Chapter 76: Return

  Sunlight streamed down from the clear sky, the harsh glare beating down on the group of cultivators practicing drills below.

  “Hah!”

  “Hah!”

  “Hah!”

  With every burst of sound, thick beams of different colored lights erupted from their palms and struck a makeshift building standing in the center of the training grounds.

  Most of the rays punched through the building and hit nothing, but several hit the practice dummies hidden within. The dummies wore small necklaces inlaid with fragments of essence stones that pulsed with weak arcane energy.

  “Okay, that’s enough!”

  A deep voice drifted down from above, upon which the cultivators stopped their drills. A man with short black hair and a shady mustache floated down and landed in front of the group.

  “That wasn’t too bad for the first time. Do you see the advantages of arcane sight, now?”

  “Yes, Senior Alan!”

  The group of young students yelled in affirmation of Alan’s words. He smirked at them and waved his hand.

  “Good. Practice this in your own time using some essence stones or with a friend. You are all dismissed. Oh, except for Dylan. Come talk to me for a second.”

  The rest of the class quickly vanished through the gates at the side as they chatted merrily with their friends. Left behind on the field, Dylan glanced at Alan’s back-turned figure and wrung his hands in nervousness. Alan had been acting strangely ever since the Crucible Convergence, especially during his combat classes.

  The rumors said he lost everything to a gambling addiction, and now owed a hefty debt to the Academy. For some reason, Alan had been trying to find Damon to resolve his debts for him. But Damon had disappeared.

  Right after the Crucible Convergence, Damon could no longer be seen in the Academy and his villa was emptied of his clothes. The higher-ups even sent down word that he would not be attending his combat and Runeology classes for a while.

  Dylan shifted uneasily as he tried to guess where his Older Brother Damon had gone. He had not left behind any word to him or any of his other friends.

  “Dylan, I’m just going to ask you once.”

  Alan still had his back to him, but the strained voice made Dylan increasingly anxious about the coming question.

  “Do you know where Damon went? I know you are very close to him.”

  Dylan swallowed the rapidly gathering saliva in his mouth and accidentally choked while doing so. He doubled over into a coughing fit. After a while, he stood back up with a reddened face and tears streaking down his cheeks.

  “Senior… I honestly don’t know where Older Brother Damon went. The last time I saw him was the night after the Crucible Convergence ended. I asked some of the others close to him and they haven’t heard anything, either.”

  Alan slowly turned around and looked at Dylan. His face darkened so much that he looked less like a man and more like a devil from a children’s story he had heard when he was young.

  “Dylan. I hope you are telling the truth. If I learn that you are hiding something from me…”

  As Alan’s words trailed off, his face distorted into a menacing grimace. Dylan shuffled backward as he raised both of his hands and frantically waved them in front of him.

  “No! There’s nothing! I promise I don’t know anything!”

  Alan stared at Dylan so fiercely that he felt like holes were being bored into his head. After another minute, the tension drained from Alan’s face and he let out a long sigh.

  “Haa… I’m not asking this because of any malicious design. You’ve probably heard the rumors already, but I am quite desperate. But that’s not the only reason. I am also truly worried for his safety.”

  Dylan calmed down as he looked at Alan’s sincere smirk. After attending enough combat classes, he had come to learn that this particular smirk could only be seen when Alan was trying to smile.

  Perhaps Senior Alan actually does care for Older Brother Damon’s whereabouts? But…

  Dylan agonized about whether he should reveal his suspicion. Alan caught sight of Dylan’s conflicted expression and hurriedly approached and grabbed his hands.

  “What is it? You can trust me.”

  “Well… The thing is…” Dylan glanced around nervously for a while. After a minute of contemplation, he finally opened his mouth. “I really don’t know anything, but I think I know someone who does…”

  “Who is it? Tell me!” Alan’s lips widened, and his teeth were revealed. Though Dylan knew this was just his grin, the sinister countenance still scared him.

  “It’s… Sister-in-l… I mean, Older Sister Claire. When we had gathered once, I brought up Older Brother Damon, and everyone expressed their confusion, except her. She stayed silent. I think she knows where he went.”

  “Claire, huh? I see…” Alan stroked his thin beard for a few seconds and then looked down at Dylan. “Good job. You can go now.”

  Dylan bowed toward Alan and then scampered off as quickly as he could. He wanted to get as far away from Alan as possible, but he also needed to find Claire and warn her.

  After he left the training grounds, he ran straight toward the Potioneering department’s area.

  Deep below Verdant Sigil Tradehaven, a web of carved tunnels and natural caves stretched out in every direction. Not many knew of the existence of this network of pathways, being only accessible to the upper-rank cultivators of the Assembly.

  At one corner of this underground maze, just beneath the Arcane Academy, a young man lay atop a stone table with his eyes closed. His hands were gathered atop his stomach, and his breathing was slow and comfortable. Standing next to him was a woman with sleek black hair tied into a high ponytail. She wore azure colored robes and a pair of thick spectacles.

  She held onto a shimmering orb made from a strange translucent material. It oscillated with a warm white light. After a few minutes, the orb stopped glowing and returned to its shimmering, translucent state.

  “The results are inconclusive.” She muttered under her breath as she closely inspected the orb in her hand.

  The young man opened his eyes and sat up, facing her with a frown.

  “Senior Belinda, it’s already been three months. Is there still no hope?”

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  Belinda raised her spectacles and looked at the young man.

  “I didn’t say there wasn’t any progress. The Mindsoul Dew you gave us has allowed us to craft this Mindsense Orb. Though it can only locate the presence of mental power within a small area, it can be very useful in weeding out any potential Psions. It is a grand step toward learning more of the mind path. Thanks, Damon.”

  “No need for thanks, Senior. The Academy has given me more than enough compensation in return. I’m just disappointed that we have been unable to ascertain any new information on the blood seed.”

  “Worry not. It should only be a matter of time. We just need to alter the scope of this Mindsense Orb to be able to enter and scan the Mind Node directly. Thanks to the cultivation manual you have shared with us, we have a much greater insight into how the mind path works. Before that, we did not even know how to locate the Mind Node, as it exists in the mind and is not part of the anatomy like the Arcane and Auric Nodes.”

  “It’s not like I had much of a choice…” Damon smiled awkwardly as he thought back to three months ago.

  On the night of the Crucible Convergence’s closing ceremony, Zoltan had come to his villa along with Tidus and Belinda. He had thought Claire had betrayed his trust when they mentioned his mind path, but it turned out that Tidus had already suspected him for a while.

  At first he thought he would be interrogated. Perhaps even have his cultivation assets seized. Instead, they escorted him to a hidden facility beneath the Academy and asked for his help. They did not have enough information about the mind path to figure out how to track the true culprit behind the blood seeds and the disaster.

  Though they asked for his cultivation manual with polite words, Damon thought refusing them was not an option. Thankfully, they only asked him to transcribe a copy of his Mindspire Tempering Sutra instead of surrendering the original. They did not seem to covet the cultivation art itself, only to use it as a reference.

  After having arrived in the underground world, he had frequently met with Belinda, who ran all the experiments by herself. Apart from her, he regularly saw Cado, who remained in a nonresponsive state. Though his body still functioned, it had begun to weaken. There was only so much nutrition they could force into someone who never woke.

  Zoltan occasionally came to check on the progress, and Tidus visited to discuss his personal findings after delving into the Sutra. The only other person he saw occasionally was Claire, who came to keep him company once a week. Her expression was full of guilt and regret, even though Damon had confirmed with Tidus that she had nothing to do with discovering his secrets.

  Damon tried to convince her that she had nothing to feel regret over, but she did not listen. She continued to reproach herself and strove to make up for it by bringing him succulent meals and delicious wine. On top of that, she occasionally gave him potions and other resources for increasing his cultivation speed. Thanks to them, his arcane cultivation was nearing the peak of mid stage.

  “Don’t say that. If you truly did not want to share the Sutra, we wouldn’t have forced you. Though it is a spectacular cultivation art, it only contains the sections pertaining to the Node Awakening and Channel Weaving realms. Like most mind path manuals recovered from ruins and demi-planes, it is heavily fragmented. Even so, it should be useful for a select few in the Academy to cultivate. It will supplement their arcane path.”

  Belinda smiled at Damon and patted him on the shoulder. Damon did not respond to her words and just remained silent. Belinda, along with the rest of the Adepts, had mistaken his compliance as honesty. They did not know that he had only copied the first half of the Sutra and had even left out some crucial information regarding Silas’s secret techniques.

  “Anyway, we can resume our Mind Node experiments next time. As you’ve explained, the blood seed attached to you does not pose any immediate threat. Instead, let’s focus on Cado. Though he resisted the seed and did not transform into a monster, it still has a hold over his mind. We’ve fed a mouthful of your Mindsoul Dew every day for the past week, and his condition has improved significantly. You previously mentioned you had found this precious material with your inheritance, but did not say how much you had… So…”

  “I still have a few dozen vials of Mindsoul Dew left. It accelerates mind cultivation, but it is even more effective for healing injuries to the mind. It would be a waste to use it for cultivation so I haven’t really used much since I discovered it.”

  Damon produced around a dozen vials and placed them on the stone table he was sitting on. Inwardly, he counted the number of vials remaining in his storage pouch. There were still a couple of hundred.

  Belinda’s eyes glowed with delight as she picked one up and inspected the contents.

  “This Mindsoul Dew is such an incredible material. I wonder where it’s from? The Sutra mentioned its effects but did not contain any additional information. I guess we’ll have to use it sparingly. Anyway, Cado has begun to mumble and move his fingers. I believe he should awaken from his stupor in the near future. Whether he will remain awake or sink back into the depths of his own mind will have to be seen. Without understanding the mechanism of the blood seed, we might not be able to heal him completely.”

  “I agree with you, Senior. Overcoming the blood seed remains the most pressing issue.” Damon nodded and then looked at Belinda with a cautious gaze. “By the way, Senior, how long do I need to remain down here?”

  “Oh, that.” Belinda waved her hand nonchalantly. “You can go back to the surface now. I will call for you whenever I make a breakthrough in my research, and I need your assistance with the tests.”

  Damon’s eyes teared up as a wide smile grew on his face. “I can finally see the sun again!”

  Belinda grabbed her stomach and laughed out loud at his antics, before standing straight again and fixing her spectacles.

  “Is it that funny, Senior Belinda?” Damon asked with a confused look.

  She stroked the pale skin of her arm and said, “It’s funny because I used to be like you a long time ago. Now, I don’t even like going outside unless it’s at night. I have spent so long down here that I am no different from an earthworm.”

  “If I may ask, why did you decide to seclude yourself down here with your tinkering? Did the Academy force you?”

  “Force? The Assembly does not force. They helped raise me to the Circuit Completion realm, so I can only repay their efforts with my own. Loyalty. It’s a silly thing that is difficult to find in the cultivation world, but it is also a powerful force. It may not exist in the Towers, but the Assembly is filled with loyalists. You get what you give, after all.”

  Damon nodded in agreement. The treatment he had received after his performance in the Crucible Convergence and sharing his mind path art had been on an entirely different level from before. Within reason, he was allowed to consume as many resources as he required for cultivation, without needing any merit points. Of course, that was only possible because he was only in the Node Awakening realm. Once he became a Channel Weaving Disciple, or even a Circuit Completion Adept, the amount of resources available to him would dwindle. He would need to use his own efforts to gather them.

  “Well, if that’s all, I’d like to go back up now, Senior.”

  “Sure thing. I’ll send a message to your communication orb if I need you.”

  Belinda walked Damon to the tunnel leading out of the room and watched him disappear into the dark passage.

  “What an interesting kid. Even if we treat him well, an Initiate is usually quite conservative and quiet in front of Adepts. But that child showed no apprehension or fear. Is it courage and confidence? Or is it recklessness and stupidity? Perhaps it is honesty and trust. Whichever it is, someone like him will grow into a pillar of the Assembly if nurtured properly.”

  She stood still in thought for several more minutes before shaking her head. She didn’t have time to ponder about a single weak Initiate’s future. She needed to get back to her research. War was on the horizon and she couldn’t spend much more time on the blood seeds.

  After walking through winding tunnels and vast caverns for several hours, Damon finally emerged from a hatch hidden within an ordinary residential building. He knew there were many entrances and exits from the underground, but this was the only one he was sure of since it was how he entered.

  He left the building and breathed deeply. The fresh, cool night air filled his lungs and made him feel refreshed from head to toe. Down in the musty, humid caves, he never felt satisfied with the air quality. The surface was definitely much better. Sadly, it was the middle of the night, and he could not catch a glimpse of the sun he had missed.

  Damon took out his communication orb and sent messages to his friends that he had returned. He had been forbidden from revealing the underground facilities, but he had already prepared an excuse. He would say he had been sent on a secret reconnaissance mission to the Lunarsol border, just in case they retaliated after what happened at the end of the Crucible Convergence. It sounded plausible enough. He had already proven himself one of the Assembly’s most capable Initiates.

  He smiled as he continued to take deep breaths and walked briskly toward his villa. He missed his soft bedding and comfortable environment. He had his own room in the underground, but everything was made of stone or metal and did not provide the same warmth as the luxurious villa.

  The moment he arrived at his house, he climbed into his bed and fell asleep with a grin on his face.

  He woke up to the warm sunlight stroking his cheeks. It embraced him as though it had missed him as well, and he felt the coldness from his past three months seep out of his bones. As he basked in the comforting feeling, frenzied banging sounded out from his door. He hurriedly jumped up and ran over, pulling it open.

  “Older Brother Damon, you’re really back!” Dylan jumped up and down with a large smile upon seeing him. However, it only lasted for a moment before his expression turned grim. “You need to hide! He’s found out that you’re back already! He’s coming for you!”

  “Wait, what? What’s going on? Who’s coming for me?”

  “Who else? Senior Alan!”

  Boom!

  An explosion rang out in the distance as a huge ball of fire hurtled toward them so fast that the air detonated behind it. Within the flames was a man. It was Alan.

  Volume 2! I will be creating the volume pages for the fiction index soon, just so it's easier to navigate.

  Damon's journey even now! A lot of exciting things will come in book 2, you can look forward to it!