Chương 1: Late to Immortality

Paike breathed in a slow and controlled pattern, following a method that was taught to him by his mother so many years ago. As he inhaled, he slowly pushed his will into his surroundings, attempting to suck up the environmental qi of the world around him. To draw, absorb, and spin it into the spiritual organ resting at his core. His awareness of the Dantian was new and shaky, but he knew the method to expand it like he knew how to walk. Yet, the qi refused to move. It was like pitch.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the most minuscule measurable amounts started to bow inside, the surface tension preventing it from breaking off and finally making permanent progress. It had taken hours of him trying to do it the "right" way before he gave up. It just wouldn't move at all, let alone into the spiral pattern that he needed to spin it into. But for now, unlike at home, his family's elders didn't watch over him. They couldn't scold or punish him for doing things the "wrong" way.

They might call it a shortcut that would only hurt him in the long run, but for him, it was the only way to progress. Paike reached out and seized hold of the energies around him with all the grip his will could muster. Once he had the viscous qi in his mental hand, he braced and yanked. He grimaced as the oily, filthy texture filled his soul. It was like shoveling dung in the horse stables with his hands.

With teeth gritted against the discomfort and pain, he took the solid handful of qi and ripped it through the membrane of his dantian. The power slowly oozed outward from the lump sitting there to fortify the rest of his spirit. That was the easy part. Technically, it was faster than standard cultivation, but it was only the gathering step. He still had to make use of the lump of power.

On top of that, it took forever to repair the damage, carefully smoothing out the walls of his spiritual body that had been so disrupted by the harsh and forceful assimilation of energy that his body, mind, soul, and spirit so clearly rejected. The hole ripped by the mass of qi he had pulled in needed to be patched carefully and immediately, lest his cultivation be crippled. Ever so slowly, he wove the threads of the frayed edges of his dantian back together.

Only once he couldn't tell the difference between the patch and the original walls did he allow himself to move on. Now began the assimilation. Paike gritted his teeth, ignoring the sweat dripping through his eyebrows and stinging his eyes. One drop dangled perilously from the tip of his nose. But still, he forced himself to take the glob of gunk in his dantian and spin it out slowly, peeling one tiny grain of it away at a time.

Once he had it suspended all throughout the organ so that it would slowly absorb over the next several days, he assessed his gains. His cultivation would advance by mere centimeters. He wanted to grab for more. Perhaps if he hadn't spent so much time trying to do it the proper way, he would have had time to assimilate a second scoop. But he had neither the time nor energy. There was one other person in the carriage with him, and he had been ignoring her for far too long.

His spiritual senses could almost sense her impatience and boredom radiating from her. Slowly, he opened his eyes and met the impatient gaze of his younger sister. He gave her a weak, apologetic smile, and she huffed, turning her head. A swirl of dark black hair covered her face briefly as his little sister stared out the window, pointedly ignoring him. Her robes were of pale blue and the purest white, and she sat properly like the lady she had been so trained to be.

Clasped in her lap, her hands were hidden in her long sleeves. He had no doubt that she was fidgeting with something out of sight. Spiritually, he could sense that she, too, had a newly awakened dantian. It was embarrassing, humiliating in a way that his much younger sister had awoken within days of him, or rather, days before him. But he stepped on the hurt to his pride with practiced ease, squashing down the offense that she had by no intention given.

The fact that she had woken at the mere age of eleven was a celebration. That it had taken him until he was almost fifteen was a disgrace. The only thing worse he could have done was never have woken at all. Of course, that was debatable. His family was of mixed opinions on it. Paike almost wished that he hadn't, that he had reached fifteen, the age of majority, where he could have gone out and found a job amongst the mortals and lived his life. But it was only almost. He didn't really believe that.

No, now that he could actually feel the power that he had sensed moving around him his entire life, well, of course, he wanted more. Immortals ruled the world. They didn't huddle inside towns or the walls of closely guarded fields as they went about their short, fleeting lives. No, they fought like his siblings and his ancestors before them. They fought the beasts, the spirits, the lesser gods, and the other cultivators.

Between these battles, they constantly protected the mortals and carved out a little bit of civilization from the rough world all around them. And, well, Paike wanted to be that. Perhaps it was still childish of him to remember the stories that some of his siblings, not too distant in age from him, had told him. How the cousins had talked about the great deeds they were going to perform when they eventually awoke. Ever since, he had been screened and found that he could sense qi around him.

The dream of being an immortal standing on top of the world had never entirely faded. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Placing his hands together, he gave his little sister a slight bow.

"Forgive me, Liming," he said.

"I fear I lost myself."

"Big brother is too serious," she said with the imperious air he imagined he must have had at her age.

"It has been a long ride, and, well, I don't think I can miss any chance at cultivation," he said humbly.

"You know my talents won't allow that." His sister huffed again, but this time, she looked him in the eye. Her features were delicate and balanced. Her pale skin matched his own. Standing next to each other, it was clear that they were siblings. Except where she was slight and slender, he was tall and broad, with shoulders that made him look even older than he was.

"I know, big brother. I just..." She trailed off, not finishing her thought.

"You're nervous," Paike poked at her with a smile. Knowing her emotions was simple as he felt them himself. She shook her head.

"Of course not. No. Why would I be nervous?" Paike smirked at the small lie.

"Why indeed? The grand sect is not much more than the local sect at home." That was ignoring much. Their family didn't dominate this grand sect like they had the local sect, and where they were going was focused on teaching those who had already awoken their cultivation. They would have gone from those just learning to sense their qi to the top of the sect, then back down to the lowest rung. Starting from the bottom would be hard. But Paike hoped that there would be less baggage for him here.

And, well, he had never been at the top of the local sect. Even when he was near the point of awakening, he was still old, slow, and untalented. But that hadn't stopped him. They had already reached the foothills of the grand sect. It wasn't like the harsh high mountains of their homelands, but small rolling hills that the locals around here called mountains. In some ways, they were mountains, but only on a technicality. They were older mountains. Mountains that had seen countless battles.

When the sect was founded, they were once tall. Not many thousands of years ago, before endless clashes between powerful cultivators of higher realms wore them down to the rolling hills of green land and pasture that they were now. Still, on top of the central peak was where the elders and core disciples lived. That core peak was still thousands of meters above the surrounding area, if only a few handfuls, instead of the tens of thousands of their home.

On the foothill they were ascending was where the outer disciples would congregate. He had heard stories of the clashes of jade beauties and haughty young masters as they formed alliances and battled over resources. Of course, the elders watched over them, making sure that nothing went truly too far, for the most part, especially not at the beginning. He had no intention of getting involved in such struggles. Becoming an outer disciple was a victory in itself for Paike.

Now, well, he would go about genuinely learning what it was to be an immortal. He could finally get to the arts, cultivation resources, manuals, and talismans that had been long forbidden from him as an unawakened mortal. Well, now that would change.

"What do you plan to do first?" Liming asked him, breaking the silence once again. Paike shook his head.

"You know as well as I do that making those sorts of plans is not useful." For the most part, their siblings kept most things a mystery. They only went over a few of the most important milestones. Challenges learned about and faced by themselves would help them grow more. Not every family held to this tradition, but all of their siblings seemed to agree that knowing about it would only hurt them. It would give them a temporary status boost in exchange for long-term power.

Liming huffed again, and he wondered if she had caught a cold. It shouldn't have been possible for an awakened, but she was so new that maybe there was still a chance of some sort of physical condition ailing her. Even she hadn't broken through with her body cultivation. Not that he had himself, but still.

"Well, I suppose the first thing is the welcoming ceremony," he said in conciliation. More to move the conversation along than anything. She accepted the gesture and nodded.

"Yes. I suppose. Do you think any of our siblings will be there to welcome us?" she asked.

"Maybe, but I doubt it," Paike said as he shook his head.

"I don't think they'd want to show any favoritism if possible, so likely someone who doesn't have any family in this batch for the year will do the ceremony."

"I suppose so," she said with a disappointed twist to her lips. A few moments of silence later, the carriage pulled to a hard halt, and Paike opened the door, extending a hand to help his little sister down after he'd climbed down. Only then did the pair of them turn to see the towering stairs leading up to the imposing stone building built in the traditional style. Its curved roof and many pillars held a majesty that couldn't be wholly natural. Neither of them spoke as they inspected the summit.

They could feel the sense of power radiating from it like the sun rising behind it. Despite its dominance over the landscape, it wasn't the only notable feature. Just above the tree line and near the summit, in several rings, were other buildings of varying sizes. The smaller ones generally sat lower down the peak, while the larger ones occupied higher positions. There was also a large, flat space carved from the mountain, as if someone had taken a knife and sliced off a piece of cake.

After they had gawked for a few moments, Paike and his little sister exchanged glances before focusing on the steps in front of them. This much, at least, they knew: it was the first test. The First Trial. To see if they were worthy of becoming students of the Grand Sect, they needed to reach the peak. There was no time limit. But it was a mark of pride to make it in less than a day. Their family had made sure that they arrived only hours before the deadline ended. If they didn't hurry, they would be late.

As they stepped towards the stairs together, a shimmering mist began to seep from the very rocks' pores. Paike held his breath, and his little sister did the same. It would have little effect, but the longer they could avoid breathing in the mist, the farther up they could get without succumbing to the nightmares that awaited them.