Chapter 15

[Cultivation Technique Alteration Token]

[Use this token to convert a cultivation technique to match a user’s roots. Crush to activate while within touch range of the target.]

[Available cultivations for conversion:]

[Grim Tempest Darkwind Scion] [95% First Realm, Qi Condensation] [CON +9] [Warning! You have a low compatibility with this path.]

I held the token in my hand. It was a physical coin, heavier than it had any right to be, made of white jade. I was alone now. I had dismissed even Wen. It was the middle of the day in the blistering summer of the desert.

Everyone was asleep.

I sat at the heart of the Precursor Ruin where I had discovered the System. Alone. Progressing through the realms was dangerous. Normally, Wen would be here. But what would he say if he saw me cultivating a technique that wasn’t the Grim Tempest’s own? Would he try to stop me?

I wouldn’t risk it.

It had been two days since I returned home. Everything had gone back to normal, except for the countdown that I kept in the corner of my vision; a count down of how long until I could step back out into another world.

And I think I had finally decided what to do.

This cultivation technique that I had carried from my youth was a part of me; it defined me in a way, something I struggled to grasp for all my early years. But I had failed. And that failure wasn’t my own, but the failure of my instructors.

Why would the Grim Tempest give their heirs an incompatible technique?

It didn’t matter. I rejected the Feng family. I rejected the Grim Tempest.

I sat on the precipice of the Core Formation realm, the first line that I could cross to move away from mortality. My meridians overflowed with power. I didn’t want to take that step forward on a cultivation technique that wasn’t meant for me. A cultivation technique designed to shape me into a tool for an unknown organization.

I crushed the token.

A wave of something like qi, but not quite, passed through and around me, ripping through the world like a beacon of power.

[Scan Complete. Users qi compatibilities:]

[Void, 70%]

[Storm, 55%]

[Compatibilities below 50% not listed. Purchase tokens to expand compatibilities.]

The text gained a metallic sheen, then, ever so slowly, started to shift to green. I heard a laugh I knew couldn’t be real, only with me in my head.

[Path of the Grim Tempest Darkwind Scion(Transcendent Quality) altered from Wind, Storm, Shadow to Void, Storm.]

[New path created]

My mind suddenly sunk, like I was falling out of my own body. I saw a forest of trees larger than worlds, existing in a place that wasn’t quite physical. Something about the trees made me think that they looked sick.

[Path of the Herald of the Last Storm, Anti-Lightning Scion(Transcendent Quality) created]

My mind screamed in pain, but my physical body was so far away that it seemed only a mild concern. I knew, distantly, that I was screaming, that my body contorted as the qi within me condensed, that sweat and gunk poured out of my body and onto the stone floor of the ruin I was trapped alone in. But my perception was fixated on something beyond the forest. High above, an infinite sky, larger than worlds, flashed with power. Swarms of creatures larger than the entire Bloodstone continent crossed the empty expanse, visible only when great currents of power arced between clouds the size of worlds.

I lost myself in a tapestry of storms larger than imagination. There was a saw inside of my head, ripping it to pieces. For just a blink, I saw a sky outside of our world, and then it was over.

When I next woke, I was back in my bed.

“Second Young Master!” Wen shouted.

I flinched, lifting my hand to my head. I pushed myself to sit up in the bed.

“What happened?” I asked. My head pounded.

Wen shoved a cup of water into my hands. I drank like I hadn’t drank in days. My stomach rumbled.

“Prepare a meal for the young master.” Wen said. A half dozen attendants ran from the room. Wen turned back to me. “You broke through into the Second Realm. You formed a core. But… it’s strange.” Wen frowned. He didn’t seem excited to share the information.

I stared at his face. At the wrinkles of age on them. If Wen belonged to a higher realm than the third, then he could be old. Much older than he seemed or implied. More than a century, even. I wondered how long it took him to acquire those wrinkles, the things he had seen. If he was older than the Patriarch.

Wen expected me to put forward information, prodding gently for an answer. When I didn’t reply, he continued prodding.

“You said it had been three days from your perspective…” Wen said. “What happened after you touched the stone?”

“Let me ask you something instead.” I said, sitting up in bed. “How did you grow to care about the lives of mortals?”

The only light inside of my estate came from qi-fueled lanterns. The glass windows were closed with wooden shudders — the wind carrying sand meant they were constantly dirty, and rather than have servants clean them every day, I opted to simply shut them.

Wen looked at the attendants in the room.

“Go draw the bath. Shut the door and activate the young master’s privacy formation. Leave us.” Wen said.

The rest of the mortal attendants scattered out of the room. A moment later, the soft buzzing of the privacy formation activated. Wen alone sat at the side of my bed.

Wen sighed, taking his time to form his words. I stared at him.

“There’s something I haven’t told you. But you were going to discover this one way or another. I am sure you already suspect it by now; I am not of the Feng Family. The truth is… I was a direct descendant of the Grim Tempest.”

“Why would you only tell me this now?” I interjected.

Wen’s face stared at me seriously. He played with a ring on his finger before pulling it off. The soft jade featured several embedded beads. One of them was purple, and dimly glowing with an internal light.

“Things are about to change.” Wen said, staring at the ring. “This light… it means that Feng Jin just reached the Third Realm. It means that your future is about to change. Like mine did. Because you and I, Sai, are relatives. Descendents of the inner families of the Grim Tempest. But blood is not enough to earn the right to inherit their power. Their own sons and daughters must fight their way through the world to earn the right. Their descendent's are scattered through clans throughout the world. It is a great honor to raise a scion of the sect, and guarantees some protection and favor.”

“But… why would they scatter their descendants around the world?”

“The sect… it is a bad place. They believe that hardship creates true strength.” Wen snorted, touching a scar on his neck. “Beyond that, the political machinations of the families below the Matriarchs constant fighting endangers all their children. The Matriarchs tacitly allow the clans to clash and murder one another in farcical duels. After centuries of infighting, the clan was losing more sons and daughters than were reaching adulthood. The number of elders of the clan shrunk, and the Grim Tempest began to lose territory. So the inner families made a deal. They scatter their children, anonymously, across the world, each one assigned a guardian. It is an honor to the outer disciples of the clan. If the children reach the Third Realm before nineteen, they, and their siblings, are given the right to participate in a tournament to earn their position in the clan.”

I leaned back against the headrest.

“I’m not going. I have no interest in — “

I stopped while looking at Wen’s face. He was wincing.

“Ah. It’s not optional, is it?” I asked.

“Not so much.” He said. “An official carrying word should arrive soon.”

“You still haven’t answered my question.”

“The answer? I was a lot like you growing up. I saw myself in you. Groomed for the apex of power from birth, with a sword in one hand. I reached the Third Realm at seventeen. I won the Storm Disciples Tournament, securing a position as an outer disciple. And then the Grim Tempest chewed me up and spat me out. I had hoped that it all could be avoided. I had hoped you could live a normal life, free from the clan’s politics. A bodyguard position is the closest an outer disciple can get to freedom, tasked with nothing but a single charge. Instead…”

“My little brother reached Foundation Establishment. So he is my brother, then, by blood?” I asked.

“Yes.” Wen said.

I closed my eyes. Then opened them.

“The legacy left in the ruins pulled me into another world.”

Wen shot to his feet, staring down at me.

“What?!”