"Oy, Wanderer! There's a bit o' residue falling from the mizzen mast, can you salvage it before the wind eats it all?"
A voice cut through the wind that danced across the deck of the ship. Liya Qing, the lookout responsible for the main mast called out to Wanderer from her vantage point, her auburn hair fluttering wildly in the wind as her brown eyes narrowed sharply.
"Understood, Miss Qing!"
Wanderer's voice cut through the wind in response to Liya Qing's request, his steady feet quickly bringing him across the deck. The ship was tossing and turning with the roiling sand beneath them, but his feet didn't stop for a second, his body bending and turning in tune with the ship to stabilize his stance.
A middle-aged man with a loose blue shirt stood close to the railings, clutching a rope tied to the sail of the main mast, supporting it to keep it steady. With the other hand, he picked up one of the tools at his side, one that looked like a butterfly web, and tossed it to Wanderer.
"Catch, don't ferget to go for the shiniest glimmers first, they'll be the most important ones."
With the tool in hand, he ran up to the raised rear portion of the deck and positioned himself beneath the sail hoisted on the mizzen mast, the rearmost mast. Mixed in with the strong wind and the sand it threw about were small glimmers of light, raining down from the sail like snowflakes.
They were evidently a bit heavier than the actual sand, slowly fluttering down rather than getting completely carried away by the wind. But if left unchecked then the wind would push the glimmers enough that they would end up falling into the sand around the ship so they still had to be caught.
"Wanderer, rope! Shao, twist! Zen, catch!"
A voice came from atop the mast, a rope dropping down from the crow's nest that served as the lookout point. Wanderer swallowed once before he grasped the rope and readied himself for what was to come. The sound of something falling mixed in with the wind, the rope Wanderer was holding going taut as it shot skyward, bringing him with it.
He quickly stretched out the net he had been given, the fine white silk that formed its head releasing a dim light as it started to attract the gleaming snowflakes. One by one they started to sink into the net, Wanderer swinging it towards the larger snowflakes. In the end, the net wasn't an all-powerful tool, it could only attract snowflakes within a certain distance so he really had to focus on the larger ones.
The rope he was holding suddenly twisted somewhat, spinning around the mast as if it wanted to twine itself around it. A glance was all Wanderer needed to see Dia Shao, clutching onto the halfway point of the mast with one hand while using the other to direct the rope that was pulling Wanderer. Thanks to Shao's aid, Wanderer started to swing around the mast, allowing him to cover a wider area to collect more snowflakes.
But he was starting to reach the end of the rope, once he reached the crow's nest from which the counterweight had been dropped, he would crash into it and become a mess of flesh and bones. So they counted the seconds, each link involved in the task counted the seconds to erase the possibility of failure. And once the allotted time was used up, they called out.
"Wanderer, drop!"
"Wanderer, let go!"
"Newbie, I'm waiting!"
Three voices joined as one, each one had counted separately but not one of them had been off. This was their job, this was their livelihood, this was their family. Errors could not be accepted, would not be allowed. Wanderer knew what to do know, Chao Zen had given him very detailed descriptions of all the jobs on the ship so that he would be ready to cover whichever one they needed him to.
What he had to do right now was trust. He had done his job, now he had to trust that the others would do theirs. Of course, one mistake and he would splatter the deck of the ship, that or end up in the sea of sand around them, food for whatever lurked beneath the surface. Could he do it? Could he put his trust in people he had known for a mere three days?
His hand let go of the rope, a sensation akin to a rock settling in his stomach overtaking him as gravity grabbed hold of him. In the end, it didn't matter whether he could or couldn't put his trust in them. He had to, that was all there was to it. So he let go of the rope and let gravity do its thing, his body rapidly dropping towards the deck.
A slight twinkle of white cut through the dancing wind and sand as he fell, tightly clutching the net so as to not lose any of the snowflakes. The twinkle grew larger and larger, all the way until he hit it and was enveloped by a soft sensation. A large mattress, rapidly inflated using Qi, had caught him. Chao Zen stood next to the mattress, his greying hair fluttering wildly as he bit down on his pipe, his grin reaching all the way to his black eyes.
"Told ya I was waiting, didn't I Newbie? Now come on an get up, Dengde is waiting beneath deck with the cauldron."
He flipped the mattress to force Wanderer off, making sure he landed on his feet and headed for the door that led beneath the deck before he put away the mattress and made his way back to his previous position. Wanderer shut out the sound of the wind as he closed the door behind him, quickly navigating the corridors as he made his way down to the bowls of the ship.
He swiftly reached his target, the door to Shin Dengde's room already wide open. He moved in with quick steps, the somewhat youthful man sitting crosslegged in front of a bubbling cauldron waving his hand.
"I take it you've picked up some residue. Hand it over and wait, it shouldn't take more than a minute or two."
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Wanderer did as he was told and handed over the net, Dengde pouring its contents into the bubbling cauldron with a slightly tired expression. But even if he looked weary, his black eyes never lost their focus. He sniffed the liquid in the cauldron a minute after dropping in the gleaming snowflakes, his brows furrowing slightly before he picked up some of the vials he had scattered around him.
He poured in a bit of viscous sludge from some of the vials, the liquid in the cauldron taking on a dim yellow hue. He then grabbed an empty jar and a brush, filling the jar with the liquid before closing it and handing the two objects to Wanderer.
"Give them to Shao, he'll see to it that they find their home."
Wanderer accepted the two items and tucked them into his bosom, keeping them safe beneath the loose brown shirt he had been given by Yi Sao. He dipped into a minor bow as he bade Dendge farewell, turning around and jogging back to the deck while Dendge returned to the cauldron to stabilize the mixture.
Wanderer ran back on deck and returned to the mizzen mast, raising his head as he traced it with his eyes. He could see Dia Shao halfway up the mast, constantly adjusting the ropes that connected the sail to the mast. He couldn't throw the jar from this distance so there was only one option available to him, he would have to climb.
So, he grabbed onto one of the many ropes twined around the mast and started to climb. There were plenty of ropes twined around the mast exactly for situations like this so Wanderer had plenty of places he could grasp onto to ascend. The roaring wind was annoying, but there was a slight irking at the back of his mind, like a tiny voice telling him that this wasn't a problem at all, this wind was far from being an enemy, not even worth a second thought.
So he climbed ever higher, from rope to rope as the wind roared, or perhaps danced, all around him. Each time it brushed against his body he felt like he saw a puppy cuddling up against its owner, eagerly seeking affirmation and care. It was an exceedingly strange thought, but the strangeness of it made Wanderer smile slightly. What an absurd situation, how could he not smile at a time like this?
"Oh, solution's done, eh? Thanks a bunch, Wanderer, I'll get the rest done."
Dia Shao's voice reached Wanderer as he smiled to himself, it seemed like he had reached his target while lost in thought. Shao stretched out an arm and accepted the jar and brush that Wanderer pushed towards him, his brown eyes shifting slightly as he put his focus onto the sails.
He spat out a heavy breath, the jar and brush levitating out of his grasp and moving towards the sail tied to the mizzen mast. Shao's eyes narrowed slightly as he focused, the jar opening itself and allowing the brush to dip itself into the slightly yellow liquid. And then the brush started to draw on the sail, constantly filling up the dimly glowing marks that covered the sail.
These marks were supposedly part of an array, a drawing with magical properties as they put it. It was their emergency solution should things take a turn for the worse, but if the array wasn't activated then it was a bit susceptible to the environment so they had to take care that it wasn't eroded in strong weather like this.
That was what the gleaming snowflakes had been, small scratches that fell off from the array. Should too many of them fall off then the array would no longer function when they needed it so they had to collect as many as possible so that they could repair it straight away.
Wanderer watched as Shao did his job, his eyes gleaming slightly. Qi, that was what Shao used to move the brush and jar without touching it. The energy of life, the source of freedom, that was what some of the crew members called it. As for Wanderer... he couldn't use it. Yi Sao had checked him and said that he lacked something important, something known as a dantian, the storehouse that contained all your Qi. No dantian, no storehouse, no Qi.
"Don't look so jealous, Wanderer. Sometimes you just draw the shorter straw in some aspects, that's just life. If you always just focus on the shorter straws then that's just what your life will be, short straws wherever you turn. Focus on the good things, the longer straws you've drawn, life'll be much happier like that."
Dia Shao looked down at Wanderer as he spoke, his expression somewhat soft. Sometimes you just encountered people who had something you didn't, that was just life, everyone on this ship had experienced. But once you focused on those things then they'd just become chains that dragged you below the surface and drowned you. It was a sad way to live, a pitiful way to live.
Wanderer simply smiled quietly at Shao's words, his gaze continuing to follow the brush and jar as they moved against the wind and painted across the sail. He got a bit lost in his observation, a bright gleam of light drawing his eyes after an unknown amount of time had passed, Shao's voice sneaking into his ears.
"Look out there, Wanderer. That's a sight you can only get from up here."
Wanderer followed Dia Shao's outstretched arm, his gaze peering across the seemingly endless sea of sand. A thick wall of wind and sand rose in the distance, surrounding them on all sides. This was the eye of the storm, the sole land of calm amidst the chaos around them. The sun was high above them, its rays reflecting off of the crystals mixed into the sand that flew about with the wind, a million bright lights dancing in the dark storm around them.
And at the centre of it all was the wreckage of what should have once been a towering building, slightly skewed now that the sand had swallowed everything but the top half. But even if it was surrounded by sand, the building itself ruined, a great tree was growing atop the building, lush green leaves casting their shade around it. Dia Shao's lips curved up as he looked at the building, pointing at the tree.
"A wreck from before the Wandering Desert was created. Look, you see that tree? The crumbling of Purgatory's Cradle should have destroyed all traces of life in the area, but yet that tree still stands firm after seven years, I can't even imagine what sort of treasure we'll find at the base of those roots."