Sect Master of the Chongming Sect

In the four hundred and twentieth year of the Qianfeng era of the Great Wei Immortal Dynasty, on the seventh day of the tenth month, the reigning emperor celebrated his birthday. Heaven and earth were in harmony, and all undertakings were auspicious.

At daybreak that day, a stout man drove a donkey cart slowly along a mountain path in the Cold Crow Mountain Range.

Several basketfuls of goods resembling coal were neatly stacked in a peak on the cart, with assorted odds and ends crammed into the corners. The small cart was piled to the brim.

At a glance, he looked like one of the traveling merchants commonly seen in the countryside around these parts.

The mountain path had always been rough and difficult to traverse. Snow fell on Cold Crow Mountain as early as the ninth month, and by now it lay ankle-deep along the road. In the past, only herb gatherers and desperate mountain bandits traveled it.

Strangely enough, even seasoned merchant caravans with mules and horses could not pass this way at this time of year, yet the old donkey pulling a cartload of goods moved as though it were walking on level ground.

A closer look revealed that the old donkey's coat shone like bright gold, dazzling in the sunlight. Its four golden hooves stepped through the deep snow without picking up a speck of snow or mud.

The man sitting on the donkey cart was not particularly tall, standing around six feet or so. He had a broad face, a heavy jaw, and large ears turned toward his chest, with a rough, hearty bearing.

Though he was deep in the mountains amid biting winds and boundless white snow, he wore only a short gray-cloth jacket on his upper body. His two exposed, muscular arms were a shade whiter than the snow.

There was nothing valuable to be seen on him.

His only accessory was a jade thumb ring on his right hand, mottled gray and white and plain in appearance. A black-glazed gourd the size of a palm also hung at his waist.

"Hee-haw!" The old donkey came to a stop and exhaled a cloud of white breath. Several enormous boulders from a landslide had blocked the mountain pass ahead, making it impossible to get through.

The old donkey was quite perceptive, and it even knew to turn its head and shake it at the man.

The man frowned, raised the little oxhide whip in his hand over his head, and lashed out viciously. The inch-thick layer of snow on the old donkey's back burst apart with a swish.

The old donkey screamed repeatedly in pain. Its front legs buckled, and it promptly fell to its knees. Tears glistened in its eyes, making it look especially pitiful.

The man's face was livid, but he knew full well what was going on. This man-eating scourge certainly knows how to put on an act.

Then he shouted sharply, "Clear the road! Move!" He raised the little whip and brought it down with another sharp crack.

The old donkey was clearly terrified. It hurriedly got to its feet, trembling, every golden hair on its body seemingly standing on end from the pain.

"Hee-haw!" The old donkey's sinews and veins instantly bulged all over its body, swelling taut as a drum. Then it opened its great mouth and spat out a chopstick-thick beam of golden light, striking a boulder two zhang long and wide in the road ahead.

The boulder exploded with a boom, sending dust billowing and shattered stone flying.

In the blink of an eye, the boulder had been completely pulverized by the golden light the old donkey had spat out.

After that single strike, the golden fur all over the old donkey dimmed. Clearly, that golden-light Law Technique was not something it could use casually.

"Again!" A sharp light flashed in the man's eyes. He gave the old donkey no chance to beg for a rest and made as if to whip it.

Frightened, the old donkey hurriedly spat out three gusts of black wind. The winds reeked horribly, mingled with waves of sinister, vicious Qi. They whirled around the boulders, lifting them one by one and tossing them into a mountain hollow more than ten zhang away.

As it used the Law Technique, the old donkey's golden coat grew dimmer still. Its very essence had likely been damaged, but the boulders blocking the pass were cleared away.

"Don't put on that lazy act for this Daoist master. When you were demanding children to eat in West Willow Village a few days ago, you didn't behave like this. Get up. If you don't, there's plenty more whipping where that came from."

"Move!" The man sitting on the cart watched coldly as he brought the whip down again. Several more sharp cracks rang out, and red plum blossoms splashed across the snow by the roadside.

The old donkey did not dare let out so much as a bray. Its head drooping, it simply pulled the cart onward along the mountain path.

The man drove the donkey cart with ease over a mountain road that would have taken an ordinary merchant caravan half a day, and soon emerged on the other side. He stopped outside an edification pavilion by the official road and studied the almanac on its black jade display board for a long while.

"Damn it, has it really been fifteen years already?" A dejected expression appeared on his fat face as he muttered to himself. Then he let out a long sigh and drove toward the outskirts of the county seat.

After a few low brays, the old donkey actually let out a long sigh of its own and trudged onward with heavy steps. One donkey and one cart drew a long stroke across the snowy landscape.

The seventh day of the tenth month was the birthday of the reigning emperor of Great Wei, as well as the dynasty's most important festival, the "Longevity Festival." At the Longevity Festival, immortals and mortals celebrated together, and highborn and commoners alike rejoiced.

Every year at this time, the county seat of Pingrong, the closest to the sect's home in the Cold Crow Mountain Range, held a grand lantern festival.

For ten whole days, there were more plays than one could watch and more lantern riddles than one could solve, dwarfs and extraordinary performers who coiled snakes and breathed fire, and accomplished Daoists who folded paper into swallows. The festivities were so lively that there was hardly any difference between day and night.

If his master were still alive, then on the seventeenth day of the tenth month this year, the county magistrate would once again lead a great procession of subordinate officials and local gentry to White Ram Monastery on the outskirts of Pingrong to pray and make wishes.

They would seek talisman water and spirit pills from the sect elder stationed at the monastery as a sign of favor.

But now, Kang Dabao rubbed the sect master's jade thumb ring on his right hand. Alas, his master was gone, and his martial uncles had all scattered.

He had driven the donkey cart to the entrance of White Ram Monastery. The gold characters on its plaque gleamed, and its central gates stood wide open.

This was one of the few grand monasteries within a hundred li. From outside, he could already see its interlocking brackets, lifelike ridge beasts, and blue roof tiles packed tightly together like scales.

The red-lacquered gates stood about three zhang high. On either side hung a couplet on ebony boards inlaid with engraved golden characters.

The first line read: "Establishing a teaching and founding a sect, purple qi comes from the east for thirty thousand li." The second read: "Writing books and passing on the Dao, five thousand words first crossed Hangu Pass."

Its incense offerings had flourished for more than a century, yet who would have thought that after a mere dozen or so years, worshippers would be so few even on the day of the Longevity Festival?

Kang Dabao looked up into the distance again and could just make out wisps of blue smoke rising from the Old Mother Temple on the other side of the outskirts. A few decades ago, had it not been no more than a wayside shrine?

Forget it, forget it. The victor became king, the defeated became an outlaw. There was nothing hard to understand about that.

He turned back to examine the ridge beasts atop White Ram Monastery's hipped roof, with no intention of going inside. When all was said and done, this was only an ordinary Daoist monastery established by the Chongming Sect.

When his master was alive, only one martial uncle had watched over it, a man past seventy who still could not break through the Qi Refining Second Layer. He had been assigned to receive people from the mortal world.

Ever since the sect began to fall on hard times fifteen years ago and could no longer pay his annual stipend of five Spirit Stones, that martial uncle had gladly asked to return home to enjoy sweets and play with his grandchildren.

Two hundred years ago, when the Chongming Sect was at its height, it had established monasteries in nine of the thirteen counties under Cloud Horn Prefecture, where the sect masters of generations past were enshrined.

Grateful for the Chongming Sect's protection, believers in every county kept incense burning in the monasteries day and night, and the oil lamps never went out.

Now, only this one remained. It probably would not be long before people forgot it too.

Why was founding Patriarch Zhang only at Foundation Establishment? Wouldn't it have been better if he'd formed a Golden Core? Then that old man, a piece of trash at the Qi Refining Seventh Layer, could never have become sect master.

And how could a waste like me, thirty-three years old, with a Mixed Spirit Root and stuck at the Qi Refinement Fourth Layer for eight years, have ended up wearing this sect master's jade thumb ring?

Just as Kang Dabao reached this point in his thoughts, an old man in hemp robes came out to greet him, leading two Daoist children with rosy lips and white teeth who carried candied and fresh fruit. Two rows of disciples in Daoist robes followed behind him. He paid his respects with a deep bow. "Disciple He Muxian pays his respects to the immortal sect master."

Kang Dabao took one look with his little eyes. He had seen the old man before.

Fifteen years ago, when Kang Dabao had succeeded as sect master, He Muxian had come with the martial uncle stationed at the monastery to pay his respects. As Kang Dabao recalled, he was the local abbot, responsible for handling the worldly affairs that martial uncle did not wish to deal with.

He was a prominent surname in the Chongming Sect. Of its six deceased sect masters, three had been surnamed He. Yes, the same three who had managed the sect into a steady decline.

Kang Dabao's master had also come from the He Household, and the old man seemed to belong to the same clan as his master.

The old man lacked immortal roots, however, so naturally he could not enter the sect and had landed a job watching over the monastery.

Kang Dabao smiled and returned the greeting from his seat on the donkey cart, teasing, "We haven't seen each other for years, Old He. I'm surprised you recognized me dressed like this."

"There is a portrait of the sect master in the monastery. This disciple leads the others in paying their respects every morning and evening." He Muxian stepped aside and gestured to the people behind him.

The disciples in Daoist robes were all thrilled to be standing face-to-face with Kang Dabao, the head of an immortal sect.

Kang Dabao nodded. He could understand these worldly disciples.

Immortals and mortals were worlds apart. No matter how far the Chongming Sect had fallen, Kang Dabao, a cultivator who was also its sect master, was still someone they deservedly looked up to.

"Old He, you look much plumper. That's good. With no ordinary people bothering you these past few years, you've been able to enjoy some peace and quiet."

"Hemu Dao is arrogant and lawless. It surely cannot last. Since the sect master took his position, there have already been signs of a revival. This disciple will not have much peace and quiet for long."

He Muxian was nearly eighty or ninety, but his voice rang like a great bell, and his back was ramrod straight.

His eyes were bright and piercing, and there was no sign of age in his movements. The sharp spirit about him looked even stronger than Kang Dabao's.

Fifteen years ago, the old man fought Daoist Black Shoes, the head of Hemu Dao, and lost in just half an incense stick's time. That's why he gave Pingrong County to Hemu Dao so readily.

Now I hear he's almost reached Foundation Establishment. Truly terrifying. Me? I'd rather live a few more years.

Kang Dabao thought to himself, casting another glance at the pile of odds and ends on his donkey cart. Old man, just where did you see any signs of a revival?

"Still, White Ram Monastery has flourished for more than a century. What harm is there in letting Hemu Dao's Old Mother Temple enjoy a few more lively years? Please, immortal sect master, come into the monastery first. This disciple has already prepared fine wine and delicious dishes. If the sect master would honor us with his presence."

Noticing that something was amiss with Kang Dabao, He Muxian broke off the subject.

"No. What sect master of the Chongming Sect ever drove a donkey cart into White Ram Monastery, dressed so disreputably at that?"

He had come here on a whim. Inside were only the same golden statue of the Dao Ancestor found in Daoist monasteries everywhere under heaven and golden statues of the six deceased sect masters of the Chongming Sect. What was there to see?

He would have one himself in a few decades anyway.

Kang Dabao shook his head, offered a polite excuse, and turned the donkey cart around to leave.

He Muxian hurriedly led the two children and the assembled disciples in a bow to see him off. They did not rise until the sound of donkey hooves had faded into the distance.

The moment He Muxian raised his head, he saw something land on the ground. He went over and picked it up. It was a strip of meat with fur still attached.

Looking more closely, he recalled that the space between the male donkey's hind legs had seemed empty when Kang Dabao drove up. How could he not know what it was?

By now, Kang Dabao and his donkey cart were out of sight. Only his voice drifted back to them:

"Old He is advanced in years and shouldn't take such a strong tonic, so share it among all the disciples at the monastery. The sect is short of funds, so let this serve as a New Year's gift for now. Hehe, its medicinal potency is considerable, so all disciples should know their limits."

I've been writing for my own amusement for years. If you don't like it, please don't flame me, haha.