27 days later (Y1010年 06月 27日)
“How long have we been here?” Julius asked, with blood spitting out of his nose.
“A hundred and fifty days,” Empress Cai said. Her arm was broken. Celeste was fixing her arm at Julius’ request.
My God. I really lost it. Julius realized his perception of time was lost. Hence, he sat down on the floor next to the campfire. It was a cool night; a rarity in all of the days. He hated being at this level. The prior level had warned him and the participants how much it would escalate from much onwards. He believed it, but the expectations were not met. This supposed expectation was to finish within less than a month. The reality came hard when it passed that, and the wonders of time subdued to the point of even forgetting. It felt like torture, reminiscent of the underground tournament. Solomon came from behind and shouted Julius’ name, startling him out.
“Woah!” Julius blurted, but it did get him out of dark thoughts. “Almost got off track again.”
“Here.” Solomon handed him a couple of napkins. “You need to rest up. Tomorrow, we are back out, moving to the castle.”
“Time does fly quickly,” Julius muttered before spitting blood.
“No more talking,” Empress Cai said, looking over at Celeste, who was about to finish. “Give him a Yu Qishui (玉汽水) (Jade Soda).”
When Celeste finished, she hovered over, using Vesper to guide her right to Julius’ side. She handed him a small glass bottle. Vivid green with a slight blue hue reflected off the glass from the campfire’s light. Julius pulled the cap open and took a slow gulp of the bottle while his lungs and his body were relatively unstable. While drinking it, his nose continued to spit blood, staining the glass. The rest at the campsite reacted repulsively to his blood. A few droplets had touched the ground, leaving a dark blue tint. It was once he finished, and the blood finally stopped leaking.
“Give me a debrief again,” Julius asked Feng, who was eating an unspecified herb soup at her resting spot.
“You don’t remember?” Feng asked.
“I do, but I only wanted to be certain.”
“Ok.” Feng finished her serving of soup and placed the tiny bowl down. She went and sat down between him and Empress Cai. “Let’s start again.”
“How many men…did we lose today?” Julius faltered.
“A hundred and ten men, and we lost fifteen thousand spirits (精神). In total, we reached three hundred thousand casualties in hundred-fifty days,” Feng said, reading from a documented paper.
Julius’ hands went over his head, madly scratching his scalp. He could hear his fingernails grinding on the skin, reminiscent of buffing on the nail file. Anger and guilt raided his mind. Ever since he entered into the Merit Universe’s Level Three, day one introduced a blood bath that even the strongest can’t ignore or prevent. His continuous down mood remained. It was only today that he couldn’t let it hold in. Feng stopped when Julius lost it.
“Continue,” the latter said.
“There are only fifty thousand men left. We have around twenty percent more to cover before the ultimate day at the castle.”
“Can we finish within two days?” Julius asked.
“Only if we are going with Plan B.” Feng looked at others at the campsite. “I mean, plan A was already failing. So, we have no choice but to do B.”
Empress Cai scratched her chin. “So, the violent option…It may be our only chance to enact it,” she said and looked at Julius. “What’s your level right now?”
Julius opened his stats.
--
Flames of Wrath (愤怒) Level: 3 →4
+ 35% to Qi; + 20% to Power.
Cultivation Level 18 → 19
Total % Base Stats Buff: 18% → 19%
Base Stats w/o adjustments
Stamina (LV 17 → 18)
HP (LV 17 → 18)
731 → 804
211,065 → 221,618
Endurance (LV 17 → 18)
452 → 489
Durability (LV 17 → 18)
526 → 579
Power (LV 17 → 18)
Attack (LV 17 → 18)
2,818 → 2,903
8,684 → 8,858
Qi (LV 17 → 18)
31,969 → 35,166
Total Score
256,245→ 270,417
Cold Resistance
Ice Resistance – 50%
50% Ash Damage Reduction (10/20)
33% Carbon Damage Reduction (11/20)
Breathing Strength Level 5/20
Heian- Juren 1 (黑暗巨人〇) Estimated Progress: 85%
??? Estimated Progress: 90%
--
“Just became 18,” Julius said with a wheeze. “I don’t know if that’s even enough.”
Empress Cai, feeling better after her arm got fixed, grabbed an empty mat from her site and brought it over near the campfire. She sat on the comfy paddings, legs crossed. One of the cultivators then handed her a dinner plate, and Empress Cai continued. “Tonight is the last and only time you get to express yourself. The last twenty percent needs to be on point.”
“You’re not a marine and already doing mentally better than me…Lucky,” Julius muttered. “I wish I was like you on that.”
“I know you…The mind was your strength and weakness and your childhood. You told some of us how it felt with your parents and troubling relationships. Based on what has been told, I don’t think your fears and weaknesses were confronted.”
Julius aimed his eyes at her. “Care to elaborate.”
“You heard our stories multiple times,” Empress Cai stated while holding her chopsticks. “What do we all share in common?”
“Hardship?”
“And.”
“Fear?”
Empress Cai nodded. “Fear…Yes. That's the one…In our hardships, we deal with our initial fears as soon as possible. While you otherwise, life only masked you to delay it further. Hence, it made things worse for you.”
“Can you fix it?” Julius asked while feeling desperate. “I need to let go of this looming crisis before I might lose it.”
“Before I do,” Empress Cai mumbled through her meal. She drank up a gulp of water to swallow down the food from her mouth. “Do you know why you are like this?’
A little reluctant, but Julius silently nodded because there was nothing to hide. “I do. It still lingers to this day despite how much I want to look away,” he said, prompting Empress Cai to stand up. She walked to him, forcing a picture in front of his eyes.
“You know who he is, right?”
“Of course I do. That bastard.”
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“See. You won’t forget, no matter how hard you try. But if you deal with it, the stress will disappear.”
“Easier said than done…How can it possibly be put down in a short time when I faced this mental hell for more than a decade,” Julius ranted much of a disturbance to the campsite. “Unless any of y’all have something that can solve this problem by tomorrow…I’ll accept.”
“I already have a couple in mind. This photo is a start, so tell me. Who was this person that betrayed you and all of us?”
“Fucking Xavier!” Julius blurted, grabbing the photo. His eyes can’t move away from it. He was giving the picture of Xavier a death stare, as if he was doing it in person. “I can’t let go of this bastard, thinking about the possibility he will screw us up again.”
“Remember his reputation?” Empress Cai reminded him. She finished her dish, handing it to one cleaner cultivator. The other handed her a refill for her drink and left her with Julius. “Sometimes you wonder why that was the case…Not being best with the public in his homeland.”
“Yep…I figured. A deep concern I overlooked.”
“Nobody blames you for it. Anything from Kriegshan is unpredictable with the rest of the world, almost like a game to predict who would be a relief or disarray. You pray for the former.”
Julius grew confused. Not at what she said, but how the attitude towards situational awareness. They treated it as if it was a game, discarding all the fears and doubts like what he currently experiences. Even Mother Elaine handled it better than him. Unless she was hiding it, too. However, it was clear that he had nothing to say about this because his focus was still on the picture. “A game?”
She nodded confidently. “Mhm. A game. It sounds ironic, but our way of thinking about improving morale might differ from your world’s point of view.”
“Yeah, no kidding,” Julius said before Empress Cai yanked the picture out of his grip, putting his mind blank for a moment. “What was that for?”
He watched her holding the photo and tearing it to shreds. All the pieces of paper rained down to the ground and dissipated into dust as Empress Cai’s qi had seeped into it when she tore it. She looked upset as her nose and mouth were fuming smoke. Worried, Julius wondered what he did wrong to bring such a reaction.
“Ok, next. I think you have had enough of staring. Let’s move on to the next step.”
Mother Elaine, with bloodied hair that overwhelmed the blonde color, joined the conversation. She saw Empress Cai’s gestures aimed at her, prompting the former to finish her meal with them. Before she sat down, the latter ordered a bunch of mats set up around the scene. Mother Elaine took the spot next to Julius, and Empress Cai began calling every qi significant cultivator to the scene.
The campsite was stationed at a spot on the hill that gave a view of the castle, which was down ahead of the valley. It looked bigger than any castle that ever existed on earth. An illusion was in place when Julius, Empress Cai, and the entire army arrived at the spot. Quickly, it broke off, revealing the legitimate size and distance of the entire castle complex. Not even peripherals could view all of it. Head turns to either left or right won’t see the ends of the border wall as tall as three Adalberht the Bright Giant stacked up.
The hill was a large flat surface, allowing a huge campsite complex for the entire army present. The spot where Julius, Mother Elaine, Feng, and Empress Cai are the command post’s campsite. It has its own tents and a campfire that keeps up to ten people. Because Empress Cai called on the rest, many either pushed themselves inside or gathered around the perimeter of the command post, of which there was no choice. Julius was bewildered by the crowd’s sudden presence.
“What’s this? Why did you call everyone?” Julius asked.
“I didn’t forget,” Empress Cai said, who stood tall, revealing a bit of her thigh that only Julius could see. Her battle outfit was partially torn and hadn’t been replaced yet. “Ever since the first meeting in that black room, I always wondered what I could do to prove that we aren't a fragmented society. All of us here are already debriefed on what we are about to do, and I’m about to explain it to you.”
Wait. No. Julius’ hands were up. “Wait, hold on now. How seriously did you take from that meeting? I was out-of-line mad.”
“There’s always a reason why everyone has emotions. It doesn't come out of nowhere,” Empress Cai said. She took off her battle coat, revealing her black tank top underclothing. There were no sleeves, but the material was silk, proved by the luster and smooth surface. “Now sit still as we all get you through this fear out of the way.” Her red aura boosted out from her back, shooting up to the night, cloudy sky.
She sat down right in front of Julius, legs crossed, knee-to-knee, touching each other. Father Kang, Mother Elaine, Feng, Celeste, Solomon, Míngyuè, Qiang Zhao, Victoria, and a few dozen more all exerted their qi in the same manner as Empress Cai. They sat down, surrounding Julius. The latter watched their qi flow between each other like flows of the river, all directed to Empress Cai. He recognized this ritual; it was discovered during the early days of Level Three at the temple.
“Oh, so this is what you’re doing,” Julius said, feeling unwound.
“Stop talking and sit still,” Empress Cai ordered, thrusting both arms right at Julius. Her hands struck both of his shoulders and gripped them. Julius’ back was forced upright after she struck both of his shoulders. “Trust me that you will go through this?”
“Sure,” Julius said; the only word he could come up with.
For a moment, his eyes were automatically pulled open as if someone was pushing his eyelid fully up. His vision experienced a moment of upgrade. He saw everything vividly to the point even the smallest speck was noticeable. It was weird, very strange. Then the next, he turned nearsighted like a camera blur effect, focusing only on Empress Cai while everyone else around him wasn’t visible.
Quickly, everything turned black. He was awake and lucid, knowing his eyes were closed. He couldn’t open it, but heavy footsteps were thumping around him, sparking his ears. This is not normal. His body felt an itch as it was reacting to the surrounding noises. Aura can’t even be exerted, and it felt he was restrained at the spot, not able to move. The darkness kept going for what he felt like for hours because by the time he was free, his legs and back were a little sore. Julius could feel the kneecaps burning up to his entire thighs. His back stung like being bitten by a bee a couple of times. Hence, he couldn’t bend down.
Wiping his eyes, Julius found himself in a dark void, reminding him of his fear of being trapped in one. It was less potent than when he first entered the Merit Universe Level One. I don’t know, but I’m not comfortable. Julius reacted with less fear but more dislike. He summoned his greatsword when echoing footsteps swarmed the edges of the void.
“So…You came prepared,” a familiar female voice said.
Julius turned to his right, recognizing it. “How is this possible?”
The tall, slender lady came out from the darkness, walking with her heels and in a black dress. Not to forget her notable bright white pupils. “Unexpected reunion, is it? This reminds us of our old times.”
“You’re leading this ritual?” Julius asked.
Hu nodded, much to her surprise. “Indeed, I am. I got called to handle someone's fears and doubts. I didn’t expect you to be the one out of everyone.”
“That’s not true. You handled the Skoltor System, so my memories aren’t truly private.”
“And I refused to read any…until now,” Hu said before strolling around in front of him because she doesn’t like being still. “I’ve only read your mind a few minutes ago, and I got my assignment down.”
“What assignment?”
Hu stopped, putting both hands on her hips. “Oh, you don’t know what this whole thing is about?”
Julius’ head shook. “No. I only read the overall before giving it away to Empress Cai. I’m pretty much entering this empty-handed.”
Hu’s eyes glared at his greatsword momentarily before giving one nod. Another after looking at himself from top to bottom. “Ok, you’re good for the first round.”
“First round?”
“I’ll show you,” Hu said, then gestured her hand in a circular motion, causing a part of the dark void to open. Bright light invaded the dark void like the window curtains opened, letting the sunlight seek into the room.
Julius followed Hu, who led him along the way. As the two stepped foot into what was revealed to be an open arena. A body of water surrounded the circumference and any other flat stone surface in the vicinity. The air was cooling, not having to feel the hot air pressure during the day. The one hundred and fifty days of going through eighty percent of Level Three was brutal, without any external qi. So, this was the first moment of relaxation. After a couple more walks, the two arrived at the humongous circular arena. Hu gave a small introduction.
The body of water that surrounded the arena was the first layer. Beyond the first layer was a circular garden of trees that flourished in beautiful green and shiny as a mirror directing light. Each tree has a collection of wondrous bushes hugging the trunk. Behind the tall trees was the bird’s eye view of nature’s landforms. Julius recognized it as being one of the earliest spots at Level Three, where the environment was less rough and dark. In fact, it was the most peaceful region after dealing with mobs. When the entire army left, the area was unreachable and never seen again, leaving the rest of the days after the tenth day to be a progressing atrocity.
Hu then showed Julius the spot where he would be doing his part, which she would explain in a moment. He walked right to where she pointed. A light of the one Hanzi flashed as he approached. Once stood, Julius saw Han stand a few meters across from him, summoning a virtual screen at her fingertips.
“I saw your level 18,” Hu said while tapping multiple times consecutively. “Not bad for getting this far because I’ll tell you, that’s kind of low. It’s not enough to supplement you through this finale.”
What? Julius was shocked at the notion, to the point of bewilderment. “Are you joking with me?”
“I wish while having tea, but no. I’m giving you temporary access to what your level should’ve been.” Hu pushed a button that triggered a notification-like sound through Julius’ ear, prompting the latter to open his screen.
“Shit, no way.” Julius was flabbergasted that his chest and body almost wanted to take a punch. It made a lot more sense. “Why didn’t it tell us about various missions before?”
“That you have to ask the final boss at the castle. He’s the one who will answer you. However, I can assume it was one of his deceptive tricks put in as training.”
“So…all of this time? I could have been higher?”
“That’s right,” Hu said. She stopped taping the virtual screen. “Now that’s out of the way…I set something up for you.” A large virtual screen summoned next to Hu. Afterward, the words on the screen flipped for Julius’ view, and the blue screen hovered right to him, revealing a list full of missions for him to accomplish and general expectations.
“A very long list,” Julius said while scrolling the screen. “This would take a lot of time to finish…Wait, then what happens to everyone else?”
“You mean the ones who got you here? They’re fine. In fact, this realm is a separate plane of space. This arena is one of the few, and the ones who helped you get here are together at a different arena that you can’t see from here…about to do the same training you are about to receive.”
“Who’s training them?”
Hu shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s either one of the realm’s residents or so. But anyway, I’ll be staying and assisting you throughout from the beginning to the end.”
Julius nodded, about to be ready for it to begin. He looked through the list one more time, estimating the time of completing it. I’ll see you on the other side. He silently said, mainly to Empress Cai and Mother Elaine.
----------------------------------------
Zenith Skydome (天頂 Skydome) (Zenit Skydome)
End of Day One.
The first day was decent. Not spectacular, but was satisfactory. Julius was given a taste for the training’s difficulty. His bones and muscles were burned by the end. The back couldn’t stand upright for more than a minute. It took him to the brink of nearly being knocked out. Luckily, he made it through that he got his first experience of sleep after hundreds of days. Although it was a nap before he woke up.
“You can’t sleep?” Hu asked, leaning against the pole at the entrance area. The entrance area was a part of the Skydome’s central building, while also connected to the pathway that led to the arena. It was made of concrete and stone with a roof, blocking the unknown sunlight. The area was open with no windows or frames, and it was built with two wings. However, the building’s right wing wasn’t accessible, and Hu wouldn’t tell him why. While the left-wing contained the residences and kitchen.
Julius came out from one of the few rooms and walked through the colonnade with the view of the arena and fresh night air blew in. “No, ever since I got stronger, sleep has been almost impossible. This was the most I’ve ever had for more than one hundred and seventy days.”
“That makes two of us because I have never slept since I got the role of Level One.”
“Oh, so you had a life before this?” Julius asked, leaning against a wall while facing towards Hu.
“How about this? I’ll tell you everything once you finish this training.”
“Sure, but now I’m hungry,” Julius said while his stomach growled. He stood with his hand-held firm on his abdomen.
“You need to eat. Your numbers are too low,” Hu said, leaning off from the column and helping Julius go to the kitchen.
The latter let go of her hand. “It's fine, I can walk…What do you want to eat?”
“I heard you can cook, right? There was one I found in your head about salmon with rice. I want to try that.”
She really read my head. Great, I hope not everything was revealed when my eyes were closed. Julius briefly thought. “Oh, I thought you disliked fish.”
“But your mind said it was tasty with rice. Additionally, I wanted to see if you can cook using your qi.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes, I am. All of your daily chores are training, and it starts now.”