Aaron stepped out of the darkness into the light and felt the cool air caress his skin. Compared to the temperatures he had grown used to on the second floor, this was positively freezing. The Cultivators prison had also been on the warmer side, but the longer he had walked through the dark tunnels, the colder and brighter it had gotten.
The first floor looked just like he remembered it. He had come out of the same tunnel he had before and was glad to see nobody around to welcome him this time. It also answered one of his questions. It was not eternally winter on the first floor, but there were seasons. A lot of snow had melted and most of the trees were clear, but there was still snow on the ground. Spring was in the air, although it was still late winter temperature wise. Already some early bloomers were pushing their stalks through snow and Aaron spotted a few flowers that grew close to the wall, waving gently in the current of mana that flooded down the wall. The symbols above him were dull and he quickly oriented himself. He spotted the area where they had set up base camp last time the Symbols had been active. The trampled earth had not recovered and it was just a field of hard packed snow that was slowly melting.
Aaron crossed the field and entered the forest, this time towards the other direction than the last time. He had not much of a choice last time he had fled and he knew the terrain that way, but it was better to explore and find a new holdout and temporary base. He had so much to do, so many things he needed to prepare and train for. What he really needed was a calendar or somewhere where he could write it down to plan it all, because it felt overwhelming to him when he thought about it.
First he had to make 2 or 3 bases that were easily concealed and small enough to give him space to sleep undisturbed. He needed to find enough food for a few days and stockpile it in a way that animals would not get to it. The next step after all that would be to learn the great masters Sensory Harmony and then get used to his newly improved senses. After that he would need to learn and train the Unceasing Palm kata and not fall behind with his other training. He needed to integrate Mei’s stretches into his routine and learn those properly, needed to go through the Qi pathways for Wind Steps and then also for The Fiend-god art and make sure they were perfect and he would need to learn how to repair those if they were not. And finally there was the Soul Catcher technique he needed to have a look at once he was finished with everything else, which might take weeks, especially if he spent every second day hunting for game.
It was going to be a lot of work, but at least Aaron was not really in a hurry. He had a bunch of manastones left and until he ran out of those he did not really see any reason to show his face anywhere. Still it would be hard work and the sheer amount of things he had to do were a list that seemed to grow exponentially with every step he took. But Aaron had learned how to deal with problems of that magnitude. You made a plan for just today, every day and you worked on small things, broke big tasks into small ones until there was nothing left to do. He wasn’t sure where he had learned that, but probably during one of his many stake outs and planned hits. The military had refined this ability to compartmentalize, to focus on one thing at a time, to ignore things that did not matter at that moment. To function under fire and while afraid of death. Which had not really been a thing in his last life, but was definitively a thing he felt in this one. Fear.
He was afraid to be caught and having to go through the whole evasion and hiding again. He was tired of it and if they caught him at a bad time while he was recovering from learning Sensory Harmony for example, then he would probably die horribly.
So the first task was to scope out the land and look for a suitable hiding spot, as well as any deer trails for some hunting. The forest was still cold and the snow was not melting underneath the tree canopy, even though it was bereft of leaves or snow. Time would tell how long that stayed this way, but for now there were plenty of tracks he could follow.
He took an hour or two just walking away from the Symbols and then started to really look for any potential bases. In the end he did not find any caves or secluded areas and decided to make a trio of fir trees one of his new temporary homes. To do that he found a big, stable branch way up in the tree and tied them together with branches from the other trees until he built a stable net of branches and needles that concealed the whole thing. It ended up looking surprisingly natural, since the trees were already close enough to touch and from underneath it was entirely invisible. He could only enter this little hideout from above and as he studied his work he decided to help the construction with some rope to ensure it would hold and not fall apart when he was using the hideout.
When all was said and done he had a small space only a few feet across that he could barely sit in. But if he was not carefull and put too much weight on anything that was not a thick branch, he might break through the loose camouflague, but at least he could sit on one of the big branches undisturbed this way. He did have to remove a bunch of needles though to have somewhere to sit that would not poke him in the butt, literally. He deposited most of his supplies here for now and went out with his bow to hunt some game, while on the lookout for other opportunities such as the three trees growing together.
Maximum concealment not comfort was his goal this time and he moved slowly, scoped out trees that looked promising and used Wind Steps sparingly. It took him a few hours until he finally found some deer and a small stream both of which were not that far from his new base actually, but their tracks had sent him on a merry chase through the snow way out into the forest. Aaron jumped into the trees and studied the small herd, picked out one of the animals and slowed his breathing. He took aim and released his arrow. He did not trust his own marksmanship though and followed it up with a giant Wind Step fueled jump that brought him soaring through the air right on top of the deer, that had collapsed. To his slight surprise the deer was dead by the time he landed and the rest of the herd had scattered already.
He had actually managed to shoot it into the heart. A perfect kill shot the likes of which he had rarely if ever been able to produce with a rifle in his last life. Luck, maybe? Or was he finally growing used to his new abilities and powers?
His body felt lighter after his rank up and he felt stronger. It felt exactly like the kind of feeling you get once you worked out for a few months and suddenly realize it actually did have a physical affect on your body, just that his improvement was far more ground breaking. Aaron felt far more in tune with himself and his body. With a slight marvel he removed the arrow from the doe’s chest, cleaned it and then decided to butcher and string the kill up right here. He let the deer bleed out by making a deep cut in its throat and hung it up in the trees with his vanishing rope supply.
Then Aaron went to scout for a few more bases around the area. He found another tree an hour or two later, a big oak that was surrounded by so many thick bushes and fallen wood it looked like a mountain of snow. The tree itself was massive and while not as protected and concealed as the last one, this one offered a concealed spot to rest on account of its secluded nature from all the big undergrowth around. He set a small camp up and cleared and secured it by cutting out a big bush and draping it over the top of the little clearing underneath the oak tree so that it left only a small opening to go through from above again. That done and satisfied with his work he returned to his kill and butchered it.
He left most of the organs for animals to eat and took the good meat with him. It should have been awkward to lug around a whole butchered and skinned deer, but Aaron could actually hold it with one bloody hand. He did not even need to heave it on his shoulders, it was that light. Again at first he thought the kill had been small, but his eyes told him a different story. He was just strong now, unnaturally so.
If this was this strong only because of ranking up once, then he wondered how he would feel like in 2-3 ranks or even the next realm. He reached his base and stored everything but one hunk of a leg of the deer high in the tree where it was concealed and animals could not get to it. He wanted to fill his grumbling stomach before he would go for Sensory Harmony.
Fire was a problem in this new base of his, he soon realized and he made a fireplace away from his base instead, in a small cove he found that had running water. There he made a small fire and roasted slabs of meat and feasted as soon as the meat cooked through. It was fine, no spices or condiments, just meat, but the meat itself was delicious as it was. It took him more than an hour to cook and eat the whole leg and leave behind only bones, but afterwards he was more sated and felt ready to begin.
It was already growing dark, but Aaron felt like that was a good thing. Less chance of anyone finding him. He climbed up into his fir tree hideout and settled down, drank some water from one of his waterskins and then leaned his back against the trunk of the tree, his legs folded underneath him. He calmed his mind first, tried to meditate and ended up cultivating for an hour or two instead.
Cultivating was easier than before, be it his newfound rank or experience, the process felt much smoother and almost effortless. He steadily filled his dantian with one of the manastones, but he knew as soon as he started that it would take ages to cultivate like this. His efficiency was much higher, yes, but the amount of Qi he needed felt like it was almost exponentially higher than before as well. To reach the next realm even if he did not use any Qi during his hunts or while defending himself, which was extremely unlikely, would take him months, plural. His new dantian was not just bigger, significantly bigger, but the Qi that returned from cycling it through the fiend-god art was also a lot thicker, reduced in volume but much more potent. Which was great, he already felt a difference when using Wind steps, just from the density of his Qi. But being more concentrated meant again, there was more room for Qi and that made the whole thing difficult to assess. But it would take ages to get to the next rank and take a whole lot of manastones, he was sure of that. Cultivating without manastones felt almost pointless at this point. The mana he absorbed was just not concentrated enough to do the trick.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Finally he stopped cultivating and fished for the sensory harmony memory core in his satchel. It was easy to find, it felt like a singing harmony of a choir when he touched it with his finger tips.
He took a deep breath, found the symbol on the core and activated it in trance mode first, he would need to experience the technique before learning it properly, after all.
Aaron found himself sitting on the top of a lonely rock in the middle of the most beautiful landscape he had ever seen. Picturesque trees with strange many toothed leaves created an ocean of multifaceted colors. He could see the whole color of the rainbow reflected in the leaves, green, yellow and red, turquoise and lilac. The color seemed to shift from tree to tree and a crystal clear stream ran down the hill, the rock was jutting out of, down into a valley and ended in a turquoise river that meandered through green fields and cultivated gardens. Birds sang in the trees, insects buzzed quietly around flowers and herbs that filled the air with a herbal sweet fragrance. The great master, Aaron presumed, sat on a cushion in almost the same pose as Aaron was sitting on, his back straight as he looked out over the valley, the trees, the beauty and up towards blue skies and towering white clouds. It was one of those days that felt made up, they were that perfect. Slowly Aaron relaxed as he felt the tranquility of the moment seep into his mind, into his very bones.
Then he felt someone think in his head, it was one of the weirdest sensations he had ever had, because he knew those were not his thoughts.
“...how does one reach this Harmony? This beauty with a simple Formation? Just by leaving a few monoliths standing in one particular pattern it transformed this wild and untamed valley into a paradise for man and beasts, but kept the monsters out.”
Aaron could spot one of the monoliths in question not far from him. A tall pillar carved out of stone and engraved from the top to the bottom with strange symbols that the great master could not entirely understand. He understood their meaning, but not their purpose or the mechanic behind how this formation was created. It was the weirdest feeling in the world to have access to another person’s knowledge, but not knowing it himself. To feel the same things like someone else, to follow their internal monologue. Because the great master’s thoughts were as confusing as they were strange. Full of concepts Aaron had no idea of, but that were intimately familiar to the great master, who understood them on such a deep level, Aaron felt like he understood them too.
“For Harmony to be created, it is not enough to simply harmonize the land, the rivers, the trees and soil. There must be more to this. Trees mutated, wild beasts turned tame and harmless. Nothing in the Formation explains any of these changes. No, it might be an unintended consequence of an attempt to subdue wild lands filled with monsters over time, through the Formation itself. No matter how intricate the formation is, how well thought out, can the lay of the land alone morph the Formation into something else entirely? How is it possible? Was its creator a master? Or was he a fool who stumbled on an answer I have sought to find for centuries?”
The great master sighed and closed his eyes, as if to deny the existence of the Valley, its Formation and their effects, but he could feel it, could feel the power run through the land in tame, perfectly even routes. It was like a garden that had become more than it had been intended to become. But how? Why? And how was it possible for the great master not to see through it. Where was the problem? Why could he not comprehend it? And then the great master had an idea, a thought so brilliant and new it opened up a whole new avenue of thinking, of living, of being.
Aaron felt knowledge pour into him, felt someone being enlightened, felt a chasm open up before him full of untamed knowledge, so deep it would swallow him up and never let him go if Aaron was not careful. He sensed more than he could comprehend the changes the great master made to himself, how he turned an epiphany into a palpable technique. It felt like someone doing higher math in their head. Qi gathered in the great masters head, twisted and contorted, changed his brain by creating pathways, a new technique was born and Aaron felt the technique settle into his own mind with the same searing epiphany as the great master had who knows how many millennia ago.
When it was done, he could hear the wispy voice of the great master in his ear.
“This is how I created Sensory Harmony, in an attempt to understand something so far beyond my understanding, I had to change how I perceive the world first before I could even begin. I had perfect control over my senses when I was done, but as I said you won’t have access to that feature until you reach the Foundation realm. For now this technique merely enhances your senses. But beware of losing yourself in the beauty of the world. This is the first step, it is the technique I used to pierce through the first layer of illusion that plagues all beings. You can do the same. We all can only understand what we perceive, can only comprehend things from our limited understanding based on the perceptions and observations we have made. But not us, not you anymore. From this day, your senses are open and the world will pour in. Eventually it will open your mind and you will see the world, this tower, this universe for what it truly is. This is one of my most prized techniques, may it guide your path towards eternity and plague you with the knowledge of what is true.”
Aaron heard the great masters voice echoing in his head and then the trance like illusion ended prematurely. Kicked him out in an instant. At first there was perfect, absolute silence and darkness, but then the noise poured in. The rustling of leaves in the wind was as loud as an airplane starting, he could hear the first insects buzzing searching for the first flowers hundreds of meters away from him, could hear the breath of an animal so far away he would not be able to see it even without the forest separating them. He could hear its footsteps like it was right next to him, until he grew aware of the sound of his own heart, until its sound overshadowed everything. The rhythmic hammering was as loud as gongs in a temple. His own breath was a loud rattle, a hissing intake of steam that made him wince. Underneath it all was the flowing sound of his own blood, his body creaked, moved, shifted with a sound like rocks grinding on other rocks.
Aaron gasped and the sound was so loud he had trouble comprehending it, it felt like it hurt his ears to hear his inaudible gasp. He wanted to close his ears, had to stop himself from hearing any more and made the mistake of moving, cupping his hands over his ears. Suddenly sensation joined the auditory overload with the force of a freight train. He could feel the harsh branch underneath him, how the needles he had ignored poked painfully into his flesh, how uncomfortable and rough the surface of it was. He felt his own heat, how his muscles contracted, could feel his blood flow, his muscles contract as he tightened everything seemingly at once. Could feel his own fingers digging into his head in attempt to muffle the sound of the world, but now sensation was drowning out every noise.
He clenched his whole body at once and it was a feeling like nothing else, so intense it might have been just as well a full body spasm. His clothes felt rough on his skin, his lips felt the temperature of the surroundings, the hairs on the back of his necks were like antennae that could gauge the wind with absolute accuracy. He felt the wind caress his body, flow through his clothes, making them push against his skin and it felt like someone was pushing him to the side, but Aaron did not move. Everything chafed, everything hurt, everything was deeply uncomfortable.
Taste came next, as inevitable as his next heartbeat. Aaron tasted his own mouth and it was awful, excruciatingly disgusting. His taste buds were overwhelmed by flavor so intense it was beyond belief. It felt like his tongue was doing a spectral analysis of what he had eaten for the last few days. Every meal dissected into nutrients, into flavors so distinct they were overwhelming his senses just from the memory of them, just from the lingering taste on his tongue. How awful it had really tasted, the dry rations the badly cooked venison, how horrid it had been not to brush his teeth for god knew how long. He could taste the leftovers on his teeth. Aaron wanted to puke, but the reaction of his gut trying to vomit was so visceral. He felt it contort and clench along with the rest of his body and got entirely distracted by the new sensations that drowned out his sense of taste. His sense of smell opened and flooded his mind.
He had his eyes still closed, but the smell opened his world. From one moment to the next he could gauge distance by smell, could smell time, how long a fragrance had lingered and yet in the next moment the closest and most fragrant things washed away the sudden epiphany. He could smell the pine needles around him with an intensity like it was a chemical attack. Beyond that he smelt blood, the smell of raw meat so intense it too was nauseating. His own kill was not far away, hung in the trees and he could smell it like it was just in front of him. The world was so full of smells it was beyond his wildest expectations. Everything had a smell, from melting water, to the wet or dry bark of a tree. Animal droppings stank so intensely he reeled back. He could taste the smell of a herd of deer in the distance, brought to him by the wind. But then his sense of smell inverted and turned in on himself. He smelled his own skin, how his hair stank, how his entire being stank of sweat and piss and shit and he could not handle it anymore.
Aaron puked and the taste of it was worse than the sensation that he had to endure, how his body convulsed without him being able to stop it. He could feel everything and his head was starting to hurt with a blinding headache. He also made the mistake and opened his eyes while puking.
The influx of light was so harsh it felt like he had looked into the sun. He quickly closed his eyes again, but in that one moment he had seen the branch underneath him in almost microscopic detail, every single bit of bark, every needle, in just a moment, like a photograph the branch burned itself into his memory, while he heaved and puked and then stopped as he realized that it was night. He had seen the branch like it was the brightest day. The realization hit him, that he could see in almost total darkness and Aaron tried opening his eyes again, forgotten the awful taste of puke in his mouth. The sheer fascination of opening his eyes washed away all other sensations.
He had never in his life seen anything so beautiful as the branches of pine and needles in front of him. It was dark, he could tell, but he could see so clearly, it mattered not. The color of the branch was washed away by the darkness, but its contour, its outline, its detail was so intensely interesting, for long moments Aaron just stared at the branches, but his sight was too strong, the longer he stared the closer the branch felt until he felt like it was closing in on him, like the needles would stab into his eyes.
All of his senses rebelled, he switched from feeling his body, tasting puke, to hearing his panting breath like booming music, to seeing the detailed texture of a piece of bark. It was a never ending spiral that just did not stop, one sense after another rose into the forefront of his mind until he felt nothing else but the splitting headache, the pain was debilitating and it did not stop. It got worse by the second, it hurt so much Aaron lost consciousness as the pain overwhelmed him.