Ren felt an intense relief when teacher Fan said that array flags would be provided. He had been dreading using simple stone plates as array flags in front of others at his new formations class. When he arrived, he saw that everyone had a short but wide table to sit behind. On the tables were 27 carved sticks of wood. Also in front of him were blank sticks of wood, a short scroll, and a carving tool. Teacher Fan swept in just then, introduced himself, and began teaching.

  “You young disciples are embarking on the path of formations. True mastery of formations is a journey without end, but it must begin somewhere, and it is my honor to guide you.”

  “Formations are one of cultivators’ most important creations and are fundamental for crafting tools and weapons, capturing beasts, refining pills beyond our realms, protecting ourselves, and defeating foes. Used right, formations can give you twice the results for half the effort.”

  “Since this is the basic class and most of you are new to the sect, you may borrow the array flags before you. We will begin with simple formations, and you will use the given technique to control them. Poor control of qi can break the flags, and a few failures are accepted, so you will carve your own replacements. You have a stick of time to learn the technique, and then we will begin.”

  He then lit a stick of incense and began laying out a formation of his own. Ren quickly studied the simple technique. Similar to his cultivation manual, it called for qi to be channeled through the wood of the array flags and would enable him to move them by will. There were also instructions on carving replacements for the basic array flags he had been given. He practiced carefully so as to not break the flags.

  When the incense had burned down, teacher Fan began speaking again. “Qi flows through nature. Like building a dam on a river, we place array flags to redirect its flow. By harnessing multiple such flows, you can create a formation. Observe.” He began to channel qi, and the formation lit up. This time, Ren could see shifting colors flow through the formation. “The sole purpose of this formation is to let qi be more easily perceived.”

  Then he took it apart with a wave of his hand, impressing all the disciples struggling to maneuver the wobbling sticks through the air. Then he taught them a qi gathering formation. This one was a much more advanced one than the simple one Ren had learned previously. He eagerly absorbed the knowledge, knowing precisely where he would use it himself.

  After the class was over, he stayed to talk with the other classmates. He heard more stories about the developing beast wave. It was a rather popular point of gossip. He shared what he had learned about why Teacher Fan was so popular. Not many other teachers provided free array flags or basic techniques to wield them. His classmates made sounds of agreement.

  Then the topic shifted to why everyone was interested in formations. One classmate was much older than the others. She talked about her experience with formations that led her to join the class. As everyone listened with growing horror, she told a tale of how she had encountered a village being stalked by a demonic cultivator. Over years, he had carved a huge sacrificial formation, intending to use it on the village. He planned to gather the blood essence from the formation to boost his own cultivation. She spoke regretfully about how her team didn’t know how to break the formation and watched helplessly as an entire village shriveled to a husk before their eyes.

  Ren shivered, but such stories were depressingly common. The strong prey on the weak. Demonic or not, cultivators had an inherently selfish perspective on things. If something could benefit you, why leave it for the next to find? Even the legends of his own ancestor who established the Zhao family were the same.

  His parents told the story with pride. How the ancestor had entered a hidden realm containing an inheritance of an immortal alongside hundreds of others and discovered many treasures. Then how he had bested would-be thieves and escaped, one amongst a dozen to exit.

  As a child he loved the daring adventures and often tried to imitate them. But after the scales eventually fell from his eyes, those adventures seemed more like scavengers descending on a carcass, grave robbers stealing everything not nailed down. It was hard to find honor in such actions.

  The elder sister’s tale had dampened the mood, so everyone dispersed. Ren went to the hall of scripture as planned. He approached the elder once again and very respectfully bowed and said,

  “Greetings, senior. I was wondering if I could be of service. I saw careless disciples have disturbed your careful arrangement of the scriptures. Since I have some time, could I assist you in sorting the first floor?

  Ren had practiced the short speech to avoid any indications that could be perceived as blame or anything negative. It was possible that the elder may reject him or accept his aid without payment, but he hoped he wouldn’t. He couldn’t be that shameless?

  The elder looked up and watched him silently. Ren could feel sweat start to bead on his brow and was seriously doubting himself when the elder spoke.

  “Why should I trust you? If you make a mess of my beloved library, how will you answer for it?”

  Ren tried to prove he understood the current organization and even offered to sort it further. He further emphasized how he was a poor new disciple and wanted a chance to bring honor to his sect by assisting in whatever way he could. He tried his best to look impoverished and pitiful.

  The elder seemed to waver. Weighing if this was worth the trouble, but since it was just a matter of the first floor and unimportant beginner-level manuals, he finally accepted.

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  “I’ll give you a month. 1 contribution point a day. If you perform well, I’ll even throw in a bonus of 10 points, but if you make a mess, you will owe me 20 points instead. I’ll be watching, boy. Don’t let me down.”

  It was a bit risky, but Ren accepted enthusiastically. Even if he performed badly, he would still be left with 10 points, but that wasn’t going to happen. He would aim for that bonus. Even the chance to read all those descriptions and learn all the different types of manuals and techniques the sect offered would be very useful knowledge.

  He thanked the elder and began immediately. He went to the previous shelves he had identified by element. Then began hunting for the others. It took him a long time, but he figured out the overall arrangement of the first floor sorted by elements and then another section that was intended for auxiliary methods such as crafting, formations, and others. This section was the messiest and would likely take the longest.

  Ren had a plan. First he would sort the easiest to identify, those by elements. Then the auxiliary. If after that he had time to spare, he would be back and further sort the shelves by either cost or type. He could definitely do all that in a month. He only needed to manage his field and cultivate at least twice a day to not slack off. The formations class was also only once a week. Yes. It was definitely possible.

  While sorting the auxiliary shelves, he had identified the one meant for formations. Thinking of the class he’d attended just that morning, he couldn’t help himself. He felt a little guilty since he had just sworn not to slack off but then justified it as taking a well-deserved break after hours of untangling the mess that was the first floor.

  There were many strange techniques mixed in with the formations, but even those looked interesting. After putting down a technique called the 100 lightning trap formation, the next one he picked up was one of the misplaced ones. This one caught his attention, though. It was a jade slip that appeared very disheveled and dusty, and as he held it in his hands, it gave a sensation of fading ephemerality. It was called “Causality of Karma.”

  It stood out to him because so far out of all the titles he had read, none were about karma. The slip was worth 100 points. Even the description was very vague. It was clearly not a cultivation manual. Ren had no idea where he would sort it. He hoped he wouldn’t find too many of those types, afraid to bother the elder and incur his wrath.

  Ren spent as much time as he could working, and the elder awarded him 1 point at the end. The reward felt disproportionate to his effort, but it was still worth it. He headed home, did maintenance on his field, and began cultivating.

  After he had finished his sword forms, he sat to meditate a little before sleep. For some reason it felt hard to calm his thoughts as they flickered from his class on formations, his new task at the hall of scripture, worries for the future, and events of the past. Even the story of the demonic cultivator would jump to his mind, and then the titles he had read about.

  As the one about karma reoccurred once again, Ren realized maybe there was more to this. His subconscious was nudging him strongly to consider something. It was the sense that he might have finally found the key to understanding whatever had been lingering in his thoughts for days. The cause for this intuition was irrelevant; he needed to act now.

  Ren rarely acted impulsively, but right then he found the qi boosting pill and swallowed it without a single hesitation. He jumped up and began practicing his Grass Blade Manual. As he moved through the stances and felt the qi rush through his meridians, his thoughts aligned and he was enlightened.

  Karma really was the key. His esoteric education had given him a brief understanding of the mysterious force known as destiny or fate, which was implicitly tied with the concept of karma. He was no monk with a deep understanding of karma, only that karma was cosmic merit tied to one's deeds.

  For now, that was enough. That moonlit night when he spared the wounded swamp otter, he must have gained karmic merit. Immediately afterwards, he had been rewarded with a breakthrough. If he stretched that line of thought, even the eagle swooping and driving the steel-haired goats into his trap could be counted amongst his fortune.

  But was mercy alone enough to justify such great rewards? If it was, wouldn’t the world of cultivators be full of kindhearted and merciful people instead of the general trend of selfishness and ruthlessness? Was it simply a reward for going against the norm?

  No. That wasn’t right. There was something he was missing. More qi than ever before was rushing through his body. He barely realized he had easily completed one large round of cultivation and was halfway through the next. The air took on that same sense of weight he had felt that night. Of a sense that something important was going to happen. The stakes weighed heavily on him. Either he would resolve this heart demon, or he would never achieve greatness as a cultivator.

  As he let go completely under the stars and flowed through the sword stances with unearthly grace, Ren came to another epiphany. The disproportionate reward wasn’t for going against the tide and displaying mercy; it was for staying true to himself and his own path when tempted to stray.

  So what was his path that he had unwittingly persevered on? He felt the energy from the pill fading and his body tiring, but he pushed hard. It was on the tip of his tongue. His muscles trembled with exhaustion. He was already on the 6th set of the 2nd round. His meridians ached from channeling qi beyond their limit. He was flagging when it came to him.

  Legacy. As soon as Ren realized it, a storm of energy began rushing through him. His trembling hands steadied around his sword. His aching legs moved with steady surety. The meridians expanded and thrummed with energy. Ren continued to cultivate with the renewed energy.

  The swamp otter had been protecting its legacy, its children, and the treasure it had nurtured for them. By not robbing it and its babies of their legacy, Ren had stayed true to himself and his own beliefs. He didn’t want to be the type of cultivator who only took without giving. He wanted to be the one who left something for those who came after, like his own ancestor had done.

  However, unlike the ancestor, who had built the foundations of a large cultivation family on likely ill-gotten wealth, he wanted to empower the next generation in an honorable and righteous manner and by rewarding the worthy.

  Instead of the one robbing hidden realms, Ren wanted to make them and challenge the delvers. Instead of finding an ancient weapon that, despite its years, was better than anything today, he wanted to make the weapon that would endure beyond its years. Instead of being lucky once in a lifetime to be at the right time and place to devour a spirit herb that slowly cultivated over 1000 years, he wanted to raise those herbs that would live for longer and evade all but the most worthy.

  Instead of finding a ring with the ghost of an ancient cultivator that provided cultivation manuals and secrets, he wanted to… maybe if he could do it without first dying.

  As the secret hope buried deep in his heart, unknown even to himself, was excavated and revealed, he realized what an incredibly troublesome Dao he had chosen for himself. Then he passed out.