On the stage, Ling Qi smiled and bowed as her first song with Hanyi came to an end. They began the next song, and Ling Qi pondered what she had heard. The short snippet wasn’t much to go on. It almost seemed like just a personal conflict, but wasn’t this sort of conflict between vassal groups the sort of thing she was supposed to keep an eye on? Also, she was curious about the girl who had ...
2021-05-24 21:53:39 +0000 UTC View PostWith Sixiang’s instruction and her ability to better tap into the flow of the qi at the Silent Stones, her refinements of the Phantasmagoria of Lunar Revelry art came easily to Ling Qi. The ways in which she had been weaving the flows of qi had been subtly wrong in ways that now seemed obvious, and correcting them was merely a matter of practice.
She could, using the techniques of the a...
2021-05-22 21:23:25 +0000 UTC View PostType:Worldbuilding. RR Friendly
Found on Discord in the Interlude Spoilers Channel
2021-05-22 21:16:07 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi centered herself as she viewed the world through the lens of spirit. She saw the whorls and eddies of qi that gathered in this place where the world was thin and the streaming curtains of silver lunar qi that wafted down from the night sky that mingled with the free-flowing streams of wind and water and streamed down to permeate the stolid earth beneath her feet. She hummed the Spring B...
2021-05-20 20:35:05 +0000 UTC View PostHello everyone! First I'd like to thank you all very much for your support, continuing or otherwise. It's been great seeing that so many people value my work enough to pay each month or year.
So first the good news, Volume 2 of Forge of Destiny, is available for preorder through amazon and audible. Links found below.
Better Late than never Eh? Only two options and six days to vote this time since we're in a bit of a rush.
2021-05-19 17:58:07 +0000 UTC View PostCharacter: Ling Qingge, not RR friendly
Found on Discord in interlude Spoilers
2021-05-17 21:46:46 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi had secured an in. Wang Chao seemed to be in a pretty good mood so she suspected he’d be amenable to more weekly training sessions. But Ling Qi thought maybe she could push for more.
“It might be interesting to make something more of it,” Ling Qi mused.
<Oh, you’re going for it? I guess the iron isn’t gonna get any hotter. You go, Ling Qi,> Sixiang silently e...
2021-05-17 21:40:34 +0000 UTC View Post“Many thanks for your invitation,” Alingge said as she strolled with Ling Qi to the empty end of the training field they had decided on.
“It’s no trouble. I was surprised to see you here though. I didn’t think still targets would offer anything to an archer of your skill,” Ling Qi said.
“It is the waking meditation, I believe you call it,” the other girl replied. “...
2021-05-15 19:31:26 +0000 UTC View PostThey spent a while longer at the archive, discussing lighter topics of cultivation and music. Ling Qi workshopped the songs she was intending to play at Lady Cai’s next gathering. Ruan Shen shared some details of a composition he was working on as part of his training with an elder which he had won through a trial before the incursion started. Even Yu Nuan had been coaxed to share a few bars ...
2021-05-13 19:32:53 +0000 UTC View Post“So, how are things with your new spirit?” Ling Qi asked as she entered the archive with Yu Nuan.
Yu Nuan had changed since the last time she had seen her. Streaks of blue and white marked her spiked hair, and a few of the little metal studs that pierced her ears and other parts of her face had been switched out for nodes that crackled with thunder and lightning qi. The other girl sti...
2021-05-10 21:47:08 +0000 UTC View PostType: Sidestory
Royal Road Friendly, found on Discord in Interlude spoilers.
2021-05-09 19:53:02 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi had a feeling that Bao Qian was out of his depth in some ways as well, though not as badly as her.
“I shall explain from the basics,” Bao Qian began. “Please inform me if I am saying something you already know, Miss Ling.”
An out. An unsaid assurance that he wasn’t trying to insult her intelligence. That was fine. She nodded and gestured for him to continue.
...
2021-05-09 00:06:33 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi almost, almost blurted out a denial and a change of subject. “That sounds fine,” she managed instead. “Did you have a place in mind?”
It happened so fast that she could have imagined it, but she thought she saw Bao Qian do a double take. “Nothing ostentatious. Perhaps the Silver Orchid?”
That was a teahouse and eatery in the central part of the village. It mostly...
2021-05-07 00:04:19 +0000 UTC View PostThe meeting place they had decided on was out near the quarry site that they had investigated together shortly after Bao Qian’s arrival. When Ling Qi arrived, she found Bao Qian and his wagon parked about half a kilometer from the work site. As she descended from the sky, he was standing before a collection of stone blocks, half a dozen in various shades and textures. As she alighted on the g...
2021-05-03 19:04:37 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi skipped across the roiling ground, trailing a train of flickering images, ephemeral and dreamlike, in her wake. All around her, phantoms in dark and refined garb circled and danced in the mist to an eerie melody. Beneath her feet, the dirt writhed and spearing roots, smoking with superheated sap, erupted from it, grasping and reaching only to catch the trailing hems of phantom gowns. 2021-05-02 02:09:24 +0000 UTC View Post
The Sect’s war footing was not immediately obvious here at the foot of White Cloud Mountain, at least, not if she wasn’t looking for it. The town guards had been supplemented by soldiers, and their equipment had seen recent upgrades and refitting. Beneath the paved streets of the inner district of the sect town, dormant formation work hummed with new life, and on the walls, the squads on du...
2021-04-29 20:39:07 +0000 UTC View PostIt was not a matter of figuring out what exercises her mother could physically handle, Ling Qi thought, but in figuring out what they could do that mother could repeat on her own and not end up getting discouraged.
It made her look back on her time training under Elder Zhou with new eyes. How much thought had he given to their lessons? Although some had dropped out, quite a few even, she ...
2021-04-26 21:48:25 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi watched the house servant who was leading her inside through a silver gleam in the fold of her gown. The young woman was a few years her elder, but nevertheless, her head was low, and the tension in her shoulders was clear. Ling Qi thought that she might be the same person who had first opened the gate for her back at the beginning when she had first visited after hiring them, but she c...
2021-04-24 19:41:33 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi’s breath hitched as the first connection came loose. It felt like a needle had jabbed into her flesh and twisted, but she had endured worse. She smoothed out her breathing as she began to work the next one loose.
To her, Forgotten Vale Melody represented many things of her past and present, but what was the most important to hold onto?
Was it loneliness? The melody exempli...
2021-04-23 00:24:30 +0000 UTC View PostThe Singing Mist Blade hummed in her grasp, its song quiet as she held it in front of her face, studying the curves of the metal and the uncountable characters finely etched into the curves of the twisting blade. A domain weapon was an odd thing, almost extraneous in many situations. Ling Qi’s acted as a pestering wasp, buzzing about enemies and distracting them, infecting her enemies with en...
2021-04-19 23:42:53 +0000 UTC View PostCharacters: Xiao Fen, Liu Xin
RR Friendly. Found in Discord on Interlude Spoilers
2021-04-17 20:59:35 +0000 UTC View Post“I’m surprised to see that you are still here,” Ling Qi said as the door of the workshop closed behind her.
Bao Qian let out a good-natured harrumph, adjusting the glass monocle on his eye as he examined a piece of carved jade. “Miss Ling, there’s no call for that sort of accusation.”
Ling Qi glanced around. It had actually taken her some time to find the Bao scion’s p...
2021-04-17 20:49:08 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi felt lighter in the days that followed her time with Sixiang. She had solved the problem, even if she still wasn’t wholly sure how, and her cultivation for the month was on schedule.
In her attempt to better understand Sixiang and their worries, she had cultivated a succession of arts in Songseeker’s Ceremony, Playful Muse’s Rapport, and Melodies of the Spirit Seekers. Songs...
2021-04-15 20:23:05 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi really was beautiful, Sixiang mused.
Their hands materialized from the waters, and their body followed. It might have been the form grandmother had made, but it was theirs now. Straying too far from this template just didn’t feel comfortable anymore. Was this what humans referred to as self-image?
“Show me something slow? I need to think,” Ling Qi said, taking their ha...
2021-04-13 00:00:39 +0000 UTC View PostIt was different this time. Perhaps Sixiang had simply grown better at manipulating this place of dreams, or perhaps they were simply holding back less of the experience from her. In any case, Ling Qi felt her mind itch as she was immersed in wholly alien senses. She felt herself drowning in the sheer sensory input that flowed through Sixiang’s/her senses, and it was a struggle just to rememb...
2021-04-10 23:36:11 +0000 UTC View PostSixiang’s expression grew somber, and despite herself, Ling Qi was aware of the handsome lines of the currently male muse’s face, not so far from her own.
“Is there really nothing else for me? That’s the wrong question, I think,” they said, and they separated for the next steps. Another set of hands clasped Ling Qi’s as she spun away, and the other dancer’s features blurred ...
2021-04-08 21:38:46 +0000 UTC View PostLing Qi’s thoughts whirled, and she began to open her mouth to respond. She felt a sharp pain then, like someone grinding their heel into the top of her foot. She shot Meizhen a sharp look, but the girl merely sipped her tea serenely, eyes down. Ling Qi held back a grimace and sipped from her cup as well. It gave her a moment to organize her thoughts.
“You were always going to diverge...
2021-04-05 20:59:32 +0000 UTC View PostCharacter: Dong Fu (The carriage driver from chapter 1)
RR Friendly, found on Discord in Interlude Spoilers.
2021-04-03 22:16:26 +0000 UTC View PostTo any who might have seen them, Ling Qi was sure they would have seemed like a relaxed and lackadaisical sight. Zhengui’s hill lay shrouded in fog and mist, swirling around the rising columns of air warmed by the heated earth and Zhengui’s breath. She sat atop Zhengui’s shell, nestled in a seat made of soft green wood and new grown leaves. Her eyes were half shut as she played a slow and...
2021-04-03 22:14:05 +0000 UTC View Post