Rieren’s cultivation took a lot longer to get closer to finishing. Another few weeks passed as she sat in one location and did her best to gather the vital signatures in the concentrated Essence. More memories of the land infiltrated her headspace, leaving little room for anything else.

This time, she wasn’t interrupted as she observed the strange memories of the land itself.

The cultivators who had met upon this land and decided to destroy it while trying to settle their dispute had been old. Very old. In fact, certain things that the memories revealed reminded her of very old people she knew, namely one of the gods who now walked among the rest of the Divine.

It was rather wild to discover that this land held the memories of one of the gods themselves.

The clash was furious, as expected, and the storm of powers striking each other was unbelievably potent. One summoned what looked like a literal sun, while another had created a storm that made the one she had inflicted upon the Arisen look like a pygmy by comparison.

In an objective sense, their powers were awe-striking. In the past, Rieren would have been readily impressed. She would have stared agog and relived the memory over and over, just to salivate at the prospect that she might one day reach close to that level, if she worked hard enough and had the requisite amount of fortune shining upon her.

So naïve.

By the time Rieren’s previous life had ended, the immense power displayed by the cultivators in the memories she was experiencing were little more than a drop in the ocean that she had grown capable of. What was a mountainous sun and a city-sized storm compared to Rieren’s Domain that could swallow continents at its outer bound.

Oh, the gods had been lucky that she’d been unable to summon her Domain in the Celestial Realm.

The memories took a strange turn once the battle was over. After the cultivators had battled to a stalemate, they had decided that it wasn’t worth it to continue fighting and had then left. In their wake was a devastated and blighted land that no longer functioned by the normal rules of nature.

Instead, a new system arose, powered by the concentrated Essence that was the leavings of the furious battle the land had been afflicted with.

The trees now grew metal and burned fiery leaves. The streams were pitch black and snaked through the air. All the grass died, turning to sand whiter than salt. Tha animals that had called this Locale their home all fled, leaving only the few Spirit Beasts here and there to make a home of it.

In the end, Rieren understood one thing. Resilience. No matter what one did, the world would go on in some fashion. If things currently existing were utterly annihilated, there would be others rising to take their place.

What Rieren needed to comprehend—had, in truth, thanks to the memories—was the sheer immortality of the world itself.

The advancement through the Enlightened realm was a transitory rush just like in other realms, but much more intense. With the world already gone from her sight thanks to being immersed in memories, Rieren didn’t find any significant change occurring at first.

Then the memories broke.

The shattered pieces of the recollections scattered to brilliant white light. Rieren was forced to squint, a rush coming out of her body as though her very soul was being unmoored from her corporeal form. She concentrated on the advancement, on the understanding she had regained, on perseverance she had witnessed.

And in the end, she found herself in the Mid-Enlightened realm. All it had taken was well over a month of constant channelling and burning through the majority of Credit she had acquired in the weeks prior.

New Achievement!

First higher Enlightenment attained! You have understood your first great truth of the world. May the rest of the truths fall in line soon enough.

Rewards

* 1 Level

* 1 Skill point

* 1 Credit

* 1 New Skill

Rieren smiled. There. She’d finally received the ability to pick the new skill she needed to fill up her empty slot. Muffling her excitement for the moment, Rieren quickly looked through what offerings she had in her skill tree.

[Skill Tree]

You have one available skill slot. Pick wisely.

Parry Stance [E]

* A [Defensive] skill that allows countering an up to B-Grade attack into a quick riposte.

* Use: Thrice per battle

* Special: [N/A]

Corkscrew Blade [E]

* A [Passive] skill that imbues all thrust attacks with a corkscrew effect.

* Use: [N/A]

* Special: The skill applies to all armaments, or lack thereof

Greatblade Strike [E]

* An [Offensive] skill that increases blade’s effective range by three times for seven slashes.

* Use: Twice per battle

* Special: Can be combined with other skills to increase effective range

It might have been a little odd not to see the old skills she actually wished for. There were no Swordstorm Severance or Silken Passage options. But that was because she had a new skill point, not a skill evolution point. The aforementioned ones were simply upgraded versions of her current skills instead of being entirely new ones.

Rieren considered the use cases for her choices. Corkscrew Blade wouldn’t be worth it. Her fighting style didn’t make use of thrusts anywhere near enough.

Though, it was curious the skill applied to all possible thrusts. Testing in her previous timeline had confirmed this applied to fully horizontal punches and kicks as well. Even their impact had a devastating corkscrew effect that rend her opponent’s flesh and bones with ease.

Still, not worth it.

Parry Stance would be amazingly powerful, but it depended on a more careful, timed style of fighting than Rieren was fully comfortable with.

But Greatblade Strike on the other hand… Rieren smiled. Increasing her sword’s effective range for a few strikes would have been a good choice on its own. One of the areas her current fighting style was limited in was range. She always needed to get up close to her enemies to deal the final blow. That was sometimes troublesome.

Adding the variety of greater range would greatly help in certain situations where it proved harder to get to regular striking distance. Especially since it would help deal with weaker foes a lot more easily. Instead of needing to expend on strike per Armistice Enforcer, she could wipe out an entire squadron of them with one Greatblade Strike.

But best of all, the skill could be applied to her other skills as well. Admittedly, that only meant Gale Blade for now, since that was the only other offensive skill she had. Regardless, it would be a very helpful addition.

With the new skill obtained, Rieren took a peek through her [Status] since it had been a while. She had made sure to add all her saved up skill points to her new skill.

[Status]

Rieren Vallorne

Race: Human

Class: Divine Bladereaver

Profession: [N/A]

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Realm: Enlightened [Mid]

Level: 29

Perks: Divine Resilience [B]

Titles: [N/A]

Stats

Body: 52

Mind: 36

Spirit: 36

Skills

Fray Passage [A]

Gale Blade [A]

Earthfell Blade [A]

Reaver Stance [A]

Greatblade Strike [B]

Techniques

Tidal Summon [C]

Call of the Past [Spirit Bond] [D]

Water Dancer Blade [D]

Domain

Ocean [C]

“Congratulations,” Elder Olg said. It was nice that he was there to greet her when she returned fully. “You advanced, didn’t you?”

Rieren smiled at him. “I certainly did.”

“Well, good. Because I have news you might want to hear, and I thought it best not to bother you until you were fully done.”

Despite the happiness Rieren felt at having achieved her cultivation goal in this Enlightenment Locale, she felt her heart shrivel a little. News didn’t sound like good news.

“What is going on?” she asked.

“Batcat has been ranging out to find more memories of the world, as you know.”

He said it as though the winged kitten was going around doing the same thing the Enlightenment Locale had done for Rieren. The truth was that Batcat had once more decided to venture out and gathered recollections from specific locations, essentially scouting the land. Apparently, it had found something quite interesting.

“What has it found?” Rieren asked, now properly beginning to start getting anxious. It had taken over a month for her to reach Mid-Enlightened. Just over five weeks, to be exact. That amount of time meant there had to have been things going on in the wider world she had missed. “Has something happened?”

“Well, it might be best if Batcat showed you. Cat!”

The kitten didn’t respond to his call. It was dozing a few paces away, and loathe as Rieren was to bother its sleep, she needed some answers. Thankfully, she doubted she needed Batcat awake to find the memories. All she had to do was channel Essence through it while she drew in the world’s natural energy.

Having advanced a stage in the Enlightened realm, Rieren’s Essence channelling was a great deal more effective than before. So far in this timeline, drawing in Essence had felt much like pulling a rope attached to a cloud.

Now, it felt as though she was inhaling the cloud directly.

Such thoughts got lost when she finally got a good look at the memories Batcat had to offer. They were a strange hodgepodge of visions, but once Rieren was able to parse them into individual sequences, her heart stuttered.

One of the first memories showed some kind of outpost. It was well-fortified and heavily populated. Armed people were strung out all over the walls and were patrolling around the border. Withing the settlement itself, people were busy with an assortment of tasks, though they all looked hushed, tense, and anxiously expectant.

For good reason. Nor far from the location, another army of Abyssals was marching towards it.

Batcat’s memories had revealed that it was broad daylight. The monsters had clearly no compunction about waiting until the cover of darkness to make their move. That suggested they were quite confident about their power.

Rieren couldn’t blame them. Even a cursory look showed how this army was even larger than the one she had tackled when all three of its contingents had been combined.

But it looked like it would meet its match. Rieren might have been powerful, and she had no idea about the relative strength of the human defenders, but she had been alone. With them altogether, she wasn’t truly afraid for the humans. They had the system to use now. With that, they would survive.

Nevertheless, it was a little alarming to see just how well the Abyssals had organized. Rows upon rows of monsters carefully arranged in peculiar battle formations with respect to the abilities offered by different races, and thus, positioned accordingly.

Once again, there was clear proof that someone intelligent was guiding these monsters.

Try as she might, she found no evidence of the presence of any Aetherians. Strange. Over the last couple of weeks, they had spotted more shooting stars cavorting through the expanse of space. But no sign of any Aetherians in the Abyssals’ ranks. Weird, and perhaps a bit alarming too.

Rieren pulled herself free from the memory. “That army was enormous. Bigger than the last one we saw. Did you find out anything about the local meteorite, Elder?”

While Rieren had been busy cultivating, Elder Olg had taken Batcat on a little investigating trip to find the meteor that Silomene had mentioned. It had taken them some time to locate it, strangely enough. Apparently, the thing had crashed down without causing any commotion at all and was floating gently on a dark pool not far from where Rieren was located.

No Aetherian was to be found around the area, according to Elder Olg’s report. It had been vacant.

That was a key point. Vacant. Not just a lump of space rock. As in, it looked like a vessel, but whatever it had brought with it was now no longer contained within it. As if things weren’t concerning enough. Elder Olg and Batcat had searched long and hard, but they were unable to find any trace of any Aetherian the meteorite might have held.

“No such luck,” Elder Olg said. “The monster may have landed and then immediately taken off towards the army.”

“We would have seen it in Batcat’s memory, if so.”

“Would we? Even if it was hiding well enough in the monsters’ ranks? Even if it was a small and unassuming variant that didn’t draw attention to itself?”

Rieren had no reply to that. In general, Aetherians could be easily told apart from Abyssals. They tended to be shinier.

But it certainly wasn’t impossible for a determined one to hide in that huge army.

“I think you pulled yourself out of the cat’s memories a little too soon, Rieren,” Elder Olg said.

“There is more?”

“Oh, yes.”

His tone didn’t suggest any of it was better than what she had already seen. Rieren had to take a deep breath before diving into Batcat’s memories again. The Elder was right. They weren’t pleasant.

Well, the first was alright. Strangely, it depicted Mercion getting ready for some kind of journey. He was at the gate of a settlement similar to the ones she had seen in the previous memory and was calling a few other people to him. The stars wheeled quickly overhead, as though the time of the cosmos had become dilated.

But it wasn’t just that. There were comets among the stars too, shooting this way and that across the navy canvas. Mercion and all the others looked rather worried. Rieren could feel their tension through the memory.

Still. That was a simple enough little recollection. The next one was terrible, however.

This time, Rieren was watching a battle from a distance. An attempted massacre, in truth. But there were no monsters here. Only people.

A Masked Avatar was flying in the air, wind twisting around the cloaked figure ferociously enough to almost be visible. Whoever it was pelted strange wooden spikes at another distant figure, a woman desperately running away. She hurtled over the ground and dashed as fast as she could, throwing shields of earth over herself that exploded when a spike struck.

Rieren frowned. An Avatar trying to apprehend someone. That woman had to be one of those undesirables Appraiser and the Gravemark Puppeteer had mentioned, one of those the empire was hunting down to prevent them from supposedly doing anything against the interest of the Elderlands.

She felt a pang of sympathy for the woman, but there wasn’t much she could do. It would take her too long anyway. By now, the woman had either escaped, or had been apprehended, if not killed.

But it did make Rieren wonder about the event itself. This was occurring here, in the Shatterlands, where things were already contentious between the imperial court and the Archnobles. But the Avatars still dared to act in this land, already carrying out the Emperor’s orders. That had to be causing some kind of stir among the Archnobles.

Rieren would have to ask Batcat where exactly that location was. Perhaps, along the way to her next Enlightenment Locale, she could swing by if it fell along the way. It would be good to make sure how far her enemies were from her.

“What do you make of it, Elder?” Rieren asked once she was done viewing the recollections.

Elder Olg seemed to be considering something. “It is a very intriguing event, is it not?”

“Intriguing?”

“Well, think of it this way. There is at least one Avatar flying around in the countryside, trying to capture—or worse, kill outright—certain enemies of the Elderlands. Now, this is all well and good, if a rather extraordinary measure. Avatars aren’t generally supposed to be running around killing people, especially when there is little proof of their criminality.”

“There are the memories of the previous timeline to go on with.”

“Yes, but do you specifically recall the one we saw? Do you know what this woman has done to merit such a reaction from the empire?”

Rieren didn’t need to think about it. She would have remembered such a face, especially if the one being chased was significant enough to be pursued by an Avatar. “I do not.”

“Exactly!” The Elder’s eyes were shining as though he would have liked nothing better than to congratulate himself on a job well done unearthing this supposed conspiracy. “See, the thing is that we must trust the imperial court in its actions, however volatile they may seem. It was always thus. But now, when tensions are so frayed, this sort of thing sets everyone on edge.”

“So you suspect the Archnobles do not approve of the Avatars in the region?”

“Most likely. I believe that in most other circumstances, the Archnobles would gladly cooperate with the imperial court and bring these malcontents to heel, but now, the presence of the Avatars only adds fuel to the growing fire.”

“Perhaps, but Silomene did mention the current Clanmasters wishing to mend the broken relationship,” she added, only just remembering the woman’s information about the recent change in leadership. “It could be that they are turning a blind eye on purpose.”

“It would only further infuriate those who never supported the ousting of the original Clanmasters to begin with.”

Rieren nodded tightly. Things were certainly deteriorating between the eastern Archnobles and the imperial court. She should have been happy about it. Wasn’t her intention of getting into the capital and upending the corrupt imperial court only benefited if there were others who went against it?

Abyss, even Essalina had proclaimed the Arteroth would cease complying with the Emperor after the Gravemark Puppeteer had publicly aired that the gods were influencing the imperial court.

How true that was would only play out properly in time, but so far, Rieren hadn’t heard much of it. If it came to pass, though, shouldn’t she rejoice?

Rieren couldn’t find it in herself to do so. This wasn’t some sort of conquest that excited her. It was simply a task she had to see through. She still found it difficult to believe that the Forborne Emperor she had come to know would let himself be manipulated to such a degree, or allow his court to get out of his control in such a manner.

No, there was something worse going. Rieren intended to find out what.

But all they could entertain were speculations at the moment. Her primary goal was growing strong enough to get to the capital without being crushed. That meant she would need to move on to her next Enlightenment Locale soon enough.

That evening, Rieren decided to take a long, well-earned break. She had spent over a month doing almost nothing but cultivating until she had broken through to the Mid-Enlightened realm. Now, it was time for her to relax just a bit before she moved on.

But unfortunately, that was not to be for her rest was soon interrupted. Batcat and the Elder had once more taken off on yet another mini adventure.

As such, Rieren was alone when she sensed a distant bloom of Essence nearing her location.