It had been like Master had said. It took me four hours until I could move almost as well as normally. All of my actions, from walking to moving my arms, had become a strange mix between extremely precise and imprecise, which had become the main reason for the many times I fell down. I could accurately manipulate my muscles, or at least to a degree I had never been able to before. But this at the same time, threw of my sense of hand eye coordination. At the very least, my mind had begun to filter information out again, though I could still find myself focusing on my beating heart from time to time.
I began to jog around the training ground to get used to faster paced movement. I also sprinted from time to time, with a bit of shadow boxing, or at least how I imagined it worked. It took me an hour and a half until I felt halfway ready to travel anywhere. I went over to Master when I felt ready, slightly disappointed that I had taken longer than she predicted. I asked, “I am ready. Can you give me the mission now?” It took me longer than usual to form the words and they were still slurred, but I managed to form multiple coherent sentences in a short time. It was progress.
Master lightly pressed against my shoulder, and I felt my balance shift. My muscles moved and began counteracting the push. I still needed to slightly adjust my feet slightly, but I did not fall over. She then said, “Punch me as hard as you can. I will give you…” I just threw the punch in the middle of her sentence. It landed in her hand which had moved in between both of us. She simply began to grin as her hand closed around my fist, “It is rude to attack while I am talking. But that is the right kind of mindset to have. Respect is for those weaker than you. And I will make sure that you will never fight those. So, your mission this time is to escort some cargo. The journey will take four days, including the trip back. You will join the mission from a mercenary group, so there will be other cultivators present. Pick three other disciples to accompany you and give the mercenaries this letter.”
She handed me a sealed letter and explained, “All the loot from anything you come across and you guys’ defeat will belong to you. It would do you good to build up some personal riches.” I moved the muscles in my right arm and hand to take the letter. I asked, “Where will we meet them and when exactly?” Master took a short glance at the sundown and said, “The mission starts around midnight, and you will need to be there earlier to hand the letter over. They will be in the building of the Eclipsed sun guild.”
While I didn’t know where exactly the building was, it sounded easy enough to find, given the name. I walked over to the Grandmasters pagoda to see if Devi and the others wanted to join me. The Grandmaster teleported in front of me, alongside Devi and Estella, as soon as I entered. He asked, “You are going on another mission?” I nodded and he disappeared. I asked the two of them, “Do you want to join me? We would accompany mercenaries this time.”
Devi immediately agreed, while Estella seemed to be on the fence about it. She said, “I am not sure if this will be the fastest way for me to progress. Like you said yourself Miranda, we should focus on our own goals.” I thought for a moment and pulled out Masters letter. I grinned and said, “We get to keep the loot of everything we defeat. Master implied that this mission is to build up some personal wealth for me.”
She still didn’t seem too convinced, so I added, “If I find a treasure, then I will trade it to you, for some of your loot.” This finally got her to agree and I asked her, “What about Pargo or the other disciples?” Devi was the one to answer first. “Pargo has secluded himself ever since. I think the deaths weigh heavily on him. Relk is studying alchemy from one of the alchemy masters and Artius is way too strong to join us.”
I nodded and turned around starting to leave. Estella quickly caught up with me and asked, “Who do you want to ask to join us? Or will it just be the three of us?” I thought for a moment. While it would probably be fine if just three of us went, I knew that Estella and Devi would not always have time to join me on missions. It seemed like a good idea, to have a few people who could join if anybody didn’t have time. I thought for a moment and realized that I only really knew one other direct disciple.
I remembered that Ivia had become a direct disciple of a man called Elder Lecil. I opened the map of the sect and searched for where he stayed at. I led the other two to a large compound similar to Master’s, just bigger and with more people inside. We entered and it took me a moment to spot Ivia. It seemed like her stature was nothing special here. Every single disciple was tall and muscular beyond belief. I found her sparring against a man who seemed like he was toying with her. We went over to the sparring grounds and waited for a few moments.
The man noticed us first and asked while dodging a kick from Ivia, “What can I do for you three? It is rare to see the disciples of the other Masters here.” Before I could answer, did the man, who I now assumed was Elder Lecil, trip Ivia up causing her to stumble. He used the opening, landing a kick squarely against her throat. Ivia collapsed coughing and I answered, “My Master gave me a mission, and I wanted to ask Ivia if she wanted to join me on it. These two would also join us.” I pulled out wanting to explain the benefits, but the man just interrupted me, “Your master is Garlou, right?”
I nodded and a slightly mad grin spread across his face. He turned to Ivia lifting her easily upright, while she had managed to stop her coughing. He said, “Great, Ivia will join you.” He patted her on the back and left. Ivia looked slightly confused and walked over to us. “What exactly did Teacher sign me up for?”
I quickly explained everything about the mission, seeing excitement spread across her face. She immediately asked when we could go. We bought the usual equipment that seemed appropriate and made our way into the city. Estella knew where the building for the mercenary group was located, so she took the lead. Since there would be nothing to do, and I wanted to distract myself from my body, did I ask Devi, “How strong exactly is Artius?”
Before he could answer, did Ivia butt in, “He is the youngest son of the Evergrah family. So, he has essentially cultivated since birth, while being pumped full of Qi pills and other treasures. So, to summarize, he is an absolute monster for his age. I highly doubt any of us will come close to catching up for at least a century or two. After that it just becomes easier, due to cultivation speed decreasing.” I was a bit surprised by her knowledge, but held that question back, instead asking, “Why didn’t he stay with his family then? It sounds like they could make him stronger than the Grandmaster could. Simply because the Grandmaster also needs to pay attention to the other disciples.”
Ivia thought for a moment, “It is a powerplay to put it bluntly. All noble families are like that. They send him here, to reinforce the alliance, but at the same time to show off. He is the weakest child and yet he will most likely be the strongest cultivator the sect will produce, while he is here.” Estella asked curiously, “How come you know so much about the noble families? I mean, I could have also told you that Artius is extremely strong, but nothing more. Is that why the noble families are so strong? They feed their children a lot of resources?”
Ivia laughed and said, “Oh, I guess you don’t know. I am Ivia Alestor. I am a noble myself, though my family doesn’t particularly favour me. As for your other question, yes that is mostly the reason. Alongside generational cultivation manuals, designed for a single blood line.”
We went to turn a street, and while turning did my mind feel the muscles in my legs flex. But I was unsure which ones I needed to move and how to properly move them, to achieve the desired rotation. I simply froze mid action and begun to think about the action I wanted to take, step by step. It took me a few moments, until I managed to turn. This of course did not go unnoticed and Ivia asked me shocked, “Did your master send you on a mission, while you are experiencing body purification?! What is wrong with her?”
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Her shock seemed genuine, but I didn’t really care. I knew that this was a rather insane thing to do, but still, I could not waste an opportunity like this. I shrugged, feeling my back and chest muscles moving to achieve the effect. At least it was semi subconsciously and I said, “My goal is rather insane, so why should my training not follow suit? I will go on this mission, no matter what.” I knew that it was borderline suicidal, but I needed to get as much as possible out of the fifty thousand years. If I took a break this time, it would at most result in a month of not fighting, but then what? What would I also take a break for?
I knew that this way of thinking could lead to burnout really fast, but I didn’t care. I trusted my will to just push through it. I was no longer on earth, so it might not even be as unhealthy anymore. We continued walking in silence, and I decided to break the silence, “I know this might be a rather stupid question, but who is the strongest person in the world?”
This gathered Devi’s interest and he said, “It is the Demon lord. I heard she won against two of the Alliance leaders once.” He had a grin on his face again and Estella chimed in, “Yeah, I heard the same. Apparently, there is an order to not engage her unless three of the leaders are present. I also heard that she got this strong by consuming the power of her foes, by eating them.” This got my attention, since that seemed like it would have been a really good manual to follow.
Ivia cut in and destroyed my dream of obtaining such a manual, to steal parts of it, “She is just one of the most talented and oldest cultivators in the world. There is no cultivation manual, which breaks the balance like this. If there was, we would have already lost, since she could just feed her underlings enough people to get on a similar level as our Alliance leaders.” She noticed that this essentially killed the excitement in the conversation.
She awkwardly scratched her neck and added, “But I also heard, that seeing her fight is an otherworldly experience. My grandmother once saw her fight and her movements with the spear were apparently god like.” She then lowered her voice and said, “So, she might not be entirely human. She could be a descendant of a god.”
This earned her everybody’s full attention, and Estella asked, “Which god do you think descended down? I feel like with how domineering she is, it must have been the god of war.” Devi argued, “I feel like she doesn’t participate in enough wars for that. When was the last time anybody actually saw her? I believe that she is the descendant of the god of power, since that is what she has sought out her entire life.”
Before the discussion could stray away from the topic, did I ask, “What is a god? To be honest I was never taught about them.” I quickly added to cover for possible slip ups in the future, “Or just things that most would consider common knowledge.”
I felt the pity practically coming off the others but didn’t care. Ivia explained, “We refer to people who have ascended as gods. Ascending just means that they have reached the peak of power one can achieve and going beyond it. Each ascension was a massive event, always destroying large parts of the world. It is commonly assumed that these damages were the shockwaves released from the teleportation spell they used. Since your master is sending you all around the world, you will likely see one of these craters one day.”
The rest of the way, did we just spent idly chatting about the gods and the world. I tried to figure out as much as possible about the world, since I still knew next to nothing and it was a good distraction. We arrived at the Eclipsed sun guild building around three hours before midnight and walked inside.
It was a surprisingly orderly place, with tables filling the left half of the hall and the other half being occupied by one gigantic table. I saw a few people sitting on the left side of the hall eating food while discussing something and spotted a lone man by the gigantic table studying what looked like a map spread across it, with pins on it. I glanced at the others and decided to talk with the man by the map.
He looked up as we came closer and began to smile like a merchant, “I am the Receptionist, Ecla. What can I do for the young lady’s and lord on this night? I promise the Eclipsed sun will fulfil whatever mission you may have.” I pulled out the letter, handing it over while explaining, “My Master said that there is a mission to escort some cargo, which we are supposed to join. Could you point us to the mercenary group which we would be joining?”
The smile of Ecla’s face slightly faltered but otherwise, he continued to look friendly. He opened the letter and read through it. This time his smile completely faded and he looked quite mad. He took a glance at us and sighed, motioning us to follow him. We went out a backdoor that I had overlooked. There was a group of five people sitting on the ground watching a young man spar with a middle aged man. Seeing that Ecla had arrived did the middle aged man interrupt the spar and joined the other five sitting on the ground, who had begun standing up.
The full team consisted of two women and five men, with all of them except the young man, looking middle aged. Before any of them could say anything, did Ecla explain, “These four will join your mission and their master has decided that it would be better if the group was made out of eight people total.” The middle aged man who had just sparred wanted to protest, but Ecla continued before a single word left the man’s lips, “I am sorry, Piul. The master in question is Lady Garlou.”
This shut down all complaints Piul seemed to have and he turned to us, “Could you explain how you fight and how strong you are? I want to know which three you will replace for the mission.” Before any of us could say anything did Ecla say, “I am sorry to interrupt one last time. Lady Garlou asked that the disciples get to keep all the loot on whatever they kill.” This soured the mood even more and Ecla just left.
Seeing that none of my companions were saying anything did I start, “I am a dual body and earth cultivator. I am still rather inexperienced at fighting, so I do not know how to properly explain my fighting style.” The others seemed to get a hold of themselves, and Estella introduced herself as a fast body cultivator, Devi introduced himself as a healer and someone who focused on defending people and lastly Ivia just said that she was a normal body cultivator, which seemed to be enough for Piul.
He sighed and said, “Guess we will be a really close ranged team this time. So, Ifra, Leol and Tref you will need to sit this one out. Sorry.” Two men and one of the women nodded but stayed with the group. Piul then asked, “Does anybody have any complaints?” Clearly not expecting a response. Which he unfortunately still got from the young man he had just sparred with.
The young man said, “Why do they get to join our mission, make it harder and then also keep the loot?” Before Piul could say anything, did the young man turn to us and said, “Come, prove to me that you at least won’t make it harder on us, despite having one extra person.” He pointed at me grinning, “I want to spar against you.”
Before any of the others could say anything, did I simply walk onto the platform. I knew that I would most likely lose, but like Master had said, I should use every opportunity to spar. I still didn’t want to end up on bad terms with the group, so I asked the young man, “Before we fight, could you tell me what your name is?” The man spat on the ground, “Lius. And you have not even told us your name.”
He gripped a sword by his side, which I had seen him use in the spar against Piul. I began to feel the earth underneath me and said, “My apologies, it slipped my mind in the moment. I am Miranda.” I began to lean forward, since even though he used a sword, Lius still relied mostly on using the wind. Or at least that how it had looked to me. I felt the individual muscles in my legs flexing and got distracted wondering how to properly let them propel me forward.
I completely missed the starting signal and just barely managed to move before something slammed into me. I felt it cut me slightly across the chest. It must have been a wind blade from Lius. I ignored the pain and closed the distance as quickly as I could while preparing the binding technique under his feet.
To my frustration, did he move out of the way of it and draw his sword. I noticed that I was still faster than he was and managed to close the distance before he could get a proper hit on me with the sword. I tackled him and immediately began to cover my skin in rocks, hoping to drag him to the ground. I focused on dragging the weight of the stones up to my torso first, which while I was successful in doing, was too slow.
Something that felt like a battering ram, slammed into my stomach, which was just getting covered in stones and threw me a few meters back. I landed heavily on my back, knocking the air out of my lungs and I felt a few of the stone splinters pierce my stomach. I felt them touch my abs after they cut through the layer of fat that I still had and tried to force myself to stand up. Which required the use of my core muscles. How did they need to contract again to put me upright.
I barely lifted my head when a sword was pressed against my neck. Lius had used the opportunity to close the distance. I sighed and let myself fall to the ground again. I began to remove the parts of the stone skin that I had been able to summon. I quickly noticed that I could also control the stone fragments in my body and made them come out without damaging any more tissue, by changing their shapes. Lius looked down on me while I did this and said, “You are really weak. Why were you send here? Is your master trying to kill us, by forcing you to come with us?” He left the stage looking extremely angry.
Devi sat down next to me, as I began to sit upright, and healed the few wounds I had. I stood up and grinned at him. I had already known that it would be impossible to win every fight, without ever having fought before, but it was still a good reminder of that fact. Piul said, “We have a few more hours before the mission starts, so make sure you are well rested until then. We will be in the main hall if you need something.” He then left with the others. All of them now clearly looking a bit more stressed. It seemed that my subpar performance really concerned them.
I considered for a moment, if I should rest and go through what I learned in the fight when I got a better idea. I asked Devi, “If we were to spar until it is time to leave, how many injuries could you heal?” He looked a bit surprised before a smile broke out on his face, “Depending on the amount of injuries that I would need to heal. But I could probably allow you to spar for another hour or so.” I turned to the others grinning and asked, “Who wants to fight me first?”
