It had been five months since Jerome entered seclusion. Since then, Csala hadn’t heard a word from him. She had lured a few outworlders into the mountain and had her way with them—under the supervision of the voice of the mountain of course.
The voice had also forbidden her from killing outworlders but Csala never killed her meals, for which she was grateful. Why kill them when you can use them again and again? She preferred to wring them dry and leave them to die by themselves. That way their deaths would not be connected to her – at least not directly.
This is the dream, she thought with a smile on her face as she sunned herself out on one of the openings on the outer wall of the mountain. She didn’t have a care in the world. I hope he dies in there from too much absorption of essence, she sighed in contentment.
From time to time, she remembered Jerome was still in the mountain waiting to pounce on her like a thief in the night. This usually spoils her mood and leads her on a consumption spree. She goes out of the mountain and has her way with whatever she meets out there. But not today. She had decided to stay in and have some alone time.
Nothing like a morning sunbath to get you filled with positive energy.
“What are you doing?”
“Huh?” Csala stood up in haste. Seeing Jerome, she screamed!
And fell off the side of the mountain.
Jerome walked to the edge of the mountain to see how she was faring but to his surprise, this side of the mountain was a vertical wall and Csala was still falling…and screaming as she fell. Jerome sighed in his heart. How did she know to design a bikini for herself? Achilles, you fucking AI. He flew down so fast that in seconds he had caught her. They hovered in the air for a while with Jerome carrying her princess style.
“Why do you look like you’ve seen a ghost?!” Jerome asked loudly. The force of the wind at the altitude they were made simple communication rather impossible, so he had to shout. But Csala didn’t shout back.
“Have you looked in a mirror?” she said, transmitting her voice to him through the air with a slight movement of her lips. Jerome heard her voice very close to his ears which raised his brows in surprise. Even with her psychic energy almost depleted, she could still do that. And the fact that Csala wasn’t capable of using essence spoke volumes of how adept she was with her psychic powers.
“There’s no need to shout,” she said.
Jerome made up his mind to keep her by his side no matter what. Learning how to better use his mental energy from Csala might just be the difference between him having an average mental strength or an outstanding one.
"Are you forgetting something, Xerae," Achilles chipped in.
No, nothing at all, he responded.
Csala couldn’t help but notice that Jerome wasn’t flying with the wings she saw him use before. He flew upwards and landed on the surface of the cave’s entrance and walked in.
“Does my appearance look that bad?” Jerome asked, setting her down on her feet. He still had to raise his voice as the wind billowed all around them, blowing his loose black robes around.
Csala giggled at him as she looked him up and down. He looked like a corpse that was mummified thousands of years ago, with almost all his hair having fallen off, and his muscles atrophied. She wondered how he could still walk and talk in his condition. However, it was funny hearing a walking corpse talk about how he looked.
It seems her confidence has returned after so long, Jerome thought. What do you think, Achilles?
There was no answer.
Achilles? Jerome called out to the AI again but still got no answer.
“Ahem. How would you like to restore your psychic energy?” Jerome asked Csala, shocking her greatly.
Achilles, are you sulking?
“Hrmph,” Achilles scoffed.
“Do you have a way to help me? Wait, wait…why do you want to help me?” Csala asked, perplexed. But her mind was running through all the reasons and quickly settled on one.
Jerome shrugged.
Csala was not convinced. “No!” she said.
She was absolutely not going to be tricked by him again. She had an idea why he wanted to help her, and she’d be damned if she helped him.
“I can force you to, you know?” Jerome said.
“Then, you better go ahead and use force. I just might end up teaching you that north is south, and east is west,” she said stubbornly.
Jerome scratched his cheek with a skeleton-like finger in embarrassment. He caught sight of what his hand looked like but didn’t react anywhere near as dramatically as Csala.
“I’m very serious about helping you recover your psychic strength. There’s a place up North where we can do it,” Jerome said before turning around to walk back into the mountain. “I just need to get a few things ready and I’ll be off. If you’re not gonna come with me, then I guess this is goodbye.”
Csala’s gaze never left him as disappeared into the mountain. She thought about his words. Was there really a way to help her? Sure there was. He couldn’t be lying about something like that. This was Terra Praeta after all.
She turned around to look toward the horizon. This kid, Jerome, was a bundle of trouble—one she didn’t want to get entangled with for too long. But the temptation of being able to wield her powers at full strength beckoned to her. She had to make a choice and she knew Jerome wouldn’t wait for her to make up her mind. But what would he want in return? She thought about the look in his eyes just now and realized that Jerome wasn’t as influenced by her beauty as he was a few moons ago.
Is that even possible? She thought to herself. Jerome was still a Sprout—nothing about that had changed. If he could resist her charms, then there was something else he wanted her for. Csala took a deep breath and raced after him. She searched the vicinity for a while but Jerome was gone. After a while, she gave up and went back to sunning herself.
He was going to come to her before going North. That much she knew.
~~~
Jerome appeared inside the library with a flash of gold light and vanished as soon as he appeared—with no effects this time around. He looked around to appreciate the beauty of his surrounding. Autumn was a real place now. His void space. The space was quite large—over 3000 acres, and filled with trees—a mirror image of his mental plane. But there was no life in the trees or the atmosphere.
Jerome took a deep breath of the air in his void space. It was normal—no essence to cycle out of it. Soon. He thought. Soon he’ll be strong enough to make it a world of his own. Jerome willed the air to move and it answered to him kicking up an abundance of dead leaves into the air. The branches on the trees swayed and the leaves on them rustled. It was like music to his ears.
“Are you still sulking, Achilles?” Jerome asked, focusing his attention on Achilles.
“Who’s sulking?” Achilles responded, his voice stern and unfeeling.
“Okay, I’m sorry. But you know Csala is a very powerful succubus, right?” Jerome said. “Her experience in wielding psychic energy can benefit me greatly.”
“I’ve been in existence long before her ancestors were born, Xerae. Do you mean to say I don’t have experience?”
“No. But you don’t have curves and a pretty face, Achilles,” Jerome said with mirth.
Achilles scuffed.
“But truly I was just poking fun at ya. And you do it all the time too, don’t act the innocent victim now,” Jerome said.
“Your head’s in the gutter, Xerae. You should meditate more,” Achilles remarked.
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“My head’s in the gutter?” Jerome said, unable to hold back laughter. “And why oh mighty Guardian did you make her a bikini? It seems to me your head’s way in the gutter than mine.”
Moving around the void space to get a feel of it and its true size, he bickered with Achilles as he strolled from one end of the void space to another. The space had a layer of film that looked as bright as clouds protecting its boundaries. Jerome touched the film with his hand pushing on it a little to stretch it. It was strong and would hold. Though nothing could really break it since it wasn’t a physical material but a law of space at work.
“I should head out North soon,” Jerome said. It had taken longer than he expected to placate Achilles. The AI was relentless and unforgiving, but the Chosen of Illyrrah was the Chosen. There was nothing he could do about it.
“Where’s Hedon now?”
“Heading back here,” Achilles said. “He’s 50,000 miles due west. At his current speed, he’ll never get here before the portal that brought you all to Terra Praeta takes you away.”
“I guess it's time to meet with him then.”
Jerome came out of his void space and went looking for Csala.
“I have taken the liberty to create an imitation of the weapon I told you about,” Achilles said and a spear appeared next to Jerome.
“A spear? It’s a spear?” Jerome was truly delighted by it.
“Since you’re not powerful enough to wield the real thing, this should suffice for now.”
“Suffice? This is a lot more powerful than anything I’ve ever wielded!” Jerome said as he gazed at the spear.
He caressed the haft of the spear appreciatively with a withered finger and felt it tingle with essence as if to welcome him. The spear’s haft and head were as dark as night with a glint of steel. Both parts were made from the same material. The double-bladed head was broad and curved from the base to the tip—like a Mainz gladius. The spear felt quite heavy in his perception and it felt right. He picked it up with his psychic energy—pleasantly surprised at the ease—and whirled it around, kicking up a strong wind.
“Brace yourself for when you grab hold of it, Xerae.”
“Hmm,” he responded and gripped the spear in his fist.
Pure essence flooded his channels, threatening to drown him. His withered frame shook violently and the air around him vibrated with a residue of the force of the spear’s essence. The essence was dense and felt like it was solid as it poured into him. Jerome had to sit down crossed-legged and cycle rapidly to absorb the spear’s essence into him and as he absorbed its essence, the spear absorbed his.
“A communion of sorts,” Achilles said, and Jerome smiled.
After a long time, the distribution of essence between himself and the spear evened out and he couldn’t tell which essence belonged to whom. Looking inward, Jerome marveled at the state of his core as it spun rapidly inside him. It was now a lot denser than it was when he came to Terra Praeta—and a lot bigger too. The essence moving through his veins felt solid…like molten steel.
“Is this really pure essence?”
“Yes and no, Xerae. It’s a mutated kind of essence that’ll give you unique abilities.”
Jerome held out a hand and poured out his essence with a thought. A block of essence materialized on his palm in an instant. It felt like holding a blob of white metallic jelly, that is until he compressed it, and it lost its flexibility. Jerome played with the block of essence on his hand for a bit. Turning it every which way, it displayed a mesmerizing iridescence, with hues of multiple colors including gold, orange, and purple. It was heavy and strong. He reshaped it into a blade, then a ball.
Essence shouldn't feel this heavy, he thought with a smile.
It almost felt like Suzie on his palm, except for the color and weight of it. The block of essence was as solid as any physical material but with a thought, could be flexible too.
“Do you think I’m ready to advance to the Spirit Realm, Achilles?” he asked.
“Not quite, Xerae. From my estimation, you‘re still at least a decade away from advancing.”
“A decade…isn’t that too far?” Jerome asked as he stood up to stretch and test his essence.
“Not at all. On the contrary, it’s the fastest of anyone in the Core Formation Realm. The fastest of the Royals take at least three decades to become Spirit artists,” Achilles said, and Jerome frowned in thought.
He absorbed his essence back into his body and began going through the different forms he practiced with his new spear, flowing seamlessly from form to form as Achilles educated him.
“You’ll come to understand more about your current Realm when you advance, Xerae. Sadly, a Sprout’s psychic foundation isn’t as evolved as a Spirit artist’s. There are things you can’t sense about yourself and others, not because your psychic energy isn’t powerful enough, but because you haven’t awakened to the fullness of your powers.”
“You make it sound so amazing,” Jerome said thinking about what Rihal told him before he left for Terra Praeta. He spun his new spear around before piercing out rapidly at an imaginary opponent in multiple short bursts, the spear blurring into dozens.
“It is, Xerae. And Rihal was right. There are lesser Realms within every Realm. If you were to categorize it, you’ll be at the early late stages of Core Formation—even though you possess more essence than a typical Sprout, and now higher quality essence than most,” Achilles said.
“Than most, who else could possess better quality essence than what I have right now?” he asked, slowing his movement for a split second. He was almost sure he felt the spear urge him to slice his imaginary opponent through the diaphragm, something that could only most likely be done with a shorter weapon like a glaive from his stance and distance from his imaginary opponent. Could the spear take other forms?
“Not better…but almost at the same level. And I’m sure a name comes to mind, Xerae.”
“Lang,” Jerome nodded pausing his training as he spoke, the image of the protector of the Fei heir appeared in his mind, “Can I beat him in a fight?”
“A few months ago, no. But now, you can do it with your hands tied behind your back. Also, the library is not a training ground, Xerae. I can send you to one.”
Jerome chuckled at that. “Can the spear change forms?” he asked as the portal array lit up beneath his feet and transported him away from the library.
“Yes it can, Xerae. One of its many applications. You just picture the weapon you want in your mind and Will it to do so.”
Jerome did. And three seconds later, a glaive was in his hand. “Shweet!...but slow.” He knew that with practice, he’d get faster at reshaping his weapon to whatever he wanted in a split second.
“So Lang…” Jerome said as he looked around the new chamber. His voice bounced back toward him from the walls. It was even bigger than the library and lined with stacks of training weapons by its walls. Gold runes lit up the dark walls and ceiling providing just enough light so he wouldn’t have to push his senses to see clearly.
“Your improved essence doesn’t mean you're at the same level as him. He's at the peak of the late stages of the Core Formation.”
"And yet I can beat him?” Jerome asked as he continued his training, shifting his weapon into different weapons as he trained.
“It's not a matter of strength but capacity and quality of essence. If someone younger has better quality essence and wider capacity for essence, even though they are at a lesser stage in the same Realm as you are, they'll surely beat you in a fight—if the gulf between the stages isn’t much.”
Jerome nodded in understanding. He’d love to test out his strength as soon as possible. He looked down at himself but only saw mummified skin and protruding bones. It was like being in the slums again but much worse. He sighed. This would probably make people underestimate him, not knowing the strength that was contained in this frail-looking body. He couldn’t wait to fill out and look as healthy as possible.
“I should help you train, Xerae,” Achilles said.
As soon as he said that, the portal array lit up in over a dozen positions around Jerome, and a dark grainy sand-like substance poured out of them.
“Iron fillings?” Jerome asked incredulously.
“Think of them as nanites, but at a macro level.”
The nanites fused together to form a variety of shapes: an armored warrior broad and tall with a chain mace, a small-statured hooded figure holding two daggers in hand—an assassin, another armored warrior with a broad sword on its shoulder, a giant panther, a giant venomous snake, an army of spiders, and the list went on.
“Do you wish to kill me, Achilles?” Jerome asked as he turned around to take in his opponents. His mind was already looking for weaknesses to exploit.
“No, Xerae,” Achilles said, “Just to train you.”
An array lit up in the chest area of the figures and they moved. Jerome brought his spear up and took a defensive stance. The chain mace warrior lashed out, swinging the heavy chain mace toward Jerome. He dodged that easily but the panther slashed at him with three-inch thick claws.
“You do wanna kill me, Achilles?” Jerome parried the panther’s claws, spinning the spear around its paw to push it away gracefully. Jerome marveled at the ease. With the size of the paw and the fact it was probably made from one of the densest metals on the planet, it should have felt very heavy as he pushed.
“From what I can see, Xerae, you seem to be doing quite well.”
The armored sword warrior came in, swinging its broad sword with an ease that attracted the eyes. It was fast—faster than Jerome expected. He parried blow after blow, expertly dodging the other puppets as he backed up against the sword warrior.
“Maybe I should increase the difficulty,” Achilles said, and the array in their chest area, which had dimmed after lighting up moments ago, lit up stronger than before. Jerome could sense essence being pulled into the puppets as they moved, their range of movements and patterns becoming faster.
A samurai warrior slashed at him with its two-handed sword and Jerome stepped to the side. He shouldered the warrior, using its body to stagger another opponent. The samurai spun as if on strings.
“Ah,” Jerome sighed as he parried its blows, dodging another attack from behind, “With the way they move I almost forgot they are puppets and can bend joints and twist body parts from angles humanly impossible.”
He put on a burst of speed as six of the puppets closed in on him, intending to box him in. Jerome was fast. He appeared behind another puppet and kicked into its back knocking it into the puppet opposite them.
“You’re a joy to watch, Xerae. And you haven’t even used essence,” Achilles said.
Jerome smiled but his smile faltered as a whip came at him. The army of spiders also rushed him—tiny little buggers in their thousands. Jerome cursed as he was forced to rotate his core and shoot a ball of flames at the spiders.
All the puppets attacked at that.
“Be careful, Xerae. They are drawn to your essence.”
“Fuck you, Achilles! You and your twisted sense of entertainment!” Jerome roared. The training ground quickly became a den of chaos and Jerome attacked anything and everything around him. He had to push essence into every part of his body to be able to withstand the hits from the puppets.
The damned puppets didn’t pull their punches—or Achilles who was controlling them didn’t. To his credit, however, Jerome’s body could take it. He felt the skin on his face pierced only twice since the battle devolved into chaos, and he had been hit many times. His wounds healed up almost instantly and his body was protected by the long flowing black robes. Every time he took a hit on his body, scripts lit up on the surface of the robe and it absorbed the force of the blow.
“You’d have to get yourself out of that melee by directing the flow of the battle, Xerae. This is the best form of training there is,” Achilles said, his voice sounding high and mighty as if he was the greatest of tutors.
Jerome snorted loudly but didn’t comment. He had his hand full as it were.