It was quite rare to hear about the treasure Elder, the old man always staying inside his hall training. But what was shocking wasn't just hearing about him, it was hearing about how he nearly died due to some mysterious nefarious energy.
After this event the Elders of the Sect were all called by the Sect's Head for a secret meeting, and none of the disciples were told what happened during this meeting. It was strange, so strange that most disciples were simply not in the mood to do anything else than try to know what happened.
Which might explain why a certain Disciple of the Sect brought another lower ranked Disciple with him to do his work for him. He had been tasked by one of the Elders to act as a guide for the new recruits who showed great promise this time. For once the sect hadn't recruited some useless trash, but this disciple wasn't in the mood to deal with this.
Now both him and the lower ranked disciple he had forced to come with him found themselves in front of a small wooden house.
" Go inside and tell that guy what he needs to know. And be quick with it, he is the last one and my patience has already been tested those few hours. " Said the high ranked disciple. The other disciple simply nodded, too afraid to speak and opened the door. They were both greeted with the sight of Jian doing some extremely intense physical training. He had been testing his new Soul Heritage, and hadn't expected people to come to this new house of his.
" Hmm, hi....Jian it is, right ? I am here to tell you that you have been accepted as an outer disciple by the sect. You showed an incredible willpower during the test, so the Sect wants you to train to become strong. If you were to reach the normal level oan outer disciple has in a small amount of time, the Sect would be ready to promote you to Inner Disciple. As an outer disciple you don't have access to a lot of things, except for the Thousand Flowers Forest, located just a few hundred meters away from the Headquarters' East Gate. You can ask some older disciples for indications if you need any help. That should be all." Said the disciple. It wasn't exactly how he was supposed to do things, but he feared the other disciple would be mad at him if he took his time with Jian.
Jian merely nodded, a little confused. He didn't even know what the Thousand Flowers Forest was.
Seeing that Jian understood him, the disciple bid him farewell as he and the higher ranked disciple left. Be it Jian or that scared disciple, none of them knew that the higher ranked disciple named Jin Wang was greatly shocked when he saw Jian.
' Was I dreaming ?! Did I really sense a Soul Heritage ?! There shouldn't be any mistakes, it was indeed a Soul Heritage. But that's weird, I didn't read the report on him, but apparently he took the willpower test, even though he had a Soul Heritage ? And he was also training like that....Even I wouldn't be able to train so intensely. Furthermore his body is a bit scrawny, so if he was used to train that way, shouldn't he be a bit more impressive ?...Too many questions, I don't like this.' Thought Jin Wang. He still decided to forget about that, since he still had to find out about what happened during the meeting.
Now alone once again, Jian returned to his training. His Soul Heritage was actually a lot more useful then he thought. The pain tolerance was extremely useful, but the fact that he could train without feeling any fatigue was what made it so overpowered. Most cultivators, at least he thought it was the case, never trained their bodies. One could become insanely powerful even while having a scrawny body. Physique was seen as non-important by most cultivators, or atleast the ones Jian saw. However the system told him that if he continued to train like this it would really help him on his cultivation path. Apparently having a strong body would help him cultivate faster and would also give him an avantage if he had to study some martial arts.
Jian had started to blindly trust the system, so he hadn't questioned it's words, merely taken in them like a dog.
Nevertheless he couldn't just train forever, he had to explore the Sect's territory a bit. He wanted to know what that Forest was, and also wanted to know if Li Kuo had been selected. And so Jian left his small house and walked on the road until he reached the main court. There were many houses around and shops too. Jian could also see several disciples fighting each other in some sort of arena close to a gate that lead to the higher levels of the territory.
Jian had some experience when it came to searching for informations, and as such he directly went to one of the shop owners, another disciple who was making money by selling some alchemy ingredients to other disciples.
" Hello fellow disciple. I came to you because I need some informations. I would like to know what the Thousand Flowers Forest is, I am kinda new here." Said Jian, scratching his head awkwardly.
" Hmm....It will cost you 5 Sect Tokens." Said the other disciple. Jian was greatly taken aback for a second, it was evident that the shop owner wanted some money in exchange for the info, but Jian didn't know what those Sect Tokens were.
" You don't know what they are, huh ? It's the currency we use here in the sect. Some tokens are given to disciples as a salary, however it's not much, and since you're new you musn't have received your salary. No Tokens, no info." Said the Shop owner, his voice becoming cold at the end.
Jian dropped his head and walked away. If he didn't have any money, he wouldn't be able to get anything, he knew that much since everyone in this Sect was greedy. However contrary to his expectations, two disciples who were passing by came to help him.
" You wanna know what the Thousand Flowers Forest is ? it's just a huge forest filled with a lot of different flowers that are used in alchemy. It also has some Beasts, usually we hunt them to get stronger. " Said one of them. Jian seemed pensive for a second before he bowed and thanked the disciple.
He then walked away and approached the arena. He wanted to see how the other disciples were fighting. After all he wasn't a fighter and wanted to know how much stronger the others were compared to him. The answer was...Not a lot. They just used Qi to enhance themselves, but didn't know any techniques.
Still they were quite amazing in Jian's eyes. He still didn't know how to cultivate, so what they were doing was impossible for him.
[ Master, cultivation isn't the most difficult thing. To reach the first step, you merely need to medidate and locate what will become your Qi Core, and then let it form itself. After that you only need to absorb Qi and lead it into your core to get stronger. ]
Jian blanked out as he heard this, but then he really got an urge to insult the system.
' Why didn't you tell me earlier ?! And don't tell me that I just didn't ask !'
[ You just didn't ask.]
Hearing the infuriating answer of the system, Jian wanted to yell at it but he suddenly heard a voice coming from behind him.
" Jian !!! You're here too !!!"
Turning around he saw Li Kuo running at him , while the other disciples looked at him like he was crazy.
" I thought you hadn't been accepted since I couldn't find you around the Outer Disciples pavillion. Although now that I think about it, some older disciples told me that a recruit had been sent to live somewhere else since there wasn't any place left in the pavillion. " Said Li Kuo as soon as he reached Jian.
" Oh so that's why. Mind giving me a tour of this pavillion later ? I wanna know where all the others live." Said Jian with an easy going smile. Li Kuo reciprocated it and they both sat. They began to watch some older disciples fight, while the others were glaring at them. If Li Kuo and Jian were closer they would've heard what the others were speaking about.
" Poor recruits, they still think they can afford to get all that friendly with each other. Wait until they learn about the Outer Tournament." Said a random disciple while laughing.
" Yeah, they'll turn enemies in a second when they hear about the competition. Outer Disciples can't afford to be friends with anyone." Said another disciple.
Li Kuo and Jian were unaware of what was being said, too lost in their observation. They were really seduced by the fights between the older disciples. To them they looked like super humans, even though they were actually too weak to even be useful to the Sect.
Just as they were about to leave, Jian and his new best friend were shocked to see the arrogant older man from the other day. He was still walking as if the whole world should worship him while being surrounded by a group of fangirls, though the group had become thinner.
" So he is there too. Atleast it proves he could back up his words. He is strong enough to get accepted. " Said Jian. Li Kuo nodded and they both ignored him until he actually went to two older disciples and asked them to spar with him.
" Is he crazy ?! We are mere recruits, we can't fight against the older disciples, even if they are only Outer Disciples. Plus those two are Qi Core Realm cultivators. From what I saw before they are most likely Qi Core Second Step Cultivators. It's suicide to go against them." Exclaimed Li Kuo. Jian who was behind him was confused by his words until the system explained what he meant.
[ Qi Core is the first Realm cultivators can access. As soon as someone enter the first step of this realm their Qi core is opened and they absorb Qi to progress through the other steps. Though some people with incredible talent or just ridiculously large Qi Core would need to absorb Qi to force open their Core, which also means that they would open their core in later steps and not in the first step. Usually the only way to do that is to take some Qi Core Realm medecine. Because one is only supposed to absorb Qi after opening their core and absorbing it by yourself without having said core opened can be dangerous. ]
Hearing this Jian nodded and tried to make sense of what he heard but a new voice interrupted him.
" That's where you are wrong, recruit. " Said an older disciple who came to sit besides Li Kuo and Jian. Now that he came back to his senses, Jian could see that the fight was about to start and many disciples had decided to sit around the arena.
" What do you mean by that ?" Asked Li Kuo, who was sure the arrogant man was about to get killed. The older disciple merely pointed at the arena, just as the fight started. Li Kuo and Jian just had the time to turn their heads that two screams were heard.
Jian's eyes widened comically as he saw the two older disciples getting their asses handed to them.
" This guy is Zhao Shu, the little genius of the Zhao Warrior Tribe. He is already a Qi Core Fourth Step Cultivator. He is already strong enough to be qualified in the tournament and become an Inner Disciple. Plus he also possess a Martial Spirit called Purple Hell Butterfly. With this he's already considered a prized disciple of the Sect." Said the disciple.
To Li Kuo and Jian it was like time stopped. As they watched Zhao Shu beat the two disciples to death, they were reminded of the fact that not all recruits were like him. Compared to them Zhao Shu was an elephant, and they were ants.
They both had strong wills, and that is exactly why they decided to take Zhao Shu as a goal to reach. They had to get as strong as him.
He was arrogant, and quite detestable. However he was strong enough for them to have some sort of respect for him.
Zhao Shu, as if he knew they were thinking about him, threw the two disciples towards Li Kuo and Jian. He then shot out towards them, using all he had to get as fast as possible, causing the other disciples to be in complete awe in front of him.
Just as he was about to send the two disciples back with a strong kick, he and Jian locked eyes. Lightning sparked between them as they glared at each other. And in this single moment Jian decided it.
Zhao Shu was now his rival !