Chapter 054
The Trio practically exploded after hearing that, all three speaking at the same time.
“Are you just trying different trades to see what you’ll like?” Bai Lian asked, her tone concerned.
“No one gets anywhere dividing their focus too much. You should just choose one and go with it,” Wentian piped in, his tone making him sound like an authority on the subject.
“It’s good to experience all trades as they all have some minor overlap, but being focussed on one is indeed best,” Mo Yu said kindly.
Joram noticed Avi’s amused smile as she continued to work the sensor suite.
“Ah, don’t worry about it,” he said casually. “I’m already decent with alchemy, enchanting, and smithing. I really only need to work on arrays, as they’re kind of weird.”
That got the Trio exchanging looks with each other. Heck, their questions, concerns, doubts, and curiosity were so strong that he clearly felt it across the Network, never mind seeing it on their faces through his perception.
What really caught his attention was what he was feeling from Mo Yu over the Network. She was definitely curious and a bit doubtful, but a thread of… certainty, determination was growing in her. He didn’t know what that was about, but was soon enlightened as she spoke.
“Joram? Are you a Reincarnator?” She asked softly, but with quiet determination, as though speaking the works might bring punishment down on her head for asking.
Joram almost froze, but managed to keep his hands moving over the controls. Avi, though, suddenly gave off waves of murderous intent through the Network. It was so strong that he suspected Mo Yu’s now pale face was due to that.
“Ah, well, that’s a thing,” he said, at the same time as he told Avi to cool it through the Network. “Are Reincarnators very common over on Zhizun Zhanshi?”
Mo Yu’s expression became a bit doubtful, a bit confused, but the curiosity was still there.
“No, they’re very rare,” she said. “But the phenomenon is well-documented. For some reason, when a soul is reincarnated, they sometimes retain memories from their past life. Some retain more than others. While sometimes a very powerful cultivator from the past is reincarnated while retaining everything but their cultivation from their previous life.”
“That’s pretty much what I’ve read on the subject,” Joram said with a nod, adjusting their heading slightly as he did.
Mo Yu, Bai Lian, and Wentian watched him carefully, trying to spot any clues.
“Well,” Mo Yu started again, clearing her throat slightly. “Most Reincarnators are revealed because of how they act. From birth, they usually have a very strong personality. They’re usually too mature for their age, learning things much faster than their peers. Their cultivation speed is also usually much faster than those around them, while they also show extraordinary talent in other things. Are able to do what hasn’t been seen in a very long time. Sometimes using techniques long thought lost to the world…”
“Makes sense,” Joram said with another nod, causing an exasperated expression to blossom on Mo Yu’s face.
“So, are you a Reincarnator or not?” She finally asked, releasing her breath all at once.
“What does it matter?” He asked, genuinely curious, causing her to look flabbergasted. “You know that I come from a clan that has been collecting knowledge from all across the world for millennia. What’s to say that I didn’t just study ancient tomes this whole time?”
Mo Yu closed her mouth, still looking like she was seeing the most confusing, puzzling, and frustrating thing in the world when she looked at him.
It was Wentian who came to her aid, motioning to everything around them as he did.
“One: by your own admission, you’re eight. Two: everything,” he said bluntly, which made Joram laugh out loud.
“I was wondering when you guys would finally get the nerve to ask,” he said once his laughter had subsided. “I don’t really care if you guys know or not, but you can’t go sharing that information, or anything else, with anyone else.”
They nodded at that, probably knowing that it would cause problems for not only him, but for themselves as well.
“That said, I’m still debating what I’ll share with the Academy. I’m leaning a bit more towards fudging my age on the application, though. As for how my Mental Strength, I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to hide that from them given that they’ll need to test me and all,” he said musingly.
“Don’t worry, we’ll keep it to ourselves!” Bai Lian declared, giving a Look to the other two, who just nodded at that.
“Good,” he said with another nod. “I’m sorry if you’re disappointed that none of you will be able to attend classes, but I’ll make an effort to bring any study materials you might need for your cultivation.”
That got a round of sincere thanks from the Trio, who then started discussing their various wants and needs for their future growth. Which also happened to include various cultivation resources that they’d need. Which also raised a few questions of their own.
“So, which Laws are you familiar with?” Bai Lian asked him as they finished talking about themselves.
“Ah, well…” he hedged, not quite sure how to explain. “I really haven’t had the time to delve into the various Elemental Laws yet,” he said, a bit embarrassed.
By the time someone reached the 2nd Tier, they were generally expected to have started cultivating/studying one Elemental Law or another. At that level, there were really only the Basic Laws they’d be able to cultivate, like air, earth, fire, or water. There were a few others, like acid, poison, and rock, amongst others, but they tended to be a bit harder to grasp.
Well, the various Laws were actually tied to each Tier of Mana. Once you could sense Tier 2 Mana, or Earth Qi, you’d then have a chance of sensing and thus studying higher, or Advanced Laws like ice, lightning, metal, and wood. Those were usually found through a combination of ones’ understanding of Basic Laws.
For example, if you were proficient with the Laws of earth and stone, you could start on the path of cultivating the Law of Metal. An understanding of Air and Fire could lead to an understanding of Lightning. Or, if you’re understanding of Air was profound enough, you could directly transition to Lightning.
The ability to sense and understand the various Laws was a topic of much debate over the millennia. Some claimed that you would need to understand a lower Law before you could understand a higher Law. Others claimed that your innate affinity for a Law was what mattered, and things would develop from there. Still others claimed that just learning about a higher Law would allow for a person to cultivate that Law should their understanding of it reach a certain threshold.
That some people had affinities for various Laws was indeed true. In fact, most people had an affinity for one Law or another. It was rarer to find someone with an affinity for two Laws, and rarer still for a person to have an affinity for even more than that.
That said, he’d never really thought about what affinity, or affinities, he might have. He’d always been drawn to metal, stone, and woodworking hobbies back on Earth, but wasn’t sure if that really had anything to do with elemental affinities here.
Well, the reaction he got from the Trio was another sight to behold. Their blank looks turned into astonishment and disbelief before their mouths opens and words flowed forth like a tsunami.
“How is that possible?”
“You surely have a strong affinity for the Law of Life!”
“If you’re not proficient in the Law of Mind, I’ll eat my hat.”
So on, and so forth.
It took a good ten minutes for them to calm down enough for him to get in a word edgewise.
“So!” He said to get their attention. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll have plenty of time to study up any Laws that seem interesting. And if any of them coincide to a Law any of your is studying, I won’t hesitate to come to you for advice,” he said, projecting confidence all the while.
Bai Lian nodded, happy that she could be of assistance. Wentian’s body language took on a stubborn edge to it, wile Mo Yu just shrugged, playing it cool.
“So, since Bai Lian has studied Earth and Water, you can help me with those,” he said, making the young woman smile. “Wentian can help me with Fire and Stone, while Mo Yu can help me with Air. I’ll likely get manuals on any of the other Basic Laws I can get, though, as they’re all kind of interesting.”
The Trio exchanged looks before Wentian spoke up.
“I wouldn’t recommend that,” he said, rolling his shoulders. “Each Law takes a long time to understand and then more time to sense. Adding to that is that it gets harder to study ‘opposing’ Laws like Earth and Air, or Fire and Water. Dividing your attention, never mind studying opposing Laws, will just cripple your growth.”
Joram nodded along with that as he changed their heading to avoid a flock of what looked like giant parakeets.
“We’ll just play it by ear then,” he said, much to Wentian’s visible frustration. “Anyways, I’ve read that you can buy specifically attuned Mana Crystals that contain a Law that’ll help a person understand that Law better.”
They nodded and this time it was Mo Yu who spoke.
“Yes, Law Crystals are available… if you have enough capital to purchase them. They’re famously expensive to acquire and almost exclusively appear at auction.”
“Yes, even Basic Law Crystals well for tens of high-grade Qi Crystals,” Bai Lian agreed. “I’ve also heard of High Law Crystals selling for many Heaven Cards before.”
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“Do any Peak Law Crystals ever show up in auction?” He asked, not quite sure that he wanted to hear the answer.
“I’ve only ever heard of people making personal trades for those before,” Mo Yu said, shaking her head.
He sighed. Of the Peak Laws he was interested in…. What was he saying. He was interested in them all. He just wasn’t sure if he’d ever get to the point where he would be able to come across those elemental phenomena any time soon. Soon being defined as: sometime in the next century or six.
Joram’s attention was drawn away from the conversation as he noticed more and more villages, towns, and cities as they flew over.
“Avi, could you check the navigation computer to see if we’re still on course,” he asked. He had been basically just flying in the rough direction of the Academy this whole time and didn’t want to have to backtrack at all should he miss the mark.
Avi nodded as she typed away, comparing what the sensors were picking up and the placement of various settlements recorded on the maps she’d imputed into the database. She replied a few minutes later.
“Adjust 1.693 degrees north,” she said, then went back to doing her thing.
Joram did just that, then got back to his conversation with the Trio.
“So, if I manage to get my hands on some higher ranked Law Crystals, I’d be able to make a fortune?”
Again, the Trio exchanged looks before one of them spoke up.
“If you’re short on funds, sure?” Wentian said with another shrug. “But if it was me, I’d keep any that I could personally use and trade the others for favours with anyone I know.”
“That’s why only Basic and Advanced Law Crystals really show up in auction houses,” Mo Yu said, taking up the thought. “Once you get to High Law Crystals, they’re rare enough that you would just want to trade what you have with someone who has what you need.”
“Makes sense,” he said. “Then I’ll just have to keep an eye out for anything interesting.”
With that said, the conversation slowly died off and the Trio took to appreciating the scenery as it practically blurred past them. It was much easier to see something the further away it was from them, even at their cruising altitude.
With nothing directly ahead of them, he turned to the holographic emitter array that would be used to disguise the runabout. Maybe one day the design of the runabout wouldn’t cause a commotion. But for now, he looked through the very small list of available disguises. Which boiled down to two; he didn’t count invisibility as a “disguise”.
One was a gigantic scintillating lotus, large enough for ten people to stand on comfortably. He was pretty sure that Avi had thrown that in there because of the Trio. The second, much more mundane one, looked like a carriage. A carriage that was as long as a tour bus and almost twice as wide. Which roughly matched how large the runabout was.
With his choice made, he waited until they were between settlements with no one around before engaging the holographic array. There wasn’t much to say about the effect on the inside, from their point of view. The only thing they saw from the inside was a very faint outline of the image.
The flight continued smoothly, the ground blurring by, until he started noticing an increase in air traffic below them. Which, really, was still out of the way. But as the minutes passed by, the number of airborne beings increased, as did their altitude the faster they flew. It got to the point where he had to not only decrease their velocity, but also increase their altitude a bit.
After a few more minutes, he spotted the ocean on the vast horizon. It first appeared as a mirage where land met sky, then quickly turned into a dazzling strip of blue. He then adjusted their heading slightly towards the, quite frankly, titanic peninsula jutting out into the ocean.
What really made the landmass especially eye-catching was that almost all of it was covered in civilization. Sure, there new hundreds of places that looked like parks set aside for leisure, play, nature, or personal use, but for the most part the peninsula was covered in various buildings ranging from houses to apartments to estates, businesses, and what he supposed were government buildings of one sort or another.
He was impressed with how orderly it all was. The streets, from north to south, east to west, were formed into a precise grid, only interrupted by larger lots that contained the aforementioned parks as well as larger estates and buildings.
Joram slowed their flight further as air traffic increased as well as to better study the Mega-City the size of most countries on Earth… probably larger than most, actually given the readings from the sensors.
The peninsula the city was on was roughly eight-thousand kilometres long and five thousand wide, the long side jutting out into the ocean. If Dovaynia hadn’t been as large as it was, the peninsula would have just been the pointy end of a continent back on Earth. As it was, the coastline extending north and south of it was relatively smooth. Yes, it had its bays and such as the coastline went on like a wobbly line, but nothing protruding even a fraction as far into the ocean as this peninsula did.
Which, really, made it quite easy to find the place.
Looking at the city, the layout seemed to be quite straightforward. The northern coast contained the vast majority of the docks and warehouses needed to store the cargo going this way or that. The southern cost seemed to primarily be reserved for the larger estates, enjoying somewhat calmer waters than the north cost.
There was also a massive river that emptied into the ocean where the southern side of the peninsula connected to the coast, creating an incredibly vast delta filled with what looked like a mixture of farmlands and swamps.
Further, past the eastern tip of the peninsula, he could see a few more islands, the largest probably twice the size of France, while the four others were significantly smaller.
The largest island, though, was quite the sight. It had the tallest buildings he could see, some several kilometres tall. They all seemed to be concentrated on the western side of the island, closer to the mainland, leaving the rest of it untouched wildlands. Well, it was forested anyway. It was probably also well-maintained.
Anyway, that left the centre of the peninsula with what looked to be a mixture of businesses of varying sorts, residential areas, and green spaces. The west coast appeared to contain the largest number of official-looking buildings separated by more green space.
That relieved him. If that much space had only been taken up by buildings and roads, it would likely have smelled like a garbage dump. Even then, there were probably areas of the city that spelled like that. Looking down at the many rivers streaking their way across the peninsula, he wondered what their waste-removal system was like. It surely had to be well-designed if, what looked like, several hundred million people lived there. If it wasn’t, he was sure that various diseases and plagues would have wipe the place out long ago.
“Take her down over there,” Avi said, placing a mark on an open section by the western docks. He was again impressed with how well Avi had integrated the systems together and wondered how she’d managed to do it all.
“Aye-aye,” he said with a grin as he corrected their heading, watching the marker move across the viewport to stay where it was supposed to.
The Trio scooted in close, eager to admire the view. He couldn’t blame them; it was quite the sight, putting to shame anything he’d seen on Earth, though the architecture was just as diverse.
The traffic grew more dense as he got closer to the designated landing spot until he was going at a veritable snail’s pace. Given how far they’d flown east, it was already getting onto evening.
Once they were closer to the front of the line that would bring them to where he could land the runabout, he finally spotted the small building used for student registration to the Academy.
“All right, be sure you don’t forget anything,” Joram said once they’d parked, which got him a few confused looks as he stood up and stretched.
“Let’s get going,” he said, then led the way out the sliding hatch/door.
Once he was out, he noticed not a few curious gazes directed at him and the “carriage”, but didn’t pay much attention to them. There was still a line-up coming out of the registration building, which annoyed him almost as much as it worried him. If he wasn’t wrong, today was the last day to register before he’d need to wait another year to apply.
‘I’ll get in line if you could sort out the runabout,’ he sent Avi, quickly moving to secure his place. Which was prudent, as there were still people arriving.
‘Got it,’ she sent as he sensed the runabout being [Planeshift]ed. ‘I’ll also pass out aura shrouds for the Trio.’
‘OK?’
‘Better to have people guessing than thinking they can push you around,’ she sent by way of explanation.
‘Ah, good call.’
With how quickly that all happened, the four soon joined Joram in line, much to the displeasure of a few who’d formed up behind him in that short time. He was surprised to see that at least fifty people had joined their line by then. Much to his relief, though, the line was moving at a reasonable pace.
What also alarmed him was the number of people exiting a door on the north side of the building, looking dejected as some met with people who’d been waiting around. If he wasn’t wrong, then those were likely people who’s applications had been rejected. His heartrate rose further as he realized that only about one in a hundred or so didn’t leave the building after entering.
Or, rather, for every one hundred people that entered in front of him, about ninety-nine others left the building. Now, he wasn’t totally sure if the ratio was correct or not, but it still made him very nervous.
‘Relax,’ Avi sent him along with reassuring feelings. ‘I’m sure that you’ll get in just fine!’
On one level, he knew intellectually that he was almost guaranteed to be accepted. But on another, baser level, he still doubted himself, even after all this time. Yes, he’d gone through changes to his being that went soul-deep. He’d reshaped how he thought. He’d gone through Altaea’s hellish training that involved both physical training for his body as well as mental training for his mind and heart.
But the seeds sown in ones’ formative years were the hardest to uproot once they’d taken hold.
His insecurities were still there, albeit significantly smaller than they’d been back on Earth. Insecurities like thinking he wasn’t good enough, or that he didn’t have enough information to act.
Taking a deep breath as he had M4 take over his motor functions, he let it out and centred himself.
He wasn’t who he’d been when he’d first arrived on this world. He had been trained and approved by Altaea herself. He’d learned and done things no one on Earth knew or had done. He’d survived an encounter with that Old Fart. He’d been reborn into a loving family, brought up to know his own self-worth. He’d been accepted for who he was, regardless of his origins.
He had family and friends who loved and supported him.
He could do this!
Coming back to himself, he realized that they were nearly at the front of the line, only four groups ahead of him when he finally heard what an attendant was saying to those at the front.
“Anyone not taking the test, please exit through there before the aspirant sees their interviewer,” she said politely, motioning to their left.
Joram looked forward again, taking note of the staff waiting for the next person they’d interview. They stood in front of a series of desks arrayed in a grid. He noticed that there seemed to be small arrays set up that blocked sound and also made the details of those at the desks blurry, likely to prevent anyone from hearing sensitive information. Which, really, was a nice touch.
He turned and nodded to Avi and the Trio before shuffling forward to the front of the line, the previous four groups having already dispersed.
‘You’ll do great,’ Avi sent with another blast of warmth. ‘I’ll see you later.’
‘Thanks,’ he sent back with gratitude.
The attendant waved him towards another attendant who then guided him to one of the tables where an interviewer, a young man who looked to be in his early twenties in what looked like a uniform, waited for them.
Joram lengthened his stride, now focussing on the man as he approached. The uniform, shockingly, resembled a school uniform that you’d find back on Earth in a private school, or in east Asia. He had a jacket with three buttons on it that was buttoned up on only the top two button. His shirt was white and collared and sported tied that had indigo stripes on a turquoise background. He was even wearing slacks and black leather shoes.
He wasn’t sure who’d chosen that colour pattern for the tie, but was almost certain they’d been colour blind.
“Application,” the man said, holding out a bored hand.
Joram quickly retrieved it from his storage ring and handed it to the interviewer.
The man’s eyebrow twitched as his fingers brushed Joram’s when he took the paperwork before motioning him to sit at the empty desk as he stepped around it and took his own seat.
He didn’t feel anything as he passed through the ward but he did notice that the ambient volume dropped significantly.
Once seated, his interviewer quickly went through the application before once again regarding him.
“Are you wearing an aura shroud, or have you truly not reached Tier 1 yet?” He asked, looking impatient. Possibly annoyed?
“No, I’m mainly focussed on Mental Strength, using body cultivation to keep up with things,” Joram said, trying hard to not actually lie. All of what he’d said was actually true; he did indeed primarily focus on Mental Strength, using body cultivation to make sure he was less squishy; less likely to be one-shot in the future by some entitled douchebag.
“I see,” he said, picking up a pen and making notes on a separate sheet of paper. “You’re applying as a crafter, so we’ll need to test your Mental Strength to be sure that it matches what it written in your application,” he said, not quite hiding the disbelief in his tone. “I’ll need to take the application fee before we go any further. How would you like to pay?”
“Have the rates changed in the couple of years?” He asked, unsure because the Clan hadn’t updated that file before its destruction.
“The application fee remains at ten Mid-Grage Tier 1 Crystals,” he replied, now looking at Joram with a bit more scrutiny, taking in his apparel.
Joram retrieved and placed a single High-Grade Tier 1 Crystal on the desk with a smile. “I’m glad,” he said, continuing to smile.
The man nodded, sliding the coin into a drawer in the desk. “Please, follow me,” he said as he stood, then began walking towards one of two corridors at the back of the room.