Fates Parallel Chapter 70 - Familiar

Jia and her friends sat in a circle, watching the kitten bat playfully at her fingers. It was almost disturbing just how life-like it was, but the kitten wasn’t real. Only Jia could interact with it physically—to the others it was just an illusion created from spiritual energy. The reason Jia hadn’t been able to detect the kitten through her domain was simple—it was part of it. Beyond that, she was still trying to puzzle out exactly what it was and what its presence meant. It was certainly cute, though.

“It’s not entirely unheard of for spiritual familiars to manifest directly like this. Though it is quite rare...”

Dae was trying to help Jia understand it while the others mostly fawned over the adorable little kitten. As he often did, he was starting a few layers too deep for her.

“Slow down, Dae. Spiritual familiar? Explain from the beginning.”

“R-right, hehe. Um, a spiritual familiar is a spirit that has been bound to a cultivator in some way—most often through a magical contract or binding formation. Usually, such methods seal the spirit into a physical object to substitute as a body.”

Jia frowned and scratched one of her ears.

“But it’s different for Heian?”

“H-Heian?”

She nodded matter of factly, as Heian gripped one of her fingers in its forepaws and savagely clawed at it with its back paws.

“Mhm, because of her black fur.”

“R-right, hehe. Well, in your case, you seem to have bonded with, uh, Heian, directly—you yourself are serving as the medium.”

Jia hummed thoughtfully and glanced up at Fujino. She’d asked him to come along since they’d discussed spirits earlier, but he’d remained silently thoughtful so far.

“What do you think?”

Fujino didn’t react for a moment and then started as if having only just realized he was being addressed.

“Hm!? Me? Oh uh...well, it’s fascinating—I understand why you were so interested in kami before.”

Jia nodded.

“Yeah, I guess that secret is out, but I was trying to ask what you could tell me about your priests and the way they interact with spirits. Is it like what Dae described?”

Fujino scratched his head and frowned.

“Yes and no. I’m not really an expert, mind you. This is fairly common knowledge that you could have gotten from Miss Takeda or Lady Hayakawa. We call a kami bound in the way Senior Dae described a shikigami, but they are far from the only type of spirit employed. For example, Grandmaster Murayoshi’s Forge is a tsukumogami—what you would call an object spirit.

“Their bond isn’t the result of a contract, and in fact, in that case the bond likely came before the spirit even manifested. A tsukumogami forms as a direct result of one’s emotional investment in an object, empowered by a near-constant investiture of ki over the course of a century or more. The bond with their wielder is the entire meaning of a tsukumogami’s existence.”

Jia pondered Fujino’s words as she played with Heian, letting it chase after a little mote of shadow essence that she manipulated within her domain—it was pretty good practice for her control as well.

“Does that make Murayoshi a priest, too?”

“Eh, not quite, no. There’s some overlap, and many of the older priests have their own tsukumogami, but I think Grandmaster Murayoshi would be rather insulted if you said that to his face.”

“Good to know. So what about me, are situations like mine more common in Yamato?”

Fujino sighed and shrugged.

“I honestly don’t know. I have heard of priests who channel the kami through themselves as mediums, but I don’t know much about the practice, and I’ve never met one.”

Dae perked up and adjusted his glasses.

“The spirit mediums of Yamato do bind spirits using their own bodies to house them! This is usually done adjacent to their own body cultivation, and they use the spirit’s power to enhance their own abilities. Um, I don’t believe they are typically known to manifest a spirit directly like this, though.”

Fujino gestured to Dae and nodded.

“There you have it. Similar, but not quite the same. I doubt your situation is entirely unique, Miss Lee, but I don’t think it’s common, either.”

Jia nodded and stared down at Heian, who had apparently grown tired of playing and curled up in her lap to sleep. She scratched its head idly as she thought. Apparently the panther spirit—Heian senior? Greater Heian? She’d think of something later—had imparted a piece of itself onto her, which had now taken the form of Heian. Did that make Heian the spirit’s child? Could spirits even have children? That was probably a silly question for her to ask, given that she was half-spirit, herself.

Wait, if Heian was the spirit’s child, did that make her the mother!? She shuddered and decided not to think about the implications of that particular can of worms. She wondered why it had suddenly manifested itself, and whether it was possible to unmanifest it. As soon as she had the thought, Heian’s form slowly dissipated into a cloud of shadow essence and returned to her soulscape, much to the disappointment of Eunae and Rika.

“Wait! Jia, what did you do? Bring her back!”

Jia chuckled at Rika’s complaints, and concentrated on her domain. Now that she knew what to look for, she could sense Heian’s presence within her soul. In fact, she now realized that Heian had been the one to absorb the dark energy she had stolen from Yan Yue. With a thought, Jia tried to call Heian out, and it’s form coalesced in front of her.

Heian stared up at her angrily, apparently upset at having been interrupted from it’s nap. It turned away from her, and dissipated once again—this time of its own accord. Rika looked like she was going to slap her, and Jia put her hands up defensively.

“She did it by herself that time! I don’t think she wants to come out right now. I can...sort of understand what she’s feeling intuitively. I think she’s tired from helping me use Steps of the Stalker earlier.”

“Aww!”

Rika crossed her arms and sulked. Jia heard Eui snickering from behind her, returning from treating Minami’s wounds.

“Oh, I didn’t know you had such a thing for cats, Rika. Should I feel threatened?”

Rika shot Eui a baleful glare.

“Not funny, Eui!”

Fujino politely ignored the banter and bowed politely to Eui.

“Thank you for treating Yuuko’s injuries, Miss An. We’re in your debt.”

Eui waved Fujino off and shook her head.

“You don’t owe us anything for fixing a mess we made. Anyway, she’s fine now, though she should probably avoid using her ki for the rest of the day just to be safe—Jia really did a number on her.”

Fujino clearly didn’t agree with Eui’s sentiment and bowed deeply.

“I appreciate it nonetheless. Thank you again.”

Eui shrugged noncommittally.

“Sure.”

Fujino took the dismissal in stride and left to return to his own group. Afterwards, Jia caught Eui up in the conversation.

“Hmm, so now you’ve got a cute little cat spirit living in you? And you think it helped you use your technique, too?”

Jia nodded.

“That’s the gist of it. Dae called it a spiritual familiar.”

“Hmm, maybe I should figure out how to get in tune with my own inner spirit—though my bloodline is pretty weak. Probably because my father wasn’t a half spirit.”

Jia raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“I didn’t know about that. Why didn’t you mention it before?”

Eui shrugged.

“I didn’t think it was important. Besides, I’ve given up on seeing my family again, so it doesn’t really feel right to talk about them.”

“Ah, sorry...”

Jia bit her tongue and cursed her own insensitivity. She had no family of her own, so she had forgotten that Eui probably missed hers.

“It’s fine, Jia. Anyway, if we’re done bullying Dae’s friends and fawning over cute kittens, can we get back to actually training? I feel like practicing on this mountain has been the first time I’ve made progress in months.”

Jia mirrored the sentiment, and they spent the rest of the day on training to take advantage of the rich spiritual energy. That night, Jia focused mainly on solidifying the lessons she’d learned in her spar against Minami Yuuko. She had been expecting a good match, but it had completely exceeded her expectations. She looked forward to training with her group in the future.

She kept a close eye on her domain, watching for any more signs that she was being watched by either Yan Yue or the mysterious intruder who’d been plaguing her for weeks. She never detected any sign of either of them, but somehow, that only made her more nervous.

---

The next morning Jia and friends were preparing to spend the last day exploring the mountain when they were approached by Minami Yuuko. She looked away nervously, crossing one arm over her chest as she spoke.

“U-um, would it be alright if I, uh, joined you guys?”

Lee Jia blinked in surprise, glancing back at her own group before responding.

“I suppose if your group wants to explore with us, I’m not against it, but—”

“No! I mean, uh, not the whole group, just—just me. I wanted to apologize for my behavior yesterday, and some of the things I said, and I thought that—well, anyway I understand if you don’t want me. I’ll just leave you alone.”

Minami turned to leave and Lee Jia reached out to stop her.

“Wait! I just misunderstood. I’ll have to check with the others, but I have no objections if you’d like to join us for the day. Actually, I was wondering about some of the things you said. What are people saying about me? I’ve heard about some rumors but...”

Minami blushed and covered her face in shame.

“Uuugh, I shouldn’t have said that—I’m so stupid! Just forget about it, okay? I was just angry and jealous—I never really believed any of the rumors.”

Lee Jia giggled and shook her head.

“Slow down, Minami! I’m not upset, I just wanted to know what you’d heard. Also, why would you be jealous of me?”

Minami averted her eyes and tugged self-consciously at her braid, her face still red.

“I don’t know. I guess I just wanted the others to look up to me the way they did to you. I thought—I guess I convinced myself that you don’t deserve it. Our style was inspired by your duel, but it was Dae who helped us actually develop it. I guess I thought you were just using him because he’s your boyfriend, but now I know I was just deluding myself.”

This time it was Lee Jia’s turn to blush.

“W-wait! Dae is not my boyfriend! Where did you hear that? Please tell me he didn’t tell you that.”

“He’s not!? From the way he talks about you I was sure that—oh gods, I just keep embarrassing myself!”

Lee Jia sighed as Minami covered her face again. She had really been putting off that discussion with Dae. It was just so awkward! How would she even start the conversation? Was she just supposed to go up to him and say ‘Hey, I know you’re probably attracted to me, and I kinda like you too, but I’m not really ready to think about dating.’...actually that didn’t sound too bad. It just felt so presumptuous, even if everyone she knew kept insisting that he was definitely interested—even complete strangers, apparently.

“Don’t worry about it. You’re not the only one to get that impression—Eui teases me about it all the time. We’re just—close friends. He was one of the first people I met here, and he helped me a lot. So...about those rumors?”

Minami straightened up and nodded rigidly.

“Right! Of course! Um, some of them are kind of mean, though.”

Jia chuckled sardonically.

“I assumed as much.”

“Okay, so the way the rumors go is basically that Yan Yue has slept with half the academy—men and women both. That’s pretty typical rich-people politics, so I just ignored it, but where you get involved is that she’s supposed to have been a good traditional Qin girl—whatever that means—before she moved in with you and An Eui. It’s pretty easy to see the implication, there.”

“So, what, I somehow corrupted her with my degenerate Goryeon ways?”

Minami shrugged.

“I don’t know. Nobody is actually talking about you, specifically. I didn’t believe a word of it until I noticed you giving Yan the cold shoulder. I guess the possibility that there might be something to the rumors was convenient when I was going out of my way to hate you.”

“Ah. Well as much as I dislike Yue, there’s nothing to any part of those rumors. She had a—a falling out, you could call it, with Eui and me. That feels like an understatement, but there you have it. I suppose I kind of understand what you had against me, now—actually, why the change of heart?”

Minami scratched the back of her head and chuckled in a decidedly Dae-like manner.

“Haha! I mean, a big part of my problem with you was that I thought you were a fraud—not an easy position to hold after you thrashed me like that. Besides, the others told me about what happened at the end of our fight. I used a lot more force than was appropriate, and I forced you to match it—I don’t blame you for that. Eiji said that you were calling for help before I had even hit the ground. I definitely misjudged you and—I want to make up for it.”

“I can respect that. You know what? Why don’t we just start fresh? Totally clean slate, no grudges on either side. We both just put the past aside and agree to move forward as friends. Okay?”

Jia offered her hand, and after a moment of hesitation, Minami took it and nodded.

“Friends, then.”

“Great! Then you can just call me Jia from now on, if you don’t mind me calling you Yuuko.”

Yuuko blushed a bit before nodding.

“S-sure. You’re pretty quick to use given names—I noticed you called Yan ‘Yue’, earlier.”

Jia giggled.

“Hahaha! Eunae’s been a bad influence on me, I guess. You should be ready for that, actually. Don’t call her Seong, and she’ll probably start using your given name right away.”

“R-really?”

“That’s just how she is—there’s no fighting it. Come on, I’ll introduce you!”

As Jia turned to guide Yuuko back to the rest of the group she felt a tug on her sleeve, and looked back to see Yuuko staring down at the ground and blushing.

“U-um, actually, there was one other thing...”

Jia frowned.

“What is it?”

“Can—can I see the kitten? I missed it before.”

Jia sighed with exasperation. Heian was getting to be more popular than she was.

---

Zheng Long was up to something—Yue was certain of it. He was far too relaxed after finding no sign of the demon they were searching for. The story was that the injured demon would be hiding somewhere on the mountain, but Yue knew that if it had ever existed, it was long gone by now.

She wasn’t certain she truly believed Lee Jia’s story, but the naive girl didn’t really seem the type to murder her brother in cold blood. She could see An Eui doing it, and Lee Jia covering for her, but if that was the case, she’d expect that Xin or Guan would have given up the story by now.

Even Zheng Long should be showing some measure of frustration at their failure—after all, he had ambitions within the sect and he was stuck here until the mission was completed. Likewise, Han Yu—who should have been fuming by now—seemed entirely content to simply gather alchemical materials. What did they know that she didn’t?

“You appear to be troubled once again, Miss Yan.”

Yue glanced up at Guan Yi’s towering form. Again? His face was impassive as always, but he seemed concerned—why? Was he attracted to her or something? She supposed she could certainly do worse, but it was dreadfully inconvenient at that particular moment.

“Don’t mind me, Sir Guan—I’m a natural worrier.”

“I hesitated to ask, previously, but is your fretful mood related to the difficulties you’ve encountered with your roommates?”

Yue paused, and caught herself before she could express her shock or suspicion.

“What makes you say I’m having trouble with Jia and Eui?”

“Miss Yan, though I may have earned the nickname Stoneface, I am still a cultivator, and thus sensitive to the emotions of others. Furthermore, I have eyes. There was clearly some hostility between you when we first arrived.”

Yue sighed. The big guy was surprisingly observant, apparently. She silently reminded herself not to judge a book by its cover.

“Just cultural clashes, really. Jia is quite sweet, but I don’t think we understand each other very well, and—well, I may have overstepped, in a few places.”

Guan Yi nodded once, slowly.

“Such is to be expected between different cultures. However, I believe you will find Miss Lee to be rather accommodating, should you bring yourself to properly apologize for any transgressions. Xin has made a fool of himself more times than I dare recount, and she has never held it against him.”

Xin Wei called back from slightly further ahead.

“I heard that!”

“Good. You were meant to.”

Yue covered her mouth with a sleeve and allowed herself a genuine giggle.

“That’s good to know, Guan. I appreciate the advice.”

Though Yue doubted that any kind of apology would suffice for her betrayal of Jia and Eui. Guilty as she was about it—and she could admit that her actions had been too extreme—she still didn’t feel that she had been in the wrong. Seong Eunae was far more dangerous than Lee Jia knew, and she was too blinded by her friendship to see it—or simply enthralled without realizing it. Still, from their perspective, it was no doubt an unforgivable transgression.

Yue snapped out of her reverie when she realized that the group had stopped. She looked ahead to see why and nearly stumbled over her own feet when she saw Lee Jia and her friends coming down the path ahead of them.

“It seems you’ll have your opportunity sooner than expected, Miss Yan.”

Yue smiled stiffly and pretended she didn’t want to stab Guan Yi.

“So it does, Sir Guan...so it does.”