I found myself in a chilly cave after walking through the door, my breath vapor rising in front of me. It was an odd sensation, it wasn't like what I was expecting. I was expecting to either walk through a portal with little to no difficulty. Maybe feel like my stomach was writhing and twisting and throwing up after having my teleportation cherry popped. Instead, it was like I was already in the cave and simply came to my senses after being unconscious. I even suspected maybe that was exactly the case. Maybe they drugged us and carried us to different parts of the mock inheritance. That seemed like a lot of trouble though. They probably did teleport us. I was just disappointed in the lack of dramatic flair. I gave this teleportation a two-star review, a very disappointing first time.
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Somewhere in the Dancing Sword Sect a middle-aged fellow responsible for drawing the arrays for the sect's entrance exam started feeling extremely wronged about something. Teleportation was simply boring okay? He tried to convince himself, but he knew the truth. He was simply terrible at making teleportation arrays exciting. Everyone else in the field, even the initiates, were already much better than him at adding pizzaz to a teleport. Where this fellow excelled, and everyone else suffered, was safety. Not once has anyone gone through a teleportation array of his and ended up with so much as a missing strand of hair. Boring and safe were this gentleman's calling cards.
Zoey would've preferred if the initiates had drawn the array.
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I seemed to be at a dead end in this cave, water dropped from stalactites on the ceiling and formed a shallow pool of water near the walls of the cave. The examiners must really want to challenge students. It was pitch black.
Initially, I could only see because of my qi sense. With my sight enhanced by qi sense, I could see the qi in everything. The multi-colored array of specks in front of me outlined all the solid and liquid objects clearly and even allowed me to see air currents. I could imagine that any disciple without the ability to see in the dark or produce light would get lost.
I briefly contemplated activating my divine sight to see more clearly, but this wasn't a match where referees were sworn to secrecy. It was unclear if the moderators here could spill our secrets. I decided to use my frostfire. I manifested a very small amount of frostfire in orbs which circled about me and lit my environment. I controlled the qi usage to be more efficient than when I was in battle, keeping my consumption under my regeneration rate. The small pool began freezing instantly with the cold radiating from my frostfire torches. I decided to move quickly before the wet ground became a slippery ice rink.
There was only one exit to this cavern so I took it, following the narrow path along rough, natural walls as they twisted and turned. Just as I started worrying that I might've been teleported outside the exam area I finally came upon a man-made wall with a crevice of missing bricks. I could see a hallway beyond the crack. I'm not sure if it was intentional or not, but it seemed I had been transported to a natural cavern system outside the real inheritance. The crack was just large enough for me to squeeze through. Never had I been so thankful for my small stature. Zack and his muscles would've gotten stuck for sure.
I put a shoulder inside the crack and started squeezing through sideways, it was a tight fit. Just as I stuck my head through I heard an ear-piercing scream and something hard bounced off my face, causing no real damage.
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In a part of the inheritance not far away, a girl with long, frizzled, brown hair and thick glasses sat on the ground after teleporting.
"Oh was that teleportation? I didn't feel a thing. Am I here? Where is here? I can't see anything. Wait there seems to be a dim bluish light, I can see a little now." Rachel tried to get her bearings for the new exam.
It took a moment for her eyes to acclimate to the dark. However, there were spirit stone sconces that lined the walls here. They hadn't been replaced in a long time though and most had completely lost their luster after qi had been leaking from them for an unknowable amount of time. The few that still glowed were much darker than the average spirit stones, which weren't very bright to begin with.
This gave Rachel an idea, she took a fresh spirit stone out of her ring and used it to illuminate her environment. It wasn't much brighter, but now she could make out the basic outlines of her environment.
"Good I wasn't swallowed by the void, I was a little worried for a moment there." Rachel talked to herself to calm her nerves. She talked to herself a lot. "Guess I should find some treasure now. Arrr matey, give me your plunder!" Rachel shouted at the inheritance in general to entertain herself.
"Why is it getting brighter all of a sudden?" Rachel tried to identify the source of the new light and noticed a giant crack in the brick wall that was now flickering with a blue light that differed from the blue light of the spirit stones. Simultaneously the temperature plummeted and Rachel began to shiver while her breath bellowed in front of her.
"Oh no, a drop in temperature and a pale blue light! It can't be a g-g-g-ghost can it? Or maybe it's a m-m-m-monster?!" Rachel quickly worked herself into a panic as the flickering light got brighter and brighter.
Suddenly an orb of light shot through the crack followed by something alive! It's a monster and it's attacking!
"Aieeeeeeeeeeee!" Rachel screamed and tossed the only thing she could arm herself with at the thing emerging from the crevice. She tossed her spirit stone.
"Ouch! What was that for?"
Rachel's panicked thoughts came to a halt after hearing another human voice. She decided to brave a glance at the crack again and saw the head and shoulder of a cute little girl trying to pull herself through the crack and now rubbing her forehead where the stone had hit.
"Aieeee, I'm so sorry I thought you were a monster!" Rachel quickly apologized.
Who was this girl? She seemed way too young to partake in the exams. And too adorable, how was such a cute thing a cultivator? Wasn't there someone like this that caused a commotion just before we entered? What was her name? Zelle? Zebra? Zoom? Zoey! That's right, Zoey Seeker!
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After Rachel and I cleared up that we weren't threats to each other, I pulled myself the rest of the way through the crack. I picked up the spirit stone and pocketed it as payment for my pain and suffering. I could hear Rachel's teeth chattering from the cold my frostfire orbs were emitting.
"Do you have anything warmer to wear? I'd put my flames away, but then it would get pretty dark," I said.
"I've got a cloak," She said as she quickly pulled it out of her ring and wore it, "Why is fire cold anyway? Can't you make normal fire?"
"For right now, no. Maybe in the future." I replied. I had been working on that very problem ever since my fire root was tainted. It wasn't impossible to fix, but it was very time-consuming. I had been dedicating hours every day to purifying my fire root, slowly purging the yin corruption. I already knew how to channel my yin qi to power my frostfire, I could do so from my yin root. The tainted fire root was preventing me from utilizing pure fire techniques.
"Can that future be the next minute or two? It Is r-really c-c-cold." Rachel's teeth were chattering even with her cloak.
"Not possible, but this hallway goes in two different directions, maybe we could part company?" I asked.
"That's probably for the best, I'll freeze to death if I stay near you." Rachel picked a direction and started walking away. I started walking in the other direction.
"Wish you well on your exam, maybe we'll meet in the sect later!" I called to Rachel's retreating figure.
Not even a minute later I heard cursing behind me about the darkness. How could she be so unprepared? Even I had a traditional lantern in my ring if I needed it. She probably wouldn't do well.
I soon came to a four-way intersection. The left path seemed disused and in ill-repair even compared to the rest of the place. The right path looked much like the path I had already traveled. In front of me, however, I could see an orange glow coming from around a bend, it seemed to be calling out and saying, "This way to treasure." I didn't trust it.
While I was still thinking about which path to take, two boys came from the right. "Anything interesting down the path you came from?" They asked as they approached.
"Maybe, I was teleported to the middle of the path. A girl who started near me headed in that direction though. What about your path?"
"Same thing," The shorter boy responded, "We started in the middle of the hall and there's been nothing interesting so far until this intersection. If you started near someone else, why not team up? You're not a loner are you?"
I could see they may be worried I'd attack them. There was no point, they had no treasure yet. "Nothing like that. I would've teamed up, but she couldn't handle the cold." I pointed to the orbs floating around me.
This group was much better equipped than the lass. They both wore heavier clothing and they had lanterns hanging from their belts.
"Yeah it's a bit chilly around you, but didn't she bring winter gear? These exams always have a subterranean component to them and it gets quite cold." The short boy was the one asking again, he seemed to be the talker in their group.
"Didn't seem like it, and judging by the cursing after we separated, she also didn't bring a proper light source."
"What about you? between the qi use and the cold, your orbs aren't exactly good light- sources either."
"I can sustain these orbs indefinitely and I'm not cold. Plus I can control these orbs to illuminate whatever I want without having to move there myself. They may be inconvenient to others, but they're way better than the lantern I have packed away." I said deadpan.
The short boy laughed heartily and even the real tall and lanky kid guffawed, "So you could've traveled with the girl, were you testing her?"
"It makes no difference to me. People can travel with me if they want, but I'm not going to inconvenience myself to accommodate them. So which path are you two going to take?" I asked.
"Well the glowing tunnel seems like the one to take, doesn't it? The path you came from seems to be a starting hall like the one we came from, and the other path just seems like a waste of time." The boy said.
I thought to remind him that our examiner said our starting locations were random. Nothing was saying that we would all start in halls without treasures. My own start proved that any empty space was seen as a valid destination for the teleport array. I decided against saying anything, the glowing path did seem like the best option.
"Yeah seems like it, guess we'll be joining up. You don't mind do you?" I asked.
"Your cold orbs would be much more welcome on a hot summer day, but we're equipped to handle it. The more the merrier I say." He replied jubilant.
The boys started down the glowing path, I almost started following them but decided to investigate the decrepit path real quick first, something about it was calling out to me. I sent an orb into the hall and saw line art all over the walls. Something about the line art seemed familiar.
"Girl, are you coming or not?" The short boy asked.
"The name is Zoey, and on second thought this other path is drawing my interest for some reason. I think I'll go this way. You can join me if you'd like. Or we could meet up later, I think both of these paths lead to a treasure and a dead-end. What do you think?"
"Nice to meet you, Zoey, my name is Robert, and tall, dark, and silent here is Stephen. I like the idea of joining up later. We can cover more ground. How long should we wait for each other?"
"Our total time down here is two days. I can't imagine a trial taking much longer than three hours. Maybe we wait for four hours at most? Do you have a method to track time down here accurately?"
"Yeah I've got an hourglass in my storage ring I keep turning. What about you? " Robert replied.
"Clever, and I've got it covered. See you in four hours." I smiled and walked into my chosen hall.
I didn't walk far, I wanted to figure this line art out first.
Not long after I started studying, I heard screams coming from the hall the boys had chosen. It seems I had made the right decision. There was something ominous about that glowing hall.