Once I was done I realized that I had just spent most of the night, seven hours, grinding out talismans for the caravan and wanted to do something a bit more creative. Even with this planet’s days being longer than Earth’s, I only had two hours before sunrise left. Theoretically, any technique or formation could be made into a talisman, so I had a few ideas for unusual talismans.
First, I wanted to see if you could use a talisman as a qi gathering pill. I made a level one talisman that did nothing but try to recharge the talisman, an idea I had to try and make the rechargeable talismans not need spirit stone or manual recharge from someone with a specific root. The markings took up too much room, though, limiting how complex the effect could be, so I abandoned the idea, but for this type of talisman it was fine. If I activated the talisman it would start gathering qi using a modified qi cloud technique, drawing qi into the talisman until it was full. The biggest problem was in detecting when it was full, but after five or six burnt out talismans I eventually had one that could work.
It was too annoying to use, though, as it would recharge after fifteen to thirty seconds, I would drain it quickly, then I would need to activate it again to have it recharge. While I could drain it faster than it recharged, if a person at the first level like Jiang or Five used it it might be useful. Still, I considered it a failure. What if I made it out of something else and connected it to a spirit stone so that it could store more? Other than the fact that I was moving away from the idea of a talisman into device territory, that was essentially a qi battery. My cell phone had a small one in case I needed bursts of power for a few minutes that exceeded the phone’s gathering capacity. Once I got back to Earth I could just use them. While this experiment might allow me to sell such things on Ilarya before the war was over, it wasn’t really useful. I even thought of having the talisman automatically inject the qi into the user at the same rate it gathered it, only to realize I had just reinvented the gathering bracelet. I would need to think outside the box if I wanted something that could survive the war ending.
After a few minutes I thought about making talismans that reproduced cultivation effects. The first thing I thought of was trying to place cultivation seeds in talisman that could then be transferred to the user. Making the idea work was more difficult than I thought, though, as the idea of copying the seed didn’t work and I returned to single use seeds. If I, for example, placed my knowledge of muscle refinement into a talisman and the person used it too many times their muscles would refine heavily along certain paths, but they would also have severe flaws in their muscle refinement. That meant that the safest seed to risk people overusing was likely the generic mind and body seeds. They would upgrade every system based on what was easiest to do, hitting natural limits based on the level of the talisman, and the improvements would generally mimic the natural upgrade pattern of drawing in large amounts of qi, so the chance of someone being harmed by them was low.
Just as the sun rose I made the last mark. Unlike the previous attempts, which all either failed to activate or rapidly lost all of the qi contained within the talisman, this one appeared stable. I fed a tiny bit of qi into it and it started to activate, and I could feel my tendons start to loosen a bit. I stopped feeding qi into it and it stopped functioning, having only expended a fraction of a percent of its qi. I refilled it from my internal stores and put it away. Unfortunately, I had only managed to make the equivalent of an early level one body cultivation seed, one which could only improve you to being on par with an early level one body cultivator, as weakening the seed helped the effect stabilize. I knew that I must be making a critical mistake that was causing the seed itself to destabilize, but at least I had, as far as I knew, created a new type of talisman that didn’t appear on the market. The low level of the effect was a problem, as I doubted it could refine a body system past a rating of thirty or forty on Earth’s scale, roughly equal to someone in decent shape, the loosening of my tendons which the talisman caused being no more effective than a light massage, but for now I at least had a proof of concept.
I hadn’t slept last night, but didn’t feel very tired, so I simply stood in the bathtub, used a cleaning spell on myself and my clothes, then got dressed again. The tub now had a bit of body soil in the bottom of it, which a servant would need to clean, but at least I didn’t smell like that myself. After using the bathroom I made sure I had stored all of my belongings and went to the dining room. Some of the servants had brought tables and chairs outside into the courtyard in front of the dining room and everyone that was part of the caravan had a seat there. I found my seat at the main table and sat down. A few minutes later the Ambassador, Ji Bo and Ji Wan entered together and sat near me. We were the four most powerful people in the caravan, three level threes and a level two that was second in command. While there were more powerful guards than him in terms of combat ability and cultivation, he was in command of the expedition while they were in command of troops, a subordinate position.
The three of them were discussing the path we would take to Crystal Summit, though I doubted I could have any meaningful input so I didn’t join the conversation. Once the remaining people of the caravan arrived Ji Bo announced the travel plans to those gathered. We would be taking the Northern gate down into the valley, then following the road northwest towards Mortal Valley. This valley was in the middle of a large oval shaped mountain range which an underground river had cut a path through. Many said that thousands of years ago it had been an inland sea, with the valley’s higher altitude northern inlet river feeding it, when someone or some thing tried to tunnel through the southern part of the mountain. The massive water amount of water pressure at the bottom of the sea breached into the tunnel, eroding a cave system and allowed the water to rapidly drain out.
To enter the valley one went through a large cave system where several long-mined out spirit stone deposits sat in the walls, leaving only the stones that weren’t worth mining. Once one got about half way through the cave, however, the qi levels in the spirit stones and the air started to rapidly decrease, and by the time one entered the thousand li tall and five hundred li wide valley all of the qi would be missing from the air. While the valley was home to over a million mortals, it had only a few cultivators, almost all of them travelers who were moving between the larger Northern cities like Crystal Summit and the smaller southern cities like High River.
The people of the valley had developed a unique culture based on ancestral worship and spiritual teachings, and most of the cultivators who chose to live there were middle level one or lower monks and priests who chose their religious practices over the strength and long life cultivation offered. To the surprise of the other high ranking level two guards which joined us, Ji Bo advised them not to provoke the locals. Many of the local priests and monks had strange abilities which could affect higher ranked cultivator despite using little qi. The locals called these effects “magic” and the effects of cultivator techniques “arts”, seeing the things we could do as merely a more powerful form of martial arts. The martial artists in the valley, despite being level one at best, were highly skilled to the point that even the high level two caravan guards would need to expend considerable qi in order to defeat them in combat.
We were also warned to be on the lookout for Human Spirits. This was a rare phenomenon that many of the newer guards didn’t seem to have heard of before. I saw Qin Jiang sitting at the end of the table for the low ranking guards along with three other level one women, but saw her shudder when he mentioned Human spirits, revealing her fear of them. I tried to reach out to her in my mind, then remembered that I had dissolved the contract upon exchanging copies of the new contract, thus removing my mental connection to her. While I could reach out to her with telepathy, she hadn’t yet learned the technique, so she couldn’t respond.
In this world, with its higher levels of qi, the souls of the dead were often too weak to withstand the ambient qi, being destroyed by the natural background pressure before they could manifest, much like how liquid qi harmed low level cultivators, and therefore the dead humans were only able to run from the underworld if they were extremely strong willed. In the valley, however, the background level was so low that they could easily manifest, then begin feeding on the chi to get stronger. Spirits could only feed to certain types of qi, known as Miasma and some Yin qi, and didn’t have much of a physical form to hold qi, so they weren’t able to cultivate very quickly, but they could eventually get as strong as cultivators and naturally had the ability to possess bodies that were weaker than them. With only the ability to remember their life events tied to strong emotions, however, they were generally mentally unstable and malevolent, often killing for fun.
Animal spirits also sometimes came into existence there, though much more rarely than human spirits, and they would usually behave much as they did in life, though often decaying and growing more unstable with time. The worst of them were usually animals that attacked humans before dying, and which continued to do so at night. The sun was associated with yang qi, which was a poison to animal and human spirits, so they rarely came out during the day, but the moon was associated with yin qi. The activity of human and animal spirits often followed the lunar cycle, with few spirits appearing when the moon was new but many appearing when it was full. We would be leaving the valley about three days before full moon, so it was likely that we would encounter them at least once.
There were also rarely plant spirits. While mundane plants sometimes also formed spirits, if these spirits were from spirit plants they would be a naturally occurring medicine spirit, and would be worth at least a thousand stones. Most medicine spirits in the Black Dragon Mountain Region came from Mortal Valley, as they were far more common there despite the rarity. If anyone in our group happened to find one they were ordered to notify Ji Bo or Ji Wan immediately, as they would be carrying spirit catching artifacts.
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After traveling through the valley we would continue to travel roughly northwest up a long mountain road until we reached Crystal Summit. There we would give the main family branch the supplies we were carrying, Ji Wan would return home and a guard captain name Ji Tul would take over as the assistant caravan master. We would then load up the wagon with raw materials and specialties from the city and set out within three days to return to High river. I knew that the Ambassador would be talking with the main family during that time in hopes of persuading them to become business partners, but that wasn’t part of the presentation.
When he was finished, Ji Bo sat down. Several people started asking questions and Ji Bo did his best to answer them. The main question was how they should defend against human spirits. This was easy, however. Because high qi pressure damaged them, qi based attacks, even something as simple as qi blast, can harm them. A man’s qi was also slightly yang attributed, so their attacks would be more effective, while a woman’s was slightly yin attributed, so their attacks would be less effective. Strangely, that fact didn’t cause there to be more female human spirits than male human spirits, as the qi inside the corpse of the dead person wasn’t used during the spirit’s formation.
When the meal was over I started handing out talismans. There were eighty four people in this caravan, seventy eight people from the Ji family, the Ambassador, myself, Jiang, and three comfort women that were hired from a local brothel, so I had enough lantern talismans that everyone received one. I also almost had enough stun talismans for everyone to take one, only leaving out Jiang, the three comfort women that were with her, and some of the weaker level one family guards, as it was unlikely that they would be able to do much with them in actual combat. By contrast, all of the level one cultivators, including Jiang and the three comfort women, got reusable level two barrier talismans and the three remaining talismans went to the three weakest level twos. These were meant to keep people alive, so I wanted to give them to those with the highest chance of getting hit. The level three barrier talismans went to the Ambassador, Li Bo, and the highest rated level two fighters, as they were the ones that were most likely to get into heavy fights and need them, plus it was my job to keep the Ambassador safe. I didn’t keep one, as I would be equipped with the seal plate and therefore had a superior barrier already.
I explained to everyone about the fact that the level two stun and barrier talismans were rechargeable, and how to recharge them. “These stun talismans use about ten stones of qi each time you activate them, so you should have hundreds of shots, but just keep that in mind. The barriers burn about a stone per minute even when not under attack, so only use them if you are in danger, or you might run out of qi in the barrier when you need it. Only myself, the Ambassador, or Ji Bo are actually capable of recharging these without depleting a stone, as we are the only level threes on this trip, so you might not be able to get it recharged if you recklessly use it.”
When I sat down the men started talking about how amazing it was to have a talisman that could be refilled with qi. Ji Bo quickly asked me about the cost however, as he didn’t want to lose money on the trip. “Well, I could probably sell all of them except for the lanterns for at least twenty stone each, if not more, but I’m giving them to the people in the caravan for free in order to get publicity. I’m hoping to sell them one day and if your people tell others about them that will increase demand. I can then either charge more if there is a material shortage or sell more talismans if there isn’t.”
Ji Bo nodded. “That is definitely thinking like a business man. When producing a new product you need to create a new market for it. I understand.” He nodded and sipped his tea. “Would you be willing to discuss allowing others to invest in such a business?”
I shrugged. “My Dao companion and I started a small business in our homeland which sells low end artifacts she crafts and low end techniques I created, with our target market being low level cultivators and rich mortals. Now that I’ve learned to make talismans, I was planning on selling them through that business, and I’m not sure how she feels about bringing in outside investors. I will have to ask her about that after we return home, then discuss it with you afterwards.”
Ji Bo nodded. “Why low end cultivators? These talismans can easily be sold to cultivator families and high ranking cultivators.”
“Sheer numbers, mostly. Yes, high level cultivators have far more money, but level ones outnumber level twos fifty to one, and level twos out number level threes one hundred to one. That means that for every level three cultivator I might sell to, there are over five thousand level ones and twos that I could sell to. Furthermore, the level threes will demand high quality goods, whereas level ones and twos are willing to accept lower quality goods. The talisman I handed you looks extremely basic, not at all like the level three talismans in the store with meaningless artwork on them. That makes them cheaper and easier to make, so I can make them faster and hire people with slightly lower skill to do so.”
“But isn’t that a bit much for them to afford? You said that they cost twenty or thirty stones each. A level two might be able to spend a month’s salary on one, but would a level one spend a year’s salary?”
“True, that’s ten to fifteen months earnings for a level one, but think about it this way. They are getting a limited use spell an entire major realm stronger than them, which means that they can take on enemies a major realm stronger than them and easily defeat an enemy at their own level. That can drastically increase their earning potential.”
He nodded while sipping tea again. “In that case, could the Ji family supply any specific goods you might need?”
I thought for a few seconds. “Do you have a source for level three beast leather talisman papers? I might be able to accept just the hides and blood of level three spirit beasts, but I’m worried that the blood might go bad before I can pick them up. If you have the papers, I can pay a stone each for them. If you have anyone with experience working leather or imbuing qi into an artifact or magic weapon to improve its level, the technique for making this leather is quite similar. They should be able to easily learn it from the Talismonger’s Path book, though they will likely need to be at least level three to make the leather.” I was down to nineteen leathers from the flood dragon, and only had a hundred or so level twos and a few hundred level ones besides that. Level threes would be much harder to find than level twos, though.
He nodded. “I’ll go ask Ji Quan if we have anyone that can learn to make them after we finish eating. I rarely see level three beast hides on the market, though, so we might not have a source of raw materials.”
“That’s the same issue I’m having. All of mine were retrieved from a hidden realm, so I lack a source. Furthermore, level three spirit beasts usually have human level intelligence, and I’m not comfortable sending people to hunt them. That sounds more like an assassination than a hunt.”
“If you aren’t comfortable killing them, then how did you get the ones you have?” he questioned.
“It’s not that I won’t kill them, it’s that I won’t set out to kill them. Intelligent ones can sometimes be negotiated with. In the case of these hides, however, they attacked us first, and we defended ourselves. I see taking their hides as being similar to looting the corpses of bandits after killing them.” I finished the last dumpling on my plate and continued. “I suppose if one wants to be consistent, you could argue that it is similar to demonic cultivators using human skin to create relics. I would argue that the fact that spirit beasts are not naturally born intelligent and only become so after their brain is refined to the level of a human makes it a different situation that doesn’t fit either argument perfectly.”
Ji Bo nodded. “I haven’t actually thought about the philosophy of hunting spirit beasts before. I assume your position is the same as those beast tamers in the White Tiger Sect?”
I nodded. “Similar, but they prefer to save the lives of any that are injured in combat so that they can be domesticated or taken as companions. I’m far more willing to let my enemies die for attacking me. I gave the men stun talismans, however, because I want to try and capture as many as possible. The Ambassador and I want to bring as many spirit beasts as possible back home to strengthen the herds and introduce more variety, so if we are attacked by spirit beasts, please instruct the men to stun them if possible. We can then capture all of them and take them with us. The talismans will also allow you to stun all of the bandits we come across, so that you can sell them to Crystal Summit.” I took a sip of my tea, the group being given the last of the purple cloud tea from yesterday, and Ji Bo nodded. “Though now that I think about it, I doubt mine and the Ambassador’s beast bags can carry all of the spirit beasts we come across. We may need to only bring the half bloods and stronger back with us.”
“We actually have many beast bags here.” said Ji Bo. “Though they are extremely basic in appearance, as we only use them for moving livestock. There is also a bit of time to send people out to buy more, though only farm supply stores will be open before we leave, as they open just after sunrise, so you will only get the basic model.” He had one of the servants run to the barn and grab the bags from a shelf. Two minutes later the man sat an arm load of what looked like burlap sacks on the ground, though from the qi they were giving off they were all early level one items.
“There were eight of them at that location, sir.” The man said. “I sent lower servants to search other locations for them as well, like the general storage and other barns.” Ji Bo nodded and I got up to inspect the bag. The stabilization wasn’t quite as good as my bag, so I would be able to shrink animals much smaller than with mine, but these bags could likely hold a small elephant. It should be more than enough for a few dozen wolves or boars, with room for hundreds of rabbits or small birds, even including fifty of something the size of a turkey or peacock. These seemed to be designed to keep the animals separate with a much stronger sleep effect as well, which would help when transporting livestock. The Ambassador's bag and mine only had a weak calming effect, not a full sleep effect, and only one area the size of a large cow. This was fine when carrying a spirit companion which was under contract, but with actual wild animals the sleep effect would likely be more useful.
“Please send people to the farm supply stores as well.” I said, pulling a spare storage bag out and transferring my final three hundred stones into it. “Buy every bag you can, but if there isn’t enough money, I prefer internal size to looks. We are moving wild animals, not prize livestock or spirit pets, so quality isn’t that important as long as we can keep them contained until we get home.” Ji Bo nodded and called to several nearby cleaning staff. They were given tokens with the family crest which acted as a reminder that the family owed them a debt. These were crude tokens, denoting a small monetary debt, so they couldn’t be abused too much by the vendors, but would serve to prove that the servants were honest about the family needing them and paying the debt back soon.
