rule two

Chapter 58

Visitor From Afar

Lei Feng looked over the winding plains with loathing in his eyes.

What was he doing here? Rather, why was he the one sent here? Purity of Qi was abysmal, and even the air itself felt stuffy. He could have been taking a bath with Luna, having the time of his life, and instead... he was here, in the decrepit nothing of the Lower Ashlands, home of the talentless, worthless, and pointless. Were it up to him, he would have built a massive wall around this entire place and let it die out in pathetic silence.

And yet, here he was, sent out to investigate the supposed appearance of an Immortal here. It was likely just a pretense, however, to kick him out temporarily and lower his cultivation speed. Recently, he'd been slowly catching up to his Seniors and threatening their position, and they likely colluded together to get him out and ensure that didn't happen.

It was frustrating and hateful, but he couldn't say no. He didn't have the power to do so.

As he believed there was no Immortal here, he didn't plan on doing any actual investigating. It was pointless--if this dry-hole could produce an Immortal, they wouldn't be rotting at the bottom of the barrel in abject irrelevance. Rather, for the next three months that he had to spend here... he decided to just have fun. It didn't matter what he did here, nobody would pass an ounce of judgement. Even if he levelled the entire thing to the ground, there'd be more people praising him than condemning him back home.

His first step was the 'vaunted' Lingshan Kingdom. He'd never heard of the place, but according to a random passerby he'd grabbed and mind-read, they had three Soul Ascendance Realm cultivators in their ranks, none of whom got along together very well. His lips stretched out into a wide smile as he slowly planned ahead--he'd cast this place in chaos, and then sit at the rear and enjoy the flames.

It wouldn't even be hard, he knew. All he had to offer was a few pitiful 'rewards', and they would be dancing in the palm of his hands. They were the lesser, even they knew that, and they'd do anything at even the faintest opportunity to escape their fates. Lei Feng could only laugh at the thought--even if he had the power to help a few break through to the Nascent Soul Realm, he'd sooner kill them than do that. Vermin should only ever be allowed to hope and nothing else, to forever gaze at something they would never be able to obtain.

**

Holy Blade Art, or its full name--Immolation of the Holy Blade Art--had always been a bit of an enigma, not just for Yu Minge, but even his Master, Holy Ancestor. The art itself was only Low-Heaven Grade, but both his Master and Yu Minge always felt that wasn't quite right. With each revolution of Qi through the meridians, or each time they'd execute any of the arts contained therein, it always felt as though something was missing, as if it were incomplete almost.

Whenever he would have some free time, he'd isolate himself and ponder on it, trying to peer into the depths he wasn't even certain were there.

Sighing, he opened his eyes and stood up, walking over to a small pond of water.

He'd walled himself off on one of the mountains surrounding the Sect and overlooking it, a place he often visited when he needed a moment of peace. With Xiaoling taking his place temporarily, he could focus elsewhere... but his mind drifted still to the place below. There was no way he wouldn't worry, especially now that they'd opened the doors to new Disciples. Once in a while, he'd cast his Divine Sense and examine the newcomers, but it seemed there was nothing truly untoward and that Xiaoling was doing a better job than even he would have.

Sighing yet again, he sat down and looked up to the sky.

He'd hit a bottleneck, he had to admit... but it was difficult not to do so. As Xiaoling said, if he wanted to break through to Nascent Soul Realm, he'd need at least twenty to thirty years, and that was if he only cultivated non-stop. He'd hoped to be able to glean a few things from the Holy Blade Art, but even that, it seemed, would take a while.

The time was running low, though; not only would he have to be on the lookout for the True Demons and whatever their next goal was, but also whoever the Central Ashlands sent to investigate. Arrogance was bound to the blood of everyone born there, and chances were that they did not come down voluntarily. It was all one thing after another, and he wished he could have learned a cloning technique when younger so he could split himself in two, three, or even ten people and be everywhere, all at once.

Alas, he had one body and one mind, and could only dedicate it to one thing at a time. Returning to the small cabin, he sat down cross-legged on a prayer mat and closed his eyes. The scripture of the Holy Blade Art appeared in his mind, long and everlasting, its lettering gilded with golden gleam. Each character seemed to chant itself toward the sky, as though demanding attention for itself over others.

Yu Minge frowned suddenly--in the midst of blinding gold, he saw a tiny mote of something else. Between the first and the second character of the first mantra, he saw a shimmering shadow, a clasp of darkness that was never there before. He rapidly pulled himself out of the image training, breathing heavily, his eyes full of worry.

"... have I been infected?"

**

Mei stared silently at an unassuming face of a young man fidgeting in front of her.

Elder Xiaoling informed her that she'd be accompanying a newly recruited Disciple who, in reality, was the shadow she was chasing almost all her life--Shen Tao, the Chosen One of the Bloodmoon Sect. Though the Elder didn't go into detail as to why a Chosen of another Sect was joining theirs, Mei could venture a guess or two.

Almost all her life, she was envious of this man's talent--she worked twice, thrice, five times as hard, she felt, than him and all others like him just to barely keep up. That was why she never felt they were too otherworldly--they coasted on their talents, never working as hard as they could, allowing themselves to stagnate. In small parts of her heart, she even hated him--the man who had everything she ever wanted, yet was swimming in the still waters just like her.

Though she wasn't particularly enthused that she'd have to shadow him, it did afford her the opportunity to see just how exactly was he wasting his talents. Was he like a lot of the Seniors she'd seen over the years, frequently visiting brothels? Or was his vice drinking? Or, perhaps, was he just... lazy?

"... what?" he asked, breaking the silence. "Why are you staring at me so hard?"

"No reason," Mei replied casually. "Spar with me."

"H-uh? What?"

"Spar with me," she pointed at the nearby field. "I had some insights recently, and I want to test them out."

"But why me?! Can't you ask one of your friends?"

"We're friends."

"..."

"..."

"Like hell we are! Who the hell is friends with you?!"

"Let's go," she shrugged her shoulders and headed over to the field. Despite his protests, audible and bodily, he followed along. "Since I know you can't use your arts in full since it would expose you, let's just fight with basic swords techniques."

"Ugh, fine," he pulled back his long hair and took out his sword.

"Here I come!"

She did the same, darting forward in the flash of light. Despite her speed, he--rather nonchalantly, at that--deflected her attack, pushing her back a few steps. She felt a ripple of Qi storm through her, making her still for a moment, but he never followed-up. Rather, he stayed rooted in the same place, his eyes dutifully watching her.

Gritting her teeth, she poured more Qi into her sword and attacked again, feigning a direct hit and going for his right side. He read her immediately, however, entirely ignoring her feign and easily deflecting her true strike.

Over and over and over and over--they must have gone for over fifty rounds in the span of ten minutes, and yet... she was unable to land a single hit. He never retaliated, only ever defending. And, unlike her, who was gasping for breath, he seemed as though they hadn't even begun just yet.

It was back, the frustration. She thought she buried it after experiencing the miracle of the Nameless Forest, having her roots ripped and re-done, and finally beginning to believe she was at the equal level with others. So why... why was it that he still seemed like a mountain looming over her?

"Just because you have more Qi or because it's purer," he seemed to have read her mind, speaking up. "Doesn't mean you can fight better. You always telegraph your attacks. And after I blocked you a few times, you tried compensating by pouring more Qi into them, tiring yourself out more and more while I never had to spend more than just minimal amount of Qi to defend."

"..." she bit her lower lip, swallowing her pride and accepting the tutelage. "Then... how do I fix it?" she asked.

"..." he smiled faintly, disappearing suddenly and appearing by her side, his sword just shy of bursting through her throat. "You fight. A lot," he whispered directly into her ear before jumping back to his original position. "Since I was five years old, I fought every day. I fought until my bones were broken and until I was bleeding from practically every inch of my body. I fought when it was cold, when it was hot, when it was snowing, raining, day or night. Unless you tower over someone else in terms of cultivation, you will always lose against people who fight every day. Besides," he added. "Your attacks... are soft. Instead of aiming for my neck, you aim for my shoulder. Instead of going for my head or my heart, you go after my hands or my thighs. You want to wound me, and not kill me."

"--of course!" she exclaimed, somewhat flustered. "I don't know what it was like for you... back there, but here, we are not allowed to severely harm our fellow Disciples."

"Oh?" he arched his eyebrows as his lips stretched out into a strange, mocking smile. "You think you can harm me... severely? Cute."

"..." I'M GOING TO KILL HIM!

Chapter 59

Scattered Ruins

Leo yawned and stretched lazily, leaving the hut and glancing about. Most of the animals were still fast asleep, as were his pair of Disciples. The last few days were rather... boring. It was mostly just watching the kids bring back the stones, and him putting the stone onto the fantasy-suffused wood, watching the raw material be processed into proper shape. On the way, he'd gather reeds and straw whenever he'd see some, having already gathered around 60% of the needed numbers for both.

Following a quick bath, he made breakfast... but it wasn't as fun anymore. He'd tried practically every combination that he could by now, and there was little else to attempt. The only thing he could do was wait for the seeds that Yue planted to grow, and see if he could concoct something with them. 

As soon as the breakfast was ready, both the animals and the kids woke up and quickly converged. The fire in their eyes was never extinguished--on the contrary, it seemed that the 'word' was spreading further and further out into the forest, as Leo spotted six newcomers this morning. They were an entire family of four-eyed, white-feathered sparrows... except they were the size of a larger pigeon. 

"Master," Yue suddenly broke the silence. "Once we complete the longhouse... can Liang and I leave the forest for a little while?"

"Hm?" Leo glanced at them. He wasn't particularly surprised--if he could, he'd leave too. There was little to do in this place, and especially for the young people in the prime of their lives, it was probably quite suffocating.

"Don't--don't get me wrong!" she quickly said. "We enjoy spending time here, a lot, but there is this one place that I always wanted to go to. Especially now, when we're growing stronger, I feel like we can accomplish something. We won't even be that far, just south of the forest--Cradle of the First Men," while Leo maintained an indifferent expression, he wanted to laugh a little bit at her reaction. 

"Are you confident?" he asked.

"Hm," she nodded. "We'll go together and never separate. If we truly ever feel like we're in danger, we will use the Void Scroll... if, if you don't mind it."

"Yes, the reason I gave it to you two is that I'd mind if you used it, so it's just a useless decoration to be left hanging in your pocket," Leo smiled faintly, taking a sip of the juice. Though he felt a bit strange about going back to loneliness, them leaving would afford him the time to explore the depths of the forest and locate the well. "Of course you can go. Just stay safe, that's all I ask."

"Of course, Master," she said. "We won't stay long. Two months at most. Ah, the Cradle is sort of like a rite of passage," she added. "It's a settlement of forts scattered around and usually manned by Disciples of the Sects. There are a lot of Demonic Beasts as well as Others, so there are constant hunts and fights happening." Leo listened to it carefully, mapping inside his mind where it was. "There are two Soul Ascendance Realm cultivators overseeing everything and protecting the forts, but it isn't unusual for the Disciples to die there, especially if they extend far past the forts' influence." 

"Others?" Leo queried. He grew a bit bolder with his questions, poking and prodding here and there, his excuse of 'being away from the world for so long' locked-and-loaded if either of the Disciples asked. Neither, however, seemed to question why he'd ask that.

"Hm, it's mostly what we call bandits and the mutants," she said. "They, too, come to the Cradle to fight for the resources. There are quite a few canyons that flood yearly, and once the floods retreat, for some reason, a lot of treasures appear--weapons, pills, herbs, armor, even martial arts and cultivation methods. Nobody has ever learned why it happens, but when it does, almost every Sect sends their best Disciples to look for good opportunities."

"Just last year," Liang said. "Senior Brother Xu went to the Cradle as one of the weakest of his generation, but he lucked into Root-Washing Pill and upgraded his roots overnight!" 

"..." Leo's eyebrows twitched for a moment as he recalled that he still had that single Root-Washing Pill somewhere in his robes. He never ended up using it, and he hadn't given it out just yet. Luckily, one of the rewards for completing the longhouse was a few more pills, so he would be able to give them out and even have two extras for the future. 

Leo had already decided to make a Sect of his own as part of the main quest rather than joining a new one. In time, he hoped, that one of the two kids in front of him would grow strong enough to herald the Sect so that he could just be a mysterious 'Master' or an 'Ancestor' that never really interacted with the world. While they dealt with the matters of the Sect, he'd travel the lands and have a bit of fun. 

That was for the future, however--a very distant future, at that. 

"That's nice," he said. "But don't chase treasures at the risk of your lives, okay?"

"Of course, Master," Yue said as the three fell into silence.

It has been some time since it was just him and the animals, Leo mused. And though he liked having people around (probably just as much if not even more), there were moments where he yearned for silence, too--especially if the pair of his Disciples broke out into one of their pointless fights. The entire forest would roar with Yue's anger and Liang's whining, and even the animals would know to scatter at those times, hiding in the holes and the trunks and the bushes, away from the hubbub. 

Even if, at times, their fighting sounded like a nice melody, at other times it was akin to locking two cats who hate each other in the same cage. 

Following the breakfast, Yue and Liang went to the quarry to finish up and make it ready for any future excavations while Leo took the compass from Yue and headed northward. He largely stayed away from the north as that was where Chilly--the crow--was. However, so long as he didn't cross that 'invisible barrier' that his gut would warn him about, he figured he would be fine. 

It wasn't long before the healthy trees gave way to the macabre ones, but he ignored them. He was alone, for the first time in a while, as none of the animals accompanied him--not even in the shadows (as far as he could tell). Though a bit scary, he fought the urge to turn around and run, investigating with the compass in hand, waiting for the damn thing to light up. 

The north, much like further west of the western pond, stuck out from the rest of the forest. None of the trees or the plants that seemed to live here appeared anywhere else in the forest--the red-capped mushrooms that were like polka dots, the 'breathing' flowers whose petals would close up and open in rhythmic fashion, the swaying branches that were almost like sentient twines, coiling around virtually everything... 

Furthermore, unlike the rest of the forest, there were no animals. Not the animals like Hoot or Red, the 'mutated', weird sort, or animals like that dog--completely ordinary. As far as he could tell, there was only Chilly, and everyone else stayed hell away from it. Leo couldn't blame them--just the mere glance of that crow made him feel like he'd touched the glass pane of death. He couldn't imagine trying to live and raise a family while surrounded by that feeling.

The trees suddenly parted, and Leo came upon a rather wide clearing--it was rectangular, stretching out westward for nearly half a mile. He paused at the edge, stunned and confused; unlike every other clearing, which had within it things you'd ordinarily find in a forest--ponds, flowers, grass, and such--this one had... a building. Yes, it was a building in major disrepair--there was no roof, half its walls were eaten by time, and it was reminiscent of those ancient ruins back on Earth that were really just a set of twelve walls vaguely forming a set of rooms. 

Leo approached with the caution, fearing something might jump from the inside--but it didn't. Just like its spiderwebbed walls, its insides were overgrown with nature too; grass and flowers had taken over, but there were still remnants of things that were. In one corner, he saw a cracked, obsidian-black cauldron lying on the side. In another, there was a stool missing two out of its tree legs, the rest of its body deep in the phase of rot. 

Scattered bits could be found between the walls, reminders that someone once lived here. Leo's mind drifted back to that grave, and he wondered whether the forest... was always a forest. There was a good chance that before the trees sprouted like in Eden, this may as well have been a completely different topology--maybe it was a flat or hilly plain, maybe it was city or a town, or even perhaps a Sect. 

He sat down onto one of the walls after ensuring it was stable, gazing upon the weathered stone. The winds blew past him, swaying the grass. Somberness and melancholy overwhelmed him, almost like a tidal wave surging from within. At some point in time, there was a person, or people, living here, enjoying everyday life. And yet, all that was left of them... were these stained walls and cracked pottery. 

Life, in moments like these, seemed woefully meaningless. They, too, must have struggled with something--perhaps cultivation, perhaps familial expectations, perhaps just love. And yet, all their struggles, small and large, faded like ashes in the winds of time. All that was left was a last syllable of their existence, a tiny speck of their cosmic inconsequentially. 

Would his life, and thus death, be any different? All his efforts to build a life in this forest, to befriend its netizens, and to help people... would they all eventually fade, the only reminder some cold structure that could not make a sound? Would those mud huts survive his end, and eventually become curious findings of people a thousand years into the future who'd wonder why somebody built mud huts in a desert? 

He chuckled lightly at the thought, standing up. 

It didn't matter, not really. He did a thousand things to make himself memorable back on Earth, but what was the point? He had no means of seeing what his death meant to that world, just as he won't have means of seeing it here. Life was too short, and too full of possibilities to fear what might come after it disappears. 

If there was time to ponder legacy after death, there was still a breath left to live. Just as he took a step forward to walk past the structure, he felt a buzz in the palm of his hand and watched the compass light up in a golden hue--it had found something.

Chapter 60

Thirst For Knowledge

Leo followed the compass' directions, moving further northwest for about fifty yards, just toward the edge of the clearing where he saw strange rock protruding from the ground--it was dark gray, sporting jagged edges and rough texture. The compass was practically blinding at this point, prompting Leo to put it away and crouch down, using his hands to dig out a small hole around the protruding rock.

He frowned--it was similar with the stone quarry. There was quite a few of them at the immediate surface, but here it was even more damning as, after digging just a bit further out, Leo found what looked like a wall. It was very much a storage space rather than a natural occurring iron mine.

Standing up, he glanced back toward the decrepit walls and bowed lightly. Even if all this iron ore was perhaps useless to them, and they just used it for trade or something, to him, it was quite important, and gratitude, even to the ghosts, was necessary.

Since the kids always wanted some employ, he decided to let them dig out the ore and bring it back to the camp while he prepared everything else. They were only short on clay and some reeds now, and Leo suspected that, within five days, they'll have gathered all the materials necessary for the longhouse.

It took a lot shorter than expected, but, at the same time, it wasn't unexpected, as it were. They'd essentially found warehouses of two of the most difficult materials to gather, and the hardest part, converting raw materials into usable resources, was handled entirely by the system.

For now, he'd have to start making a clearing a further out from the camp, which meant some mild deforesting. He'd also have to avoid cutting the trees where the animals built their nests, so he hoped there would be enough clearance for the longhouse as he really didn't want to ask any of the animals to move.

A stray thought fluttered through his head for a moment--to keep the iron mine a secret... for a little while longer. He briefly smiled at the thought and dismissed it, wondering whether his old, Earthbound fear of being alone was resurfacing a bit.

By the time Leo returned to the camp, Yue and Liang had settled the stones and were casually sparring. They did it rather often, but it never broke out into an outright fight--they mostly didn't even use Qi, merely practicing attacking with the art he'd given them and dodging using the footwork. It all seemed so basic, even from the sidelines, that Leo was a bit embarrassed that they were practicing so earnestly. At first, he thought they were doing it to please him, but he quickly picked up on the fact that they were doing it even when he wasn't there.

Considering that they probably had a wealth of spectacle-inducing arts on the outside that could color the sky red, he wondered what was their obsession with his. Was it just fealty of a Disciple? Or were the system's methods in some way overpowered? Yue did mention that she used the footwork to escape her Father who was, supposedly, much stronger than her. Alas, unless he himself went out into the green world and saw firsthand the capabilities of the other arts, it was all a moot thought.

"Master!" the two stopped and greeted him.

"You guys done?"

"Yeah. We brought over all the necessary stone," Yue said.

"Good. I've found an iron mine. Well, not so much a mine as it is iron storage. You guys can start bringing the ores over tomorrow."

"Yes, Master!" both exclaimed.

Leo started making dinner while they started doing their daily pre-dinner exercises--it was mostly stretches and some running, Leo noticed. The stretches were reminiscent of those he'd see on yoga websites, in those odd days when he'd look up any stretch for lower back pain. He memorized a few of the poses, deciding to give them a shot when the kids were gone.

Before dinner, both went for a quick bath--separately, of course--before settling down near the campfires and waiting patiently. Animals, too, began to converge once again, as every other day, leaving the forest's depths.

It was then that it dawned on him--they still lacked animal hides!

Sighing inwardly, he felt a bit dispirited at the thought. Considering that he'd explored quite a large area around the camp without finding any hostile animals, maybe he'd have to send the kids outside the forest to look for them, or go even deeper in a desperate bid? He wasn't certain what the right call was, deciding to leave it for tomorrow. Perhaps, if he asked nicely enough, one of his furry friends might guide him--whether they understood his words or his intentions, it seemed that they could at least be counted on for some primitive communications, if nothing else.

"Master, tell us a story!" Liang immediately said after the dinner was served. Leo hadn't even managed to get a bite in before the young man's bright eyes bored a hole in him.

"Haah, fine. What kind of story do you want?" Leo asked.

"Similar to the Immortal Tortoise one!" Liang replied. "Are there any other mythical animals like that?"

"..." Leo had to be quite careful here as his knowledge of the outside world was nonexistent. To him, in effect, everything was a mythical animal, and if he jumped ahead and started mentioning dragons or phoenixes, it might turn out that they are rather common in this world. So, instead, he decided to talk about something entirely alien--black holes. "Hmm, instead of that, do you guys know what a black hole is?" It's a hole that is--

"It's... a hole that is black?" Liang ventured a guess, and Leo nearly bent over laughing as he'd already imagined the young man saying those exact words.

"Technically, I suppose," Leo chuckled. "But no, they're not just that," he said. "Black holes are incomprehensibly massive things that exist in the vastness beyond our world," he added. "What is the most unique thing about them is that once anything enters a black hole, it can never leave."

"So, it's a prison? Is it a prison for the Demonic Deities?!" even Yue joined in.

"No," Leo shook his head. "They are natural things, not man-made. Nobody can control them or utilize them--they are not so much a prison as they are the final frontier of sorts. There is this idea that our world, and all worlds beyond it, and everything we know, will eventually die out. The night sky flickering with stars will grow dim and one day become extinguished, a black canvas without color. One by one, everything will begin dying out, and black holes will continue growing larger by absorbing things around them. Over the course of innumerable years, there would be nothing left--nothing except for them.

"Everything would become cold and lightless, and in the vastness of everything, only the black holes would be, sort of like reminders that, a long time ago, there used to be life. However, even they are not immortal. They... bleed energy, bit by bit," he simplified it. "So, the idea states that, once the last of the black holes has died, it would consolidate the end of everything. There would no longer be light, life, or energy--just... nothing."

"..." the two fell silent, looks of horror on their faces. Leo chuckled faintly, feeling rather empathetic--the concept of existential dread was the universal sort, it seemed.

"Don't be so scared," he said. "The number of years that it will take is beyond the scope of reality. Both us, and everyone in this world, will have long since perished, with naught but flimsy, cosmic dust in our stead. Do you know how black holes come to be?" the two shook their heads. "It is said that some stars, the massive stars, upon death do not go out in a blaze of glory that alights the cosmos with color--but, rather, they collapse unto themselves so densely that they break the barrier, forming a singularity and forming a point of no return."

"Wow...!!" Yue exclaimed. "How do you know so much, Master?!"

"So much? I barely know a thing," Leo shrugged. "Just some shallow bits of knowledge I picked up on from others. Now, eat before it gets cold. Look at the animals--they've all finished and are eyeing your portions."

"Ah, right! Yes, let's eat..."

Leo laughed faintly at their hurried fingers cradling the wooden spoons and scooping up the stew. At the very least, he now had the topic that he could use to glaze their eyes. It seemed this world had no working knowledge of physics beyond the most ordinary. He feared, if ever for a moment, that there were cultivation methods and martial arts out there capable of 'replicating' the effects of a black hole, the sort of ultimate attack that could potentially end the world.

If they did exist, at least the kids weren't aware of them. But even the thought of attacks like that existing sent shivers down Leo's spine. Someone capable of wielding such a power... wasn't that too terrifying?

He put the thought away, slinking back into the more comforting notions. Tomorrow, while the kids dug out the iron ore from the warehouse, he'd see if his furry friends could take him someplace to hunt. And he hoped verily that he wouldn't run out of tidbits of physics knowledge that he had before the kids departed. But seeing their faces undergo innumerable expressions as he delivered a story was heart-stirring; there truly was nothing quite like a curious mind. It was a sponge, forever thirsty for knowledge.

Chapter 61

Small Woes and Large

Leo stared at the winding canyon in front of him in a bit of a daze, wondering whether he'd crossed worlds again on accident. However, glancing to the side where he saw the large, muscular, black tiger standing, looking back at him with an 'odd' expression, he was certain that wasn't the case. He was still very much in the same world, in the same forest even, but it was just that the topology of the place ceased making sense. 

The trees parted like a sea, giving way to a canyon that was at least five miles long and just about half that wide. It had a lot of strange terraces that bored into the sides, forming caves, and quite a few 'levels', all seemingly populated with life. 

When he asked earlier in the camp whether there were any animals he could hunt for the hides, the black tiger was the first one to emerge from between the trees and, while the rest of the animals completely ignored them, guide him southwest. They hiked casually for about three hours before they emerged here, at an entirely alien place--a canyon in the middle of the forest. 

"So... which ones can I hunt?" Leo asked gingerly. Instead of 'replying', the black tiger seemed to 'shrug' as it were and suddenly lie flatly down onto the ground, closing his eyes, and falling asleep. 

Leo reeled for a moment, but not a second longer, turning back toward the canyon. It likely meant that he could hunt them all--well, not all, since not all animals in the canyon had hides. There were plenty of oversized spiders that he was desperately trying to envision as anything else, but there were also boars, bears, and wolves. The key difference, even he noticed, was that none of the animals in the canyon had Qi--and even the few that did, only had small wisps that couldn't qualify them even as 'Qi Condensation' realm beasts. 

Though he'd seen quite a few of the 'normal' animals shutter around inside the forest, he'd never seen them congregate in such a large number at one place. 

The next important bit of business was: how to hunt them? His eyes spied a few ways down into the canyon, but even if he could do so, he imagined that attacking one would yield the ire of every other animal, and even if he was a cultivator, that didn't mean that a few hundred of ordinary animals wouldn't chew him out in seconds.

He contemplated baiting them out of the canyon, but that would also be difficult as he had nothing to bait them with--if he used his juice or stew, chances were that every animal would sprint out of the canyon as though it were migration season.

Thus, he sat down, cross-legged, closed his eyes and began to meditate... on how to hunt competently, something he hadn't even done in a game. 

**

Xiaoling sighed, pushing herself away from the desk and rubbing the bridge between her eyes. Her head felt like it would split, and it wasn't because of an injury, but because of the sheer amount of paperwork she'd buried herself in the past few days. Thanks to the new admissions, as well as the massive damage that the Sect took, there was a lot of restructuring that took place. And, in moments like these, it was always dangerous--embezzlement, corruption, pure incompetence, if every person and every small copper coin weren't being tracked properly, it could cause a cascade of issues down the line that would hinder the entire thing.

There were parts of her festering with anger toward her Master--she was somewhat dubious on his extraction from everything, and his retreat into the solitary confinement. Though he declared the reason noble, was it possible that he simply shunned all this paperwork onto her, knowing what was coming? Well, knowing him... it wasn't outside the realm of possibility.

She, thankfully, wasn't alone--there were six Elders working even more than her, day and night it felt, to keep up with everything. Their already old and thin frames were thinning further, and soon it seemed they'd become sheets of wallpaper against the wall. 

"Alright everyone, take a break," she said, standing up. "We're down to the final stretch. All that's left is Hall Assignments for the newcomers as well as inventory for trade. How are our gift stocks?"

"Not as much as we'd hoped, Sect Master," they'd gotten around to calling her that despite her wishes, and all she could do was translate it into 'Elder' inside her mind. "Most of the local Sects simply added about 20% extra on their annual tax, and though the mortals also donated, it is mostly food and few scarce medicinal plants." 

"What about other Tier IV Sects?"

"Celestial Orchid Sect sent twenty Celestial Plums," one of the Elder responded. "Monetarily, it is extremely generous. But--"

"--it's kind of useless?" Xiaoling frowned. "They're those fruits that you eat when you need art enlightenment, right?"

"Yes. They're one of the most profitable exports of the Celestial Orchid Sect. Buying ten, at any given time, is all but impossible."

"Hm. What about the Pavilion?"

"They sent three branches of the Heavenly Tree."

"Those bastards," Xiaoling's eyebrows twitched with anger. Just like with the Celestial Orchid Sect, the branches themselves held immense monetary value--in fact, it was virtually impossible to buy them, as the Heavenly Pavilion only ever gifted them. However, their use was extremely niche--conjuring up a Heavenly Light Formation. With three branches, they could operate the array for about a year, but the benefits of the array were that it cleansed the mind and kept the demons out. Ordinarily, it would be beneficial--but during the reconstruction, it was virtually useless. 

"Which Sect sent us the most useful thing?" Xiaoling asked.

"It would probably be Misty Rain Sect," one of the Elders replied. Xiaoling frowned, digging deep into her memory bank to bring up the memories of the Sect.

"Do we have any major dealings with them?"

"Not as far as we are aware, Sect Master. However, your Master, supposedly, rescued some of their Disciples about a hundred years ago in a Secret Realm. Could this be repayment?"

"What did they send?"

"They sent a batch of a thousand of Qi Gathering Pellets, five hundred Bone-Mending Pastes, twenty barrels of Azure Wine, and ten spatial rings worth of building materials." 

"Wow," Xiaoling whistled lowly. Even if, speaking strictly in terms of Spirit Stones, they came up short against the two Tier VI Sects, in terms of usability for now... it wasn't even in the same realm. "From what I know, they themselves are a fairly small, Tier III Sect. What's their history?"

"They are a splinter Sect from the Celestial Orchid Sect," an Elder said. "It is not publicly known why they split, but about two hundred years ago, some of the Elders and the Vice Master at the time left the Celestial Orchid Sect and founded the Misty Rain Sect. From what I recall, they only have one requirement for acceptance: girls and women under the age of 30."

"They don't take in men?"

"Hm, not directly. But they do have male Disciples, as the Elders themselves aren't prohibited in finding Disciples outside the Sect and taking them in directly." 

"Right. Boytoys."

"Khm."

"Alright," she shrugged. "Make a note that, once this is all settled, we ought to send an envoy and express our gratitude."

"Will do, Sect Master."

Xiaoling walked over to the window, leaning against the pane, and looking over the Sect. The reconstruction was going well--there were seldom traces of the level of destruction that took place here just a while back, but some still remained. Medicinal Hall would take at least half a year to be rebuilt completely, and probably closer to ten years to be fully restocked. 

Martial Hall couldn't even be rebuilt--they had to tear down the rubble and construct it anew from the ashes. Luckily, that, too, ought to be done in just a couple of months. 

Considering the wounds, the scars would be few--if only the visible ones. What was left was to pick themselves up and move onward; for now, at least. Revenge would come, in due time, no matter who their attackers were. 

Stretching, she turned back and saw that the Elders were still hard at it, sifting through mountains of papers, their old skins aging visibly still. She smiled faintly and retreated to her seat--she couldn't let them soak up the worst of it, when the youngest was at least thrice her age. As she said, it was the last push, and once they were past it, they'd be able to simply sit back and recuperate. 

"Sect Master!" the doors were suddenly flung open, one of the Outer Elders shuffling through swiftly. "Dragon--Dragon--"

"Calm down and spit it out."

"Obsidian Dragon Realm has opened!" 

"--WHAT?!" she exploded to her feet, her eyes widening. Impossible, was her first thought, and for a good reason. Obsidian Dragon Realm was one of the six known Hidden Realms of the Lower Ashlands, and the one with the most consistent opening times--every 13 years, on the dot. Except, it hasn't even been 8 years since it last opened. And it just had to be when they were in the middle of rebuilding. How the hell did this happen...?

Chapter 62

Five Faces of Death

Leo's eyes were wide open, his breath held in his lungs, and his body prone to the ground.

Using only the faint movements of his fingers, he tethered the sword to Qi, manipulating it from above and abruptly shooting forward, aiming for the head of the rather large boar beyond the shrubbery. He'd hidden himself for nearly two hours, barely moving and breathing, waiting to see whether any of the animals would evacuate the canyon--and one just did. 

The sword shot silently through the air and, without any resistance, pierced through the boar's head, killing it immediately. 

Leo stood up, only now realizing he was covered in sweat, and glancing over at the black tiger who was casually napping. The massive beast didn't have to hide--it seemed invisible to the world, as though only Leo could see it. It was either that, or the animals in the canyon simply 'surrendered' themselves to whatever would happen in regard to the obsidian beast. Whichever it was, Leo felt a bit peeved--but, once again, dared not feel it for too long. 

He walked over toward the boar and crouched by the beast--the sword lay embedded in the ground by its side, with Leo quickly retrieving it and washing it with Qi. The boar itself was about one and a half (size-wise) of the one he first hunted, many moons ago. Looking over toward the canyon, rather than going on indiscriminate slaughter, Leo made a choice: he'd only come back once they were out of meat. 

Even if it was for the quest and 'justified', Leo felt iffy hunting just for the hides and possibly throwing away hundreds of pounds of perfectly edible food in the process. Even beyond that, he didn't want to see the life here as mere materials, even if they were animals, unlike his other furry friends. 

Tossing the boar over his shoulder, he started heading back, with the black tiger catching up to him quickly and walking by his side. Unlike Hoot or Red or Milky or White or most others at the camp, whom he could 'understand' in a sense, Leo couldn't grasp an iota of tiger's thoughts or intentions. Nothing was interpretable within those magnificent eyes, and Leo didn't dare probe further beyond that. 

"Do you prefer vegetable stew or would you want me to start making one with meat from now on?" he asked. The tiger merely glanced at him and continued moving, as though he said nothing. His cheeks red, he looked away for a second and calmed himself down. "I'm just trying to be nice. But, I mean, you're also nice--you took me here, showed me that place. So, uh... ah, dear God, if the world could see me, would they think I'm putting on a skit for them?" 

Leo chuckled faintly at the silence--the tiger, disinterested as ever, matched his pace perfectly. When Leo slowed down, so did the beast, and when Leo sped back up, the black shadow was right by his side. Though Leo feared the beast, it was more so because it was larger than him, and looked like it could de-organ him in about six seconds. Unlike his other friends, however, Leo never quite grasped the 'intellect' that he'd seen in them; whether it was because it wasn't there, or because the tiger deemed him unworthy of showcase... that was impossible to guess. 

By the time he returned to the camp, the night was already descending. The two kids were both in their huts, meditating, while the animals had converged and were waiting patiently. 

"Sorry, sorry. Hey, you two," he called the two kids out. "Either one of you know how to properly skin and prepare an animal?"

"Hm? Oh, you hunted something, Master!" Liang was the first to emerge, almost like a bolt of thunder. "Yes, I am an expert in 27 different ways of skinning, cutting, and dissecting animals!" 

"... one is enough," Leo looked at him oddly for a moment as he put down the boar. "Okay, get on it. As fast as possible. Tonight's dinner will be luxurious, briefly-made-an-appearance-a-while-back meat stew."

"Finally!!" Liang wept as he fell to his knees, hugging the dead carcass. Leo felt goosebumps shoot through him at the sight, feeling a slight need to throw some holy water at the young man. "I'll be done in just ten--no, five minutes, Master! Just give me five minutes!"

"No, wait, I was thinking more like an hour--"

"--I can't wait that long to eat meat!" 

Thus, Leo watched in horror as Liang dismantled the boar at such a speed that it left him speechless. All he could do was silently pour water into the pots and alight the fires, scattering vegetables and spices alongside cut up pieces of meat. The image, though, was seared in his brain--that of a muscular youth all but using his teeth to (rather skillfully) tear away skin from the flesh. Just how much did that bastard wanna eat meat?!

He discovered new things about his Disciples almost every day--for instance, though Yue was clever and sharp-witted, she was also a bit of an airhead. Also, she enjoyed taking a day off here and there where she'd frolic in the pond or play with Blackie or just do nothing. She also had a wealth of books in that spatial ring of hers that she'd take out once in a while and read. It wasn't that she read, but that she was rather secretive about it--Leo, once, caught a glimpse of a few letters and words, lengthy, and throbbing, and wild, and embrace. He dared not peek any further, staying well away from her whenever she had a book in her hands.

Liang, besides working out all the time, enjoyed occasionally running around with Milky and sometimes spent hours just petting the tiny panther. He also loved climbing trees, and would occasionally even race Red (so far, their record was 0-44 in favor of the monkey). And, now, Leo learned that the young man loved meat. Though it may have just been the fact that he hadn't tasted it in quite some time. 

In fairness, everyone seemed a bit excited with the newness of the stew, with quite a few animals accidentally salivating onto the ground. It was quite a sight to behold, though Leo pretended he didn't see anything--a courtesy he had hoped they'd repay the next time he embarrassed himself.

**

A faceless skin 'stared' at him amidst the flames of destruction. The entire mountain camp, more fortified than some castles, was burning. Hundreds of bodies lay scattered amidst the rubble, whether they were Qi Condensation recruits or Avatar Realm bosses. Everyone... everyone was dead. 

And it was all because of him--no, it wasn't him. It wasn't a person--just a thing that walked silently in the night, and annihilated them. 

"P-please... please, show mercy!" he fell to his knees, pleading. "I--I didn't do anything wrong! I am just a cook, not a bandit! I--yes, I was also captured! I was forced to labor away here!"

"--you desire Mercy?" a ghastly phantom suddenly appeared next to the thing, bodiless apparition with a human face embossed in shadows and smoke. The face itself was smiling kindly, eyes void of judgment. 

"Though you desire Me," a voice was sweet and loving, as though a mother's warm embrace. He found his heart stirring with guilt, and his eyes bleeding tears. "Do you deserve Me?" 

"Or Me?" another phantom appeared, with the sole difference being the face--rather than kindness, there was rage. Anger. Resentment boiling like water in a cauldron. "Look into your soul, and recognize you do not deserve mercy--you deserve Wrath!"

At the same time, three more apparitions appeared--one with an expressionless, stoic, emotionless face; another with kindly yet judgmental one, and lastly, one with winter's chill and apathy. 

All five stared at him, and he felt as though he'd died and was upon the Ten Courts of Hell. He was being judged, but he could not lie--it was as though the eyes staring at him had stripped him naked and bared him for the entire world to see. There was neither skin nor flesh to shield his sins, not an armor strong enough to hide his guilt. What did he deserve? Mercy? No. He'd never shown it to those who begged him just as he was begging them. 

"P-punishment!" he keeled over further, tearing his heart out. "I, I deserve to be punished..." 

"You desire Me?" a chilly, apathetic voice trailed into his ears. His entire body frosted over as he forced himself to look up--standing there, before him, was no longer a phantom, but a woman. She was beautiful, yet he felt his eyes sting as though with needles when he looked at her. Beneath the beautiful facade, he witnessed it--a thousand scars webbing out everywhere. "Hm, indeed. Your soul bleeds filth. Let it be so, o' thy sinful fiend--"

"--We thus cast Judgment upon you," all five voices joined into a choir. "You deserve not the Mercy, for you were never Merciful; you deserve not the Redemption, because you never sought to Redeem your heart; you deserve not the Wrath, for it would be a Kindness to you; you deserve not Justice, for you were not wronged. Thus, you shall be Punished, forever and onward-more."

There was silence soon, only the crackling of the flames and the distant wailing of the tormented occasionally breaking it. The phantoms disappeared, leaving only the faceless humanoid--and it, too, morphed and distorted, as though made of clay. The bodice gave way to a much smaller frame, with limbs spanning out into feathered wings. The colorless white grew darker and darker until it was black, and from the fumes of the transformation, a singular animal emerged--an ordinary-seeming crow, no larger than any other seen in the wild. 

It flapped its wings and hung its beak low, looking over the burning mountain keep for a brief moment before turning around and flying out through the smoke. In the distance, the night fog gave way to the thick canopy of the trees that stretched as far as the eye could see. The crow, without stop, headed toward its northern parts, silently becoming one with the trees, as though it had never left them.

Chapter 63

A Glimpse Into Eternity

It was the first time Leo encountered uphill terrain in the forest--well, beyond the slightly slanted part eastward, where the exit lay. This one, however, was a legitimate climb--steep, with roots and jagged rocks decorating every visible inch of earth. Though, the roots were treeless--in their stead were strange steles, white like marble, rectangular and narrowed toward the top. In some way, it reminded Leo of a graveyard; though there were no etchings in the stone of any sort, no markings, and the steles seemed too close to each other to be tombstones, it was just the feeling he got.

As the kids were busy with bringing the iron ore, and having seemingly encountered some issues that made excavating process a bit harder, and as he decided not to hunt just for the sake of hides, that left only one item on his agenda--the Well, rooted deep in the forest. 

It was one of the 'silent' rewards that he got for shearing Soul of the Forest, and it appeared not at the time with the rest of the rewards, but later at night, in his dreams. 

He dreamed he was tiny feline, scurrying between the trees and roots with grace and nimbleness of a fox, and speed of a rabbit. The colors were vivid and blinding, but somehow nonobstructive at the same time. He wasn't in control of himself, but more of a passenger to a will beyond his own; it was as though he was following a predetermined path, and that path led past the trees and flowerbeds and the canopies, and up this very hill, past the macabre steles, and over beyond. 

At the end of a path was a well--in his dream, Leo never approached it, staying outside the mini cirque. It was a bit larger than an 'average' well, cast in gray, old stone, though that was all there was to it--it didn't seem to have been built for the purposes of getting water, but something else entirely.

He soon reached the top of the hill, but he was still far from his destination--a dip awaited into yet another hill, though the steles themselves grew scarcer. The reason he assumed they were steles and not just a natural rock formation was due to the smoothness of the stone and the fact that they were all practically identical, sans an occasional slight difference in height. 

Strangely, his flanks extended into another set of hillsides with identical composition and, had he not dreamed the exact route and committed it to memory, he would have likely gotten lost in this place. There were subtle differences here and there, and certain markings that created distinct appearances of different hills, but they were rather minor and easily missed. More and more, he wondered, just how large this forest was--and just many different terrains it contained within the confines of the trees. 

Unlike most other times he ventured out, he was now alone--a couple of animals followed him for a while, but it seemed they stopped once they realized where he was going. 

The wind and the sun were the only things accompanying him, though he didn't mind it terribly. He'd always 'known', in a sense, that there were differences between loneliness and being alone, even if he never internalized them. Now, however, he understood--likely as ever he would. There was budding alacrity inside of him toward the entire ordeal, a desire to both bespangle the woods with friends, yet also have a corner to himself, one entirely invisible to others.

A word lit up inside the deep reaches of his memory--peregrinator. It was an old, outdated, and virtually never used way to call someone a traveler. He couldn't quite recall where he heard or even how he remembered it, but it was seared into his memory. Over the years on Earth, a sense of irony developed--despite travelling the globe, as it were, he never considered himself a traveler, per se. Even if he could never explain it, in his heart he felt that the way he saw the world did not earn him the title of a traveler.

Perhaps it was the predetermined roads he'd taken, always staying within the bounds and never exploring out further, or perhaps it was just some dismal naivety that budded within him a long time ago: whichever it was, it had been curbed by now. He was a peregrinator, even if he only ever saw the trees and what arose between them.

There still lingered parts of him deep within that yearned to return, especially now, bolstered with a new mindset. But he feared he'd regress into his old self swiftly if he was shorn of this world and all within it. Thus, he buried those parts even deeper, so that they were as silent as the world around him was now.

It was six long hours since leaving the camp that he finally came atop the final hill--the steles were scattered to the point of there only being a few, and the hill sloped down into a narrow bend before opening out into a round cirque. The rock was dry, as though it hadn't tasted water in centuries, and there were no living plants anywhere around. Sharp, jagged pebbles littered the ground, and the surrounding walls heaved steep toward the sky, though with just enough protrusions to make them climbable.

Leo carefully descended and walked up to the edge of the fall, looking down at the round maw--it was just about four hundred yards across, evenly flat with the exception of the far other side and the small indentation around the well itself. 

He covered his feet with Qi and leapt--unlike more natural cirques, this one wasn't terribly deep or large, with the wall's side only being about fifteen feet tall at the highest. There were no waters feeding it, though there were remnant channels that almost seemed like hand-carved blade points. 

Landing silently, he swallowed a knot in his throat before taking a step forward. He didn't know why he dreamed of this place, or what he was supposed to do with it--in fact, he was beginning to regret coming here a bit. He was still inordinately weak, and his effulgent personality was not meant for this atramentous place. 

The well gave him somewhat of a similar feeling to when he first met Chilly--not quite as cold and despondent and indifferent, but more... eldritch, in a sense, unknowable, confusing. He didn't think C'thulu would spring forth in all its tentacled glory, but he could have sworn there was a backdrop of some horror music playing in the distance, just beyond the reach of his ears. 

He stopped by the well's side, not daring to peer over the edge, instead focusing on the aged, weathered stone. Crouching down, he saw a thousand cracks web out, and he saw granular bits of sand occasionally be blown of by the scattered bouts of wind. Nothing, it seemed, had been here for hundreds, if not thousands of years. It once again raised the question he'd been grappling with for a while now--whether this forest was natural... or built to bury and hide whatever stood here before it. 

He reached out with his hand, gently touching the stone. It was oddly warm and cold at the same time, and as he moved his fingers, he created a dusted-off trail on the surface. Frowning, he stood back up and stepped over, looking into the black abyss. By now, he expected the system to signal something, or at least tell him what this place was. But... there was nothing. 

Furthermore, he could only see some ten-ish feet into the well, and it was just the stone and nothing else. There were no sounds coming from it, there was no bucket that he could lower to try and fetch some water... there was nothing. 

Just as he began fearing he'd been pranked by a tree of all things, the ground quaked rather unnaturally. The surrounding cliffs began to bleed ash and dust while the surrounding ground began to crack. The sounds were deafening, and though he wanted to bolt out with all the speed he could muster, he found himself (unwillingly) glued to the ground, watching in abject horror as the world around him began to open up like a maw of a beast.

The cracked, dry ground fractured outward from around thirteen individual points--the tiny lines radiated out into circles, and almost as though groundhogs were digging out, he watched white steles arising. 

They were different from all the ones he'd seen before--they were thinner, taller, ashen-gray in color rather than marble-white, and, most importantly, weren't naked and bereft of symbols. 

He quickly counted thirteen and prayed that this would be the end of it--but it wasn't. Above them, just as they seemed to have been 'born' fully, motes of blinding light appeared and began fluttering about like mad fae, taking a few moments to converge toward the well. Leo felt a sudden burst of energy push into his chest as he fell down, gasping for breath. It was then that it happened, the briefest of flashes. It was shorter than the blink of an eye, so short that, were he not a cultivator... he would have probably missed it.

An image was layered over his current surroundings--rather than decrepit stone and washed-out well, he bore witness... to life. Beautiful, milky-white buildings sprawled outward from the well, cut inwardly like spirals and rising upward over thirty feet. The cracked, dry ground was instead paved with perfectly smooth limestone, and the steles... were nowhere to be found. Instead, there were people--young, old, smiling, laughing, crying, clothed in breathtaking garments that seemed entirely out of this world.

Robes were spangled with adorning gems, golden embossing of the clothing shimmering visibly even in daylight. Everyone wore seeming mountains of jewelry, from the mother-cradled babes to the old and hunched-over. Beautiful, gracious animals littered the streets--animals... he recognized. His friends. 

Milky was playing with a young, copper-skinned, white-haired girl.

Blackie was drinking from a shimmering cup that an old man was giving him.

Hoot was frozen with his wings spanned out, beak pointed toward the sky and opened, as though he were in the middle of relaying the greatest story of all time. 

Red was holding hands with two young boys, identical in face and body, hanging between them with a wide grin. 

It was just a flash... but he saw it. The aforetime born world. Was it just an illusion? Was it a glimpse into the past forgotten and lost? Or was it his mind playing tricks on him? 

"No..." he mumbled with a shaking jaw. His eyes caught sight of the words on the stele just by his side. There were rows and rows of letters he could not recognize, but he could those at the very top. 

Here Layeth Avun'van, Our beloved Second King

He who sheltered Humans, and shielded them from the cruel World

Chapter 64

Sheltered Bonds

Night had fallen by the time Leo returned to the camp. He was absentminded the entire way back, unable to rip himself away from that image he'd glimpsed.

Nothing further changed after that--the thirteen steles remained, and though they all had inscriptions on their surfaces, Leo was only able to read that one and none other. No, there was one change--whereas before he felt nothing from the well, soon after the steles appeared, the well began to exude a certain foreboding pressure. He couldn't quite understand what it was, or even remotely what it meant, and he feared sticking around and finding out. So, he just left.

He had plans to return, eventually, but for now he'd book that part of the forest in the depths of his mind and ignore it. Even if he wanted to ask Blackie, Milky and others about it, there was no way the animals could answer him. For all he knew, he'd fabricated the entire thing. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more certain he got that he did, in fact, fabricate it.

Over the past few weeks, especially, he'd gotten in his head the idea that there was something here before there was a forest--a city, a kingdom, a sect. He cherry-picked bits and pieces of knowledge that he acquired and made up fantastical stories surrounding them. Throughout, he fed his mind this nonsense, and he just so happened to bear witness to an 'image' that proved his 'theories'? 

He had to ask himself, which was likelier? That he correctly interpreted a few scattered pieces of 'evidence' that had virtually no context to them, guessing that this place was once a prosperous hub of people, possibly thousands of years ago... or that his wild imagination got the better of him? 

Then again... there was still the issue of the stele he could read from. 

Here Layeth Avun'van, Our beloved Second King

He who sheltered Humans, and shielded them from the cruel World

He most certainly did not make it up, and it pointed toward more uncertainty than anything else. Beyond implying that there may have been something here before the forest, Leo was more focused on the fact that the steles weren't built by humans--rather, their builders sheltered and protected humans. Whether it was literal, metaphorical, or so contextually bereft that it was pointless to make any assumptions... he wasn't nearly clever enough to figure out.

After all, his definition of a 'human' might be completely different from theirs--perhaps they were all human, but, as it oft did throughout history, racism threw a wrench in the definitions. 

Whichever it was, for now it wasn't important. That place wasn't likely to go anywhere, so he already had a plan in mind--he committed to memory some of the lines that he didn't recognize, and would 'stealthily' see if he could figure out which language they were written in and if there was somebody who could translate them. Until then, he wouldn't show the place to anyone, least of all the kids who'd likely have a thousand questions he couldn't even begin to answer.

The next few days passed by rather routinely. Since Leo didn't have anything to do, he'd tag along with the kids and sunbathe with animals draped all over him while the two tore out iron ore from the warehouse and logged it back over to the camp. Supposedly, his non-reliance on spatial treasures inspired them, so they refused to carry the ore in the spatial rings. He found the entire thing bordering the edge of pretentious, but as he'd have to reveal the reason he didn't use spatial items was because he didn't have any (as this supposed martial master), he simply let them be.

At night, he'd occasionally regale one or another curiosity of physics--white holes, quasars, heat death of the universe, whatever little tidbits he could recall through the fog. Both the kids and the animals seemed to eat it all up, but he had to start rejecting their requests as, otherwise, he would run out of those tidbits in a few days. 

It was just about a week later that the last bit of the ore was collected. In the meantime, Leo had gone out to hunt two more times and had, altogether, managed to collect 12 hides. It seemed that one animal produced more than one hide, making him rather happy. 

"Master, can we leave in two days?" the silent dinner was interrupted as Yue raised a question with a rather quivering voice. "I, I know we said that we'd do it after longhouse was completed, but the entry to the Cradle will become much harder after Eux Festival. It would mean that most of the newcomers had joined groups, and that most of the groups would no longer be recruiting. If we went there, we'd essentially only be allowed to use forts as shelters--we wouldn't be given food or water or any information about anything. As the winter approaches, most of the forts begin rationing food and water, and even if cultivators can go a long time without them, it's still not indefinite. At least not for the weaker ones like us." 

"..." Leo remained silent for a moment, holding back a laugh. Yue's current expression reminded him of how he felt when he was fourteen and asked his parents if he could go to his first concert with friends. Anticipation, nervousness, a bit of guilt, but, most of all, a deep yearning that gave fire to his lacking courage. Unlike his parents, however, who told him he couldn't go because he flunked math just a week prior, Leo wasn't about to do the same. "Of course. It will be a bit lonely, but I have a lot of friends to keep me company. Besides, being cooped up in one place, especially one so far away from your peers, must be doing a number to your psyche. So, go out, have fun, challenge the world, but, most importantly, stay safe and come back healthy and stronger." 

The twos' faces lit up like fireflies as they dug into their stew even more ferociously. Though they still bantered, and got on each other's nerves, his two Disciples had developed a rather enviable bond. While Liang taught Yue how to take care of her body, she taught him the most common scams of the world and how to avoid them. While he taught her that it was sometimes okay to let loose and not think too much about something, she, in return, taught him that oftentimes, the solution wasn't in the fists. 

It was a budding friendship still, yes, but Leo saw glimpses of what it was likely to become in the future--the inseparable bond that would chain them together for life. The kind of friendship that he always yearned for, but never quite captured. It was difficult, after all; from early on, both his parents warned him that people would approach him just for his money and that they wouldn't care for him--and he'd seen it, hundreds of times. At some point, it simply became easier to assume everyone was after his money, and use said money to garner 'friends'. It was never real, however--just a facsimile of something he dreamed of often. 

"I'll prepare a lot of food and juice for you two," Leo said. "And here," he took out the remaining Basic Qi Pills (save for one that he left for himself). 

"Thank you, Master," the two said. "Ah, here, Master," Yue handed over the tiny seed of Wisp of Wood Qi. "Thank you so much! It has helped me grasp just enough of the true nature of Wood Qi that I am now able to incorporate it slightly into my defense."

"Ah, right!" Liang exclaimed. "May... may I keep the Seed for tonight, Master?" he added. "I am planning on breaking through, and I feel it will be helpful to me..."

"Of course," Leo caught a glimpse of envy in Yue's gaze, but it quickly disappeared, replaced instead with happiness. "It will be your duty to protect your Senior Sister outside."

"Don't worry, Master!!" the young man exclaimed, thumping his chest. "I won't let anything happen to Sister Yue! I'll use these godly muscles that you helped form and protect her--"

"--just shut up," Yue interrupted, physically putting a hand over his lips and lowering her head while sighing. "Master, will you really be fine without us helping with building the longhouse? I know you said that the hardest part was gathering materials, but the more I think about it, the more I wonder how you'll build it all by yourself." I won't, that's how... Leo thought for a moment but merely smiled outwardly.

"Don't worry about it," he said. "By the time you two come back, this place will be completely different. Those seeds you've planted might also sprout. Ah, while you're on the outside, keep an eye out for the standard furniture that we can use to decorate the longhouse. Nothing too fancy or expensive, however. Just things you'll put in your rooms." 

"Yes, Master!" 

Though they said they'd be back in a couple of months at most, life was always uncertain, especially if the Cradle of the First Men was as they described--a volatile battlefield that can change overnight. The fact that they would have the Void Scroll calmed his heart ever so slightly--he made them promise that, if they were ever in true danger to their lives, they'd rip the scroll in a heartbeat. 

Just to be safe, he, once again, handed the feather over to Yue--she accepted it with even graver gravitas than before. She did tell him that she used the feather to kill someone much stronger than her, but as Leo hadn't really encountered any real danger himself while staying in the forest, he still felt it was best that she held on to it. 

He wondered, for a moment, precisely where Anuvar was--he hadn't seen the hawk since the day he healed it and was granted the feather. Perhaps it was out there, conquering the skies once more, and it would return if it ever got wounded again. Maybe then, he could ask for a couple of more feathers... though, probably not.

Chapter 65

Spirit of Origin

For the first time since the day the single bolt of lightning erupted within the camp, the night was not calm.

Leo left his hut--as did Yue--just a little past the midnight. The animals, too, had cleared the northernmost building, joining the two of them and watching as the world around began to churn and change. Visible motes of Qi began to evacuate the ground below, shimmering like fireflies, while wind began to howl circularly around the hut. Its rooftop was soon blown off as a figure emerged, coated in shatteringly-golden light.

Liang didn't seem himself--the usually loose, a bit confused and airheaded young man was gone. In his stead was a figure commanding respect--he was floating midair, suspended but without wires to hold him up. His legs were crossed, hands resting on his knees, his short, black hair billowing in the harsh winds.

His robe aflutter, he seemed... divine, almost.

The world shifted in that instant; roots seemed to tremble, and the trees abound began to sway, and as the golden light spilled forth from him, piercing the sky for a moment, something tangential appeared behind him. It was him, yet not--a manifestation of sacred will, a phantom visage of his innermost self. The featureless face grew eyes at that moment, and they slowly opened. A ripple tore across the forest, the divinely golden eyes bearing down upon the world as though they existed in a realm beyond.

The winds picked up the speed and began to surge around him, and bolts of lightning coalesced into limbs that tore toward him--and yet, a barrier of holy light appeared, embossing his figure, and protecting him. Yet, strangely, there was only silence--the golden eyes looked up toward the sky, and the looming firmament replied.

Blue skies quickly turned ashen, bolts of lightning like dragons dancing within the world-devouring clouds. Leo felt his heartbeat quicken, and fear surge from within him; he hadn't feared much in this world, even if he faced it confused and ignoble, but he feared that singular night that tore through his soul like a blade.

Just as then, the heavens spat out a singular bolt of lightning--one as thick as the trunk of a tree. It was as purple as an aged bruise, and it coiled so quickly it had reached Liang in the blink of an eye. And yet, the boy remained calm.

He raised his right fist and punched out. He did it so simply that Leo assumed he had made a mistake, and yet, it was enough. The bolt of lightning shattered like a shard of glass, and the mirage behind him cackled at the heavens for a moment as it began to fade. The winds quelled, and his figure began to descend toward the ground.

Leo felt a bit of a sting in his chest, prompting him to look down--his robes were torn through, and bits of charred and burnt flesh were visible. He held back the panic as he quickly turned to the side to see Yue--luckily, it seemed that he'd taken the brunt of it, and save for a small wound on her shoulder, she seemed fine.

Just as Leo thought it was over, the fading visage reappeared abruptly--though it began to morph rather quickly. Liang's face began to expand and contort, as though by divine hands, and before long, the golden pair of eyes were the only recognizable part--surrounding them, however, was a phantom of a well-armored bear.

The beast roared toward the sky, its voice louder than the bolt before. It stretched out its massive arms and cradled Liang's figure within them before seemingly submerging into the young man. The latter's robes ripped into ash, his back contorting for a moment as flesh began to bleed, being carved by an invisible knife. Within a moment, it stopped, however--in the stead of youthful, if scarred skin, there was now a lifelike tattoo of the bear Leo had just seen.

"I-Impossible...!!!" Yue's voice quivered as she suddenly fell to her knees. Leo grew worried for a moment that something had gone wrong, but she quickly elaborated. "Spirit... of Origin?! How is that even possible?! I thought... I thought it was just a made up story..."

Leo itched with every inch of his body to query, but his gut was telling him that this wasn't one of those things where he could pass off his ignorance as just being 'isolated from the world'. Though, he could still venture a guess or two.

Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, and now Spirit Creation--if Leo assumed that the name of the realm was quite literal, then Liang had formed a Spirit in the process of the breakthrough. Just as there were grades for when Leo himself broke through to the Foundation Establishment, it was likely that there were different grades for the Spirit itself. Whether Spirit of Origin was the best or not, he wasn't certain, but what he did know was that it was more than just impressive.

Even the animals around them seemed a bit aroused by the phenomenon, but only for a moment. They quickly dispersed, having witnessed the show.

"... Master," Yue's voice was rather strange.

"Yes?"

"You must lend me the Seed of Dao when I'm close to breakthrough."

"Of course."

"Promise me!" he looked down and saw that she all but wept. She'd forcibly bitten her lips and was fighting back the tears. It was in moments like these that Leo realized something--even if they both were in their twenties, it was more appropriate to treat them as if they were in their late teens. They both grew up rather sheltered, and lost a good number of formative years on harsh cultivation and little else.

"Kind of hurts that you don't trust me, Yue."

"N-no, I, I trust you, Master! I really do! Ah, I'm sorry..." no longer able to hold back the tears, she quickly looked away and hid her face. Leo felt for her and even understood her.

"Hey," he crouched down and gently patted her head before pulling her toward his chest. She threw her arms around him and squeezed tightly. "You aren't any less talented than Liang, Yue. When the day comes, the woods will bear witness to your greatness, too. And I will be right here, as proud as ever. Besides, isn't this a good thing? The stronger your Junior Brother is, the more you can work him at the Cradle." she chuckled for a moment, though didn't pull away. "Now, let's go and congratulate him."

"Yeah."

The two approached the now-demolished hut just in time to see Liang leave it. For a brief moment, his countenance was otherworldly--it was as though he bent the laws of nature around him, compelling them to his will. That feeling was brief, though, as it disappeared as soon as he opened his mouth and stretched his lips into a wild, boyish smile.

"Master, Senior Sister, I broke through!"

"Your rooftop?" Yue said as Leo sighed.

"What? Ah, he he," he laughed sheepishly, scratching the top of his head. "I'm sorry, Master. I'll fix it... uh, when I come back."

"Ha ha, don't worry about it. Congratulations, Liang. I'm very proud of you."

"Thank you, Master!"

Leo took special care for the breakfast in the morning, loading it up with the 'best stuff' as he called it--the few fruits and vegetables that made rather rare appearances. His Disciples would be gone in two days, so he wanted to fatten them up now, and keep the leftovers as a farewell gift.

**

Yu Minge snapped his eyes open and glanced westward, past the walls of his isolation chamber. His lips stretched out into a smile, though his eyes bore a bit of shock and confusion.

Even if he was in deep pondering, it was impossible to miss it--the bout of energy exploded into the sky, and he caught the fading visage of a Primordial Bear, one of the rarest Body Spirits in the world. There was only one person that Yu Minge knew who stood the remotest chance of awakening it, and that someone was Xu Liang.

"Spirit of Origin," he mumbled softly, sighing. Even he only managed to awaken Spirt of Five Elements. Just about 99% of all cultivators awaken Spirit of Earth. Geniuses like Mei, Lya, Song, and even Shen Tao awaken Spirit of Light at best. Generational geniuses like himself and Xiaoling awaken Spirit of Five Elements.

There was no recorded Spirit of Origin awakened in the Lower Ashlands--until now, at least. Yu Minge was more and more certain that either there was a human-leaning Spirit in the forest helping them for some reason, or that there was an Immortal there who took pity on them. Whichever it was, the results were all but impossible. Awakening Spirit of Origin wasn't the matter of talent--if it were, Yu Minge would have awakened it, too.

It was the matter of not understanding Dao.

Most people only ever even begin taking brief glimpses at Dao once they reach Soul Ascendance Realm. Only at Nascent Soul Realm did it become something they were conscious of, and only Immortals studied it extensively. Even the tiniest glimpse of Dao before that was like a drop of Heavenly Dew--no, perhaps even rarer than that.

The young boy was blessed, and it was a good thing. Whether he was a Disciple of the Holy Blade Sect or not, Liang would always hold this place close to his heart, and would sprint over in their time of need.

Yu Minge didn't go back to meditating--he couldn't. His mind was stirred, and he even felt a bit of envy. Trying to ponder upon the Holy Blade Art in that state of mind was akin to inviting demons directly into his soul. For a moment he considered asking Xiaoling to explain what exactly happened, but thought better of it. That Disciple of his was more than just stubborn--if she'd made a promise to someone, she'd sooner die than break it.

"Haah, Heavens spin the wheels of fate," he walked up to the window, glancing at the lively Sect below. "What for, though? And why now? What is changing?" he--as most of his peers at this level--were extremely vary of strange, sudden anomalies. They never signaled good things to come--rather, they were always omens sent by the Heavens to warn the world of the upcoming storm. The greater the anomaly, the greater the storm--and from the looks of it... it would be a world-devouring one.