Border of the Hollow Mountain Range at the edge of the Flaming Valley, AB 35923, June 10th, 0800 hours—

Aur Xilot was having a horrible day at the end of a terrible week to top off what could be called the worst month of her life. Why? Because any sequence of events, no matter how good they might look at the start, which leads to death, can't really be called a satisfactory journey, right… Then what does that mean for life? We will all die in the end, so by that logic, doesn't it mean all lives are bad? Maybe I should say that a path that leads to an otherwise avoidable death is bad… but then I feel like I'm adding too many qualifiers. And someone could argue that many deaths aren't avoidable, but they are as much or more meaningless than those that aren't. Not to mention that many avoidable deaths are the most meaningful… This will require more thought before I bring it up to anyon—

Smacking the weak chimera flying at her to the side, Xilot dodged a spike moving faster than the speed of sound. She didn't dodge the attack because it would hurt her. There was hardly a chance of that, but swaying to the side was less disruptive than taking the hit. A blow that strong would push her to the side tens of feet, and getting back on her path would take time she wasn't sure she had.

Grimacing and thus marring her rosy, heart-shaped lips, Xilot flicked her arm out and released a wave of shadow Qi from her fingers. The glob of potent acid flying toward her splattered over the loosely condensed Qi and was forced to the sides, sending the viscous liquid away from her as she shot through the center of the mess. To many, using their Qi to block an attack that would, at worst, irritate their skin will be considered a waste. To them, she would tell them to go smell brimstone. Or maybe sit point first on their sword. It could also be their weapon of choice; she wasn't picky about what they sat on.

Because — and she could not express this enough to adequately convey the vehemence deep within her soul — she would not fly around with her body visible to anyone with eyes to see. No, the details of her body would be for the eyes of her future husband alone. Xilot would rather die before compromising on the matter. Though she supposed there was always the option to kill any and everything that had seen her. However, there would always be a question in the back of Xilot's mind whether she got everything. The only way to be sure would be to get her maternal grandfather involved, asking him to burn out the whole area into molten slag, but then she would have to tell the embarrassing story. And she wasn't sure she could survive the experience… Yeah, it was just better all around to "waste" some of her Qi.

Talking about wasting Qi, the real crime was using the resources she had spent a lifetime accumulating to kill the beasts flooding into the mountain range. Typically, no one, not even the spirit beasts, would care if a weak creature entered their domain. At worst, it was an annoyance solved with a flick of the wrist, and at best, it could be a meal. With tens of thousands of these chimeras appearing in endless streams of flesh, the local beasts took it personally and became riled.

Now that she thought about it, frenzied would be a better word. There was a full-on war going on within what felt like the entire mountain range between the chimeras and spirit beasts. Which was a massive problem for her. Well, it was also a problem for anyone else in the clan who happened to be out on a mission. But to be honest, she wouldn't give up a lock of her hair for them, let alone care enough about their survival that it might mean her death. Like her, they were on their own, with only their fate and willpower able to decide their future. Xilot herself was only in the Radiant Core Stage, and her chances of getting out of here weren't looking great with her lack of power. Gifted as she might be to be able to achieve the rank at her age, that meant nothing in the face of death.

Pushing a surge of Qi into her Shadow Flickering Sword, Xilot shot forward, crouching low and leaning into the strong wind. Her eyes were half-lidded, and her clothes were snapping against her body as she searched the forest of trees for a path through it. If it wasn't for her Shadow Qi, extending along her shadow into the surrounding forest, she wouldn't be able to move as fast as she was. The valley she was currently passing through had a decently old forest, making it possible for her to fly between the trunks, as few small trees could get enough light to grow. Even with trunks hundreds of yards apart, the cultivator was moving so fast that she had fractions of a second to decide on her path and how to dodge an attack, but that wasn't anything she couldn't handle.

For as enraged as the spirit beasts were and as numerous as the pests were on the ground, it was still better than traveling high in the sky right now, which was her preferred mode of travel. While she could jump from one shadow to another in an instant, it was Qi-intensive, and over long distances, it wasn't practical at her level. This was a serious problem at the moment, as feeding her Qi into an enchantment designed to propel her fast — preferably an enchantment implanted in a sky ship that she could lounge and relax on while traveling — the higher one was, the better. The main reason was that the efficiency of the enchantment was worse the closer one was to the ground, thanks to the air thickness. Being a hundred feet from the ground as she was, which was the bare minimum one wanted to be, would make even a nascent soul realm cultivator think twice about the Qi cost over long distances. Xilot was not even close to advancing to the nascent soul realm, which meant she would be drained dry in a matter of days, but if the cultivator couldn't get somewhere safe in a couple of days, as far as she was concerned, she deserved death.

Despite all the drawbacks, being close to the forest floor had one massive advantage, and that was it had far fewer creatures than the hundreds of thousands of chimeras swarming through the sky like flocks of locusts staining the heavens. Even if she went all out, she doubted she could survive more than a few minutes up there. Which was why she was weaving her way through the trees like she was the needle of some seamstress. That was if the needle needed to dodge constant attacks and pick out her own path. All in all, it was a massive pain in her backside.

Seeing a line of light ahead, Xilot sped up, entering a corkscrew as she dodged dozens of attacks from multiple angles. She even had to flick away a few of the spikes with her fingers and expend a drop of Qi to block others that would hit her. Some of the attacks were so weak they were shattering from the wind proceeding her, but that meant little. Xilot wouldn't know what she would do if someone saw her clothes marred from the attacks of such weak creatures. The same could be said if people saw her taking the attacks seriously enough to block them… Though, on the off chance it happened, she could simply say she was curious. And it was true that she had never seen anything like these creatures, as their strength was surprising given they were all but devoid of Qi. At the thought, her master's voice popped into her head, saying, "Inspiration can come from any source."

Acting impulsively, Xilot snatched the biggest spike out of the air and crushed it to powder in her fist with a modicum of effort. For the utter lack of Qi within the material… it possesses decent strength, she thought. Perhaps it would be worth a second or two to look at the creatures closer. Understanding why how something works without Qi could be beneficial. At worst, it would give her a better understanding of the underlying principles of the world, and learning such knowledge could offer a chance for enlightenment. However, even a slight amount of Qi would enhance the material far beyond what it is now.

Xilot burst from underneath the forest and blinked in surprise, taking in what she saw farther up the mountain. Stretching out her senses toward the conflict, her heart was clamped in an iron grip of fear almost immediately. Without a second thought, the woman twisted her body sideways as the sword swung in a ninety-degree turn to her right. Once it was pointed in the right direction, the cultivator started dumping all of her Qi into the sword until it began to vibrate under her feet. The enchantments in the sword quickly reached the maximum amount of Qi they could safely take, but she didn't care about its limits. With the implacable will that allowed her to smash and compress her Qi together and form her radiant core, she forced more Shadow Qi into the sword.

The extra Qi caused the flying sword to nearly double in speed as black shadowy smoke began leaking from the blade, forming a black comet streaking over the ground. With every beat of her heart, she could feel the enchantment breaking apart and becoming unstable under the strain of being overloaded. Already, there was damage that would cost hundreds of spirit stones to fix, and a few more minutes would mean having to buy an entirely new sword. Costly as it might be, her life meant more, so Xilot kept forcing her Qi into the sword, her eyes locked on the endless sky stretching between the distant pair of mountain ridges at the end of the vale. Close enough for me to yearn for, far enough that I will never reach.

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Whatever these creatures were, they were colossally foolish to the point that the only logical explanation would be that they were wishing death upon themselves. What had to be millions of the things were marching up and into a mountain that was home to what she suspected was Unity Realm being. Xilot could feel its pressure hanging in the air all around the mountain as a warning, and yet the creatures were blissfully ignoring it. Or are they drawn to it like moths to flame, seeking out the most powerful foe?

The world shuddered, and from one moment to the next, Xilot was smashing into the ground, digging a trench through the earth. A projection of power that was two major realms over her own was pressing down on her, trying to crush the air from her lungs. Forcing her body to roll over through gritted teeth and willpower, she struggled to catch her breath, knowing she was only alive and able to move because she wasn't the focus of the irritation. The cultivator just happened to be within the area of influence, and now she would have to pay the price for such arrogance. Gritting her teeth, she pressed her arms against the ground, and her hands sank into the soil from the force she exerted to raze her body.

Xilot didn't care. She felt rocks crumble into powder under her hands as she forced her body upright. Even with her knees under her, moving didn't become any easier, and it could be said it was more challenging as she had fewer points of contact with the earth. With a scream of effort, she lifted one foot and planted it on the ground to drive herself to her feet, not that you could call what she was doing standing. The cultivator's knees were bent so much that all she had to do was lift her arms, and she would be in a horse stance. And when she lifted a leg, the focus of her weight nearly had her thigh touching the ground as it sank. In such a way, Xilot waddled forward, feeling like she was slogging her way through thick mud as she continued to distance herself from the suspiciously snow-peaked mountain.

In a matter of seconds, the woman plowed her way a hundred feet through the ground, leaving a trail a blind beggar could follow even without the racket she was making. Then, the mountain behind her cracked. Dread suddenly blossomed in her chest and sent a shiver down her spine, but steeling herself, the cultivator turned to face her fear head-on. A crack that a decent-sized city could be constructed in ran up a cliff from base to peak. As light slipped through the opening to hit a surface that hadn't seen the light in… who knew how long, if not ever, hues of every color shimmered through the air and over the ground.

To Xilot, the danger made the sight even more beautiful but no less terrifying. While she couldn't see much within the hollow mountain or determine what was causing the light to shift, she could make out the wall of glistening white crystals rolling toward her. It was hard to miss. If Xilot had to put a name on what she was seeing, she would say it was countless ice crystals, but that meant nothing. Qi types were as numberless as the stars in the sky, and appearances could be deceiving. Often, that was intentional, so an attack would catch an opponent off guard.

The young mistress knew it was pointless. Whether she struggled against it or not, it would end the same… with her death. But she refused to dishonor her clan. If you boiled the Aur Clan down to a single point, it would be survival. It was not the ideal of survival where you lived at any cost or where fleeing was the first choice when confronted by a dangerous foe, and betrayal was the norm. It was survival and thus elevation through struggle. You could only reach the peaks of power by constantly struggling and testing yourself against the world. It was a harsh doctrine, and many found themselves unable to continue or break under the pressure. It was unfortunate, but that was their fate, and at least they knew their limits as they tried their best.

Pulling all of her Qi out of her core, the world around Aur Xilot flooded with a blackness that was darker than a moonless and starless night and more pervasive than a cavern deep within the earth. And yet, in many ways, she could see better within the darkness than she could while standing under a noonday sun without a cloud in the sky. She could sense every speck of dust within the darkness, and no one could walk through it without her knowledge. Her quasi domain, suffused with her Qi and willpower that she had cultivated over her life, looked pitiful compared to what was surging at her, but she didn't care.

From where she was standing, the amount of Qi pouring out of the exposed cavern and over the mountain seemed endless, but Xilot knew better. Everything had limits, even if to the weak, the strong seemed as unimaginable as the unending heavens above. It didn't help that trees, rocks, insects, and chimeras vanished one after another. When the crystalline wind swept over them, they disappeared like they had never existed. And it just kept advancing.

Flexing her will, Xilot compressed her shadows that expanded thirty or more yards into what looked like a dark liquid half an inch layered over her skin. Drawing her sword, a portion of the darkness oozed over her body to thinly collect over the blade. It might be vain, but she hoped to puncture the crystal wall and drill a hole through the storm. No, she didn't hope. The cultivator knew she could as she drew her arm back, readying herself for a thrust.

With a scream containing all of her resolve and conviction, the young woman lunged forward with her sword an instant before the crystallin wall impacted her. Her Shadow Qi twisted in a river down her arm and then her sword until it leapt from the tip in a spiraling point. And the technique shattered as it came in contact with the wall. She had time to think, why would an Elementalist be in these mountains?

And then the world went black, and she felt nothing…

Which didn't make any sense. Opening her eyes, Xilot looked around, finding herself atop a mountain. A mountain that was not the one she was about to die on, and a figure was seated on a large stone a couple strides to her front. Dropping to her knees and kowtowing to the seated man, the cultivator said, "Aur Xilot, thanks, senior. Though it may be impertinent, this one must beg the question of why you bothered to rescue her?"

"Does one need a reason to save family?" The old man asked, his voice sounding warm and pleasant.

At his words, Xilot's back flinched ever so slightly, and if she were some kind of animal, the hair over her body would be standing on end, bristling in rage. "If senior's words are accurate, then you know that kinship would mean the reason to save me would have to be all the greater. Only adversity and struggle can bring out the strength to change the fate of the world. Weakness in any form will only lead to the end of the clan."

A barking laugh filled with scorn shook and cracked the stone under her, and she knew the sound alone should have made her body a bloody pulp, but she was untouched. "Yes," The man sighed, a weariness she could not begin to fathom filling his voice. "And it is to your elders' shame that we have forced such a burden onto your shoulders. We have inflicted such suffering onto you for a hope so fleeting that it is more likely that a mortal will be able to pluck a star from the heavens while standing upon the ground."

Pressing her forehead to the stone, partly out of shame at failing but primarily to ensure she spared her venerated elder any embarrassment in his moment of weakness, the cultivator declared. "We would rather die on our feet struggling in the darkness than live blindly in the light. What is life without purpose?"

Frustrated pride filled the old man's voice as he spoke to himself, "Who cursed me to have a clan of descendants of such will and conviction that they would rather go out in blazing glory than a slow smolder?"

Awe, filling her voice, Xilot couldn't help but cheekily respond, "That would be your own fault for your teachings, Ancestor."

With a dry amusement, her ancestor chuckled and said, "Yes. Yes, I suppose it is. Who am I to deny my descendants the philosophy that propelled me to such heights?"

Seconds passed, and the young woman didn't flinch as she waited. Finally, she decided to speak again. "While it is the honor of my life to be within your presence, Honored Ancestor, I must ask again… Why did you save me?"

"Ahh, children are always in such a rush… but so be it. Rise, and come stand next to me." Not hesitating after receiving an order, Xilot got to her feet and strode as hastily as she could while remaining at a dignified and measured pace, cursing herself for not putting on better clothes. As she stood next to her ancestor, she followed the direction of his gaze, seeing a distant dip in the slope of the mounting. She could not make out any details in the valley, but that meant nothing. Something of importance had to be drawing her ancestor's attention, and it was up to her to discern what it was.

"While surviving countless deadly encounters through struggle will take you to new heights, it is not the only way to reach them. Some obstacles are impossible to overcome as you are, and surviving a stumble that should lead to your death only thanks to a fated encounter does not mean you failed. Continuing on your path of unassisted struggle after misstepping can be as much or more rewarding depending on how you react to the event. And this may be one such opportunity for you. I am telling you this to remind you that while you happened to fit my purposes and were conveniently near, your path is not over unless you stop walking it."

"I understand Ancestor. What task do you have for me?"

"Well," The cultivator's ancestor said, his voice dripping with anticipation and curiosity. "I have been told these latest arrivals are interesting, and I want you to… closely observe one while providing limited assistance. All in accordance with the precepts of the clan, of course."

"As you command, Ancestor," Xilot said with a bow.