Chapter Text
In the heavenly realm, clouds rolled like waves in the boundless sea and crystal palaces reflected the sun in its infinite glory.
On the peak of the tallest mountain in the heavens was a forest of peach trees in eternal bloom. Located within the depths of the forest was a cave, and within that cave lay the only god in the three realms whose strength surpassed Erlang Shen's, the Grand Marshal of the Heavenly Forces.
A single one of the Grand Marshal's steps was capable of leveling mountains and splitting the seas. The storm of peach blossom petals yielded to his presence like spring snow, and the layers of protections woven into the swirling array melted at his touch. The barrier over the cave entrance, constructed using every binding spell known to the nine heavens, dissipated like fine mist beneath his hands.
The stone prison beneath the mountain was filled with a darkness so deep and profound that a weaker god would lose all sense of orientation after a few steps. The bone-chilling cold was even more unbearable. It was capable of suffocating the strongest immortal flames, so vicious it could crack a god's inner core. The seals woven into the lichen clinging to the walls were designed to absorb spiritual energy—the lifeblood of the divine—making every step past the entrance feel like one was bearing the weight of a mountain on his shoulders.
Erlang Shen was the master of this place, but even he was not immune to the restrictions on its walls. This prison was much crueler than the one he had crafted for his twin sister thousands of years ago. It had to be unforgiving and impenetrable in order to contain the god who nearly destroyed the mortal realm and took four of heaven's strongest martial gods to subdue.
Erlang Shen had not yet forgotten the humiliation of needing to request assistance to defeat his own subordinate. Anger surged in his meridians like a raging river, but he buried the urge to summon his blade and draw blood as the narrow pathway finally opened into a spacious cavern, walls and ceiling carved by his own claws.
In the center of the cavern sat a stone platform surrounded by a body of water so vast as to be considered a lake. Erlang Shen lifted his hand, a small pale fire flickering to life in his palm. The flame of pure spiritual energy cast a silver light over the water as it slowly drifted away from his hand. The feeble flame passed through each of the seven torches positioned around the lake. As the one who had crafted this prison, he was also the only one in the three realms who could use his spiritual powers freely within the mountain, but even this tiny flame was barely strong enough to complete a full circuit and light all of the torches.
Erlang Shen began to walk over the water to the platform, heavy robes barely skimming the surface of the lake.
In the center of the platform, bound by chains forged in the blood of the qilin, was the god who was sealed away three thousand years ago for his crimes against the heavens and the mortal realm.
"You," Erlang Shen said, his voice rumbling with the force of an earthquake, so loud as to cause the mountain itself to tremble. As soon as he spoke, his purpose for this visit was forgotten, swept away by the old grudges and resentment which had festered in his heart for thousands of years. His voice, growing ever fiercer, continued, "Why do you insist on remaining silent after all these years? Don't forget, you still owe the heavens an explanation for seeking to destroy the mortal realm!"
The god of war finally lifted his head as if just noticing his presence. He was unable to summon even a fragment of his divine power in all of these thousands of years, yet acted as if his confinement was a trivial matter unworthy of his consideration, a mild inconvenience at best. There was no trace of remorse or regret in his steady gaze.
"Why bring up the past after so many years?" His voice, thin and weak from disuse, was like wisps of smoke rising from the morning mist, barely stirring the dense air. It lacked both warmth and resentment, as if the one in front of him was no more than a passing stranger.
He had always possessed a heart of stone, unfettered by the bonds of friendship and affection which had been Sanshengmu's fatal flaw. However, in the end, both of them had forced Erlang Shen's hand.
Erlang Shen was the Grand Marshal of the Heavenly Forces. He did not need his sister's compassionate words nor the god of war's stalwart support. He quelled the fury raging in his heart like a tempest. If three thousand years of confinement had failed to change his old friend's mind, then nothing he said now would make a difference.
"Chiyou, God of War." He spoke with the utmost formality and a commanding tone stripped of all familiarity and affection. He hid the bitter sting of disappointment deep within his heart. "I have come here today on behalf of the Emperor of Heaven to deliver a message and an order."
He was no longer able to guess how his old friend would react. After he had been apprehended, he accepted the grave charges laid against him without explanation. He was calm during the whole trial, but Erlang Shen's body was still riddled with injuries sustained in the fight to stop him from destroying the mortal realm. Erlang Shen had ridden into battle with him countless times, yet had never seen him so fierce and aggravated, less like the god of war he knew and more like a vengeful spirit.
Chiyou, against his expectations, lowered himself into a deferential bow with his hands clasped accordingly. The harsh grinding of steel on stone followed his movements. The chains which bound his wrists and ankles were also inlaid with spells so potent that the air itself trembled in protest.
"It was decreed following the Great War that heaven and earth were to be divided, with the gods in heaven and mortals upon the earth. Despite this decree, the gods continue to descend to the mortal realm, causing chaos and strife among men, even trapping a portion of themselves in human vessels.
"The God of War, Chiyou, is hereby ordered to return the fragments of the gods in the mortal realm to the heavens. The Heavenly Emperor, in his infinite benevolence and generosity, is willing to pardon your crimes and end your three thousand year seclusion if you accomplish this task. Do you, Chiyou, accept the heavenly order?"
The stone prison was a place of endless darkness, but there was power in names, even in the depths of a mountain designed to imprison one of the strongest gods in heaven. The divine power within the mandate resonated in the empty cavern despite the tapestry of spells woven into its foundations.
"I, Chiyou, accept the heavenly order." Chiyou's thin voice pierced the silence like the edge of a blade. The echo that followed his words made him sound frail and insubstantial, but Erlang Shen's body remained as tense as a bowstring.
A god without access to spiritual energy might have seemed pitiful, but he was still as dangerous as a tiger, others mere ants beneath his claws.
"Very well." Erlang Shen's lips curled into a sneer. His lungs had long since begun to burn from the cold air, but he ignored the prickling pain as he laughed. "Those fools answer a shaman's call, then become addicted to playing around in the mortal realm and are reluctant to leave. However, a divine vessel cannot be destroyed by mortal hands. This matter troubles the Heavenly Emperor greatly. Despite his decree to separate the two realms, these gods insist on neglecting their duties to interfere with the mortal realm."
"Enough," Chiyou said. On anyone else, this brisk word might have been followed by a sneer, but his face remained empty of all emotion. "I only need to descend to the mortal realm and destroy the divine vessels, correct?"
The Heavenly Emperor would hardly have bothered to issue a decree and agree to release a convicted god from confinement if the task could be accomplished so easily. Erlang Shen scoffed.
"Did you not hear what I just said?" he snapped. "I sealed away your spiritual energy, not your five senses. The two realms have remained separate for over a thousand years. If you descend in a fury and wipe out the entire population of shamans in a single night, you will shake both heaven and earth, completely disregarding the Heavenly Emperor's decree. Furthermore, do you really think we will allow you to leave this prison at your full strength?"
Erlang Shen knew very well that Chiyou's silence was not born from anger or annoyance. He was fundamentally unable to understand why they needed to complicate matters when a simpler solution was available.
Of all the gods in heaven, the god of war was always the most dutiful and the most loyal. He could not be swayed by emotion and never acted without reason. His attempt to destroy the mortal realm was an inconceivable act for which he never offered an explanation, not even the smallest excuse for his disastrous decision.
Once, Erlang Shen had believed the sky would fall before Chiyou ever betrayed his own nature. His sister, Sanshengmu, was always too gentle and compassionate for her own good. He knew her kindness would someday be her downfall. Chiyou, on the other hand, had remained by his side for centuries, unchanging and unflinching against the tides of time and the annals of history. Erlang Shen had trusted him as much as he trusted one of his own limbs.
However, every banquet had to come to an end and fate eventually forced them to part, leading each of them down a solitary path of no return.
Erlang Shen produced a set of golden bracelets adorned with small bells, each trembling with an enormous amount of spiritual energy even in this barren cavern.
"You must wear these when you descend to the mortal realm. You are forbidden from using your divine form to complete this task."
Chiyou's eyes were the color of molten amber, like the tears of a tiger, bravery and ferocity all faded with time. He stared at the bracelets and finally spoke without any inflection in his tone.
"Very well."
Chiyou lifted his arms, which had been bound in chains for all these years.
Erlang Shen curled his fingers and released the spell on the chains with a wary gaze in his eyes. Chiyou wasn't foolish enough to resist the promise of freedom within his grasp when granted by the highest authority in the heavens, but Erlang Shen had not forgotten that desperate battle waged over the immortal mountains. He, who had always emerged victorious and reigned over all of the armies in heaven, found himself in a truly dire situation for the first time in his existence.
To release the god who caused such mayhem felt like a mistake, but to say so would be the greatest betrayal. Erlang Shen could only place his faith in the god of war he had grown up with, the one who was rational and knew how to discern right from wrong.
The chains dispersed into dust before they hit the ground. An incredible surge of power, strong enough to split the clouds, rippled across the lake's surface. The water churned furiously and waves crashed ashore. Erlang Shen quickly set the golden bracelets around his wrists with a wave of his hand. The cleansing bells chimed softly as the new binding spell settled.
When the process was finished, the water in the lake returned to its placid state and Erlang Shen stepped back.
"Take as long as you need to complete this task. There is no need to rush." He paused to consider his next words, which had sprung to mind all of a sudden. "When, inevitably, you find yourself at the Chuulu Korikh, pass my dear sister a message: if she is willing to admit her wrongs, she may be permitted to return to the heavens. However, if she insists on remaining stubborn, then there will be no second chances."
Erlang Shen could not understand her compassion and love towards humanity even now.
"Is it the eradication of all shamans that you seek, or simply for the gods to leave their vessels?" Chiyou asked, ignoring his request. Erlang Shen never expected him to listen—he had only asked on a whim, and was willing to drop the matter just as quickly.
"The age of gods is over," Erlang Shen said with a growl that rumbled in his chest. "It should have ended with my sister's imprisonment if you ask me, but all of heaven is in agreement: nothing good comes from mingling with mortals."
Chiyou bowed his head, but Erlang Shen couldn't tell if he agreed with the decision or was simply acknowledging his words. His old friend had always been inscrutable. And in light of his actions three thousand years ago, Erlang Shen could not say with any confidence that he had really ever known him after all.
"I understand." Chiyou lifted his left arm to examine the bracelet. On his pale skin, the gold stood out like the sun blazing in a cloudless sky.
His wrists seemed thinner than Erlang Shen remembered, but perhaps it was only the passage of time warping his perspective. No matter how frail those hands appeared, they were still capable of rewriting the landscape at his full power. The bracelets would constantly drain his spiritual energy, making it difficult to build any reserves, but they were necessary. If Chiyou still harbored even a drop of his old ambition to destroy the mortal realm, they might not be lucky enough to stop him a second time.
"It shall be done." Chiyou lowered his arm, accepting the task and the new shackles without protest.
Erlang Shen was finally able to remove the barrier holding the stone prison together.
A deafening roar shook the mountain and wind began to rush into the cavern, carrying with it the scent of peach blossoms and freshly fallen rain.
The forest of peach blossoms was dying.
This forest had existed since the days of Chiyou's youth. The pale pink blossoms, which had always bloomed in brilliant clusters, spun in the wind like dust. Erlang Shen's barrier had siphoned spiritual energy from the forest for many years. The backlash of releasing those spells had caused all of the trees on the mountain to wither; only time would tell if they were still capable of recovering.
The wind whistled through the empty branches, carrying a pleasant warmth. The piercing cold which had settled like poison in his veins began to melt, ever so slowly. As they left the isolated mountain which had served as his prison for the last three millennia, the persistent warmth of the endless blue sky breathed life back into his limbs despite his new restraints cutting him off from the spiritual energy which saturated the heavens.
It was a short journey to the platform that linked the heavens to the mortal realm, but neither god spoke a word. Although they had known each other for tens of thousands of years, that familiarity and companionship was lost forever.
At the edge of the platform, Chiyou gazed dispassionately at the swirling clouds below his feet.
"Eradicate the shamans and return the gods to heaven," he reiterated. He had no issue with the order, but did have to ask, "Why not simply command the gods to stop responding to the summons and lending mortals their power?"
Erlang Shen did not reply at first. He was always stubbornly silent when cornered in an argument. The fury instead pulsed beneath his skin, festering and waiting for the perfect moment to explode.
"I don't presume to understand the Heavenly Emperor's will," he snapped with such vehemence that it must have meant he was only following orders. When he didn't know the answer, he often grew quite defensive. "Why question such magnanimity? The Heavenly Emperor has granted you this opportunity to redeem yourself. Who are you to protest?"
"Who's protesting?" Chiyou said absently. He lifted his arm to point at the swirling clouds below. The bells on his wrists chimed softly as he moved. "Do you have a destination in mind?"
A wisp of spiritual energy flowed from the tip of Erlang Shen's finger to the center of Chiyou's forehead. A memory instantly swept over him like a scroll unfurling all at once, carrying the view of a palace on a mountain shrouded in mist. The memory's hazy contours expanded and he saw himself sitting with Erlang Shen and his sister, Sanshengmu, in a familiar garden beneath the watchful arms of the willow trees.
When the gods were very young, they were also once carefree and ignorant.
The memory, already weak with time, faded quickly. Erlang Shen replaced the memory of their youth with a vision of a decaying temple complex in the mortal realm. The stones and tiles were overrun with moss and lichen and several smaller buildings on the outskirts had fallen into disrepair. This, too, faded quickly, leaving only the impression of rushing water roaring in his ears.
"There is a sect in the process of selecting initiates for their next batch of shamans." Erlang Shen's lip curled in disgust. "Why don't you start there and join them."
"Which god does this sect worship?" Chiyou asked, probing for the reason behind Erlang Shen's faint sneer and utter loathing.
"Not a god," Erlang Shen hissed. "A mere mortal like themselves. My sister's bastard child."
"Ah. The Lotus Warrior." The man himself was long dead, but the depths of Erlang Shen's hatred far exceeded the bounds of life and death. "A half-mortal. It makes sense that they would relate to a half-mortal more than a god."
"Chiyou," Erlang Shen growled. "Watch what you say."
Chiyou had no desire to argue with him. It didn't matter which god this sect worshipped. The Heavenly Emperor himself had sentenced them to death—they could only accept this decree and hope to be reborn with a better fate in the next life.
"Join them?" he confirmed. It sounded like a bothersome task. Why disguise himself when the gods could simply send a storm of heavenly thunder to wipe out the sect overnight? If Chiyou had access to his spiritual energy, he could do it himself with a snap of his fingers.
"Yes." Erlang Shen's lips parted, cruel amusement overcoming his disdain. A laugh rumbled in his throat. "I remember you being quite adorable when you were young. How could anyone resist such a pretty child? Those dumb mortals will fail to realize they invited a tiger into their den until it's too late."
"Fine." Perhaps Erlang Shen simply wanted to laugh at his expense, or perhaps there was a deeper reason he wanted Chiyou to descend to the mortal realm in disguise. It didn't matter. Chiyou may have valued efficiency, but orders were orders. "I'll be leaving now."
He didn't bother exchanging any further words with the Grand Marshal. The opportunity had long since passed for them to speak amicably with each other.
Chiyou took a step off the platform.
The fierce winds would have battered a weaker god. His body, engulfed by the clouds, tumbled into the skies above the mortal realm until a rush of snow and ice suddenly began to batter his much smaller form. A storm was raging on the mountain, winds howling like furious beasts trampling across the plains.
When he finally plummeted to the ground, he landed in a deep snow bank. His hair had fallen loose around his face, obscuring his view.
The air was blisteringly cold, but compared to the prison where he had spent the last three thousand years, the snow on his skin was refreshing.
The world was brimming with vitality in every breeze, every blade of grass and drop of water. The bracelets sealed away his divine form and constantly drained his spiritual energy, but did not cut him off from the world the same way the stone prison had. Even the insignificant pinpricks of snow on his face held more power than he had felt in a very long time.
After all, Erlang Shen had made sure not to leave him helpless in this strange land. Despite the anger and resentment in his heart, he didn't wish for the same fate that befell his sister to fall upon his childhood friend. Chiyou could still draw the spiritual energy from the world around him into his inner core. He could not shift his form or call upon the enormous reserves of power he once used to level mountains and empty the seas, but he could circulate energy through his meridians to keep himself warm.
When he pushed himself to his feet, he found himself at the bottom of a steep slope. The boughs of pine trees rose high above his head, obscuring the grey skies above. Beyond the howling of the wind through the trees, he heard the sound of voices shouting back and forth from the top of the ridge.
Chiyou blinked the frost from his eyes as a face peered over the edge of the cliff with a timid but curious expression. The face belonged to a young boy no older than twelve.
"Hey, over here! Someone fell off the path!"
The boy disappeared briefly. A short but heated debate on the need to risk life and limb to help whoever was stupid enough to fall down the slope carried on, out of view. Chiyou's senses were naturally much sharper than any human's, so he heard the entire conversation as if it was whispered into his ear.
The children on the ridge both sounded quite young. Their sense of righteousness was offset by their fear of injury and failure.
Chiyou examined the slope, which was not particularly steep. He could have scaled it within one or two short leaps, but a normal human child was incapable of performing such acrobatic feats.
Still, he wasn't about to wait for a couple of weak and indecisive children to save him. He took a step forward and started to climb.
The young boy managed to convince an older child of fifteen or sixteen to assist him, but by the time they glanced over the ridge, Chiyou had already made good progress. It wasn't a difficult climb, even if his hands were smaller and limbs much shorter now. There were plenty of tree roots and packed earth for him to brace himself, and the pain of his skin breaking against rough stones and brambles was so insignificant, it couldn't even be called a minor annoyance.
The snow continued to fall at a furious pace, thick layers consuming the mountainside. Faces creased from worry and amazement gazed down at him through the flurries.
"Don't you have a rope on you or something?"
"Why would I be carrying a rope?" The older boy answered with a slightly aggressive snort. "How did he even fall off the cliff?"
"I don't know, but I found him just now. I bet you Poyun had something to do with it!"
"The kid from the inspector's family?"
"Yeah! He just about knocked Ah-Sang off the mountain earlier. Can't you do anything about him?"
"Jinlin, I'm just a trainee. I can't do anything."
"Just a trainee? You already managed to summon a god!"
"One that's completely useless here. What am I supposed to do, run Poyun through with a pair of tusks?"
Human children were so noisy.
Although, Chiyou supposed the gods were really not much better. Erlang Shen might have learned to appear refined and elegant, but his arrogance made him prone to throwing a fit whenever he was proven wrong or incompetent. Chiyou was willing to bet this was the reason he placed the binding spell on a pair of bracelets instead of a necklace, which was easily hidden, or a headband, which wouldn't look out of place. Only small children wore gold bracelets with bells on them.
Chiyou pulled himself the rest of the way up the slope with no help from the pair of boys squabbling at the top. When they finally noticed him standing next to them, the smaller boy called Jinlin choked in surprise.
"You—" He glanced down the snow-covered slope, then to Chiyou's diminutive hands which were red and bleeding. The boy's eyes brightened with alarm. "Are you alright? How did you get up here so fast?"
The answer was fairly obvious and didn't need to be stated, but the two boys waited for an answer nonetheless.
"…I climbed," Chiyou said after an awkward pause. His voice was still a bit scratchy and hoarse. "It's not that steep."
The younger boy darted forward and grabbed his hand. Chiyou flinched, but didn't pull away. Of course, it wasn't out of fear, but the sudden disregard for his personal space had started him. Even before his attempt to destroy the mortal realm, not a single god in the heavens would have dared to touch him in such a brazen manner, including Erlang Shen. The Grand Marshal knew to keep his hands to himself unless he wanted to lose them.
"You're freezing!" The boy ignored his wary gaze and breathed a puff of warm air over his reddened fingers, then rubbed them together. When he realized his flushed skin wasn't red only from the cold, he grimaced and wiped the blood off on his pants.
Chiyou took the opportunity to reclaim his hands.
"I'm fine," he said. "They're just scratches."
"Well…" The boy hesitated, but decided to trust him. After all, they weren't on a mountain in the middle of a snowstorm for the fun of it. Erlang Shen had said the sect was in the middle of a selection process. "If you're feeling fine, then let's hurry. We've got to catch up with the others if we want to stand a chance. And Baji! Can't you do something about Poyun? He's going to get someone killed!"
Jinlin didn't give the older child a chance to answer. He dashed away, down a crude path cut through the forest; it was slowly disappearing beneath the heavy snowfall and would be difficult to spot from the main road in a few hours. Jinlin didn't pay the treacherous path any mind and tugged a reluctant Chiyou behind him.
The sect's selection process seemed to be more than a simple race through the mountains. Jinlin would periodically stop and dart off the path to search the base of certain trees. Chiyou watched him, unable to figure out the reason for his ridiculous and aimless scurrying. However, every time the boy passed his motionless form, he sat him a worried frown with brows furrowed and eyes brimming with curiosity.
"What?" Chiyou finally said.
"What did you do to piss Poyun off?" Jinlin pulled him down an embankment. He was naturally a little clumsy, but quick enough on his feet to scale the slope without falling face first in the snow. "He's a bully for sure, but he's usually all talk. I've known him since we were kids. The most he ever did to me was throw rotten fruit at my head. I can't believe he's gotten so bold."
Chiyou decided it was best not to answer and instead made himself look busy, though he still didn't know what they were searching for.
After a while, Jinlin gave up questioning him and returned to his own search.
"Nothing here, either," he sighed, sitting back on his heels. "How're we supposed to tell a century's old ginseng root from a regular one?"
Chiyou paused, wrist-deep in snow. That was it? That was the competition? Even with his divine form sealed, he was still able to perceive the spiritual energy in the world around him. If he concentrated, he could even siphon enough off for his own use.
The natural world was overflowing with spiritual energy. The wild and ruthless energy carried by a raging river felt different from the subdued and dense energy contained in the trees and earth. Finding a hundred year old ginseng was an easy task.
However, Chiyou was a god born into this world to represent an intrinsic part of the natural order and these were only human children. They had never cultivated or opened their minds to touch the realm of the divine. All of their years of life so far did not amount to even a blink in time to a god as old as Chiyou. It was unfair of him to judge Jinlin for his ignorance.
The boy stabbed the frozen ground with a blunt knife aimlessly. Chiyou finally grabbed the boy by the wrist to stop his reckless digging and narrowed his eyes at him.
"Don't be so careless," he scolded him. "You will damage the root if you keep digging anywhere you please. Slow down. You can't identify a hundred year old ginseng by sight alone."
Although the mortal realm paled in comparison to the bountiful spiritual energy in the heavens, anything that had accumulated the energy of the natural world for long enough would gain a vitality of its own. It could not be called true sentience, but the pulse of life was strong enough to mimic it.
Chiyou burrowed into the earth with his bare hands, ignoring the dirt wedged beneath his fingernails and the cold piercing his skin.
Jinlin looked over his shoulder and blinked at him with wide eyes like a curious animal, then burst into a grin.
"Wow, you know your stuff. Where're you from? What's your name?"
Chiyou paused. To find a hundred year old ginseng, eradicate all of the shamans in the mortal realm—those were easy tasks. He could complete them even if he was half-dead and have time and energy to spare. However, this was one question he had never truly had to answer in the tens of thousands of years since his creation.
"I'm Chiyou," he finally said. Jinlin was only a child, his age barely into the double digits, so he failed to detect the hesitation in Chiyou's voice.
There really was no need for him to hesitate. No mortal would know his personal name. Even the few rare shamans with the ability to commune with the Pantheon of gods that presided over the universe only knew the gods by their titles.
Such as Erlang Shen, whose personal name was Yang Jian. Or Sanshengmu, whose name was Huayue.
"Chiyou?" Jinlin echoed, oddly delighted by his half-hearted introduction. "I'm Jinlin! I'm from Bie Village."
"Bie?" Chiyou repeated, frowning slightly. It was such an ominous name. "As in 'parting' and 'farewell'?"
"Yeah, a lot of people from my village work with the dead." Jinlin's enthusiasm withered a little. A bit subdued, he asked, "What about you?"
Chiyou chose that moment to unearth a ginseng root from a deep hole he had been working on for the past few minutes. The root was filled with raw and pure spiritual energy, but for a god like him, a hundred year old ginseng barely qualified as a snack. He handed it to Jinlin without a second thought.
"Here. Found one."
Jinlin was instantly distracted by the root placed in his hands. The quality was actually rather good with few impurities. By Chiyou's estimate, the root was probably a hundred and fifty to two hundred years old. Two hundred years passed in the blink of an eye to a god, but to a mortal, it far exceeded their natural lifespan.
Jinlin looked a bit puzzled, but he ultimately shoved the ginseng back into Chiyou's hand and kept digging in earnest with his small, rusty knife.
"You're the one who found it," Jinlin said while Chiyou stared at him, quietly amazed this boy had enough integrity to decline such a rare gift given freely. "I'm not like Poyun, stealing credit from others."
Chiyou watched the boy scrape at the frozen earth. It was a strange assignment. Consuming a plant filled with spiritual energy would benefit a being like himself. One strong enough could heal wounds in his inner core and stabilize his meridian pathways. However, mortal bodies were far less efficient and couldn't make full use of the plant's properties. That was the reason shamans opted to borrow a god's powers instead of refining their own cores.
"What do they do with the ginseng?" Chiyou asked.
"It's supposed to help balance out the effects of the drugs we use to connect with the gods, but Baji can tell you more. He was actually able to call a god recently, and he'll be going to Sinegard this summer as long as he passes the Keju."
"…You want to be one, too." Chiyou brushed the dirt off the gnarled root in his hands.
"What?"
"A shaman."
"Of course!" Jinlin's wide smile popped into view again. "Someone has to keep the tradition alive. We're just lucky that the Empress is one of us and values our service to the country. Why do you ask? Aren't you here because you want to become a shaman, too?"
Chiyou supposed the allure of power beyond mortal limits was tempting to such weak and short-lived beings, but the inevitable fate of all shamans was madness and imprisonment. To him, three thousand years of imprisonment was not such a long time, but to humans, it would feel like eternity.
"Yes, of course," he replied half-heartedly.
Jinlin was too young, naive, and excited by the whole ordeal to read the lack of enthusiasm in his voice. The boy took his thin, fake smile at face value and continued to dig aimlessly in the snow and ice. Chiyou watched him, unable to understand the source of his dedication.
In the end, Jinlin had very little innate spiritual awareness and only found the required piece of ginseng due to Chiyou's subtle guidance. The sun was sinking into the horizon by the time they found the correct path back to the base of the mountain. The wind clawed at their limbs as they finally emerged from the trees, soaking went and stiff from ice and fatigue.
Jinlin was trembling, but a painfully wide grin spread across his face when they reached a lone pavilion overlooking a frozen river.
A small crowd had already gathered on the cliff. Most were children under the age of fourteen and the rest were adults wearing self-important smiles and arrogance stitched into every line of their clothes.
Jinlin bristled next to him as soon as he saw a tall boy with a boastful grin in the crowd. He was surrounded by several other children, all fawning over him with false sincerity.
Chiyou tugged sharply on Jinlin's sleeve.
"Don't bother," he said. "It's not worth a fight."
Jinlin frowned, looking quite wronged by his attempt to save the boy from a thrashing.
"He could have really hurt you."
"But I'm not hurt. I'm fine." Chiyou redirected his attention to the pavilion, where the examiners were marking scores down after inspecting the pieces of gingseng the children found. "Anyway, aren't we supposed to turn these in?"
The examiners accepted the entries with overly solemn expressions. They had remarkably poor spiritual awareness, yet possessed such arrogant and self-important confidence in their rulings. They gave certain applicants a small nod of approval but handled several roots of high quality ginseng with the same care they would a piece of rotten fruit. Needless to say, none of the adults present had a connection to the gods.
Erlang Shen had told him that this sect worshipped the Lotus Warrior. Clearly, none of them had inherited his power. Chiyou did not understand why they insisted on raising shamans despite their lack of power, but he supposed the reason didn't matter in the end.
"The age of gods is over," Erlang Shen had declared with absolute certainty. The fate of all shamans under heaven had already been decided and Chiyou was merely the tool used to see that fate come to pass. In the tens of thousands of years since his creation, Chiyou had never once failed to eradicate his enemies.
Chiyou was the god of war and his will was an extension of heaven's will. All of the gods were, ultimately, no more than the tools by which the natural forces of the world continued to turn.
Chiyou did not hold grudges or resentment. His only desire was to carry out his orders as efficiently as possible.
If he had access to his full range of powers, he would have been able to wipe this sect out immediately. He wouldn't have to pretend to be a meek and clueless child. Now that he was stuck in this weak form with orders to be as discreet as possible, he had to be a little more creative. He couldn't call down a deluge of heavenly thunder to strike them all dead. He had to think of something else.
Even in this diminished state, he could have taken on everyone in the immediate vicinity, albeit with a few injuries. Nothing they could do would even come close to killing him, but it would attract attention—maybe even from the Empress who Jinlin had spoke so highly of.
When the selection ended at sundown, Chiyou was still no closer to figuring out a solution to his problem.