205. Settling In

Alistair and Red’s room in the Living Quarters was the size of a large college dorm room. It was larger on the inside by a factor of two, composed of deep blue stillwater. Thankfully, the splashes that occurred when you stepped on it seemed to be cosmetic—it didn’t actually get you wet.

There were two beds on opposite sides of the room, each floating slightly above the floor on invisible currents of stabilized water vapor.

The frames were carved from polished indigo coral, inlaid with silver runes that pulsed gently with Mana-gathering arrays. The bedding itself appeared to be woven from a fibrous wool that shifted between shades of blue as ambient light played across its surface.

A modest storage cabinet formed a dark oak accompanied both beds, along with a desk made from the same type of wood. There was a singular light on the ceiling, a luminary jellyfish that pulsed at irregular intervals.

The floor beneath them was a glass pane that offered a spectacular underwater view of Selvitari’s vast oceanic ecosystem. Schools of exotic fish with scales that seemed to capture and refract Mana itself swam past occasionally, while cultivation-enhanced coral formations glowed with subtle power in the far distance. The Clear Water Sect had placed their lowest disciple’s above a seabed of activity. Alistair couldn’t help but admire the natural beauty of a Heavenly quality world.

True to his word, before Alistair could ask a single question, Red hopped into his bed and closed his eyes.

No way he’s actually asleep, Alistair thought, walking over and waving his hand over Red’s face. His roommate did not move, his body serenely slumbering in a fetal position as the cocoon-like fiber of the bed wrapped around him.

“Get away from that man,” Dev'rox ordered. “True Divine Prodigies shouldn’t be disturbed by the likes of you.”

Alistair swatted Dev'rox away with a palm, etherealizing his hand so that it wouldn’t pass through. “What’s a Divine Prodigy?”

“For each division of the Physical Plane, you could say there are three categories of talent. It’s not very well-defined, it’s more of a cultural thing. I heard it in passing back when I worked with Kyraxadon for the Pathfinder AI. Divine Prodigy would be the highest, then Heaven-Touched, and finally Nascent Seed. You’d be a frontier Heaven-Touched, probably. It’s not an exact science.”

The other window in their dorm looked out to the horizon. They were at the edge of the Clear Water Sect, where hundreds of miles of water separated them from the nearest human settlement. The sun was setting in the distance, a blue star that orbited the Heavenly quality continent rather than the other way around.

Alistair hopped into his bed, the fiber warping around his body to fit every contour with perfect comfort. The Mana-gathering array was nowhere near a cultivation chamber, but it doubled the ambient Mana, which was already higher than anything he had ever known.

And still, he knew that the process of leveling would be far slower as an Adept. The amount of Mana that he needed to add to his soulcore was ridiculous, just to get to level 101. There had to be faster ways to progress.

Why did prodigies advance faster through the realms? They understood the Dao better, but how did that help them with their soulcores? The sect would have the answers he sought. Alistair didn’t sleep like Red, but he entered a deep, meditative trance as he cultivated. His first “class” tomorrow reminded him of his first day of university.

----------

The entire compound of the Clear Water Sect was a hundred miles long and wide. At a safe jogging pace where he could easily avoid fellow disciples, he could make it to the Technique Hall in five minutes. He gave himself a thirty-minute buffer, just in case. No way he was going to be late on his first day.

The blue sun was still below the horizon when Alistair set out for his remedial lessons. Red was sound asleep.

“Hey,” Alistair whispered, shaking his roommate. “Are you coming?”

Red groaned in his sleep, turning around. “Nah. This Red Harmonia has never in his life needed ‘remedial’ treatment.”

“Suit yourself.”

Instead of jogging down the bridges, Alistair decided to have a bit of fun and jump into the water. The oceans had even more ambient Mana than the air, as he expected. It was cool and soothing, completely the opposite of the depths of Stillwater Basin.

There was no way he could swim as fast as he could run, but that was why he got up thirty minutes before the sunrise. It had been a long time since he was in the water, but his technique was better than before. [Adaptive Kinesthesia] worked to a lesser extent on his memories, and Tommy, his friend from before the initiation, was a D1 swimmer. Alistair had seen him swim many times, even if it was years ago.

The ocean’s embrace was like a mother’s hug. The absolute clarity of the waters was unrivaled. The Clear Water Sect’s name was no lie. Alistair darted through fish and other marine life with ease. Even the smallest creature that he saw had Mana pulsing through its veins. It was hard to believe, but they felt like they were all level 60-80.

Not smart like the Beast Lords back on Earth were, Alistair thought. The Pathfinder AI injected them with a bit of extra smarts just to mess with us. Damn that thing can be a bastard.

Alistair flowed underneath the buildings, marveling at his ability. He swirled in circles, doing tricks that would make artistic swimmers jealous. He dove thousands of feet down, coming back up with ease like an orca.

A tingle went down Alistair’s spine when he reached a mile down. Curiosity got the best of him—he reasoned there couldn’t be anything that dangerous right next to the sect. Would they let a sea monster eat the disciples?

So he pushed deeper. He had enough time, right? Something called to him, deep in his bones. In his soul. He didn’t know how much time had passed. And then—

Alistair stopped as he focused inward on his Domain, flushing the foreign Dao out of his mind.

“Impressive. Only just reaching Adept, yet your heart is certain.”

A giant mermaid flipped Alistair around to face her with nothing but her will. She was striking in a way that made him breathless, despite lacking a need to breathe. The soft shimmer of her dark scales and the slow drift of her ink-black hair gave her an otherworldly elegance that commanded both attention and unease.

“Pardon me, senior,” Alistair said. “I was heading toward my lessons. May I inquire as to who you are, so I may address you properly?”

“Do they no longer inform new disciples of little old me?” the mermaid laughed. “Call me Sheeloth. I am the Guardian of the Depths. You shall have nothing to fear from the old things of the trenches while I am here.”

“Thank you, great Guardian,” Alistair said. “I believe I must be going now, Elder Fanghorn requests me.”

“Hmm,” she said, ignoring his last comments. “You are Alistair, no? Loroa told me that the new current generation of recruits might be the greatest in the history of the Clear Water Sect. Your name came up as one of them.”

“That’s me. I endeavor to meet the Perfect’s expectations.”

“She does have the highest expectations. What else can you expect of my old friend? She thinks that we all have her impeccable talent.”

Sheeloth looked lost in thought. “I forget myself. You’re to go to the Technique Hall? I wouldn’t want to get you on Bruce’s bad side because of this mermaid. She tilted her head, studying him like a curious dog.

“That is true, great Guardian,” Alistair said with a polite, underwater bow. “I wouldn’t want to make a bad impression on my first day.”

She chuckled. “You are more correct than you realize. Elder Fanghorn despises his lack of talent, leading to his impotent wrath. But there’s no need to be so formal. I’m not your instructor.”

He hesitated. “Still, you’re clearly in the Visionary realm. I try to be polite with those of such power.”

She waved a lazy hand through the water. “Mm. The Dao is the Dao. Be too respectful, and you won’t have enough bite to break through your bottlenecks.”

Before he could respond, the water around became darkness, and he shifted through the void between worlds near instantaneously.

Alistair landed lightly on a bridge of living coral, the sea a few feet below. Before him, two conch-shell structures faced each other miles apart—one radiating warm, herbal scents, the other silent and heavy with suppressed power.

The Technique Hall.

Right on time, the sun still not having made its appearance. Alistair ran over to the building on the right, looking up at its majestic shell. As he approached the entrance—an elegantly curved aperture that spiraled inward. The opening pulsed with subdued aquamarine light, projecting a subtle barrier that likely kept uninvited guests from entering.

Stepping through the aperture, Alistair found himself in a vast circular chamber that defied conventional space. The interior was considerably larger than the exterior suggested, with walls of crystalwater curving upward to form a dome that captured and refracted the ambient Mana, creating cascading prismatic patterns across the polished floor of pearl-white stone that paved the way to different areas.

What immediately drew his attention were the countless crystals displayed in recessed alcoves throughout the hall. They hung suspended in preservation fields, their structures emanating faint auras of various colors—technique crystals of different elements and paths, preserved across millennia, maybe even millions of years in certain cases.

Concentric rings of tiered platforms descended toward a central dais. Crystalwater display cases hovered at the center of everything, housing what appeared to be the most precious techniques of the sect—their protective barriers shimmering with multiple layers of sealing formations.

Alistair spotted a smaller chamber branching off from the main hall, following the prismatic patterns created from the refracted Mana. The symbols communicated directly with his brain, indicating a “Remedial Lesson” location.

Following the subtle current of Mana, he made his way down a corridor where display cases contained technique crystals labeled with names like “Clarity of the Deepest Abyss” and “Flowing Star Path Technique.”

When he entered the designated chamber, nine figures were already present. Riyord Fen and his sister were the only ones he recognized. The seven others must have been those affiliated candidates whose background was considered not up to snuff. Perhaps they had been adopted from subordinate sects.

They sat in a crescent formation facing an empty instructor’s platform. Alistair sat down next to his sister. Sheeloth implied Elder Fanghorn to be a spiteful man, so he was glad to pass under his notice for now.

“Evangeline,” Alistair called out softly.

His sister turned, her face brightening. “Right on time,” she whispered, gesturing for him to join her. “I was beginning to wonder if you'd found your way.”

“Had a bit of an... unexpected detour,” Alistair replied, settling beside her. “I’ll explain later.” He glanced around at the other disciples—a mix of nervous and confident expressions.

Before he could ask Evangeline about their fellow disciples, a ripple of tension passed through the chamber. The flowing stillwater in the walls suddenly paused as a figure materialized on the instructor’s platform.

Elder Fanghorn stood imposingly tall, his sea-green robes hanging perfectly still despite the subtle current that perpetually circulated through the sect’s chambers. His face bore the weathered lines of countless years of cultivation, offset by bright red eyes that made him look monstrous. A thin beard traced the line of his jaw. He was a severe-looking man who lacked the otherworldly beauty of most cultivators at his level.

“I am Elder Fanghorn,” he announced without preamble, his voice carrying the weight of mountain water. “Elder of the Technique Hall. Your presence here indicates your foundations are... lacking.”

That word “lacking” emerged like a physical force, carrying a subtle hint of the Dao that made several disciples flinch.

“You—” He paused, counting the disciples with a piercing gaze. “Nine. There should be eleven.”

As if summoned by his displeasure, hurried footsteps echoed from the corridor. A purple-haired woman ran in, her breath coming in quick gasps.

“Forgive my tardiness, elder,” she began, bowing deeply. “I was—”

“Serena Moonshine,” Elder Fanghorn cut her off, his voice deceptively soft. The temperature in the chamber dropped perceptibly. “From a newly initiated planet in the Disputed Shard. You consider yourself privileged enough to waste my time?”

“No, Elder Fanghorn, I—”

“Silence.” The word crashed like a wave. “The Technique Hall does not tolerate imprecision. Time is the first resource a cultivator must master. Let this be clear to all of you. From this moment forward, anyone who arrives even one second after the appointed time will be permanently removed from these lessons. I doubt you shall make it past your first five years.”

He gestured casually toward Serena, who had gone completely still.

“You retain your place only because formal instruction has not yet begun. Do not mistake this for leniency. Where is the other, a Red Harmonia?”

Alistair spoke up. “Honored elder, he is my roommate, so I asked him to come with me, but he refused. I don’t think he will ever join us.”

“It’s his damnation,” Elder Fanghorn said, shaking his head.

Turning away from the chastened disciple, Elder Fanghorn's expression shifted to one of clinical assessment as he regarded the assembled group.

“Now, we shall proceed with your evaluation. Today, you will demonstrate your understanding of the foundational principles of breathing and cycling. I wish to see what kind of shabby foundations I’m working with. One at a time, I want you to stand before your peers and show me the most advanced breathing and cycle technique you know. Form a line.”

They obeyed the elder without question, lining up in a single file.

Alistair noted the behavior of the ten disciples with interest. Serena, as he remembered her, had a flaming spirit, and immediately jumped to the front despite her previous admonishment. A pink-haired man almost got there first, and then everyone else got there at a normal pace.

Alistair was third-to-last, only his sister and then Riyord Fen behind him. The fifteen-year-old boy had his head down, staring at his feet.

Serena closed her eyes. She took a deep breath. Alistair saw the flow of ambient Mana in the room draw toward her.

As for the cycling exercise, his gaze was not yet penetrating enough for that. After a minute, the elder bade her to stop.

“Absolutely subpar. What are the names of those two exercises?”

“S-system Breathing Exercise #9 and System Cycling Exercise #13,” Serena admitted.

“Even disregarding the rudimentary exercises,” the elder said, “your technique is horrendous. The first thing you shall do with your merit points is to purchase more suitable exercises, ones proper for the Adept realm. Next!”

Elder Fanghorn went all the way down the line, verbally eviscerating all of them. He spared not one man or woman, explaining how utterly inadequate their exercises and skill in performing those exercises were.

Finally, it was Alistair’s turn.

Unlike Sheeloth, the red-eyed elder didn’t seem to recognize him. He supposed that only Elder Mo was aware of the Perfect recruiting him and his sister, and the Guardian of the Depths was just a personal friend.

“Next!” the elder shouted. Alistair walked up to the platform and started inhaling.

Like Serena, he still had the system purchased exercises, though more advanced ones than her, at #3 and #4 for each.

He had considered buying even more advanced ones before heading to Nuevo Invierno, but they were extremely expensive and at the time he had allocated almost all his money to his people. Plus, he reasoned the energy he got from killing zombies would be more than sufficient.

At Adept realm, his reasoning went, he could get more appropriate exercises.

Alistair drew the abounding ambient Mana into his meridians through every pore in his body, cycling it according to System Cycling Exercise #4. In his mind, he performed the exercise exactly as the manual had taught him.

“Another unacceptable exercise,” the elder said. “You have some competency in executing it, though your flaws are plentiful. So far, the best out of all you sorry bunch. You are Alistair, correct?”

“Yes, elder.”

“It is impressive you landed in the top ten ranking of the current class. However I don’t expect you to hold that position for long. Your foundations are pitifully lacking. Now, is the woman who shares your looks behind your sister? I hope she can restore honor to your family name! Next!”

The elder hurried him away. Alistair watched from the sidelines, interested to see how things would go. Oliver might have been the only one from his planet who could impress the hard-nosed elder.

Or maybe Pharaoh, Alistair amended. His sister couldn’t be far behind. Her natural talent in things that required a refined touch was unfair.

As expected, Elder Fanghorn’s expression changed as his sister performed the exercises. He knew from spending six whole months on an ice planet with her that she also used the system provided exercises, #1 and #1.

Not the biggest difference in numbers, but her skill was far superior.

“You are the first that meets any sort of adequacy,” Elder Fanghorn announced. “Your skills are still inferior to the majority of your peers in the recently accepted outer disciples, but I believe you can improve quickly. This is what the rest of you need to strive for.”

Alistair idly noted that he had not explained how to do the exercises properly.

Finally came Riyord Fen, the unaffiliated genius who was the fifth ranked of the new outer disciples.

The shy boy chose to sit down in a meditative position with his thumbs touching his middle fingers, palms facing upward. His breaths were shallow and almost imperceptible.

Elder Fanghorn nearly gasped.

“What technique is that, boy!?” he cried out, almost grabbing Riyord by the shoulder, before realizing how improper that would be.

“Elder, I don’t know,” Riyord said, unable to hold eye contact with the Profound realm. “I kind of… invented it myself? I grew up in the slums of a poor planet, so I didn’t have any formal teaching. I just go with my instincts.”

“Went with your instincts, you say,” Elder Fanghorn said, having regained his composure. “Well, for fifteen years of age, mightily impressive. You have some minor mistakes, but nothing that isn’t to be expected. I think I’ve found a diamond in the rough.”

The elder clapped his hands and glanced at every other student in the room. “Talent is not measured by your brute force Attributes. I’ve met many Prime Initiates in my time who could steamroll those at Early Adept through raw physicality, but fell far behind by the time they were Middle Adept. In this world, talent is everything. I can mold you, I can improve you, but at the end of the day, the Heavens bless some and not others.”

Elder Fanghorn’s face took on a more solemn and compassionate look. “That is not to discourage you. To struggle against Fate and defy your destiny, to transcend your Heaven-given talent—this is the cultivator’s journey, for all except a few. Now, let me explain a few things.

“The Clear Water Sect is not, strictly speaking, a school. There are no regular classes, my remedial lessons being an exception. We are a sect. We seek to grow stronger in good company, to cultivate and raise our powers, to achieve immortality, and to secure eternity. We serve at the Emperor’s will, and we are to instill a cultivator’s duty and good sense into the next generation.

“We provide beast tides and auctions and Dungeon opportunities. Mostly for merit points, but occasionally as a sect as a whole. We offer items, Skills, Talents, and techniques at a far more discounted cost than what you’d find anywhere else. We offer elders’ time, Profounds and Visionaries of great wisdom and ability. If you wish to treat the sect like a school, you may, using your merit points to join lectures. Many core and inner disciples work on projects with elders. But instruction is never our main goal in belonging to the sect.

“Now, let us return to the lesson. Since I will wait for you to purchase superior breathing and cycling techniques before I instruct you in that, for the rest of today, I want to inquire on the nature of progression itself.”

Alistair’s curiosity rose at that. Elder Fanghorn continued. “As Adepts, you have all formed your Domains. The gap between Adept and Foundation is considered one of the largest because Foundations lack a Domain. Now, can anyone tell me how you become a Profound realm?”

Several people raised their hands, including him. Dev'rox had explained it to him when he saw Bakrav use “First Law: This Mountain Cannot Be Outnumbered” in assisting Jindor.

“After you reach level 199,” a classmate answered, “you confirm the Third Law of your Domain.”

“And Domain Laws are?”

“Domain Laws are a distillment of your purpose and your path. They are conditions within your Domain that you wish to make unbreakable. Even for a Visionary, they won’t truly become Multiversal Law, but they represent that dream.”

“Representing a dream,” Elder Fanghorn said. “An interesting way of wording it, but not incorrect. So why then is it that you even need to improve your soulcore at all? Why does the Pathfinder AI ‘limit’ us to progression at the intervals of 130 and 160?”

That was a question that Alistair had been wondering himself. It seemed arbitrary to attach the Dao to certain levels of Mana cultivation.

His sister was the one to respond. “I know for Foundation, it is because our mortal minds are too feeble to comprehend the truths of the Dao. The Pathfinder AI refines our bodies and brains to be able to handle the Dao better. For Adept, I believe it is the same story, but with a complication. Each of the Three Laws has a spiritual weight to it. We need to make room within our soulcore to fit that weight.”

“Excellent. Because your soulcore expands in on itself, its size is directly proportional to the amount of Dao energy you can contain within it. In fact, you naturally add a small amount of spiritual energy when expanding your soulcore via Mana, though it’s not as large as insights that are cataloged as part of your Dao Nodes. Think of it like a mortal lifting weights—the increased pressure of cycling encourages your soul to grow ever so slightly. You will never have an insight into the Dao so large that your soulcore membrane can’t accommodate the increase in spiritual weight, so you don’t need a special process like the Three Laws. The Pathfinder AI ensures it.

“Now, in terms of combat, it doesn’t mean a physically larger Domain will win—you can concentrate your Dao energy as much as you want, and neither does it mean the total amount of Dao energy determines who wins a Domain Battle, but it is a factor. Because the addition of a Law is such a discrete jump in spiritual weight, the only way to make way for that is by concentrating the form of your Mana.”

Elder Fanghorn went into an hour-long lecture about that. The current state of the Mana within their soulcore was akin to a gas. What they needed to do now was, with the assistance of Adept-level cycling exercises, compress that Mana into a liquid to give more room. Then they would compress the liquid into a solid to reach Late Adept.

It was a complicated process that could turn deadly, and the elder made them promise not to do it without supervision unless it was absolutely necessary.

Elder Fanghorn told them they would meet every seven days at the crack of dawn, no exceptions, no excuses.

And that was that.

His first remedial lesson was over, and he wasn’t sure where to go next.