The sword Master gave me was a single-edged two-handed longsword that looked a bit like a big curved needle with a very sharp edge.

It looked frail but the material it was made out of was good enough for even Foundation Establishment disciples to use confidently, so it would serve its purpose for the lil’ old me well.

It would be quite inconvenient to use for me on the account of my current body size and the sword’s generally unwieldy design if I were a normal mortal.

Cultivators, however, didn’t need to care about the efficiency of their tools, as those tools were rarely important in and of themselves.

Of course, even if I was a cultivator, technically, not only could I not use qi, I also was currently but an ant-like existence that was a Qi-Refinement disciple.

And I’m not talking about the Cosmic ants or the Demon ants or any other kind of actually significant and very dangerous beings that are also ants, I mean, like, a mortal non-spiritual ant when I say ant-lke existence.

Why did I even have to say it, everybody understands it anyway…

Sigh.

Ahem. Since Master is well-aware of my circumstances and since he still gave me the sword like this, I believe that there must be something about either the sword itself, or the martian technique he wanted to teach me.

“It’s not Martian, it’s martial”

“Did I speak my thought out loud again, Master?”

“Yes”, I slapped my forehead in resignation. After rewinding time a thousand years back, I must have suffered either a brain or tongue injury that made me speak too much.

“So, what is it about the martial technique that requires such an… eccentric... sword?”, the temptation of using another similar-sounding word was so great, I almost did it. But I’m a serious person. Yeah.

“You’ll see, Oalus. And you put the accent on the first syllable of “martial”, instead of the last. Also, it’s not only the technique that created the need for this sword to be like this. I also made it with your specialty in mind”

Specialty? What did he mean… Let me look at this sword again. Ah-huh! Got it!

“So, it can also be used as a Solomon’s key?”

“Yes”

A Solomon’s key (named after Immortal King Solomon, the creator of the tool as well as an ancient cultivator and one of the founders of formation-making as a discipline) is a tool that any Formation master has used at least once in their life.

Formations require delicate control and many hours of testing at times and a Solomon’s key can be used to simplify many things by acting as a focus of the spiritual power of the Formation master.

It may come as something unexpected but I personally never needed to use it that much.

Maybe I used it a few times at the beginning of my studies but then I got the hang of it all and never used it again.

It’s not only because I am a god-like genius when it comes to Formations(though there’s that too. What do you mean modesty? Is it some new sort of Rimmet fruit?), it’s also because I picked up Formations when I was a Soul Formation cultivator and my spiritual power at that time was strong enough to ignore mental fatigue.

But I guess I will need it now. Even with all of my experience, the meager amounts of spiritual power I possess right now call for being economical when it comes to many things.

This level of consideration from Master truly warmed my heart.

“Thank you, Master! I’ll use it well”, now this needle looked much more beautiful in my eyes.

“I am glad you liked it. Don’t forget the sword’s original function though”

“I won’t, Master”

“Now, let me start teaching the technique...”

…

…

…

I didn’t skip the teaching process because my results were too poor and embarrassing due to my lack of talent for the sword, of course not.

I just don’t think that these mary arts are of any research value. I originally thought that mortals being able to use even rudimentary magical powers was something ground-breaking and it probably is for mortals. For me though, it’s not that interesting. The basic ideas are a bit witty but their significance stops there.

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***

*Master’s POV*

While this old- While I said that I wanted Oalur to go to the mortal world for the sake of learning that mortals have a good side of them too, it’s not the main point I wanted him to learn.

I have noticed that he has been very lonely since he returned in time. At first I attributed it to the loss of everything he had in the previous timeline and the confusion that came with it, but the more I observed, the clearer it became that the problem was of more fundamental nature.

He is detached from his own humanity. He distances himself from everything that is going on around him and observes it all with the mentality of an observer rather than a participant.

It’s not his true nature, I know. During the time he was opening his meridians, I very frequently had to get him out of the pool full of the medical liquids he was submerged in for various reasons.

He often sleep-talked while he was in the coma during the times he was out. Those were snippets of conversations, monologues, and just stray thoughts and remarks.

Among all the instances when he sleep-talked, the most common times as well as the only ones where he spoke like he cared about being listened to by whoever he talked to were the times when he talked with a certain person named Hilda.

Every other time felt like he didn’t care if he he had the ear of his conversation partners. He wasn’t looking down on himself at those times, I reckon. He probably thought it was beneath him to care for the opinions of other people he talked to. It was so and it still is so for everyone I have seen him interact with, including myself, to a lesser extent. For everyone, except Hilda.

As far as I know, Hilda was his wife in the previous timeline. He told me very little about her except for the facts that she was powerful, that she followed the Heavenly path of Alchemy, that she was a demon by birth and she died earlier than him. But during the brief times that he spoke about her, his eyes shined and he seemed engrossed in the memories.

His eyes betrayed hints of joy when he spoke of something he remembered fondly about her. They betrayed hints of awe and wonder other times. They showed a myriad of emotions such as nostalgia, longing, sadness, goodwill and even love – very human emotions his eyes just never showed during all other times he spoke of his memories.

The crushing sadness and the feeling of loss and desolation he had around him when he briefly said that she died during the Heavenly tribulation couldn’t be hid despite his attempts to conceal them.

I understood that Hilda was someone more important to him than anything and anyone, even himself. He dreamt of her many times during his coma, he revisited the times when she was near him over and over again.

When he woke up, he cried right after sleep-talking of a memory of her. At that time he attributed it to the pain in his leg but I don’t think he can justify all the other times he cried during his coma in the same manner.

It seems Hilda impacted him so much that his world revolved around her. He told me that he began learning Formations because of her and during the whole time he has been here he never acted like the formation masters I know.

I myself know a generous amount about formations and I have interacted with many formation masters in my time. All of those masters dedicated themselves to making and studying formations. They forgot to rest and they never knew when to stop when it came to formations.

If anyone of them was put in Oalur’s shoes, they would not care about anything but doing something associated with formations all day long. But Oalur showed very little sign of interest when it came to the subject in question.

I even created a sword that also was a Solomon’s key for him – it would earn me at least a mean look I thought, as there’s no formation master who wouldn’t take such a gesture to heart. But he looked grateful instead. To him, the Solomon’s key wasn’t a sign of identity like for others. It was nothing but a tool.

It’s not to say that he doesn’t love Formation Dao, not at all. It’s simply that much of his love for this Dao is likely intertwined with his love for Hilda.

With her dead, now even if he finds her again it will not be the same. Her death left a giant hole in his heart and he may try to fill it with other things but it will never truly close.

I can imagine how hard it is for him to learn to care and depend on others and I believe meeting Hilda was nothing but a gift from Fate for him. But Fate rarely gives gifts and expecting another such coincidence to occur is nothing short of praying for a miracle.

I don’t want him to live like this. It may be selfish and it may be me denying his only love, but I wish for him to move on.

He needs to find somebody else to, if not replace, then at least ease the pain. It doesn’t have to be love, but he needs more people to truly put into his heart.

But in order for him to be able to put others in his heart, he needs to forgive the weakness of others.

It’s easy to dismiss others’ feelings and emotions when looking from a higher position of power. Oalur himself isn’t very suited for compassion too and the fact that he carries memories of him standing at the top of the Universe will only make his ability to consider others to be on the same level as him worse.

And what better way to start seeing those weaker than him as important too than by letting him see the lives of the weakest humans of them all – mortals?

While mortals are indeed weak and their lives are pitifully short and they spend them in pain in suffering for the most part, even they have their own place in the world and a cultivator can learn to care even for them.

Which is why I sent him to the mortal martial arts country while he is still weak.

There are many countries on this planet and there are many ways of life for mortals. The country I sent him to is located in a region where mortal practicing martial arts are quite common.

It’s a wild and free place where power rules. I find this way of life quite barbaric but a lot of the individuals there live their lives on the edge of the blade so their personalities are quite eye-catching and their personal power would be enough on average for Oalur to not feel too pressured but don’t feel too conceited. At least I hope they will prove to be enough to make him see them as fellow humans.

I just hope he will be able to learn this lesson in the year he’ll spend there.