The bright sun had dimmed considerably with the passing day. Ri was an endless faucet of questions. Her eyes hadn’t lost their shine for hours.
“you can even imitate wills with arrays?!”
Unbeknownst to Dyon and Ri, the cave walls had begun to glow with a faint light. They sat together around a flickering light array as they bounced theories off of each other. This was something that was highly beneficial to Dyon as well. Although he was very clever in his utilization of arrays, it could be said that his foundation was shaky. It was reminiscent of a fluent speaker of a language being unable to explain why a sentence made more sense one way as opposed to another.
“you can, definitely. For example, take wind will. If you input a command to blow, it might work just fine. But, if you instead input a command to create a vacuum, the effectiveness of the array increases many folds. You can imitate having more control over wind that way. Air wants nothing more than to fill empty space. If there’s suddenly a lack of substance in an area –“
“Something will come to fill it!”
“Exactly. All of sudden, instead of using the array’s energy to create a fake simulation of wind, you’re instead manipulating the will of true wind by understanding how it wants to act and react.”
“Fascinating, I’ve never thought about it that way. But, you still haven’t told me why you simplify your arrays like this. I’ve never seen an array expert do such a thing. In fact, although it’s ingenious, many masters might even see it as a taboo.”
“actually, it’s just for protection. I’ve decided to wait on energy cultivation, so, I used array alchemy as my main form of protection.”
Ri looked confused at this, “but, your soul is so strong. Why would you need to use array alchemy? For you to have such a high attainment in array alchemy, it’s impossible for your soul to be weak.”
Dyon gave Ri an odd look. He thought that she was too smart to ask that question… ‘there must be a way then!’
Dyon’s eyes brightened, “in my experience, soul cultivation techniques take too long to cast. Is it different here?”
A sudden look of realization hit Ri, “I see… in your world the soul must be a supplement then, mostly used to defend against those that do specialize in such techniques. The elves actually specialize in soul cultivating. Often, we never even bother with energy or body cultivation. Although, technically, we’re all born with great body constitutions although they may not all be god level.”
Dyon looked on in interest. The Celestial Deer Sect had specialized in soul techniques as well, but that was mostly as a necessity to sustain their love of array alchemy. But, it seemed that it was the opposite for Elves. They loved soul cultivation, and array alchemy was just a logical follow up of that.
‘Maybe that might be connected to why they’re so good at those ancient games?…’ Dyon’s mind wandered a bit.
Ri’s voice snapped him out of this thought bubble, “I’ve been ignorant,” she said berating herself, “in the Elvin world, your soul is able to manifest into any number of things. For example, the Eostre family is able to manifest their souls as a moon. Actually, that’s often how you can tell which clans people come from. But, those kinds of techniques that ensure a specific kind of manifestation are heavily guarded by their respective families because it’s the root of all of their powers. That’s what we’d call a Singularity type technique. Meaning only one possible outcome. Those who are completely confident in themselves, or come from poor families with no backing, use what we’d call a Unique type technique. That technique is formed on the basis of the talent and personality of the person. Not many choose this path because it also means finding your own path to soul cultivation. Singularity techniques already come with the next steps ready for you, but this isn’t true of a Unique type technique. Also, although I’m calling it a Unique type technique, there’s actually only a single method to awakening your own unique soul manifestation.”
Dyon’s eyes glazed over in thought, ‘manifestation of a soul?’ Dyon’s mind flashed back to the moment before he stepped into the legacy world. Just at that moment, his emotions were burning and he felt himself resonating with the demon qilin essence within him and an illusory qilin appeared behind him. At the moment, he had assumed that that was simply what happened when you tapped into your body cultivation… but, when he was fighting the geniuses, he hadn’t been able to replicate the same phenomenon. But now, Ri was describing something that was eerily similar to what he felt at that moment.
‘was I tapping into the remnant soul of the demon qilin? Or is it just that body and soul cultivation can manifest the same phenomena? Also, why wasn’t I able to do it again? Was it maybe the Sage blood overrunning the demon qilin? But, why wasn’t I able to manifest the Sage then? Is it because I haven’t integrated enough of the essence? Am I not powerful enough yet? Or maybe the souls of the essences within me haven’t reached a proper balance yet?’
Dyon’s mind was running at high speeds, trying to analyze any and everything. Ri sat cross legged with her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands, watching him intently. The light flickered across their faces, and Ri found herself enraptured by Dyon’s serious expression.
‘wait… flickering? SHIT I FORGOT!’
Although they had set up a lighting formation, it shouldn’t flicker. The only explanation was that the reason Ri called this her secret place was manifesting itself. But, this could mean a ridiculous amount of danger for Dyon!
“Dyon! Snap out of it! You need to go!”
Dyon looked up from his thoughts, confused, “huh?”
The cave’s walls suddenly brightened even more. Suddenly, a rush of flickering lights swarmed from the depths of the cave.
‘dammit! It’s too late!’
Ri regretted this. She had been so lost in her excitement, that she had put Dyon’s life in danger. Although this cave was perfectly safe for her, the same couldn’t be said of most people. In fact, that was the main reason she had sat them at the edge of the cave, had Dyon seen what was going on inside, he might have already died.
Little Black looked up from his nap with an adorable confused expression, but then he just went back to sleep, ignoring Ri’s panic.
Dyon looked around at the lights intently. They were actually quite beautiful. Ri seemed worried, but it was too late to do anything about it now. But, Dyon didn’t feel any different, so it confused him that she was so concerned.
The lights began to slow. All of a sudden, you could make up the figures of tiny butterflies floating around the cave, circling them intently.
Dyon reached out his hand, allowing one to delicately land on his hand. He felt the celestial will within him furiously activate, resonating with the fluttering butterflies.
‘this.. what is this?’ Dyon couldn’t understand what was going on.
However, his surprise completely paled in comparison to Ri’s, ‘he’s alive?…’
“What is this?” Asked Dyon.
Ri was stunned, unable to reply.
“Ri?”
“Oh… um… Right!…”
Dyon looked at Ri with an odd look. The butterflies continued to circle around them. A few had even landed on Little Black. It seemed like they were resonating with him as well.
“Well… this is actually a source of purity will. Purity type wills are rare, but, they do exist. Each is slightly different from the next, but the reigning will above them is without a doubt Celestial Will. But, there are others. For example, a non-elemental type will like the will of buddha, or a simpler form like the will of light. Many wills also have paths of deeper understanding that can divert to purity as well. For example, fire and ice can do this….”
Dyon nodded. His aurora had properties of purification. He wondered if this was related.
“This source was actually created by my mother… It helps you along the path of purification… But, my mother was very clear on the fact that only those with a pure heart could survive. The purity surges at night because my mother was at her most powerful under the night sky… but, for some reason, you’re still here…”
Dyon nearly choked on air, ‘am I not pure enough for you?’
But Ri took this a completely different way, “hmph, am I not pure enough for you? Maybe you should go hang out with another girl whose image is great enough for you, Mr. Jaws.”
Dyon’s eyes widened as a grieved looked appeared on his face, ‘this girl is too much… is it necessary for her to misunderstand me so much? Mr. Jaws? What the hell does that mean?’
“You know that’s not what I meant…”
Ri harrumphed but didn’t reply, ‘all men are the same.’
Dyon could only sigh and change the conversation topic, “why is it that this only happens at night?”
“Well, my mom used to specialize in ice will…”
Dyon didn’t say anything when he heard her use past tense, he only respectfully listened. Ri seemed to appreciate the fact Dyon didn’t ask any questions or show any signs of fake pity. Those kinds of eyes were ones she hated the most.
“Ice will gets a boost during the night, as fire will would during the day, much like it would probably be easier to tap into lightning will during a storm. My mother couldn’t reach far enough along the path of ice purification… so, she made this place, hoping that I would improve quickly and surpass her.”
‘I wonder why they find the purity path to be so important…’ thought Dyon.
Ri, having finally relaxed from her worry, started walking towards the depths of the cave, “although I’m sure you don’t cultivate the purity path because I sense too much demonic type will on you, it seems that despite this, your heart comes from a good place. I don’t mind showing you the depths of the cave as a payment for talking with me today.”
Dyon was going to correct her, but then he thought of something more important, “what… what exactly would have happened had my heart not been ‘pure’…”
Ri turned back with her mischievous grin, “my mother was very powerful. She was probably even more powerful than my father although I can’t be sure. Even if you were at the Celestial stage of cultivation, if you hadn’t had a pure heart, the ice butterflies would have purified you.”
Dyon shuddered at what this would mean. But, Ri didn’t let him wonder for too long.
“your death would look beautiful… sure. But, imagine every one of your cells getting washed over by a cleanser…”
A cold sweat covered Dyon’s back, ‘you mean like pouring rubbing alcohol into a wound?…. but your whole body instead?’
Dyon almost turned around and left, but Ri’s evil nature shone through again. She skipped over gleefully and pulled on Dyon’s arm, dragging him into the cave. Despite his feigned apprehensiveness, Dyon learned something else about wills, especially his celestial will. Dyon remembered very clearly that when he used his celestial will in front of the big sect experts, they would often not know what it was or dismiss it as a ‘purity type will’. This could mean a few things: either it was difficult to distinguish purity type wills when they were so low level, or it was impossible to distinguish them at all. There was also the possibility that celestial will had left this world for so long, that no one remembered what it felt like.
Soon, the enter a wide underground space.
There was a lake of pure energy, bathing the surroundings in light. The space was filled with crystals that had been purified by the energy. Flickers of ice and snow wafted through, but the feeling wasn’t that of bone piercing cold, but instead reminiscent of an ache you treat with a cold pack.
‘So, this is the purity path of ice?… It feels much different from Delia’s ice wil…’
“This place isn’t only good for meditating on purity wills. Because of the nature of the purity path, it helps all forms of comprehension except for its direct opposite: demonic will. So, although you can’t use this place to help you understand that demonic type will of yours, I’m sure a genius like you has understood more than just a single will.”
Dyon found Ri’s word choice very interesting. It might mean that demonic will was much like celestial will in how it wasn’t able to be recognized easily. In fact, if it wasn’t for the geniuses that went into the world with him telling the elders that he had gotten the inheritance of the sage, they might not have understood that he was using demonic will. And now, Ri didn’t label his will as the true demonic form, but rather a demonic type will. Very similar to the purity path.
‘it seems like those ancient wills have been forgotten by most… they don’t even understand their proper feel anymore. It doesn’t matter for now, I can use this place to better my understanding of celestial purity. Although this is a much weaker path of purity, Ri’s mother was so powerful that her legacy is only of benefit for someone as weak as me…’
Dyon’s Celestial Will was currently still at the 3rd level. He had spent the past half year trying to deepen his understanding rather than speeding through to tap into more and more of it. With the help of Ri’s mother, maybe he could finally step forward.
What Dyon had come to understand was that the level of your will didn’t necessarily correspond to your level of understanding. If that was the case, then you wouldn’t have to be an essence gathering expert to understand an intent. A level of will was simply the amount you could tap into a certain thing by. However, there were varying levels of understanding you could have for said will. The problem was that there had never been a set ranking system for that understanding. The reason was because there was a near infinite number of paths a will could take. And that was on top of your ability to fuse them to create all new effects. As such, instead of a ranking system, levels of understanding began to be categorized by their paths. As such, aside from the normal will and intent, one through nine ranking system, there was an untold number of rankings for paths.
What Dyon had begun to realize is that he had inadvertently set his celestial will into many paths. He had delved into the desire path with Madeleine, he had diverted to the healing path helping those from the legacy world, and he had delved into the defensive path by using purity to dissolve attacks. And that was not to mention the conventional purity path he’d take once he began to clear his meridian paths with celestial will.
Dyon was fascinated by the martial world because of this. Everything you did seemed to have a purpose and a reaction. His singular Celestial will could all of a sudden become 4 different wills with paths all to their own, and he hadn’t even realized he was doing it. When Dyon started consolidating his theories with his master’s memories, he only became more and more enthralled.
‘it seems the purity ice path isn’t about defense or healing at all. Which is interesting because the water purity path is almost entirely about healing. Instead, the ice purity path should be about attacking! Just think about all the different ways people could use wills to fight… assuming a person’s abilities based on the will the display is a sure way to die an early death…’
Using purity to attack… Dyon thought this made perfect sense. From his human world knowledge, he knew that ice only differed from water by its energy levels and the structure of its atoms. However, that very structure, made it also very susceptible to shattering. Applying that to battle would have deadly results.
Ri was watching off to the side, amused by how many facial expression changes Dyon was undergoing. She liked watching the process of him thinking.
“I don’t mind you coming here honestly. It seems like you and I might be the only ones able to survive here anyway,” Ri interrupted Dyon causing him to look up.
He was stunned for a bit. Ri looked amazing. Her light blue-silver hair was fluttering in ice and snow. Her silver eyes looked only a half shade from a dull blue under the lights. If Dyon didn’t see her ordinary face, he would have sworn that this girl was a beauty equal to Madeleine after she had been cured.
“you’re quite beautiful you know,” Dyon said seriously, a light smile playing his face.
‘did he?… no, definitely not,’ Ri shook her head and gave Dyon an odd look, “I already allowed you to be here, you don’t need to flatter me,” she said rolling her eyes.
Dyon only smiled and said nothing.
“You haven’t told me… what are you doing here? Humans usually only come here for their academy trials and only stay within a defined area. Actually, we only let them do this because of an ancient contract that the king isn’t willing to renege on. But, you were hiding in your ring? That area shouldn’t have anything powerful enough to threaten you.”
Dyon sighed, “I actually came here heavily injured. There are a lot of annoying enemies that I have. They’re mostly angry because I revealed their secrets and took the inheritance of a legacy world they took 500 years to open.”
Ri’s eyes brightened with interest.
“I plan on going back in about another year because of the world tournament.”
Ri spoke up when she heard this, “the world tournament? Do you plan on participating as a rogue cultivator?”
Dyon nodded, “I guess so. I’d rather die than represent those corrupt bastards.”
Ri chuckled, “you say this like you’d bring them untold glory. I can’t say anything about humans as I don’t know much about them, but the representations of the 3 Elvin Academies is no joke… You may be powerful and talented, but you’re still too weak. Your soul is powerful, but you haven’t manifested it as a medium to attack and defend with. Your body is strong, but no stronger than a regular peak foundation stage expert. And, I’m not too certain on your wills honestly, but, unless you had many years to understand them properly, there’s no way they can make up for your deficiencies. And that’s on top of the fact you haven’t reached enough bodily maturity to begin energy cultivation. But, at the same time, this can’t be said for the geniuses you’ll be fighting against. Not only are these geniuses who still have peak level talent even while waiting to reach maturity, they’ve actually begun to cultivate.
Mind you, these are geniuses who follow not 1 but 2 paths of cultivation. Not only can they manifest their souls, their energy cultivation has long since caught up to their soul cultivation. And since they’re elves, their body constitutions are good too. How could you expect to do anything against that? It’s not like you’re me.”
Ri looked over at Dyon expecting to see a demoralized boy, but all she saw were sharp eyes radiating endless battle intent.
‘is that?… it feels like he’s manifesting an aura… but he hasn’t reached essence gathering yet…’
A bit apprehensive, Ri continued, “did I mention that many of these geniuses know at least 4 wills…”
Ri was hoping that that would snap Dyon out of his state, but all she heard was a cheery laugh.
BOOM!
Dyon’s demonic will skyrocketed, swirling madly among the fluttering snow and white lights. His body emitted a dark aura, that flickered in blacks and blood reds.
‘he’s manifesting his demonic will here?! Is he trying to get himself killed?!’
But, Ri’s worries were unfounded. The mere fact the demonic will was fighting against the purity of the surroundings was enough for Dyon’s comprehension to deepen. Ri could only watch in astonishment, realizing how wrong she was that Dyon couldn’t use this space to improve his demonic will.
Dyon finally retracted his aura after about half an hour with a broad smile on his face.
Ri was shaken, ‘he didn’t manifest a true aura… not yet… but, that’s about as close as you can get without stepping into the essence gathering stage of energy cultivation…’
“Thank you, Ri. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have understood the sovereign path of my demonic will.”
Ri trembled, ‘the sovereign path? How cocky does this guy need to be to have a breakthrough in such a path while I’m trying to destroy his confidence?!’
Ri could only shake her head, chuckling bitterly, “*hmph, men.”
Dyon only smiled as he continued to meditate in the room. Ri was again surprised by his level of focus. Just like the human world, it was impossible for anyone to focus on a singular thing for so long. Your mind would inevitably wonder, or you would get stiff and bored. But, this didn’t seem to apply to Dyon. It was like he could stay in this state for forever.
‘maybe this has something to do with his innate aurora?…’
Ri had heard that innate aurora’s made array alchemy much more manageable, not because of a power boost, although that was the case too, but because it helped you to learn and retain things better. This was also part of the reason why array theory and alchemy had separated. It was impossible for most to master one even with an entire life, let alone two. This was why array alchemy was rare even in the Elvin Kingdom. Ri was a special case since her mother’s purity path aided her in reaching better focus in addition to a blood line she also received from her mother. But, even here, formation guilds were separate from alchemy guilds.
Soon, it was the dead of night. Dyon continued to meditate. With his increased soul power and being only a step away from the 5th stage, his need for sleep was considerably less. If you included the fact his impurities were being washed away by the atmosphere, then he could stay awake for even longer.
‘once I step into the 5th stage, I’ll be able to finally manifest my arrays as true objects that can be sustained without my feeding them. That’ll upgrade my array alchemy to an entirely new level. But, I feel like I’ve been neglecting my alchemy… Also, I’ve never even been formerly ranked as an array alchemist, maybe I should do that.’
Dyon’s thoughts were interrupted by a sleep Ri, “I’m going to get some sleep,” she said pulling out a few cushions and blankets, “tomorrow, since you want to be here for a while, I can take you around. If you want to improve, you should consider joining the academy I’m a part of. There aren’t any rules against non-elves joining since there’s never been a precedent, but, if I recommend you, they won’t say anything. Plus, those old fogies at the formation and alchemy guilds should be taught a lesson,” she said chuckling mischievously as she slowly fell asleep.
Dyon chuckled at the devious nature of Ri, ‘you’re so fiery, but you didn’t even hesitate to fall asleep near a man you’ve only known for a day. You must really have a deep trust in your mother,’ Dyon thought with a smile. It hadn’t escaped Dyon’s notice that the fact Ri could survive here meant that her heart was also pure.
After Ri fell asleep, Dyon happily took out his device to read through the messages Madeleine had sent him. After that, he began to practice using Celestial Deer’s Rend. He had been at the peak of the 4th stage for the majority his 6-month training regiment and was nearing the 5th stage. Although he thought this was slow, he had no choice but to take it one step at a time.
Dyon gritted his teeth as his skin reddened from strain. But, if you looked closely, a slight tinge of excitement played his features.
**
In the dead of night, near a small village on the outer skirts of a large Elvin city, shadows were shifting in the darkness.
“The Norville family is truly an odd bunch…” spoke one of the shadows, a bit of contempt layering his voice.
“if they’re odd, what does that make you for accepting their money?”
The shadow had no response, so he could only sigh.
“Just shut up and focus on the scouting. We need to find exactly which children have been orphaned and who haven’t. The campaign ended pre-maturely, so the Norville family wants this done now. They’ve even paid extra in all their excitement.
Whichever homes you see lack an accompanying adult, mark them down. We’ll have to deal with this before the bureaucrats get involved.”
The shadow could only resign himself. Although the Kingdom was filled with occurrences just like these, he had a family to feed too. He could little afford to not take this job. But…
“what do you think are the odds of the government helping them afterwards,” he couldn’t help but ask.
The leader of the group sighed, “if it makes you feel better, this may be the best course for their lives. They’ll receive training in a singularity type technique, and if they’re talented, they’ll have a prosperous future. The Royals aren’t in a place to go against the wishes of such a powerful family, and the other powerful families just don’t care… even if everyone knows what’s going on, there’s no real evidence. And truthfully, even if there was evidence, it would be ignored…”
A shadow who was listening to all of this near the back of their 5-man party was confused. He wasn’t sure what was going on at all. All he was told was that they were responsible for transporting orphans to a new place, so he had no choice but to tap on the shoulder of the shadow near him.
“what… what happens to them?…”
The shadow turned to him and whispered in a faint voice, “Norville means desire in our ancient language… you figure it out…”
The group fell silent, a heavy atmosphere reigning. The soft rustling of the wind through the dark forest did little to help their moods as the continued to skirt around the small villages… marking down homes… knowing that every note they made was signing a child off to a life they didn’t choose.