Fates Parallel Chapter 268 - Reconnaissance

Takeda Rika sat in a small restaurant with her friends while they made small talk and tried to get used to their false identities. She also investigated the alley behind the restaurant, and the building across the street, and they were close enough to the river for her to take a look at the nicer neighborhood on the other side. Not that clairvoyance was anything special—anyone with a domain could do that much, and Yoshika had way more range than Rika.

What made Rika special was that her Hundred Mirrors technique let her actually interact with people while she did so. She wasn't limited to just observing. Yoshika could make illusory copies of herself too, but she was still a beginner—this was Rika's specialty.

She started small to begin with—just a few copies here and there to get the lay of the land. She made sure that each one was a little different and tried not to use the same name more than once at a time if she had to give one.

She found a man resting by the riverbank, staring up at the sky with a branch of bamboo sticking out of his mouth.

"Excuse me sir, I'm new in town and I was wondering if you might help me get acquainted with the area."

And another unloading bags of rice from an ox-drawn cart.

"Sorry to bother you, but do you happen to know where I could find a doctor?"

And another, lashing together lengths of bamboo to form a fence.

"That's nice work! I don't suppose you take commissions or know someone who does?"

And so on. Rika spread out through the town, talking to the locals and gathering information.

It wasn't exactly easy. Before her breakthrough, Rika could only manage three copies at a time, and she relied on intensely drilled routines in order to actually control them. Unlike Yoshika, she was only one person at her core, and she could only spread herself so thin.

That had changed after her breakthrough—partly, at least. Thanks to her training with—and occasionally as—Yoshika, Rika had learned to give her copies a limited form of autonomy. It wasn't as sophisticated as the simulacrum they'd built together, but it was enough to lighten some of the mental burden the technique placed on her.

Copying Yoshika's Absolute Awareness was far beyond Rika, but the lessons she'd learned from it were incredibly useful. Not only that, but Yun had been helping her modify a compartmentalization technique that let her divvy up her concentration between the copies, freely adjusting how much micromanagement each one got.

All told, it meant that Rika could control more copies than ever, and with improved precision and flexibility. It was everything she'd hoped for when she'd started creating the technique, but she still had a long way to go before perfecting it.

“Miss, did you hear me?”

Rika shook her head and returned her attention to the man in front of her—which one was this again? Right, the one she’d asked about the doctor. She did a quick mental rewind of the conversation—he’d been asking her to clarify what exactly she was looking for.

“Yes, sorry! I’m not used to such a busy town, and it’s a bit distracting. I’m not sure, exactly. My cousin is sick and she needs a doctor.”

The man grunted with exertion as he lifted a sack of rice nearly as large as he was and tossed it into the pile next to him before wiping the sweat off his brow and sighing.

“I figured it was something like that, but I don’t know what to tell you. I take it you’re from down south on the frontier?”

The ‘frontier,’ Rika noted, never the ‘border.’

“Yes sir, that’s right.”

“Right, well there’s a few places around. Most of the midwives around town will know a thing or two about ailments, but I’m guessing you already tried that back at home.”

Rika nodded along. Much like the guard, it was often easier to let people come to their own conclusions than to try to spin an elaborate story. The man grabbed another sack of rice as he continued.

“I think I heard about an apothecary on the other side of the river, but I don’t know him myself. My sister had a rough time during her pregnancy last year, and the midwife sent a runner across the river for some medicine—that’ll be your best bet.”

He dumped another sack of rice and pointed down the street.

“She should be home now, taking care of the kids. A few streets down—the Gao house, er not that you’d know which one that is. Well, just ask around and someone will point it out for you. You’re looking for Zhang Qingge, and you can tell her I sent you. Oh, I’m Zhang Yong—sorry for not introducing myself earlier.”

Rika bowed.

“Tian Lihua. Nice to meet you Zhang Yong, and thank you for all the help.”

The man smiled affably as he resumed his work.

“Not at all miss! A chance to chat with a pretty young lady while I work has made my whole week. Good luck, and give your cousin my regards!”

Rika bid Zhang Yong the laborer farewell and proceeded down the street according to his directions. Meanwhile, she similarly concluded her business with a craftsman who was more than happy to construct them a simple bamboo litter for nothing more than the cost of materials—which was next to nothing when they lived right next to a huge forest of the stuff—and a local farmer who offered to give her a tour of the town and an explanation of the surrounding area. Though the farmer was a little overeager to keep bringing up his unmarried son during the conversation.

Throughout it all, there was one thing that stood out to Rika. A strange, uncomfortable feeling that kept worming its way into her mind, sowing doubt over every interaction.

“They’re all so nice!”

Jia blinked at Rika’s sudden outburst—she’d cut her off mid-sentence.

“What?”

Rika blushed, leaning forward to speak in hushed tones and avoid being overheard.

“The townsfolk, Li Meili. They’re all super nice. Nobody has questioned a single thing I’ve told them, and they’ve all been totally welcoming. I’m even starting to think that guard was only questioning us because it’s literally his job. In hindsight, he was pretty nice too, wasn’t he?”

Jung cocked her head.

“Isn’t that a good thing?”

“Well, yeah, I guess. It’s just...this is Qin.”

“...and?”

Rika scratched her head, not really sure how to respond. Jung hadn’t spent two years at the Grand Academy of Spiritual, Martial, and Arcane Arts, surrounded by imperial citizens outnumbering the Goryeon and Yamato students combined. She hadn’t had to put up with the constant casual xenophobia, or the frustrating way the Qin played with their words. Thankfully, the other two clearly understood what she was saying.

Eui nodded solemnly.

“No, you’re right. That is weird. Maybe the culture’s not as strong out here on the outskirts?”

Rika shrugged.

“I don’t know. There’s still that reverence for the emperor, or the way that they call the border the ‘frontier’ as if there’s nothing else out there. It’s still Qin, they’re just...nice.”

Jung leaned her elbow on the table and rested her chin in her hand, tapping her lips thoughtfully.

“I’m not entirely certain I understand, but in the past you’ve only spoken to cultivators, right?”

Jia shook her head.

“No, there were caravans that came in sometimes to sell things to the academy. There were mortals among them.”

“Sure, but mortals who were accustomed to dealing with immortal practitioners, and who knew what they were dealing with. I suspect you’ve gotten a rather biased impression of this nation’s culture.”

Rika froze. Jung was absolutely right. Elder Qin Zhao had once said that less than one in a thousand imperial citizens would ever awaken their qi, but every single person in the academy was either a cultivator, or dealt with them regularly. They’d built their impression of the country based on a group that made up less than a single percent of the actual population. In fact, since the academy was a place for elites even among cultivators, it was probably less than one percent of one percent.

They’d been expecting the people of Qin to be self-serving and manipulative bigots because that was what they’d grown accustomed to in the academy. But the truth was that the people of Qin were just...people. If Rika compared Qinghe to her own hometown, then the attitudes made perfect sense. It was a small town with a sense of community—everybody knew everybody, and they were used to helping each other out.

Even as they spoke, Rika was saying her farewells to Zhang Qingge and her frankly astonishing collection of little Gaos—that was one busy woman—with directions to her preferred midwife in hand and assurances that if anyone knew what to do it’d be Lai Jingfei. She’d even invited them to dinner.

“I think Li Zhen is right. We need to abandon our preconceptions about the people of Qin. We’ve never met them before today. Everything that we thought was part of Qin culture was actually cultivator culture.”

The girls nodded in agreement as one of Rika’s copies arrived at the midwife’s house—or rather, her husband’s house. The patriarchal family structures, at least, were not unique to cultivators. Like most of the houses on the south side of the river it was a simple wooden building with dried bamboo tiles for a roof. It had a dusty, monochromatic look, but looked cozy enough. It reminded Rika of the villages back home in Yamato.

In front of the house, Rika saw a middle-aged woman tossing bits of grain into a fenced-off pen, where half a dozen chickens started happily pecking away at the ground. The woman turned and met Rika’s eyes, glanced behind her, then sighed.

“Right. Come on in—the husband won’t be home for another few hours yet, if he doesn’t get caught up drinking.”

She turned around and marched back into the house without waiting for a response, and Rika had to rush to catch up.

“Uh, sorry, are you Lai Jingfei? My name is Tian Lihua.”

“That’s me. How can I help you, Miss Tian?”

Rika followed her into the house, which mostly consisted of a single large room with a kitchen in the corner and a large table in the center surrounded by simple mats for sitting. A shaggy looking dog sat curled up on a single cushioned chair that was surrounded by sewing materials and clothing. Lai Jingfei snapped her fingers loud enough to make Rika wince, then pointed to another mat opposite the kitchen. The dog looked up, sneezed, then relinquished the chair and loped over to the mat before curling back up.

“Lazy thing.”

Lai Jingfei brushed a bit of dog hair off the seat before throwing herself into it and scooping up a pair of pants to begin sewing. After a few seconds of silence, she glanced up without stopping her hands and scowled at Rika.

“Well? I haven’t got all day, woman, out with it!”

“R-right!”

Rika looked around momentarily, but in lieu of something to sit on, she opted to just kneel and sit on her heels. She finally took a moment to really look at the woman in front of her. Lai Jingfei had a matronly look about her. She had crows feet at the corners of her eyes, but had otherwise aged quite gracefully. Her hands were rough and calloused, but moved with practiced ease as she did her sewing. Her long black hair was tied close to her head in a complicated bun, and had only a few streaks of gray running through it.

“Zhang Qingge said you handled her pregnancy last year, and referred me to you.”

“Mhm, I remember. That was a tough one—you’d think the girl would learn to stop panicking after the fourth time. What of it? Are you late? Feeling sick in the mornings? Tired?”

Rika shook her head.

“Oh, no, sorry—I’m not here for me. It’s my cousin, she—”

“Tsk, should have brought her, then. Same questions to her, if you can answer them.”

“Uh, I don’t think she’s pregnant, no. She’s just sick.”

Lai Jingfei scoffed.

“How would you know? Do you know how many women I’ve had come to me insisting that it’s impossible for them to be pregnant?”

Rika chuckled—she’d heard that one often enough herself back home. Just as well she wasn’t interested in men, or she might have had a few close calls herself.

“I’m sure you do, but really—she’s been sick for a long time. It’s just started to get worse recently, and so we’re looking for a doctor to help her. I heard you knew an apothecary on the other side of town.”

The midwife’s hands stopped. She set aside her sewing and leveled a hard gaze at Rika.

“What did you say your name was?”

“Tian Lihua, miss.”

Lai Jingfei stared into Rika’s eyes for a long moment, searching. Rika tried to sense the midwife’s emotions, but she’d never had as good a handle on the empathy thing as Yoshika did. All she got was a vague sense of unease—something Rika said had disturbed her. Finally, the older woman sat back and sighed.

“Miss Tian, you need to understand that an illness like that doesn’t tend to end well, and if it’s started to worsen, then it’s probably too late for your cousin. But yes—we do have a doctor in town who deals in medicines. A bit eccentric, and he doesn’t usually take patients directly, but I’ll write you a letter of introduction. Just—try not to get your hopes up, understand?”

Rika bowed.

“Of course, miss. Thank you very much.”

As soon as Lai Jingfei left to write her letter, the dog reclaimed the chair and Rika scratched it idly behind the ears. Back at the in, Rika grinned smugly at Jia.

“Li Meili, I think I’ve found your doctor.”