Chapter 95: Something of My Own
Yun Che had barely begun enjoying the feeling of not being sentenced to prison when someone called his name.
He stopped outside the judgment chamber and turned. Lei Zhenyu, who had been stretching his injured shoulder and looking as though he intended never to enter another courtroom voluntarily, stopped beside him. An official in dark blue robes approached carrying a thin wooden tablet and several sheets of stamped paper. He was middle-aged, neat, and possessed the particular expression of a man for whom somebody else's six-month punishment was merely another entry that had to be filed before the end of the day.
"Yun Che. Lei Zhenyu."
"Yes."
"I am Officer Qiao Wen, from the Goldriver Civic Administration. Your sentence has been registered." He held out two identification slips. "Beginning tomorrow, you are required to report to City Hall every morning at eight."
Yun Che accepted his.
"Every morning?"
"For six months."
There went the last bit of his good mood.
Officer Qiao either failed to notice or did not care. "Your minimum daily service requirement is five hours. Some assignments may take longer. If you are sent on an operation outside the city, naturally, you will not abandon it after precisely five hours and announce that your punishment has concluded for the day."
Lei Zhenyu nodded. That seemed reasonable.
"What kind of work?" Yun Che asked.
"Whatever Goldriver requires."
Yun Che did not particularly like the breadth of that answer.
The official looked down at his papers. "Your occupations and abilities have already been recorded. Yun Che: blacksmith, artificer, hunter, Foundation Realm cultivator, some knowledge of runes, mechanical construction and equipment repair."
"Yes."
"Most of your assignments will therefore involve your trade. Public equipment repair. Guard weapons. Bridges. Locks. Water-gate mechanisms. Municipal workshops. Emergency maintenance. You may occasionally be assigned elsewhere if your cultivation or other abilities are needed."
That actually did not sound terrible.
Yun Che had imagined six months of carrying rocks from one side of Goldriver to the other and then carrying them back.
Officer Qiao turned to Lei.
"Lei Zhenyu: Foundation Realm combat cultivator, lightning specialist, trained hunter and sect disciple. You may be attached to city patrols, monster-control teams, hunting parties or guard training. If the training office considers you qualified, you may assist instructors teaching recruits."
Lei's expression brightened slightly.
Yun Che looked at him.
"You get to fight things."
"You get to hit metal."
"That's different."
"How?"
Yun Che couldn't immediately explain how.
Officer Qiao continued before they could begin arguing. "You will receive no wages for compulsory hours. Meals required during distant assignments and materials necessary for your assigned work will be provided. Personal projects are your own responsibility. Your supervisors will submit performance reports."
"And if we perform well?" Yun Che asked.
"Then you perform well."
Yun Che waited.
The man's expression finally softened by the smallest amount.
"Consistently exceptional service can be submitted for sentence reduction. Do not expect it. Earn it. Goldriver has shortened service periods before when the offender provided significantly greater value than required."
That interested Yun Che much more.
"How much shorter?"
"That depends entirely upon what you do."
"So theoretically—"
"Do not spend your first day trying to calculate how little community service you can get away with."
Lei coughed into his fist.
Yun Che glared at him.
Officer Qiao handed them their reporting documents. "Eight in the morning. Late arrival is recorded. Refusing reasonable assignments is recorded. Deliberately performing below your ability is recorded. You were given a lenient sentence because the court accepted that you acted without knowledge of the Stormcrest Thunder Tiger's crimes. Do not make the court regret that leniency."
The humor left Yun Che's face.
"I won't."
Lei nodded as well.
Officer Qiao studied them for another moment before leaving.
Yun Che looked down at the document.
Six months.
Five hours every day.
He supposed things could have been much worse.
Jin Wei appeared behind them and clapped him on the shoulder.
"Excellent! Now that we've finished discussing prison, criminals and unpaid labor, I'll show you Goldriver."
Yun Che looked at him.
"That was an impressive change of subject."
"I've been waiting twenty days for this."
If Mistforge belonged to mountains, smoke and ringing steel, Goldriver belonged to water.
The four of them boarded a long, narrow passenger boat from a dock not far from the Consortium compound. Yun Che sat with Lin Xia while Jin Wei immediately claimed the front as though he personally owned the canal. Lei Zhenyu took the opposite seat and spent the first few minutes watching the boatman manipulate the current with a water rune beneath the vessel.
Goldriver had been constructed between two great rivers flowing along opposite sides of the city, but instead of allowing those rivers to define its borders, its builders had brought the water inside. Great channels crossed the metropolis from east to west, narrowing into smaller canals that wound between districts before joining again farther ahead. Bridges arched overhead. Boats carrying grain, timber, ore and passengers slipped past one another in practiced streams. Some buildings opened directly onto the canals, their lower floors fitted with private docks instead of conventional entrances. Water wheels turned beside workshops. Children jumped from low stone platforms into designated swimming channels while their parents shouted warnings after them.
Lin Xia leaned over the side and watched their reflection break apart beneath the ripples.
"This is beautiful."
"I know," Jin Wei said happily. "Night is better."
"Why?"
"Lanterns everywhere. Restaurants put tables beside the canals. Musicians perform on boats. Couples rent private ones and disappear into the smaller waterways."
Lei finally stopped examining the propulsion rune.
"So it's a romantic place."
"Very."
Yun Che glanced at Jin Wei.
"You sound suspiciously experienced."
"I appreciate my city."
"That didn't answer him," Lin Xia said.
Jin Wei ignored both of them.
For Yun Che, the quiet movement of the boat was strangely pleasant. There were crowds everywhere, which still bothered him more than he wanted to admit, and twice he caught himself staring too long at cultivators walking along the banks. Once, a heavy crate fell somewhere behind them with a tremendous crash, and his entire body tightened before his mind even understood the sound.
Nobody commented.
He appreciated that.
Instead, Jin Wei pointed ahead.
"There. You're going to like this."
The canal widened until it resembled a small lake surrounded by tiered seating.
Several long lanes had been marked across the water using floating barriers. Training platforms stood along the banks, and enormous boards displayed names, records and upcoming events.
A sleek blue-scaled lizard shot across the water while they watched, its feet striking the surface so quickly that it barely sank. Behind it came something resembling a six-legged otter, swimming with enough force to throw a wake taller than Yun Che.
Jin Wei spread his arms.
"Goldriver Watercourse Arena."
Lei immediately became more interested.
"Racing?"
"Beast racing. City sanctioned. The main tournament happens once a year, but there are smaller competitions throughout the year."
"What are the rules?"
"The creature has to cross the course itself. Swimming is allowed. Running on water is allowed. Water techniques are allowed within the registered limits. No flying."
Lei nodded approvingly.
"Reasonable."
Yun Che looked toward Amon, who had accompanied them in his smaller travel form.
Amon looked back.
No.
"I didn't say anything."
You thought it.
Mirage, perched comfortably on Amon's head now that her wing had healed, immediately disagreed.
I would look magnificent racing.
"You'd be disqualified."
Mirage's antennae drooped.
This city has terrible laws.
The aquarium was less a building than an artificial ecosystem.
It occupied several connected structures built around an enormous central water dome. Freshwater beasts filled one section, ocean creatures another. Yun Che saw luminous fish that communicated by changing patterns across their bodies, armored turtles larger than carriages, transparent eels through whose bodies he could actually watch Ki circulating, and a bizarre little creature that looked so permanently furious that Lin Xia spent several minutes laughing at it.
Whisper enjoyed the aquarium more than anyone.
He floated from enclosure to enclosure until Yun Che had to remind him three separate times that going through the viewing barrier to "look closer" was likely against the rules.
"The City Lord owns the collection," Jin Wei explained.
"The whole aquarium?" Lin Xia asked.
"Most of it."
Lei looked around at a tank large enough to contain a village pond.
"Why?"
"Because he can."
Yun Che understood immediately.
Jin Wei continued with considerably more admiration. "It isn't just entertainment. They research aquatic species here. Breeding, medicines, beast cultivation, food production. But yes, part of it is simply his collection."
"The City Lord seems rich," Yun Che said.
Jin Wei gave him an offended look.
"Rich? Yun Che, I'm rich. My father is extremely rich. City Lord Cao Jinhai is what happens when rich people look at someone else and become depressed."
Their boat eventually passed an enormous seven-tiered tower.
Each successive floor was narrower than the one beneath it, producing a great stepped structure rising over the surrounding district. Cultivators entered constantly through the lower doors, while access points to the upper levels were heavily guarded.
"The Sevenfold Wisdom Tower," Jin Wei explained. "First-grade techniques on the first level. Second grade on the second. All the way to seventh."
Yun Che stared upward.
"Anyone can enter?"
"The first levels? Yes, after paying or meeting the requirements. Higher floors require considerably more. Money, contribution, qualifications, recommendations—depends on what you're accessing. The seventh floor isn't somewhere you wander into because you happen to have a free afternoon."
That building alone gave Yun Che another reason to remain in Goldriver.
Then he noticed something much more familiar.
A bicycle passed them.
Then another.
Then five more.
One rider had baskets attached to both sides. Another wore a courier uniform. Two children raced one another along the canal road while an elderly man shouted at them to slow down.
Yun Che simply stared.
Lin Xia smiled.
"They really spread."
Jin Wei laughed. "Spread? They're normal here now. The City Lord liked the idea when merchants brought them from Mistforge. Once his businesses started ordering them, everyone wanted one. They're cheap compared with maintaining a beast, they don't need feeding, and they're faster than walking."
Yun Che watched a woman cycle across a bridge.
Something he had introduced because he remembered it from another world had become ordinary enough that nobody here even looked twice.
That felt strangely satisfying.
The football grounds affected him similarly.
There were several pitches rather than one. Children played on smaller fields. Adults had organized teams on the larger ones, complete with spectators shouting from benches. Someone scored while their boat passed and half the bank erupted in cheers.
"Mistforge never took it this seriously," Yun Che said.
"Goldriver likes games," Jin Wei replied. "People here have money and free time. Give them something entertaining and they'll turn it into a competition."
Lei watched one player dribble past two opponents.
"He has good footwork."
Yun Che stared at him.
"Please don't turn football into combat training."
"It would improve balance."
"Lei."
"And spatial awareness."
"Lei."
Their final stop was the great clock tower overlooking the heart of Goldriver.
By the time they reached its upper observation level, the sun had begun its slow descent. From there, Yun Che finally understood the city's scale. Canals glittered between dense districts. Hundreds of bridges crossed the water. Ships moved along the great arteries connecting one river to the other, carrying the wealth of distant provinces straight through Goldriver.
But Jin Wei was looking elsewhere.
"There."
An island rested within the widest central channel.
A bridge connected it to the city, but guards controlled both ends. At its center stood a sprawling palace surrounded by enormous gardens. Trees hid smaller buildings among their leaves. Yun Che could make out private training grounds, courtyards and even a small forest enclosed entirely within the estate.
The private docks were ridiculous.
Several ships sat there whose decoration alone probably cost more than Yun Che had earned in either of his lives.
Rare beasts wandered through fenced gardens. Guards patrolled the grounds. Servants moved along paved paths between buildings. The entire island had been arranged so carefully that even from this distance it seemed less like someone's house and more like a private kingdom sitting inside Goldriver.
Jin Wei rested his arms against the stone railing.
"That's what I want."
Lin Xia looked at him.
"The palace?"
"Not the palace."
Jin Wei's usual playful expression had changed.
"That."
He gestured toward everything.
"The businesses. The influence. The freedom."
Yun Che glanced at him.
Jin Wei talked about money constantly. Yun Che had always assumed much of it was simply Jin Wei being Jin Wei.
Now he understood there was something more behind it.
"City Lord Cao owns properties across Cangyun," Jin Wei continued. "Warehouses, mines, shipyards, farms, restaurants, beast ranches, workshops. He has investments outside the kingdom too. Half the things tourists come to see in Goldriver were built by one of his companies."
Lei frowned.
"Was his clan already wealthy?"
"No."
Jin Wei smiled.
"That's why I admire him."
He pointed toward the island.
"He came from a village nobody cared about. No great clan. No Spirit Transformation ancestor protecting him. No ancient inheritance waiting for him. He started trading village goods, then bought wagons. Wagons became caravans. Caravans became warehouses. Then ships. Workshops. Land. Companies."
"How old is he?" Lin Xia asked.
"More than two hundred."
Yun Che nodded. That sounded less absurd by cultivator standards.
Jin Wei's eyes remained on the palace.
"He built Goldriver into this. Not in a thousand years. In his own lifetime."
For once, there was no joke afterward.
"My father inherited the Consortium. I'll inherit part of it someday. That's already more than most people will ever have." Jin Wei tapped his fingers against the railing. "But I don't want my greatest achievement to be that my grandfather and father were successful."
Yun Che understood that feeling.
"You want something that's yours."
"Exactly."
Jin Wei smiled again, but more quietly this time.
"Someday, I want people to look at something like this and say I built it."
Yun Che looked across Goldriver once more.
Ten days ago, he had nearly died.
His armor had been shattered. His weapons destroyed. His confidence had collapsed so completely that he had been afraid to leave a smithy. Now he was standing above a city filled with things people had created: canals carved through stone, towers filled with accumulated knowledge, strange beasts studied rather than merely hunted, games transported hundreds of kilometers from Mistforge, and bicycles that had once existed only as memories inside his head.
Perhaps strength did not always have to mean surviving the next monster.
Sometimes it meant building something that remained after you were gone.
Jin Wei suddenly slapped him on the back.
"Which is why you should work for my father."
Yun Che nearly hit the railing.
"You ruined the moment."
"I improved it."
"You absolutely did not."
Lin Xia laughed.
Even Lei smiled.
And for perhaps the first time since the stormlands, Yun Che found himself laughing with them without having to force it.
Tomorrow morning at eight, he would begin six months of punishment.
After that?
He didn't know.
For the moment, strangely enough, not knowing didn't frighten him quite as much.