The farther away from the capital he got, the more confident Sen felt that he’d outrun any potential pursuit. Not that he expected that pursuit would herald any violence, just the imposition of deeply unwanted obligations. If the king had asked for his presence, Sen would have been hard-pressed to come up with a good reason why he couldn’t go. It wasn’t really Jing that Sen wanted to avoid. It was the prospect of some formal event in which he would be required to pretend to care about the things that nobles would say to him or try to rope him into. The very idea was enough to make his skin crawl. Sen thought he’d have found it personally easier to say no to the sects. He’d had a lot of practice at saying no to sects or at least saying no to sect members. On balance, though, he expected that would end up having more negative consequences for him in the long run. He was just happy that he’d managed to avoid the problem on that visit.
He was less hopeful that he’d escape so easily on his next visit unless he was very sneaky about coming and going. Not that city walls posed any kind of real obstacle to him, but he had to imagine that there were people assigned to watch for things like cultivators blatantly ignoring protections like walls. Although, even there, he did have advantages he could deploy that would make getting noticed unlikely. Still, every additional step and sneaky move was an opportunity to draw a lot more attention than he wanted on him. Still, with the capital well behind him, Sen stopped feeling like it was an absolute requirement to set up an obscuring formation every single night. He’d discovered that most spirit beasts were quite willing to detour around dangerous formations. He didn’t know if they recognized the formations for what they were or instinctively sensed the danger they represented. He didn’t think it mattered that much on his side of things. He didn’t need to understand as long as they found somewhere else to be.
Yet, it seemed the heavens were simply waiting for him to relax his vigilance. The second evening that he decided to forgo the obscuring formation, things immediately took a turn for the weird. Sen had barely gotten his fire started when he felt someone simply walk through his formations like they weren’t even there. That was enough to give him pause. Doing something like that meant that they had either forcibly suppressed the reactions of the formations, which pretty much limited the possibilities down to nascent soul cultivators, or someone understood those formations even better than he did. Neither option left Sen feeling warm and secure. When a figure strode over to the campfire, they were met by the sight of Sen standing there with a spear in hand. They studied each other for long moments across the crackling campfire, faces impassive.
Sen didn’t know what to make the man. He looked to be of an approximate age with Sen, which he knew meant nothing. From what he could glean, the stranger was approximately the same level of advancement, which Sen also knew meant practically nothing in terms of what people could actually accomplish. For someone who had been through the fires of multiple advancements, though, the man was surprisingly plain. He had a wider face with smooth cheeks and heavy eyebrows. Sen couldn’t read anything from the man’s face about what the stranger was thinking. The man eyed the spear curiously but didn’t seem nearly cautious enough about it to suit Sen.
“Are you always this friendly?” asked the man.
“When people barge into my camp after forcing their way through my formations, yes.”
“I don’t mean you any harm.”
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“Said every bandit and murderer in history.”
“That’s a fair point. Perhaps we could just speak for a moment.”“Let’s not.”
“If I did mean you harm, do you really think you could stop me?”
“Yes,” said Sen.
The icy assurance in Sen’s voice seemed to give the man legitimate pause. He gave the spear a longer look.
“That’s a very basic weapon for a core formation cultivator.”
Sen looked down at the spear. It was the one he’d used through most of his time as a foundation formation cultivator. He gave the man a bleak smile.
“It’s killed plenty of core cultivators who thought too much of themselves and not enough of me,” said Sen. “There. We talked. You can go now.”
“I’d have thought someone so hostile would have attacked me by now.”
“Don’t mistake my reluctance to get blood all over this campsite as reluctance to send you to your next life.”
“My name is…” began the stranger.
“I don’t care,” said Sen and let lightning qi infuse the spear.
The stranger took a step back when lightning started to crackle around the spearhead. The passive expression the man had worn up until then shifted into what Sen thought was a much saner wariness.
“That isn’t necessary. We don’t have to fight.”
“It seems like we do since you refuse to leave.”
“Why do you assume I’m your enemy?”
“I’m not even going to dignify that. Let me be as clear as I can be. I’m not interested in whatever you’re selling.”
Heaving a tremendous sigh, the man spoke again. “If I beat you in a fight, will you at least listen to me?”
“No. Because I don’t fight for fun. If we fight, one of us dies.”
The man looked positively baffled at that response. “Haven’t you ever heard of sparring?”
“Sparring is for children, training, and people you trust. So, I suggest that you take your life, be grateful for it, and leave me alone.”
The stranger lifted his hands in a way that Sen guessed that he was supposed to read as peaceful. He wasn’t moved by this display. If anything, it made him even more tense.
“Is there some other circumstance in which you would be willing to hear me out? At an inn, perhaps?”
“So you can have hostages to threaten? No. I don’t think so.”
“Hostages? Why would I need hostages?”
“Because people don’t like hearing the word no,” said Sen, as he started pouring earth qi into the ground. “A truth that you’ve repeatedly proven by not leaving.”
The stranger took several breaths. “I’m not leaving because I was sent to find you.”
“Yes, I’m sure you were. Sent by a sect, or a king, or someone else that you think I should think is important. Well, I don’t think they’re important. I don’t want to meet them. And I have no intention of getting involved. I’m done getting involved with other people’s problems.”
The stranger looked at Sen like it was the first time he was truly seeing him. “You mean that don’t you? You truly don’t care why I’m here, where I came from, or who sent me. There are literally no words that will convince you of anything I say.”
“You do understand. Good. Now, please leave me alone.”
“What could have possibly happened to fill you with this much disdain and distrust for people you don’t even know?”
“Oh, that’s easy. I have lived to regret it nearly every time I’ve ever listened to a stranger. It always leads to the same place. Me standing over a mound of dead bodies,” said Sen.
“That isn’t what I want.”
“It’s never what anyone says they want, but it’s always the price of getting what they want. Except I’m the one who ends up doing the killing. Well, not this time. If there are people who need killing, go home and do it yourself.”
“They told me this would be difficult, but I never dreamed you would be this broken.”
Whatever tenuous grip on civility that had kept Sen going through the very aggravating conversation disappeared. It was replaced with a familiar, deadly calm.
“We’re done now,” said Sen.
“Wait, I…”
“I have been exceedingly patient with you. That’s over. We’re done. You can go, or you can die.”
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