I sat there staring at my dantian. Something about the spikes was scratching at my mind. It had something to do with connecting them to myself, somehow. However, I was too tired to work it out and soon turned my attention away, deciding I needed some rest before I went shopping.

  After having made that decision, I found myself jerking awake and realising that I had simply passed out right there on my cultivation cushion. A moment later, my attention was instantly drawn to a speaker.

  “WARNING! Void Qi resources have been depleted!” A female voice announced.

  *******

  Reece Witherson was pacing back and forth in his office as he thought over the implications of the report he had just received. Washington had survived, the news was now reporting on the system, and people were joining up in droves. The government would need to put a lid on this quickly, or they would soon lose control.

  Reece was a little worried, as he had started keeping a close eye on the Emmerson clan. They had joined up because of the news, and their rank skyrocketed quickly due to the millions of acres they already owned.

  “This is a nightmare,” he groaned.

  He turned and walked over to the intercom, about to call his secretary in, when the door flew open and a pudgy man in a suit came running in, waving a piece of paper over his head.

  “I got it! Sir, I got it. This is the confirmation list of all Washington clan members!” he screamed as he crossed the room, then slammed the paper down on Reece's desk.

  “Sir, it’s confirmed. The majority of the Washington clan members are politicians. They're made up of both the Republican Party and the Democrats. That way, if the clan needs something passed, they can push it through Congress. On the bright side, the President and the Vice President are not officially members of the Washington clan.”

  “Alright. We’ll need to contact Sean and see if he’s started a clan yet. If he has, then warn him of the danger Washington represents to the President. If he hasn’t, then encourage him, and all the special agents in the Secret Service, to join our clan. Offer Sean an officer position if you have to. We must ensure the government’s protection from a coup.”

  “Yes, sir!” the pudgy man replied before turning on his heel and rushing from the room.

  “Alright,” Reece said to himself as he turned to look out the window. “Step one: separate Washington from the President. Step two: push the clan members out of Congress and replace them with people who can keep the government running without such a one-sided agenda. Perhaps replace them with representatives from all the noble clans. Step three, which can be placed before step one at the first opportunity, kill that fuckin’ Washington lunatic.”

  *******

  Celestial Count Malcolm Twiddles was sitting in a conference room aboard the Emperor's ship with the Emperor himself. Just before the discussions began, Malcolm glanced at Celestial Marquess Joshua Walker and gave him a small look of disapproval before returning his attention to what the Emperor was saying.

  “You have both been doing a lot of war games and throwing an above-usual amount of resources and personnel at a… seriously? This is a backwaters resource galaxy! Why are you two fighting over this thing?” he asked, feeling slightly annoyed. After a few moments, he waved his hand, dismissing the question.

  “Actually, I don’t care. What I do care about is the above-average number of complaints I’m receiving about your misuse of power. Care to explain why a Celestial Marquess thought it would be a good idea for a dreadnought to be deployed to a poor-resource galaxy, or why a Celestial Count thought it would be a good idea to have someone violently busted out of a psych ward ship and then handed command of a military frigate?”

  “It was a new ship, and a bunch of military ships were violating the Emperor's law. So, in a show of power that the Emperor's law should not be violated so blatantly, I decided to take my new ship for a run through the galaxy and remind everyone of the Emperor's might, and his zero tolerance for the blatant disregard of the law,” Joshua replied smoothly.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “An upstart overstepped their authority and had my daughter arrested without filing the appropriate forms. I thought I would give them a reminder of what happens when you offend an immortal, especially over a cadet that isn’t even from a celestial clan,” Malcolm spat, before looking a little guilty at having spoken to the Emperor in such a manner.

  “I don’t care about the cadet or minor lawbreaking over such a useless galaxy. You have both overreacted to the situations. Rein in your people and stop throwing resources at a galaxy that won’t even cover what you’ve already thrown at it. Finally, you both will make amends to the other for this shit and move on. Besides, we have bigger problems. A Void-walking sect ship was detected near your skirmish grounds, and I need you both to bury whatever this little spat is and get some ships out there to patrol the area. Make sure another one of those nosy bastards doesn’t come back to poke their noses into my experiment,” the Emperor growled.

  “Of course,” they both replied instantly before giving the other an apologetic look.

  “I shall give up the galaxy, it is not important to our clan. However, I cannot be held accountable for any family members still inside the galaxy that have stopped responding to calls. I know Eloana left some upstart kid in charge of an outpost near your daughter's toy, for instance.” Malcolm said.

  ”Thank you, I am sure my daughter will appreciate her toy being less stressed by a feeling of impending doom in her home star system. I will, in exchange, have some people head in and extract your family before any local can get planet-endangering thoughts,” Joshua replied with a kind voice.

  ”Great, glad you two could come to an understanding. Now knock this nonsense off and stop interfering with the Gold Ranked players' games. You know they pay for the dimension’s rent, making this experiment possible. We don’t need them thinking the promise that they can destroy and kill anything they want or build and defend their property without NPCs deciding to have a turf war in their domain, you know that could lead to them thinking this game is not fun anymore,” The Emperor snapped at them both before taking a breath and continuing in a calmer voice.

  ”You both should know, one of the complaints came from such a player, telling me that some jackass NPCs were destroying the careful balance they had created for their experiment, and that they had to start all over again in a new place, because the planet somehow got an orbital station, is also now becoming system aware, and is rapidly joining the system.”

  *******

  I had managed to drag myself to the bed and get a bit more sleep before I ran from my quarters and almost skipped down the hallway to the airlock that I was currently standing in, waiting for it to cycle so I could run to the nearest markets. The second the outer door opened, I ran straight out and into Itshu Biyu.

  ”ouch, my nose.” I complained as I took a step back.

  “Kenna, what are you doing out of... How the fuck are you in the Nascent Realm already?! It’s only been thirty-seven hours since I told you to cultivate that realm,” Itshu Biyu yelled, before quickly pulling something out of a pocket on the left side of her pants and began tapping away on what quickly became apparent to be a piece of glass about the same size as the phone I had once owned back on Earth.

  I was a little surprised when I saw the colour slowly drain from her face, and her eyes darted between me and the piece of glass in her hand a few times before she cleared her throat with a slight cough and spoke.

  “I don’t know how you managed to use your Qi to hold a cultivation room in a time dilation bubble you shouldn't even know how to create, but according to the room's sensors, you were inside that room cultivating non-stop for twenty-nine years. You also completely depleted the ship's Void Qi stores and will now have to replace one of the most expensive types of Qi to continue cultivating,” she said slowly, as if she couldn't believe she was even saying it.

  “No idea, it just kinda happened. I tried to follow where the Qi was going and figure out how I was doing it. I kinda got a minor understanding of it, but only enough to turn it off and on again while it was already doing it,” I said, feeling a little unsure.

  “Barely,” she replied as she reached into a pocket on the right side of her pants and pulled out a second piece of glass before holding it out to me.

  “This is a Personal Slate, more commonly known as a Phone. With it, you can manage all your affairs on the ship, including banking and local resource acquisition. You can also use it to communicate long distances with people who have tapped their phone against yours,” she said, tapping her slate against mine. “They still work even if one person is in another dimension.”

  “Wow, that is pretty cool,” I said excitedly as I tapped the screen trying to turn it on like I had my original phone.

  “Yes, very cool,” she replied dryly before continuing. “As it so happens, I was on my way back to the ship to give this to you and collect you for the opening ceremony, where we will see all the hopefuls perform their first test to see if they even qualify to walk down the cultivation path.”

  “What, like stick your hand on this orb, and if it lights up, you have a dao root or something?” I asked, feeling silly.

  ”Yes,” she replied simply, before turning suddenly and walking back down the hallway she had come from.

  “Wait! Are you serious, that’s what happens?” I asked as I ran to catch up with her.

  ”In the simplest terms, yes. It will also announce what affinity the dao root has and if the person possesses a bloodline.” She replied as she continued walking.

  ”Wow, that’s pretty cool,” I replied before thinking about it and asking, “What’s my dao root and bloodline?”

  ”You are kidding, right?” She replied as she turned her head to look at me like I was crazy, before sighing and rolling her eyes when she noticed I wasn’t.

  “It should be obvious to you that you have a Void Qi dao root, a peak Jade-Ranked one at that. Before you ask, it goes Mortal, Common, Sky, Jade, and lastly Heavenly. Now, your bloodline should be so obvious that I feel stupid having to tell you that you have the Void Hawk bloodline.”

  I nodded my head sheepishly as I tried not to giggle nervously or rub the back of my head, and instead turned my attention to looking around myself, noting that the hallway had, at some point, changed to a landing pad area, and Itshu Biyu was approaching a small flying car that had ‘TAXI’ on the side of it.

  She quickly got in and sat down, waiting for me to do the same before tapping her phone to a light green square next to the door we had just entered from.

  “Young Blood Sky Box, Vaticolm Ceremony Grounds.” She said to it. A moment later, the door closed, and I felt the vehicle move away from the ground before the windows showed it turning. The next second, I felt the thrusters engage and watched the scenery fly past the windows.

  The Lost Tavern Discord about whatever you want :D

  Patreon, where you can read ten chapters ahead for only $5 or 20 chapters, plus other stories, and a bit of rambling that I am working on for only $10