《Agartha (hiatus)》 Chapter 1: A New Beginning ¡°Where am i, something feels weird, why do I feel so tired? Why does my body feel so heavy? Who am i? Why can''t I remember anything.¡± ¡°??????????????????????¡± ¡°Everything looks so blurry.What are they saying. Who are these people. So tired.Why do they look so huge. I really can¡¯t keep my eyes open. I guess I have no choice but to rest for now.¡± ¡°?????????????????¡± ¡°?????????????¡± So many questions but no one can tell me anything. ¡°AHBABABA!!!!¡± (Where am i) !!!!! Why is my voice like this? What happened to my voice!!! Wait what happened to my body what the shit is this! I have become a baby ! ¡°AHBABABABABA!!!!¡±¡°AHBABABABBBABA!!!!¡± ¡°WAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!¡± *hurried footsteps* ¡°??????????????¡± ¡°???????????????????¡± Next thing I know I was lifted up and tits were stuffed into my face. Bliss! Life does not seems to be so bad as a baby. Days piled on as I gained an understanding of where I am. It seems like those tits belong to my mother and this is a small household. The bliss factor went down many notches upon that understanding, so much for oedipal complex. I can¡¯t remember anything about myself or where I am from. It is as if I have common sense but yet I do not know anything at the same time. I can¡¯t see beyond 2 meters. Everything becomes too blurry for me to tell anything. Seem like there is a limit to how much a baby see and can do. Days passed and there was a celebration. It seems like this is done for me. Slowly, I accustom myself to this world that I am in. Moving about as a baby was hard but getting things was harder. However, I learned a trick. ¡°WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!¡± *Hurried footsteps* I started pointing at what I wanted. A book. My mother has appeared. ¡°???????????????????¡± ¡°WAAAAAA!¡± I continued pointing at the book. Sadly, I could not speak. It seemed that my vocal chord has yet to be developed. I acted like a little tyrant in the house. It was the only way I could learn about the world. Days passed once again. I gained a small understanding of this world I am in. There are 20 days a month and there are 4 months a season and 4 season a year. The question came to me, should I act like what I think is a normal child¡¯s behaviour or should I act like I am a supergenius? Then an idea struck me. Be careless. Be smart but make mistakes. After the mistakes, make a big fuss and sulk. Months passed with that planned in my head. I slowly learned the language. I can now understand most of it. I am called marcus by my parents. My mother is called Claire and my father is called Seville. 2 years old. I still snuggle at my mother¡¯s side when I sleep.( Gotta love titties and their softness) I can read write and speak the language now. This world has many tribes and had many different languages in the past but over the years the unification war gave them what we now call as the common language. I am still stuck within the confines of the house as I am too young to be allowed to leave the place alone. I have been warned that there are monsters roaming around and it would be too dangerous if I meet one right now as I have not developed abilities. they called the abilities [the tree]. It is called the tree as you need to nourish it for it to grow and bloom. Even though it is called the tree, each manifested ability may not be a tree. It can be anything. My mother has her¡¯s as a watering can and my father¡¯s ability is an bulb planter. All they could do were conjure it and use it. It seemed that they hard no talent and that their abilities could not be further awakened.To further awaken their abilitlies meant growing a branch and bearing fruits on the tree. There are 20 tiers to the tree and each tier has five branches. On each branch there are 5 fruits. The branches are the active abilities and the fruits are the passive abilities. If the branches never develope, no matter how much you do you will never gain any abilities. 5 years old. Every year, skilled masters travels from village to village to awaken the abilities of each child who has passed the age of five. After watching the awakening of the other kids for the last 2 years, it has finally become my turn. I stepped in line with the other five years old who were all excited as well and awaited for my turn. I stepped into the tent that will tell me my future. The skilled master was a lady in her later 20s. I looked at her in awe as she was much younger than I thought. I always imagined the skilled master to be a old man or something. She smiled and said: ¡°put your left hand on the orb and your right hand facing your right with the palm out and focus your mind on the orb. Imagine a power coming out from the orb and travel through your body then finally come out from the palm of your right hand. It may take a while and it may hurt.¡± I closed my eyes to focus. It took a while to focus my mind on the orb and imagine a power flowing from it into me. I let the power flow into my every being. It a warm tingly feeling that was somehow very soothing. I took the power and finally guided to my right palm. It was a very odd feeling. It was as if something was growing out from my palm and that it felt as if it was an extension of myself that I have that I never knew I had. I opened my eyes to see a surprised master. She was looking at what I had brought about. I looked at it and saw what seemed to be a vine coming out of my hand. It took me by a slight surprise and it faded away almost immediately. The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. I was about to ask about my ability when my world started spinning and faded to black. When I opened my eyes I looked at the same titties that I have been looking at for the past five years hanging before my eyes. ¡°Hi mom, what happened?¡± ¡°You were out for about 15 min. It seems that your ability has caught the eye of the skilled master and she would like you to join her at the academy.¡± ¡°The academy?¡± ¡°Yes. The place where everyone whose ability catches the eye of the skilled master goes to study at.¡± ¡°When do I need to go?¡± ¡°Next season¡± ¡°For how long?¡± ¡°Five years or more.¡± ¡°Then when is the fastest I come home to see you and father again?¡± ¡°Three season and a half season before the school break for half a season and that means 280 days¡± * Looks like I will be missing these titties for a while.* I sat down after lying in her lap for about another 15 min or so. It was rather uneventful other than the slight hiccup that I caused when I was awakened. Of the 20 over kids that were tested, only 8 others were selected to go to the academy. With that it was all over, at the last week of the season a skilled master will pick up the 9 of us and bring us to the academy. For most five years old, it would be the hardest thing for them. Not seeing their parent for 280 day is too much for their young minds and that they would want these last days to never end. For me it was the opposite. I could not wait for the school to start. Being mature in the mind made me pine for the coming education to utilizing these vine that I now barely can control. Everyday, I visualized how I would use the vine and how I manipulate it. I was strictly told by the skilled master not to conjure my vine as it is too taxing for my body now. **at home** "Mother, why is it that I am the only one that fainted?" "It is because your tree was corporeal and that is usually something that will happen only after training and cultivating" It is then that I realize that most people who first awaken their tree would have a ethereal form of their tree and not like me who has a corporeal form already. It is supposed to take weeks of training and cultivating before it becomes corporeal. Then i asked once again ¡°Mother, if the corporeal form needs training and cultivating, why is it that it is done at five years old? is it not dangerous for us?¡± ¡°You see, it is safer that way. some of us have beast type tree and some of us have tree that has an elemental type. imagine having fire coming out of the tree and something catches fire, would that be dangerous?¡± ¡°Ahhh that would hurt.¡± ¡°Now you know why it has to be done when you are still so young and not older?¡± ¡°Yes, but what about those that awaken their abilities accidentally?¡± ¡°That is why the cultivation method is not taught to kids until they go to an academy to learn it.¡± ¡°It is just sad that my tree can¡¯t grow up.¡± My mother¡¯s eyes glistened with a tint of sadness while saying so. "But at least i have you as my little miracle.¡± A little smile spreading across her face almost immediately after ¡°It is just a little odd how your father and I are both objects while you are a plant.¡± I looked at her and wondered as well and then a spark of inspiration hit me! ¡°I know! You are a watering can and father is a bulb planter, you two have one thing in common, growing a plant! And that is where I come in!¡± With that said, I stood in front of her with the most awesome and suave pose a five year old can give. ¡°Hahaha Seville, come in! You need to hear what your son just said and see how he is acting now.¡± From outside ¡° Coming! What did he say?¡± My father then walks in from outside a moment later and sees my awesome pose. He then hears the story from my mother and smiles. He walks over and then hugged me and my mother together. ¡° That¡¯s our son.¡± Come to think of it, how old was I when I got transferred to this body? I can¡¯t imagine myself dying and be reborn and grow up to be who I am now at the age of five but what can i do? it is a god¡¯s joke i guess, incomplete mind wipe. AN: although it is seems hard for a kid to understand a word like corporeal and ethereal for a kid that is five, in some languages, like chinese, they are just one word and would seem simple enough for a parent to say to a kid. eg. ?(real)which can mean corporeal ?(false) which can also loosely mean ethereal . Chapter 2 : Flock *kakkak* *kakkak* *kakkak* *kakkak* *kakkak* *kakkak* A tiger-horse drawn wagon rolls alone upon the aisle that leads up to my house. ¡°Marcus, your ride is here.¡± ¡°Ok.¡± ¡°It is good to see you again marcus. I hope you have followed my instruction to not summon your tree¡± ¡°Yes.¡± ¡°Good. Now with that settled, time for all of us to head to the academy. We have 3 days of journey ahead of us.¡± I look around at the eight other kids and see that seven of them were all red-eye. It seems that parting is really harsh for them. I can¡¯t blame them, we are all age five from how everyone sees it. Inside this wagon there was really nothing much to see. there were the 9 of us and 3 adult, 1 sleeping, 1 driving the wagon and the skilled master. The wagon was just a cloth roofed cart that is 18 hands wide, 22 hands tall and 30 hands long, enough to seat three time the amount of kids and still have plenty of space to spare. It bugged me as to why we needed this much space when there is so little of us so i asked. ¡°Erm master, why is it that this wagon is so big? There is only 12 of us so why do we need such a big wagon?¡± ¡°¡±Call me Amy. I am of the house of Johnson. You see, we are travelling almost non-stop until we reach a town and the next town is about 1.5 days ride away. You kids need to sleep and where are you doing to do that if the wagon is not big enough? Any smaller all of you will have to hug each other to sleep.¡± The other 8 kids who were listening in resounded in unison: ¡°NOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooo¡± Amy gave a wry smile ¡°When I first went to the academy many years ago, i sat with 3 villages¡¯ kids. there were over 20 of us in a wagon half the size of this wagon. It was fine when we sat but when we slept, we were so close to each other that we cuddle back to back. Not to mention, the road is bumpy. we ended up all colorful when we reached the academy. Oh and who kicks when sleeping please raise your hand.¡± After a brief moment of peace. ¡°No one? I am going to tie up the one who kicks another at night when sleeping if i find out¡± After another brief moment of peace. ¡°Good. Guess no broken teeth this time round then. On my last trip i had one that kicks when sleeping and he took out another boy¡¯s tooth¡± All the kids covered their mouth that very instant suddenly fearful of the people around them. *That ought to make sure they sleep with enough space from each other during the night.* ¡°No need to worry about it for now. We are not going to be sleeping so soon. While we are moving, everyone keep an eye out and look around. We do not know when a wild beast will appear as we travel. Since there are 9 of you, I will have the four of you look out for me while I rest for a moment. Wake me up if anything happens.¡± Other than the occasional toilet breaks, meal breaks and wagon sickness from all that uneven group, the ride to the next town was rather uneventful. We were just about done with the forest that we were passing through and about another 2 hours ride away from the town. It was just when I thought all will be fine for this trip, distant screeching was heard coming from the west and it was coming closer. ¡°Hhhhhhheeeeeelllllllpppppppppp!!!¡± ¡°HHHHHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEllllllllllllllllpppppppppppppppp!!!¡± ¡°HHHHHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP!!!¡± Amy furrowed her eyebrow as she understood the problem. Wild beast attack and they are heading this way. ¡°Ok kids stay in the wagon and make no noise. Ivan, wake up Drake. The 2 of you protect the kids. Marcus, you are the only kid here that has a corporeal tree right now, if anything happens i permit you to use it. Remember you only have enough power for one hit and you will faint. Aim for the largest part of the beast so that you will not miss.¡± Ivan stops the wagon and gets up while saying: ¡°OK. I will go wake him up.¡± ¡°OK. I will do my best but if the beast is too strong for us what do we do?¡± ¡°my tree is a fire crane so if it bad, shout for me to alert me. i will make it fly over as soon as possible to help.¡± With that amy rushed over to help knowing that every minute counts. The clock ticked away as we awaited her return, after about 10 minutes or so, the screeching noises lessened but it got louder. Everyone understood that the battle would be soon upon us. the nine of us huddled together while the 2 adults kept a lookout on the 2 side of the wagon If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. SCREEEEEEECH~~ A small bird appeared within our line of sight followed by another and then another, they numbered to hundreds in a brief moment of time. They were really loud given their numbers. Ivan looked at the birds with dismay ¡°Nature and Chaos hybrid. Everyone be careful. They may not be fast but they have the numbers. This won¡¯t be easy battle.¡± all the other kids flinched at those words and huddled together even closer with that in mind, a horse-buffalo appeared before Ivan and started charging towards those bird. A buffalo-horse appeared before Drake but it did not charge but circled around the wagon. Ivan:¡°We are brothers. Our father¡¯s tree is a horse and our mother¡¯s tree is a buffalo. so we kind of took on a little of each.¡± Drake added with a chuckle: ¡°Our father keeps insisting that he¡¯s is a stallion and not just any horse.¡± ¡°Who here has a fire or light element tree? We may need some distraction later.¡± ¡°Me.¡± a girl whom I think the name is Janice meekly replied ¡°Later, i want you to send your tree towards the forest in Amy¡¯s direction. Lesson kids, the interesting thing about Nature and Chaos type hybrid, Nature type goes towards light usually, and Chaos type has a certain level of unpredictability. These two combined has a funny weakness we can use, bright object attracts their attention and they will charge towards it usually. So when i say now, send it out.¡± ¡°Erm, OK. i will try my best.¡± Brute force. Absolute brute force. That was all I could think of as I saw Ivan¡¯s horse-buffalo charging through the birds. The birds meshed into each other with its charge and those that survived were crushed under its hooves. Every minute hundreds fell, but hundreds took its place. Soon a circle of birds gathered and there was still no end in sight of them. PHOEBEEEEEEEEEEE~~~~~ A torrent of flame flew by leaving a fiery path in its wake. PHOEBEEEEEEEEEEE~~~~~ Another torrent appeared and hundreds died again. With each call, the forest slowly became silent. Amy soon appeared with her crane as she lead those survivors she just saved to the wagon. ¡°Looks like we are going to have a good haul. Can¡¯t let the kids do it though, they are still too young. As a reward for saving you folks, we are taking all the core fragments. we will spend another hour here to rest up and collect the core fragments¡± As the Survivors patched themselves up, Amy, Drake and Ivan went and cleaned up the battlefield. the survivors soon joined in to collect the fragments. ¡°423 small fragments, 85 medium fragments and 20 large fragments. not a bad haul.¡± Ivan said after counting for the third time. ¡°let''s see, the 9 of you will get a little of each. We got plenty more than i expected. You kids will need them soon anyway. You survivors have no complaints right? ¡± Amy glared at them with daggers in her eyes The bunch of survivors tensed up and all agreed. The wagon soon started moving again. I looked at the little shiny stones in my hands, 20 small fragments, 5 medium fragments and 1 large fragment. I wonder what they are used for and asked but none of the adults were willing to say. They all said the same thing though: ¡°You will learn about them in the academy.¡± during the 2 hour journey to town, the survivors talked about how they ended up in that predicament. After listening to their story, I agreed that they were idiots. They wanted to breed those birds. many people have tried and succeed. They wanted to do the same too. They managed to sneak in to grab those bird eggs. At first they grabbed about 10 of them and all was fine but they got greedy. They saw a bigger egg that they knew belong to the royal line of those birds and they wanted to breed that too. All the breeders know not to touch the royal line because the whole nest will come after them if the eggs is taken. They saw that it was guarded but parents were nowhere in sight. they picked off the guards and stole the eggs. They left immediately but they did not know the eggs was marked. They left a scent trail for the birds to follow which resulted in what we saw. ¡°So what happened to the royal eggs?¡± i asked. The survivors looked at Amy and said: ¡°Not with us.¡± Drake and Ivan smirked and Amy looked as if nothing happened. The other kids did not understand but i understood that Amy now hold those eggs. Not bad for a chick. chapter 3 Reaching the next town, we rested for a night there. Finally there was a proper bed and after the hectic journey and the (un)fortunate/unexpected windfall/accident. These events tired out the five years old mind more than anything else. After a brief dinner and a good long shower, all the kids were knocked out. It was not until the next day near noon that we took off. During this second half of the journey, nothing much happened and it became a sightseeing journey for all the kids once again. Finally we reached the academy. All of us were bored to tears already. We have all finally arrived with a sore and fairly bruised butt. Can you imagine sitting on a wooden board that trembles, jerks and bounce in random interval? It is like someone slapping your butt for fun. Except it lasted for 3 days. Maybe that sounds fine but can you imagine that on a five year old? My soft tender butt! I feel like i can¡¯t get married anymore. Looking around, i see rows of kids lining up and waiting for placement. There are hundreds if not thousands of kids! If there are only 10 kids a village, just how many villages are there? Asking amy, ¡°how many villages are there if there are that many kids?¡± ¡°We have villages, towns, districts, counties and states and we currently reside in a county. 5 village matches 1 town and 20 town matches to 1 district and 5 district makes 1 county and 20 county makes 1 state.Usually we have 10 kids from a village, 20 from a town, 50 from a district and 200 from a county and over a thousand from state. From all the kids here, we split everyone based on their type of tree.¡± ((10x5+20)x20+50)x5+200= 7450 Doing some complex math for a five year old, it seems that there are at least 7450 five years old here. The day slowly trickled away as batch by batch students are screened again and assigned to their specialty. The students are split by elements. The common ones are earth, fire, water, air, light, dark, spirit and there''s the others. Most students do not belong in just one element. For example my vine current belongs to the earth and water elements. Should one day my tree evolve and gain healing ability, i will have a new sub-element, the light element. If it gains something that belongs to another element it will gain that subtype. When it was finally my turn, Amy came along as well. ¡°Eric, this boy marcus would not be summoning his tree, we do not want to waste time seeing another fainter. You still have many more to screen. He is talented but i do not want him to grow up in the academy with everyone staring. His tree is a vine of nature element so he will be in the earth and water element classes.¡± ¡°A fainter? Good prospects then. Throw him with the elites?¡± ¡°No. Those rich kids will make fun of his vine instead.It is still too weak. We do not want another case of 5 years ago.¡± ¡°True. Put him among the irregulars then. They are the only ones whose tree flickers from corporeal and incorporeal form. That would be the best camouflage for him.¡± ¡°That works too. Watched and given extra attention while not being disturbed by the elites as the elites do not want to get hurt. Good plan. Guess we will do that.¡± Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author. ¡°...¡± ¡°...¡± ¡°...¡± ¡°...¡± The conversation went on to further discuss about my placement and where do i stay to keep me hidden from view. Sign. Politics. Hearing the continued conversation i understood that there are many factions in this school. Given that there are about at least 35000 students at any one point, certain ¡®governing¡¯ groups must exist. Amy and Eric belong to the group Osprey and my hometown is under their watch. They have lots to discuss so as to make it seem as long as a normal observation of student¡¯s tree. Just as we were leaving, Amy instructed again and again. ¡°Remember Marcus, if anyone ask you to reveal your tree, say that you can¡¯t control your tree and that you are an irregular. They will avoid you as they do not want to get hurt.¡± When it was all finalized, i was assigned to first year level of plant, nature, earth, water, basic combat classes. With that which is done, i waited for what is to happen next. There was not many of us from the village but there was plenty of other students. All in all it took another half a day before everyone was assigned to a dorm. Everyone from the village was scattered apart as we all had different type of tree. The core of my classes revolve around plants so i reside in the dorm full of people with similar tree. The place is huge! It takes five minutes to run from end to end. After a simple round of exploration and touring, almost all the kids crashed on their beds when night fell. Common thing about plant type ability holders, we tire easily during the night like plants. *Clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-clank-* Groans and moans were heard all over the place as it was first time for most kids to wake up in such a rude and loud way and many proceeded to crying. After a brief period the older kids came over to pacify them. All of them had been through this very same rude awakening and understood the pain. Loneliness.No family, no friends and no one to comfort them is a very painful thing. After a brief period of settling down, everyone proceeded to the halls for the meals. Two simple meat buns, not as tasty as the ones i had at home. After the meal we got around the campus. Even though the halls looked huge on the inside, the halls where just an average looking building from the outside. Each of the hall is expanded by spatial enchantments. Come to think of it, the sleeping quarters was a rather plain mansion but yet over 1000 could sleep there. Everything around was rather pack and close to each other but i do wonder, if there is spatial enchantment, why is there no spatial travel? But since no one can give me an answer as of right now, i guess i have to wait until i learn about it in the future. now all that is left is just waiting to get to classes. chapter 4 - class double post. long over due. Chapter 4 -class ¡°All right i am mika and kids today all of you will be learning a cultivation technique suited to your needs. Plant users will follow me and come over to this corner of the classroom. I will guide you on your cultivation skill. Animal type will go to teacher rachael at the back. Elemental students will be outside with andrew. For the rest of you not in these groups your specific trainers will come and assist you.¡± Seats shuffles as the kids stood up and gathered at the respective areas. ¡°Kids, what are plants? Are they alive? What do they do? Do they give life? Think carefully. Give yourselves a minute to think about what it can do.¡± After what seemed like forever¡­. ¡°Come here little girl, what is your name?¡± ¡°Ariel.¡± ¡°Tell me ariel, what is your tree?¡± ¡° A flower¡± ¡°Do you know what type of flower is that?¡± Ariel shakes her head. ¡°Show us your flower¡± Ariel brought out her hand and willed a small daisy into existence ¡°Ariel your flower is a daisy. Is your daisy pretty?¡± Ariel nods her head again. ¡°Close your eyes, can you imagine your daisy in your head?¡± After a brief pause, ariel nods her head once again. ¡°Imagine a wind blowing by, can you see your daisy moving with the wind? After a brief second of pause, ariel once again nodded her head. Everyone watched in amazement as her daisy slowly started to sway. No one said anything as teacher mika put her finger to her lips and stared everyone into silence. ¡°Now can you imagine your daisy starting to grow taller and bigger?¡± Ariel once again nodded. Her eyes still closed and no one could say anything under the watchful gaze of teacher mika. Everyone watched as the daisy grew taller and bigger. ¡°Ok ariel, that is very good. Now open your eyes and look at your daisy.¡± Ariel opened her eyes and look at her daisy. But in her surprise because of the difference, her daisy disappeared into nothingness once again. ¡°Now as all of you can see, it is very simple. All you need to do is imagine what it can do. Today we will focus on doing what you just see until the end of the class. Marcus, because you are an irregular, you will not be summoning your tree but you will continue to do the same. Also for your tree i want you to imagine it growing from a seed. You must understand that your tree is a vine and since we do not know what kind of vine it is, your imagination will shape it into what it can be. As for the rest of you, when you are not sure , feel free to ask me anything. One at a time.¡± With a quick visualization, i imagine a very very small seed. So small i can barely see it. Slowly, a vine comes out. But which way should my vine grow? How does it grow? That does not seem right. Something does not fit. What went wrong? I kept visualizing the vine in my head but i could not understand what is wrong with the visualization. ¡°Teacher mika, what does a vine look like as a seed?¡± Teacher mika stumbled at that question. There are many types of vines and there are all kinds of seeds for vines and to ask for a type of seed is something hard to explain. Especially in my case where nothing is know about my vine and that it is too dangerous to bring out my vine. After a brief thought,teacher mika replied:¡± since you are still not allowed to summon your tree, i cannot tell you much on how it looks like. however we will let you learn about vines from books. Come with me later and i will bring you to the bibliotheca to let you learn about them. Can your read?¡± ¡°Yes¡± ¡°Good. That makes things easier.¡± As the class ended, three other kids had the same issue of visualizing and came along to the bibliotheca. ¡°Let''s see. Plants, plants, plants. There we are, leaves. Root, fruit and finally vines. Ok now we have them. Take them back to read. If there are any questions, ask them in the next class. after collecting the books, everyone headed down for the combat classes. Everyone has to learn about combat even if it is just the basic. knowing how to block and how to attack is a need to know in this kingdom. people with the abilities high enough for combat needs to protect their loved ones from danger and also protect themselves. combat class was somewhat easy for now. we mainly needed to build stamina and for that we had ¡°jogging.¡± it was more of a game of ¡°Cat and Mouse¡± actually. but since everyone had different amount of stamina, the class slowly split up so that the fast chases the fast and the slow chases the slow. it was tiring but fun. how hard do you want to tax kids around the age of 8? that was just the basic, after all that fun it was the serious stuff. the proper training depended on the type of tree. those with trees that were weapon/armor oriented tree would focus on combat the revolves around it. animal/plant type would train on how to use their tree. those with special types of tree have their own specific training menus for combat. The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. once again, because i am not allowed to summon my tree, i had to go for the next best thing. ropes and traps. it is quite interesting as to how to build traps. i should add that to my mental training menus to make it less boring when i do my cycles. and as for ropes, well vines do look like ropes so why not. hand to hand combat can come later anyway. after that came the elemental classes. they were all boring though. basics about the different elements, where to find them what they look like, creatures that are the embodiments of those elements and where to find them ETC ETC. after hearing about them for 2 hours, every five year old had become brain dead. first was cultivation. that was not too hard for most, then was the jogging, which was physically tiring and then there was finally the elemental classes that gave everyone information overload. i simply listened to the basic and ignored the rest. we are all going to learn about the further details anyway in the future classes. going back to the dorm after the meal, i started reading up on the books, i found nothing that looked like the vine i had. however, based on the books the common factors about vines was how it can be used. flexible like a rope and it has the ability to cling onto almost anything. they have sensor like abilities to help them find thing to cling. some even have thorns. and then there is the woody ones that grow thick and huge. with that in mind, i slowly build up the stages of a vine. from the mustard seed to the lone tendril that sprouts out and clings on to the first thing it could. but given that this is mental space, there is nothing for it to cling to so it coils itself then lashes out its tendril feelers repeatedly while growing longer and longer. nothing could help it as it continued to grow longer and longer while finding a thing to cling to. then somewhere along the way a bud grows then came the flowers from it. From the flowers came the fruits and then finally the seeds. I stumbled at this point. How does a plant die? with no answers, all i could do was leave the plant to fade from my mind while i restarted this process. The cycle repeated itself . It was a long slow process. When I completed the first 1 cycle of rebirth, it took over 20 minutes. According to the teachers and seniors, if you work hard and is proficient in cultivation, you can complete more than 10 cycles at the same time 10 times at half the time if not lesser time. As a light recap and understanding cultivation is about the flexibility of the mind. It is like a reservoir. You draw from the reservoir to summon your tree. The cultivation method is like a dam. The more you build it the more it can store.It is also what that limits the flow of power. It explains why I fainted during the first summoning. Small reservoir with big drain and no limiter. It does not explain why I summoned a corporeal tree on my first try though, guess the force is strong in me. With those in mind I decided to train the flexibility of my mind. I imagined the first vine in my head. It grew to a mental equivalent of ? hand tall. Next I imagined it waving left and right. No leaves nothing. Just a vine waving left and right. Next I tried to imagine another seed. Step 1. Success. So I went to step 2. Growing the 2nd vine. However, when I started growing the 2nd vine, the image of the first vine disappeared from my mind. Guess step 2 was a failure. No complains there. I just started and I am doing ¡°advanced¡± training. Knowing where my current limits are, I dedicated 1 cycle worth of time to step 2 as part of my training as well. Every 10 cycles I would visualize a 2nd vine. with every set of 10+1 cycle, the time it took got shorter. After a month of cultivation, i finally had a breakthrough with the 2nd vine. However, that only worked if i kept the image of the first vine still and unmoving. it was still a breakthrough though. i lost the 1st vine¡¯s image after the 2nd vine grew to ? hand tall of mental size. not bad i would say but i still have a long way to go. Chapter 5 - evaluation 8 months have passed since i started school. Everyday, 4 hours of class, 2-4 hours of ¡°combat¡± and the rest divided between sleep and cultivation. I must say i have made some progress. Each cycle now takes 2 minutes or so to complete now. I still wonder about how plants die. However, according to what everyone says, most plants do not die. Or at least not on their own. They simply stop growing taller, from being able to transport the water and nutrients up. They die if they run out of nutrients. Or they die if the environment does not suit them. Some simply hibernate when the environment does not suit them. I plan to add to my future mental training menu ¡°environments¡± to temper my vine. No point seeing my vine vanish the moment it touches fire or get frozen. Other than that, i have progressed from 1 still vine of ? hand tall and 1 still vine of ? hand tall to 4 vines of ? hand tall and 1 still vine of ? hand tall. If it was the moving vine, i could only manage 2 ? hand tall vines that sway in the same direction i get way too distracted when i make the 3rd vine sway. I still can¡¯t make them move individually but i will get to that someday. For now it is the bi annual evaluation. I still have yet to summon my vine ever since that first time where i fainted. Everyone has to go through this evaluation to mark the progress that we all are in. It is something like exams or so to speak. Pass and you get to learn the more advanced stuff. According to the ¡°irregular¡± seniors, it is only in these evaluation where we get cleared to use the core fragments to improve our cultivation. I am told this because i am known as an irregular to everyone but the need to know. Not even the teachers know about it though. Stupid politics. According to the irregular seniors, what we are missing is control. We can¡¯t control our output and so the results can be explosive and literally too. One irregular senior who controlled a flame type tree burned and scarred himself when summoned his tree.(A healer took care of the scar though) everyone¡¯s tree is supposed to not hurt the person that uses it unless it has gained the ability from a branch or fruit that requires some form of special price to use it. The senior had not gained a branch and yet it has already hurt him. Due to that, everyone that was tagged ¡°irregular¡± are not allowed to summon their tree unless they have to and that a healer would be called upon incase there is any accidents. As the saying goes, tread not the pink panther lair, it is only luck that which saved your life. Sometimes it is best not to try too hard to succeed. Enough of the personal mumbling though. I am nervous and i am next in line for the trial. *Knock-knock* ¡°Enter¡± Entering the room, i stood before a panel of 3. Am eric and another lady which i presume is the healer. ¡°Ah. Marcus good to see you again. Has your cultivation been going well? Joyce, this is the boy i talked about during our last trip.¡± Joyce looked at me closer and asked ¡° how long do you take to complete one basic cultivation cycle now and how long did you take when you 1st started?¡± I looked at amy and she nodded. Given consent, i stated. ¡°I started at 20 minutes a cycle now i am at 2 minutes a cycle. I manage about 3 hour a day at least when not in class.¡± ¡°Did i not say he would be impressive?¡± Amy beamed at me. ¡°I must say that is impressive. 75 cycles a day at least. You goal would be to achieve 250 cycles a hour by the next examination.¡± Eric chipped in. ¡°Now back to the main topic, marcus, remember that feeling when you first summoned your tree? Now do the same again while visualizing your tree at the pace you normally do during one cycle of cultivation and hold that last visualization for us to see. We do not have all day sadly.¡± Thinking back to that first time, the strange yet comforting feeling slowly drifted out of my palm. First came the seed then came the vine. From the vine came the buds and from the buds came the flower. Lastly from the flowers came the fruits and from the fruits came the seeds again. Once the seeds were formed, i held that image in my head and opened my eye to look at it. True enough a ? hand tall vine was floating above my palm just like i visualized. ¡°That¡­ that is just so small! Marcus what happened to your vine? When you first summoned your vine it thicker and much longer than this.¡± Looking at how it is, i simply said. ¡° When it was big and thick i fainted after a brief moment so i thought if i made it smaller i would not faint that soon. The last i check the mental image broke when i made one grow to 15 hands tall and 1 hand wide. Would you like to see a 10 hand tall and 1 hand wide version?¡± Joyce looks at amy and asked. ¡° Is he really only five and going six?¡± ¡°Yes¡± Not knowing if she was answering joyce or me, i closed my eyes and began focussing on my vine once again, willing it to grow to 10 hh x 1 hh. Holding that image in my head i opened my eyes i looked at the small tower with pride for a brief moment then i saw the world spin and i was out once again¡­ Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.Joyce: ¡°Looks like more work for me today. How shall we promote him? Advance classes? Can we permit him to use the core fragments? Hunting trip?¡± Amy¡± i permit the use of core for him. He already has a small collection of it.¡± Eric ¡° i permit the advance nature class for him and not the other classes.¡± Joyce ¡°cores?¡± Amy ¡°he has some wren core fragments. I did not think he will use them so soon though. But not so big a surprise there. He did faint on the first try.¡± Eric ¡° no hunting trip for him yet. If he faints on a trip to protect others, they will have to carry a dead weight around for a while.¡± Amy ¡° there is no denying that. We will see how it goes in the next evaluation for that. He is still too young anyway. He has the power of a 8 but the mind of a fiver. He will need more guidance.¡± Eric ¡°should we assign him a instructor? He is not like the others. I can''t see his mental limit from what he can do. There is no doubt that he is talented but if he keeps fainting from over exertion without knowing where his current limit is we can¡¯t put him in the exhibition tournament.¡± Joyce ¡° can¡¯t deny that. Anyone who has been labeled irregular usually are sought after once their powers are better contained. The current ice clan head is an irregular too. No one messes with her unless they want to go home frosted over. And thanks to her leaking power, she still looks so young even though she is now over 40.¡± Amy ¡° i vote for daniel as instructor. His tree is a viper vine. He knows a thing or two about vines and he is able to control the size of his tree as well. He is the best fit from our faction.¡± Eric ¡° what about fraven from the eagle faction? He was another fainter. He might be able to help him with regulating power.¡± Joyce ¡°i will go with daniel. It is better to keep things to our own circle. Amy, do you think you can get your family to adopt him? He will be needing a strong backer in the future and it is best we take him early. If he gets discovered, the other families will be all over him and it will be much harder to have him for ourselves.¡± Amy ¡° i can try the best i can do is get them to pay attention to him for the exhibition tournament. And since he won¡¯t be in it for this year. I can only make a suggestion and nothing else. Not every fainter gains a branch. The family does not want to waste time and resources. Less than half the students will gain a branch in the first place and much lesser for fainters.¡± Joyce ¡° guess there is that. So let''s summarize, advance nature class and daniel for instructor. Core usage permitted. Hunting trip for gathering core not permitted. Still no summoning allowed unless 2 adults are present with permission.¡± Amy ¡° pretty much that is it for him for now, wake him up joyce. Only your tree can to that among the 3 of us¡± Joyce proceeds to waking marcus up. Joyce summons her tree and used it to channel power to help wake marcus up. After channeling for over 30 seconds she could only exclaim ¡° guys! We have a monster here! I have channelled more than a quarter of my power into him and he is still not showing any signs of waking up. Most fainters around his age only need one tenth of this!¡± After pouring in about half her power, i finally started to wake up. ¡°Urggg¡­.¡± Looking up at joyce and the others, i dreaded the outcome. ¡°I guess i failed.¡± ¡°Yes. You still have a long way to go since you do not know your limit. You will now be punished with extra classes with daniel for 2 hours a day until the next evaluation. You will go for advance nature class in addition to the basic nature class. You are permitted to use the cores you already have but you are not allowed to go on hunting trips to get more. Other than that there is nothing else to add for now. Go back and rest. You are not allowed to practice cultivation for the rest of the day.¡± With nothing better available for me, i headed back to the dorm. Joyce ¡°his reserve is twenty times larger than those his age and yet he still faints so easily within seconds, just what kind of imagination does he have? To have such a foundation and that is when he still have no branches. Just how far will he go. I feel so jealous of his gift. By the way amy. What is the core type that was given to him ?¡± Amy ¡° chao nature hybrid wern. He is of nature, earth and water. If he now gains chaos, his road to success will really be rough. But i have a good feeling about it.¡± Joyce ¡°good feeling?¡± ¡°Remember what is the properties of wern? Speed and numbers. If he gains either of that for his first branch it will be jackpot. Maybe i should get him some royal wern core fragments. He was there anyways when we obtained those eggs¡± Eric ¡°we will see about that but for now let us proceed with the evaluation. We still have many kids to go¡± ¡°Right¡± ¡°Right¡± chapter 6 - spirit master spirit master all alone in the dorm and not allowed to cultivate, i was bored to tears by the end of 10 minutes. i am fully charged thanks to the treatment i was given and now i can¡¯t rest. now fully charged and filled with active imagination i kept wondering about what went wrong. thinking back many times over, i understood some key points. i made a big vine without knowing my limits. the drain when i mentally visualize does not correspond to what i actually manifest. i got greedy something must be wrong with my method of summoning my vine. i will need to compare it with the others to understand where i went wrong. my vine is small and yet it drains me so much looking at these points i decided to relook at the steps i had when i summoned my vine. unlike the first time which was from the orb into me and from every part of me into the summon, the second time was purely from me into the summon. step 1 was to draw it from oneself. step 2 was to bring it out from the body into the summon. it was just 2 steps. or at least that is what i was told and what everyone is doing. but something must be wrong for me. it does not suit me or at least something is still missing. firstly, my vine is small and yet it drains me so much. it can be one of the few possibilities that i can think of. problem 1, i have a small reserve. problem 2, my summon puts a huge drain on my reserve. problem 3, i am doing something wrong. problem 4, a combination of the previous 3. there is nothing i can do about problem 1, i am not allowed to cultivate for now while resting. from problem 2 i have a huge drain. i may have to find a way to limit the flow of power to my summon. as for problem 3 there is nothing i can do about it. i can do nothing about what i yet to know is at fault. looking back, i wondered what was different from drawing power out from the orb and drawing power out of myself. i started visualizing that feeling again that warm feeling that flowed from the orb into me. with that image i visualized what i did just earlier. the feeling was just different. but what was it that was different? i could not tell. however, just from the feeling it was plain. it felt like pure energy only. but it felt empty like it was missing something. something that i can feel in the power i visualized and not in the one from the orb. something felt wrong though. like i was holding power the wrong way. there was nothing i could do about it. with no prior training and strict instruction to not manifest it there was nothing i could do about it. with nothing better in mind, i decided to visualize my mental realm. not being allowed to cultivate did not mean i could not take a walk in my own mind to see what was different after the second manifestation. visualizing my mental realm, i began sounding off in my head. sending a pulse of energy in one direction and feeling it travel, mapping my realm at the same time. little did i know i am using a modified form of a very advanced technique of spirit echolocation usable only by tier 3 spirit masters. most tier 3 masters can''t use it as their mental realm is still not as powerful. this method that i was using however, was less practical but drains much lesser of power. this technique is supposed to send a wave of energy out in all direction within the mental realm from one point of origin. this technique like its namesake is a echolocation ability, meaning that it can be used as a detection ability. after sending multiple pulses, i noticed one peculiarity, the lump of power that was fired of was passing through 2 types of energy. one that i could feel belong to me and the other that was not. not knowing what the other could be i pondered hard for a five year old. what could have caused this. sitting down in the room, i could not figure out what could be the cause. with that being still an unknown, i started pacing about in the room. no one was going to be back so soon anyway. after pacing about for the umpteenth time, i paced into the corridor and that was to no avail. with that in irony, i paced back all the way to the examination hall to ask Amy. waiting near the door to where the evaluation is done, after multiple kids entered and left, eric guided one of the kids out and saw me waiting outside. he looked at me bemused with a raised eyebrow and walked over. ¡°why are you still here? i thought we told you to go back and rest. why are you back here?¡± ¡° I have a question and i think it would be best to ask Amy.¡± ¡°why her and not anyone else? her element is not the same as you so how can she help?¡± ¡° I do not know who else to ask for this question of mine.¡± ¡°wait here then. i will talk to her about it.¡± Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! Eric walks back into the hall to talk to Amy. ¡°Amy, Marcus is back and he has a question to ask. let him in?¡± ¡°i guess it is fine. we three need a break anyway. let him in.¡± Eric got back and brought me back into the hall. ¡°Marcus what is your question?¡± ¡° I was bored and was visualizing my mental realm. you said i was not allowed to do cultivation and is supposed to rest but i can¡¯t sleep so i visualized what my mental realm was like in the meantime. i was bouncing multiple pulses of energy in my head then after some time i realized that it was passing through 2 types of energy. one that i could feel belong to me and the other that was not. i am not sure what to do about it so i came back to ask.¡± Eric, Joyce and Amy were all stumped and stupefied by my reply. it only took them a moment to understand and replicate what i did in their mental realm. they realized that i just used a modified form of spirit echolocation. Amy gave Joyce a bemused face. ¡°looks like you have to be his instructor as well. he seems to be a spirit master as well in the future.¡± ¡°what is a spirit master?¡± Joyce looked at me and smiled. ¡° someone whose spirit is strong and sensitive. not only that, they have the ability to control and use spirit energy without channeling it through their tree to use it. only one in ten masters are spirit masters and only one in one hundred is a natural. and you are a natural. not only that you rival a tier three spirit master in ability. a one in a thousand if not a one in a million level genius. even if you never gain a branch all the major families would want you and invest in you heavily to get you.¡± Joyce then grabs me firmly and told me grimly and firmly. ¡° You are only five and you have that level of ability. it is an ability to die for and even kill for. you will not tell others about this until the day when you can protect yourself.¡± Amy then adds ¡°from now on you will be under my personal protection and from osprey¡¯s protection. however, all these will be in secret. you will not tell anyone about it. not even the teachers and other instructors. only the 4 of us in this hall and Daniel and one or two of the higher ups will know about this. Joyce will be with you when Daniel is having training sessions with you. she will be giving you spirit master¡¯s training while you are with Daniel.¡± ¡°we will have to make some changes for today then. he will be with us while we are having the evaluation so that he can convert all my spirit energy without further risk.¡± ¡°OK Marcus, try this visual these two different powers in your mental realm. one that is yours and one that is not yours. visualize separating them so that your power is gathered into a ball and those that are not is expelled out. then i want you to visualize a hole opening up from the ball a small portion of those powers that are not to be be eaten up by the hole and close up. then slowly visualize it spinning and mixing together until all of it becomes just like your power. i want you only mix a small bit at a time. there can be no rush you understand me?¡± ¡°yes¡± ¡°good. now sit on the floor here next to me so that i can monitor you while the evaluation goes on.¡± with that i sat next to her and the evaluation continued as per normal with me inside the hall. it was a boring task. eat a small bubble and mix. eat a small bubble and mix. after doing about 100 bubbles of power, i decided to pick up the pace. i split my collated ball of power into two and started doing 2 bubbles a time. everything seemed to be fine and after another 100, i decided to bring up the pace and split the bubbles to 4. after another 200 bubbles i decided to split again. but after in doing so i realized that i slowed down instead and returned back to 4 bubbles. quickly and efficiently, i picked up in pace. it was like sanding down a rock with sand. you chip a rock and put the chipped pieces among the sand and started spinning the sand to grind the chipped pieces until it turns to sand. an idea hit me while i was ¡®sanding¡¯ it down. i was not maximizing the ¡°space¡± in each bubble. i could grind more than one chipped piece in each bubble. with that i doubled if not tripled my speed in mixing the powers together. Joyce who sat next to me observed from the side while evaluating the others could only turn her head in surprise each time my speed pick up by a little. it was her powers i am mixing with so she was very much aware what is going on. using her spirit force, Joyce channeled a message to Amy : He just went from Priority 10 to Priority 5 chapter 7 - little man In her mind Amy had to think about many things.There are thousands of members in the osprey faction from the lowest of members and their families to the upper echelons. The lowest of members and their families would not be listed in the priority. To be classed to priority, only one thing mattered. Talent. Some would say you would still need connections to do so but without talent, you would not be even within the radar of the faction. Amy was priority 7 at her best and Joyce is a rank higher at priority 6 due to her ability as a spirit master. Saying that Marcus is priority 5 only meant one thing. Talent. Even so, it was a gamble. He is still too young and giving him that ranking so young could spell trouble. Being a fainter mean he has talent. Many factions would pay attention to him and may approach him in the future. That would be fine. However he is also a spirit master and a young one at that. He is only five and he is able to do a simplified version of spirit echolocation that belongs to the realm of a tier three spirit master. Hiding him would protect him. He is just a commoner and if a royal family member finds out they might kill him as he will be a threat if he does not take their side. She herself did not gain priority ranking until she was 15 and it took her 4 years to get to priority 7. Not only that, competition is tough and if things stay the same for her, she would be falling back to priority 8. There is nothing to complain about in terms of priority but her level of say in decision-making would fall. Bringing Marcus to light would push herself and Joyce to possibly priority 5 as well. They may have stumbled onto a diamond in the rough and they have to polish it in secret as it may be too big for the world to see it so soon. should she adopt him into her house as a protege? he has promise but it may tie him down instead. the youngest spirit master was 8 when he discovered his abilities and was adopted into a house only to die by the age of 15 from assassination. the risk is too great. he is only 5 and if he is discovered before the age of 10 he is most likely to die before he is 15. many things about Marcus kept running in her head and she could not decide. if she followed what joyce said, he may get all the resources that he will need. priority 5 in the faction would do wonders for him. adopting him as protege would give him protection as well. the scale of protection would defer accordingly but the risk is also true. having daniel and Joyce as instructors may be more than enough for him for now. but how about one year down the road? what if his teachers discover his talents that would mean they get that fame instead for the discovery. discovery by school may be safer for now and we can prep him for that. we just need him to hide his talents for now. it is like building a castle, build the foundation big and sturdy so that when it grows it can end up as big as a mountain and still will not collapse like a single lone tree against flood. contemplation was not her strong suit. her talent lies in the midst of battle. in combat. it was not an easy place to be in but she thrives in it.it is peace time right now. the occasional outbreaks of bandits and monster invasions were the only major battles in the recent years. she looked at Joyce and was wondering what she should do next when it dawned on her. joint custody. by having her and Joyce share resources with Marcus, he would have been able to gain more resources while not being tied down by the house and faction turmoils. it is a gamble but the risk to him would be much lower than having him join right upfront at such a young age. we have too many spies running amok. connecting back on Joyce''s spirit connection, she shared her idea. Joyce frowned on the idea but slowly warmed up to it. she enjoyed her status as a priority 6 and she longed to climb to priority 5. not only was she not able to climb to priority 5 she now even has to share resources with this small boy. however, the more she thought about it the more she found the idea more viable. he could be her ticket to priority 4 even. With such a big unpolished gem, if they shape him well, they could even bring him to higher level or even him bringing them to higher level. with that in mind, she agreed to it. i sat next to Joyce until the day ended. sitting there i have slowly and steadily consumed all of the original spirit energy that Joyce had placed in me to wake me up. with nothing else to do i learned the basics of a spirit master from joyce. when spirit is formless it is known as spirit energy. when it acts on an object it is known as spirit force. when we bring about our tree, we call it manifesting as it is it went from formless to gaining a shape. it is also the reason why some of us still have incorporeal tree, there is not enough spirit force in it to make it corporeal. our mind is like a container for spirit energy. we can build and expand the size of this container. there are said to be many ways to cultivate spirit energy. one way would be the most basic of ways, the normal cultivation method that everyone uses. other than that method, spirit masters techniques are classified into different fields. container, purity and density. if you imagine them as an attack, one who expands the container would usually be attacking with tens of swords. trying to overwhelm with quantity. as for the one who focuses on purity it would be attacking with a quality sword, quality over quantity, and one who focus on density would be a dense sword, just raw power. a fainter is special existence. it seems fainter usually has higher purity or density than others. however the main reason they faint is their container. it can''t keep up with the purity or density. it also meant that they have a starting point higher than others. as for me, it seems that i am even more a special existence. my tree is a vine. it is one of the lowest of manifestations and yet i was a fainter. it usually meant that the person has a small container if he faints for manifesting an incorporeal tree even when assisted with that orb and that would not pass the test to be brought to the school. however, in my case, i brought out a corporeal tree at first try when existed. it meant that i had either higher purity or high density for my age and that the container aspect is unable to handle it. it was this unusual situation that got me into the school. i am a big unknown. full of potential and yet a big gamble. even i myself agree that i am an oddity and that i need all the help i can get. as i listened to the teaching of Joyce. i came to a better understanding of what it meant by container. the container is the capacity of the soul. the stronger the soul the more it can store. my soul is many times stronger than those of a five year old. it can¡¯t be helped unlike most five years old, i was already fully aware since birth. guess i got a good head start at that. however, it seemed that i also pack high density to my spirit energy. I have no idea ass to why that is, but i can only account it as just my luck and fortune to be ¡®greater¡¯ than others in this aspect. Joyce did not understand why i am higher in these 2 aspects either but i think i know why. I seemed to be a reincarnated soul of some sort but just missing my past life memories. Not sure why or how that happened but i can only think of it as my good fortune for now. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. ¡°Are you listening to me Marcus?¡± ¡°Eh what? Sorry. I was thinking about the 3 types and did not notice.¡± ¡°As i was saying,it is irrelevant that you think about the 3 types for now. the heavier aspects of things involved are just theories anyway. We have researchers for that. You only have to understand the basics of it and make use of it.¡± ¡°Ehhhhh¡­.¡± ¡°You do not need to think about it too much for now.¡± ¡°Ok¡± For now, i will teach you how to focus your energy. It will improve the quality of your spirit. Hopefully it will stabilize your spirit consumption and allow u to use your tree normally. Listen carefully.¡± ¡°Ready¡± ¡°You remember the feeling when you first drew spirit energy from the orb? This time round imagine the world as if it was orb and draw spirit energy from the world. Don¡¯t do that yet. Listen. I know you are eager to try but u have to listen to everything before you try. Now back to it, after you draw the spirit into yourself you need to store it. But as you know, this energy is different from what you have in you so you have to refine it. Imagine it as a grindstone and push your spirit energy against it. It will be painful so do not draw too much of this natural energy. This works for you and those like you who have nature and spirit affinity. Now try it. I will be on vigil.¡± After listening to that, i started trying it. Pain. all i remembered for the next 3 hours or so was just pain. Nothing more but also nothing less. It was like scratching a chalkboard inside one¡¯s head. Nerve wrecking pain that does not end. The worse part was that it does not weaken. The pain was constant and true. Outside, Joyce kept watch. She knew it would hurt. But she forgot. Marcus was only five. For such a young mind, this pain would be of a totally different level. Marcus had not yet experienced the strifes of life so his will is not yet strong. Most who practiced this method are already in their 20s and would have a fairly steeled mind. It was her fault and she could not stop it. This energy can only be removed by Marcus himself and she can¡¯t interfere. Not that she would not but she cannot. If she send in her spirit energy into Marcus mind to remove that little b of nature energy right now, his spirit energy would be wiped out by her¡¯s in an instant and he may never wake up again. Joyce started tearing up as she watch Marcus''s face contort in pain. It was her fault that he was in this much pain. After the first hour, Marcus slowly began to twitch and spasm. By the second hour, Marcus had gone from the original lotus sitting position to a repeated tonic and clonic seizure. By the third hour, Marcus had lost all bodily control and his limbs would flail about uncontrolled. Blood, sweat, poop, urine and vomit was everywhere. he was soon about to go into arrest but there was nothing she could do. All she could do now was cradle him in her arms and hold his arms and legs close so that no one would get hurt. It was her fault that he was in this pain and it is her fault that he might die. She could feel the turmoil in his spirit energy and there was no way for her to help him. All she could do was just watch him as he slowly grind that spirit energy away. I wanted to scream. This pain just would not go away. I knew that there would pain but i never knew it would hurt so much. This grating pain did not end. What seemed like seconds slowly felt like hours. It felt like time was just never ending pain. It just does not stop. As long as that bit of spirit energy was there there was no way this pain would go away. I have to grind it away. I must grind it away. It was the only thing in my mind pain and grind. If it were a normal spirit master doing this, they would have just finished grinding this energy in one hour. However for Marcus, his spirit energy was still too weak. Most who started this exercise were at least tier 1 spirit master or had that level of spirit energy. Marcus had higher level of spirit than his peers but that was all. He did not have that level of spirit energy yet. He could only do it slowly and steadily. Slowly, i could feel that the end of this pain was coming. In the midst of this pain what felt like hundreds of nails scratching the chalkboard slowly felt like reducing in number. It did not mean that the pain was any lesser. It was like slowly pinching grains out from a bag of grains. You do not notice it. I had to endure. Deep down it felt like if i stop enduring i would die. I could only endure this pain as i kept grinding away. It was a mind twisting pain. An agony. But i endured. That was all i could do. Then finally, it ended. The pain finally ended. I felt that warm pair of arms i was in but i could not move. I was just too tired. All i managed was just a slight jerk before i blanked out. 3 hours. He endured for 3 hours! He managed to endure all that for that long! Holding that frail figure in her arms, she went to the nearest water source to clean him and herself up before heading to the healer¡¯s ward. Upon reaching the ward, the healers almost had a hard time trying to peel Marcus from Joyce. She wanted to see this through. No. she had to see this through. It was her fault that Marcus had become like this. He was battered and bruised and dehydrated. It was because of her that he suffered from all that for 3 hours. It was her fault. She was wrought with self-blame. The healers finally had some leeway after they managed to compromise with her just some hands away so that they could do their job. It was only the next day when Marcus finally woke up. my whole body feels so dense and heavy.i can barely lift my eyelids even. So thirsty and hungry, my mind feels so foggy and clouded. I feel sick. One thing is for sure though it felt like 2 steps forward 3 steps back. Ahh¡­ but such warm and soft pillow¡­ just want to snuggle in it¡­. Snuggle¡­. Joyce tensed up as she held that frail figure lying on her chest. For the whole night she laid next to him watching him. When he woke up she lifted him up and let him rest there thinking that he would be awake and she would apologize. Then the small little unexpected situation happened. Like a kid missing his mother¡¯s embrace, Marcus snuggled into her bosoms and fell back asleep. There was little she could do but hold him there as he rested. At least he woke up. The worst did not happen so that was a relief. With that, her tense mind finally relaxed and nodded off into her own dreamland. The healers who came in to check saw them both resting in that mannerism could only smile in amusement and left them to their devices. They had plenty of rooms anyway. It was around evening when i ¡°properly¡± woke up. It was all hazy in my head, i felt the soft warm pillow under my head, it felt so comfortable so without thinking i was snuggling into it rubbing my face into it. The next thing i knew was a sharp pain in the glabella (space between the eyes) that got me awake. ¡°Awake now little man?¡± chapter - 8 Wrecked There was nothing much i could do. By slowly nod. I was awake but my body still felt heavy. Then as my mind slowly cleared up, i felt my parched throat and all that bad taste in my mouth. I was thirsty and hungry. I needed food. I tried speaking but my voice would not come out. I tried to move but i had little energy to do so. Every movement hurt. My body was all sore. All that spasm made my body all sore. The healers healed most the damages. If i were older then they would have done more but i was so young and they would rather let nature take its course. My body would rebuild itself to be better that it was according to them. Their philosophy was : we let you leave stronger than before you came. Thankfully Joyce was a spirit master and she entered my mind and got to know what i needed most. Food and water. However, with my whole body being a wreck, i could barely take anything in. With some help from a water element master from a nearby room, they managed to bring some food and water into my stomach without choking me. It was really funny seeing small water bunnies jumping into my mouth. It was an enlightening experience. Amy, Daniel and Eric came later in the night before anyone else came, together the 5 of us came to consensus that we would call this as backlash from the evaluation. This whole time while we had the discussion, i was stuck in joyce¡¯s embrace. The 3 of them almost ended up in fits of laughter as they saw me in her embrace. It seems that i had awakened the motherly instincts of Joyce and that i now can¡¯t escape her clutches. It seemed that she was known for her stoic and impassive character and this side of her was rather refreshing from their point of view. Over the next few days i was like a mini celebrity. Classmates came and went, seniors came and went. Even teachers and some factions and families came and went. Some came to make fun, some came from concern. Those families and factions tried to recruit me into their fold. They all promised resources and assistance to me should i join but a cold pair of laser beam eyes stared them into retreat. They promised to come back and ask again however. By the end of the rest at the ward, i had amassed a small fortune for a 5 year old. Everyone that came to try and recruit me had brought gifts. Herbs, core fragments of different sizes and types, magic tools, scrolls and various materials. There was also a large number of ¡°useless¡± lifestyle items and toys. I also ended up with a stack of dolls that i have no use for. Apparently some jerks laughed and said i was weak like a girl and bought me dolls and girly items. That happened only on the first day as the next day it had stopped and most of those jerks became my neighbors. Their broken bones were all healed up but their bruises were still there when i left. Good job healers! Also, apparently those jerks entered the ward in dresses and makeup. Mother hen pretty much kept everything for me as they were all stuff i could not use yet. She did leave me some protective items. As a mini celebrity i was constantly under watch. Jealous people, jerks and people from opposing factions and families were watching me. I came out from the osprey faction¡¯s territory. I am most likely going to join the osprey faction and that meant that i am a target to eliminate. It is an open secret that i may be a spirit master. Only spirit masters and fainters have backlashes like that. It was better to play safe than be sorry. A 5 year old spirit master. No one will believe it. No one wants to believe it. They all just want to believe in what they want to believe in. It worked in my favor as no one is supposed to know that i was doing spirit refining and a backlash was the best cover up. Nothing was known about my vine and that alone was a big reason why the cover up could worked. Things pretty much went back to normal for everyone. Or at least everyone but me. I had become almost skin and bones.3 plus hours. That was all it took to turn me from a healthy boy to skin and bones. It was also the very reason why mother hen refused to let go of me. She was afraid to lose me the moment she let go of me. It would have put her in guilt and that would have destroyed her. My days were spent going from home to class, from class to bibliotheca, from bibliotheca to ward and from ward to home. I was too weak. Or at least my body was too weak. I needed help to just eat. But i was not going to complain, bunnies are awesome. The bunny master did not really mind anyway. He called it ¡°precision training¡± and it was an interesting experience to him. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it Meal time had become a spectacle. Many of the younger kids would hunt for where i was going to be ¡°eating¡±. My food was similar to baby food mush so seeing whitish bunnies hopping into my mouth was just too cute for them to resist. It took another few days before i was able to eat on my own. When that finally happened, it was a big hurray for me but a throng of kids in tears. On a side note, the bunny master got a decent paying job at a nearby healer¡¯s ward after that. There was also a slight influx in demand for water element masters thanks to this incident. In spite of all these, i did not stop in my cultivation. It was the only thing i could do. However, i learned from the bunny master, he did what i did not know could be done, he expanded the same amount of spirit energy no matter the the size of the manifestation of the tree if he chose to do so. He made 2 bunnies 1hh tall then he split one of them to two. He took 1 of the 2 split halves and repeated it. He repeated for another 2 times.he then took one of the last 2 and made it 1hh tall By the end i saw that there 6 bunnies of different sizes they were all of same shade of blue other than the last one which was much paler but 1hh tall. Next he shrunk all bunnies to the same size as the smallest one. The one that was not split had become a much deeper blue as compared to the other bunnies. It was truly a blessing in disguise. It was a stupid reason why i kept fainting. I had been going at almost full throttle every time. Amy and Joyce both face-palmed themselves. They forgot about common sense. They got used to how everyone would only use a trickle of their spirit energy when they manifest their tree to keep it prolonged that they simply thought that i had a small capacity. It was a strange combination of circumstances that put me in my current situation. Think of it this way, if a person were to manifest a 1hh tall tree, they would use around 1 unit of spirit energy and maintain it for cycle, by the end of the day they may have used only 10 to 20 units of spirit energy. However, i had placed many times more than that into a 1hh tall tree. I expanded much more than most people in terms of spirit energy on every task. However thanks to that my baseline as compared to others have become more firm than others. It was like comparing whose soup is thicker and you added so much more cartilage that it had become a paste. Thanks to this discovery, there was a new training menu for me for my cultivation. I have to now know where is my minimal to manifest a tree in my mind. I have to do the reverse of what the bunny master showed me. I had to keep double the size of my tree then halve it. I could not do it. I tried to ¡®chop¡¯ it into 2 and all i got was a splitting headache. Finally i found an answer in the books. Plants keep growing. So in this case i grow it into 2! The plan was half a success. Why half? Cause it now has 3 ends instead of two. By the end of all trying there was still no success. My vine have now become a ball of vine with 23 ends. It still used the same amount of spirit energy as my basic 2 ended vine. That meant that the plan was a failure. I still could not tell what was my minimal from this. In a fit of frustration i decided to make the longest vine at the same thickness until i am worn out. 20hh tall that was all there was to it. 20 times only? Now i was really pissed. I began a mad thrashing in my head. I repeated it again and again pushing at to the maximum each time. It always broke at 20hh tall. However i was unrelenting at that. I kept going with that. Something is me broke or snapped. 22hh, 24hh, 26hh, 30hh, 35hh, 43hh, 54hh, 67hh then 80hh. Each time i it broke i repeated again and again i was not aware that it was going longer and longer. It stopped at 80hh. Instead of breaking, it simply faded away at 80hh. i did not stop there i kept going and going in my head then there was suddenly a sharp pain in my head then i blacked out. Chapter 9 - comatose As a side note hands is an actual unit of measurement. It is usually used to measure the height of horses. 1 hand is about 10 cm. I had gone berserk. Not only that my tree went berserk as well and manifested on its own. It was as if it had a life of its own. Good thing was that i was cultivating on my own. It meant that i would have hurt no one as no one was near me. Bad thing was no one was no one was around to save me. It was only by irony that i was saved. I was saved by my stalkers. They needed to make sure if i was a spirit master or just a fainter. This just proved one thing. I am a fainter. But i was only five and they could not bear to leave me to die. Some of the stalkers managed to get healers while one of those closer to joyce managed get joyce over. It was a horrifying sight to behold. Vines were lashing out all overs. Tears of blood flowing out of my eyes.there were vines big and small all over my body moving and writhing about. They flickered in and out of existence lashing at everything. Only thing that was threatening everyone around was the lone vine the just kept growing longer and longer. It was as if i had become a monster. Everyone had steered clear of the vines but there was nothing much that could be done about that lone vine. It was too long! Then finally it stopped growing at about 80 hands and would just thrash about without warning before fading away. There was nothing everyone could do other than to watch. There was no saving a guy who has gone berserk. It did not take long but finally it was over. I have finally collapse from exhaustion. The only surprise was that it took too long for me to exhaust myself as compared to those of my age. Too short as compare to those who usually went beserk. Too odd as i was only 5 and could already go berserk. Most who had gone berserk usually have landed in a desperate situation or a traumatic situation. I was in school what kind of these 2 extreme could i be in no one could tell. There was nothing much that could be done. The only thing that could be done was just to wait. Wait for me to wake up and know what caused me to go berserk. The healers rushed to my aid hoping that i would not have died. It was very much often that those who went berserk would die or suffer from some irreparable damage if not treated in time. Not again. Just barely weeks have passed and my body is in the the same state again. It felt like i have been hit by armored elehogs 10 times over and still counting. I tried moving. I could feel my body but i can¡¯t move at all. Not even a twitch. I was wide awake but my body could not respond to me. The only thing that was different was the sharpness of my mind. That was the big surprise. Everything felt so clear. It was better than ever. The sharpest i have had in ages. Everything was so clear and so sharp. I can¡¯t move my body so my eyes were still closed. However i could hear everything and could feel everything. I could even feel them breath. Wait. them breathe? It felt so familiar. I can tell and recognise one of them. It is Joyce. As for the others i could not tell but i know most of them. How. how can i tell them i was awake there was no way for them to hear me. I am alive but they do not know it. There was no way to tell them that i am awake. There was nothing that could be done. Hours turn into days. Days turns to months. No one could tell that i was was awake. Too awake. I could not sleep. Day in day out i was awake. My parents came and stayed with me for a month but there was nothing they could do. They went back in the end. The farm had to be taken care of. I stayed in the healer¡¯s ward. It was the only place that could give me the care i needed. At first there were many people who visited me. Classmates and teachers would come and go. Healers would come and say they can help and tried to no avail. They even tried to shock and inflict pain on me to see if i was faking it. I could feel it all. Sharp and clear as day. I was screaming all over in my head but there was no response at all from my body to tell them that i was awake. Slowly the number of people that visited decreased. It got really lonely. I got to know the people around me. The main healer was Phil. He would check on me daily at regular interval to see if i was still alive. He would poke and prick me to check me for response. It seemed as if he enjoy doing it so i hate him for that. The one whom i felt close to was the assistant healer Alice. She is the one who would come and turn me around, feed me clean me and my other needs. She smells good too. Not that i can express it. Joyce would come by almost everyday to visit me as well when time allows. She would cradle me in her arms occasionally. Many others would come into my room for various reasons. To most of them i am in a coma. Dead. invisible. Secrets were exchange, stories were shared and sometimes intimate acts were performed. Good thing i was not watching, but i could hear it all¡­ urggh. Some came to share their worries with me. To them i was the best listener. The quietest best friend that always listens. Everything was fine. I was ok with that. That was part of the charm of being in a coma. Except that there was 2 problems. I was fully aware¡­.. And i could not forget. I now have perfect memory. Forever awake and perfect memory. Every minute detail. From the number of birds that fly by the window to the number of steps a person takes when since opening the door to my room, i could remember it all. It is all there. I can never forget. Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. My parents came again. It is my birthday. There was a small celebration. They opened my eyes for the day. It is usually closed. They do not want me to end up with dry eyes. I could not even blink. My mother had lost weight. She looks so haggard now. She must have been worried sick. These few months must have been tough on her. At least those shawl that she is wearing look good on her. I did not remember her having it back when i was home though. Dad lost some weight too. But he seemed fitter now. I guess he has been doing more than 2 person¡¯s share of work now. Me staying at the healer¡¯s ward is not free. Joyce paid for most part though. A rural farmer¡¯s pay can only do so much. Joyce wanted to pay for everything but my dad insisted. Joyce has become a family beyond blood ties. She decided to take me as her godson. Even with me like this she still took me as her godson. I am very thankful for that. Amy came in that lovely flame embossed dress that really suited her. Eric and Daniel came about as well. It was a fairly peaceful birthday. No big fanfare. It was rather solemn. My mother made me a quilt. As for my father he did not know what to give. So he gave me a massage. I could feel his worn out hands going about gentle yet firm. I could feel him put his heart and soul into it. It was the only thing that he could think of that he could give. He said as he continued to massage that it would have been odd to bring a plant into the room for me. It was the only thing that he could think of to gift to me. He could not make a quilt. He could make a bow. He could make a chair. He could make a bed. He could build a house. He could grow a tree but there was nothing he could give me that he thought would give me comfort. Everyone just watched and teared. I was crying. I crying really hard deep down. I wanted to reach out but there was no response from my body. There was just no response. I wished, I willed, I hoped. There was just no response. Zilch. Nada. Nothing. There was just no response. It hurts. It really hurt. This powerlessness. I was going into the depths of darkness with no light in sight. It really hurt. Not even a tear flowed out. My 6th birthday ended with everyone leaving with tears still in their eyes. Alice hugged me to sleep. Or at least until the time when everyone else was asleep. I now have too much time. Everyone needed to spend time to eat, sleep, class, work or fight. I did not have any of that. I did not need to put myself through any of that because there were others doing things all those basic needs for me. I had nothing else to do. In the end, all these free time were spent cultivating. I had nothing else to lose anyway. All 20 hours of a day I would be cultivating. As I cultivated I was still very much aware of everything around me. Can you imagine the amount of work done? Most people would cultivate for 4 hours a day. I do five times of that. 6400 hours a year as compared to the average people who only did 1280 hours a year. Three years i was in that state for 3 years. I am going nine now. That is 3 years out of the minimal five years that i could stay in the school. My world revolved around those around me. The dreaded head healer who pokes me to no end, Alice who took care of me like i was her younger brother. Amy who would drop by once in a blue moon she still feels guilty that i am in this state. She should have left me back home and never took me to the school. She felt that if she did i would have lived a normal life and not be in this state i am currently in. she still regrets. Joyce, my dear mother hen/godmother, she would come in and tell me stories about the world around. She kept me updated to world news. Not that i really needed it. I have enough stories from all my random ¡®visitors¡¯ that drop in for their fancy activities. Plenty of juicy gossips that are very useful should i ¡®wake up¡¯. Chapter 10 - Caged My amount spirit is huge now. Now that i am going nine, i have spent at least 15,000 hours more than those that were going nine. Think of it simply, 3 years of 20 hours a day, 5 days a week, 4 weeks a month 4 months a season and 4 seasons a year, i have spent 19,200 hours cultivating. Everyone else would only have done around 4,800 hours only. Cultivation is not just A+B it is more like it is more of A*B where A is past effort and b is that day¡¯s effort. Most people would put 70% of their energy to cultivate or even lesser unless they are on form or in the zone. I am always at 100%. Or at least most of the time unless i get distracted by the things around me. I have plenty of time to spare. Plenty of times to fail as well. I can cultivate at least 50 vines of various size doing various things all at the same time now for at least 100 cycles a second now. That was not even me trying. I could also make traps and animals in my mind made from vines. The limit was still 80 hands. But that was more than enough to make small animals. I have a small animal farm complete with fences now. They are part of the 50 vines in my always running in my head. I have grown really attached to the bunny in my head thanks to the bunny master. Unlike most people who will tire, i can¡¯t. What was worse is that if i try really hard time would feel like time has stood still. I could slice time into finer and fine bits. I realized that only recently. Then came a breakthrough. As i slowed down time, i began to notice an intricate weave surrounding my mind. It felt like that was the thing that separated me from my body. I began to work harder and harder. I began to realize, it seemed to work. It seemed to be breaking but just a little. It was not really obvious but it healed back almost immediately. That gave me home. 3 years of work and finally something. There was nothing much but still it meant something. The only problem was that the only way to feel it and work on it is when time felt like it stood still. That became my goal. Slicing the time to even smaller bits and making that last longer. The control over my power was already amazing if anyone were to see it. It can now rival a lord. A lord is someone who had gone past master. Tier 1 and 2 were novice and apprentice master respectively. Most people live their lives at these levels. Tier 3 were skilled masters and tier 4 were expert masters. Finally, tier 5 are grandmasters. Most people would never reach grandmaster level let alone be coming lord level. Even if they did they would be near the end of lives already. Me? I have it at age 9. If Joyce had reached this same level of spirit she would have noticed the very same cage that i am in. it was colorless and odorless poison that not many people know about. It came from a fruit called eugeroprofen. It is meant to kill people. Meant for people to go berserk. It sharpens the mind and relaxes the body. Making the person caged in their body. Not only was it a physical cage it was a mental cage. It cuts the connection between the mind and the body. Medications were made from this were meant for spirit lords and above. Lords would use it to sharpen their minds for short periods of time for when at their level, their abilities would be aware of this case and break out of easily. Restoring the use of the body. It was meant to be a drug for them to be in the zone. Just that for those below, it was made to kill. Upon the discovery of the cage, it got me thinking. Why am i in this state? What could have caused me to be in this state.it did not seem natural for a 5 year old to go berserk. Then it dawned on me i would not have notice it was an act of someone had i not noticed this cage. No one could anyway. Or at least not the people around me. As my 9th birthday got closer, i know that my parents are coming. i want to surprise them. I want to surprise everyone. I worked harder and harder. Slowly i could feel that cage wearing out. I have only about 10 days left. 200 hours or so to go i can do 1000 cycles a second now. But it is not enough. I need to be faster. At the rate i can see from the cage repairing itself and me breaking out from it, i need to go faster. I broke even at 800 cycles. That was not enough. 100 hours left. 1300 cycles now. Need to be faster 60 hours left. 1500 cycles. Still not enough. I can feel it breaking now. But i need to be faster 5 hours until the first bird call that rings of daylight for my birthday. My parents would arrive 2 hours after that. Then at lunch 4 hours after where Amy, Daniel, Joyce and Alice would come in. Eric did not come after that first birthday. We were not that close. I only saw him for 4 times anyway. We never even talked. 1 hour to daylight. I am so close. I can feel it. I can make it in time for my parent¡¯s arrival. No wait! NO! NO! NO! NOOOOOOoooooo! I could feel the cage pressing on harder¡­ it seems that the final wall was the hardest to break. 2000 cycles of strength was still not enough. Not only that that momentary hope brought a lapse in my concentration and set me back by another hour. 2 hours to lunch. my parent have arrived and was with me for 2 hours already. I could not pay attention to them. If my usual state was me being in the zone, i have now gone beyond that. I have shut out all external sensations. I am no longer aware of anything else other that going through the cycles and focusing on breaking down that wall. Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators! If some could measure the 3 aspects of my spirit they would see that i have a grandmaster level spirit container, skilled level of purity and almost lord level of density. That was the thing. This cage needed a lord level to of breakthrough. Even if it was just having lord level i could brute force and punch through. But density was a closer aspect to breaking through. 2100, 2150, 2200, 2280, 2350, 2450, 2499, 2499, 2499, 2499¡­ shit. So close. Why. why not 2500? one more cycle i am sure just past that and i would break through this cage. Is the the end? I could feel freedom just inches away. Please let me step out of here. Please give me that miracle!!!! Then my eyes were opened. It was time. My celebration was about to begin. I saw my body after one year once again. I could see everyone again. The world was so bright and colorful. I have forgotten that. that bright light brought back memories. The things i saw that quilt, the pillowcase made by my mother from 2 years ago, the wooden bed frame my father made last year and the small figurine set that show our family of 3, he had to make one of Joyce and Alice after that though. Joyce insisted and my mother chimed in about Alice it was rather funny seeing him react that way. I could swear that i saw him have a taken aback response for that briefest of moment perfect memory for the record. The jade pendant from Joyce she got be that was carved with a rune that meant recovery and healing. I looked around from my mind. What was it that i was missing? I had no idea. I knew i had to do something about it but i did not know what i could do. I am still stuck at 2499 cycles. Then an idea it me. If 1 vine a cycle for 2499 cycles a second did not work what if i did 2 vines a cycle for the same amounts? With that, i tried again. With 2 vines each cycle, i had gone back down to 1100 cycles. That really went down plenty. But that meant i have plenty of space to grow. With the experience and feeling from 2499 cycles i progressed very quickly to 1249 and got stuck again. Not willing to admit defeat, i with 3 then 4 then 5. I now got stuck at 499. Finally i reached 50 a cycle. It was still not enough. I realized i needed to get back into the state of being beyond the the zone. But time was up the celebration was about to start. It was a simple fare. The celebration was a small affair once again. I need to get out. I have ¡®missed¡¯ 3 birthdays already. If being beyond the zone was 120% i am back to 100%. I could actually feel the tiredness creeping in. It meant something though. To feel tired it meant that something was working. With what i have just seen, i decided it as my new source of motivation. I focused once again. I had a huge reserve. But how would i be able to punch through all that. It was as if i needed just an extra push and i would have succeeded. With my eyes open i could see my mother reaching for my hand. I began to focus on that hand. Willing my hand to move. Time grinded to almost a halt. The world lost its color. All i saw was just the hand reaching for mine. I began to cultivate profusely. I got back to 2499 a cycle and at that moment when the hands touched, it was as if a force and reached out to me and gave me that final push. 2500. 2500. 2500. 2550. 2600. 2650. 2700. 2750. 2800. 2850. 2900. 2950. 3000. Crack. Craccccck. An echo could be heard resounding in my heart. My heart skipped a beat. No one could tell. Only me. Another thing happened right after. My eyes widened from that shock. I had finally broken free. The only issue was that my body weak. A kid who had not move for so many years. I am almost skin and bones. It was a pitiful sight. But at least i could move. That was the miracle that i needed. The only miracle that we all needed. I was awake. The best birthday surprise for everyone if i must say. The healers came to check as everyone made a big commotion from this little act. I could move. Just barely. A twitch here a twitch there to show that i could still feel and understand what everyone was saying. Then finally, Joyce entered my mind. She got stupefied. Not only was i fully awake i was way better than before. I was at an even higher level than her. The first thing i had her teach me was how to speak with the others with the mind like how she is doing with me right now. After some tries, i managed to get into her mind. With that, i reached for Amy, then Alice, then finally my parents. We conversed. I spoke into their minds while they spoke out loud. I told them the abridged story. I hid the fact that i was awake all the time. I told them that i had become very sensitive. If anything happened around me then i would sometimes notice and wake up. I teased and joked that the head healer should be fired. He pricks and pokes me way too often. Joyce almost rushed out and wanted to go and kill the head healer. My father manage to rush out before anyone could stop him and managed to land a punch on the head healer before he was pulled away. It was a good laugh. It was good to interact again. chapter 11 - recovery Over the course of the next few days, it was a series of test. They had to test me for this, they had to check me for that they wanted to make sure i had everything all ok. It was annoying but i have to let them have their way. I have 3 pairs of eyes staring at me at all times. Almost. Toilet break and showers were the only time that i was freed. My meals were tonic after tonic. Muscle growth, that was what the focus was. I was skin and bones and the tonics really helped. By the 3rd day i could stand on my own and walk on the fourth. The technology for feeding had improved. That incident had opened new doors for everyone. It was still pretty interesting to see food flying about. You could say it has become an art form to appeal to the kids. Too bad i only got to enjoy 2 days of it. On a side note, some inns even hired them to help with food arrangement that would have been impossible without. Kitchens used to the domain of the flame elementalist. Now, even the water elementalist have stepped up to the challenge. As for those who had both elements and have a passion for cooking, they are now the best paid amongst all. Everywhere i go, i was being watched. I am the miracle boy. The boy who lived.The one who was thought to be dead. People would gawk and watch wherever i go. There was almost no place where i cannot be spotted. i now have only 2 places of solitude. The biblioteca and my personal room. In the biblioteca i have a room to myself. Not that i want to but i have to. I even have a dedicated assistant to bring me all the books. Perfect recall. I can remember everything. I would end up opening book after book digesting everything. After seeing the speed that i read on the first day, they called me the walking biblio. As long as it is a book i read i could even recite it backwards. There was just that one cookbook by a guy named Nicholas Flamel that really got to me. It felt like that was a big secret hidden in it and the truth seemed to elude me. Cultivating has become second nature to me. I would be cultivating even as i walk. It has become instinctual. 2700 cycles or so a second and that is just me not focusing. I am hitting 4000 cycles a second already. Peers of my age are still at 5000 cycles a minute at best. I was light years ahead of them in this regard. The only irony is was that my drain when using my tree was huge as well. I still could last 50 times longer than those my age thankfully. It would really suck if i end up pretty average. One month. In one month i finished reading all the books the biblioteca has. Or at least the branch i was in at the school. The school is split into 9 zones. I have finished all the books in my zone. the other 8 zones are a distance away and there is a stiff competition between the different zones. it would take some effort before i gain access to them. All the cultivation books that were available had been read by me and i now i am trying to formulate a better one for myself thanks to that. The method of cultivation that Joyce originally provided for me was a fairly efficient one this new one that i am formulating for myself right now is an upgrade of that. Using this half modified one i could already feel the difference. It was just a matter of time before i gift this to Joyce. Knowing my parents¡¯ tree, i formulated a simpler cultivation method for them. Hopefully one day something good will come if they become tier 1 novice master. I look back at myself and laugh. I am still a tier 0 as well. I may be a tier 1 lord spirit master but with no skills to support it. It was a curious situation now. I need to gain abilities. Being tier 0 meant plenty of dangers. Especially now that i am a universal target. Stupid spy networks. Thanks to that though, i get plenty of resources. I have enough stacks of core and core fragments to sustain me for 3 months at least. Or at least that is what i thought. I finally started on core absorption. Fresh core would have been best but given that fresh ones are hard to get so i had to make do. I began absorbing the first core fragments i ever got. The wren cores. Not that i needed more chaos element to my already crazy life i needed it for the multiplication ability that it was known for. I needed it to make me use less spirit energy. I may be able to use spirit force to fight but it is very draining for my spirit. The wren core allows me to split my unit of spirit energy into smaller bodies. Meaning instead of lasting 50 times longer, i can last much much longer than others. Irony is that to most people it is a support ability and there is zero combat capability or so to speak on its own. Most people would think it would be a waste to use it as the tier one branch and that i should use it as a fruit and recommended me all kinds of better cores. I had an interesting concept in mind. Based on the various books i have read, there were some diaries that spoke of an interesting situation. Using support is actually better than an offensive branch as a starter. It is totally different from the system that everyone one was using but it was not just written by one person but over the course of 5000 years of history, there were actually over 100 authors who said that or suggested that. The only issue was that the support ability had to be similar to the innate ability of the tree itself. The level of the core obtained had to be similar to the user as well. You can only use cores from beast 1-2 tiers higher than you. Any higher you may die from just even absorbing the core. The core would be too potent. The wrens are lower tier 2 beast. They are actually tier 1 but they usually are found in large numbers and only those who reach tier 3 would hunt them. They are also usually farmed for their cores. Amy¡¯s family now has a big farm of them. They are like the literal only farm for wrens in the region now. They bought over all the others. They had the best wren after all. The king and queen wrens. Of the hundreds of wrens born, only 1-2 royals are born. You can search through hundreds of wren nest but you will not find royal wren eggs. We were really lucky to get them on that trip. A royal wren is a upper tier 2 beast on its own and a nest with them would be mean a tier 3 nest. It was really lucky for everyone for that trip. Even those ¡°hunter¡±. They survived, we got free cores and Amy got royal wren eggs. I now have lifetime supply of free wren cores. Focusing on the wren cores and core fragments, i began drawing the spirit energy in the core and started assimilating them into my spirit as according to the books. With that many people¡¯s diaries telling their insights on absorbing the core it had become an easy task. After the tenth core fragment, i despaired. Due to my extremely large spirit container, i needed an extremely large amount of spirit to make it work. Meaning i need way more cores than what i have. At least eighty times more. I am going to be using up 1 week¡¯s worth of core in 1 hour. There is the good and bad about it. If i need that much to make a branch, it meant my tier 1 ability would be deeply rooted and the ability will most likely persist into my other branches. But that i think would not be enough. I need the speed to go with a tier 1 branch. I needed the lightning Gonzales. It is a small mouse with little combative ability. It is the fastest tier 2 beast. Hard to catch and reproduce very fast as well. It is a pest in for most farmers. Put a pair in a farm and by the end of a season there would be hundreds of them in the farm and you would be left with half the harvest. There are many eradication request all year round so it is still not that hard to obtain. The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.In each element there are beast and monsters that hold only just those element in lower tiers. To advance from one tier to another it would require plenty of cores. It is like a piggy bank. You need to fill it up before it overflows and you need to get a bigger piggy bank. Most people would use them as a filler cores. Using them to support their growth while waiting for the core that they need to advance. A week has passed and i can feel myself at the critical point.i am waiting for the final piece of the puzzle. I am about to break through to being a tier 1. I have to keep suppressing it. I needed to hold back. According to one theorist amongst the books, there was a way to make abilities stronger. It was a very limited ability. It is supposed to be very hard for people to achieve unless unless they are rich. And even if they are it would still be very hard for most people to do it still. It involves having to use all the same type of core when growing a branch or a fruit. It would be hard for most people but not for me. Or at least not the case for my first branch and fruit. I have chosen the most common of cores that can be found. A pest and a farmed beast. Cheap and suits my needs. Now all i am waiting for is the final wren core. a royal wren is dying from sickness. Should nothing happen a royal wren would live to 10 years at least. this royal wren however is different. It grew older faster than the others. It reached maturity 4 times faster than the other wren. It was also a little bigger than the other royals. It was a lower tier 3 royal wren. Amy¡¯s family had tried breeding it but it did not work. It bore no kids. They had no idea who were the parents either and could not make another like it. You could say it was the perfect wren for me to rank up into tier 1. It is the only reason why i am holding back my rank up. *Knock-Knock* *Knock* *Knock-Knock-Knock* *Knock-Knock* ¡°Come in¡± That was the code for Amy¡¯s liaison. Everyone who come would have a different code. I can remember them all anyway. If anyone fakes it i would know. The slight difference in tapping is obvious to me. It is like fingerprints to me. Unique. Someone tried to copy the knock and thought that they had done it perfectly. I could still tell the difference. He was not allowed entry. Everyone was entry by invite only so that no bluff worked. Amy and Joyce made sure of that. Handing over the box containing the core, the liaison quickly left right after. I had to make sure though. I rattled the box.1 sound only. 1 core. That should be right. With that i opened and started to absorb my lynch pin. As i start to absorb it, i felt a trace of something more. Focusing on it, i realized it were the fragmented memories of the wren. i embraced the memories of that royal wren. It seemed that the wren was not just any wren. It was a royal wren with a strong spirit. It is seems to be the reason for its explosive growth. The speed that it has comes from that endless well of energy. No. that cant be right. Something else must have been the cause of its growth. I delved deeper into the memories. Like a researcher i seek the true case of the strength. I sliced and diced the memories into compartments. One by one i observed. Then i saw this memory. Then one fragment caught my eye. The earliest memory. That white glow that it felt when it was still an egg. I scrolled through my extensive mental library, looking for anything of that semblance. There was no records of anything like that for wrens. Amongst the lores of the past, there was just one that had that likeness. Stronger, faster, bigger and smarter. A spritemeld. Thought to be extinct and only in the myths. It is born from the elements and would meld into the nearest living newborn dormant until maturity. It would give power in exchange of vitality. It seemed to fit the case for this royal wren. Good for me bad luck for this wren. If it were in the wild it would have been even stronger and would lord over an area and would have lived for much longer but here it is just cattle to the humans. Knowing what it most likely it, i focused on the core once again. I need to get to tier 1 soon and this is the best chance. Half way into the absorption, i felt something in me break. A sudden surge of spirit energy surged into me from the core and from the space all around like a fierce torrent. It was pain all over my body as the core turned to dust. It was within expectation. It hurt but i was fine. It was mind over matter. I have endured all those itch that i could feel but not scratch already what is just a little pain. Time ticked on, the flow of spirit kept coming. The very fundamentals of spirit energy is now being reformed. If it were most people, it would have taken 5 hours maximum to rank up. Sadly, i would need more. Having a much higher reserve, much more dense spirit and higher purity, it would mean i need many times more than others. Not only that, i have been suppressing the ranks to increase the quality of the rank up. It would mean that it would take at least a day or two before i complete my rank up. A record for anyone¡¯s first rank up anyway. Outside, people were gathering. If it were the usual, rank up, the upheaval of the spirit energy all around would not be this great. The spirit energy that was gathering had become so dense that a low mist was starting to form. Thankfully i was the only one in the room. There was no one else to spot its existence. All or nothing, i decided to pick up the pace. 1 time, 2 times, 3 times, the pain doubled each time. 4 times the speed but 8 times the pain. If i increased again by another time that would be 16 times the pain. I could endure the pain but the amount of reward i only 1 time more. Not worth the pain i am going through. Also, i do not want Joyce to kill me. She lectured me for at least an hour everyday when i first woke up just to ingrain it into me. She did not know that i can¡¯t forget at that point but thanks to that she has become a waking reminder to not do stupid things. All i can do is impatiently wait. chapter 12 - hunting season After the passing hours, it was finally over. The new power finally manifested. I reopened my eyes seeing the world in new light. Literally. I could finally see what the other tiered people could see. The traces of spirit essences that is floating around. This is also where true cultivation start. The ability to draw spirit essences into oneself to become spirit energy. Hopping back into my mind, i tested my new power. For one moment i thought it was what i wanted. The replication ability. It felt the same yet different. There was like no drain.to minute to matter. Recovering the very moment of manifestation. Except i could feel everything from it. I could feel what it feels like it was an additional arm of mine. Knowing that, i stepped out of my mind. I had to try it out. Finding Daniel, i asked him for a practice combat. I needed to test out my powers. Something that only recently i could use offensively. Reaching the combat grounds, Daniel readied himself and waiting for me to start. He brings out an armored trilobite. It is a defensive tree perfect for practice combat. I brought out my tree. The vine. It still looked the same. I practiced with it. Monitoring my spirit consumption, i started from 1 hh to 80 hh i made sure i have full control. Thankfully, like how it went in my mind, the drain had become minimal. I was recovering faster than my drain. This was not supposed to happen though. It was just that the speed of my cultivation was way higher than most at this tier 1. Confirming that, i began to take offensive. With the replication ability, i made more and more vines manifest. Upon breaking even with my cultivation speed, i have about 70 standing about not doing anything. It felt like i have 70 additions limbs all around me. Moving them about would be too draining. I let most of it dissipate and started my offensive. 5 vines waved about in the air heading towards Daniel¡¯s shield. As the vines flew, they began to bend and twist into different shapes. It was a peculiar situation for Daniel. He had fought with many people before. There were many with the ability to replicate but he has never seen that many at one go. Not only that, each vine was doing its own action. They weaved and formed into different animals and weapons. There was not much that could be done but to take them on head on. Seeing what that is coming, he parried them one at a time the rabbit pounced and jumped all over, doing head pounds when it has the chance to. Like a spring the serpent-like vine springs about binding daniel in its track. The others were weapons that binds as well. A snare, a web and a whip. Daniel had no way to fight back. No one expects a vine to be so versatile. Zero offensive ability other than that head pound. All trapping ability only. A support type. It is a simple system. Offensive beats support, support beats defensive and defensive beats offensive if they are of the same level. And i tier 1 support just beat Daniel who is a tier 3 it was a predisposition thing but to hold down someone who is 2 tiers higher is still rare among the lower levels. After a brief contemplation, Daniel decided it was time for me to go hunting. Pulling Amy, Joyce and 2 others along, it quickly progressed on. We entered the outer woods of the nearby hinterland. It was a trip made for me. Everyone else was just support. They wanted to see how far we could push for my ability. We had a rolling cage with us. As a support ability, it would be interesting to see how many i can bring back alive for breeding. The outer woods is sparsely populated by tier 1-3 beast. The deeper we go the higher tier they get. Moving quickly through the woods, we breeze through most of the tier 1 and 2. The evasive and fast ones took a little more time. After the 5th pair of captured animal, all i saw was the eye of 5 adults blinded by money. Woe on me. They did me promise me the future cores though. I would need fillers cores in the future. The humor was that they forgot i am a tier 1 spirit lord. I need way more cores than most people. Humans still need plenty of cores, but beast breed faster. As long as there is food for them, they will breed. Also, not everyone can afford them. Everyone is now blinded by the greed while i am holding on to another goal in mind. I need the final cores for my fruits. Lightning foxhound and armored elehog. Speed and offensive. Maybe something poisonous in the future. Maybe some steel tipped beast as well. So much plans but without the final cores it means nothing. And with my binding ability, it would mean i get to keep them to the freshest. When i need the cores. Traveling deeper into the woods, we reached the edge of the outer woods. It is where true danger begins. Not knowing when we will meet an enemy. We set up a base camp. All in all, we now have 5 pairs of basic tier 1 beasts 3, pairs of tier 2 beasts and 1 pair of tier 3 beasts. Not a bad haul. It is just that not all of them will survive or breed to large numbers. Sabotage is prevalent between factions and families. We took turns resting and keeping watch. Not that i needed to but they wanted to keep it routine. Best not to be complacent. Recalling all the details of woods i am in, i am hoping for some plant beast. In pockets of areas filled with dense spirit, sometimes we have plants that gains some form of awareness. They will at some point gain cores as well. There are 2 such zones in the near vicinity. I however, know of another 1. The location was mentioned in one of the diaries from 300 years back. It is located at a nearby canyon. The owner of the diary did not go to to that area he was in a rush and it was inaccessible for him. It was a small cave on the other side of the wall with an outcropping. He would have missed it if he had not used spirit sight to look around for beast hiding nearby. He came back months later but could not remember where it could be. This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Spirit sight is something that everyone learns to use automatically when they gain their first branch. It is simply the ability to sense the spirit essence in the air around us. Beast with cores would also radiate spirit energy from their body. This energy would cause ripples in the spirit essence. No one keeps spirit sight on all the time. Imagine seeing colors floating all around you in different colors mingling and drifting about is fascinating at the beginning, but prolonged usage would cause nausea and various hallucinogenic effect. It drove quite a number crazy doing so. What a waste. Dawn broke and we headed to the canyon. It was just at the edge of the woods we were at. Together with Joyce, the two of us began hunting for that forgotten cave. After spending about an hour hunting, i made the discovery. It was really faint. It was no wonder that he could not find it. The cave had collapsed and the outcrop that he remembered had also fallen. Joyce almost could not detect it. I had to direct her to it for her to notice that minute difference. The wind spirit essence in the canyon is too volatile and easily hides the cave entrance. Knowing where the exact spot is, we headed to the other side with help of Amy¡¯s tree and my tree.the winds in the canyon are aggressive and so the idea we came up with was that I made a rope bridge out of many vines while Amy''s tree assisted us when we cross. We had to leave the cage behind for a moment so the other 2 stayed and only Amy, Daniel, Joyce and i headed for the cave. Daniel¡¯s trilobite crawled along the wall and dug a path for us. I had to support it with my vine so that the winds did not blow away his tree. It was quite interesting to see the wall being shaved away. AN: It would look something like this. http://www.plumby.com/photos/1998/1998_09_grandcanyon_havasupai/images/File0357.jpg 2 hours later, we reach the cave opening. We pretty much clinged on to the wall all the way. Daniel had made hand holds all along the path. So it was pretty much safe. It took another hour before we managed to clear the rubble and enter the cave. The moment we cleared the cave, our first reaction was to turn away to puke. The was a massive grotesque outgrowth pulsing in the center. Around it laid what seem to be human corpses. The corpses looks shriveled and dead for for hundreds of year. It seemed like we were not the first. The horror was not that there were human corpses. The horror was they were still alive. And they were connected to the outgrowth. It was a parasitic relationship where the outgrowth feeds off the barely alive ¡®human corpses¡¯. One thing is for sure. That grotesque outgrowth is the cause of that slight spirit essence distortion. There is a core in it. From the looks of it, it is dangerous. Stepping away from the cave, we gathered back with the other 2 waiting at the cage. an:Think http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=107385 So¡­ what do we do? Kill it or leave it? Can we save the humans? Is it safe to even approach it. After the slight discussion, it was a consensus. Torch it. If anything survives, torch it again. If it could survive so long, it is dangerous so it must be killed. while we still can. It was a painful hour to pass. Those screams that kept ringing in my head. Those endless resounding echo that will not leave my memories until the end of time. The screams finally died down. We left the fire burning for a little while longer just in case and then we waited. After a brief peek into the cave, we send another 2 rounds of fire into it just in case. After the cave cooled down, i used my tree to dig around for anything that could have been left. It was like finding a pen with your finger in a room with your eyes closed. It is just a good thing that I have over 100 ¡®fingers'' seeking at the same time. It was draining but it is more efficient. After about another hour, i finally retrieved everything that i feel could be useful. Rings, armors, jewelries, and various items that survived the fiery assaults. Flipping through all these items we finally found what we wanted. The core. We flamed it again just in case. Very much to our surprise, we could hear an echo of scream coming from it. It is still alive! We continued to flame it. We flamed it until the scream died out. Then flamed it a while more just in case once again and then i probed it. Not Joyce as i have a higher level of spirit cultivation than her. Looking into the memories of the core, all i saw was fragments of what it did when it was still alive. Absorb. Absorb and give back.it absorbed spirit from the people it is attached to and puts them into a dream like state. These people do not die immediately but waste away with time, resulting in those ¡°corpses¡± we saw at that time. Knowing that it has two abilities that are very useful to me, i decided to move on and plan on what i could do with it. To hold and gain 2 fruits at a time or take a gamble for one of abilities, or do i want to use it as a branch. A brief contemplation, with my lack of elemental abilities, i could still wait and give it as a future branch. The ability is too good to pass. With that i stored it away in a box for storing cores to reduce loss. Nature element has the best absorb ability. It absorbs almost everything that is not too extreme. As for the other items, we split everything excluding me. I already have the best item in this cave. We decided that this extra trip will be our secret and headed to the deeper woods once again. Within the box, a small rattle was heard but no one noticed. not a chapter just some history the mc (marcus) , is a country bumpkin. he lives in his countryside living a simple life. he is aged 5 when he starts his journey. a home schooled kid from the country side, how much of common sense can he have? almost everyone who can manifest are tier 0 in his hometown. not only that, no one is allowed to teach the kids under 5 cultivation methods to keep them safe. the tier system works this way there are 20 tiers but they are split to 4 levels: master, lord, saint and lastly supreme each level contains 5 tiers: novice, apprentice, skilled, expert and grandmaster. the tree has 20 branches which corresponds to each tier. on each tier are 5 fruits. think main skill and sub skills. for a tier 1 skill like the mc, he has the multiplication ability. the sub skills would be fruits that supplement it. so the current plan for the mc would be to that he wants speed and energy saving. so for his fruits he may choose to continue to use the wrens for more multiplication-like ability or he may use other cores to supplement it. think of each branch and fruit as a container, to level up to the next tier you need to fill it up. you can fill it up with anything or you can choose to fill it up with only one type of thing. Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.so some users choose to fill it up with basic cores of a certain element or ability so that there is that sort of purity then use what is dubbed as the lynch pin core to level up. when spirit is formless it is known as spirit energy. when it acts on an object it is known as spirit force. spirit in the air is known as spirit essence. spirit masters are a title. they can even be a tier 0. they have the ability to channel spirit for various things. they can control spirit energy use spirit force even without manifesting their tree. you can also think of it as a person who is a fire and ice mage. i may be proficient as a fire mage but i may not be proficient as a ice mage. both uses mana but that does not mean that i will be equally proficient. also about the world, 80% of the population are tier 0. meaning that most of the kids will end up going home still tier 0. in a few chapters, the exhibition tournament will begin. so cheer up people, i ain''t going to time skip anytime soon i think. oh and for those who noticed, the concept of tiers and cores are built from the idea of combat continent/soul land chapter 13 - band of the hawks Roawr! ¡°Came from the east, someone must be fighting over there. Let''s head over.¡± As we are rushing over, a tree trunk a man tall came spinning in our direction. We deftly dodged the projectile with inches to spare and continued our rush with abet more care. Entering our vision is a clearing of broken trees. A team of hunters are cornering a tier 4 shimmering kavu. From the sidelines we could tell they did not need our help. We stood by the side and waited in case of anything. It would seem like everything is going to be fine but the battle had drawn some of the local denizens to come and visit. Knowing that those guys already have their hand full, we had a small discussion and gave them a shout out. ¡°Thank us later¡± Then we start our approach and begin our preparation for the coming battle. Eric started digging pit falls all around. When he is done, i would cover them with my vine. My vines would be able to tolerate tier 3 and below beast going over them and would break if a higher tier beast steps on it. A natural pitfall for the strong. We can manually kill the tier 3 and below anyway.. Amy can just flame the pitfalls until the trapped beast dies. Perfect cycle. Barely finishing the set up, our first prey arrived. A bash from the trilobite, a concussive mental attack from me and joyce and some trap binding from me, we subdued the first one. No blood no fuss and a tier 3 rock tiger is down on the ground. If it is a pair, we will keep it. If not it is a good night to them. Tier 3 s of no challenge thanks to me. Lord level mental attack is almost too much for them to handle. Joyce is there just there to make sure my attack is not too severe or to add a finishing touch. My fine control still sucks. I have killed 27 beast accidentally already. One by one we take them down. It is not an easy feat. tier 4 and tier 5 beast are starting to appear from the scent of blood that is beginning to permeate the air. With me and joyce as control, everyone still has a fighting chance. Not to mention, with my extensive knowledge, i know where most of their critical weakness are. With tier 4 beast i deal almost no damage to them. A tier 1 vine can barely penetrate their skin. No one to blame though. The plan be more efficient in energy and not be more powerful. I am already very powerful in a sense for my age. A tier 1 fruitless user subduing a tier 3 user is rare enough.. It is a hard battle for the team of hunters, the shimmering kavu is of the light element and has the ability to heal. Small wounds heal quickly that makes the battle hard and long. Only the occasional major wounds helped with weakening the beast. The team is a well trained team and must have been together since the very beginning. Looking at their well coordinated strikes and timely rescues we can see how many close shaves they have been in. they form of mainly tier 3 masters and a tier 4 master which seems to be their leader. We really had to stay on a lookout for them, a light element beast core of any tier is something every beast seeks. Just gaining a slight increase in regeneration is a boon to any beast. After keeping a lookout and taking down 2 other tier 4 beast, It is over, they managed to subdue the kavu.,it is a good core i must say for the healer that they have. Light element beast are hard to find. Night has fallen. it is a moonless night knowing that it is not safe here, we cleared out from the area of devastation and set up a new base camp a distance away with the team of hunters. Settling in with them, we waiting next to the bonfire as the healer absorbed the core. ¡°Hi, i am Gattsu, i am the leader of this group and we are the band of the hawk. Thank you for helping us keep other beast away.¡± ¡°You are welcome i am Amy and we are from the academy.¡± ¡°The academy!¡± Gattsu looked at me in surprise before continuing ¡°it is for this boy eh, this is quite deep into the woods for a tier 1 novice, is he up to the task?¡± ¡°He is. He is a support class right now, but he is even able to bind even a tier 3 right now.¡± Gattsu once again looks at me ¡°hey kid! What is your name, I want ¡­.¡± Gattsu stopped in his words. He could feel that icy cold stare coming from Joyce. This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. The tension held on over there and it felt like the temperature had dropped at least a degree or so. Around the corner, there was a muffled cough from Daniel that sounded like ¡°mother hen.¡± That broke the tension and Gattsu rose his hands in surrender. Still he added ¡°the offer still stands for the future. Think about it.¡± We further chatted about our haul and exchanged stories of our escapades while we waited for the healer to complete her absorption. At the moment of absorption, it was rather an amazing sight. It could be seen that the healer was slightly glowing. That gentle soft glow slowly spread out and about 20 hands of space around her was glowing as well. The light spirit energy have gathered all around her as she began to absorb them as well. It was a true fascination. As the light show ended, everyone approached her to congratulate her. Just then my mental radar picked up a presence approaching our camp. Not wanting anyone else to know that i am first to notice, i mentally spoke to Joyce ¡°we are getting company of 1 coming from the north. It seems to be a tier 5 and coming fast.¡± Joyce then reacted and acted as if she is the first to notice and relayed the message. With the healer at the center, we prepared for combat. There was no time for pitfalls so there was no helping it that i was almost useless. a splash of vines at the eyes is still a good distraction if need be. With everything in place, it was just a waiting game. Cold sweat beaded on everyone¡¯s forehead. The beast is coming and it is coming in fast. It is 1 tier higher than Gattsu so the risk is much higher. I may be a novice spirit lord but i without the corresponding skill to match. I only have the skills that Joyce though me so i only know tier 3 spirit master attacks. That alone is inadequate to stop a tier 5 beast. A tier 5 beast also has some form of budding awareness and that itself adds a certain level of risk. Then the horror broke out. It was a crow feathered octopus with claws at the tip of the tentacles. ¡°MIMICK!!!!¡± ¡°This sucks.¡± ¡°Formation B-3. fan out¡± I look at Joyce and Amy and ask, ¡°mental link with them?¡± They look at each other and nodded. The benefit of being lord level, multiple connections of mental speak at one time with ease. We have to pretend that the connection comes from Joyce though, too dangerous for them to know that it come from me. With the connection set in place, it was action time. I was to keep distracting it and binding it. There was also the laws of physic where i dump a well timed big and thick log right on the head to stun it with the help of gravity and vines. True to its name, it began to copy the characteristics of our attacks. It began to gain a hard shell like Eric¡¯s tree, wings like Amy¡¯s tree and the various tree qualities the belong to the band of the hawks. It was fine trying to survive its attack but the main problem was its ability to stretch and its ability to fly. Its razor sharp claws whip through the air cutting through the trees that we manifested. Like a octopus we could not cage it, it would squeeze through the smallest of gaps and escape. The only way to win is a battle of attrition. The mimick has no natural predator left in the immediate area because of its speed and offensive ability and right now it is furious. These weak little things are attacking it and now it just wants to kill these insects. Sending wave after wave of claws and firing feathers at the insects that is annoying it it learns of the skills that they have. It is always the same. The instinct to learn and attack. The only problem is that it still lacks the ability to scheme and plan. It is just a small step away from doing so. Becoming a tier 1 lord would grant it that. That on its own is the saving grace. Slowly the attacks become less frequent, the feathers stopped flying as often as it would usually have. Everyone understands that it will be soon now. Everyone inched closer as the circle slowly tightens on the mimick. Daybreak is about come and it had been a long night. chapter 14 - Countdown The fight ended just at dawn broke. It knew it was going to die and tried escaping. It almost escaped by creating a body double. With one tentacle in the ground and putting the core in it, it attempted to abandon the bigger body and hide in that one lone tentacle. Had i not notice the trace amount of spirit still left in the core as it travelled underground we would still have been fighting the fake body that ¡®died¡¯ shortly after. ¡°What sneaky bastard¡± Gattsu pounded hard on that tentacle with a massive grumble after we managed to dig it out of ground. Unlike most cores, this core that we now gained is very, very odd. It is not a exactly solid. We almost mistook it for something else had we not felt the spirit energy that was coming from it. After a long debate, Gattsu made a compromise on the ownership of the core. A tier 5 core is not easy to come by. Mimick cores are rare and hard to get. Not only that, the transformative ability of the Mimick if obtained will boost the combat capability of the user. In the end, in exchange for the core, we provided them with 8 tier 4 cores. It greatly beyond the value of a typical tier 5 core but to us it is worth it. There is just a very simple reason to it. My tree is already able to imitate various object already. (not by ability but by sheer skill)If i gain that ability as well, it would be even more seamless. The only issue would be color which any color changer type of beast will do. After another brief debate, we and the band of the hawks decided to return after a brief rest. We barely had any sleep. 1 tier 5 is enough to keep us all away from this area for the moment. As we headed back, Gattsu extended his invitation to me multiple times as we travelled. He could see how crucial I was as I almost literally ¡®pick¡¯ up more and more lower tier beast for breeding. A routine of scare and snare from me and Amy. Daniel would occasionally be put to work when a beast starts charging in. it was almost eye power for Joyce and the 2 others that came along with us. She was just there to help hide my ability as a spirit lord. When we finally left the woods and got back to civilization, the people from the band of the hawk were all drooling. We had amassed more living beast than they have had in their 10 best Hunts combined. 30 tier 1 beasts, 18 tier 2 beasts, 12 tier 3 beast. 2 tier 4 beast. And that is just those alive. We have about 3 times that dead. The tier 4 beast was a true bonus. They were just spirit bear pups that had wandered out of their parents protection. Once they grow up they would be tier 5 beast and if lucky they may become tier 1 lord class beast. There was nothing much the band of the hawks could do about it though, we were just too efficient. There was just no need for them to do anything. ¡°Hey can my band get some front row seats to watch the exhibition tournament that he will be in? He is going to be in it right? The one that is coming up in 2 months from now.¡± ¡°Front row seats? Sure, but pay up. 1 tier 2 core per person for front row seats. The viewing gallery is just cost some fragments only if you find it too expensive.¡± ¡°Urgg¡± after a brief contemplation, Gattsu decided to pay up it is cheaper than buying off others still. It cost 5 tier 2 cores at least at the blackmarket. They do want to find more people to join them as hunters and these tournaments are made with this idea in mind. Of course there is a separate reason as well. Betting. They have seen my battle prowess and would like to make use of the chance to make some money. I am a dark horse that they saw first hand. ¡°Exhibition tournament?¡± I had forgotten about the tournament. It was the only time where students officially fight for their branch of the school to decide the school ranking and at the same time. There is also the lynchpin core that they will provide for the top 32. The top 32 to 17 gets a single lynchpin core of their current tier. The top 16 to 9 gets 1 lynchpin cores 1 tier above their current tier. The top 8 to 5 gets 1 lynchpin cores 1 tier above their current tier and 1 lynchpin core of their current tier. The top 4 and 3 gets 2 lynchpin cores 1 tier above their current tier. The 2nd place get 2 lynchpin cores 1 tier above their current tier and 1 fruits worth of filler cores of their current tier. The top gets 3 lynchpin cores 1 tier above their current tier and 1 fruits worth of filler cores of their current tier. Each tier has their own battle so it would be rather interesting to watch. Tier 0 vs tier 0. Tier 1 vs tier 1 all the way to tier 4 vs tier 4 Tier 3 and tier 4 are battles between teachers. It is more of a show than battle As it is an exhibition tournament, the top 4 of each tier will get to battle it out after for additional rewards. The reward varies from person to person. It is about talent and it only looks at that. The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Knowing that i am already behind others of my age in terms of level, getting top position would be very important to me. Most of those that are nine and manage to stay in the school are at least at tier 1 3 fruits already. I am still at tier 1 0 fruits. I got lots to work on to catch up to them. Not to mention that i need at least 5 times more core than others to gain a fruit. Hopefully i will get enough lightning gonzales by the time of tournament. I am trading 1 tier 3 core for 30 tier 2 and 1 tier 3 core for 5 tier 3 king gonzales. A very tempting offer for the people at the mercenaries guild. Not many people want lightning gonzales even though it is good for the speed type. The issue with it is that the odds of gaining the speed aspect. The multiplying aspect tends to appear more often than the speed aspect. I want both aspect so it works for me. Reaching back at the school, I headed to the mercenaries guild. 2 lots of tier 2 cores. No kings yet. Give it a week or so and I should have it. With that I paid the 2 tier 3 cores and left. It is quite a win win situation for the farmers, hunters and I. 1 is rid of pest, 1 gets fame and a good core payment and 1 get his needed filler cores. I am overpaying them anyway. It would need at least 40 lightning Gonzales core to trade for a tier 3 core. If it were any other non pest tier 2 core it would only take 5 cores at maximum. Pest cores are just that worthless. With my tier 4 covered thanks to the mimic, my tier 3 core as that unknown core from the cave. I am missing a tier 2 core. Contemplating since leaving the woods, i posted a new request. Tier 3 core with poison, numbing, paralyzing aspect. 50 needed Payment: 20 tier 2 filler core per core. Tier 3 leader type core with poison, numbing, paralyzing aspect. Payment: tier 3 defensive magic shield With these 2 set in place, i am all ready for my tournament. Or at least that is what i thought. Upon stepping into combat class, I realize I had missed out on too much combat experience. I have plenty of combat techniques in my head. But that did not mean i am able to perform them. Spending the day fighting the people around, i was steadily gaining my battle reflexes. I emded up gaining the nickname ¡°relentless¡±. i would end up ¡°visiting¡± Alice many times a day just for a quick recovery before rushing back for another quick battle. The defensive hate me and the offensive love me. The support class would play about a game of tag. I would be the one to catch them. They need to evade my attack or block my attack with their own tree. There is even a wall of fame as to how long they lasted before they got caught by me. The longest lasting was 3 minutes and 28 seconds. It was by a tool user. She uses a mirror and she would direct light at me and blind me so that I would miss her. I won by luck when she tripped as she was too focused on me. With that battle, i was reminded on the need to make use of topography. My main annoyance was the flame element users. Be it offensive or defensive, they would easily burn through my vine. It took a while longer to win them and much shorter time to lose to them. At night I would spend it cultivating. It is the only benefit of not being able to sleep. While waiting for the king lightning gonzales, 2 weeks later, i used up all 60 cores. Sadly, I could not feel the limit coming up. Heading to the mercenaries guild I picked up more of my needed cores. 5 sets of cores and 2 sets kings. That is 7 tier 3 cores. With the previous 2 I have used up a total of 9 and I have 5 left only. After splitting the loot from the hunting trip I gained plenty of cores but it seems that I am using cores as fast as I am gaining cores. I cancelled the filler core request knowing that it would be useless for me. I kept the king lightning gonzales thinking to use them as filler cores instead. No point wasting time with the normal filler cores if i am unable to level up with them already. Checking with the staff on how many more groups of hunters are hunting the normal lightning gonzales, there were 8 more teams who picked up the job. This sucked from my point of view. I have 5 cores left to trade and there are 8 more teams. Not a very good sign. Not having a choice i got a little thick skinned i headed to Amy for help. After many ¡°konks¡± on the head, Amy hand me another 10 tier 3 cores. I could have gotten them from Joyce but if i did, she most likely would have cancelled my request and put a more tempting offer than what i put up. She would most likely put the new request at about 1 tier 3 core for 25 lightning gonzalez and 1 tier 3 core for 3 tier 3 king gonzales or something along those lines. Mother hen can be scary for the wrong reason more often than not. With everything settled, i headed for more combat practice. chapter 15 - Travel to Zebub Town For those that wonder, an average person need about 10-15 cores to gain a branch/fruit. Practice was starting to become easier. Thinking that, i took a leaf out of the knight¡¯s training. I armored up. Slapping weights all over my body, i continued to fight with the others. The idea was to keep my body stressed at all times. It becomes a reverse cat and mouse now with the support class. i am the one running now with my body weighted, every lap i make in the arena that we set up i would pick up up wore weights. It would be about how many weights i pick up before i got caught. It was a rather fun thing and useful idea that there are others also starting to do the very same. It is a very useful idea. The weight puts the users at a certain fatigue level and that alone helps make thing more effective. In a real situation, when you are running for your live the odds are that you will be tired but the enemy may not be. Knowing how to evade and react is very important skill to have. The laps and weights systems simply accelerates the fatigue level very quickly. By the end of 2 weeks, almost everyone was carrying some form of weight. It had become mandatory to do so by the teachers but there was still quite a number who refuses. Of those, most of them are elites or nobles. The consider it beneath them to have to do so. Some of the ladies refuses also. They do not want those ¡°big bulky muscles¡± to appear and ruin their beauty. It was like a major crash course for me, 5 more weeks to the exhibition tournament. I can breakthrough anytime now actually i am just compressing for more power. What that was supposed to be used for 5 fruits ended up all in 1 fruit. The worse part is i can¡¯t imagine just how much i would need to level up when i am tier 3. Then it got me thinking. What if i used tier 3 cores when i am tier 1? Would that help? In theory, having a using a tier 3 core at tier 1 would flood a person¡¯s body with too much spirit energy and cause the person to self-destruct. There was one case which almost succeeded. He was attempting to create his last fruit on tier 1 and made a gamble. He survived and used a tier 3 core at tier 1. The only price was that he became crippled. Making all his efforts go down the drain. What was the point in being strong when you end up being crippled. Thinking back, At the rate i am going, it is highly likely that i will succeed what he failed. Maybe i will sustain some injuries but what could be worse that what i have suffered all these years. Knowing my next steps, i re-planned my layout for the tree. Going to the mercenaries guild, i looked up the extermination request for something what would be most fitting for me. After a flipping through numerous request, i found i was looking fr. Request Exterminate the nest of steel-tipped feathered octopus Estimated number : 40 Estimated tier : Upper tier 2 Behaviour : Aggressive Element : Wind, Air, Metal, Water Requested by: Mayor of Zebub Town This should be a good trip. It is near my village as well, i can visit my parents at the same time. It has been a while since i have been home. I do wonder if the bed at home is still the one i used when i was 5. Taking up the request, i headed off to find Amy and Joyce and inform them before leaving. After a series of planning with Amy and Joyce, i headed off alone. The deal was that i am to return within 10 days or there will be no more individual trips for me. I am pushing the time too close for comfort. Giving a polite bow as i see him,¡°Hey Ivan! Nice to see you again!¡± ¡°Hey kid, nice to see you too. It has been 4 years huh. Time sure flies. Too bad my brother won¡¯t be here, his wife is giving birth within these few days. Twins from what i hear, i hope they are both boys though, this uncle i am will not know what to get for a girl.¡± This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. Hearing that, i could only give a chuckle, all i am waiting now is for him to ask me. I did not read all that books without knowing what would be good for a newborn. In fact i have many unisex items that would have been perfect for the kid and the development of their tree in the future. Not only that, those items are cheap and affordable. One of such is an item forgotten by history. It is forgotten for 1 reason. It works only on those under the age of 1 and after that age, the effects are more or less minute. Hearing my chunkle, Ivan looks at me once again, ¡°what you laughing about?¡± Looking at him once again, i gave him the crescent moon eyes smiling not saying a word. It took a while before Ivan gave me an incredulous look. ¡°You have an idea what to give?¡± Giving him a wider smile, i nodding my head. ¡°You cheeky boy! What is the item?¡± ivan grabs me by a chokehold and starts giving me a noogie. Knowing that my prank achieved the purpose it is intended for with unintended results, it took a while before i escape the hold and explained what the item was. It is a simple potpourri bag. Made with dried petals of the some simple common herbs and some common leaves. This bag was easy enough to obtain but the difficult part was the time it takes to make. With the help of a flame element user, drying it would be of no problems for the first one but it would not be as effective as a naturally dried one. The ingredient easy to get but the ratio had to be perfect. Meaning that i would be the only one able to make it for now. After an hour or so, the first one is made. This one would last 12 days or so. Enough time for me to get back and make a new one which will last longer. A properly made one would last half a season or so. For now, it is one step at a time. Of course it was not for free, the payment was a free ride. Something Ivan immediately accepted. An item that increases spirit for a baby at a very low cost. It is something made by commoners for commoners. The nobles thought they erased this from history but they did not expect someone who can understand ancient text and bring this item back to life. why would nobles want such item to exist if it threatens their supremacy over commoners. Luckily, it was a rather uneventful ride. Other than the light sightseeing and some small frys that i took out in seconds, we reached Zebub Town on time Reaching the town, we headed to the mayor¡¯s office. Walking into the office, we were greeted by a muscled man with a steely expression ¡°Hi i am mayor Ekron. You must be the one who will be killing all those freaks of nature. I would have been the one killing them had i not been bogged down by paperwork.¡± shaking Ivan¡¯s hand as he points to the stacks of never ending paperwork around him. ¡°Actually, the one doing the killing will be him.¡± as Ivan points towards me. Ekron narrows his eyes as he looks towards me, ¡°Are you sure that would be the case?¡± Looking back at at Ekron, ¡°Yes¡± ¡°Not bad kid, i like the look in your eyes. Not many at your age can look at me in the eyes and say the same. The nest is due west once you leave the office. I hope to see you return alive.¡± With that, Ekron went back to his never ending paperwork. Stepping out of the office, Ivan looks at me ¡°no wonder my brother would not come. This guy gives even me the creeps. He outright refused upon hearing that we were coming to Zebub Town.¡± I could only give him a weak smile as we headed to the destination Chapter 16 - Stupid Octopus ¡°I think we have reached the place. Ivan i think you may have to bring our ride away and come back in about an hour to collect the bodies.¡± ¡°1 hour? Are you sure you can take care of them in 1 hour?¡± ¡°Make it 2 then. I can handle them with and i think. I do not think will take care of the job.¡± ¡° i will be 3 minutes away all you need is just make the call and i will be there in under 1 if i rush over without the ride. ¡°Ok see you in 2 hours.¡± With that, as Ivan was leaving, i began formulating the plan of assault. After setting up some traps just to make things easier, i began my assault. Climbing up one of the trees, i wrapped some vines around myself to anchor myself on the tree. Next i began spewing vines all over the steel tipped. Even though they are called octopus, they do not live in water, they are tree climbers. They would cling on trees and attack anything that passes below them. They would spin like flying guillotine from the sky and latch on a person¡¯s head and cut it off. From each head they cut they lay an egg into it and that would grow into a new steel tipped.for a nest of about 40, it would mean about 40 lives were lost. Knowing all that, i also sent out human shape vines to the ground for them to target. After trapping the 3rd one, i realise that i could not kill them. My offensive ability was too low to crush their skull. Knowing that flaw, i really hope to up my offensive ability with the core from them. I began looking around for something that would kill them. After weaving between the octopuses for over 10 minutes as they dived all around me attempting to take my head off, i realized one thing. There is one thing as hard as their head, their head. Smashing their head on to each other head was the next best thing i could do. With that added into my how to kill list, i began smashing the heads together. But their heads were to hard to crack still. In the end i began swinging them towards each other. Like weighted chains, the centrifugal force did what it was meant to do a couple of swings. The heads began cracking and they started dying. *screech* ¡°Ahh so the king finally appears¡­ 18 and 1 king to go¡± Using the same tactic as previous i started smashing the heads of the captured octopuses into the king octopus. *crack* *crack* *crack* Damnit. Looks like i need more speed. The king is a tier 3 high lower if not middle tier 3 and his skull is a tough nut to crack i can¡¯t even wrap my vine around it fast enough to bind it either. Looks like this will take a little longer than 1 hour. After smashing 8 more octopus into the king there was still no dents. 8 down 11 more to go. I am running out of heads to smash. Just what kind of head was used to give birth to it. It is really annoying to not be able to punch through that thick skull of it. Looks like there is no choice to it. I have to take out all the rest first. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. As time ticked on, it finally became a 1 on 1. Me versus the king. As the tentacles whipped about as it spins, i could feel as if the air itself was cut. It was not fun feeling those close shave when the tentacle miss you by inches. I cant grab it because it keeps breaking out and it cant kill me because i keep pulling myself away using the vines as arms and legs. AN: just imagine doc octopus Counting off the time, in about 10 minutes or so i will be seeing Ivan again most likely. I need to finish fast. Since quality did not work, it is time for quantity. Sending about 5% of my spirit energy all at once, i generated numerous amount of vines and simply piled on it. Crude and simple. All that is left is to wait until it suffocate. I could feel the vines breaking and creaking still. With the passing of time, i can still feel it struggle but it is getting weaker. By the time Ivan arrives, it should be just about too weak to move but it may be still alove and may still escape. It is better to play save and keep it wrapped up even after until i can find someone who can kill the octopus or make sure it is dead. Once i get back i need to demand compensation from that mayor. He did not put a restriction on the request. The king is a middle tier 3 and not a lower tier 3. A middle tier 3 would require a team or someone who is tier 3 for the hunt. Ivan arrived moments later to the well kept clearing made from the fight. ¡°Not bad kid. 40? Or more?¡± ¡°42 and a middle tier 3 king that i am not sure if it is dead or not.¡± ¡°Middle tier 3 king? Did it escape? Or is that well wrapped thing on the floor there it?¡± ¡°That little gift-wrapped is still alive i think. Weakened but still alive i think. I have not checked.¡± ¡°Then check it. You are a spirit master right? There is that spirit attack thingy that i know you guys can do right?¡± ¡°Wait how did you know?¡± ¡°I heard from Amy. She accidentally let slip to me on one of our trips out. 3 years ago after you collapse back then. And don¡¯t worry. I told no one. Not even my brother. Back to the main topic, the spirit attack thingy?¡± ¡°Arg¡­¡­. damnit¡­¡­ i forgot. One moment.¡± Looking at that gift-wrapped king I began sending waves of spirit into it, attacking its mind. Barely a moment it is dead. So much for having so much trouble killing this when all i needed to do was use spirit. Facing off the other kids and not using my powers as a spirit master when facing them made me forgot about that i have it. It made me forget that this is the real world and there is no need to hold back.