Fates Parallel Chapter 289 - Happiness

Of course Yoshika didn’t expect the alchemist to work for free. Their profession required even more supplies than magecraft.

“Does it have to be from the sect? We have fairly considerable resources of our own.”

Luo Mingyu gave her a skeptical look.

“A couple of itinerant rogues skulking through the countryside under illusory disguises? Forgive me if I sound circumspect, but I suspect you may be underestimating the craft.”

“We can be pretty resourceful—just try us. What do you need?”

“Hm. Well, aside from my tools, some qi crystals or cores, and a proper ritual circle, I’ll require several herbal reagents with very exacting specifications. I can’t be certain which, exactly, but chances are the ones I need don’t grow locally, which means they’ll be within the sect reserves and only accessible through a considerable investment of credits, if at all.”

Yoshika crossed her arms, casting a doubtful look at the alchemist.

“You don’t know which ones?”

“Not yet, no. The elixir will have to be tuned very carefully to Miss Li Zhen’s condition. I need to know what kind of physique she has, her elemental attunement, the amount of qi in her body, the rate at which the corruption spreads—everything has to be perfect. Any errors and the elixir either doesn’t work, or kills her.”

Jung grimaced as Luo Mingyu listed off all the tests he’d need to do.

“Am I going to have to pee on something again?”

He chuckled and shook his head.

“No, I’ve long since grown past my father’s methods. I should be able to get most of what I need from a sample of blood and a simple diagnostic technique.”

Yoshika tapped her chin with a finger.

“Let’s get that out of the way, then. What would you need to conduct your tests?”

“Not much. A sterile surface, a ritual circle, and a few minutes.”

With a gesture, Yoshika leveled a portion of the hill—solidifying a flat layer of stone beneath the dirt, then turning everything above it into brittle dust with her Domain of the Earthen Realm. Then, she blew the dust away with a gust of air created with a bit of sneaky talismanless magic—which she could probably pass off as a spiritual art if pressed.

“Will that be good enough to make your formation?”

Luo Mingyu blinked at the flat surface, nonplussed.

“Probably, yes. As impressive as that is, however, I’m no inscriptionist. It takes a specialized skill set to—”

Yoshika buried both her faces in her palms.

“What do you need it to do?”

“Uh, well...”

It took a bit of back and forth to get the formation in place, but Luo Mingyu at least had a strong enough understanding of the mechanics of the formation to describe it well, and it was simple enough that Yoshika was able to replicate what he needed.

“Miss Li, I am impressed. You weren’t kidding when you said you were resourceful. Even for cultivators of your power, the breadth of your knowledge is incredible. Frankly, I’m surprised you haven’t already mastered alchemy yourself.”

Yoshika pursed her lips.

“We learned a few basics, but never quite got the chance to study it any further. Will this work, then?”

Luo Mingyu looked over the formation circle, nodding enthusiastically.

“Oh, no doubt. In fact, this might even be better than the one I use back at the sect—you’ve made considerable improvements to the energy efficiency and even managed to make it smaller! If I didn’t know any better I’d think you were a Goryeon ma—”

His gushing halted abruptly as he realized what he’d been about to say. Luo Mingyu whirled around to meet Yoshika’s gaze with a look of wide-eyed bewilderment.

“This is Goryeon spellcraft, isn’t it? You’re an arcane practitioner as well! I should have guessed that when you revealed you were half-spirits...”

Yoshika sighed. As nice as it was to have her skills appreciated, she just wanted to get it over with.

“Can you get on with the tests? It’s past midnight and Zhen needs to rest.”

“Of course, of course. Miss Li Zhen, would you lie down in the center of the circle, please?”

There wasn’t much left for Yoshika to contribute while Luo Mingyu conducted his tests, so she settled down to take a moment to think over her experiences as Li Meili. There was a lot to cover, but the most urgent was a specific feeling that she had very intentionally shoved aside, but now forced herself to analyze.

With trepidation, Yoshika released the seal on that feeling and considered it carefully. It was bright and beautiful—pleasant in its own way, despite the distress it caused her. She wasn’t quite sure what to make of it.

“It’s not that big a deal. We’ve got a crush.”

Jia wasn’t surprised to hear Eui’s voice in her head. For something like this, it felt more fitting to discuss it as a couple.

“It feels like a pretty big deal to me. What are we supposed to do about it?”

“We don’t have to do anything. It’s just a crush—it’s not like we’ve never had one. It’s not that different to how you felt about Dae.”

“Or how you felt about me?”

Eui rolled her eyes.

“Sure, if you want to think of it that way. The point I’m trying to make is that it’s not some huge problem that needs solving. Pan Jiaying is cute and all, but it’s just a passing attraction. Your crush on Dae wasn’t that big a deal either.”

“It felt like it at the time. For that matter, so did yours. I was so confused and worried—I stressed for months about how things would turn out.”

“That’s because we were fifteen, Jia. We’re adults now, and we can handle ourselves like adults. I think that we can safely ignore this one. I mean, what are we going to do, ask her out on a date? She hates us, and I’m not really interested in big complicated relationships like Rika’s. I’m happy with just you and me.”

Jia chewed on her lip.

“She wants to talk to Li Meili. I don’t think she hates us, she just doesn’t understand us. And after what happened tonight, I don’t think we understand us that well, either. That loneliness that Li Meili felt wasn’t just because she was separated from us—it was deeper than that.”

Eui frowned. She knew what Jia meant. As Yoshika, they always felt a sort of distant loneliness that they’d offset with the contentment of being together and the knowledge that they’d always have each other. Bereft of either of those comforts, their avatar had been a powder keg of unresolved trauma and insecurity.

“Okay, maybe you’re right, but does that change anything?”

“I think it might. When we first became Yoshika, we were so confused. I remember worrying that we weren’t just two partners, but three—one of which was being shunned by the others. For a time, we tried to use Yoshika only in emergencies or for cultivation—it was a long time before we ever just...lived as her.”

“I know, Jia, I was there.”

Jia chuckled.

“Of course. And we’re happy as Yoshika, content with the knowledge that she is us and we are her. But now we’ve seen another possibility—a version of Yoshika without either of us. Li Meili.”

Eui’s brows furrowed as she began picking up what Jia was implying.

“And she wasn’t happy. She was lonely and desperate for anything to attach her identity to.”

“Exactly. And it’s our fault. I mean—it kind of has to be, right? She’s us. I think that we’ve been so desperate to hang on to our individual identities since Do Hye told us we’d eventually become inextricably merged that we’ve been subconsciously denying our identity as Yoshika.”

“But we link our minds all the time, don’t we? Sometimes for days at a time.”

Jia shook her head.

“But it’s always for a purpose, isn’t it? To solve some problem, or surmount a challenge, to give ourselves time to think, or to coordinate in a fight. When was the last time we lived our lives as Yoshika just for the sake of being Yoshika?”

“...I don’t think we’ve done that since we were still at the academy. During the tournament, when we stayed linked for weeks to see how it would feel.”

“And we were miserable. We were constantly moody, we snapped at Kaede, we went completely overboard against Sun Jaehwa, and then the moment it was no longer necessary for the tournament we split apart again even though we were in the middle of the biggest crisis of our lives.”

Eui grimaced. She hadn’t thought about it much since then, but they could have gotten themselves killed if they’d been less lucky.

“Okay, but that was a really stressful time. I don’t think it’s unusual for us to have been moody.”

“Maybe you’re right, but I think it’s something bigger than that. I’m happy, Eui. Happier than I’ve ever been in my life, and it’s because I can be with you and our friends and family.”

“Me too, Jia. Meeting you is the best thing that ever happened to me. Sometimes it almost hurts how much I love you. I’ve never been happier.”

Jia blushed. Somehow even years together hadn’t inoculated her against the intensity of Eui’s passion.

“I love you too. But something is different when we’re Yoshika. It’s hard to notice when we’re together, because we still feel at least some of that individual happiness, and we have our friends and family too. When we were Li Meili, we didn’t have any of that.”

“And it broke us...”

“Yeah...”

The silence stretched on between them. Nearby, Luo Mingyu was finishing the last of his rituals with Jung, while Pan Jiaying sat in sullen silence, occasionally stealing glances at Jia when she thought neither of them were looking. Eui sighed.

“So how does our crush play into any of this?”

Jia shrugged.

“I don’t know. At the very least, I think we owe her that conversation. And we owe it to ourselves, too. One day, maybe soon, we’re going to have to cross the threshold into xiantian, and when that happens we really need to make sure we know exactly who we are.”

Eui nodded slowly. Luo Mingyu approached with Jung in tow.

“All done! Impressively efficient ritual circle—I was struggling to keep up with it.”

Jia smiled up at him politely.

“Did you get everything you needed?”

He nodded.

“I did. Miss Li Zhen is yin-aligned, as expected—though it’s always good to check these things to be sure. The real surprise was her attunement—pure Yin.”

Jia furrowed her brows.

“That doesn’t make sense. Body and soul are supposed to be naturally balanced. A yin aligned soul is almost always matched by a Yang-aspected element.”

“Almost always, yes. Miss Li Zhen is two rarities in one, and not for the better. Elemental Yin is rare and difficult to manage even when it’s not combined with a Yin-aligned soul. That imbalance may actually be what caused the heart of corruption to form, but I can’t be certain.”

“Will your elixir still work?”

Luo Mingyu gave her an exasperated sigh.

“I still don’t know for certain that it will work at all, but this doesn’t change anything in that regard. I know exactly which materials I’ll need now.”

“Good.”

Jia held out a hand. She knew that revealing her storage artifact was probably unwise, but she’d already sworn both of them to secrecy and she was running out of patience. Her entire supply of magical herbs, with the exception of Heian’s flower bush, were dumped unceremoniously at the alchemist’s feet.

“Take whatever you need and get to work.”

He blinked at the pile before rallying himself.

“That’s very impressive, but I never actually said I was willing to go that far—and certainly not for free.”

Eui shot him an incredulous glare.

“Are you serious right now? After all that, you’re going to back down now?! What do you want, you greedy fuck?”

Luo held his hands up, smiling nervously.

“That’s not what I meant—just hear me out. I wasn’t joking when I said I’d need things from the sect. You have indeed proven to be quite resourceful, but this isn’t enough. Your collection, while remarkably well preserved, is entirely wild herbs. What they lack in potency, they make up for in variety and rarity, but they do lack potency. I need something stronger—with a solid concentration of Yang to help balance out Li Zhen’s qi.”

Jia crossed her arms, frowning.

“How much would it cost to get something like that from your sect?”

“That’s just the thing—you normally can’t get something like that from the sect. At a minimum I’d need a hundred-year-old ginseng, freshly harvested. Those are restricted—only core disciples can even ask to use them. I have certain privileges as the sect’s only alchemist, but even attempting to get my hands on one would be a considerable risk, and I can’t exactly tell them what I plan to use it for.”

Eui glanced sidelong at Pan Jiaying, who’d gone very, very still.

“I seem to recall a certain someone showing us a patch of hundred-year-old ginseng right in the outer sect gardens. If they’re so restricted, why do they have random errand girls taking care of them?”

Luo Mingyu held a finger up to answer, then furrowed his brow.

“Actually, that’s a good question. Junior Pan Jiaying?”

Pan Jiaying went pale and swallowed nervously.

“I-I um...never actually officially told anyone that they’d reached that age. I was told how old they were when I took over caring for them, which is how I knew, but then I just...kept taking care of them.”

“Tsk. You were supposed to report it so that they could be transplanted to the inner sect gardens. Those are too valuable to leave in the care of outer disciples.”

Jia shrugged.

“Isn’t this good for us, though?”

Luo Mingyu shook his head and scoffed.

“I don’t see how. Even if we know where to find them in the outer sect, it’s not as if you’re going to just waltz in there and rob a sect that specializes in surveillance, are you?”

Jia exchanged a meaningful glance with Eui, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. Luo Mingyu’s smile faded as he glanced between them, his face growing as pale as Pan Jiaying’s.

“Are you?”