Book 5: Chapter 22: Human Concerns
Another week flew by without incident before Falling Leaf brought up the toddler at the village.
“How did you know what to do? When that little girl grabbed my leg, how did you know what to do?”
Sen gave her a surprised look. “I didn’t.”
Falling Leaf gave him an exasperated look. “You obviously did.”
Sen laughed and shook his head. “I didn’t. It worked, which was great, but I didn’t know it would work. I was just looking for a way to distract her, and everybody likes presents. Plus, I figured a little qi magic would impress her. I think everything seems like a miracle when you’re that age. So, I performed a miracle for her.”The birth of this content finds its genesis in Nøv€lß¡n★
Falling Leaf’s mouth was hanging open a little when she asked, “That’s it?”
Sen shrugged and nodded. “I mean, yeah. What were you expecting? Some complicated answer that delves deep into the human mind?”
“Yes!”
They’d stopped to eat before venturing back into the wilds for their final leg of the journey. Sen figured that they should have plenty of time as long as they didn’t slow down too much. He was sitting under a tree with his back up against the trunk. He let his head tip back until it rested against bark. He tried to think of a way to explain what he’d done and why in a way that would make sense to Falling Leaf.
“Most people aren’t that complicated when you get right down to it. There are exceptions out there. Cultivators and nobles often have obscure reasons for doing what they do. The same applies to bandits but for different reasons. On the whole, though, your average person just isn’t trying to run complicated schemes or be obscure. People want their basic needs met. Food, shelter, and a little bit of safety. Most of what they care about is going to be centered on those things. If they have a family, they worry about their family and try to think of ways to keep their family sheltered, fed, and safe. Anything beyond that is a bonus. For children, it’s even simpler. They want attention. They want to be entertained. So, that’s what I did. I gave her a little attention and provided a little entertainment.”
Falling Leaf was frowning up a storm at those comments. “Humans seem a lot more complicated than that to me.”
“They are but that’s when you’re dealing with people you know. Personal history, personality quirks, and even your mood can influence how those things play out. When you’re dealing with people one time and never likely to see them again, you can generally assume that food, shelter, family, and safety are their priorities. If you can throw in some entertainment or kindness, you’ll probably be on safe ground more often than not. Plus, you’re a cultivator. If you act a little strange, most people will just chalk it up to that.”
“You make it sound easy.”
“Well, easy is probably overselling it,” said Sen. “It’s probably more accurate to say that it’s straightforward. You probably got a bit of a skewed view of things because most of the people you’ve dealt with regularly have been cultivators, nobles, or both. Master Feng, Auntie Caihong, and Uncle Kho are so old and have so much experience that you can’t use them as an example for anything except how really old nascent soul cultivators work. I end up dealing with cultivators and nobles all the time, so all of those people are bad examples too. You’ve gotten an extraordinarily lopsided experience of people. I’ll tell you what. I spent some time in a village a while back. I just lived there with a family. I learned a lot from doing that. Once we get this business with my body cultivation settled, we’ll find a place like that. We’ll just live there for a while. You can get to know people at your own pace. See how they live and how they interact. If you hate it, we’ll move on.”
“Fu Ruolan was clearly fine with me leaving for months on end. So, sometime in the next couple of years,” said Sen before sighing a little. “Speaking of Fu Ruolan, we should get moving. I’d rather get back early than get back late.”
“Do you think she’d refuse to give you the manual if you got back late?”
“I honestly have no idea what she’d do. She might not be insane the way everyone thinks she is, but that doesn’t make her any easier to understand. I mean, we spent six months living there and I think I had two conversations with her. She’s as much a mystery to me now as she was on the day we met her.”
Falling Leaf pursed her lips before she spoke. “I think she is insane.”
That made Sen pause as he was storing things back in his storage ring. “Why do you say that?”
“She isn’t mad the way some people seem to be mad, but there’s a smell about her. Even when she seems to be in control, her scent changes by the second. It’s like she’s wearing a very good mask. I’ve never smelled anything like it before, but it makes me nervous. She might not kill us out of hand, but I don’t think we should rush to trust her either.”
“I see,” said Sen, trying to fit this new information into his picture of the nascent soul cultivator.
“I know you need her for that manual,” said Falling Leaf. “Just don’t assume her judgment is good. Not unless you see some signs that make you think she’s got the right of it.”
“Well, that certainly doesn’t make me feel good, given that I’m stuck with her for another four years and a bit.”
Falling Leaf looked down. “I’m sorry.”
“No, don’t be sorry. I’m glad you told me. That would have been a very bad thing to learn the hard way.”
Sen watched a bit of tension leave Falling Leaf’s posture at those words. He wondered how long she’d been debating whether to share that bit of suspicion with him. Given that he’d been keeping back bad feelings and suspicious thoughts for a while, it might well have been months. The difference was that Sen knew he was over-primed to expect trouble. He didn’t trust his own gut reactions to alert him in quite the same way he once did. Falling Leaf didn’t seem to suffer that affliction of minor paranoia.
“You can always talk to me about it when you have concerns like that. You have excellent instincts for trouble, probably better than mine in a lot of ways. I’d rather you tell me and have it turn out to be not true than get blindsided by something.”
Falling Leaf perked up at that blanket permission to vent her suspicions. “I will.”
“Good,” said Sen. “With any luck, we’ll get through this last bit of the journey without much trouble.”
