Fang Xiang

This is both a work of science fiction and an exploration of the meaning of life, love, literature and art. Brainpower is no longer the main ingredient for being human in this far distant future world.  Spirituality, physical balance, and diligence all come together as integrity for Chen Mu, the Card Apprentice.  The cards which Chen Mu masters in his own scrappy way, distill all the powers of the cosmos –  human and nonhuman –  into something that is not a book, not technology, and neither art nor magic, but is these and more.  Learn about these strange cards, which can embody everything you might imagine for the future of technology, but also a future beyond technology which promotes the best, and sometimes the worst, from mankind’s past.

The Card Apprentice

Chen Mu had been improving the metallic separator he had constructed for those few days. The level of the industrial metallurgical machinery that had been purchased was far deficient from what Alfonso had in his lab. He'd had to wrack his brain to just barely build a separator.

Chen Mu felt strangely ashamed looking at the ugly machine. If Alfonso were to see it, chances were he'd laugh at him. Still, he seemed to have something of a glorious tradition in that regard, having made the Blue Moon Gun, which was famous for being so ugly in its first rendition.

Unfortunately, the metallurgic arts there were far from comparable to the Moqi Clan. Otherwise, he would have considered making the Blue Moon Gun. That was the sort of card appliance an ordinary person could use. Who knew how many times more ordinary people there were in the world than card artisans?

Brenton’s Choice