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237 - The Red Lady's Return [Sturmblitz]
🕑 Added 2023-05-21 18:53:36 +0000 UTCKarmesin's return to Arches had gone almost suspiciously smoothly.
None in Arches knew of her escapades in Borea beyond the fact she brought back a bounty of rare resources and relics that could buy a city. Some were what she had taken from the Crescent Jungle herself, some she had traded with the exiles, and some she had received as gifts for participating in the subjugation of Eisengeist. Most valuable among them, to her, was some of the dragon's own flesh and blood. The quantity was comparatively small to the huge haul the Newman Sect had taken with them, but on its own, Karmesin's share would still be considered a superlative bounty... Which was why she had to keep it hidden, mostly from anyone from Pateiria who might think to divest her of her spoils. It still felt utterly bizarre to have foreigners admit to her claim, and without protest at that, but here she was. Her opinion of Boreans had grown quite significantly during her time in their land, even if she still found their honor system to be asinine.
The good duke, bless his mildly schizophrenic mind, was over the moon over a single cask of Borean blood-mead.
Karmesin couldn't just up and found her own sect, certainly not the way Newman had done. Not for lack of ability or knowledge. She did, after all, qualify for the program that turned her into a Tiger-class chimera by fighting her way up through the local world of martial arts. But she was not a cultivator in the traditional sense, the path she trod was one whose very beginning had been a fortuitous encounter on par with meeting a hidden elder and being given a cultivation method for the tiniest, flimsiest excuse, like helping the old man pick herbs. She still didn't look back on those weeks of gruesome metamorphosis fondly, especially since she had grown into a local bogeyman in that area, but... Karmesin's path was not one that could be passed down in a manner befitting of a real sect's doctrine. At best, she might be able to formulate something new using her own experience, especially pertaining to managing constructs and spiritual strain.
Perhaps her understanding of the Black Rod Trigrams would one day grow enough to be written down as a scripture, but she suspected it would be a long while before then. She'd been concerned that merely using the Trigrams would risk anyone who saw them gaining insight, but something in her mind pushed back against the idea, perhaps the very knowledge of the Trigrams themselves. Searching back, Karmesin narrowed down the moment when the splinter of knowing had lodged itself into her. She had thought it to be merely looking at the sigils on the Black Rod she had helped Zefaris create, but that wasn't it. It was her involvement in the formation, somehow... And something else. Some vague sense of approval from the very idea of the Black Rod Trigrams themselves. She may have discarded that idea if it was not entirely in line with the symbols' eldritch nature. Merely imagining them still exerted a tickling strain behind her forehead.
Regardless of potential future insight, right now, she lacked the means to properly make the most of the New Era of Cultivation. Forming a sect under her own control was nonetheless high on her list of priorities, being that such an organization was an all-in-one package of military, political, ideological, and economic influence. Some of Ikesia's regions even extended a whole bevy of benefits merely for placing one's sect within their borders; compensation for the deterrence factor.
The political implications were another thing to consider. She couldn't afford to place herself as the head of a sect, not without obtaining the Emperor's direct approval. Though she was fairly confident she could achieve that, it would place her sect directly under his control by one means or another, and would attract more of his attention than she liked. At this moment, she felt comfortable having the exact amount of His Divinity's attention that she did; enough to bypass bureaucracy and receive support if she truly needed it, but not enough that He paid her any personal attention on a regular basis. So long as the White Dragon of the North received his tael of silver, he would leave her be.
Sourcing disciples would be no issue, especially since Arches already had a martial arts school whose disciples showed enough promise to worry the old Order of the Dragon on occasion.
No, the hard part would be sourcing actual techniques to make use of.
Her trusted right-hand man and contact in the Land of Lingering Smoke, Meng, was just the man for the job.
When she gave him the assignment of sourcing a cultivation method, she did so with the explicit instruction to avoid manuals that seemed to be extraordinarily special, desiring a method which didn't demand specific relics or constitutions. In short, she wanted something that could be practiced by a medium-sized sect without rousing suspicion. It would be, after all, her sect's surface-level cover method, while she herself would work on sourcing something for the core disciples.
Before he left her, however, she asked him another question. One of curiosity.
"Meng, what is your actual name? You just took the Emperor's mortal name and replaced one letter for your alias."
"It was the most common name at the time I picked it, Lady Karmesin. If you wish to know a more truthful name to call me by, or perhaps one which does not hearken back to His Divinity's mortal past, then I would offer up Fu Chen," he replied. Nothing to his voice or aura suggested any deception to his words, but Karmesin knew that this, too, was an alias. That wording was almost aggressively noncommittal. For all she knew, the man might have so many aliases that his own name was lost among them.
"Before you go... Keep an eye out for promising alchemists."
"As you wish, Lady Karmesin."
