Vilex had not been lying about the army.

The seven mountains of the sect were under siege. Most of the enemies were core formation or higher. All the elders were in battles in which they were outnumbered. The disciples weren't being slaughtered, but were fighting against a group of Jubilee core formation experts who trapped them in constructs of vine and stone.

There were three fights that dominated the battlefied. Least of these was Elder Ang fighting two other Nascent souls. But the Martial Alliance had bought at least dozen nascent soul fighters, each a pinnacle of their sect. The Kraitchild clan only had three.

The only reason they weren't being overrun was the dragon and the serpent. They were both facing an army of enemies each, and their bites, strikes, and magic knocked down scores of Martial Alliance cultivators.

His parents were nowhere to be found. Well then, he would make them come to him. As he rushed towards the disciples - his disciples - he couldn't quite say that logic motivated him to take the impossible fight in front of him.

There were three core formation experts suppressing the disciples. Most core formation fighters could fly while he could not, but they had foolishly stuck to the ground. He leapt from the mountain and descended like a meteor.

They were not prepared. The three of them looked to be in their mid to late twenties, possibly thirty, and were grouped together and examining the hundred disciples caught in their magic. They probably had formed their cores relatively recently, and that would the greatest accomplishment that they would ever achieve. They could throw around more power than he could, but they lacked battle experience.

One of them noticed him descending onto them, but the qi barrier they hastily built was the wrong answer. His momentum and spear shattered it, and the jet of water that would have been an appropriate response glanced him. His spear landed on one of their stomachs, slamming and pinning it to the ground. His feet followed suit, picking the spear up and pivoting it to catch another in the thigh. The spells holding the disciples broke again, and immediately a slow of venom qi bolts hit the third of their number, who proceeded to get out of there as quickly as she could, grabbing the other two as she went. He let them go.

"RETREAT TO THE MAIN MOUNTAIN AND REGROUP!" He roared, and they followed without question. He also felt a surge of energy in his body. Despite the repeated fights, he felt... overfull. He had an art name Gluttony his father taught him, a secret technique that allowed for the storage of energy in ones body, highly useful for preparing for a long fight and body cultivation. He would need to use the juice, but the flow of energy he felt from his surroundings were not slowing despite the fact he was not acting to pull qi in.

Whatever was happening to him, if it continued he would have no choice but to form his core. Was this what his mother had hinted at? What Vilex had been so curious about? A core not pushed to form, but which formed from an excess of energy?

The mystery would have to wait. He ran nearer to the snake. It was somewhere between the mascot, protector, and local deity of the Venom Mountain sect, and it was known as the Glutton. One part in sixteen of the budget went to feeding it, and it also often went out to hunt. Now it was swallowing cultivators, with many of the elders working to support it.

The Glutton would attack any clump of enemies, while the elders supporting it would pick up stragglers. There was a large group of enemies which had erected a barrier arch of stone as thick as three men and a qi barrier just as formidable. Ten or fifteen cultivators were underneath it, throwing spells at a very angry giant snake. There was at least a nascent soul reinforcing the stone, because even lashes from a tail half as thick as the stone failed the knock it over or break it.

Sev's foundation establishment cultivation got lost in the noise of battle, and he managed to duck under the shelter between tail lashes.

This group was more experienced than the prior one. He managed to spear one person and stab another before a blast of wind slammed him against the wall and kept him there.

"You can't kill him. Foundation Establishment." Someone shouted.

"He's the Kraitchild kid. Bugger's a hostage. We need to draw out his mother." Another chimed in between spell casts.

"He's grinning. This is a trap. I say we stab the fucker and be done with him. He's on the edge of core."

"Marici! Look at this child! Deplorable that they make them fight, for us to sink to killing them would be worse."

"Look at this snake! If Kalbrun breaks his concentration from an attack, you think he'll wait to stab us? This is war."

"I can't hold this forever regardless. Also, me and Marici can't deal with his mother should she come. The elder dragon was unexpected and the snake is tougher than we thought. The Dragon strike force is winning. Rest of the field in a stalemate, but we only have the reserves for the Violet Witch. If that Elder doesn't fall before her husband shows, we're in trouble."

Someone entered the back as another strike shook the rock. "Ang is defeated, " - Sev's eyes widened, no no- "Eyes on Sanguina-"

Sev felt the pressure on him drop as all the air in the area was driven in a point that stabbed forward at the person who entered. A hole bored through their body and expanded, blowing viscera out of the back, but then the wind died.

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Sev turned his head to see spears of blood tear through all the experts but two. One had blocked the spear with stone, the other air - but the latter had a dagger in his heart. The blood then went backwards, taking the blood of the corpses with it.

The two remaining experts had to be nascent soul. One of them collapsed the barrier around a blurry spot in Sev's vision, around which a wall of blood rose. The moment it happened, he left as quickly as possible.

As the stones collapsed, Sev's mother was revealed in the rubble.

Sanguina Violet had not aged in the entire time she had been Sev's mother. Nascent souls were legendary beings - they lived longer, not because they aged slower, but because their bodies did not decay. Their mind and soul still aged, so at the end of their life their body would rapidly catch up. However, until their age got into the triple digits their appearance was whatever they wanted it to be.

Sanguina Violet had purple eyes, the emblem of the house for which she was the last member. She had black hair that stretched down to her waist in bouncy curls, and was always dressed in what looked like luxurious pajamas. The most comfortable and expensive dress or robe that you would ever seen, always dark reds of various shades.

The color of blood.

"What will we do with you, Sevvie?"

Sev cracked the tracking stone. "Is Elder Ang alive?" Wait, no, that wasn't what he meant to say. "I'm letting Seaheart know your location. You and father are unfit to rule the clan. I'll make a deal with them."

"Severum, dear, Ang is fine. But what nonsense are you talking about? We have those fools right where they want to be. All the pieces are in place."

"What do you mean mom? The Elders are outnumbered two or three to one. The only reason we haven't completely folded is that our core formation elders have more combat experience, and their nascent souls are stuck on the Glutton and the elder dragon. You heard them. They're here to hunt you, mother, and they have reserves."

She shook her head, wearing a mock frown. His mother's moods were usually played up, for she cared for little.

When she was genuinely in a mood? Empires quaked.

"Sevvie, dear. You need to stop with this childishness. Quoth the third sage: 'heaven and earth are inhumane: treat the ten thousand things like straw dogs.'"

She walked up to him and put her hands on his shoulders. "'The sage too is inhumane: he uses the hundred-fold people like straw dogs.' You have their loyalty, their belief. You feel it, don't you? I can see your core on the precipice. Your connection with them is so much deeper than mine was. Your cultivation at a more perfect place."

"What are you on about, mother? It doesn't matter. I'm going to save the sect from you and dad. Whatever it takes."

His mother shook her head. "Darling, must I spell it out for you? Your father is like my parents. I didn't realize it when I married him, but his ambition is for what he owns, not who he is. The sect does not matter. It gave you an environment for practice and preparation, but you will soon exceed what this sect, or any sect, can offer you."

Sev started, but his mother cut him off. "There are two limits for practitioners at the nascent soul. The first is that advancement ceases to be about power alone. It requires connection to natural law, or principle, or spiritual truth. This is why it was called the nascent soul by the ancients: although it has always been the peak of cultivation for most of the mortal world, it is the just the first step on the true journey. The second problem is that even if you have the luck, skill, and connection, the power requirements for improvement in nascent soul are extraordinary. No sect not spoken of in legends can supply the resources necessary."

"Mother, can your quotes and lectures about legendary states wait? We are under siege - "

Mother pulled out her dagger. Its hilt and handle were black bone, inlaid with gems, of some creature long dead. The blade was serrated and slightly curved, and was the color of blood freshly spilled. Just staring at the blade made Sev tense in instinctual fear. Mother held it like it was Sev's little brother.

"There are two ways around this problem. Well, three. The first is to form a cult around yourself, and expand until you have a claim on a natural law or principle. Their worship feeds you. You can also try to take over an existing cult."

She held the dagger aloft, and twirled it lazily in the air. "Alternatively, you can try to forge a connection without followers. This is much harder, but doable. Do something that is not forgotten, that resonates so strongly it changes the world."

"The last is a secret the Martial Alliance is trying to keep under wraps. Authority and power bleed. Stay near something or someone with more than they can possibly contain and some will wash off on you."

Sev knew his mother was obsessed with the advancement despite being at what most considered the pinnacle of cultivation. They had talked often about the subject, and Sev had gathered though it wasn't explicitly said that she had leveraged the house war her family had started to become one of the strongest people alive. But she always danced around specifics, focused on theory. Belief, Connection, and Authority. Vague terms that even his father admitted to not truly understanding.

Something was different this time. It was the look in her eye. A look that Sev knew meant that the time for theory was over.

"People are starting to die now. The sect is lost. Swear vengeance and come with me."

She touched his shoulder, and all the power in his body was pulled out. A torrent came to fill it, and then the original power was shunted back into him. It was too much. Too much. He tried to handle the storm, but then it happened again.

"Your connection to this sect was stronger than mine was. Swear vengeance on the martial alliance. We'll bring them down, mother and son-"

"No. NO" He roared.

This is what it was all for? This was his mother's master plan? To lead him down the path that she had gone on, to sacrifice his sect for power?

He was disappointed. And a little sad.

"The Sect will survive. I WILL NOT BE ITS VENGENCE YET."

Every word was a scream, as the power started to crumble in him. Collapse. And Coalesce.

"IF IT IS WORTH AVENGING, IT IS WORTH DEFENDING."

It was happening, whether he liked it or not. This stupid fight. His core formation.

He found a speaking stone. The message formation, and activated it so that his next words would

"THIS IS SEVERUM KRAITCHILD. I CHALLENGE DEXALOR KRAITCHILD FOR SECT HEAD, AND CLAIM LEADERSHIP OF THE VENOM MOUNTAIN SECT IN HIS ABSCENSE. SANGUINA VOILET AND SCARLET KRAITCHILD HAVE BETRAYED THE SECT, AND ARE TO BE CAPTURED ON SIGHT. RETREAT TO THE CENTRAL MOUNTAIN. I AM READY TO BROKER PEACE WITH THE MARTIAL ALLIANCE FOR THOSE TWO AND CESSATION OF ANY PACTS MADE WITH DRAGONS."

His mother looked at him. She lifted her dagger up as a hammer as large as a person crashed into it and went flying. There was a small grin in her mouth.

"You've grown up, my little Sevvie. Remember I love you. Stay in touch."

A loving push sent him flying away as five nascent souls descended on her.