn them, though.”

Sen’s hopes of soaring down to town for a quick visit to see Grandmother Lu crumbled. “Oh. Why?”

“There are a lot of reasons, but the biggest reason is that you need a lot of qi available to use any of the techniques. It’s a lot more than you have at your disposal, even with your recent improvements.”

“Why is that, master?”

“Well, gravity is part of the natural order. If you want to fly, you have to violate that natural order. The world makes it very expensive for you to carry out those kinds of transgressions. It’s part of the reason why the climb to immortality is so difficult. The closer you get, the more qi you need to accumulate. After all, it’s the nature of living things to die. If you think about it, immortality is the ultimate transgression against nature. Honestly, I’m a little surprised that the universe allows for it at all. Then again, maybe not. So few people pull it off, maybe it’s less of a problem than I imagine.”

Sen let those ideas roll around in his head for the better part of a mile before he asked a question that had been on his mind for a long time. “Are you immortal?”

Master Feng gave him a rueful smile. “I suppose to someone so young that it must sound that way to hear me and Jaw-Long talk. You hear us old monsters talking about things that happened hundreds or even thousands of years ago. It probably seems like an impossibly long time. No, I’m not an immortal. At least, I’m not one yet.

“Will you be?”

Feng took another long break to consider that question. “I honestly haven’t decided. I probably could become one. If we’re talking about raw power, I have enough to make the leap. At least, I do if I survive the tribulation. Of course, I’ve also got more perspective on the whole idea than most people do. I’m not sure that immortality is all it’s cracked up to be.”

“Why not? Why wouldn’t you want to live forever?”

Master Feng sighed a little at that. “For one, no one has a clear picture of what the heavens are actually like for ascending cultivators. There are stories, of course, but I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who knew. Immortals return from time to time, but I’ve never managed to meet one. In fact, they seemed to go out of their way to not meet me. Maybe they knew I’d ask them questions they didn’t want to answer. So, there’s that problem.

“You may struggle with this idea a bit, but long life isn’t always a gift. The country I was born in doesn’t exist anymore. It hasn’t existed for a very long time. In fact, the country that my country became doesn’t exist anymore, either. I don’t recognize the holidays most people celebrate. I know the right customs, but they all seem foreign to me. I only know about five people who can still make the food I grew up eating. You’ve met three of them on this mountain. Living for a very long time means a lot of loss. You lose the people you love. You lose the places you love. Yet, ascending means an even more profound loss. You lose the world itself.

“There are a lot of things wrong in the world. It can be violent, cruel, and terribly unfair. You know that firsthand. Yet, the world can also be beautiful and surprising and utterly sublime. I’ve seen sights in this world that I can only hope you’ll live to see, Sen. I’ve seen sunrises at sea. There’s nothing but water in every direction and then the sun breaks the horizon. It turns the water into a sheet of gold. I’ve stood on the peaks of mountains in the desert that are so high in the sky that no mortal could survive there. You look out from those peaks. It’s like you can glimpse the farthest reaches of the world and, if you’re paying attention, you can touch eternity. They say that the heavens are filled with wonders, but I already know that this world contains wonders. To become immortal, I would have to knowingly surrender those wonders.”

Sen was very quiet after that. He’d never heard his master speak about anything that way before. There were definitely things in there that he didn’t understand. What was a tribulation? He also knew he only understood a little bit about what his master meant when he talked about loss. Yet, even Sen knew that there were wonders to be found if you were patient enough to look for them. Sen’s wonders were smaller things than Master Feng’s, but he wouldn’t want to surrender them. Still, a stark reality remained beneath it all.

“If you don’t ascend, that means you’ll die,” said Sen.

“It does. Don’t look so morbid about it. It’s not like it’s going to happen next week or even next year. Cultivation has its pitfalls, but the higher you go, the longer you live. I don’t know exactly how much longer I have, but I expect I’d have to measure it in centuries. Besides, that’s what I’d be choosing if I decide not to become an immortal.”

“I suppose so,” Sen agreed, although without much conviction. “Can I ask you something else?”

“Go ahead.”

“What’s a tribulation?”

“Oh, right. That. I suppose now is as good a time to warn you as any. The heavens don’t approve of cultivators trying to become immortal. So, they send down tribulations to try to stop it. It generally happens at key points of your cultivation journey, usually after you break through to a new level.”

Sen frowned. “Okay. I think I understand that. But what are the actual tribulations? I mean, what happens?”

“Lighting,” said Master Feng with an air of casual indifference. “It’s usually lightning.”

Sen’s eyes went wide. “That sounds bad.”

Master Feng snorted. “By the time Jaw-Long is done training you with a spear, I expect that you’ll have a very solid grip on lightning.”

It took another two days of walking, but Sen finally saw Uncle Kho’s enormous house through the trees. Sen broke out into a grin until he saw that Master Feng had stopped walking. Sen shot him a questioning look.

“Go on,” said Master Feng. “I’m sure they’re expecting you.”

“What about you?”

“I’ll be around, so don’t slack off on your practice. At this point, though, it’s time to expand your knowledge base. There’s more to being a cultivator than fighting. Jaw-Long and his wife have their own specialties. So, it’s best to let them teach you about those things.”

Sen hesitated, suddenly unsure if he wanted to go back. He liked Uncle Kho, but he wasn’t thrilled with the prospect of learning from Ma Caihong. He didn’t feel that simmering anger toward her anymore. He’d managed to vent those feelings on the tide of spirit beasts that he’d killed.

“I-,” Sen started to say, but let the word just hang there.

Feng answered as if he could read Sen’s mind. “You don’t have to like someone to learn from them. Besides, you shouldn’t let my grievances become yours without a good reason. I appreciate your loyalty. I truly do. But, you should make up your own mind about Ma Caihong.”

Sen let those words sink in before he offered Master Feng a bow. “As you say, master.”