Aimless Ascension

A couple of days passed and Xiaolin could walk again, though far from recovering completely. Well, she could now cycle quietly to ease her recovery, but anything too heavy would revert to her condition for a couple of days again.

Xiaolin had been very careful about this, not that Gale would ever let her do anything drastic again. He had put a bracelet on her wrist that would break on a loud alarm whenever she crossed a threshold of speed in her cycling, alerting him to rebuke her again.

The alarm on the bracelet only blared twice. First was when Xiaolin wasn't aware of its feature, and the next time was simply because Xiaolin wasn't paying much attention to her cycling.

Gale also wouldn't let her accumulate new energy in her body. Apart from all this, she had another serious concern these days. The scars that were left behind after her skin tore up.

Unfortunately, it seemed the tear marks wouldn't be healed that easily. Thankfully, the tear marks on her face were rather thin, and they seemed to have added to her innocence, somehow. A brutish blush on both cheeks seemed almost natural from a little distance away.

Well, a good quality potion would do her good to heal those, but there was a time for that after she heals completely. Though to completely remove the tear marks, she had to advance to copper. The advancement metamorphosis was the easiest way to shrug away all that's wrong about a practitioner's physique.

Although copper advancement wasn't as strong as iron, it should be able to recover all skin injuries and marks.

Other than that, there was a slight issue she was facing these days. How to spend the day without getting bored? That was something that kept her awake at night these days. In the Inn, at least she had something to do to spend her spare time, but since she couldn't practise now, Xiaolin was left with all the hours with nothing to do.

Well, after she could walk, she would watch Gale from her couch as he worked on his scribing with an intensity in her eyes, as if she couldn't wait till she learned scribing.

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"Well, this is too early for you to learn," Gale said and considered, staring at all his tools. "But there's no harm in introducing the tools and what I do with them. But first, you must know what scribing is. Do you know what it is?"

"It is the divine language left behind by gods," Xiaolin gave a textbook answer, "that can be used in various ways to make various tools or apply them in different spirit arts and techniques."

Gale snorted. "It's just complicated symmetrical drawings, the gods be damned if they take credit for these too."

Xiaolin laughed sweetly, finding her master back to his usual humorous behaviour for the first time after her injury.

"That reminds me," Gale said, turning towards her. "Do you have an answer to the question I gave you about gods?"

About a week ago, Gale asked his disciple a question which had no wrong answers. He asked her if Gods are killable or not. For reflexive thinking only, he wasn't looking for gods to kill. Not to mention, it was easier to find conscience in the fiends than gods in the world.

"Master, I have an answer," Xiaolin said. These past couple of days, she just had too much time in hand to just rest, so it was mostly thinking she was doing.

"So, what is your answer?"

"Yes, gods are killable," his disciple said.

Gale nodded thoughtfully. Xiaolin couldn't detect anything from his expression. It was as simple as him tasting gravy while cooking. "What are the facts behind your answer?"

"Obviously, we grew up learning to worship divinity," Xiaolin began collecting her thoughts, "but to fear them as well. Fear their wrath, fear their disputes as when gods fight among themselves catastrophe befalls common people and practitioners alike. There were various legends and myths about gods fighting. If they are imperishable, then what's the point of the fights? Why are there songs about heroes slaying evil gods?"

Gale nodded as her reasoning was sound, though a little naïve, but that was because of the lack of knowledge. Nothing else.

Gale found his disciple looking at him with a look as if asking for praise. Gale obliged. "As I mentioned," he said, "there's no wrong answer to the question. Still, good job on your reasoning. Most people give something edgy as an answer."

"Master, what is your answer to the question?"

"That I'll tell you after you answer my next question," Gale said. "So the next question: What's the difference between a god and a mortal if the god is perishable?"

"The rank of spirit arts?" Xiaolin answered immediately.

"These questions aren't just for guessing. Answer me at a letter date." Gale smiled. "Anyway, back to scripts. You aren't wrong about them being a language. Obviously, it wasn't like any common language, but something profound and gibberish unless you use it the correct way.

"So now what is the right way? The answer is a binding of two rune letters in perfect symmetrical order. Let me show you."

Gale drew Qi to his fingers and drew with it on the floor under her watchful gaze. The drawing wasn't complicated at all. It was a thin, runic pattern. Gale drew another identical rune on its right and bound them together in a symmetrical form.

"Now I need a weight," Gale said and looked around to find a glass on the side table. With a flick of his finger, the glass flew from the table to his palm along with a wisp of wind. "Look closely."

Gale didn't need to tell her that, as she was already paying close attention. Gale held the glass above the rune pattern only about a metre above. Under his disciple's stare, Gale dropped the glass into the runic pattern.

Xiaolin already foresaw him dropping the grass, but what happened next was totally unexpected, even though she was expecting something magical.

The pattern lit up in a faint blue light the moment the glass made contact with it. Then the runes buzzed with a thrusting force upwards as the glass flung up straight, defying gravity.