Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Strangely, it doesn’t happen when they break her flute. No. It occurs once she’s finally cried herself to sleep that night in her bedroom; tired and hurting and blissfully unaware of her father’s whereabouts. 

At some point in the night, she finds herself bolting upright as a surge of memories rush through her mind. It doesn’t hurt, despite the memories being wholly unfamiliar. Rather, it’s merely as though she’s pulled back the cover of an old book and is reading again after several years. 

Tang San.

That was the name of the person living through the memories.

He had been a baby given to the Tang sect at birth and raised as an outer disciple. Throughout his life he had diligently served the Tang sect. From childhood to young adult, Tang San had studied and learned and worked under the heavy weight of the Tang. Many of the outer disciples had shown kindness and compassion to Tang San, even when he hadn’t believed he merited it. Unlike his fellows, Tang San improved slowly with his cultivation. He had no backers to provide expensive soul forming pills, yes, but he also wasn’t well suited for the Tang Sect’s method of cultivation of his golden core. What took others days, took Tang San weeks or even months. 

Techniques and ancient wisdoms had come easily to the boy, but sitting still long enough to cultivate had been a trial. The Tang Sect cultivated through the Still Body, Still Mind technique. By stilling both body and mind, practitioners could draw natural qi from their surroundings and into their body. The stiller a practitioner became, the more intune with the natural world they became. However, being still was not simply a matter of stilling one’s body. Rather, the user was required to still everything they could, from important muscles like the heart to even thoughts or emotions. Users capable of such entered a near death state where their body achieved stasis while their mind fled the physical realm for more heavenly pursuits. Done well or often enough would lead to the accumulation of enough energy to form a foundation and then a golden core. 

Tang San had not been prodigious with the Still Body, Still Mind technique. His mind had always wanted to focus on doing something and typically his body was not far behind.

Unfortunately, his lack of focus had had detrimental effects on Tang San. 

Trash. 

Weak.

Useless. 

Wasteful. 

Being a grown man and still struggling to cultivate had drawn scorn from the others. Not inside his close circle of friends; they all knew him. They knew his diligence and they knew his determination to do well by the sect that had taken him in. No, it was the inner disciples that passed through or the ever changing rotation of outer disciples visiting that salted his ears with such malice and ridicule. 

Yet, Tang San had loved the Tang sect. How could he not? They had taken him in as a squalling infant when they could have left him to die. In that ancient world, taking in parentless children was the abnormality- not the norm. Many other children grew up, suffered through, and died on their own. Yet, the Tang Sect had chosen to take in the unwanted, useless, dead weight, Xiao San and turn him into the educated, useful, loved Tang San. Certainly, his cultivation had been an exercise in futility, but Tang San had been smart. He’d been able to make himself quite handy to  the Tang Sect by building and repairing secret weapons, the Sect’s old siege equipment, even some broken drawbridges. Tang San had been useful and appreciated for it by his fellow outer Disciples on the Northern Ridge Outpost.  It had only been strangers that hadn’t seen Tang San’s worth and if they had stuck around long enough, even they had warmed up. 

Yet- Tang San had eventually flown too close to the sun and been burned for it. On the eve of war with another Sect, Tang San had realized that the sect no longer had the strength it once had with the old masters. The secret weapons, created through their special forging and Qi techniques, had not been made in many a year. Most of them had been destroyed over the centuries since the last Master of Creation had ascended. The Tang Sect was formidable, with many powerful cultivators with high level golden cores- but it had been built on the strength of those secret weapons. Without them, the Sect was just another midrank cultivator clan- not nearly strong enough to hold the vast lands and resources it had come to hold. 

Clearly, something had needed to be done. And Tang San hadn’t wanted to see his martial siblings die. Not his kind Shixiongs and Shijies who had watched over him and encouraged him all of his life. Not his cute Shidis and Shimeis who constantly begged him to teach them, play with them, or give them a treat from the kitchen after dinner. No. Tang San would not allow the Tang San to enter a war it could not win. 

So, he had snuck into the inner most reaches of the Tang Sect. Past the grandmaster’s palace and straight to the Sect’s Treasure Tower. Ordinarily, one wouldn’t be able to get past the barriers and guards so easily, but Tang San had been studying the Tang Sect’s arrays and secret techniques since he could sit on Yan-Shimei’s lap. One didn’t require strength to get past a Tang Array. Rather, the arrays were designed to feed on the invader’s Qi before turning it against them. No, the arrays required active spirit veins and grandmaster level skill. 

No more, no less .

Tang San had been raised on barriers, arrays, and secret traps. Breaking into the Treasure Tower was... not easy, but less of a challenge than he had hoped. Recreating the Bhudda’s Fury Tang Lotus- Now THAT has been a challenge. But it was one he took on gladly. Yet, just as he finished forging it, he had been discovered. As a gift to the Sect that had given and taken so much from him, he returned the clothes on his back and gave the elders and inner disciples that had followed him the Lotus. He wouldn’t be using it anymore. 

...

Taylor opens her eyes to tears and the blurred shadows of her room. Oh. That was a lot. Tang San had felt and loved and hurt and done so much. 

It makes her feel contradictingly hollow and full to the brim. His memories bubble over hers, but the misery and pain of her last year of hell leech the heat of his life away. Taylor Hebert. Tang San. The same soul, but such different people. Or perhaps only different experiences to shape them. 

Taylor squeezes her eyes shut and shakes her head. It does nothing to banish her existential thoughts, but it does make her feel a little more grounded to reality. 

Okay. She has the memories of a man from another world in her head. Yes. She can deal with this. This is fine . She’s not in pain; she doesn’t feel like she’s about to run around screaming about the cultivation world or go on a disciple gathering spree to build her own sect. This is fine. Taylor stretches and curls her fingers over and over again as her thoughts race. Similar to the stretching of a cat, she bunches and kneads at the fabric of her comforter. 

Pulling at a loose thread, she ponders her predicament. On the outside, nothing has really changed. The Taylor of yesterday and the Taylor of today face the same problems. Emma, Sophia, and Madison will still be there when she arrives at school. On the inside however... Taylor feels different. The memories of Tang San mix unpleasantly with their bullying campaign. 

On one hand, Tang San had the support of all of his martial siblings, at least the ones that got to know him for his kind nature and hardworking spirit. He never had any doubts on his own self worth. His ability and whether or not he was paying back the Tang Sect well enough, but never his worth as a person. 

On the other hand... Tang San wasn’t always able to contribute in what he felt was a meaningful way and the degradation he suffered from inner disciples or people who didn’t take the time to know him left a scar. His martial siblings gave him a strong sense of self worth, but even that could be eroded by the self-hatred gifted by others. Taylors experiences with the Trio mirror Tang San’s experiences with inner disciples eerily. 

Taylor can’t continue in the way she’s been living. Not only will a compilation of her painful experiences build until she snaps, Tang San’s own sense of self worth won’t let her. She may not be beautiful, smart, or athletic, but she is her own person and she has worth in that alone. People she knows love and value her. Her father loves and values her. Her mother had loved and valued her. Her neighbors and friends at the Dockworkers Union love and value her.

Under the Trio’s haze of shame, Taylor hadn’t been able to grasp all of the love and value she still held to others. The constant bombardment at school had blinded her to the concerned gazes of her neighbors and the shy questions of her father’s associates. But now- Tang San’s memories paint over her surroundings with sharp context and clarity. Her father had been acting concerned for a while now- asking if she’s alright, how school was going. His awkwardness prevented him from doing much- but he was concerned for her. And he showed it in the best way he knew how.

Meanwhile, the neighbors had begun to leave casserole dishes on her porch months ago. At the time, she had assumed it was out of pity, but Tang San’s thoughts say it was out of love. And the dockworkers? They’d been passing birthday notes, Christmas cards, and even Valentine chocolate to her through her father even though she hadn’t visited the docks in years . 

All of this compiles within Taylor’s head as a sturdy foundation. She’s not alone and she’s not unwanted. The Trio could never take away her worth to her family and the community that raised her. 

Taylor Hebert is loved and she is worthy. 

And there is nothing anyone or thing could ever do to change that.

It takes a while for the tears to stop, but when they do, Taylor feels better than she has in a long time. Curling up in her blankets, she closes her eyes and drifts back to sleep. She’ll sort out tomorrow when tomorrow comes. This is enough for tonight. 

She has a good feeling about it and she’s sure those cultivation techniques are going to come in handy real soon.

Author note:

Hey, I'm going to be putting some recommendations for light novels down here. I'm going to try for novels that you've probably never heard of before, so feel free to look them up find a new favorite read. As an author myself, I can definitely say the struggle to get noticed is very intimidating, so I want to help some indie authors out a bit. Feel free to put your own recs in the comments.

First up is Reborn: As a Defective Drake

This series is an isekai where the main character incarnates into the runt of a nest of dragons. Being the runt, his siblings try to eat him as soon as he hatches. He (of course) escapes out into the medieval world and has to fend for himself while being about the size of a mouse. It's definitely a different take for the isekai genre and the main character has to actually use his brain to survive instead of his brawn. If you like smart MCs, this could be a good series for you as it follows the dragon from hatching to finding his own place in the world.

Chapter Text

Huff, Huff-huff.... Huff, Huff-huff.

Thud-Thud-Thud. 

The steady slap of Taylor’s tennis shoes resound in the quiet, predawn of her neighborhood. Ordinarily, she would never be out this early, but opening her spiritual pathways and using her meridians won’t be possible if she just sits around. If cultivating was easy, everyone would do it. 

The physical exercise will encourage qi flow and build muscles. Later, once she’s built up her body a little, she’ll use acupuncture to forcefully trigger her spirit veins. Once forcefully awakened, she would be able to begin training with them and drawing in spiritual energy to her body. Eventually- and she knew it would be eventually- she would be able to lay a foundation and then form a golden core. 

But none of that would happen if she blew her body to bits with Qi driven acupuncture. Without first firming and forging her body, Taylor knew she'd never survive opening her spirit veins. Hence: a lot of exercise. 

Huff, Huff-huff.... Huff, Huff-huff.

Thud-Thud-Thud. 

She turns a corner and glances at the sky. Dawn’s light has just begun to turn peak over the horizon, turning soft periwinkle into an array of warm pink and orange. Time to head home. 

With a determined nod, Taylor goes to cut across the overgrown park sitting between two rows of older homes. Partway through, she slows as she hears something rustle in the grass. 

Mew. A tiny, silver striped kitten pokes its head out of the grass. Yellow eyes glint in the dim morning. Taylor blinks at the sight. Reaching into her pocket, she pulls out a granola bar she had planned to eat for breakfast. Unwrapping it, she breaks up the pieces before carefully laying them on the ground. This particular bar doesn’t have added nuts or chocolate, and while the preservatives weren’t great for animals, the oats and wheat it was made of wouldn’t hurt the kitten any more than starving would. 

Sweeping her gaze back to the front, Taylor continues onward. Within ten minutes, she’s skipping the broken step on the porch and carefully doing some cool down stretches. When she’s able to move her own qi around, she won’t need to be so careful about muscle damage, but for now she has to be very careful her new, intensive regime doesn’t affect her body negatively. 

>>><<<

Slipping inside, she toes off her tennis shoes and leaves them by the door. Then she heads up the stairs to get a shower and prepare for school. Looking in the mirror afterwards, she can’t find a physical change, but somehow she looks different. Peering closely at her reflection, she blinks and leans back. She’s lost the bags under her eyes from little sleep and her face remains clear of acne due to the healthier eating and exercising she’s been doing since Friday. 

Could two days of good sleep and good eating really do so much? She twists herself left and right before she figures it out. 

Taylor Hebert no longer slouches. Before remembering Tang San, Taylor would instinctively take the weaker body posture in order to appear smaller and less noticeable. Head bowed, arms curled around her body, Taylor would scurry along in hopes of avoiding any of the Trio’s gaze. Now, she stands up straight in a black tee and faded jeans. Her arms remain at her side, and she tilts her chin upwards in confidence. She looks... normal. Not ugly, though not as beautiful as he shijies and shimeis either. She just looks... like a normal girl getting ready for school.

Confidence really does do wonders for her look in the mirror. Taylor finds the edges of her mouth twisting up as she watches her reflection. Belief in oneself truly is the first step to any kind of goal. With a determined nod, Taylor hurries to check that her homework is in her backpack. She has three sets today- one in her backpack, one in her bra, and one electronic one on a jumpdrive in her shoe. Today, she’s going to get all A’s if it kills her! 

A determined grimace set to her lips, she troops back downstairs. Dad isn’t awake yet, so she pours herself some cereal and starts heating a pan of butter up. Looking in the fridge has her raising her eyebrows. They didn’t order take out... that much? Right? Surely they had some bacon? 

Rooting around in the meat drawer left her throwing out a pack of meat that wasn’t the right color and pulling out a carton of eggs instead. Eggs have a great shelf life. Supposedly you don’t even need to refrigerate them, but Taylor’s never tested that theory and she wasn’t keen on doing so now. Either way, an egg breakfast will give her the protein she needed in her day and hopefully help her father... diminish his gut a bit. 

Within a few moments, she is pulling the eggs off the stove, adding cheddar cheese to the top of her portion and plating the rest to leave on the table under a napkin. Scarfing down the cereal, she tidies her cooking area and carefully wraps her eggs up in a tortilla like a burrito. She pins a note on a paper pad and leaves it by the plated eggs on the table. Then, she’s out the door with her backpack slung over her shoulders and her egg burrito in hand. 

By now, the sun has crested over the horizon to deliver golden rays across the city-scape of Brockton Bay. She squints at the light before loping towards the bus stop. 

Today is going to be a good day. She is going to make it so. 

>>><<<

The day certainly starts well. She arrives at school a few minutes earlier than usual because, for once, her bus is running on time. Strolling into Winslow still feels like stepping into the past though, and Taylor can’t help the tension that builds between her shoulder blades. Despite all of the changes that have happened internally to Taylor over the weekend, most of it doesn’t show on the outside. Indeed, to her peers, she still ranks as the lowest pariah within the school. Their scorn, disdain, apathy, and even their pity grate on her like a layer of sandpaper applied to her skin. 

Am I really the most interesting thing for them to gawk at today?

Taylor huffs a little and hurries to her locker. She’s not dumb enough to leave her homework in it; too many missing binders have ruined it for her. But she does drop off two heavy textbooks. Her sudden increase in physical activity may be light compared to a cultivator, but her body still doesn’t like her new activities. Her back twinges slightly and her feet feel too warm and tender in her tennis shoes. Next she’s off to class. 

To her luck, homeroom begins and ends without incident. Mrs. Flora takes roll, smiles at each student like they’ve made her day, and dismisses them after going over some changes to sport club schedules. The woman toddles around slowly with her baby bump but is determined to make it to midterms of the fall semester. 

Taylor’s next class is geometry. It’s also the first class with homework due. Right on cue, the trio attempts to strike. 

A gaggle of girls approach from another hallway. Taylor can see them from her peripheral vision. They appear to be entirely focused on their own conversation and giggle happily about it, but she spots a few eyes turned discreetly her way. Taking a deep breath, Taylor attempts to disengage by moving to the side of the hallway. 

No luck, the girls also move to the side of the hallway. A short haired brunette leads the pack forward. She passes Taylor without so much of a glance, talking rapidly about a new movie from Earth Aleph. The next two also glide by without so much of a thought to Taylor; their heels click by quickly. It’s the third girl, a short, slightly bigger blonde that makes a move for Taylor’s homework. 

The blonde steps up quickly to reach towards Taylor’s back, but Taylor side steps towards the wall. Not to be deterred, the blonde takes another step closer and does manage to pull down the zipper on Taylor’s backpack. In response, Taylor slams her now open backpack against the wall, crushing the blonde’s hand between her back and the wall. 

“Oww!” The teenager yelps and quickly pulls her hand back to fold it against herself. A dirty look appears on the girl’s face as she opens her mouth to say something, but Taylor silences her with the dirtiest look she can manage. Her dark brows lower, her wide mouth turns down, and her dark eyes glower. With her height, she towers over the insipid blonde. The blonde rapidly blinks up at Taylor and finally puts her singular braincell to work and realizes that “Oh, hey. This isn’t a good idea”. 

Realization made, the little blonde turns and flits away for the rest of the gaggle of girls. Down the hall, Taylor can hear one of the ring leaders tearing into the blonde. Rolling her eyes, Taylor takes the time to check her homework and then zip her backpack up. 

Maybe she should make a lock? When she opens her spirit veins she’ll be able to use a basic qi lock or even just make a qiankun pouch to store things in. The dimensional subspace would be able to hold items many time’s the pouch’s size. If she’s careful not to let other people realize what it is, she'll be able to use an item like that to avoid having anything other important things stolen or broken. 

Nodding to herself, she heads to geometry. Entering the room, she spots Ms. Weigl already at the front, reading a book before class. Gripping her backpack straps, she heads to Ms. Weigl’s desk. 

“Excuse me?” Taylor murmurs. Ms. Weigl raises her face from her book. Eye contact is made and Taylor knows she has exactly one minute of attention before her teacher will return to her latest bout of escapism. 

“Yes, Miss Hebert?”

“I’d like to go ahead and turn in my homework. I don’t think I’ll need to review it.” Taylor swiftly swings her backpack around to unzip it and present her math homework. Ms. Weigl gives the homework a dry, uninterested look.

“Are you sure, Ms. Hebert? I usually allow students to receive half credit for missed problems if they mark the correct way to solve the problem in pen.” 

“I’m sure. I... don’t want an accidental ink spill to ruin my hard work.” Taylor smiles joylessly at her math teacher. Ms. Weigl looks at her for a minute and then frowns out over the class. 

“Ah...” The woman blinks. “I’ll be glad to accept your homework early, Miss Hebert. I would also like to receive your work without any... unfortunate accidents occurring in the classroom.” The last portion of her statement is said to the room at large and the woman’s sharp, brown eyes linger on Madison Clemens and her posse. Taylor finds herself blinking at the unexpected support. Ms. Weigl has never been very involved in Winslow. Rejected from teaching at a nearby university due to a student claiming the woman was racist, Iris Weigl had taken the job at Winslow to make ends meet. She had no love for the school and certainly never put in more than the absolute minimum to ensure her class ran smoothly and she wouldn’t be let go. Most of the students knew the woman was only waiting around till she’d earned enough to get out of the Bay. For her to be even slightly active for Taylor’s behalf was... an unexpected boone. 

Taylor’s lips quirk upwards slightly and she hands over her homework to her geometry teacher happily. There. One down, four more to go. 

Zipping her backpack up, she heads to the back of the class to take a seat near a window. Tang San had been skilled in mathematics. Now that Taylor has awakened his memories, his skill with math has transferred over to her. A class like high school geometry won't be challenging at all thanks to all of that applied knowledge. 

She settles in for a nice hour and a half of bird watching. 

Chapter Text

The rest of her class periods before lunch pass without hassle- she turns in her homework, keeps her head up in diligent watch over her homework and personal items, and thwarts two other attempts on her property. 

    The first is an attempt to spill ink on her notes in history class. Tang San’s own historical knowledge is obviously not applicable to Earth Bet’s history and is no help to her here. Therefore, she takes out her notebook and takes notes. When she’s actually paying attention, history class isn’t that bad. Tang San makes the older  time periods, like the beginning at the fertile crescent, feel more real as he actually did have to cook and live without electricity. Knowing the feeling of planting rice yourself and then making flour from it by hand gives learning about the first hunter/gatherers much more interesting. Taylor amuses herself by daydreaming about planting her own garden as she writes down the teacher’s lecture in neat, color coded bullet points. 

    Luckily, she’s not too far off into the clouds when she sees a quick movement from her right. Fast as a three winged razor hawk, Taylor snaps her hand out to grab a capsule full of ink. Her fingers close around the other student’s and she makes sure to squeeze extra hard before turning her head and giving the idiot brunette the viles glare she can manage. The mousy little girl squeaks and tries to pull her hand back. Taylor allows it, but not before stealing the ink capsule for herself.  She doesn’t know what she’ll use it for yet, but she’s sure she’ll think of something. 

    The second attempt is another attempt to destroy her homework. This time it occurs as she’s walking towards the lunch room. Truthfully, she’d normally be avoiding this place. But after her victories, she’s feeling pretty pretty confident in herself. So, she strolls purposefully to the lunch room. Taylor won’t be eating the food there- to cultivate she needs to avoid impurities in her foods and eat more wholesomely- but it will be a statement she needs to leave sooner rather than later. 

    Taylor Hebert is done being their entertainment and punching bag. If they don’t like her, that’s fine, but they’re still going to have to get used to her because she’s not going anywhere. 

She’s walking towards the double doors leading to the cafeteria when something strong grabs her backpack and yanks on it. Her eyes widen as she stumbles back in surprise.

Taylor has a moment of confusion before her mind clicks and she’s able to react. Unfortunately, she’s only just begun exercising and can’t even feel her own qi, so brute forcing her way out of this isn’t an option. Luckily, she doesn’t need qi to practice the more practical aspects of wu wei. Or, as Taylor thinks of it: going with the flow. 

Taking a few extra steps back, Taylor follows the pull of whoever has grabbed her backpack. Within the second step she hears the thud of her assailant falling on their butt without the resistance of Taylor pulling away. The change in angle allows her to turn into a sidestep and break the fool’s hold on her backpack. Looking down, she’s unsurprised to see a young, dark skinned boy from the guys’ track team. Rob-something? He’s well known for crushing on Sophia and for being a heavy-handed idiot.

Unfortunately, she can’t kick him while he’s down. Should Sophia or Emma’s lackeys hear, they would tell a teacher a carefully curated version of the events to get Taylor in trouble. The narrative would go from Taylor’s backpack being almost stolen to Taylor beating up on a black kid for racist reasons. 

But still... the gobsmacked look on the boy’s face makes kicking him very tempting. Giving an aggravated sigh, Taylor walks away. Entering the lunchroom, she finds a somewhat full table and sits down. The residents immediately stop their conversation and look at her in surprise.

“Uh, what are you doing?” An asian kid asks His bowl cut hair marks him as trying to follow some kind of Korean pop star while the black stud earrings and ripped jeans give him a distinctly rebel vibe. 

“I’m eating lunch.” Taylor replies staunchly as she settles her paper bag on the table. She leaves her backpack on her to avoid someone walking off with it. Taylor starts pulling out her tupperware containers. Sliced fruit, leftover sesame chicken, and some steamed vegetables make up her nutritiously balanced meal. 

“But why here? This is our table.” A taller, somewhat menacing senior with long braided hair asks. Taylor looks up and blinks. He’s got some specifically colored clothing and arm bands on. Oh. This is an ABB table. Whoops. It's too late now. She still needs to make an impression and getting up to swap tables won’t do that for anyone who’s watching.

“If you don’t like it, you are free to leave.”  Taylor says after a moment. “Honestly, I am sorry for disturbing your lunch meeting, but I’ve got my own issues to handle.” Braid Guy raises an eyebrow, but Taylor refuses to speak further. Instead, she starts chowing down on her veggies. Being steamed, they’re a little bland so she mixes her sesame chicken with them to let them absorb some of the sweet sauce from the meat. 

“Hey! You can’t just sit here. This is ours.” A girl she somewhat recognizes as being scary smart in chemistry  objects to Taylor’s continued lunching. Hana Mitsuko? Mitsuki? Mitsu-something? 

“I know. I’ll be gone tomorrow. Please just bear with it for now.” Taylor intones flatly. She hopes they don’t cause a scene. She’d rather just be seen sitting with a group than sitting alone, but either way will make a statement so she’s not too upset. 

“I don’t think you understand.” Braid Guy stands up to his oh-so-intimidating height of five-four. “We want you gone now.” His shoulders firm and he takes what he thinks is an intimidating step closer. But frankly? Taylor isn’t worried. Tang San had seen far worse than this tiny yappy dog and had felt far worse from actual threats to his life. So, Taylor’s not worried either. 

“I can understand that. Unfortunately, I’m not going to move. I’m not bothering you, I don’t particularly care for your conversation so I won’t be interrupting anything, and I need this spot.” Taylor looks the boy in the eye as she speaks. She keeps her posture relaxed and calm and even cuts up a few large slices of fruit without looking just to drive home how not-threatening his threat display is. 

For a moment, she relishes the nonplussed look the teen sports. Truly, she’s going to remember this for weeks to come. 

“No. You don’t get it. I’m telling you to move or you’re going to regret it.” Braid Guy tries again, this time with an actual threat attached in case she missed his previous non-verbal one. He frowns mightily at her, but she can see the confusion lurking behind his facade. 

“That’s unfortunate.” Taylor answers his threat with a neutral tone and a careful statement. She’s not going to be giving way to him, but she doesn’t really want to have to watch her back on the way home or avoid tails trying to track down her living place thanks to some bratty gangster wannabe. For another second the confusion holds, and then the boy finally understands that Taylor has understood his threats the entire time, she’s just not found them very threatening. It enrages him.

“You little-!” Braid Guy starts forward, already shifting his stance in preparation for a swing but he’s quickly grabbed from behind. The Korean wannabe and Hana Something each grip his arms and tug him back. They speak in hushed voices not meant to carry, but Taylor still picks up on them due to her proximity.

“Kim, stop! You can’t get another demerit!” Hana snarls furiously into his ear.

“Hold it, dude! She’s baiting you.” Korean Wannabe gasps into Kim’s other ear. Together, the two manage to haul him back and away from Taylor. Meanwhile, Taylor makes fast work of her remaining food. She doesn’t really want to run into the trio and if she stays much longer she’s sure they’ll show up from wherever they’ve been looking for her. Standing, she holds in a snort when the three gangster brats flinch back in surprise. Compared to Tang San’s memories these three are but children and sort of act like children too. 

“Okay, I’m finished. Thank you for your consideration in allowing me to sit with you.” Taylor speaks without inflection as she packs up her empty tupperware. She forces herself not to salute like Tang San would have with gratitude. She doesn’t feel particularly thankful to them as they tried to scare her off the whole time and Taylor Hebert isn’t actually a cultivator or of Eastern descent. It would be especially strange if she started pulling out all of Tang San’s mannerisms and cultural cues. 

“Uh-wha-hey!” Kim’s eyes widen to comical proportions as he comprehends her actions. “We didn’t let you!” He bursts out angrily. However, at that point Taylor is already making her exit. She’s probably interacted more with people today than she normally does in a week and it’s wearing her a little thin. 

Off to computer class she goes, where she’s free of her usual tormentors and she gets to do easy classwork. She puts the lunch room confrontation from her mind with a simple reminder to herself to sit with a different group of teenagers tomorrow.

<<<>>>><<<<>>>><<<<>>>>

Computer class goes splendidly and she’s even able to start some of the research she desperately needs to get further in cultivation. The Tang Sect’s cultivation method hadn’t appealed to Tang San, and Taylor won’t delude herself into thinking it will work for her. 

She needs a different way to form her foundation and build her golden core. Hopefully one that’s quick, though she knows a few shortcuts that can help out it it’s not. 

At first, her search doesn’t go well. News and information from China hasn’t been unbiased in decades thanks to the communistic/militaristic powers that currently control it. And, cultivation sounds too much like parahumans in the Google Search Bar. However, once she starts looking into historical Taoism is when she hits a jackpot. Old legends, myths, and folklore are exactly what she needs. If this world ever held even a glimpse of cultivation and the ascent to heaven, it would be hinted at in stories and folktales. 

Unfortunately, she’s just getting into her first cultivator folktale when computer class ends. Darn it. She doesn’t need the information immediately as she’s still technically tempering her body. She’ll have to go through tempering it, cleansing it, and opening/waking her spirit veins/meridians before she’ll need the information to start drawing in natural energy and converting it into spiritual energy for her foundation and golden core. So, really she’s looking at weeks or even months before she’ll need the information. However, cultivating is never a straightforward process and some cultivation paths require special tools or environments to succeed without permanently damaging anything. 

And in this world, Taylor doesn’t know of any panacea to heal spirit wounds. So, damaging herself  in pursuit of power is not an option. She’s going to cultivate to immortality but she’s going to do so safely and carefully. Randomly growing wings or going blind will not be part of her ascension. 

At any rate, she tidies up her work space, deletes her search history, and proceeds to head over to the best and worst class: Cape Class. Or, technically World Issues, but she refuses to deny the truth of what the class is. It is the best class because the topics do tend to be interesting and relevant, and the worst becauseMaddison takes the class with her and Mr. Gladly teaches it. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad if it were only one evil or the other, but Mr. Gladly gave the trio almost free rein in the classroom. If there was any sort of plausible deniability, he would gladly take it.

Taylor holds in a sigh as she enters the class room and sees Maddison there, waiting for her. The girl smiles deviously as soon as Taylor meets her eyes. Taylor blinks. 

This is going to be a long class.

Chapter Text

Nothing happens on the way to her seat, but Taylor barely resists rolling her eyes at the gum stuck to her seat. Really, how juvenile can Madison Clemens get? She pulls a kleenex from her side pocket on her back pack and carefully removes the gum wad from her seat before sitting. If there’s any residue left on the seat- well it just means her butt smells like bubblegum today. Nothing to get upset over and ruin her good mood. 

She hears Clemens giggle from a few seat behind her, but pays it no mind when Mr. Gladly walks into the room. 

“Good afternoon, everyone.” Mr. Gladly smiles like it’s the best day of his life. Taylor doesn’t know how he does it, because he smiles like that every single day. “Today, I’ll be taking in your papers on the history of parahumans across Europe. I hope you all remembered to add some economical effects of parahumans. Please pass your papers forward.” Taylor grimaces. She sits in the second row and the girl in front of her is one of Clemens’s cheer friends. She’ll just have to be unorthodox. 

Taylor turns to look back at the seat behind her expectantly. The boy, a young, soft-featured hispanic with bleached tips, roots through his own backpack frantically. Taylor blinks. Well, she supposes it would be weird if no one ever lost their homework in their disorganized backpack. 

“Hey, are you gonna pass the homework up or not?” The girl behind the hispanic boy asks. She’s holding two sets of papers in her hands, having already grabbed the homework from the kid in the last row.

“Just a minute,” The boy mumbles distractly as he speeds up his fretful search. 

“Look, if you don’t have your homework, you don’t have it. Hurry up and pass this along.” The fourth row girl pushes her papers forward again. 

“Hey, come on, it was in here this morning. Just gimme a minute.” The boy huffs at her.

“Valdez-” the girl starts to growl, but Taylor inserts herself smoothly by reaching down and pulling a folded bundle of paper from the outer pocket of the backpack. Unrolling it, she confirms what looks like a very messily written paper on Germany’s crime rates and produce exports. Interestingly enough, he’s included some basic drafts of the stock market and some financing formulas to prove the return on investment. Very detailed work for a sophomore’s class. Just... messy.

“You found it!” Valdez cries out in relief.

“Here,” Taylor reaches over Valdez and tugs the papers from the girl’s hands. Then, she stands up and walks to the front herself. As she passes the front-most desk, she takes especial joy in ripping the girl’s homework from her hands. The girl, a blond, blue eyed twig just looks up at her in surprise. Clearly, she isn’t expecting Taylor to be very active in any of this. Which, granted - Taylor hadn’t been so spirited in a while. It’s only now, with Tang San’s memories, that she’s finally taking an active stance in her life once more. 

And really, it is an active stance compared to the passive endurance she’d been subsumed into. The difference between the two is as apparent as night is from day. Now that she’s had a wake up call, Taylor feels like she has finally taken a breath of air after being held down under the water for so long. It feels glorious and powerful.

“Er,” Mr. Gladly’s eyes flicker between Taylor and the front-row girl before he pastes on a transparent smile. “Thank you, Taylor.” He says as he takes her stack of papers from him. Taylor doesn’t bother to answer the insipid man. Instead she just just shoots him a look and heads back to her seat. She’s self-aware enough to know that Mr. Gladly hasn’t done anything today to deserve her scorn, but she’s not going to just let any of his past negligence go either. Tang San’s people were very firm believers of “An Eye for an Eye,” and while Taylor doesn’t think that motto is good for every thing in life... she’s not about to shy away from some good old-fashioned payback. And she’s petty, sue her. 

Taylor settles back into her seat and pulls out her textbook and a sheaf of notebook paper. Tang san’s memories can’t help with World Issues. Perhaps the memories can give perspective, but they can’t recite the dates Africa began descending into chaos or explain the warning signs of the Yangban’s first war of terror. Thus, she’ll actually have to pay attention to Gladly’s idiocy. Joy.

<<<>>><<<<>>>><<<>>>

Taylor runs home. She could catch the bus, but it’s better for her to run home and work on refining her body. Once home, she heads to her bathroom, strips, and sits herself down under a steady stream of water.It’s no cold waterfall, but it will do. She needs to wash the sweat off and work on her qi. Slow and sluggish as it is without waking her spirit veins and using her meridians, she still needs to use it to slowly draw out the impurities in her body. She’s been settling into a moving meditation while running to start refining her bones and cartilage. Now, it’s time to get rid of all of the toxins she’s accumulated through the years of eating highly processed foods and living in a post-industrialization world. Smog, exhaust, aerosol sprays, have damaged her lungs, been a blight to her skin cells, and even killed off some odd hundred brain cells. Meanwhile, artificial sweeteners, preservatives, and hormones have invaded her gut’s microbiome, built up in multiple important areas in her body, and messed with her own natural hormones. 

It’s time to get rid of those and live the natural life she knows will feel so much better. Hence, the next half hour she spends meditating. By the time she opens her eyes, she knows she’s  pruned as a prune and the water is beginning to run cold. Their water bill is going to get a bit high tonight, but Taylor can’t really see this process taking too long and once the initial cleanse is over, she’ll be able to keep toxins out with some basic meditation and upkeep. 

Standing, she stretches and hurries to her room to get dressed. Then she heads over to her notebook on her desk. She needs to start planning her next phase of cultivation. Even though she doesn’t have a method, she’s still sure of some basic necessities she’ll need to prep.

The first of which is a cultivation room or area. To cultivate, she’s going to have to pull qi in from the natural world. To cultivate quickly, she’s going to want to cultivate using qit that’s attuned to her own spirit veins and element. 

Taylor has two dual elements of wood and water. The elements being highly symbiotic is both a boon and a threat to her. Too much water would drown her wood, but if left alone, her wood element could grow using the water and become unwieldy or a danger to her health. Like in all things, balance and moderation would be key here. If she could cultivate successfully, she would represent harmony in nature. With wood came perseverance. With water came the ability to adapt. 

To cultivate at all, she would need to have an area with feng shui that empowered her elements without overpowering her. Preferably, this would be an area she could access often and for long amounts of time. Thus, it would be best to have an area closer to home or even at home. Taylor didn’t really want to explain to a neighbor why she was found meditating in their hedge, afterall. Or, if she decided to make an area further abroad, why she was found meditating in a ramshackle hut in the middle of the trainyard. 

So, close to home and preferably on property she has the right to be seen on. The backyard immediately comes to mind, but Taylor doesn’t want to be reliant on the wether to cultivate. Plus, once she reaches high level cultivation, she’ll need somewhere she can’t be seen. At a low level, cultivation techniques don’t have any visual clues. However, at a higher level, the amount of qi she can pull at once increases and becomes visible to the human eye. Taylor doesn’t really want to have to move cultivation areas, so she sets the backyard aside for a temporary last resort if she can’t find anything else close to home. 

That leaves her with inside the house. Taylor looks around her bedroom. She has a small twin sized bed, a desk, a book shelf, a small closet, and a lamp. Plenty of wood to boost her cultivation, but no water and she’d never be able to make the kind of alterations she needs without her father noticing. For the same reasons, that also knocks out the kitchen, living room, and guest bedroom. Her father may not spend a lot of time at home, but he would notice if she suddenly put live plants and a lot of water in any of those areas. 

The only areas in the house her dad rarely enters is the garage, the basement, and the attic. Of those, she thinks the only areas she’ll be able to successfully modify are the basement and the attic. The garage doesn’t have any windows and the door to it is set facing north. Bad feng shui. 

Nodding to herself, Taylor sets out to descend to the basement. The old wooden stairs creak under her feet, but she smiles at the dim light of the partially underground room. Two windows, one at each side of the house let in plenty of late afternoon light. It’s probably even better in the morning. The musty smell of a little-used room floods her nose as Taylor carefully looks around. Old exercise equipment, miscellaneous boxes, and holiday decorations sit randomly in small pils around the room. Neither Taylor nor her father have ever been extravagant shoppers so they’ve never had to carefully organize this space for more room. 

Nodding to herself, Taylor hurries over to check the windows.They open up and out which is just fine for Taylor, but the mechanisms have become stiff with disuse and it takes her a few moments of struggle to get the first one open. Immediately, fresh air spreads into the basement. Taylor breathes a sigh of relief and looks at the rest of the room. The concrete floors and walls will be a problem for cultivating her water element as earth destroys water, ut if she adds more wood element somehow, she can negate that effect because wood destroys earth. Meanwhile, water strengthens wood and metal strengthens water. 

Taylor taps the floor idly. Maybe she can put down some wood paneling? Tang San had been used to such menial tasks and these days the wood paneling used is much easier to work with. But... real wood paneling would be excessively expensive for a room her father doesn’t even use. Taylor frowns. She knows how to work with the wood to make her own paneling. It will take time, but so will getting to the point in her cultivation that it matters. She’ll also need to source the wood...

Giving a huff, Taylor wrenches the basement window closed. She’ll check the attic next, she decides. Depending on which one needs the least amount of work, that’s what she’ll choose. Giving one last glance around the basement, Taylor ascends the stairs and heads to the upstairs hallway. The only issue with the attic is that it’s only accessible by way of the pull down ladder in the upstairs hallway ceiling. 

It would be easy enough to tell her dad she needs space and wants a girl's room, but if he ever goes up there and sees her cultivation tools... that could be hard to explain. Still, she pulls down the ladder and sneezes at the rush of dust that descends with a blast of hot air.

Right. The attic doesn’t have air conditioning. 

Taylor grimaces and climbs up. The hot, dusty air in the attic feels gross on her skin and can practically feel a layer of sweat starting to form. 

The attic itself is very well lit with one window at each end and a “A” frame for the ceiling. Insulation sits between each support beam along the angled roof and the floor consists of more of the same between more wooden two-by-four beams. 

Taylor frowns. Great. No matter which area she chooses she’s going to be doing some woodworking first. She has no doubt that stepping on any of the fluffy insulation in front of her will just leave her falling through the drywall ceiling of the room below. So, she’ll need something up here to keep her from falling through, Plus, she’s not really sure what insulation is made of and as of yet, cannot sense feng shui with her tiny bit of cultivation. So, she’ll need to barricade it off with wood. She’ll also need to collect and bring in some water element. She would have a similar problem in the basement, but she can’t exactly run a watering hose up to the attic the way she can run one into the basement through the windows. 

There’s also a tiny bit of metal in the attic thanks to the electrical lines she can see running around. It’s not a lot, but the metal will be detrimental to the wood she’s going to be putting down. Taylor looks it over and gives a sigh. Either way, it looks like she’ll be going the long route to using either of the two areas for cultivation. 

Taylor turns and heads back down stairs. She’ll need to think it over. Whichever area she chooses is going to affect her cultivation. 

Chapter Text

Danny arrives home a little after six. By that point, Taylor has cooked a healthy meal of spicy cabbage, mushrooms,and onions with beef cuts, and a small portion of rice. Lots of veggies, some meat, and a tiny bit of carb. And, completely free of heavy preservatives since it had been fast frozen within twenty-four hours of being picked or butchered. And rice is... rice. Does rice go bad?

Either way, Danny’s meal is waiting for him when he gets home. Taylor’s also waiting for him at the kitchen table. Danny immediately stops at the sight of both daughter and bribe. The Chinese take-out he holds in one hand swings back and forth.

“Ah, something we need to- uh- talk about?” He asks stiltedly. The two of them probably wouldn’t win the award for worst father/daughter relationship, but they’re not great at the whole talking thing either. Taylor blinks and reconsiders her presentation. She had meant the food as a bribe, but her set up is also reminiscent of her mother’s set up when Taylor had told Annette about some of the new words she had heard on the dock’s “Bring your kid to work” day. Well, at least she has Danny’s attention. 

“Yep.” Taylor pops the “P” sound and points at the food. “But you should eat first. I made dinner so we can sit down and eat healthy tonight.” Danny looks at her spread of food on the table and then down at the take out. 

“Sure thing, Taylor. Just let me put this away.” Danny shambles over to the fridge and stuffs the take out in it. There’s plenty of space for it to fit; the two of them don’t cook often. He settles at the table carefully and regards the food in front of him as if it might bite him. Taylor has no such qualms. She digs in happily and closes her eyes as the spice hits her tongue.Tang San’s memories had not been lying about how good spicy cabbage is. 

Seeing her begin eating, Danny also began to tentatively eat. After the first bite, he raises his eyebrows in surprise.. 

“This is pretty good, Taylor.”

“Thanks, Dad. I went by the library after school today and looked at a few cooking books. Some of the asian recipes looked interesting so I thought I would try it since we’re always eating some kind of foriegn take-out.” Certainly a lie, but not one her dad will suspect. She can’t exactly tell him she has memories from a past life who lived in a strange, Chinese-only world. 

“Oh? Well, we could order pizza or something else. With Uber Eats we could even order Italian.” 

“It’s not really about the kind of food. I just figured we could save some money and eat a little healthier if we ate at home, you know? What goes in always comes out. Plus, it gives me something to work on. I get bored sometimes.” Taylor pushes some food around on her plate while she speaks. Even since Annette died, Danny has been resistant to family-oriented activities. He’s also buried himself in work. Thankfully, he hadn’t turned to alcohol for longer than a week before Zoe Barnes had found him and dragged him out of the pub by the ear. After that, he’d been better and the two had eventually fallen into the routine of work-first, don’t talk to each other that they keep now. 

“Well, I mean,” Here Danny pauses, unsure of what to say or do. Taylor advances the conversation next, sure she has him on the backfoot.

“I was also wondering if I could maybe do some gardening in the backyard- we’re not using it for anything and it’s not too late for a Winter or Fall crop.And I want to clean up the basement too - I want to do yoga in the mornings and we don’t have space up here.” She lines it up as a question, but her tone doesn’t leave anything for imagination. 

Tang San had once found that speaking confidently allowed other people to be confident in his reasons or actions, even if he was in a section of the sect he really shouldn’t be in.Taylor imitates him in tone, but gives some leeway in her verbiage. 

Despite her memories, Taylor’s not an adult and as such can’t expect a show of confidence to take her as far as Tang San’s charisma would have. However, her careful phrasing and posture take effect exactly as she had hoped. 

“Well, I don’t mind if you do some gardening in the back- the place hasn’t been mowed in a while though, so you’ll need to get out the old mower. But there are a lot of boxes down in the basement. Some of that was your grandparents’ and,” Here Danny’s eyes creased and he seemed to almost want to swallow back his words. “Your mother, also. Her things are down there.”

“That’s okay- I’ll just move it up to the attic. I checked there and it looks like if I can get some plywood on the floor’s studs it’ll be perfect for storing things. Or, I’ll just move everything to the area behind the stairs.” Taylor takes another bite of her food while she watches her father. The man reflexively grimaces at her words before rebuffing her. 

“I really don’t feel comfortable with-”

“Dad. I won’t damage anything or throw anything out- I’m just going to move it around. It’s not like we’re using any of it. What’s the harm in moving it?” Taylor cuts him off as a spark of anger curls in her chest. Danny doesn’t want to get into mom’s stuff. He doesn’t want to think of Annete and therefore avoids anything to do with her. Most commonly, that  means he avoids Taylor and the fact that he has a family. Well, too bad. She needs somewhere to cultivate and the basement is it. He doesn’t have to go down there and get into Mom’s stuff, he just has to look the other way.

Now, it should be noted that if Danny Hebert was a better parent, he wouldn’t take the sass Taylor is giving him. However, Danny Hebert is not a great parent and sass from his teenage daughter over items he doesn’t want to think about is far, far over his parenting skill. He’d stopped parenting her years ago when her mother died. This sass breaks his will to continue the argument over something he just doesn’t want to think about.

“Okay, Taylor. Just don’t throw anything out or break anything. I don’t want to go looking for something later and not have it.” Danny says and looks down at his food to begin eating. 

“Yes, sir.” Taylor agrees. “I won’t throw anything away and I’ll even make sure to label everything so that it's easy to find.” Taylor doubts her father will ever go looking through Mom’s things, but the promise seems to be enough to set Danny at ease. The man chomps down on his cabbage like he’s starving or trying very hard to avoid conversation with his teenager. Taylor feels a bit irritated at his obvious avoidance, but consoles herself with her winnings. She has tacit permission to mess around in the back yard all she wants and to begin work on the basement. She’ll have to ease him into her plans for the basement slowly, but the backyard would need to be set up  long before she can get to the basement anyway. 

The rest of the dinner is spent in silence. Taylor doesn’t even try to pretend her father’s silence doesn’t hurt. Tang San had never been in the habit of lying to himself about others’ opinions of him, and Taylor has no plans to start now. 

<<<>>><<<<>>>><<<>>>

The next day starts a new routine. Taylor wakes, runs, showers, heads to school, avoids having her homework stolen, comes home, and works on the backyard. As her father had said, the first thing she ends up doing is mowing it. 

No one had been taking care of the backyard beyond making sure it didn’t get too overgrown, so there’s a very healthy knee high field of grass out there waiting for her. It takes the whole afternoon of slowly going back and forth to get the grass cut down to size, but by five she has a huge pile of grass clippings and a tamed backyard. 

She heads in to shower (cleanse her body) and cook dinner feeling quite proud of herself. She cooks a mixture of veggies into a beef stir fry and goes ahead and eats when Danny’s not home by five. The previous day’s uncomfortable conversation likely means her father will be working late the next few days. Taylor tries not to let it upset her. She’d known she was broaching uncomfortable ground when she’d requested use of the basement. This is only the highly predictable result of her confrontation. 

Still, it irks her. She packs the leftovers away in a few tupperware bowls and does the dishes morosely before heading down into the basement. Truly, she doesn’t want to know what plastic rates as an element, so all of the plastic tubs will be leaving to find space in the attic or being switched out to wooden storage instead. Perhaps she could build shelves? Clothing and most paper items count as wood element and won’t mess with her feng shui. 

Huffing, Taylor starts organizing the tubs. Annette’s things are easy to spot. All of Taylor’s mom’s personal belongings had been packed away in the week following the funeral so all of it rests in identical purple tubs with purple and green lids. Taylor’s tempted to go through them just to look at her mother’s things, but set those aside for now. 

Meanwhile, the seasonal decorations all sit in old cardboard boxes. These have a very thick layer of dust on top of them as even when Annette was alive, the Hebert family only celebrated if they felt like it. Back then that meant Halloween, Christmas, and sometimes Thanksgiving. Taylor moves these boxes towards the stairs. She doesn’t think they’ll be getting any use for a very long time, but asking Danny to throw them out will be a hassle. She’ll tote them up to the attic once she gets some boards to place across the two-by-four support beams that run across the floor. 

That leaves her grandparents’ things. These sit in a collection of eclectic totes, bins, and even one large U.S. Navy Seals wooden locker. Despite having no recollection of either of them, Taylor can tell which items hold her grandmother’s things and which hold her grandfather’s things just by what was used. Her grandfather’s items have been haphazardly stuffed into cardboard boxes, his locker, and even a few old shoeboxes. Meanwhile, her grandmother’s items sit in a collection of a few old embroidered totes, two suitcases, an old-fashioned plastic bin, and even a very, very dated hat box. Pale cream flowers adorn both the hat box and the suitcases. Taylor wonders if it was her grandmother’s favorite. 

Curious burns within her so scoots herself over to her grandmother’s things and starts going through them. Most of the items are normal, everyday things. There’s a journal filled with shopping lists, notes, and other day to day thoughts. Scarves, brooches, and a few hats actually sit under a pair of lace gloves in the hat box. Both suitcases are filled with old dresses, blouses, and even a petticoat. It’s not until she gets to the old bin that Taylor finds anything interesting. 

On top, is an old, antiquated photo album. Whipping the dust off of it reveals a sepia tones picture of an older woman, an older man, and a teenager who Taylor is shocked to realize is her mom. Annette Hebert had been tall and skinny, like Taylor. Her curly hair is cut short in the photo, even though Taylor remembers it being down to her mother’s waist when the car accident happened. To Taylor’s disbelief, the Annet in the photo wears a button-up, oversized, neon tie-dyed denim shirt, with high waisted, knee length shorts and white tennis shoes. 

The old fashion causes Taylor to blink away both tears at seeing her mother’s image and poorly timed giggles. Goodness, she would never have imagined her mother wearing anything like that! Running her fingers along the spine, she ponders it for a moment before lifting it from the plastic bin. She’ll be holding onto this for a bit. It’s not like anyone else will go looking for it. 

So intent is she on her grandmother’s photo album is she that Taylor almost doesn’t look at what else is in the box. However, when she does look she finds herself blinking in disbelief. 

Where did her grandmother get Chinese war fans? And why?

Looking at the luggage, Taylor can tell that her grandmother liked to travel. Perhaps the woman had bought them on her travels to the East? 

Taylor shakes away her musings and reaches for the war fans. The pair have tarnished steel for the outside casing and likely for the ribbing too. Lifting the first, Taylor finds herself surprised by how heavy the fan is. This is no item of leisure. Taylor opens the fan carefully and is gratified when none of the aged, delicate silk on the inside rips. A classical poem spreads out before her and she reads the lines eagerly.

“Before my bed there's a pool of light

I wonder if it's frost on the ground”

Opening the other fan, she finds the rest of the poem.

“Looking up, I find the moon bright

Then bowing my head, I drown in homesickness.”

Taylor finds herself blinking back tears for the second time that evening. Ah. A poem about being away from home or unable to go home. The words strike at the heart she’s inherited from Tang San surprisingly hard. She hasn’t really... thought about it much. But, she’s technically Tang San’s reincarnation. Tang San died. He left behind everything and everyone he’d ever known. 

So far, she’s been focused on her own problems and her own hurts, but Tang San had lost everything. His friends, his adopted family. And she’s inherited his will, his life, his joys, and his sorrows. 

She sniffles a little and carefully closes both of the fans before tucking them into her waist band. She’s keeping these. And the photo album. If Dad wants them he’s going to have to fight her for them. 

She sets the boxes aside and heads back up stairs. She’ll look through Grandpa’s old things another time. She’s done for tonight.  

Chapter Text

The next morning dawns cloudy and overcast. Somehow, the weather suits Taylor’s mood perfectly as she ponders her next conundrum. Tang San had always worked fields by hand, and she doesn’t mind doing so herself, but where is she going to get the seeds she needs? 

    She can ask Dad for them, but she needs to let him have some time to settle after last night’s discussion. Taylor huffs extra hard as she races through a nearby neighborhood on her morning jog. To get the kind of feng shui arrangement she needs to get started on the basement, the backyard needs to be perfectly arranged with nine different sections to represent each aspect of life. The back door to her home sits in the North side, which makes it easy to know how to arrange the rest of the garden.

    The north side represents the element of water, her career, and life’s ebbs and flows of luck. This is also the side that will be pressed up against her basement window, which is good. She’ll need to pull a little of that water element she’ll be adding into her underground cultivation chamber. However, the Northeast side sits right next to it and she’ll have to frame that very carefully so she doesn’t add more Earth to her cultivation chamber than strictly necessary. The other element bordering her basement is metal and presents much less danger to her cultivation. 

    Taylor gives a long sigh as she finally reaches the end of her ever lengthening jogging route. She pulls a long stretch and leans over to do some lunges. 

    Despite it being the most important to her basement, Taylor can’t really start on any of the Northern sides yet. They need copious  amounts of elements that she’s either unable to get at her current cultivation level or would raise far too many eyebrows from both her father and her neighbors. 

    No, she’s going to have to start small, at the other end of the garden which means seeds instead of rocks, metal bits, or water.  The one that will give her the most profitable rewards is the East area, and if she can get a head start on the central area, she’ll be able to boost the growth of the medicinal herbs and bamboo she’ll be planting there. But...

    Taylor heaves another sigh. She still can’t buy the herbs without any money. If she can just get enough money to plant the first seeds for the herbs, she’ll be able to earn the rest by selling medicinal packets or teas. But she has to earn enough for the non-genetically modified seeds first and those are expensive. With how the current trends lends towards modifying plants to be more resistant to diseases and more prolific in their output, normal, non-modified seeds have become expensive. 

    Taylor can understand why, since the genetically modified seeds are easier to grow and more profitable all around, but she can’t bring artificial seeds into her feng shui garden. Even discounting the lack of natural unity they’ll create, most modified seeds don’t provide the same nutrients or effects as their legacy counterparts. For example, the new “seedless” watermelons are never as sweet due to the inhibitors placed on gathering the nutrients needed to create seeds. Without the need to feed seeds, watermelons won’t gather the glucose needed to taste sweet. Other crops are similarly affected when modified, with corn and wheat losing out on important nutrients in favor of being more resistant to disease.

    Taylor does not want to test what kind of medicine artificially “improved” herbs will create. She doesn’t even want to indulge her curiosity to see if the herbs are still wood element, or if they become metal or something. No thanks. 

    But organic seeds are soooo expensive these days...

Taylor passes one of the overgrown, abandoned houses that sits at the end of her route and pauses. Like many of the other houses in this area that borders both the trainyard and the docks, this house has been abandoned and left to the passing of time. It’s an older house, built decades before Brockton Bay began its turn for the worst. 

    Most of the homes here are owned by either a bank through a foreclosure or the government from when the previous owners stopped paying taxes and allowed them to seize the property. No one wants to live next to the docks or the trainyard, so no one buys the land to live on and no one wants to open a business in an at risk area. Which, fair. Taylor doesn’t think she’d invest here if she had money either. It is an unsafe area and if she could, she would definitely relocate herself and her dad somewhere further away from it. 

    As it is, Taylor carefully looks around the neighborhood. No one lives here and the sun’s first rays are just barely beginning to peak over the bay. Taylor can’t see anyone and though her subtle senses are yet unrefined, she doesn’t sense anyone either. Taylor walks onto the property and towards the overgrown flower beds. 

    Due to the abandoned state of the property, the beds have become overgrown with all manners of weeds, bushes, and even the original inhabitants. However, that’s not what’s caught Taylor’s attention. Hidden slightly behind a large elephant-ear bush, is a few strands of tired, wimpy looking rosemary.

    Despite being late Summer, this bush still sports a few light purple blooms on its long stalks. Taylor feels excitement mount in her chest. These houses have been abandoned for as long as Taylor’s been alive. The chance of this plant sporting genetic modifications is pretty low due to it having been planted so long ago. Rosemary plants are perennial, so Taylor isn’t positive this Rosemary is non-genetically modified since she hasn’t tested the viability of its seeds, but she’ll be able to tell soon enough depending on how many seeds she can harvest and how well they germinate. Modified plants don’t usually produce viable seeds. Sometimes they do, but not reliably.

Plus, Taylor may not be able to use Qi right now, but nothing is stopping her from sensing it in her surroundings. Not very well, but enough that with physical contact, she’ll be able to sense the nature of these seeds. Closing her eyes, Taylor reaches out a hand and carefully runs her fingers along the stalks and thin, spiky leaves of the rosemary. Warm, growing qi meets her sluggish senses. It moves ever upwards along the plant and gathers in the tight groups of seeds within the purple flowers. To her senses, these seeds burn bright with potential and energy. If they’d been tampered with, their wood element would be in conflict with the tampering since wood is all about natural growth. 

Grinning with joy, Taylor quickly harvests all of the light purple flowers she can find and stuffs them carefully into her fanny pack.They’ll need time to dry properly before she can harvest the seeds, but she’ll be able to use feng shui to boost their natural growth once she’s planted them.

Taylor looks at the rest of the bed and pauses. What are the chances that there are other old herbs still flowering and reproducing in the area? These old houses have stood empty for a while. Squatters and idiots use them from time to time, but the gardens and landscaping have mostly been left to nature’s will. Cops still come to this area on occasion, but surely no one will mind her harvesting a few herbs? Once she starts really cultivating, cops won’t be able to catch her anyway.

And, this could also potentially fix her other issue of where to plant her vegetables. Feng Shui gardens don’t always leave space for vegetables. If she can create a feng shui farm away from her cultivation based feng shui garden, she’ll be able to focus the garden at home to boost her cultivation and the garden elsewhere to create healthy, organic food to feed herself and help her cultivation. She’s already pretty set on cultivating as a spiritual cultivator rather than a physical one. Spiritual cultivators have a lot more options available to them than physical ones in terms of techniques and ways to use them.

Plus, Taylor doesn’t actually like physical exercise. Yes, she can and is doing it to help refine her body, but she doesn’t actually want to continue doing it for longer than she needs to or for more than she has to. Let Sophia be a sweaty mess and run around all day. Taylor’s interest lies in literature and understanding the mysteries of the world. She wants to create - not destroy. 

Spiritual cultivation is not the only cultivation capable of such, but it is the one with the most options readily available. However, being a spiritual cultivator means eating simply to avoid cluttering the body or sullying the spirit with fatty foods or oils. Preservatives will be a big “No” once Taylor starts cultivating in earnest, but fatty meats and heavy foods will also serve to detract from her cultivation. 

With all of these thoughts in mind, Taylor trudges over to the old wooden fence separating the property’s back yard from its front yard. Taking another furtive glance at the road, Taylor grabs the top and pushes herself up and over the fence. For a moment, she hangs on top and looks over the yard from her vantage point. Old pots, an old willow, and some towering weeds fill this backyard. The willow tree could be particularly useful for harvesting willow bark. Willow bark is a potent pain reliever in medicines as it helps reduce swelling and alleviate joint pain.Taylor can also see into a few other yards from here, and there are definitely some promising flowerbeds littered around the area. 

Holding both arms out for balance, Taylor begins trotting along the tops of the fences. She heads towards home, but takes care to peer into each garden as she goes. Of course, not every backyard has a fence lining it and some of the fences have even collapsed over time. It’s in one of these broken down areas that she makes her next discovery: bamboo.

The thin, bending stalks are of the shorter, denser, umbrella variant and have completely taken over one of the yards to the point of outgrowing its old wooden fence. Taylor stares into it in awe before pulling out her pocket knife. There’s no way she’s heading for home without taking a few cuttings. This is exactly what she needs to get started on the East section of her garden. 

Luckily, bamboo grows fast by itself and especially fast when assisted by feng shui. 

<<<>>><<<<>>>><<<>>>

Despite her great mood from the morning’s discoveries, Taylor still finds it difficult to drag herself to school. Not necessarily because she’s dreading the act of turning in her homework or the war the Trio have been waging against her, but because Taylor has other things she really wants to get back. 

It’s almost kind of novel, the fact that she’s really looking forward to the end of the school not because it’s the end of her torment, but because it’s the beginning of her work on the backyard. This giddy feeling stays with her even as she laments her need to attend school for a total of seven hours. Truly, she’s sure she could finish school much faster without having to attend class and listen to lectures. 

Unfortunately, today is the day the Trio have decided to reinforce their reign.

Emma, Sophia, and Madison await her at the front door. Not all together, of course. Rather, Taylor spots Emma chattering away with a few impressionable freshman girls and see Madison a little further down the front hall flirting with a sophomore baseball player who’s dumb enough to think he has a chance. Taylor can’t see Sophia, but she does sense a fierce presence at the edge of her subtle senses. Sophia’s here, the jerk’s just waiting outside of her sight.

Taylor sighs both in frustration and in forlorn sadness. There goes her good mood. Regardless of how this next confrontation turns out, she’s not going to be riding on her previous creative high for the rest of the day. Honestly, she’d kind of been hoping to avoid a big confrontation like this and just continue slipping steadily away from their schemes until they decide she’s too much trouble or effort. 

Still, Taylor can’t exactly skip school, so she continues onwards. Today she has her usual set up of three homework copies stashed in different places around her body. One in her backpack, another in her bra, and the last carefully folded in her shoe. So far, neither of the two extra hidden copies have been needed, but she’s also managed to avoid a direct confrontation against the trio so far.  

As soon as she crosses the threshold, Emma moves in. 

“Oh Taylor,” She draws the final syllable of Taylor’s name out in a high pitched voice. The effect is supposed to be infantilizing, but Tang San’s memories help Taylor to see it as a sign of Emma’s own immaturity. Real powerful people don’t bother trying to make you feel bad about yourself. They just kill you or take what they want while you watch. “I’m surprised to see you here today. After what the news said about the drug bust in the stacks, I thought for sure your dad would have booked you into rehab.” Around them, Emma’s sycophants laugh and giggle like Emma’s delivering the final part of a joke. 

Usually, Taylor would have been at least somewhat upset by now. If not by the fact that it’s Emma saying these demeaning things then by the insinuation that she’d turn to drugs. However, Taylor’s not really bothered by Emma. It hurts, yes. The ancient core of her that is Tang San knows it will always hurt that Emma betrayed her. 

But Emma’s words themselves are the most she can do. Her petty thievery and school pranks are the worst Emma can do. Tang San’s seen worse. Heck, even Taylor’s experienced worse things. However, that emotional separation doesn’t stop Taylor from talking back. She’s not someone that takes other people’s crap lying down and it’s about time she reminded the world of it. 

Emma has the same weakness all bullies do- she’s targeting those weaker than herself to make herself feel better, revealing a core of self-depreciation and internal fragility. 

“Making stuff up must be your way of coping, huh?” Taylor asks nonchalantly. “Well, I hope you feel better soon, Emma.” Taylor sidesteps the redhead and starts down the hall again. She’s slightly behind her new routine of arriving early to class due to her garden explorations this morning. 

“Feel better? I’ll feel much better when I don’t have to smell your stench, Tay. Did you forget how to bathe again?” Emma whirls around with a flash of anger. She doesn’t like being ignored or sidestepped. 

“Or maybe her family just can’t afford it right now?” Madison sidles up from where she’d been leading the poor sophomore on. Like usual, her cute appearance can’t hide her childish glee in taking apart those weaker than her. “I mean, her father’s with the dockworker’s union. You know they’re just buying time since they can’t do anything useful anymore.” 

“You know, your arguments would probably make more sense if my hair wasn’t still wet from being washed. And really, Clemens? You dad’s company just hired more dockworkers to do security work on contract because they couldn’t find anyone else who want to work with him. Sounds like you need the dockworkers a lot more than you think you do.” Taylor rolls her eyes. 

Clemens’s father works as an engineer for one of the bigger construction firms in the city. A bonafide genius, but horrible at using his own social skills for anything more than loving on his daughter. Therefore, the company always struggles to find people willing to work with him. More often than not, those people end up being the rough-and-tumble crew of the dockworkers. 

“W-well! At least my dad can pay for clothes that don’t make me look like trash.” Taylor looks at Madison and makes a big show of looking up and down. Madison is the only one of the trio to really enjoy flirting with boys and her outfit looks like it. Ripped jeans that show both too much skin and skin too high to be modest and a crop top that shows the bottom parts of her bra when she raises her arms.. Technically cute by street standards, but horribly immodest on a sixteen year old. 

In comparison, Taylor’s jeans and black sweatshirt can’t be more different.

“I think your definition of trash is very different from my definition.” Taylor states. Madison colors immediately, her cheeks turning red enough to match Emma’s hair. Turning, Taylor once again tries to head inside. However, she finds herself tumbling forward thanks to a push from behind. 

She catches herself with her hands and winces at the sting of the tile against her palms. 

“Enjoy your trip, Hebert?” Taylor recognizes the new voice immediately. 

“Hess.” Taylor greets as she picks herself up off the ground. As expected, the african american teen stands where Taylor had been standing. She has her hands on her hips and smirks down at Taylor. Taylor frowns. She hadn’t sensed Hess coming at all and ever since awakening Tang San’s memories she’d been taking special care to keep her guard up. 

Very strange. Still, time ticks ever on and Taylor has other things to do today than serve a detention for being late to homeroom. 

“I hope you have a good day and receive a spiritual revelation.” Taylor says truthfully. If Hess became a Bhuddist she’d need to stop being so evil to everyone. 

Then, for hopefully the final time, Taylor turns on her heel to leave. Behind her, she can hear Hess stuttering in surprise. The girl isn’t the smartest of the trio and typically resorts to acting like a brute. Meanwhile, Emma reigns as the brains of the operation but is too emotionally invested to stay clear headed. Clemens also doesn’t really have the brains to act when surprised, so Taylor makes it all the way to homeroom without any further issues.

Chapter Text

After the morning, the Trio does their level best to catch Taylor off foot. Madison resorts to juice on Taylor’s chair, Emma makes two other passes at Taylor in the halls, and Sophia makes a constant effort to appear in Taylor’s blind spot. It's almost bad enough to have her considering skipping lunch in the cafeteria in favor of somewhere else on campus. Their childish digs at her self worth may not affect her like before, but she doesn’t like the constant assault on her person during school. And, though Tang San’s memories do shield her, having Emma constantly in her face demeaning her doesn’t feel good.

    Emma had been her best friend. Her sister, even. Taylor knows her own worth thanks to Tang San, but Emma’s words still feel like they hold worth to Taylor. She can’t just dismiss them so easily, even after a year of hatred. 

    So, she ponders going into the cafeteria. Ultimately, it’s Tang San’s refusal to accept defeat that pushes her onwards. Tang San had never bowed his head, even when under scrutiny from direct disciples and Tang Sect members. He’d been obedient and done his best, but he’d never let them tear him down so easily. 

    So, Taylor won’t bow down to the Trio’s attacks so easily. She’s the incarnation of a fierce Tang Sect Cultivator. To run from three teenage mortals is unacceptable. 

    Walking into the Cafeteria, Taylor looks over the assorted tables. She’d sat with the ABB that first day, alone her second day, and her third she’d ended up squished between two jocks who took turns trying to steal her homemade chicken sandwich when she wouldn’t vacate her seat. Truthfully, Taylor had enjoyed that day the most and she thinks the two freshman basketball players did too. 

    Still, she doesn’t see the pair now and she’s not too keen to submit her nose to their lack of deodorant two days in a row. Giving a huff, Taylor decides to pick at random again. So far it has given her some delightful conversations. Repeating “Eeny Meeny Miney Mo” in her head, she heads over to a random table and takes a seat. The occupants, two guys and a girl drop their conversation to stare at her.

    “Hey, what are you doing?” The boy, a slightly overweight redhead, speaks first. His round glasses perch at the very end of his nose and his wavy red hair descends to just past his ears. 

“I’m sitting here so that I can eat my lunch.” Taylor explains as she pulls out her paper bag lunch. She really needs to get something better to carry her food, but until she settles things with the Trio, she doesn’t want to bring anything expensive into the school. 

“Um, yeah, but we don’t know you. And you just came over to sit with us without asking.” The girl pipes up from her seat across from Taylor. She wears her blond hair down in a smart looking pair of braids. 

“Oh, I’m Taylor Hebert. It’s nice to meet you.” Taylor introduces herself as she pulls out her healthy meal of sauteed mushrooms, green beans, and chicken. She hopes the chicken doesn’t have too many chemicals in it, but there’s not really much she can do on that front if it has. Tang San may have worked the fields when he was younger, but he has absolutely no idea how to care for livestock. Plus, her backyard is going to be a carefully cultivated waypoint of qi. No cow or chicken poop allowed. 

She’ll need to find somewhere local to source organic meat from.

“That’s not the same as us knowing each other and you know it. Also, my name’s Abigail.” Apparently done arguing, the braids girl pulls out her own packed lunch of a salad and some ham. The boys glance at each other before following Abigail’s lead.

“I’m Lucas Stewart.” The slightly overweight boy even offers his hand for a shake as he introduces himself. Bemused, Taylor shakes his hand and notices that his clothes are slightly nicer than one would expect of Winslow. 

“Really guys?” The last student at the table asks. He’s a dark skinned fellow with his hair done up in fuzzy braids. “Fine, whatever. I’m Jake Green. I guess it’s nice to meet you.” Unlike Lucas, Jake pointedly doesn’t extend his hand for a handshake. Taylor doesn’t mind. Lucas’s hand had been pretty sweaty and she’s not keen on round two of sweaty teenage boy hands. 

Taylor nods and begins chowing down on her food. She’s hungry after this morning’s discoveries. The others, at a loss for what to say, also partake in their lunches. For a few minutes, silence reigns as king. Then, Abigail, apparently fed up with the timid boys to either side of her, gives a huffing sigh before bulldozing ahead.

“So, did you get your presentation for Mr. Lori’s class done?” She asks Lucas. The boy in question jerks in surprise before looking up in wide eyes.

“I forgot!” He blurts. Looking down at his food, he starts shoveling the cafeteria mystery meat into his mouth as quickly as possible. 

“Dude, slow down. You’re going to choke.” Jake says. “Besides, even if you rush, class starts in fifteen minutes. There’s no way you’ll get it done in time.” Unaffected by his friend’s impending doom, Jake relaxes and leans back in his chair with a stretch. 

“But I can at least get half credit if I do half of it!” Lucas swallows enough of the food to say somewhat understandably before grabbing his tray and bolting for the wash window. 

Halfway there, he bumps into some seniors who immediately start heckling him. Abigail groans at the sight.

“That idiot...” She stands and grumbles to herself before taking several purposeful strides over to the profusely apologizing Lucas. Jake snorts and leisurely nibbles at the bread roll he’s been taking chunks out of. Taylor looks at him and raises an eyebrow. He blinks at her innocently before sitting up.

“Abigail’s got it covered. Lucas gets into this crap all the time. He’s pretty forgetful thanks to his meds and has the social awareness of a caterpillar thanks to them too. He wants off of them, but his parents get preferential treatment  from the government if he’s on them so...” Jake shrugs his shoulders before scooping the remainder of his mashed potatoes onto his fork. Thus finished, he takes his tray and goes to sling an arm over one of the enraged jocks. Leaning in close, he whispers something in the young man’s ear that has the meat head freezing up. After a moment, the group of football players beat a rapid retreat across the cafeteria. Taylor blinks. 

Huh.

She’ll need to keep an eye on Jake. His whisper had looked a lot like blackmail and Tang San had seen enough of that for Taylor to know she wants no part in it. 

<<<>>><<<<>>>><<<>>>

Once school is out, Taylor jogs home, but first detours over to the bamboo patch she’d found growing in the abandoned area near the docks. Once again, she doesn’t see anyone and every house on the block looks abandoned. Hoisting herself over the fence again, she hurries towards the overgrown bamboo patch. 

This patch is a variant of bamboo known for growing quite quickly and turning bright green upon maturation. Once a bamboo sprout has matured, it propagates by way of a unique root system and is very difficult to control. While there are several variations of bamboo that don’t propagate so aggressively, this particular bamboo variant is a severe hazard as an invasive species. Taylor’s kind of shocked to see it in Brockton Bay, but the amount of people to care about the ecosystem as opposed to superhuman terrorist has been dwindling to near nothing for the past few decades. Laws that were once in place to protect the ecosystem have fallen to the wayside in favor of first protecting what civility there is left to the human race. 

Still, the younger, brighter green sprouts are the bamboo she heads to first. Pulling a switchblade from her shoe, Taylor makes quick work of collecting twenty or so cuttings for the purpose of propagating them in her own backyard. With Tang San’s knowledge of cultivation, Taylor has several options for easily ensuring the bamboo doesn’t become a hazard and wreak her garden’s feng shui. 

Once clipped, she pulls out a few paper towels she’d packed this morning and wraps them up. Then she walks over to someone’s old garden pond and sprinkles a little bit of water on the paper towel until it is pretty damp but not quite wet-wet. Then she shoves the cuttings in her backpack and pulls out some old canvas she’d found in the garage and some long strips of the same she’d cut earlier. 

She checks her switchblade and sighs. It’s going to be very dull after today. She concludes her misery and walks over to the oldest looking bamboo shoots on the lot. These are a dark green and brown and tower over both her and the house. Each at least a few inches thick, these bamboo have likely been growing here  for half as long as she’s been alive. Taylor feels absolutely no shame as she grins up at them. These old shoots are going to look wonderful as her basement flooring. 

Cutting the aged bamboo is both harder and easier than cutting pieces off the saplings. For one, the bamboo is older and much denser. It takes her several minutes of huffing and sawing at the base to even reach the hollow interior of the plant. For two, these shoots are much thicker, so she has inches to cut instead of a centimeter or less. However, they don’t bend as much as the fresh shoots. Certainly, the older bamboo retains its natural sway, but at least she’s not worried about cutting herself if she applies too much pressure and the shoot bends out of the way of her blade. At any rate, it takes her a good thirty minutes to saw through a single bamboo trunk. 

The dark green trunk slowly tilts to one side once she’s finished cutting the last fibers. Above her, the trunk is supported by the leafy branches of it’s brethren. Pushing on it, she eventually pulls the trunk out of the branches and onto the ground. Lengthwise, it barely fits into the length of the backyard and still brushes up again the near fallen fence. 

Taylor looks at her switchblade and then back at the bamboo pole. This... really isn’t working. If she tries chopping the bamboo up into carryable pieces with just her switchblade, she’ll be here till the cows come home. 

Yet, she doesn’t exactly have access to her qi to put down more force and even if she did, her switchblade isn’t capable of taking her qi like a spirit blade would be. What she really needs is a saw or, better yet, a chain saw. One of those would work like a charm to cut down the bamboo and fix it to size. 

Still, she has what she has. Giving an overly dramatic grumble, Taylor turns back to swing away at the bamboo with her switchblade. She manages six yard length pieces before the sun starts to paint the world in orange and gold. She puts the pieces onto her canvas, wraps it up and ties it with one of the longer pieces of cloth, and then straps the whole thing across her back. It’s heavy, and her muscles protest it, but she takes it in stride. Her body needs to be a lot stronger before she’ll be able to get to any real cultivation. 

Once again, Taylor traipses through abandoned yards on her way home, exploring the veritable treasure trove that’s been left to her. Along the way, she picks up lavender, calendula, and chamomile. She’s especially excited about the chamomile. That stuff’s used in a butt-ton of recipes as a base and later a balance for any dangerously high level cultivator ingredients. 

When she gets home, Taylor sets her spoils out to dry and pulls out the knife sharpener. She’s got a lot of bamboo to cut and one small blade to cut it with.