After several rounds of testing Samantha and Silas got a better idea about the internal workings of spatial storage. The time compression inside was similar to the current rift at around a 354 times difference, but it slowed anything inside down instead of speeding them up. Silas could consistently hold his breath for 15 minutes without strain, so even though there was no air within storage he could be safely left inside the equivalent of 88.5 ‘normal’ hours. If he pushed himself to his limit of 25 minutes without air–which was deeply uncomfortable for him but wouldn’t cause him to lose consciousness–Samantha could store him for 147.5 hours.
Funnily enough, despite Silas’s initial eagerness to make use of the Rift Mark, the more they experimented with it the less he wanted to spend extended periods inside. Beyond the lack of air, there were no light sources and Silas’s body was locked into a state of stasis until he was retrieved. To him, being frozen in pitch blackness was even worse than the days upon days of ‘boring’ cultivation. So, he usually only opted to go inside for short periods–about a day ‘normal’ time and less than 5 minutes from Silas’s perspective–when he felt well and truly bored. This happened most often while she was studying the technique manual for Dynamic Cultivation because she needed quiet, and couldn’t focus properly if Tobias and Silas were sparring.
As she feared, the technique manual was dense in both content and flowery language. It was so challenging to understand in some places that she almost didn’t believe her interpretation when it instructed her to tear out the final page of the book and absorb its knowledge. She had to reread that section multiple times before she was willing to even consider purposefully damaging the Epic treasure. When she came to terms with the fact there was no other path forward, she physically cringed the entire time she pulled the singular page free from the ribbon that tied everything together. As soon as she did, though, she was rewarded with an unexpected boon. The scripted page lit up as her eyes scanned it, giving her a new mindset before it crumbled into dust.
Congratulations! You’ve learned a new Mindset.
Fragmented Consciousness (Epic)
While this passive mindset is in use, a small fragment of your mind can be assigned a simple task to perform without conscious thought.
Synergy Detected with Mind Meridian!
You can now assign your fragment more complex tasks to perform. This greater fragment is capable of handling an additional task.
Seeing these notifications, some of the book’s more inscrutable sections suddenly made a lot more sense.
Most of the manual covered how to create a partition in one’s mind (if the reader didn’t already possess one) and how best to leverage the newly learned mindset for training based on if your fragment was ‘lesser’ or ‘greater’. For example, a lesser fragment could be assigned to perform one particular type of exercise while the majority of her consciousness was focused on cultivation, while a greater fragment could be assigned to cultivate while her remaining consciousness handled more intense and varied activities. It was obvious that a greater fragment was more desirable than a lesser one, however the book wasn’t terribly clear on what made the fragment types different or how they were obtained. Apparently, an open mind meridian was one of the ways she could gain a greater fragment, though she doubted that it was the only way.
A reread of the manual with this new understanding revealed tantalizing possibilities and applications that were previously out of reach. One of the most exciting new implementations–besides the manual’s main goal of training and cultivating at the same time–was that she could now use [Fragmented Consciousness] to run [Sage’s Rumination] and [Hyperfocus] simultaneously. Even better than that, her fragment could cultivate at all times while keeping an additional mindset up as well. Cultivating ambient qi constantly wouldn’t be a quick path to power by any means, but it was far better than not cultivating at all! She could even advance in her sleep, albeit very slowly.
All in all it took two weeks of uninterrupted study to get through the thin manual and successfully task her fragment to cultivate and use [Hyperfocus]. She’d been fully expecting it to take longer, but didn’t complain about the relatively quick progress. Samantha was more than ready to start her long journey to Low Silver, and Silas was also glad to be able to play around freely again.
With the actual qi compression being handled by her greater fragment, the time she spent in the cultivation chamber was surprisingly productive. She no longer needed to carefully schedule when she ate and slept around the chamber’s ‘active’ time, and so only cared about when she needed to recharge Tobias’s construct at the end of each day. Tobias’s construct could last a little over 8 hours now, and she was sure to spend as much of it sparring with him and Silas as was reasonable.
With Tobias’s enhanced attributes, he now outmatched her in everything but Agility. Arts could bridge that gap, but if her qi pool was anything less than full then her cultivation advancement ground to a halt. Her fragment handled restarting the qi compression cycle once her pool was topped off again, but Samantha wanted to avoid wasting time in the cultivation chamber if possible. Thus, her sparring sessions with Tobias almost always ended the same way: complete defeat.
Tobias’s polearm specialties made him an inherently better fighter than she was in terms of technique and form, as if he were some sort of prodigy or decades-experienced veteran. Without the advantage of better attributes helping her in their one-on-one duels–and her encouraging Tobias to use the arts at his disposal freely, even if she couldn’t–it was a rarity for her to beat him at all. She could usually only manage it if Silas teamed up with her, but she didn’t let these repeated losses discourage her. Doing so poorly in spars early on just meant that she should keep working to improve herself. She was already performing at her lowest, so the only way to go was up.
As she became more intimately familiar with Tobias’s fighting style and he worked with her to shore up her weaknesses, she slowly started to close the gap between them. She still lost most of the time, but it felt like a grand achievement whenever she managed to beat the odds and squeak out a win. She started to believe that she’d reach a turning point soon and their matches would be more even. That was… until Tobias finally learned how to use [Cloud Run]. After integrating her movement art into his arsenal, Samantha got a glimpse into the absolute terror she could be to enemies if she utilized it correctly.
Perhaps it had something to do with the nature of being a construct, but Tobias was near-instantly able to leverage the art in a fight with expertise even she hadn’t yet reached. The ways he was able to move through the battlefield while using the walls and ceilings as his own personal floor pushed her to reimagine how she could use [Cloud Run] herself. It also forced her to rapidly improve her defensive capabilities and expand–or, perhaps, reduce–what she was expecting and prepared to counter in a fight. She might have been able to address his new and improved mobility more quickly had she been willing to expend qi on arts as well, but such a resolution would’ve been dissatisfying to her. Cultivation came first, and she didn’t want to only be able to win when she relied on arts. She wanted to treat this as an opportunity to improve her base spearmanship and fighting capabilities.
Months of regular daily sparring did see her results slowly trend upwards again. While she would’ve liked to credit her improvements to her new-found experience, attribute increases likely also played a role in making her a more equal opponent for Tobias. The training enhancement powders she’d bought from the rift shop were working wonders, and even Resilience–the most stubborn attribute to raise–was making progress. Silas, of course, was delighted to ‘help’ her train the stat by shooting her repeatedly with blunted [Antler Shots] both in and out of spars. This wasn’t to say that she let this ‘assistance’ go unrewarded… she was equally happy to swat him with the flat of her spearhead when she saw the opportunity. It became a game of sorts between them, though she was reluctant to label it as fun. Moreso, it was satisfying to finally exact petty revenge after being unexpectedly struck. The only rules were not to attack each other when sleeping (or attacking after pretending to be asleep), while using the bathroom, or eating, but any other time was fair. It was a semi-painful way to pass the time, but was a surprisingly good way to break up the monotony of each day while keeping each other on their toes.
In what seemed like no time at all, Samantha felt a familiar pressure building up in her center. Looking inwards, she saw countless beads of energy being pressed up against the inside of her core layer. Knowing her advancement was imminent, she reviewed what progress she’d made over the last 9 months.
Attributes:
Aptitude (Approximate Max Value):
Strength: 23
Average (27)
Agility: 42 => 43
Extraordinary (50)
Endurance: 34
High (40)
Resilience: 23 => 24
Average (29)
Closing her profile, she pulled out a special elixir from her spatial storage that would help with the qi compression process. The elixir had cost 2,000 points, but it actually paid for itself and then some when considering the time it would save her. If she let things take their natural course, she estimated her core layer would finish forming in 1-2 weeks. With the compression elixir, that time was cut down to a mere 1-2 days, and she’d be able to put the cultivation time towards Low Silver instead.
She drank the concoction in one gulp and sat in the lotus position. A mild burning sensation trailed down her throat and settled in her stomach, but she put all thoughts of discomfort from her mind. Though she could debatably leave this last push to her fragment alone, she felt more comfortable finalizing the core layer formation with her full, conscious attention.
She began to sweat as the burning sensation in her gut turned into something resembling a painful muscle cramp, but breathed through it as best she could. Looking inwards once more, she saw the beads were rapidly flattening and spreading out across the inside of her core layer. She shivered as the viscous pools began to crystallize and solidify, sending a fresh wave of cramping pain through her torso. Like wildfire the crystals expanded and joined with other patches from neighboring beads of compressed energy, until the entire inner surface was coated with a fresh sheet of solid power. Like exhaling a held breath, the tension throughout her cultivation base relaxed and calm relief flooded her.
Congratulations, you’ve advanced to Peak Bronze!
Your Rebirth Core has granted you +1 to Endurance and +0.5 to Resilience, and has raised your approximate maximum values by those amounts.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
For being bonded to a spirit beast at the time of your advancement, +1 Bond Ability Point.
She checked her attributes once again.
Attributes:
Aptitude (Approximate Max Value):
Strength: 23
Average (27 => 29)
Agility: 43
Extraordinary (50 => 55)
Endurance: 34 => 35
High (40 => 41 => 44)
Resilience: 24 => 24 (24.5)
Average (29 => 29(29.5) => 31(31.5))
Standing and shaking out her limbs, she took a few moments to appreciate the feeling of new potential buzzing through her body. She was excited to have more growing room yet again, which would speed up her attribute advancement training until they got closer to their approximate maximums. As she released her concentration on her profile, a new System message awaited her.
Congratulations, you’ve formed your second core layer!
By strengthening and reinforcing your core, you have gained the ability to store a second qi droplet in your dantian. You may now create another core skill by choosing a new art and/or mark to apply to your second core layer.
View current options? Y/N
Core skills were abilities that would grow in strength alongside her with each new Cultivation Tier she ascended/ qi droplet she added to her dantian. She also had until Peak Silver (when her third layer was formed) to finalize her core skill, and didn’t need to add it right now. That being said, she was incredibly curious what her choices at the moment were, and she wanted to pick a core skill before she left the rift. Taking a glance now wouldn’t hurt anything, and would give her a decent idea of what to expect going forwards.
She mentally selected yes, and a new notification popped up.
Your dantian currently contains 1 condensed qi droplet. Based on your current arts and marks you can convert the following into core skills:
Inspect (Common)
* Base Description: By focusing your spiritual senses on a target and expending qi, you can either retrieve basic information or gain useful insights that can be used in combat.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): By focusing your spiritual senses on a target and expending qi, you can either retrieve basic information or gain useful insights that can be used in combat. Inspecting people/objects below your current power will always succeed, and failing to inspect people/objects of equal/ greater strength will no longer notify the target.
Indomitable Body (Rare)
* Base Description: Expend 1 qi point to saturate a chosen body part with fortifying energy, temporarily increasing the Resilience of that part by 10 points for 6 seconds or until the energy is spent absorbing damage.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): Expend 2 qi points to saturate a chosen body part with fortifying energy, temporarily increasing the Resilience of that part by 15 points for 9 seconds or until the energy is spent absorbing damage.
Cloud Run (Rare)
* Base Description: Solid surfaces of condensed qi are created beneath–and anchored to–each foot. While active (2 qi/ second), these platforms allow the user to step on any surface as if it were solid, and can be moved independently (at a moderate pace) to adjust the user’s speed or direction.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): Solid surfaces of condensed qi are created beneath–and anchored to–each foot. While active (1.8 qi/ second), these platforms allow the user to step on any surface as if it were solid, and can be moved independently (at a moderately high pace) to adjust the user’s speed or direction.
Flawless Healing Touch (Rare)
* Base Description: When touching near an injury on yourself or others, you can near instantaneously heal the wound to perfect condition. (10 qi/ ~5 oz mass)
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): When touching near an injury on yourself or others, you can near instantaneously heal the wound to perfect condition (10 qi/ ~6.5 oz mass).
* + Rift Mark (1 Droplet): When touching near an injury on yourself or others, you can near instantaneously heal the wound to perfect condition (10 qi/ ~6.5 oz mass). Alternatively, you can potentially remove up to 6.5 oz of flesh where you touch (depending on target’s qi defenses). [*Loss of personal spatial storage]
Geas (Common)
* Base Description: By reserving 5-20 qi of your overall pool, you can form a contractual thread between you and your target. Each contractual thread can be assigned a single, well-defined task which the target must be able to reasonably complete. If the target knowingly refuses to complete the task, they will receive damage to their cultivation base proportional to the amount of qi reserved. When the task is completed, the contractual thread will be harmlessly dissolved and the invested qi will no longer be reserved.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): By reserving 10-25 qi of your overall pool, you can form a contractual thread between you and your target. Each contractual thread can be assigned two well-defined tasks which the target must be able to reasonably complete. If the target knowingly refuses to complete the task, they will receive damage to their cultivation base proportional to the amount of qi reserved. When the task is completed, the contractual thread will be harmlessly dissolved and the invested qi will no longer be reserved.
* + Rift Mark (1 Droplet): By reserving 10-25 qi of your overall pool, you can form a contractual thread between you and your target. Each contractual thread can be assigned two well-defined tasks which the target must be able to reasonably complete. If the target knowingly refuses to complete the task, they will receive damage to their cultivation base proportional to the amount of qi reserved. Alternatively, the qi can be put towards a small spatial storage somewhere within or on the recipient’s body. An item can be put in storage when the geas is made, which will be expelled upon task failure or returned to you upon completion. When the task is completed, the contractual thread will be harmlessly dissolved and the invested qi will no longer be reserved. [*Loss of personal spatial storage]
Telekinesis (Uncommon)
* Base Description: For every point of qi invested, exert one pound of force for 10 seconds on any object.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): For every point of qi invested, exert 1.5 pounds of force for 15 seconds on any object.
* + Rift Mark (1 Droplet): For every point of qi invested, exert 1.5 pounds of force for 15 seconds on any object. Small enough items influenced by telekinesis can be instantly placed into spatial storage. Spatially stored items can also be telekinetically removed. Range of spatial storage access/interactivity is extended to match the range of [Telekinesis]. [*Personal spatial storage maintained]
Desert Breeze (Uncommon)
* Base Description: Manipulate the air around you. Qi cost is dependent on air volume affected and the degree of manipulation.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): Manipulate the air around you with improved control and efficiency. Qi cost is dependent on air volume affected and the degree of manipulation.
* + Rift Mark (1 Droplet): Manipulate the air around you with improved control and efficiency. Qi cost is dependent on air volume affected and the degree of manipulation. Your spatial storage can be used to compress air, and you can choose to maintain a breathable environment inside spatial storage. [*Personal spatial storage maintained]
Rift Walk (Legendary)
* Base Description: Rend space and bend it to your will, allowing two otherwise distant points to be traversed with a single step (50 qi/ 30 seconds + 0.1qi/50 feet). Rifts take a short time to form and cause a spatial disturbance in their immediate area. Anything remaining in the rift’s field of influence upon opening will be destroyed.
* Core Skill (1 Droplet): Rend space and bend it to your will, allowing two otherwise distant points to be traversed with a single step (45 qi/ 30 seconds + 0.1qi/60 feet). Rifts take a short time to form and cause a spatial disturbance in their immediate area. Anything remaining in the rift’s field of influence upon opening will be destroyed.
* + Rift Mark (1 Droplet): Rend space and bend it to your will, allowing two otherwise distant points to be traversed with a single step (45 qi/ 30 seconds + 0.1qi/60 feet). Rifts take a short time to form and cause a spatial disturbance in their immediate area. Anything remaining in the rift’s field of influence upon opening will be destroyed. Personal spatial storage volume increases are now dependent on the number of droplets instead of per floor (Current: 1ft x 1ft x 1ft). You gain a personal rift domain which can be entered and exited via [Rift Walk]. The current maximum volume of this domain is 10ft x 10ft x 10ft, and up to 10 qi can be reserved to make full use of this space. Less or no qi can be reserved for a smaller domain volume.
Select a core skill? Y/N
Samantha let out an appreciative hum looking through the options, but was careful to select ‘no’ for the final prompt. The offerings were even more tempting than she’d expected. Clearly, including a mark with the core skills created the most potent combinations. [Inspect], [Indomitable Body] and [Cloud Run] didn’t seem to be very compatible with the Rift Mark’s spatial storage ability, and thus these arts only would receive basic enhancements upon being converted into a core skill. The other available arts were a different story, though.
The addition of the Rift Mark seemed to add a new aspect to each potential core skill. [Flawless Healing Touch] would gain the ability to remove flesh almost as effectively as it restored it. [Geas] would let her store poisons or explosives inside of people as a consequence of failing to complete a task she assigned them. [Telekinesis] would modify her spatial storage so that it could be interacted with at distance, rather than the current limitation of the opening needing to be within arms’ reach of her. [Desert Breeze] solved the lack-of-oxygen issue that currently existed in her storage, and she imagined she could use the air compression ability to store damaging bursts of wind. [Rift Walk] would slightly reduce her personal storage space size in the long term, but in exchange it gave her access to a personal rift domain that she could enter and exit at will. She didn’t know what a rift domain was, exactly, but she was sure that it was useful.
Her second droplet wasn’t too far off, and if she checked her choices again after reaching Low Silver she’d be able to see how each of the core skills would be enhanced. Though she was already mentally narrowing down what appealed most to her, seeing the upgrades would help to finalize her choices. Then again, seeing all of the awesome potential that the Rift Mark added to these skills made her consider other options too. Depending on how many points remained after she reached Low Silver, it might be worthwhile to buy an art for the express purpose of converting it into a core skill. After all, she was able to start opening meridians again now without breaking the golden ratio. This widened the range of arts she could use, and she might find something that synergized even better with the Rift Mark. There were certainly several options that had caught her eye before, but she had put off buying until later.
There was a lot to think about on how she could best use this time to grow, but luckily she had plenty of time to consider her options. If the small amount of progress her fragment was already making towards the next rank was any indication, she had been right to think Low Silver was still a long way off. It wasn’t time to celebrate her advancement just yet. She had to get back to work.