The walk back to Grandmother Lu’s house was done mostly in silence. Sen had expected that he’d feel different when everything was done, changed somehow by bringing the conflict to a close. Instead, he just felt a vague sense of emptiness and fatigue. It made a certain kind of sense to him, though. The situation had changed, but whatever changes he might have gone through weren’t especially wrapped up in that situation. The conflict had driven some advancement, but almost entirely by clarifying things he didn’t want to become. The violence required to end the conflict had almost felt like a step in the wrong direction to him, a move toward that agent of chaos he didn’t want to become. Yet, it hadn’t been a conflict of his own choosing. Seeing the pure, spiteful, irrational rage in the mayor’s eyes had been proof enough of that for Sen. Yes, he’d done things he didn’t want to do, but it hadn’t truly been a step off the path he wanted to forge for himself.

Having Falling Leaf walking with him was also a comfort. He hadn’t realized just how much he would miss the big cat’s presence. It only became apparent to him now that it was gone. As much as he relished her company, though, he was more confident than ever that she had been right. The world of human beings wasn’t a world for her. She could make occasional visits, but she’d attract too much attention if she were always with him. Her instincts would lead her into situations that neither of them could hope to extract her from. He could just see her attacking someone who just acted threatening toward him, regardless of how dangerous they actually were. Worse still, she might make the same choice with someone who neither of them could handle. Sen was not under any illusion that every conflict that found him could be resolved with a similar kind of brute force. It was only the relative weakness of the cultivators here that let him play this out the way he had. Against more powerful enemies, against a sect, his approach would have utterly failed.

Master Feng or Uncle Kho might be able to send sects running with only their names or a quick flash of overwhelming power. Neither of those choices were available to Sen. For that matter, if he somehow did develop the kind of reputation that made his name a byword for terror, it would mean that he had failed in countless other ways to become the man he wished to be. Yet, without recourse to those kinds of options, he couldn’t see any way that he could ever safely take Falling Leaf away from the mountain or, barring that, away from the wilds where men so rarely tread of their own free will. As much as he missed her, only pure selfishness would ever let him justify taking her along with him. As with so much else, she had been wiser than he. As they neared Grandmother Lu’s home, Sen paused and looked to the sky once more. The faintest edges of light were visible on the horizon, heralding a new day. Maybe, it would mean a fresh start for Orchard’s Reach as well. Someone would have to take over for the mayor. Sen looked down at Falling Leaf, who regarded him with curious eyes.

“Thank you for watching over Grandmother Lu. For coming with me. Just, thank you.”

The big cat bumped her head against Sen’s leg in acknowledgment. He smiled and rested a hand on her head.

“I know you can’t do it all the time. But, if you could look in her occasionally, while she’s still here, I’d be grateful. Maybe let her catch a glimpse of you from time to time. She’d like that.”

Falling Leaf let out an exasperated noise, but she nodded. Then, she looked off toward the mountain.

Sen nodded. “You need to go. I understand. Goodbye for now.”

The ghost panther gave him another affectionate nudge, then vanished into the darkness. As he watched her go, it wasn’t with the same awful feeling of loss. He knew that he’d miss her, but he also knew now that her remaining on the mountain was what was best for her. The journey he was about to take to the sea was for him. Whatever benefits there were to be had were his. The trip would only bring her danger. Sen looked around the town. As terrible as it all had been, as wasteful and pointless as the deaths were, he had needed it all on some level. He had needed it to see that he had outgrown the town in so many ways.

The townspeople had nothing to offer him, and he had scant little to offer them in return. They were, save perhaps for a few scattered qi condensation stage cultivators, mortals. As a foundation formation stage cultivator, he would quite literally outlive all of them. Assuming some other cultivator didn’t eventually turn up and cut him down, decades and then centuries would pass beneath his eyes. If he never advanced his cultivation another step, he could well outlive the great-grandchildren of the people resting in their beds in the houses around him. The gap that extended life created was inevitable, inescapable, and all but insurmountable. Some would view him with awe, others with resentment, but they would always see the cultivator first. If they saw Sen at all, it would be a distant second.

No, his relationship with this place and the people in it had run its course. Moving forward, it would be little more than a convenient location to stop for a meal on his way to see Uncle Kho and Ma Caihong. For, unless he had truly missed his guess, Grandmother Lu wouldn’t be here much longer either. He had been her reason to stay, and he was leaving. The simple knowledge that there was nothing in Orchard’s Reach for him let him shed a burden he hadn’t even noticed was weighing him down. He didn’t bear the place any particular ill will, he just didn’t care about it. He could be on his way and never think about it again. He was free. He was free of whatever grudges he’d held, and also free of any obligations. He could make his life in whatever way he saw fit and whatever place he saw fit.

He smiled a little as he imagined what that half-starved, half-feral child he had been would have made of him as he was now. That boy would have hidden, terrified of the unknown, and perhaps rightly so. The unknown had scooped him up and forged him into something else, after all. If that boy had truly understood the pain and sacrifices involved, Sen suspected that he might have gone along anyway. He would have been more cautious, but the lure of a different life, a life like one from the stories he’d heard while eavesdropping in dirty alleys, would have likely proven too much of a temptation. With one last look around, Sen finally let the ghost of that child rest. He wouldn’t forget that child, nor should any sane person forget what made them, but he needn’t be haunted by that child either. Satisfied that he’d understood what he needed to understand, Sen covered the last little distance and went inside Grandmother Lu’s house. He found her waiting for him.

“It’s done, then?” she asked.

He nodded. “It’s done. I expect there will probably be some chaos because of it. Guards and servants telling wild tales. That sort of thing. I’ll be long gone by the time anyone shows up to sort things out, though.”

“Good. It’s never wise to leave unfinished business behind you if you can avoid it. It has a way of tracking you down later and bringing friends. Are you still planning on going east? Tide’s Rest, was it?”

“Yes. There’s something there for me. Maybe something I need to do, or someone I need to meet. I don’t really know. It’s a little frustrating to be honest, knowing where to go but not why.”

Grandmother Lu absently hummed while she gathered her thoughts. “I have a caravan headed that way in a few days. If you can wait that long, you could travel with them. Pose as a guard. It’s a good cover.”

“Or, I could just be a guard for it. That’s an even better cover. I’m a wandering cultivator, Grandmother. As I understand it, we’re always in need of work.”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “I’m not paying you to be a distraction to every woman in that caravan.”

Sen gave the older woman a wounded look and pulled out the satchel. “And to think, I was going to give you all this gold.”

Grandmother Lu watched with wide eyes as Sen opened the satchel, grabbed a handful of the golden taels, and made them disappear into his storage ring. Then, he gave her a big smile and offered her the satchel.

“Now you don’t have to pay me,” he said, shaking the bag a little.

The old woman snorted and grabbed the satchel. “You’re only giving me this so that you’ll have more places to find help.”

“That’s not the only reason. It’s also so I’ll know that, even if the worst happens, you’ll never wind up in a hovel again.”

Grandmother Lu went very still for a few moments. “Don’t you know that it’s terrible manners to make an old woman cry?”

“As you say, Grandmother.”