In a small cottage in the outskirts of the Hanjie village.
A small boy slowly opened his eyes. His head still ached from overdeal he had experienced. The events of the day before slowly started playing in his mind.
'Can your sword annihilate anything that stands in your path be it the Gods themselves? Sounds so cheesy now that I hear it. Hopefully, it sounded cool to the old man. I never thought he would react so heavily when I asked him to teach me.'
The door of the cottage opened and Wang Weisheng strode into the cottage with a light smile on his face.
"How do you like my humble abode?"
"So this is where you live, huh."
"Most of my time is spent meditating in this little cottage. When I came here for the first time about 200 years ago, the spatial fluctuations gave me a bad scare. Although I travel a lot, I return here to observe the fluctuation at least once a year."
"Won't cultivators who visit the village find the array strange?"
"You overestimate the amount of cultivators. Villages are the worst places to visit. A location is determined to be a village, town or city according to the amount of spiritual qi that flows in that particular environment. Cultivators have little to no reason to visit villages."
"Don't cultivators that are born and raised in the villages come to visit their relatives?"
"Once a person finds out that he or she has the talent needed for cultivation, they usually bring their family along with them to the cities. There usually isn't enough reason for these kind of people to return."
"But don't cultivators have to enter villages to scout for talent?"
"Sadly, people from town and villages can only go to the nearest city holding a talent evaluation to get a chance to enter cultivation sects."
"What about those who can't afford it?"
"They can only blame their fate."
"Wait, really? What if you miss an extraordinary talent by not giving those people a chance?"
"Such is the cruelty of the cultivation world."
"You were the Commander General of the Martial Alliance. A single word from you would be enough for them to spread out the evaluations, right?"
"It not that easy. The tool that evaluates the cultivation talents of a person is incredibly rare. These tools constitute of the core of a Paragon Realm beast along side the incredibly rare black iron. How many Paragon Realm cores do you think the Martial Alliance as a whole has?"
"No idea."
"Less than a hundred. And out of these hundred cores, almost half the the cores are used to create strong weapons for higher ups of the Great 5 sects. Hence, only ten cities in each province can hold a talent evaluation."
"That too bad. So, how are you going to check my talent? Do you have one of those tools?"
"Why would I take an Evaluator for no reason? I had no idea you were going to come. Besides, we really do not need it, do we? You should have an idea of your own talent, right?"
"Yeah, that's true. How are talents usually evaluated?"
"The colour and the intensity of the light emitted by the core usually determines the amount and type of talent one possesses. The higher the intensity of the light, the higher the talent and the colour determines the element you are most suited to. Talent are divided into low, mediocre, intermediate, advance, earth and heaven."
"Are heaven ranked talents rare?"
"There has only been one heaven ranked talent for the past few centuries. And he stands before you. Heaven ranked talents are so miraculously talented that they are able to become Paragon in just a hundred years. I was a anomaly even among the heaven ranked talents. I was able to reach the Paragon Realm in just 67 years, after all."
"Hmmm.. so I can be classified as a heaven ranked talent as well."
"It does not really matter but I asking just to be sure. How old were you when you became a Paragon?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"So you really took less than 67 years. Just tell it to me straight. I am not that petty to be disappointed by the fact that my disciple is more talented than me. In fact, that would make me very happy."
"I took 55 years to become a Paragon."
Wang Weisheng's face slowly distorted. His kind smile slowly turn into a forced smile. His face scrunched up to avoid the obvious displeasure that he felt.
'15 years. A 15 year difference. A freaking 15 year difference! I have totally lost face in front of the kid, now. Why did I try and brag to my disciple about my talent? I look like a fool.'
Looking at Wang Weisheng's scrunched up face, Lucas in fact felt relieved.
'It's good that I didn't mention the fact that Astral energy is more difficult to handle than spiritual qi or the fact that I had in fact reached the Demigod Realm in 91 years. It'll just get him more depressed.'
"Ahem. That wonderful news for me. You are so talented. Very good."
'Old man, stop forcing yourself. One look at your face and I can already understand that you received a extremely powerful emotional attack. It becoming pathetic now.'
"Thank you for the praise."
"But that does not mean you can be overconfident. Anything may happen at anytime in the cultivation world. I will not be around forever to protect."
"I am aware."
"Putting all that aside. We will begin your training tomorrow. So pack your belo.... never mind, I will go to the marketplace to get you some clothes. For now, your objective is to get to perfect condition before my training starts. We are leaving Hanjie tomorrow. You will slowly have to learn everything you need to know about this world alongside your training."
"Do I have to kowtow or something?"
"What did people from your world do?"
"Well, our world was slightly more advanced. There was no rigid master-disciple system. Its more of a mentor system. Other than the rigidity, there is not much of a difference."
"Hmmm... an interesting system. Just address me as master, no need for kowtowing or any other formalities. Come to think of it, I didn't ask for you name. How rude of me."
"Well, my name is Lucas Malcolm but I think it will stick out to much. You should give me a name, old ma.. master."
"Lucas Malcolm.. weird name. Do all the people in your world have similar names?"
"Unlike Azure, our world is filled with diversity. There are many different races of people living in the world. Each race have their own culture and tradition. Similarly, the naming system is extremely diverse."
"Many races of humans living together, huh. Like in total harmony?"
"There is still a lot of discrimination but it got a lot better over the ages. So, they are not entirely living together in total harmony but we make it work with our laws and systems."
"That is incredible in itself, I guess. I really want to visit your world now. An event for later, I guess. People in this world would indeed find the name incredibly weird. Your name from now on out will be Wang Wei, adopted son and disciple of the Absolute Sword Paragon."
"Are you sure about this, master? Won't it attract unnecessary attention?"
"Only if you go about proclaiming the fact that I adopted you."
"Won't someone find out if they saw you with me?"
"How many people do you think can recognize me in after I have aged so much?"
"How many?"
"Less than 10 people in the entirety of Azure."
"Incredibly.... you really must have lived an incredibly secluded lifestyle. But master, won't you have to address yourself as Wang Weisheng."
"You need not worry. My name while I am in seclusion is Wang Chen."
"OH!"
"You should rest now. My training is not going to be easy."
"Can I train with this body? I'm only four years old physically."
"You think I didn't take it into account. I did some thinking while you were unconscious. I came up with a perfected plan. I am going to make you a perfect vessel for the Absolute Sword technique. For six years, our main focus will be the perfection of your physical state. I will make your body into one that is extremely compactable with my technique. Its something I will be trying for the first time. I am going to try and create an entirely new Physique. The Absolute Sword Physique."
'Is he serious? Create a Physique... how in the world..'