The Ancient Redvile Temple, despite being a Danger Zone, usually had visitors come throughout the year. If only to visit the Cloudsea Domain.
Naturally, it wasn’t a tourist spot and only people in the Spirit Realm dared to come. However, those that did come usually coveted the tempering effects of the four Cloudsea Sectors.
On the ground level of the Cloudrain Sector, Elizabeth and her group weren’t the only ones present, as groups of Transcendent Foundation Stage Cultivators and Foundation Collapse Stage Cultivators could be found every other kilometer.
Normally, no one would bother foreign groups as everyone was there to try tempering their bodies, increase their understanding of the Laws of Water, or test their understanding of other Laws to counteract the frightening Cloudrain.
However, with Elizabeth being the Shaman Priestess and Ygny being the son of the current Monster King, their group was bound to attract attention. Fortunately, Cultivators at the level of those capable of training at the Cloudsea Domain knew better than to try barging into the group's business. Though, that didn’t stop them from periodically monitoring them.
In such conditions, Elizabeth simply drowned out her surroundings as she walked into the effective range of the Cloudrain Sector. Had she not prepare beforehand and entered in the same barebones manner that she did with her finger as she tested the rain after Ygny’s introduction, perhaps she might have been sustained wounds as she was instantly engulfed with tens of thousands of rain droplets each with the strength of a Peak Phase King Stage Martial Practitioner every second.
Fortunately, she had Yrre to guide her. Thus, the experience became tolerable after she entered the Cloudrain Sector with a barrier of Space and Time safeguarding her. A barrier made out of her rudimentary understanding of Space and Time Laws.
Of course, despite her Status claiming she had Good Affinity for Space, Time, and their fusion in Spacetime. Despite her Fragmented Transcendent Time Affinity which at one point was held by a True Goddess in the original Elizabeth, Belle. It did very little to change the fact that Elizabeth's current understanding of the intrinsic Laws that made up reality were literally less than a drop of water in the face of an ocean.
Elizabeth was just barely above the level where she could simulate Yrre in using her understanding of energy Laws to help her case. Her Spacetime Barrier was more or less just an amalgamation of Spacetime True Qi held together by her comprehension.
Fortunately, for what little she knew, it was more than enough for her to calmly sit at the edge of the Cloudrain Sector and meditate. She still felt like she was being pelted with an unending stream of semi-trucks falling from the sky, but with her cultivation, she could handle that kind of stress indefinitely.
There, by manipulating the Space around her to grind out on the power of the Water Laws that made up the rain and her understanding of Time making it so she reduced the rate with which the rain hit her, Elizabeth returned to her Soul Land.
Perched upon one of the hundreds of Stargazer Lilies there, Elizabeth let herself wallow in the feeling of getting hit by the rain. This was her attempt at understanding the insights within the Cloudrain and would have seemed pointless if she hadn’t already learned the hard way during her first attempt at creating an Affinity for Fire.
She didn’t have a cultivation method for Water, and she certainly wasn’t going to waste the reward she earned by entering the Spirit Realm for one either.
Instead, following Yrre’s advice, she attempted to first try to develop an understanding of Water. Though, if too much time passed and her gains in this field of expertise tapered beyond a certain point, she wouldn’t hesitate to give up and cultivate the myriad other cultivation methods she had to combat the rain instead of integrating with it.
Soon, an hour passed while Elizabeth simply sat there. If one went by sight alone, they would never guess the amount of force being applied to her body as the rain’s effect only impacted challenging Cultivators. If anything, the only change there was to the ground was that it absorbed the water; not letting it accumulate into the ocean that would no doubt manifest after a week's worth of rain.
Sitting amidst the rain by her lonesome, Elizabeth exemplified the essence of cultivation. To the layman non-practitioner, sitting out in the rain seemed like one of the most boring things a person could engage in. Yet for Cultivators, even without the spiritual rain, with just a cultivation method and the function of time, seemingly boring and monotonous exercises could be fraught with excitement and action. Endless and horrifyingly complex action.
In Elizabeth’s Soul Land, she wasn’t merely sitting out in the rain. She was actively deducing the endless mysteries contained within the Cloudrain.
If it were compared to filling out a jigsaw puzzle, she was working on one with a trillion pieces. Figuratively speaking, every insight she acquired formed into one piece of the puzzle which she had to flip, turn, press, and pray would fit into the larger picture. All the while, she progressed without really knowing if the pieces she was creating were part of the puzzle, to begin with.
Fortunately, she already had experience with Elemental Energies. Her understanding of Fire and Ice made the process of picking up Water marginally less tedious.
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Moreover, with Spellcrafting she had worked with Water Magic to make a couple baths for herself. Though, at best, that only improved her case by giving her a starting point with a few extra pieces.
Yrre, watching Elizabeth's progress from a distance, smiled and thought, 'Master will soon enough understand the benefits of following through with my suggestion.'
She took a cursory glance at the Cloudrain Sector, collecting a handful of rainwater without diminishing the complexity of the insights locked in the water, before she made an appraisal. Thinking, 'Whoever designed this Ancient Redvile Temple had an understanding of Water Laws that could rival Core Formation experts.'
Her assessment was doubtlessly accurate if only proven by how slow Elizabeth was at picking apart the complexities in the Cloudrain. However, once she started cracking the code, an unexpected but welcome surprise made itself clear.
[Alert! Breakthrough in Affinity!!!
Innate Skills:
*New) Water Affinity
Tier: Trash (Pseudo Good)
Understanding: Rudimentary 1%
Description: Now possessing the ability to generate Water Energy/Magic, active Water-type Skills and Spells are usable. Supplemented by the user’s Cultivation Base as a Spirit Realm Cultivator, manipulation of Water-type True Qi and its use in any Water-type techniques is possible.
Current Effect: Cultivation remains unimpeded until Level 10. Low Mortal Grade Water-type buffs are 50% more potent.
*New) Form Sharpening
Description: Whether it relates to your ability to manipulate Water or your body, you will intuitively know how best to improve your form. In relation to Water and its energies, this will allow all your abilities to be that much more bizarre, powerful, and hard to avoid.
Current Effect: Water and body manipulation become increasingly easier to master the higher your Affinity for Water becomes.]
Locked in her meditation, Elizabeth’s acquisition of an Affinity for Water passed without her face changing its expression. As Yrre had said, all energies were connected and solely by virtue of her possession of Trash Tier Affinity for Chaos, the origin of all energies, Elizabeth had an advantage over most cultivators when it came to understanding and improving not just Water Affinity, but any Affinity in existence.
…
As Elizabeth sank into her meditation, countless quintillions of kilometers away, across several dimensional boundaries, in an otherwise lackluster planet, not dissimilar to Endrin, two figures stood hovering above a massive warzone. The two figures duking it out above all the others in a planetary war were naturally the strongest powerhouses of the factions at war. The moment either was defeated, the war would ostensibly end.
One figure was clad in black robes and held an even blacker sword that seemed to steal the light from the world around it. He was known as Goulin. The other wore insufferably flashy golden armor and somehow managed to block and fight evenly with Goulin’s sword with only his heavy and disproportionately oversized gauntlets. He was known as Werst.
Threatening to cross over the atmosphere and into the bounds of space, the two figures had been locked in combat for hours now and at last, one had given the other the chance to end it all.
Shing!
What looked like a single chopping motion of the Goulin’s sword left Werst cut up into nine pieces.
“Damn,” Goulin muttered in between his heavy panting. He still kept his eyes trained on his fallen opponent as he said, “Perhaps going after another top-ranking Chosen is a bit ambitious, even for me.”
In a moment of distraction, he thought, ‘Though, I don’t really understand what his Goldfinger was.’ Before he could even react, the severed limbs of the man he had bested all appeared to have teleported as they struck him at every vital point with merciless precision.
“Ack!” Goulin, now wide-eyed, coughed up a veritable bucket of blood and knew he was done for.
One of Werst’s severed arms had crashed into his Dantian and shattered it beyond repair. Even if Werst granted him mercy and left right then and there, Goulin’s lack of energy would soon kill him as he couldn’t move or breathe in space.
Still, curious as to where he had failed, Goulin used up what was left of his quickly diminishing energy reserves to ask, “H-how?”
He wasn’t some rookie cultivator, he was Goulin. Void Source Goulin, Cosmo’s Chosen for the Cataclysm, and before his impending death, he was ranked 5th among his Chosen peers.
He had developed a ridiculously solid Immortal Foundation while he was at the Transcending Foundation Stage with 89 Spiritual Pillars and condensed a Golden Core in the Core Formation Stage.
“How?” Werst repeated after recollecting his severed body parts, slotting them back into his body as if he were a mannequin instead of a living being. He wasn’t exactly human, but like Goulin he was humanoid enough to be mistaken as one.
“I might tell you if you swear loyalty,” Werst said. By his expression, one wouldn’t think he had just been sliced up into pieces.
Goulin couldn’t even reply as a tear in reality manifested above him. From it, an unstoppable mass of black lightning descended to obliterate him.
The aftermath of the black lightning caused Werst to blanch as he felt his soul shudder. To cause such a disturbance despite being several hundred meters away from each other, Werst paled even harder after speculating what Goulin must have felt before dying.
“Hmph!” A voice simmering with anger crept from the tear as Werst tried to collect himself. “What a joke, my Chosen was actually the first to go? Tsk, so much for being ranked 5th…”
Turning to address Werst directly, Cosmo returned a tone of calm to his voice, lest he accidentally kill the man with his reality-breaking power.
With a monotone streak, Cosmo said, “Let this be a lesson to you, boy. Before attempting something like that again, if there is a next time anyway, you should aim to steal your opponents Goldfinger if it is corporeal in nature."
Werst could almost feel Cosmo snicker through the void as he continued, "The moment you ask the question, Chosen Sponsors like me are free to act. Those that are like me won’t hesitate to get a little revenge.”
With everything he wanted to say, said, the tear in reality closed up and Werst was left to collect himself from that terrifying experience.
Intuitively, he understood that the only reason he was alive after facing Cosmo, was because he was a Chosen. But throughout the entire time, he felt he was entirely at the deity's mercy. The mercy of a deity who was evidently angered for not only losing his chance with the Cataclysm, but also for being the first to lose.
Eventually, Werst recovered, both from his encounter with Cosmo and the injuries he had sustained from fighting Goulin. After refilling his reserves with the generous use of his stocked pills, Werst left the site of his battle in space to end the war down below. With Goulin gone, he alone could turn the tables on a planetary war.