by Aaron Oster
His Core and channels were left feeling strained, which in turn made him lethargic and slow to react. Cycling became an almost painful exercise as he continued to try staving off attacks while he attempted to find his Full-body technique at the same time.
Another blast of energy hit him, the Weakness Chakra digging its needle-like tendrils into his skin, trying to find purchase to slide its way into him. After nearly three weeks of training, Roy was intimately familiar with the feeling of Weakness Essence and how it behaved. It was, as implied, the exact opposite of Power.
Where Power tried to overwhelm, Weakness tried to find cracks or chinks to worm into. Each blow struck by a Weakness construct sapped at his strength, while Power would seek to crush with sheer force. But there were some similarities as well. For one, it was noticeable in the way they attacked.
Even though Weakness targeted weak points in defenses, the attacks were still straightforward. There were no slippery movements, redirecting attacks, or deceptions, unlike the Path of Water, which Roy loathed more than any single Path out there. Weakness also had an almost familiar feel to it when it struck. So familiar, in fact, that Roy could almost touch on its actual meaning.
Of course, seeing as his Path was one of Power, true understanding of it would be forever out of his reach. Still, having even a basic understanding of the other Paths could only aid in his advancement.
“Stay focused,” Geon said when Roy was nearly struck in the back of the head, only just managing to turn in time to block.
“It’s kinda hard to do that when I’m defending myself on all sides and trying to figure out a technique.”
“You already did it once,” Geon replied. “Or is that as far as that squishy brain of yours will go?”
Roy didn’t have the energy to argue with the Dungeon Core, so he ignored the comment and continued defending himself.
The scorching Chakra continued to pound into him, one blast after the next and coming from multiple directions. They never came two at a time, but as the days progressed, they had been coming closer and closer together, forcing him to be more and more active in his defense.
He could sense Doragon’s disapproving gaze on him even as the constructs ground to a halt, giving him the chance to collapse into his cycling position and try to work through the pain as he replenished his stores of Essence.
“You’re not pushing at the boundaries of your Core,” Doragon said, his voice sounding agitated.
“What’s the point?” Roy snapped, forcing himself to keep his eyes shut. “My Core doesn’t expand by way of Essence anymore. Besides, my capacity is massive when compared to others of my advancement, so —”
“Do you believe you’re strong enough then?” Doragon asked, his voice cutting across Roy’s. “Do you truly believe that you’re so powerful and your Core is so large that you can just stop?”
Roy bit back an angry retort, forcing himself to think logically for a moment. Truthfully, even he didn’t believe what he’d just said. Any Martial Artist admitting to having ‘enough’ would have their advancement grind to a very sudden and permanent halt. In the world of cultivators, enough was never enough.
If you stopped advancing, you would begin to regress, and even those with immortal bodies would slowly have their minds eroded away. Advancement was the one driving goal that they all shared, and stating that you were strong enough truly signaled the end.
“No,” Roy muttered sourly. “I don’t.”
“Then stop arguing with me and keep pushing at the bounds of your Core using Essence,” Doragon said, his voice cracking out like a whip.
Roy bit back another retort and did as he was told, pulling in the Power generated by his fight and running it through the pattern in his chest to purify it. Even with all of his fighting, he wasn’t actually using as much as he was pulling in, so his Core was near the bursting point where Essence was involved.
Right now, around half of his Core was made up of Essence, while another thirty percent was made up of Qi. The rest was Chakra, the small sphere growing every single day, as he was forced to continually purify and forge more to allow the influx of Essence to keep coming in. He barely had half an hour before Doragon resumed the fight, forcing him back to his feet and taking the blasts once more.
He was thinking now, his mind churning through the possibilities of why Doragon kept insisting he push at the bounds of his Core with an inferior energy. Why did Doragon try to show him his bestial strength, then immediately switch to training something else as soon as he’d discovered it. And why was the focus on Essence of all things?
Shouldn’t he be learning about a Path of his own? About how to get past Base Red? About how he would place in this competition?
He had so many questions and not nearly enough answers. Roy had a feeling that he wouldn’t be getting any until he passed this part of his training. He could understand why Doragon wanted him to learn the Full-body and Full-area techniques. After all, a Conqueror technique could only be learned once knowledge of all eight of the base techniques were mastered.
Roy hid a wince as another blast of energy slammed into him, his slip in concentration causing a small amount of the Weakness Chakra to dig into his chest. Roy felt a flare of pain as his own Chakra instinctively rose to fight it off, only for him to force it down and fight it off with Essence. The process took a lot longer and caused an incredible amount of pain, but if Doragon caught him using Chakra, he’d be in for a world of hurt.
As he continued to fight, his mind began to wander again. What was it he was missing exactly, and why was it that his Full-body technique had yet to manifest? He knew all of the separate components, and judging by how his Full-area technique had shown itself, this would be a weaker version of his Qi technique, so what was stopping him from accessing it?
“You need to stop thinking so much and just do it,” Geon said, interrupting his thoughts.
“Can you please stop doing that?” Roy asked, more in exasperation than annoyance.
Whenever he became this tired, his thoughts would begin unconsciously leaking through to the Core, and Geon would always comment when they did.
“Your Path is straightforward,” Geon continued, completely ignoring Roy’s perfectly reasonable request. “You’re overthinking things. Power isn’t complicated, especially Power Essence. If anything, the Qi technique should have been harder for you to learn, not easier.”
“But I’d already had a basis for the technique. I knew it beforehand,” Roy tried to defend himself, only to realize the second he spoke that he’d just walked right into Geon’s trap.
“Which clearly means that you had to have had an Essence technique as well,” Geon replied, triumph clear in his voice.
“How do you know?” Roy asked, thinking fast. “It isn’t impossible to learn Qi techniques before Essence techniques.”
“That might be true, but in case you’ve forgotten, I got to feel all of the energy that came pouring in, along with a healthy dose of memories. You definitely learned those techniques before. Now you just have to relearn them.”
“Wait,” Roy said, Geon’s words sinking in. “You knew what my techniques were this whole time and didn’t tell me?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Geon said.
It seemed that his trademark denial when being caught in something was still going strong, despite their advancement.
“Geon,” Roy said threateningly.
“Roy,” Geon replied.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
“I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about,” the Core replied. “I think you might have taken one too many hits to the head. You might want to have that squishy brain examined and —”
Power exploded around Roy as he triggered a Full-body technique. Misty golden light leaked from his skin as he shot forward, driving a fist into the stomach of the closest construct. There was an explosion as the Essence around his fist detonated, blowing a hole in the co
nstruct’s stomach.
He punched again and again, his fists flashing out in rapid succession as he tore the construct to pieces. Two lances of energy flashed across the open training ground, both slamming into triangular, golden plates that traced themselves over his body.
He whirled, the ground beneath his feet exploding as he closed the distance between them in a flash, his heavy fists crashing into their faces and driving them into the ground. It hardly took any time at all for him to finish them off, and he whirled on Doragon as he did.
“More. Give me more!” he demanded, his chest heaving and power blazing.
“No,” Doragon said, crossing his arms. “You’ve completed the exercise. Release your technique and sit down to cultivate.”
Calming down was the last thing Roy wanted to do. Geon had gotten him so angry with that last comment that he’d somehow managed to trigger a Full-body technique, but now that his blood was boiling, he couldn’t just stop.
“You need to sit down and cultivate. Now,” Doragon said, his voice hard and uncompromising. “And when I say now, I mean this instant. Either that, or you’ll undo all of the work we’ve done so far.”
Now that got through to Roy in a way nothing else could have. After almost three weeks of this, there was no way he was going to be starting over. With an effort of will, he forced his Essence technique down and sat where he was, pulling in the Essence generated by their fight and cycling it into his Core.
“Start forging Charka as soon as your Core is full of Essence,” Doragon said, his voice drifting to Roy as though over a great distance. “And continue repeating the process until your Core is full to bursting with Chakra.”
Roy’s brows furrowed when he heard that. Sure, the fight had generated plenty of Essence, but there wasn’t nearly enough to fill his Core. He was about to say as much when he felt a sudden presence looming over him. Before he could open his eyes, something glassy and ridged was placed in his lap.
He could feel the Power Essence of the Beast Core almost immediately, its rich golden light swirling around inside the gem-like glassy construct.
“Before you ask, I purposefully retrieved Cores rich in Essence only,” Doragon said. “Cores already containing Qi or Chakra wouldn’t give you the same benefit. Whenever you start to run low, I’ll swap out for a new Core. You will not move and will not stop cultivating until your Core is full or you risk setting us back months. Nod if you understand.”
Roy did so, his concentration now split between his own Core and that of the unknown Beast’s in his hands.
His own Core was massive, and each part of purified Essence only gave him one twenty-fifth as much Chakra. In other words, fully purified Essence was only a tenth of any natural Essence he’d pull in. Weaving Qi would further reduce that to a fifth of the Essence he used, and forging Chakra from that would only give him a fifth of the Qi he refined.
It would have been an extremely long process, if not for his cultivation technique, which allowed him to pull in and purify massive amounts of Essence and Qi at a time. His channels had been widened by various Pills as well and toughened to take the strain. Still, filling his entire Core with Chakra would take quite a bit of work, but now that he was no longer being attacked, it was significantly easier to concentrate.
The pain was still very much there, though by this point, it was fading into the background as Roy finally saw an end in sight.
41
Roy felt it the moment he hit his limit, when he hit the wall that signaled that his Core was full. It was an odd sensation, seeing as he’d always had more room to push and grow, except when coming up against the barrier of a new Belt. This was a different sensation however, as though he’d run up against an invisible barrier in his advancement. He knew it could be broken, that much was obvious, but it was the how that mattered.
“My Core is full to bursting, just like you asked,” Roy said, finally opening his eyes.
A bottle was shoved in his face, the contents inside so bright that they nearly blinded him.
“Drink and cycle this one time through your channels,” Doragon said, pushing the bottle into his hand. “Whatever you do, don’t let it pass through your Core, and no matter how much it hurts, don’t you dare stop.”
Roy didn’t like the sound of that. Not one bit. Even so, he wasn’t going to argue with the man. Not until he saw the results of all these instructions. It was a strange order, not to allow the contents of the vial into his Core, but it was possible to pull in and immediately use Essence without cycling it first.
No one ever did that though, seeing as it wouldn’t give any permanent boost to their cultivation base, nor would the techniques be very efficient. He placed the vial to his lips and tipped it back. The contents were thick and viscous, feeling almost solid as they trickled down his throat.
It didn’t taste of anything and Roy didn’t feel any pain as the heavy contents settled into his stomach, glowing a brilliant shade of gold. It was so bright that it was painful to look at, even inside his own body. He briefly wondered if Doragon had been exaggerating about the pain as he reached for the dense pool of liquid in his stomach.
Those doubts fled the instant it entered his channels.
Roy screamed. He screamed so loudly that his vocal cords felt to the point of tearing and he tasted blood in the back of his throat.
“Don’t you dare stop,” Doragon yelled as Roy began to ease up, the pain too much for him to bear.
He tried stopping anyway, until he felt a powerful grip seize his shoulder.
“Don’t. You. Dare. Stop!” Doragon yelled, not an inch from his face.
As much as Roy didn’t want to keep going, he could feel the blazing intensity of Doragon’s presence. The threat of imminent violence, as well as the fact that whatever Doragon was trying to accomplish here would need to be started from the beginning if he failed was enough to keep him rooted. Roy had dealt with pain before, so he did what he always did when it came to these things.
He dug deep into his well of willpower and forced himself onward.
The pain resumed as soon as he pulled the golden liquid up from his stomach again. It wasn’t just his channels that hurt, since the liquid seared its way through him, moving so agonizingly slow that Roy had to wonder if it was moving at all. Where it passed, it left his channels glowing, flicking between bright and dim gold.
Roy’s entire body began to tremble as he forced the near-solid liquid up and down simultaneously, pushing to his upper and lower body to try and lessen the duration of the pain. It felt like an eternity. Everything hurt on a level that made Roy wonder if this was how he was going to die.
He could feel his body’s temperature skyrocketing while Geon yelled incoherently at the back of his subconsciousness. All he was aware of at that moment was the excruciating pain lighting up every single nerve ending in his entire body and the hand clamped tightly on his shoulder.
It was the only thing keeping him anchored to reality. The only thing keeping him going. The reminder that he was alive. Pain was temporary and he was sure that the gains from whatever the hell this was would be worth it in the end.
It became harder and harder to tell himself this when the liquid finally reached his shoulders and neck. The boiling, burning agony throbbed behind his eyes, feeling as though it were actually melting his brain, just like Geon always said it would.
Then, when he felt like he couldn’t take a second more, like he would collapse into a puddle of melted slag, it was over. The tips of his fingers and toes tingled as the last of the energy from the bottle was spent, leaving him locked in place, utterly drenched in sweat and his entire body shivering with the effort of maintaining that constant push.
“Good job,” Doragon said, his hand still clamped on Roy’s shoulder. “You’ll probably sleep for the next few days, but that’s about as long as your body will need to integrate what I gave you. You can relax.”
As though his body had been waiting for that exact order, R
oy collapsed, unconscious before he even came close to hitting the ground.
When Roy next awoke, the world seemed to be different somehow. It was hard to place as his eyes flickered open and he found himself staring at the ceiling inside his small room. He inhaled deeply, feeling the muscles in his chest — still a bit sore — expand. The air tasted sweeter than it normally did, which was strange, considering that the air normally didn’t taste of anything.
“You’re awake,” Doragon said, sliding the door open and letting the bright sunlight from outside stream in.
The fact that Doragon knew he was up didn’t surprise Roy in the least. That man seemed to know everything.
“How long have I been asleep?” Roy asked, vaguely remembering being told about sleeping before he’d passed out.
“A bit over fifty hours,” Doragon replied. “Which was expected. You have another hour in bed if you so choose. A bath will be waiting for you as well as a meal. I will explain everything that I put you through once you’re done eating.”
As tempted as Roy was to simply roll over, close his eyes, and go back to sleep, he really wanted to find out what all that training had been for. With Doragon literally telling him he would find out, Roy forced himself to get up. His body twinged in discomfort as sore and tired muscles stretched and bones that still felt tender strained under the movement.
Groaning softly to himself, Roy made his way over the bath — which was steaming quite a bit — and sank in, already preparing himself for the discomfort. That was why, when he sunk in, Roy was so surprised when the water felt quite normal. For a few moments, he wondered if Doragon had used normal water this time.
That suspicion was proven to be false, as he cupped some of the water between his hands and examined it a bit closer. The water was a bit cloudy, small gray and blue particles swirling around as he allowed it to stream down between his fingers. This was the same water, without a doubt, so why didn’t it hurt?
