The next day, Chún decided to start firing the pottery first. He could do his exercise, chores and everything else while the kiln was doing its job - he just had to make sure the kiln was fed with enough fuel periodically.
A good night's sleep had worked wonders on his state of mind. He did wonder if he would ever not require sleep like the Consumers in the stories. So far he had not stopped feeling tired at night.
Stretching, he grabbed his loincloth - he was getting pretty good at weaving those - and headed out of his cave.
"Good Morning, Mountain. Good Morning, your Highness", he greeted the Heaven and Earth Vine as he passed through the tunnel entrance and the screen of Vine leaves.
The Vines swayed in response; a large, ripe fruit falling towards him that he caught reflexively.
"Thank you for breakfast!" Chún called back as he moved towards the fire pit.
"So how did the drying work out?" He sent up the link as in munched on the fruit, savoring the refreshing, slightly sweet juice from the Vine fruit.
"Only a couple of failures - a few got too hot and had water go to steam, cracking," replied his locus - showing him replays of parts of the clay drying too fast and breaking as the excess water turned to steam.
Chún squatted down by the fire pit and started pulling out the dry pots, setting cracked ones aside. "There are five or six good ones here. That will do to start. The broken ones will help with the next batch." Carefully, he put the dry pots into the temporary basket that sat where he had left it the previous night, and piled up the broken pottery on the ground beside the fire-pit.
Humming softly to himself, small pulses of unfocused Essence rippling out with every note, he enjoyed the warm caress of the Golden Crow's feathers across his shoulders and the cool of the morning air as he worked.
Looking at the dried clay pots with his Essence Sense, he could still see a lot of Water and Earth patterns present. He nodded to himself - he had thought that was the case. This was why it was necessary to make the clay glow red hot before it became pottery.
Finishing, he stood with the basket and walked smoothly, careful not to shake its contents, to the kiln. Since he was being careful, the trip took a little longer than usual, but he got to his little spot near the creek soon enough. Checking quickly to make sure the kiln was undisturbed, he put the dry clay pots down a small distance away and busied himself stacking mid-sized deadwood into the kiln over the clay bars in the entrance. Once the opening was full with wood, except for the gap under the clay grate, he filled up the small fire pit in front of the kiln with small deadwood and kindling and lit it with a spark of Fire Essence.
As the small pile of kindling and deadwood at the mouth of the kiln caught alight, he moved to the side of the kiln with the opening into the firing chamber he had dug out when he had built the kiln and quickly placed the dry clay pots inside, pushing them as far back as he could go. Smoke was beginning to flow back through the kiln as it caught the heat and sucked the fire into the larger wood stacked on top of the clay bars.
Finished with placing the clay pots in the firing chamber he moved the plug of mud he had originally removed to create the opening back into place - a few splashes of water into the old mud pit and mixing the mud about gave him enough material to seal the plug shut as smoke and heat leaked out from around it.
With the side entrance sealed the kiln started drawing strongly though the chimney, the rising heat sucking in more oxygen through the kiln entrance and fanning the fire which had completely transferred from the small fire pit to the heavier wood on top of the clay bars inside the kiln.
"Mountain, watch the process please. Please make note of the changes inside the kiln as well as the pottery - we might be able to make improvements to the kiln as well."
Chún opened his Essence Sense as he looked at the kiln. There was a stream of Fire and Air Essence blasting through the construct all being contained and concentrated by Earth Essence.
Walking around to the back of the kiln he looked down the chimney - he could just see some of the pottery which meant they were in the right location.
Moving back to the front, he fed more wood on top of the clay bars. They would become pottery themselves soon. Frowning, he estimated the burn rate and chewed on his bottom link, thinking.
"Friend, please let me know if the fire starts to need more fuel. I need to go and do the daily chores."
"Of course," replied his locus.
Nodding in satisfaction, he ran back to the clearing to top up the stew pot with water, use the latrine, water the vegetables and fruit plot, especially the two very fancy looking apple saplings that had poked their heads though sometime in the last couple of days - almost gleaming with Essence. The other plants in the garden had noticeably increased in growth and vitality since they had appeared due to the amount of Essence the small trees were fountaining into the air.
"Wonder what the apples will be like - maybe something else worth selling?" he said to himself thoughtfully.
"They would likely be considered a low level Immortal's Fruit if you brought them off the mountain," his locus responded.
"Thought those had to be peaches," Chún said. "I guess it's not an option."
"I am having to let increasing amounts of Essence through connection back to Golden Crow in order to keep it from building up too fast here, so it would not be impossible."
Chún looked up at that. "Um? Will that not cause problems? The Culti - I mean Consumers will notice."
The Mountain shrugged in the link as Chún directed water from the stream over the fruit and vegetables. "The situation has changed. I cannot be found by anything below World Level consumers now. However, the old Mountain site still requires Essence to function - completely blocking off the flow would be damaging to the planet and be extremely noticeable."
The locus gave the impression of a sly smile. "Two problems solving each other, as the old saying goes. I need somewhere to place the excess Essence - and an 'ordinary' Treasure Mountain is useful to explain any Beasts or Essence Materialisation that might spill across dimensions for mortals or anyone else to notice.
I also re-established the old obscuring, hiding and spatial extension Dao's that were present there prior to the battle, so anyone will have to work to get in - they are unlikely to go looking for another hidden land if they succeed."
Chún's eyes widened as he jumped into the trees to practice Monkey Movement. "So there are two of you?"
His locus laughed. "No, I've just got a 'hand' or 'foot' still on Golden Crow Planet. This realm is not big enough to sustain itself with moisture, air or heat yet anyway so I exchange those things along with Essence with the original site - although I do not pull Essence in anymore, of course." The Mountain paused, "It's been a half shi. The kiln needs feeding."
"Right." Chún leapt from the clearing to his workshop in three bounds and quickly fed the kiln even larger deadwood. Checking with his Essence sense and looking down the chimney showed the clay starting to glow very slightly with a barely dull red, and the Water Dao patterns starting to vanish.
"That looks about right for this amount of time. I wonder what would happen with an Essence worked kiln, Fire Essence driven flames and Essence imbued clay. Wish I could start on that now."
"We could probably start the Essence built kiln now," offered his locus, "I can replicate what you did and reinforce the Dao patterns I see forming inside the ordinary kiln when it is in use. There is a lot of heat loss with the current kiln as well since it is just mud - if I make it of the same sort of stone as the fire pit and stew pot in the clearing - it will be much stronger, hotter and heat more evenly and efficiently."
Chún tilted his right hand left to right, considering. "I will need to dig out clay heavily imbued with Essence, make new pottery and dry it out against a Fire Essence fuelled fire. That will take the rest of the day if I start now."
"I can raise the Essence Kiln quickly," replied the Mountain, "As for drying the pots…" A small pit lined in the same black stone has the fire-pit in the Vine's clearing formed in Chún's small 'workshop' area a few arm spans away from the kiln, with four layers rock shelves formed around the sides. A very bright, almost transparent flame, rose from the centre of the pit.
Chún looked at the flame with is Essence Sense and quickly shut it off as it showed an incandescent amount of Fire Essence coming from a small hole beneath the Fire.
"Does that connect to one of the Nine Hells?" he joked nervously.
"You can put the clay on the shelves around the Fire Essence. They should all dry at the same rate. I will turn the Fire Essence off while you are standing in the pit of course."
"You did not need me to make that kiln at all," realised Chún belatedly.
"It was fascinating watching it directly - I have never seen it before personally. It was enjoyable."
"Do you even need me to make the pottery?" demanded Chún, a little annoyed.
"I struggle with such delicate work. Perhaps I will improve in time," his locus responded matter-of-factly. "I would suggest circulating your Essence through the clay as you work it, it should help make it more responsive to retaining different Dao characteristics."
"Wait, like the staff and the cloak?" asked Chún in realisation, "They turned out a bit… well, I am not trying to make godly pots…"
The Mountain laughed. Chún swore he felt a slight shiver between his feet. "Hardly godly. Your old staff is now the most powerful Treasure we have and it is only really able to help keep this minor plane stable. It is not even close to a Divine level treasure - your current staff and cloak are several levels below that. Even the Silver trees and most definitely the Heaven and Earth Vine rank above them. When the Vine becomes a Five Elements Tree it will be equal if not stronger than the World Tree and it would still not be considered Divine - perhaps quasi-Divine?"
Chún shrugged and picked up his basket, headed for the creek and the clay deposits. "I did not know. The Cloak and Staff seem very powerful to me."
"They are by the standards of anyone below World Level Cultivation. But they were created because of the very high levels of Essence flowing through you and them at the time. Unless you plan to work the clay during another major ignition of high level treasures, it will not gain characteristics like that - I believe it may be able to retain Dao patterns easier, that is all."
Chún nodded as he splashed across the creek, heading for the heaviest concentration of Essence in the clay along the creek bank. "OK. I will try."
---
Being a little more practised meant that Chún got the clay out faster. This time he took the basket back to his 'workshop', then went back to the Vine's clearing to get the broken clay pots and his work stone.
Back at the 'workshop' he placed the clay lumps into the mud pit he had originally dug out to make his kiln, which reminded him to go and feed some more logs in. Looking down the chimney, he could see that the clay was glowing red now and the kiln was roaring like a dragon.
"Anything interesting happening in the kiln?" he asked his locus as he went back to the clay in the mud pit, letting Essence puddle through his fingers into the new Essence heavy clay as he broke it down with kneading and water.
"Only clay left now - everything else got burnt out nicely, wood, plant matter and stuff. The water which is usually part of the clay is also leaving now, a bunch of crystals forming. All starting to melt together so that it is solid."
He blinked. "And that is all… ok?"
"Yes, that is how clay turns to ceramic."
"Oh. Well, this is nice and dough like now, time to knead the old dry clay into it this time… oh, wait," he paused as he grabbed his rock to start moulding the clay into a block, "the old clay is not Essence heavy, will that reduce the chances of retaining Dao?"
The Mountain was silent for a moment. "Not certain. It might. Also might help - balance and all that. Split your clay in half, add the dry clay to one and leave it out of the other. We can compare the products made with the different mixes afterwards."
"Good idea." Chún did as his locus suggested pushing Essence through his hands the whole time he was kneading the clay and soon had two lumps of clay roughly the size of his head, which almost glowed with Essence.
The lumps needed to stiffen a bit so he jumped into the new drying pit, put them on the shelves and jumped back out again. "Turn on the Fire Essence please, friend."
The Fire appeared in the centre again, although it was clearly not as hot as before. Chún nodded approvingly. "Good idea, do not want to bake the clay. " He walked over to the kiln and fed in the rest of his large deadwood.
"That should be sufficient - about two Shi- let it die down after that," instructed his locus.
"Wash and lunch then."
---
Back after eating, Chún saw the kiln was not actively heating anymore, allowing it to gradually cool down. He knew the gradually part was important - he'd seen more than one apprentice beaten for opening a kiln too soon, destroying the pottery as it cooled too fast and shattered.
"Turn the Fire off, please." He jumped into the hot pit and retrieved the clay blocks which almost seemed pure blocks of Essence now. He regarded them warily, "This is going to be interesting," he muttered to himself.
"Yes," agreed his locus.
Rolling his eyes, he ignored the comment and went back to his work-stone and like last time used his fingers and a little water to shape lumps he broke off the blocks into pots, a few plates and cups. He made sure to keep pushing Essence into the clay through his fingers the whole time.
After about a Shi of work, the clay was used up. Looking at the pots, plates and cups with Essence sense he could see that all the Essence patterns and Dao characters of Earth, Water, Life and Fire were very strong, reinforced and currently balanced.
"Wonder how that will change. Hope the fire does not completely kill the rest," he said quietly, rising to put the clay objects on the stone shelves. The Fire Essence reappeared as he leapt out.
"OK, time to hunt and gather."
---
Hunting was uneventful again, which Chún was thankful for. He still was not in the mood for more Essence-related craziness yet. He dropped the struggling boar in the Vine clearing after two or so shi away and was rewarded with the usual meat, pelt and ivory. More food and trade goods were always good he thought happily as he went about his usual process of planting small gatherings in his garden plot and boiling or roasting everything else with herbs, wild onions, oil, spices and so on..
The Golden Crow was going to his nest again so Chún decided an early night would be in order again - heading for his nightly bath, which he had gotten completely addicted to. By the time he was finished the food would be ready and then his bed. He could start the new firing in the Mountain's improved kiln tomorrow as well as open up his one to see how his ordinary firing went.
Part of him wondered how long the calm could last, but he resolved to make the most of it. He would probably be missing it soon, if his last few weeks were any indication.