“…unless you make a deal with me.”
“Deal…? What deal? Where am I?” Jin asked slowly.
“You are simply in your own soul realm. Normally someone as weak as you have no hope of doing such an act but I did it as an exception since you are about to die.”
So it wasn’t a dream. Jin thought bitterly as he remembered the scene where he was just about to die, falling to his miserable death.
“Yes it wasn’t a dream. A hot head like you thought you could rule the world by gaining a pathetic amount of strength.” The voice replied as if it read Jin’s mind.
“You are… Prometheus? My Avatar?” Jin asked carefully after hearing that he’s in his Soul Realm.
“Yes.”
“Am I going to die?” Jin asked desperately. There was so much he wanted to accomplish, he can’t die.
“That depends entirely on you. If you accept three conditions from me, I am able to save you.”
“What conditions?”
“I’ll only tell you after you agree.”
“How do I know you’ll honor your end of the deal?” Jin asked innocently.
“You don’t.”
“…” Jin didn’t know how to reply.
“You are in my Titan Domain right now. It’ll only suspend time for so long. Don’t you want to live?”
“Of course I want to live, what’s the fun in dying?” Jin rebutted.
“…” It was Prometheus’s turn to be silent.
“Alright I’ll do it.” Jin said after a few quick thoughts. It wasn’t like he was left with much choice. The demon-like being sounded like he could care less if Jin took the deal or not.
Two unusual tinges swelled up from within him. It was as if someone branded his organs with burning iron but the sensation disappeared within a second.
“The first condition is that you are not allowed to accept any Avatars that’s not of God Rank. Only Avatars from myths and legends are acceptable; Dragons, Phoenixes, Griffins, Medusas, Cyclops, and such. They’ll have to go through my approvals first. Any other Avatars that don’t meet the standard shall become food for me.”
“God Rank? Food… does that mean I can’t use an Avatar at all?” Jin exclaimed. The experience earlier made him realize that although he has powerful Avatars but he can’t use their power at all because they are well beyond his reach.
“For the near future… yes, you won’t be able to access the full power of your Avatars. You can only wield a portion of their powers temporary. Only after you form a foundation to start on the road to immortality would you be able to start wielding a portion of our strengths.” Prometheus said indifferently.
“However I’ll teach you ancient cultivation methods used by the very first humans who achieved godhood. With my guidance, there’s a chance you could be invincible under the heavens of this world.” Prometheus added to prevent a pointless exclamation from Jin.
Cultivation? Immortal? Jin couldn’t process the new information but Prometheus ignored him and continued on.
“The other two conditions are that I’ll be allowed to take over your body three times. It’ll be when I choose so. The last condition is simple, you may never reveal my existence to anyone. I’ll kill you myself personally before you get the chance to do so.”
Gulp. The last sentence was spoken with such an intense killing intent that if Jin had his real body, he would have wetted his pants.
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“Tell me what you know about the elements. Don’t be slow, we only got so much time.” Prometheus continued without giving Jin time to process everything. .
“Well there’s the four elements – Fire, Water, Air and Earth. Most kingdoms on our continent specializes in one of them. Our Holy Fire kingdom along with Endless Flames kingdom specialize in the element of fire. Our city specializes in the element of lightning which is a subset of fire. The kingdom of the Frozen Jade specializes in the water element and their experts can even produce ice and snow. I heard it’s the hardest element to train in. Then there’s the three kingdoms that specializes in the earth elements, earth element user can create earthquakes and other natural disasters so they are deemed the strongest. The Floating Cloud Kingdom is the only kingdom that uses the element air and is usually considered the weakest.” Jin replied as he was reminded he was on the verge of dying.
“Go on. What other elements are there?”
“The school taught us that we must strive to condense our flames to bring out its full power, if we can condense it enough then lightning will be born.” Jin said as he explained the mechanics of producing lightning as he was taught.
“Wrong wrong, all wrong.” The archaic voice spoke out with obvious disdain. It was if Jin said something ridiculous and blasphemous.
“There must be users who wield the power of light and darkness in this backwashed land, how do you suppose they go about it?” An obvious sigh could be heard.
“Oh right… there are legends of people using powers outside of the four elements. I guess the power of light and dark comes from their Avatars?” Jin guessed.
“This world is so premature when it comes to cultivation, there must not be a lot of bright minds around.” Avatar Prometheus continued on sighing.
“What is cultivation? I don’t really understand.” Jin asked shyly.
“Cultivation is the process of acquiring enough strength to become an immortal. You can think of cultivating as a means of getting stronger. The more you cultivate, the longer you will live. In this land, how are people accomplishing this? Tell me everything you know.”
“Stronger? Living longer?” Jin mused. “Well most people depend on using Avatars for power. We do use Ki to train our body but usually we don’t even need to be half as strong as the Avatar to use its powers. I guess if we train our body enough, we might live longer? I am not sure.”
Jin then proceeded to explain the ranking system from F to A. It applies to humans, Avatars, monsters and items. Obviously the higher the letter, the better it is. Each rank also has lower, mid, and upper levels. Then just as he was explaining the usage of Ki, Prometheus finally stopped him.
“What a load of rubbish. The usage of Ki is all wrong. No wonder you didn’t know about immortality. No one can reach that with such nonsense. The ranking system is equally trashy. Listen to me from now on there will only be internal strength, I don’t want to hear the word Ki. As for your knowledge of the elements, I want you to forget all of it. The first set of skills I’ll teach you is the Five Element Theory. After learning this… you can survive this fall all by yourself!”