“What are you doing here?” Monk Mountain asks Cheeky Monkey.
“Oh, there’s more coming,” he grins before popping a piece of fruit into his mouth at the other monks encouragement. “We got wind that there’s a gathering going on to try to catch ghosts tonight. I came to warn you, but you beat me here. Good thing we’ve got the Demonic Sect Catastrophe, huh?” he says, playfully nudging one of Little Corpse’s Servants with his elbow while grinning cheekily.
-Tch! I knew it!- I glare at Little Corpse who just shrugs and moves to intercept the monk before his Servant snaps. -The masked ones are bonded to my Servant, not me, so they might not like you teasing them. They like me as much as Little Law,- I say while gesturing to the Rules Lawyer.
I get to watch the monks process the name before Little Law grunts, spinning around to put me out of his sight while the other two laugh at his expense.
-And why are you laughing? Huh? Cheeky Monkey! Monk Mountain!- I gesture at them in turn. They exchange looks before all three monks are left laughing and congratulating one another on their new nicknames. -Nonsense!-
Tch! They weren’t supposed to like it!
“There’s still a few hours,” Little Corpse says before laying out panels of my wimble silk. “Monks and living hunans should rest. Take turns on watch if you’d like, but we’ll try to keep you safe. For my Master’s sake,” he murmurs, moving off to the side in quiet contemplation.
I snort.
-Yeah, if anything happens to them they’ll blame me first,- I say in agreement. I go from hungry to sleepy, and I’m pretty sure I just woke up from a two-day nap. -Imma take a nap.- I yawn, shift to my abbreviated form, and immediately pass out mid-curl.
-Wake up,- Little Corpse gently pats me. -The girls’ Pots are full. We need you awake in case you need to do a controlled dump.-
-Take out the trash and take a shit,- I yawn and stretch while Little Corpse stammers and someone sputters and coughs. -Sounds like the monks are still here. Where’re the girls?-
I’m missing something in my cultivation, ‘cause waking up is either all systems online and brain’s booting or brain’s up and running and my Ultravision slowly powers up like an old CRT monitor.
-Bwom,- I say as I finally focus enough to be able to see and think, finding the girls easily. -Bank’s open. Make your deposits.-
The girls shuffle over, open coin purses in hand. They exchange a look, tip the bags towards me, and a cloud pours out, along with screams, that pass straight into me with no effort on my part.
[Tribute]
[+20 -Ghost]
[+1000 x5 -Resentment]
[+10000 -Resentment]
[Ghost Pot +1000/-20]
[Resentment: +7721480/-559795]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1838130/27401047]
[Current Qi: 85340/957945100]
[Max Will: 23944324]
[HP: 23944324]
[Current Karma: 109604189/234520515]
[Resentment Wallet: 200C.St.,113R.Sl.,228R.Sh.,2C.M.R.P.,0D.M.R.N.,10I.D.P.,1A.D.P]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,691K,180P,697R,179Da,258De,2605k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10679St]
-Deposit acknowledged,- I quip, stretching and grooming. -Are there any other services you’d like to make use of today.-
-They’re not going back into your Void, and if they need to make another Deposit, it’ll be later,- Little Corpse sends firmly, Dad voicing putting his foot down on everyone’s grounded asses. -You... No. You’re not glowing or smoking, so we might be good. Are your numbers okay?-
-Iono,- I shrug. Kinda was planning on checking if I glowed or not, but did not think about the Resentment making me look like I was smoking.
[Ghost Pot +1000/-20]
[Resentment: +7721480/-559795]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1838130/27401047]
[Current Qi: 85340/957945100]
[Max Will: 23944324]
[HP: 23944324]
[Current Karma: 109604189/234520515]
-Still not enough Qi even if I did need to dump, so I’ll have to go back to the Exchange to see if there’s anything else I can do, but I think I’m good for now,- I admit, looking around to see light coming in through the door and some screened windows higher up. -Day time. Guess we’re moving the family home. They still alive?-
“They’re fine, and we’re fine, too,” Cheeky Monkey grins, reclined on a silk panel with one leg propped on a raised knee, his free foot just idly drawing a circle in the air.
-Tch!- I glare back at him and he grins wider before Little Corpse gives my side a quick pop. -Oy!- I snap as I dance to spin on him.
[Death Knell]
[+1 Con. Qi]
[-30 -Resentment]
[+30 Resentment]
[+10 Karma]
[Last Rites II Enhanced]
[+1 Con. Qi]
[+1000 +Resentment]
[+1000 Karma]
[Ghost Pot +1000/-0]
[Resentment: +7721480/-559795]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1838130/27401047]
[Current Qi: 85340/957945100]
[Max Will: 23944324]
[HP: 23944324]
[Current Karma: 109604189/234520515]
[Resentment Wallet: 200C.St.,113R.Sl.,228R.Sh.,2C.M.R.P.,0D.M.R.N.,10I.D.P.,1A.D.P]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,691K,180P,697R,179Da,258De,2605k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10679St]
“We need --,”Little Corpse begins, turning to look at the group resting on the panels before turning to glare back at me when I interrupt him.
-Sorry. Finger slipped,- I say as I sit down, making sure to keep my face blank as I stare straight ahead, not looking at anyone.
“What does that even mean...?” he asks before shaking his head. “No. Tch!” -*A few of the spirits that should be Unwilling in your Pot are just working in your Inner Void.
-There’s a new merit system with a minimum qualification for continuing to reside outside of your Ghost Pot since you’re picking up so many squatters.- Little Corpse informs me.
Am I? I didn’t notice.
I open up the Karma Exchange to see if there’s any other options available, and the list keeps scrolling. It’s not grouped by Regard, Qi or Requirements, but I do see a lot of green Exchange buttons ready. I’ll have to go back over them later. For now we’ve got an escort mission.Before I can say a word I’ve got a new marker that says Green River Bank, and I belatedly remember we’re supposed to make sure they don’t get robbed of the coin I gave them, not just their lives and souls.
“We’re not going with you,” Cheeky Monkey chimes in.
-I wasn’t going to take you,- I say, narrowing my eyes at him. Ass.
“Come on! Don’t be angry!” Cheeky Monkey’s limbs shoot out as he flails before he somehow winds up flat on his stomach. He flops his arms and legs up occasionally while trying to convince me that they didn’t do anything wrong. “We were just giving pointers!”
I drone loudly as Little Corpse gets dressed in his hidden cultivator farmer getup that apparently is this world’s version of putting on a pair of over-sized sunglasses. His servants wander back into my void, the girls stand by in fresh robes, their hair done up in some strange fan style versus their braid ball, and then Little Corpse gives me the signal.
Now I’m standing with a family and my group of Ghosts in front of a bank I never did get around to using. I catch a whiff of Trinity as Little Corpse and the girls escort the family into the bank. I shrug, seeing how they’ve got it under control, and wander off to find a fox.
“You didn’t come back to take a nap, did you?” Trinity hiss laughs, posted up literally in a chair near a stall right next to the bank.
-How’d you know I’d be here?- I ask as I gallop over to him.
“I’ve been checking for a while. Didn’t know you were in a coma for a while, and then I came back when you woke up. First time it worked,” he admits, sipping from a cup and grinning at me with his mouthful of tiny sharp teeth.
-I’m glad you’re okay and sorry you never got to meet the cubs,- I sigh. No use wondering if things would have been different without all the hunan interference, but meh.
“Too many people involved,” he shudders.
-You’re good people,- I tell him before getting up and heading back to the bank. Longer I’m near him, more interested someone’s going to get. -Stay safe.-
-They’ve got their accounts sorted, so we can either move back to Eager Heart or the monastery, and you wanted to get a pet Bone Snare from the Graveyards,- Little Corpse sighs, dismissing the girls back to the Ghost Pot. They don’t register as Unwilling, but we’ve got a Contract that appears to still be active, not that that means anything.
-We’ve got Ghosts and Resentment at Eager Heart, but it’s a madhouse during the day,- I shrug. I didn’t see anything, but there’s been several reports.
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
-Let’s check it out, then,- Little Corpse shrugs.
I don’t know if he collected my silk, but it’d be good to double check. I transfer us and he immediately shakes his head while moving to collect the “beds” left from the family leaving.
-I figured we’d be back to check on the monks,- he says as he cleans up. When Cheeky Monkey makes a great show of reclining and snuggling into his sheet while stealing peeks at Little Corpse, Little Corpse frowns back at him. “My Master’s Master kept them in a coma producing silk past the point where they could recover, so she’s leery of anyone manipulating her abilities. You haven’t worked her into a death coma, but she also won’t let you. Truly, it’s no joking matter.
“She doesn’t trust monks now outside of trading, but she will become aggressive towards them if you push her too far,” Little Corpse warns, Cheeky Monkey’s smile falling slowly as they sit up, their hands coming down from where they’d been cushioning their head.
-Tch! Call me lazy, say I sleep all day. I learn from other Spirits that I’m a bank and not supposed to be active at all,- I tell Little Corpse while making a point not to put the monks in my sight. -Oh, but I’m a lazy bug. Helped me clean up the other hunan’s trash? Want me to produce treasure for you, too? Watch if I don’t produce them for myself! Make an army and an empire and trap you on the other side of red tape!-
“We’re back to see these treasure hunters and people who make it safer to move at night,” Little Corpse tells them while moving the trash around. He’s going to make a blind so that he can stay hidden while we wait for sneak thieves.
“We should get going. The next group of day purifiers should be here soon. They might have more information for you,” Little Law says, standing up and folding his bedding before laying it on the ground in front of me. I bank it and we give one another small bows before he stands off to the side, waiting on the others. “It’s too dangerous to leave this place alone, but it’s too dangerous for us to ignore Sorrow’s Roost. We’re spread quite thin. We appreciate the help you’ve given in purifying Resentment.”
[Death Knell]
[+1 Con. Qi]
[-30 -Resentment]
[+30 Resentment]
[+10 Karma]
[Last Rites II Enhanced]
[+1 Con. Qi]
[+1000 +Resentment]
[+1000 Karma]
[Ghost Pot +1000/-0]
[Resentment: +8221540/-579875]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1838222/27401169]
[Current Qi: 87420/957945100]
[Max Will: 23944324]
[HP: 23944324]
[Current Karma: 109604679/234520515]
[Resentment Wallet: 200C.St.,113R.Sl.,228R.Sh.,2C.M.R.P.,0D.M.R.N.,10I.D.P.,1A.D.P]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,691K,180P,697R,179Da,258De,2605k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10679St]
-Tch! Don’t glare at me! He was asking for it!- I snap at Little Corpse when my tone startles Little Law.
Cheeky Monkey and Monk Mountain laugh, and after a while Little Law joins them. The monks pack up, Little Corpse quickly banking the silk as they get up. They leave and Little Corpse grabs me, tucking me against his side with the intention of hiding us both in his hide. I glare at him, reminding him that I could probably just burrow into a pile and wait, and he agrees, letting me down to find my own hiding spot.
I cheat. Apparently my god-like cheat skill is banking, but I’ve got access to what might be system Logs. You want to give me access to everything and then make me a pet? See if I don’t rebel. I bank a pile of garbage, Withdraw a box I find within, climb into it, and Withdraw the pile back on top of me. It’s not exactly as it was, but I’m buried and hidden. Suck it!
While I wait, I go back through the Exchange. There’s a way to Exchange anything, even years off your life, for Karma. Don’t know why or how you can tell how long you live, but I guess it’s a moot point. I can exchange Condensed Qi, but I’m finding it hard enough to find Qi to condense, so that sounds like a bad deal. I can exchange Earthly metal currency, and Spiritual condensed Qi, I can even exchange negative Resentment. There’s probably an option for Will and Health, but I get distracted by Little Corpse telling me “they’re here” before I can look further. Who da fuq is “they”?
Smugglers. Some of them are Vengeful Ghost Sect members, the Logs saying they’ve got treasures to gather Resentment, and some look like the not-ninjas from Red Silk Sect. What’s more unpleasant than the thought of these two groups having their worst members joining hands is the fact that a garbage pile near Little Corpse is actually a disguised trap door, and these assholes have built another Mill below the shell of Eager Heart before it became a shell.
Dude! Spoiler alert!
-Better we learn from your logs now than be surprised once we’re inside,- Little Corpse points out, and I’ve no way to explain that uncovering the secret of the mystery dungeon would have been more interesting. -But you did uncover the secret of the dungeon...?-
I sigh and keep my thoughts to myself as Little Corpse uses his knowledge of the buildings layout with my transfer ability to just Void Walk behind the lookout and put them down. Scary. I don’t know if it’s scarier than the fact that the woman looks like just some random cultivator, or the fact that she is just some random cultivator that helped make a nightmare dungeon. I bank my garbage pile, take on my hunan form, and walk over to him before we begin our descent into the underside.
-She might not have helped with its construction,- Little Corpse points out. -She could just be someone who hopes to use it. There’s no guarantee she even knows how it’s made. Your Logs show she’s not sure why there are Poison Cultivators here, and she’s just a lookout.-
-Why the fuck are you trying to make me feel shittier about this?- I ask him, flabbergasted that he’s defending someone who wants to harvest Resentment from a fucking fountain spewing out of some unknown hole.
-It might literally just be a naturally occurring portal between this Realm and the Mortal Realms like the Graveyards,- he points out, and I remember the rider whose horse he stole saying there were ways in and out of the Graveyards. -*Just because we’re attacking them doesn’t mean they have to be evil.
-You’ve met plenty of cultivators that just need strife to further their cultivation. Why can’t we just be here to sharpen ourselves against other cultivators? Why bring in morality as long as we’re not torturing anyone who hasn’t wronged us?-
Not “that doesn’t deserve it”. Perspective. Didn’t I get pissed off at Spring Cow for dragging me to a village and then he died protecting one that I later helped “save”? Should probably go back and check on that.
-Purifying Sorrow’s Roost will be impossible if you don’t know the root of the Resentment,- Little Corpse tells me as we nonchalantly wait with the group we just watched go down. There are several tunnels that merge, and I’m assuming, since I can’t open it, that my map is currently being used, so I don’t even know if we’re actually in Green River anymore.
Silent Howl:
Nope.
You moving out of the stairwell put you through a portal.
You are in another Hell.
Not the Graveyards.
Somewhere different.
I think it’s all tunnels and burrows.
-Don’t,- Little Corpse says firmly, glaring at me before I can actually tone to see what happens.
-It might have been funny,- I point out, but he just glares at me.
The group ahead of us turns to do a quick check on us, shuffling away slightly, making a point to separate from us. Well, shit. A masked person who screams Grave Lord walks up to the group from further down the burrows, sees me, doesn’t recognize me and still sighs. Da fuq?
“Of course you’re here,” she says with a shake of her head.
-She knows of you, not who you are, and she has an ability to communicate with other Grave Lords. Neither I nor the others heard her,- Little Corpse says in response to my outraged head bobs while the group in front of us raises a variety of badges.
-Well--,- I got nothing. No, wait! -So she walks up, sighs, and I got all loose-necked for no reason?-
-I don’t know how to respond to that,- Little Corpse says as the woman guides the group ahead of us down the hall, still shaking her head. -She fully expects you to go around siphoning Resentments without paying.-
-Paying for what? This is a naturally occurring Portal,- I remind him. I shift to my abbreviated “Lesser” Void moth form, compressing myself as much as I can until I’m nearly cat sized. -Now let’s go sneak into the areas they don’t want us to see!-
-You’ve been drumming since before you attained godhood, so sneaking is a bit of an issue...- Little Corpse sighs, scooping me up as he walks past when I freeze in realization. -And you’re glowing again.-
-So what was the point of me hiding?- I thrash before slumping.
-I assumed you’d stopped drumming. The others realized that the drum had followed them and moved away from someone amateur enough to need a prayer drum to gather Resentment.-
-Tch! It works!- I thrash defensively.
[Ghost Pot +1000/-0]
[Resentment: +10971870/-666900]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1838623/27401703]
[Current Qi: 96410/957945100]
[Max Will: 23944324]
[HP: 23944324]
[Current Karma: 109606814/234520515]
-Bah! Not enough Qi...- I grumble before going to the Exchange. I scroll down until I see where I can exchange 100 Spirit Stones and 10M Regard for another Pearl, but Little Corpse darts down a nearby tunnel and pins me to the ground. -Oy!-
-That’s the Ascendant Pearl! The one the size of a road shrine?- he snaps, shoving me down into the dirt. -Where are you going to shift to spit it out? Huh?!-
Oh, shit. The Wrecking Pearl! Crap! I’d forgotten all about that! How the hells did I forget about that...?
-You start glowing at about 10. Can’t you make 10 smaller pearls? How much do those cost?-
-This is why you get paid,- I say before I try to stand up. Can’t, ‘cause he’s still slamming me in a rage. -You wanna get up now or am I doing this later?-
-Ah!- I swear he blushes as he removes his forearm from where he’d pinned my cat-sized buggy self to the ground.
Tch! Scruffed again...
[1M x10 Regard Exchanged Successfully]
[-1M x10 +Resentment]
[+100 x10 Con. Qi]
[-100 x10 Spirit Stones]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,10679 – 1000 St]
[+1M x10 Karma]
[Ghost Pot: +1000/-0]
[Resentment: +971870/-666900]
[Current Condensed Qi: 1837265/27399896]
[Current Qi: 66250/957945100]
[Max Will: 23944324]
[HP: 23944324]
[Current Karma: 119606814/234520515]
[Resentment Wallet: 200C.St.,113R.Sl.,228R.Sh.,2C.M.R.P.,0D.M.R.N.,10I.D.P.,1A.D.P]
[Mortal Wallet: 12E,691K,180P,697R,179Da,258De,2605k]
[Spirit Wallet: 0Dr,0Ph,0Th,1325Di,126Co,9679St]
-If you were just going to use your money, despite saying it would be wasteful, why didn’t you just do the larger exchange,- Little Corpse hisses through his hands, a sharp pain nestled firmly behind his brow.
-... That’s actually a good point...- I mumble, then scroll through looking for an option where I could exchange 1000 Spirit Stones for 10M Karma, then remember the Exchange button is greyed out so I’d actually have to pay attention. -Tch! Remind me next time.-
Little Corpse groans as I put off on grooming and continue xploring the tunnel he dragged us down. Being covered in dust might make it harder to see me. Not sure what it’ll do to my cloud of Get Fucked, but we’ll just have to see. I growl as Little Corpse pounces on me, -- full ass launches himself to land on me like I’m a contested sports ball, -- and then drags me off to the side.
-Let’s not take the chance?- he groans, rubbing at his forehead with his eyes shut. -These tunnels are cramped which will limit the girls and myself, so you’ll need a way to defend yourself until we can reach you.-
I look around the tunnels, wondering what he’s on about, then realize that the tunnels aren’t spacious, I’m smaller. Ah. Fair enough. He groans and I sit down for a quick groom.
