The stars shone brightly in the sky above the Desert of Death, in the deepest part of it, a teenager sat on a small stone platform as a man circled it.
Navin walked around the border of a stone dais. Ethan sat cross-legged in the center of it, deep in a meditative state as he followed the method of Primordial Soul Profound Breath to assimilate energies and form his cultivation core.
With every step, runes were formed, they extended, swirled, joined and arranged themselves on a formation around Ethan.
Once Navin completed a whole lap on his walk, the array was competed and shone with great power.
He continued walking, and emitted a vast aura, thick and firm like the earth; this aura started to flow in a circle around Ethan and began to be absorbed by him.
Taking another step, Navin started to emit another type of aura, sharp as the edge of a blade and concise like a needle, hard like a shield and penetrating like a spear, hard and unbending yet malleable and adaptive, an aura of metal.
He took another step, and another element appeared, flowing fast and changing shapes with fluidity, running fierce and calm alternatively, rising and falling like the tides, an aura of water.
Then came an aura of wood, nurturing itself and sustaining by absorbing the environment’s resources, growing tall and strong, deep in its roots, far-reaching on its branches, filled with vitality.
An aura of fire, fierce and strong, consuming and destructive, but also protective and supportive of life.
Another step; a white light was emitted, expanding and permeating all, refracting on a myriad of colors.
Darkness, deep and encompassing, absorbing everything, welcoming anything to enter its bottomless abyss.
Lightning, proud and swift, dancing with thunderous splendor, indomitable and unstoppable.
Navin continued to emanate different kinds of energies of all elements, Qi with different intents, a wide variety of powers and forces of the cosmos entered the grand formation and swirled around Ethan, dancing in a mysterious revolution with a subtle and sublime rhythm, resembling the cosmos itself.
Ethan absorbed all these energies indiscriminately and drove them into the depths of his body. In the depths of his mind, Ethan watched with fascination the myriad of energies that gathered on him.
His soul commanded the energies to gather and form a spiral; in the center of it, a strange void was greedily devouring all the energies.
This was the secret method of forming a cultivation core developed by Navin; by gathering all kinds of energies of the cosmos into a void within oneself, replicating the phenomenon a myriad forces returning to a common source, a core that surpassed all others could be formed, possessing infinite potential and an easier advancing path, being formed by studying the essence of the formation of the cosmos itself, it possessed the capability to wield any kind of energy.
It was a Supreme Core, peerless among all cultivation arts.
Qi, Ether, Mana, Miasma, Intent, Astral Force, Karma, Élan, Orenda, Elemental Essences, Arcanum, Demonic Energy, Divine Power, and other exotic types of energy entered the Void inside Ethan, commanded by his will.
In the center of the Void, something came to be.
A light appeared and expanded, fusing with the Void and forming a spiral of Primordial Chaos, all the energies rushed into it and were absorbed completely, a flash of power was emitted and rocked Ethan’s body, mind, and soul.
Ethan’s cultivation core was successfully formed.
Somewhere inside his chest, near his heart, a spiraling sphere of Primordial Chaos placed itself. It was a place that went beyond physical and if he was opened up by surgeons they would find nothing there.
It was the seed of his future cultivation, shining with endless possibilities.
Ethan opened his eyes and took a deep breath, taking in the rest of the energies swirling around him, the array in the stone dais rose from it and was also absorbed, arranging itself firmly around his core, protecting and sustaining it.
The Sun had already risen on the horizon.
Navin watched his Disciple with a smile, he felt a bit of nostalgia as he recalled his own beginning on his cultivation path, although Navin could boast that he had a greater success and a smoother path advancing in his stages of cultivation than others, he didn’t have a start so privileged as his Disciples had.
That Supreme Core he enabled his Disciples to form was the sublimation of his years of comprehending the cosmos, they started at a place where he arrived after much training and effort.
And it was merely the beginning of their path, barely the tip of the iceberg, only a taste of the wonders that this martial art and cultivation method had to offer in the future.
But that too was part of nature and the advancing of any knowledge and art.
If the teachers didn’t pass down their knowledge for the new generations to carry on, how would there be any advancement in any science?
By taking on where the predecessors stopped, the successors would bring advancements and improvements, this was the way of the world.
This was evolution.
And Navin happily accepted it, by teaching his students without reservation and readily helping them to have an easier and more beneficial beginning, although he could not walk their paths for them, he could show them the gate and make sure they were ready for the journey.
The rest was up to them.
He had proudly looked at his Disciples’ breakthroughs, he watched as they were facing their own challenges and overcoming them, coming up with their own theories, techniques, and inventions, they had made great contributions to his Legacy and art, Navin had benefitted a lot too.
He didn’t plan to let them surpass him though, he will continually move forward, and transcend this cosmos to go beyond, continuing his path on a higher stage.
He would never do anything detrimental to them like slowing down their advancement or feel jealous of them, if they actually managed to overcome him, he would be the first to applause their effort and congratulate their success.
It was simply that he himself still continued to improve and despite their privileged start, he was still way ahead, so if they one day caught up to him, he only had himself to blame for slacking off.
And yet, he grinned at the thought, he actually encouraged them to do their best and try, that pressure on himself was a nice incentive.
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Ethan stood up and exhaled slowly, feeling each acupoint on his body open and close, the entirety of his being was vibrating with power.
“Congratulations on your success, you are now a cultivator. How do you feel?”
“I feel... great, better than great! This is amazing!”
Ethan raised an excited voice and jumped around, feeling the strength of his body.
In the middle of a jump, Ethan seemed to remember something and turned to his Master.
“Ah! Almost forgot!”
Ethan rushed towards Navin and stopped 3 meters in front of him, then he kowtowed.
“Thank you very much, Master!”
“Hahaha, you are welcome. Don’t worry, I know that a sudden rush of power can be exhilarating, at least you didn’t blow up anything, like a certain kid I know.”
Ethan stood up with a huge grin and Navin patted his head then gave him a slap on the back.
“Well, go for a run, test your body.”
“Alright!”
Ethan started running at high speed, feeling like never before, he felt like he was flying, each step propelling him with great force, covering dozens of meters in a second.
Inhale, absorb the power around, channel the energy, move the body, coordinate them, exhale.
Ethan took notice of every action needed to make his movement more efficient, how putting an arm forward as the other went to the back, inclining his head, lowering his stance, extend the legs and kick the ground with the tips of his feet sometimes and using the talons at others, how to rotate his hips in coordination with the body to smoothly make a turn and change direction without losing speed, even accelerating in the process; every part of his body interacted in synchrony to carry him forward.
All that information was in his mind, and now it was part of him, it was an instinct of his body, the subconscious mind making efforts to carry on the desires of his conscious mind, making the process much smoother.
Ethan recalled the instructions on his cultivation art about basic running.
‘Don’t run against the wind, ride it. To run with the wind, embrace it and see its path in the subtlety of its variations, make your body swim in the flow of the air and gain control of it.’
It sounded crazy, even now.
But with his core formed and being more sensitive to the cosmos around him, Ethan could actually feel the wind, he had been blindly rushing ahead, piercing through the wall of air, but now he adjusted his steps and moved in accordance to the air, no longer fighting the wind but using it to dash faster.
He suddenly felt himself take flight while running, it was even greater than when his Master had made him levitate...
It took him a second to notice he wasn’t flying because of his own technique; his Master had made him fly.
“Sorry to spoil your fun, but you almost run right into the mouth of a monster.”
Following Navin’s words, a bestial roar was heard and the ground exploded, tons of sand rose into the air as a giant beast appeared from under the dunes.
“What’s that thing!!”
Ethan screamed upon seeing the beast that rose from the sands.
It was like a mutated armadillo, having a yellowish carapace full of scales and spikes on its back, a row of black scutes extended along the back of its neck. It had 4 long and thick legs ending on five sharp claws that undoubtedly possessed great strength to move all that weight around.
However, it didn’t have the tail nor the head of an armadillo.
Its tail was like a black scorpion’s, segmented and carried in a forward curve above its back, a bright red venomous stinger was on its end.
Its head was a strange thing for Ethan, he didn’t know how to describe it except for it being a wolf head with mandibles like an insect’s and covered in armored scales.
“Hmm, that’s a Desert Krakatoa King, pretty strong for a medium-level world, the foreign energies in the black castle must have caused this being to reach such evolution despite the environment.”
Navin appraised the creature with a thoughtful expression.
“So, wanna kill it?” Navin suddenly asked Ethan
“Whaaat!? Master, I can’t kill this thing, it’s too huge!”
“For a cultivator, the enemy’s size is irrelevant, you must be able to slay titans.”
“Ok, but that’s when I have trained a lot, right? I only just formed my core today!”
Ethan yelled at his Master who joked around with something so serious as fighting this monster.
“Silly kid, I don’t mean you have to kill it alone, I’ll hold it for you, and you deal the finishing blow, take this chance to experience for yourself the conscious absorption of life force.”
“And how do I kill that? Will you give me a super bazooka?”
“Almost. I’ll give you a weapon, and you’ll shove it down his head to kill it. Don’t worry, it’s a sharp weapon.”
Navin made a huge 3-meter-long spear with a long and strangely shaped crimson spearhead, the shaft shone with a soft blue light.
The whole thing practically screamed ‘fantasy weapon’ it looked like something dark elves or demons would use in an MMORPG.
Ethan grabbed the weapon and looked at the monster on the ground.
The gargantuan beast was completely paralyzed due to Navin, and it could only hatefully stare at them, although fear was quickly replacing all other emotions.
Ethan was moved to the top of the Desert Krakatoa King’s head and stabbed it with the spear.
The humungous monster let out a painful squeak and dropped to the ground, it was dead in an instant.
Before Ethan could express surprise at how easy it was to kill that thing, he felt a rush of energy enter him, he instinctively mobilized his Qi and drove the massive aura of life force into his core.
He felt his core devour all that life force and then change it into his own, with an exhalation, Ethan felt all his muscles strengthen and his bones got sturdier as a wave of heat coursed through him.
So this was the process to take in energy from the killed prey and use it to evolve.
Was this how a character in a game leveled up?
The heat felt a bit intense, probably due to the strength of the beast that had been killed.
Navin waved a hand and both the monster and the spear that killed it disappeared.
“See? I told you it would be easy.”
Navin said with a smile as he and Ethan landed softly on the sand.
“Now, put some clothes, ok? It would be bad for you to get an insolation due to carelessly going around half-naked in a desert. At least learn how to carry out photosynthesis first.”
Ethan was still wearing only black shorts, he was even barefoot, but he didn’t feel any discomfort, he was still high on the adrenaline rush from forming his core, running and then killing a monster, so he hadn’t paid attention to such things.
It was due to his excitement when running that he had gone far from the black spire without realizing and almost got eaten by the Desert Krakatoa King.
He had walked more than 3 kilometers in the short 5 minutes of his run.
"Am I supposed to be a plant now? How could I do photosynthesis?"
Ethan asked as he got a set of clothes and shoes out of his spatial ring.
Over his usual city clothes from his world, he wore clothes Navin made for him to be on the desert; a cream-colored cloak to cover his body and a blue headdress fashioned from a square scarf that his Master called a Keffiyeh, Ethan just called it ‘headscarf’.
"Sunlight and heat can be used as sources of energy, you can absorb them to cultivate too. You will soon understand that it is highly beneficial for you to experience various types of energy, your core is a greedy and gluttonous thing, feed it all kind of things and it will grow more powerful."
While Ethan didn’t feel any pain like a normal person would from being like this under the scorching heat of the Sun in a desert, he wasn’t really comfortable being directly hit by the Sun. The clothes his Master made seemed to be magical, he felt fresh the moment he put them on.
“Come on then, let’s get you out of this desert, when we find some weaker monsters, you’ll hunt them to practice. I'll make you a weapon, so think about what you'd like to use. Of course, we'll try numerous things before deciding.”
“Hmm? Aren’t we going to enter that weird black spire?”
They had walked for 3 days to reach that place, after all.
“I already investigated what I wanted to know from it, and it doesn’t have anything of value to me. It can be useful to you, but you are not ready to enter there yet, once you are strong enough to kill a King-class Beast like the one before on your own, we’ll come back here and you’ll raid the place.”
Navin took Ethan into the air as he spoke, they flew into the distance at high speed, towards the south.
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Many hours later, in the City of Lauhr, located at the southern border of the Desert of Death.
This city was a place frequented by anyone strong and crazy enough to challenge the Desert of Death from the Kingdom of Sahbadia on the easternmost side of Iben Continent.
This was a land full of hunters and warriors seeking fame and fortune, and also a place especially watched by influences from all across the world of Tie-Gol.
The Desert of Death was a death trap for any who dared to intrude into its sands, but it also hid countless priceless treasures within; the skin, scales, fangs, claws, and cores of the numerous beasts that lived in that land were extremely valuable, and any country valued them as well as the warriors capable of slaying such monsters.
On the 6th day of the first month of the year 3000 D.F, a boy not older than 15 years old came out from the Desert of Death, wearing clean clothes and without any wound on him, however, he had hunted numerous beasts from within the Desert. This kid carried as a weapon only a single gray spear and was accompanied by a strange bird on his shoulder that appeared and disappeared at irregular intervals.
No one knew where this boy came from, his racial traits marked him as human, but he wasn’t from Sahbadia Kingdom and none of the scouts or Desert Watchers had seen him entering, later reports would confirm he came from deeper than their furthest outpost inside the Desert of Death.
It was at that moment, a legend was born.