Chapter 473

"This is an endurance quest," Arthur snarled, after a long period of near equilibrium, when the ghosts would threaten to attack but never enter the pathway. Or, not in sufficient numbers that it made empowering himself make any sense. He took out the occassional floating wisp that came close, sweeping his staff through them and watching the dust motes shatter, ghost dust driftig to the floor. 

There was no time to even collect it, since Bomoh Umi kept walking, so he had to follow after her. 

"Get back here, Jan!" 

"Tau lah," Jan complained, waving at him from the edge of the trail further up. She was prespiring like a pig, sweat staining her forehead and leaving it gleaming and shiny in the little light the jungle canopy allowed to filter through. Without the boost from Bomoh Umi's meat, Arthur knew he would be struggling to see anything, even with his Keen Sight trait. As it stood, between the buff, his trait and his Yin Body's natural resonance with the night, he was likely seeing as well right now as he would have been in the day.

Or close enough, at least to not make a difference.

In particular, he was realising that as he grew more confident in the buff that had been passed to him, as he understood how the energies flowed, he was better able to discern the flow of the Yang energy in the air and the dense clumps of Yin energy that made up the ghosts. 

"You boleh cultivate and draw energy moving or not?" Arthur asked Jan.

"Tak boleh," Jan said. "Too slow, lah."

"Yeah..." It was frustrating, that they could not utilize basic cultivation techniques on the move; the few methods that allowed that almost entirely geared and only allowin a slow drip. It was, generally, considered incredibly inefficient and thus, not the preferred method. All they could do was... "I can refine from cores. You?"

"Hard, but okay lah."

"Then go ahead. Bomoh Umi, you think the hantu coming soon, ah?" He asked.

"Maybe, maybe not. Who knows what they want but our lives, eh?" A small qwirk of her lips. "I could ask, but then we have to stop. And you were hurry, hurry, hurry lah."

"I see..." Inclining his head, Arthur looked at Jan as he added. "The energy from the food she gave us, I think it's a way for us to learn a new technique."

"Really?"

Arthur quickly explained what he was thinking, how he was finding the way the Yang energy from the meat was interacting with his own body and skills and what he was thinking. Jan made a few comments on her own observations, noting that she was not noticing the same issues obviously, but smirked at his next statement.

"No lah. That's for you all to do. I'm not going to try testing out and making a new technique."

"But-"

"You and Mel and Uswah, all like playing with it. Me? I'm happy lah. I get the books, learn them. Do good with them. That's enough, no need to keep pushing," she flexed her parangs in her hand and added. "Got enough to learn, no?"

Arthur shook his head, wanting to point out how their Advanced Healing technique came from his experimentation. Then realised he was just trying to push his own desires on her and shut his mouth.

"Watch me?"

Accepting her nod, Arthur switched his focus inwards a little. Not entirely leaving the world, but splitting his attention so that he could focus not just on the way the energy from the still digesting meat was flowing through him, but how it played with his body and, subsequently, his Yin Aura.

In itself, the Yin Aura gave him a sense of shadows, of pools of greater Yin concentration. The Yang energy from the meat buffed him to see the flow of Yang energy further, made the world brighter by increasing the contrast in the world. If he could learn to interlace some of that same ability to his Yin Aura, Arthur assumed that it would further increase his sensitivity. 

Right now, a body - like the Bomoh, like Jan walking beside him - was a blob of warmth, a pulse of heat in his Yin Aura sense. Jan was warmer than the Bomoh by far, or perhaps, radiated more warmth. Not a surprise, considering her size - but also, he assumed, the fact that Jan herself was stronger as a full Climber.

Certainly, from past experience, the difference between someone like Yao Jing or Rick to Jan was so small that it was near impossible for himt o track. The fact that she was a woman should have meant that he was able to tell the difference between the pair, but even Uswah who had originated and taught him the aura, was only able to get it right slightly more than half the time.  Yin Aura was useful for many things, from helping them stay silent, to making them harder to find and sneak around; and at a pinch, to drain energy from others, causing Yang-energy based individuals to slow down or, potentially, succumb to sleep.

Adding this Yang energy sensing, this refinement to the aura could be highly beneficial. He was imagining it working on a wider basis, spread out across the surroundings to act as though it was a seocndary sensing mehtod, a way of seeing the world like an internal ultrasound. Like a famous red devil from the comics and TV show. 

Though, really, he still liked the first TV show version best, instead of the cartoon adaptation that they had created. Admittedly, the cosplays from the Black Cat character had been quite the thing for a bit from what he had seen.

Focused internally, footstep after footstep moving onwards, he traced the energies through his aura, pouring it through his system before pushing it outwards. It drained a little of his Refined Energy to keep it running, but had the advantage at least of being something that he could refill at a later date. 

At the same time, while he was paying attention to the modification of the technique, he was using the pulses to track the shifting movements of the ghosts all around. They were gathering near the back of their party, all of them waiting for a moment to launch their attack, sending the occassional ghost out to test their attention.

Killing them was simple enough, but draining for Arthur and Jan.

Not just on their cultivation energy, but also on their attention, their focus. Jan started muttering about Mel being the smarter to have gotten enchanted weaponry and even Arthur was beginning to doubt his own choices.

And still, the Bomoh trudged on and that tiger stalked them, never leaving.

On and on, as the night deepened and the cry of owls resounded through the air, the chirp and buzz of dozens of crickets the only accompaniment to their plodding pace, each moment a slow, agonizing ratcheting of tension.