For a fourteen year old girl, Alina Blake is terrifying, in Jaki Jokull’s opinion. Sure, she has almost no formal training outside of what he’s taught her, and he could kill her with ease if he so wished. No, what’s terrifying is what she could become. Her potential. Her qi density should be impossible for a mortal, and there is absolutely no doubt in his mind that she is not a demon. She’s something higher than a B rank species, of this he is certain. Even a Twin Soul demon shouldn’t have the qi density she does, at her age, in the Mortal Layer.
She’s certainly S rank or higher, but what species she is, Jaki doesn’t know. He’s traveled a lot, but he is no expert on the hundreds of races on this slice of the Ring, so he’s completely certain he has never encountered whatever it is that she is.
The density alone isn’t the only scary thing. The types of qi in her body are worrying. Most races have a single type of qi, usually flavored with a single elemental dao, or aligned with positivity or negativity. A dual-core cultivator would have two. A Twin Soul would have two. A dual-core Twin Soul would have three or four. The problem is, you literally cannot be a dual-core cultivator this early on your path. That’s the rule for most races, though the numbers could potentially be doubled for a race that has a naturally dual nature.
Alina Blake has six types of qi that he can smell.
The two strongest and most overwhelming by far are yin and yang, positive and negative, qi. Even more shocking is how they seem almost perfectly equal in balance, something unheard of in any race he’s even known. They drown out the other four to the point to where he cannot accurately tell what they are just by the scent and taste of the qi alone, but he’s certain of the number.
He wishes he could sense qi more accurately. He wishes he could see her qi. What would this young girl look like to a higher stage cultivator than he is? The Crone surely knows, but he’d rather cripple his cultivation than make any kind of a deal with that entity.
He needs to train the girl as fast as he can, get her stronger, at least on his own level, before leaving the village. As she is now, she’s likely to be immediately captured by the first cultivator that sees her and takes an interest.
To avoid a fate of being studied and dissected, put in an exotic collection, slain as an early rival, or trained as some sect’s weapon.
She needs to get stronger.
—----------------—
Alina leaned against the wooden fence separating the road north of town and the forest beyond from a half-harvested golden field of grain. Her head lay to the side, cheek smooshed into her more-muscular–than-it-had-ever-been shoulder. With her armpit painfully pressing into the wood of the fence and arm outstretched, she inspected a translucent crystal of some sort held between two fingers, a faint blue glow emanating from within.
A crunching of dirt and rocks on the road from behind her signaled that her break was over, and that it was about time to return to her daily training.
“Where’d you get that from?” Her arctic-fox-beastkin instructor inquired.
“The Crone. What even is it?”
“Spirit stone. Quite a decent boon of her to give, they’re exceedingly rare.”
Alina nodded. She figured that was what it was, as she’d heard of them before. Used as a currency between cultivators much more valuable than coin, they could also apparently be used to power formations, or be used in cultivation somehow.
“She gave me ten of them. Seven are blue. One is black, one is white, one is red.”
Silence reigned for a few moments, with no response coming from behind. She twisted the stone again, watching as the light filtered through the crystal from a different angle.
“A significant boon, then.” Her instructor retracted. “Want to tell me what the meeting yesterday was about?”
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“She threatened me. Said if I ever attacked the village for revenge in the future, she’d fight me or something. Honestly, I only understood some of what she said. She talks very weirdly. But then she gave me the spirit stones as a bribe? I guess.”
“Best not to attack the village, then. Trust me on that one. Bribery or not, the spirit stones are a significant gift to receive at your stage. You can reach the Body Layer today.”
Alina pushed off of the wooden fence and whirled around. “What?” She yelped in surprise.
“Yep. Perfect timing, too. Today’s a good day for a Tribulation. Some consider the first compression to be the hardest barrier to break, but with one of those stones you can put that past you today.” Her teacher confirmed. Then he turned around and walked back into the forest, headed towards the clearing by the creek that they had been practicing in nearly every day since he had arrived.
Naturally, she followed him.
Back in the clearing, Alina was now less enthused. She had asked him questions the entire trek back, but he had refused to elaborate further.
Instead, he just made her sit down in a lotus pose once they reached the clearing. Finally, he deigned to answer her questions.
“Spirit stones can help in cultivation because they contain a lot of qi. Same reason they are used to power formations, or used in alchemy, among other uses. A single spirit stone would not be useful for a cultivator in a higher layer, and would be dangerous to a mortal usually, so what we’re about to do is somewhat unconventional, but not entirely unheard of. You’re going to swallow one.”
“Wait wait wait wait. ‘Usually’ dangerous to a mortal? I’m in the Mortal Layer. Dangerous how?”
“Your average mortal is unused to having too much qi inside their body. It can be dangerous to them in numerous ways, so eating spirit stones is not a fast track to getting qi compressions. Even if a mortal were unharmed by ingesting one, it would take several of them to reach the first qi compression, due to the fact that the body won’t actually absorb all of the qi in the spirit stone. A lot of it will be wasted. You, however, have two advantages.” He held up his hand, two fingers painting towards the sky.
“Advantage the first; you are already very close to your first qi compression, another week or two of training and it’d happen naturally, I suspect. So even though much of the qi in this spirit stone will be wasted, it’ll still save you a few weeks of work.” Putting a finger down, he continued.
“Secondly, you already have much more qi than the average mortal. The method of ingesting spirit stones is in general much safer the higher rank a race you are, so while the spirit stones would likely be wasted on a Beastkin such as the villagers in this village, it’s perfect for you.” He finished, putting the second finger down.
“So I really just… eat one of the spirit stones?”
“Yes. Your soul will break it down the same way your stomach breaks down food.”
“Will I poop it out?”
Jaki smacked his palm against his forehead and dragged his hand down his face, pulling the skin under his eyes down in annoyance.
“I know you’re a child, but that is a very childish question.” He exasperated. “In a way, perhaps. Your body will purge itself of impurities when you ascend a layer, but no, you will not ‘poop’ out a crystal, if that is your concern.”
“And you’re certain the extra qi won’t hurt me?”
“Normally, it’d be advised to breathe out the excess qi to prevent it building up inside your body, but we’ve had this conversation before.”
“‘Learning Breathing Techniques is dangerous for mortals.’ Yeah, yeah.” Alina imitated, more mocked, really, her instructor. “Alright, then. Guess I’ll just get it over with.”
She put a blue spirit stone on her tongue, closed her mouth, and swallowed.
Honestly, it tasted like nothing. It was cold on her tongue, like ice, but completely and impossibly smooth with no bumpy imperfections, unlike ice. It didn’t begin to fill her mouth with water the way ice did when it melted on your tongue. Honestly, she’d never felt glass before, but this is probably what she’d imagine it tasted like.
It was very cold, though, so instead of holding it in her mouth and stewing on second thoughts, she swallowed. It hurt her throat going down, as it was just a big too big to comfortably swallow. Like swallowing a too-big bite of food without chewing, but not too big that it gets stuck. Just enough to leave the throat feeling bruised. The hurt was quickly replaced by numbness at the chill she felt, however.
“Ahhh.” She breathlessly sighed, the same way you would after a cold drink on a hot day. Freezing air escaped her mouth and chilled her nostrils, her breath visible in front of her face. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say that that spirit stone had ice-dao qi?”
Her instructor nodded, and she found herself surprised that, despite how cold it was in her mouth and going down, her stomach did not feel chilled at all.
“While we wait on your body to absorb the qi, let’s discuss your first Tribulation. The first Tribulation of each layer is always a vision relating to mortality. It’s different for everyone, but usually-”
And then she blacked out.