"And when the balance between Life and Death is first broken, the Dead shall walk amongst the living." — Divinations of Limbo by Auspeus Taba, circa. 10699.
No one can escape the inescapable passage of time. All things and creatures on this tender Earth were destined to fade into oblivion. It was a thread of fate shared by all who roamed the world.
It was a stroke of imperfection that the Heavens had bestowed out of kindness to Earth... or so the sages of yore had written in their aged journals. In an unclean world rife with so many evils and tribulations, the Heavens took pity on the poor Earth, and in an act of selfless charity...
The Heavens imparted the Earth the gift of mortality.
Thus, death graced the damned Earth, and a single path of deliverance was opened.
A definitive conclusion to the unending misery begot by life.
Greed. Hatred. Delusion. — As long as these blemishes existed in one's heart, one would never be able to shake off the mortal coil. Nor would they be allowed to walk through the Gates of Heaven...
A soft sigh escaped Laude's lips as he leisurely read a moldy scroll on the third floor of the Spring Pagoda. The more he thought about the passage of time, the more despaired.
Six seasons had come and gone since that fateful day that lightning bolt struck him in a state of undeath. An entire year and a half had passed like grains of sand slipping through his hands. Enough time had passed that he had finally come to terms with his bizarre constitution.
He could not die, nor could he grow older. He was a static being in an ever-changing world, something that had given him unique insight into the cruelty that came with immortality.
"You're making that face again, Laudie. You have to stop letting your emotions get the best of you," said a gentle voice, pulling Laude out of his downward mental spiral.
Belladonna snatched the old scroll Laude had been reading out of his hands and examined it for a couple of seconds before she said, "The Meditations of Sage A'zara, Volume One. Why do you always choose the driest texts to read? There are much better journals than this, you know."
Laude shook his head and replied, "Usually, the dullest texts offer the most unbiased analyses. Though much more palatable, colorful literature is often marked by prejudice and is less trustworthy. Take that as a piece of hard-earned wisdom from an ex-imperial official."
Fancy, embellished stories were the stuff of fiction. Oftentimes, reality could trump fiction in terms of strangeness, but incidents like that were exceedingly rare. But when it did happen, well...
Anything was possible.
The more Laude studied about the world of cultivation, the more he found himself living a lie.
He learned that saints of yore once used the power of the stars to move mountains and part the seas. That the greatest scholars united and built a floating metropolis, the lost city of Masento, which was once home to the largest Society in history — the Garden of Eternity.
And apparently, the afterlife was a real place you could visit... if you were dead, of course. Ghosts, wraiths, demons, devils, and all manner of intelligent beastfolk still roamed the land, though they had begun to disappear with the depletion of Spiritual Qi across the world.
The path the Heavens had created for intelligent creatures to escape the cycle of samsara had begun to close.
Each star that disappeared from the starry sky represented the loss of a single path to Heaven.
And when the last star in the sky faded into oblivion, the Gates of Heaven would close forever. No one would ever be allowed to reach enlightenment and break free from the Eternal Wheel.
When Heaven and Earth finally separated, the advent of the Two-Path Conflux would consume the Earth. The land of the living and the dead would intersect, creating a deathless world...
"A world without the grace of Death, where the living and dead perpetually roam a stagnant world," murmured Laude as he thought what he had learned about the Departing Prophecy.
Belladonna quietly observed Laude with a pensive expression before she said, "No one can say with certainty what the future holds for us, Laude. Not even the greatest Oracles can see the full breadth of possibilities within the river of time. Don't let that old fossil mess with your head..."
For what it was worth, Laude wasn't always so pessimistic about the future, but it was hard to keep for him to keep his chin up when he had been labeled as one of the major signs of an impending doomsday.
Distant prophetic disasters aside, Laude already had a personal catastrophe on his hands, his upcoming exorcist examination. Or rather... his ninth attempt at passing the exorcist exam.
It was a comprehensive exam that covered everything an exorcist would require to fulfill their responsibilities out in the field — identifying supernatural threats, mending wounds and knowing the remedies for various illnesses, and demonstrating a basic proficiency of Exorcist Arts.
The exorcist examination was split into three parts; a straightforward written test, a dialogue about several subjects with an Elder, and finally, an exorcism field test held behind Acadia-Soul Mountain.
The written and spoken sections of the examination were not what Laude was concerned about, as he had passed them every single time without fail. Not a surprising result, given his academic nature. No, what kept him from passing the condemned exam was the third section regarding the use of Exorcist Arts.
To put it simply, Laude possessed more than enough theoretical knowledge to perform basic Exorcist Arts. In fact, in a year and a half, he had memorized enough theory to match the junior disciples of White Dew Society.
His incessant studying, questioning of Elders, and general behavior of solely hanging out in the Spring Pagoda had earned him the moniker, 'Book Ghost' amongst his peers. They thought of him as a wandering ghost that had come haunt White Dew Society's main library...
No matter how hard Laude tried to practice the art of Consolidation, he could not sense what was referred to as his "spiritual core," the nucleus of his inner heart.
By locating his spiritual core, he would be able to connect to the Heavens above, which was required to perform any form of Immortal Arts, including Excorcist Arts. It was the first step in any cultivator's journey in the long path of enlightenment.
It was not cultivators that imposed changes on the Earth, but rather the Heavens themselves.
To put it simply, all Immortal Arts — whether it involved sealing demons, invoking the natural elements, projecting one's soul out of their body — it was all based on borrowing power from the stars, the Heavens above.
The entire point of Consolidation was to nurture one's connection to the Heavens by nurturing their spiritual core with Spiritual Qi.
In a way, it was a two-way relationship.
Men on Earth offered Spiritual Qi as payment, and the Heavens offered them a fragment of the power it possessed in return. The larger the offering of Spiritual Qi, the greater the compensation one would end up receiving from the Heavens.
It was also important to note the connection one had to the Heavens. The stronger the connection one had to Heavens, the less Spiritual Qi they would have to offer and the more power they would be able to draw from the Heavens.
The way Laude comprehended it, his spiritual core was an 'antenna,' Spiritual Qi was both 'fuel' and 'building material' for the antenna, and the Heavens were recipients of his signals.
Cultivators would broadcast a signal toward the Heavens. They would intercept that signal and send their own signal back to Earth — manifesting as a myriad of phenomena to known cultivators as Immortal Arts.
'The problem is that I can't find my blasted spiritual core! There's nothing like that in my body! No matter how hard I try, I can't find the damn thing! The meditation rituals don't work at all!!!'
In the beginning, Laude thought that the problem had lay with him. Perhaps he had not adequately understood the theory behind Consolidation, or he had not entered a deep enough state of meditation to perceive his spiritual core, but...
Days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months without a single inch of progress.
As the seasons passed, his theoretical and practical skills continued to improve along with his cultivation knowledge. Still, the most essential skill to every cultivator, the ability to Consolidate, had not improved in the slightest.
For all intents and purposes, he was stranded. He could not even perform even the simplest of Immortal Arts.
And stubborn as he was, Laude refused to go to the Elders for their help on this matter. Not out of a vain sense of pride or arrogance in his talents, but because he refused to accept any further charity.
Since Laude could stand on his own two feet, he had never given up on a goal that he had set for himself. If he wanted to learn something, do something, or become something, he would see it through, come hell or high water.
Many in Haalo, Laude's family included, thought his success stemmed from his brilliant mind, but not once had Laude ever attributed his triumphs to his intellect.
No, Laude knew that all of his accomplishments stemmed from his unwavering resolve. His indomitable will to make his dreams come true. He considered that his greatest talent.
'A man can be born with all the blessings the Heavens can provide, but if he doesn't have the will to make something out of himself, he'll still end up dying a miserable beggar. On the other hand, a penniless vagrant with a heart of iron still has a chance to die a lord, despite his humble origins...'
Hard work was all that mattered in the end, not one's natural talents. Even if you comprehended and improved slower than your more gifted peers, you'd still make it to the finish line just like them as long as you doggedly persisted in pursuing your passion.
Laude was frustrated with his lack of progress, but by no means was he ready to give in anytime soon.
Determined to find a solution on his own, he had scoured the Spring Pagoda for every single book, scroll, and faded piece of scrap paper that discussed the art of Consolidation. He had methodically gone through everything he could get his hands on, from the first floor to the third floor.
Metaphysics and Immortality: A Two-part Dialogue About Consolidation — by Beatrice Kaleem
Divinity Sundered, Reflections of My Path of Consolidation — by Indral Gallo
An Oral History on the Art of Consolidation — by Sepharo Maasateva
The Art of Consolidation: Five Easy Steps To Become An Expert Cultivator — by Landana Olsem
How to Practice Consolidation: A Simple Guide For Dummies, 8th Edition — by Teddy Blontro
The reading list went on and on and on...
Laude spared no expense, even if it had come at the cost of his sanity. By the end of the last month, he had finished reading over a hundred and forty-seven different pieces of literature, seemingly to no avail. Not a single thing Laude had read worked, driving him further into his growing madness...
Even Belladonna, who was an avid bibliophile herself, found Laude's ongoing obsession with reading every book that even mentioned Consolidation disturbing. She had never met someone like him before in her life.
Hell, even Granny Tilia, the librarian of the Spring Pagoda, found it unusual that someone like Laude had been mysteriously chosen by the Heavens.
Laude's demeanor... his stubbornness, obsessiveness, and his disdain of oppression were traits more commonly found in rogue cultivators who strayed from morality, rather than orthodox cultivators like themselves in White Dew Society.
To be fair, though, those traits were also held by many famous cultivators who had left their mark on history. Some of them orthodox, some of them rogue — all of them eccentric individualists.
This, in particular, concerned Granny Tilia. Types like Laude could easily switch sides if it meant it would fulfill their goals. It all depended on how driven they were to achieve their goals...
When Granny Tilia saw Belladonna forcibly dragging a downcast Laude out of the Spring Pagoda, she subtly gave the young lass a small nod of approval. The boy had practically been living on the third floor of the library for the past three weeks, to the point that Granny Tilia once wondered if he had died up there.
Last thing she wanted was for the damn boy to actually turn into a ghost and haunt the library. In any case, it was high time the boy go outside and get some fresh air for once...