Sebastian crawled out of the dingy little shelter where he had spent the last few weeks of his life and stood up to take in the sunlight which illuminated the gorge.
He drew a deep breath. It revved up his essence circulation like an engine. Energy coursed through his body, washing out the effects of his anxiety.
That did it.
Every fiber of his being told him, screamed at him, that it was all real.
Having settled down, he steeled his resolve and returned to his bed where he sat down, legs crossed.
The first thing Sebastian did was check his Status, to see to which level his progress had been translated by the [System].
System status
Name: Sebastian Moore
Level: 14
Cultivation status
Name: Sebastian Moore
Cultivation method
- Earthen Cultivation Art
Cultivation stage
- Spirit Sculpting
- → Minor stage: Peak
Physical cultivation stage
- Clay
Titles
- Blessed
- Sole Cultivator
Talent
- Akashic Connection
It took me all the way to level 14!
Sebastian closed his fists and felt the power of his current level.
I’ll take in as much essence as I can today before making my attempt to ascend later tonight, and tomorrow… tomorrow I leave this gorge and see what else this world has to offer.
Setting his plan into motion, Sebastian directly began cultivating, absorbing more essence than ever as the range with which he could draw in natural essence had increased. The circulation of essence through his complex Peak meridian system formed a natural whirlpool to aid his already powerful intent. Sebastian could definitely understand now why the manual kept going back to the image of a whirlpool, fortunately it harmonized well with his own image of a black hole.
His intent remained unwavering as he saturated his spirit body with more essence than ever before. By the evening, he was ready. Not only did he have all the essence he could need, he also had the experience from having performed a baptism before to draw from.
His spiritual sense pushed deeper and deeper into his spirit until he finally reached the membrane between the realms
Sebastian’s discorporate consciousness floated before an enormous membrane, reaching out into infinity in all directions, something which would wreak havoc on his mind if he thought about it for too long. The membrane hummed with energy as all the colors of the universe flickered and flowed within it. One moment, it looked like a thin piece of glass, and the next an infinitely thick veil, endlessly changing yet somehow maintaining its structure.
Behind Sebastian’s floating consciousness amassed a vast mist of increasingly red essence with an earthy terracotta tone. His consciousness drifted back until it fused with the essence. With a thought—a thought which contained the unrelenting resolve and will that he had gathered during his lifetime and honed during his time in this world—he used his powerful intent to take complete control over the cloud of essence. He used that control to make the vast mist spin.
Slowly at first but quickly picking up speed. As it spun faster and faster, its shape compressed and gradually formed a massive drill pointed directly at the membrane. Once the drill spun as rapidly as it possibly could, Sebastian launched it forward.
Ting - CRASH!
Although the membrane was far stronger than last time, Sebastian’s drill tore through it with relative ease. After a moment of quiet, the entire membrane shattered, and he was immediately overwhelmed by a tremor. If his first experience of a baptism—a System-guided baptism when he leveled up—felt like a phone on vibrate, and his first true essence baptism was like an earthquake, then this one was a violent volcanic eruption.
The connection between the physical and spiritual realms was so strong that Sebastian could actually feel the essence that was circulating his meridian system coursing through his physical body, unlike the mere effects of it that he had felt before. For a moment, it was as though his spirit body and physical body were truly one and the same. His senses stretched out far beyond his little shelter, spreading through the gorge and up to the surface above, giving him a glimpse of the greater world out there. It reminded him of the nature of his current circumstances. A frog in a well, seeing the slice of heavens above and thinking the world is smaller than it truly is, only to bear witness to true, grand scale of the world beyond the confines of the well—or in his case, gorge.
Then the membrane began to heal and everything settled down, but unlike last time he didn’t automatically wake up from his cultivative state. Perhaps the connection had been so strong that his consciousness couldn’t escape without an intent to guide it. When he observed his spirit body, his meridian system was now a permanent aspect of his spirit, naturally circulating his essence and drawing in small amounts of natural essence on its own as a result of that flow.
To help it along, and to speed up the process of recovering from the expenditure of his ascension, he spent some time cultivating before finally opening his eyes. When he did, he was met by several [System] alerts.
Major cultivation stage increased
Physical cultivation stage increased
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
Analyzing
Analysis complete
Adjusting calculations
Calculations adjusted
Level adjusted
I guess the [System] is having to put in some effort to manage the Cultivation Status, if levels truly are based entirely on the first stage then it makes sense that translating higher stages to levels might be tricky. Well, let’s see where it landed.
System status
Name: Sebastian Moore
Level: 20
Cultivation status
Name: Sebastian Moore
Cultivation method
- Earthen Cultivation Art
Cultivation stage
- Essence Consolidation
- → Minor stage: Low
Physical cultivation stage
- Leather
Titles
- Blessed
- Sole Cultivator
Talent
- Akashic Connection
Holy crap! I directly jumped up 6 levels. Maybe, with the increase in my physical cultivation stage, my body is strong enough to be worth a couple levels?
“Physical cultivation stage: Leather”, huh? From what I remember from the manual it pretty much means what it says—my entire body should now be about a durable as a strong leather armor. I know clay at some point in the process can be called ‘leathery’, but I’m not sure if it truly translates. Either clay-working is very different here or whoever created this cultivation method took some liberties. Who am I kidding, of course clay-working is going to be different here, to some extent at least.
Whatever, the important thing is that my entire body is basically armor in and of itself! With this, I feel good about making my way out into the world.
Sebastian took some time to exercise and move his newly superhuman body before getting another good night of sleep. The next morning Sebastian packed up whatever felt useful and valuable from his shelter, which wasn’t much. Mostly he just rolled up his cleanest blanket and shoved it into his bag—which resembled a duffel bag—from the goblin camp along with the manual and all the other bits of jewelry and trinkets from the treasure room. He was gonna need money at some point after all and stuff like that was always worth something.
Sebastian stood in front of the shelter that had been not only his home since he arrived in this world but his safe haven. While he had ventured out a few times and even raided that goblin camp, he had spent most of his time right here at his make-shift shelter.
Looking at it now, he could finally admit to himself that he had been using it as a security blanket, a place he could fool himself into believing was safe and secure to convince himself not to wander off into the scary and dangerous world outside. In truth, he had just gotten lucky—lucky that nothing had found him, lucky that the only threats he had found were fairly weak goblins, and lucky that he found the cultivation manual so he could not only get stronger but also sustain himself even without any real source of food or water.
Now it was time to let that luck go and actually do something.
He had made a vow to himself to get revenge against an entire kingdom, after all. Even if that was a rather spontaneous reaction to what they did to him, even if it was a hasty decision, even if it was an emotional and reckless decision he still had every intention of seeing it through. And in order to do so he needed to leave this gorge.
Sebastian took a deep breath, turned around, and walked away. It was still early in the morning, the sun would already have been out if not for the blanket of clouds covering the sky, as if the world itself mirrored his own anxiety.
His walk turned to a jog, which turned into a run, and finally into a sprint at full speed, which given his current superhuman powers was extraordinarily fast. As he ran, the wind rushed past his face. He gradually let his anxiety be replaced by a strong sense of freedom, not just his inevitable freedom from the gorge but from any and all responsibility, and even from the limits of a mere mortal.
He was a cultivator in a fantasy world and nothing was gonna stop him from reaching the absolute peak of power.
With the speed at which Sebastian ran, he arrived back at the goblin camp in no time. He slowed down into a jog before confidently sauntering into the camp, no longer concerned if there were any goblins left or their potential attack. The camp was clearly feeling the loss of all the goblins he had killed. Even so, they had stationed guards in the camp, three to be precise, and they all stared at Sebastian with murder in their eyes. There were likely more inside the caves but it meant nothing to Sebastian.
He casually met their gaze for a moment until he had enough and simply ignored them. Rather than bothering with them, he did a final cursory search around the camp to see if there was anything else he found useful.
Unfortunately there wasn’t really anything. He had already looted the camp and they hadn’t had a chance to launch any raids since then to resupply, if they even had the manpower to do so any time soon.
The only thing he did find was a bota bag filled with what seemed to be wine tucked in by some empty boxes which he must have missed last time. The goblins probably took it thinking it was water and then threw it aside when they discovered it was wine.
Their trash was Sebastian’s treasure. He was never a big drinker but after the past few weeks, some wine was exactly what the doctor ordered. He tied it to his bag and made his way over to the fire pit where there was some meat cooking. Like last time, it looked enough like deer that he wasn’t gonna complain.
Seeing him loot their camp was bad enough, but when they saw him steal what was to be their breakfast, one of the goblins couldn’t take it any more and sprinted directly toward him. Once it got close enough, it followed the same pattern as just about all the other goblins had in the past—it jumped at him. While it didn’t have any weapons, it did have a mouth full of sharp teeth.
Sebastian lifted his left arm as a shield and the goblins chomped down directly on his forearm. The same bite which during his first night here had almost killed him, now couldn’t even break the skin. Sebastian watched the ugly creature with a detached contempt as it hung by the maw off of his arm, struggling with all its might.
Not wanting the little monster to continue slobbering all over his arm, Sebastian grabbed it by the head with his other hand, removed its grasp of his arm, and slammed it down into the ground, face first. The goblin died instantly, and the other two screeched in fear as they retreated to the entrance of the cave.
The essence he received from the kill was next to nothing at this point so he didn’t even pay it any mind. He ambled up the path that led out of the gorge, or the “Valley of Remembrance” as he remembered Lyra had called it.
As Sebastian reached the top, he was met with a calm breeze welcoming him into the world at large. He stood there for a moment, enjoying the fresh air as he scanned the surrounding area.
Seems my memory was right, there is a forest in the distance, which should confirm that I’m probably directly west of the castle, give or take, with that forest going south. What little I remember of the map won’t be much help but the forest should be my best bet, there might be some sort of river or road or something which in turn should lead to a town. Not to mention that there was a war both to the east and to the north so as far as directions go, south doesn’t seem like a bad idea.
Setting his sights south, Sebastian left the Valley of Remembrance behind him, and he walked toward the edge of the forest.