The first thing that Ren noticed during his now new and improved, at least he thought so, nightly cultivation, was that not only did he now nourish his spirit but the amount that would seep into his flesh and bones sharply increased. And though he was confident that using the new arts would help him in the long run, right now the addition of the one slowed his cultivation, at least to some extent.

The next few days flowed into each other almost without Ren noticing. Stand up, eat, run to class as fast as possible, train with the other disciples, eat, run back to his house, sink back into deep meditation. He said deep meditation, but as the days dragged on, Ren let everything around him fade away. He didn't interact with the other disciples any more, trying instead to stay in deeper meditation at all times, maximizing his efforts. His movements and the sparse talks he still had began to resemble a finely tuned clockwork more than they did a human being.

Daiyu and the others obviously did not escape this change that took place in Ren. Some looked at him like an abomination, his placid eyes that lost their former lustre and only tried to find the straightest path to improvement. Little Fatty described it with a grimace: the eyes of a dead person walking. He shook his head at it in regret, but did not take any action to prevent the continuation of this sad act playing out. No one else stepped in as well, and the Adept, who came across as a relatively friendly fellow to Daiyu, even watched it all with fascination, making her stomach roil in revulsion.

After one week, Daiyu had enough. Ren was just answering with either yes or no. When she asked him to spend an afternoon with her and the others at one of the local waterfalls, he just looked at her with a disgusted expression. His answer was a simple, I have to train and will see you tomorrow. Before she could add anything or interject that he was being ridiculous to the extreme, as beside cultivating they should still enjoy their time together, he was already leaving the premises in a sprint.

She could only sigh, but with steely determination in her eyes, she followed him on his way. They flashed through the scenery, boulders and trees, not stopping on the paths or to talk to any passing disciples. Daiyu was taken aback by how much Ren had improved in this last week especially, he was almost as fast as someone who had just reached the rank of Novice.

But she was still keen on stopping this madness of nothing but training, lest he become just another monster, losing sight of all else to just pursue ever greater heights. She was sure that he didn't even realize how, after just opening up more, he shut down harder than ever, and it scared her. He was still a young boy, after all.

Before Ren could enter his house, Daiyu appeared before him, blocking his entrance with a stony expression.

He had obviously noticed her following him, but just discarded it as unimportant, he still had to find a way to integrate all the other arts into his constant circulation. The eye of the sword was relatively easy to add to his repertoire, the drain not even noticeable at all, and everything felt clearer to him, he was more focused, but the movement art was another beast all together.

He could not use it all the time as he initially wanted, as it exhausted his spirit far too fast, all of his body pushed to its limit. In light of this, he pushed it back to a later date, maybe he would get an idea in the future. Some inspiration that would make it all click together.

The domain of the sword was still a complete mystery to Ren, it did not really have a circulation path in his body, but instead used the circulation of the cultivation art to control streams of spirit from any part of your body.

This endeavour still bore no fruit, as it turned out one of the hallmarks of a Novice was the budding ability to control spirit outside your body. Ren had not achieved this, and thus he also shelved it for a later date.

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Coming back from his musings, Ren looked Daiyu in the eyes as she was still blocking his door with a frown marring her face and her arms crossed in front of her chest.

"Please move, Daiyu. I have to train." He told her in a calm tone, not showing any emotion, unnerving Daiyu. "I won't, Ren. Can you even hear yourself? The last few days, you didn't laugh a single time, showed no reaction to anything, and even while training you simply turn everything else out. What happened, Ren?" She sounded hurt and even a little angry, and every part of her screamed that she would not leave without an answer, from her stance to her eyes and even her very spirit.

It took Ren aback, as Daiyu had suspected, he didn't realize at all that he was focused to such an extent that he almost completely shut down. Thinking back to the last week, he recognized that he didn't even react to taunts from Zhen Jian or the friendly banter of little Fatty. All that mattered was cultivation. The soft hum of his spirit and body constantly improving, patterns and swinging swords flying through his mind in a never ending spiral, trying to ingrain them into his very being, almost manic.

Lost for words, and slowly coming to terms with the fact that he might have been too zealous in his pursuit, Ren wanted to apologize to her, but at the same time he was tempted to simply continue.

A dark part of his mind whispered to him, that it would be fine, he just had to sink even deeper into his cultivation, forget all distractions, be at peace and all would fall into place.

But this was not right, and he knew it, everybody did, even Ren. Simply cultivating without any motivation, becoming completely detached from reality and all human contact, could only lead to tragedy.

While he had the goal of being reunited with his friends, he had to be honest with himself. The last three days he had not once thought of either Lin, Aya, or the town of his birth. Instead, all he could see was the ugly face of Obsession, short-lived though it might have been.

And so Daiyu and Ren stood, neither saying a word. A warm wind blew across, summer had finally come in full force. Just as she wanted to say more, already unfolding her arms, Ren said. "I am sorry." In a small, subdued tone, making Daiyu blink and lose all her thunder.

"Huh? What did you say?" She could not believe her ears. Was it really this easy to get Ren out of his senselessness? She feared that it might be far harder to convince Ren, maybe because it was only such a short time someone could still easily get through to him? But all that didn't really matter right now, she had to make sure that he would not immediately fall back into it. Daiyu had heard stories of people, mostly cultivators, who found an obsession and were never heard from again. Maybe they reached immortality and left this realm, but was that even worth it if you never had any experiences at all? Daiyu didn't know, but she would be damned if it happened right before her very eyes.

"I said I am sorry, Daiyu." Ren reiterated for her. "You should be!" She declared pompously. "The next days you will definitely spend more time with our class, understood? And no more Mr. scary face!"

'Mr. scary face?' Ren thought to himself. He simply nodded his head, yes he would.

"I guess that is all for now." Daiyu then looked a little lost on how to continue. "I guess we will see each other tomorrow, Ren." She said, with a smile back on her face, and took off in a sprint, making Ren think about how he was not that fast yet. He shook his head to push that thought back down.

Entering his house, Ren's first instinct was to grab the manual to look at the arts again, as he might have missed some key point. With the book already in his hands, he instead turned the pages to where the author, Sundering Sword, talked about all manner of things.

When he saw the title of the next entry, he could only bring himself to smile wryly.

The Face Of Obsession.