When a cultivator reached the fourth level he would choose an art to advance further or he could make his own art from scratch. The ones who chose an already existing art were in the majority while the ones who made their own arts were the minority but it was a well known fact that tailor made art was far superior to common arts. It was another reason why The Academy was so important since it has the biggest meridian art depository in the world and many of it's arts were from the main academy. It also had a huge amount of reference scriptures for those who wanted to creat their own arts. This was one of the main reasons Thadius was here. He wanted to make use of the scriptures to make his own art.
The academy also had lectures, training facilities, friendly spars, life or death spars, juniors could take advice from their seniors, take on missions for more merit to buy resources, talk to teachers for guidance though it was the teachers choice whether to guide somone or not or take them as their disciple. The biggest benefit of being a disciple was that they would get to consult with their master regularly and also recieve resources without doing missions. Teachers usually looked for students with meridians similar to theirs so they could better guide them but is was often difficult for mutated meridians to find teachers with similar talents because of their rarity so Thadius would be happy if somone had just one his mutated meridians and take him as their disciple.
The first day the new batch would be gathered in the main hall to recieve some words from the headmaster. Almost a thousand youths were in the hall chatting amongst themselves. Thadius was also standing with the Ma clan members casually talking with them. This scene surprised Ajax since he was often rediculed by people with stronger background in the clan but even though Thadius was the son of a core elder he was very easygoing. This gave Ajax a good impression.
Suddenly the entire hall went silent and it was because of the presence of a middle aged man with long red hair. This was Rojer Drake the current headmaster of the academy. A peak eighth stage meridian cultivator with twenty eight accessed accupoints and an elite disciple of the main academy. He took the stage and said that the laws of the jungle prevail in the academy. The strong survive and get a chance to go on a bigger stage while the weak ones struggle at the bottom. The academy can only lend you a hand, only those who firmly grab that hand and rise up are the ones who will have a chance to reign supreme. Saying this much he left without looking back. Listening to his words the youths felt the need to work hard and stand out. They had to take on missions improve their cultivation and study under the tutelage of a master so they had the chance to fight at the world level.
Thadius was also excited not to stand out but to go to the scripture library and develop his personal art. Only once would the students be allowed to enter for free and for unlimited time, after that they would have to pay in merit. Thadius intended to use this chance and develop the initial level of his art in one go and not leave until he is done.
The initial level could be used in the fourth stage after which came the middle level for fifth meridian cultivators then the upper level and finally the pefect level for sixth and seventh stage cultivators respectively.
From the eighth level onwards one had to grasp laws to move forward in cultivation but this was not what Thadius had time think about. He was busy reading scriptures comprehending them and thinking how to best utilise them.