CHAPTER 25

In two years, it had been obvious that having one on himself at all times would be useful. Just so he could understand his own state better. He directly placed it so he could see his core area. And he ended up quite surprised. While the presence of a third core was expected, it had led to a breakthrough to the third realm.

In a single day, he went from awakened core to the third realm. Something that took years to most people. Even Okami, before becoming Mir’s followers, only reached the fourth realm after five years of cultivation. This showed the gap between Mir and others as well as the true worth of his eyesight. After rejoicing over his breakthrough, he intensely looked at his new core:

VENERABLE GOLDEN SUN KING DRAGON BLOODLINE AWAKENED CORE

RANK 1 – 3nd realm

Bio: Cores are the origin of energy. Every being with a core can direct the energy from heaven and earth inside his body, cultivate it and become stronger through this action commonly referred to as cultivation. It is possible to awaken a second core when reaching the first realm and then once every five realms, provided the core balance* is not broken.

Second Core: A core awakened after reaching Rank 1 Realm 1. Can be activated and deactivated at will.

Bloodline Core: A core merged with the bloodline of a different being. Provides a part of the being’s power by extracting its DNA from the bloodline. By activating the bloodline core, body modifications and a change in the emitted energy might be induced.

Balance: FIRE ELEMENTAL CORE (4.0)

Venerable Golden Sun King Dragon bloodline: The activation of this bloodline induces a body modification, an emitted energy change and provides different additional abilities.

Body Modification: The body skin is replaced by golden scales. This provide additional defense and attack power in melee battle. Body Modification: Add-on small dragon gold mustache. Provides additional awareness of surroundings. Body Modification: Muscle Mass expansion. More muscles for more attack power. Emitted Energy Modification: The energy color is turned from neutral to gold for all skills. Visual Style Benefit: ‘Dragons are noble and stylish’ Additional Elemental Benefit: 50% more damages when using fire-elemental skills. Additional Elemental Weakness: 50% weaker to water-related skills. Additional Skill Benefit: King Dragon’s roar: Induce Paralysis to weaker opponents.

Status: UNLOCKED

Golden Sun Dragon Breath: A long-range attack originating from the mouth. Fire-elemental attack. Might indulge an explosion depending on the energy used. Can take time to charge depending on the energy used.

Status: UNLOCKED

Venerable Golden Sun King Dragon image summoning: Summoning of a spiritual Venerable Golden Sun King Dragon in all its glory to help during battle.

Status: LOCKED (strength insufficient)

That’s more than expected. He knew from his trial with Oka that it would be something incredible but he had no idea about the skill and elemental benefits. It was something he didn’t see when looking at Oka’s core before.

Did he unlock more of his eyesight abilities? Probably. One more thing to rejoice about. Today was a wonderful day. He was eager to try all of those new abilities.

He concentrated and activated this third core of his. Soon, golden light was emitted blurring the surroundings and he felt warmth running through his body. Where it passed, he felt the change. As the light decreased, he began to see his reflection. It was hard to accept this new body of his. First things first, he grew. From a meter fifty, he reached a meter sixty. Ten whole centimeters. For a seven years old, this was quite the height.

Also, his skin was nowhere to be seen, replaced by scales. Gold everywhere but on his frontal bust where it was golden white. Also, the scales only went up to his neck without modifying his face. The only place where skin still existed. His hair had turned from brown to golden and he had a mustache. It was just two strands of golden hair that grew from between his nose and mouth but it felt weird. Even in his previous life, he didn’t have one. However, as a seven-year-old, he had a long golden one. A few centimeters long and freely floating in the air. At the very least, it didn’t go too bad with his actual morphology.

He could also feel the muscle bulging in his arms and legs and his newly earned six-pack. That one was the most shocking. More than scales replacing skin? Yes. He was prepared for the scales but such muscle growth was unexpected. He never worked out. Be it in this life or the previous. Even more in his previous life, he was a bit fat…A bit… Seeing himself so muscular was shocking. And invigorating. He loved it. For the first time in two lives, he fell in love with himself.

Who was the dumbass who said appearance didn’t matter? No doubt a rich playboy. If he could meet him, he would most likely insult his stupidity and punched his face with a brick or something. Appearance was all that matters, that and money and in this world, power. Still, he was happy. This was more than worth the pain. He looked awesome.

This was far from your average seven-years-old appearance. He couldn’t help but laugh crazily at his reflection. After indulging in his newborn narcissism for longer than any sane man would have, his old man’s mind woke up as he wondered: “Did my jewels also grew? Maybe they became muscular as well?!”…

After discussing whether checking was a good or bad idea, he couldn’t bear the curiosity. Since there was no one else here anyway, he checked… And wasn’t disappointed. He inwardly screamed:

“This ain’t no 7-year-old for sure!”

For a time, he also wondered if he earned a dragon’s vigor but decided against checking that far. There was a limit.

After all this trivial nonsense, he returned on the right track. It was time to check his strength. He concentrated and began to send energy outside his body. He was turning his close surrounding into a giant energy whirlpool. A golden one at that. And in the center, he opened his eyes. It felt awesome. He was the one emitting this energy. His power was surging.

He decided to try the first skill, the King dragon’s roar. He knew how to by instinct. He concentrated power in his lungs and roared. If he wasn’t the one roaring, this sound would have scared him shitless, no doubts. It was powerful, noble and fear-inducing. Truly wonderful.

Then, he tried the second skill. Golden Sun Dragon Breath. He had to redirect all energy towards his mouth and stock it until it reached the highest point possible. In a matter of seconds, it was filled with too much energy. It was burning his lips and tongue so much he had to open his mouth.

From there, a ray of golden light shot forth. It went on for two seconds before reaching the end of the room and exploding. It created such a blast that Mir was forced a few step backs. Afterwards, the room was clean no more. The place hit was destroyed. There were rubbles everywhere and cracks in both the walls and the ground. It was devastated on many meters around the explosion epicenter. This was violent. Such an attack wasn’t intended for a light spar. This was a skill to kill, to slaughter.

For the first time, Mir became conscious of what having strength meant. There were responsibilities coming with strength. And in this world, the reason people were after strength was not to play around. They wished for strength to kill their ways to the top. For the first time, he became conscious of the brutality of this world and his belonging to it. This was no more a game or a lazy run. It became dangerous. From now on, he had to be even more cautious. He was wielding a power able to kill, this was not a small matter. It changed everything.

After pondering for some time and testing his ability to move around in this upgraded body, Mir deactivated the second core, the fire core, and exited the training center. He went to see Elder Bu first. Then, he asked him:

“Elder Bu, can you take me to Grand Elder Fin?”

Elder Fin. He was elder Lan’s brother and a grand elder of the Burning Sea School. Due to a misfortune that led him to be crippled and lose his awakened core, he lost his martial artist status and had to forfeit his standing in the school. However, after a deal with Mir, he received a recipe to bring back his core to life. He went on a journey with his younger brother and in a matter of months, he came back with his core regrown.

He earned back his cultivation and was reinvested to the position of Grand Elder. He still owed something to Mir. He had promised him to teach him about martial tailoring. However, when he came back first and he tried to show Mir, Mir was unable to see and comprehend anything.

Martial Tailoring was all about influencing the energies and bringing new powers to life in objects. At that time, Mir couldn’t see and use energy. Now that he could, he believed it was time to learn martial tailoring and time for Elder Fin to uphold his part of the deal.

With elder Bu leading the way, they reached the Tailoring Mountain soon. They went up to the tailoring Pavilion and asked for elder Fin. After a few minutes of waiting in the main hall, they were joined by the grand elder. Only elder Bu bowed respectfully. He was ignored. Even worse, dismissed by elder Fin.

He directed Mir up to the third floor, his personal quarters. Just like his younger brother’s, it contained an entire world. Though it was plainer. They discussed as they entered this world:

“So, little Mir, what brings you here after so long?

-You didn’t forget our previous deal, elder Fin, did you?

-I didn’t. Does this mean that you have finally become a martial artist?

-That is right. And I am here to try learning martial tailoring once more.

-Congratulations. And regarding me teaching you, I did not forget, let us go right now if you want to. I will show you once more.”

They walked for a few kilometers before reaching a lake. There was a small bridge leading to a small island in the middle of the lake. Once they were on the small island that was no larger than twenty meters and completely flat with small green grass growing everywhere, a dark desk appeared.

Maybe it wasn’t a desk? Mir didn’t really know. It was just a big rectangular dark mass. It was around one meter fifty, the size of Mir. He couldn’t see anything on it. Elder Fin chuckled and made a chair appear. Mir got up on that chair and he could now see the rectangular mass. It was flat and plain black. There was nothing on it. Mir wasn’t impressed. Elder Fin said:

“This is my workplace. If I want to work on an object, I place it on this dark desk and start the process. This desk looks like this because I liked it, don’t question it too much. We did not even go this far last time since you couldn’t sense energy at all but, now, I can feel your ability to do so myself…

-Isn’t that actually just a big rectangular dark ebonite rock?

-…It is. Anyway, let me show you some martial tailoring.”

He took out a small crystal, a hammer the size of a hand and a small knife. He placed them on the dark mass and said:

“This here is a martial crystal. It is formed from the condensation of monster cores. The more cores are fused, the bigger the martial crystal. You need to imbue energy inside it first. This is a martial hammer and this is a basic knife, the object we will tailor. So, how does this work you ask?

-I didn’t.

-I will still answer. You infuse energy into the crystal. You place the crystal on the object and hammer them both at the same time until the crystal is fused into the object. That’s it. Of course, you need to imbue martial energy into the hammer and that energy must be stronger or equal to the one in the crystal. This will then turn the object into a martial item. Here, I will show you.”

Elder Fin took the crystal in his hands and focused. A strong wind blew from him and entered the crystal. It was him merging energy into the crystal. Five minutes later, the crystal turned white. Elder Fin satisfyingly nodded and turned to Mir:

“When enough energy has been merged, the crystal will become colored. That is a sign of when to stop. If I went further, it would have blown up and everything would have been lost. It would have just been turned to ash without causing any damages anywhere though so don’t think you can use them as weapons: you can’t. Now, we place the crystal on top of the object. Then, take the hammer and while constantly giving energy to the hammer, we strike on them both.”

From then on, elder Fin stopped talking and focused on the task. He hammered away at the knife and crystal. With each strike, the crystal was absorbed a bit more into the knife. In the end, it glowed brightly and the crystal had completely disappeared.

A small gust of wind was emitted by the knife and that was it. It didn’t seem to be any different than before. However, Mir knew it was a success by the satisfied look on Elder Fin’s face. He turned to Mir and said:

“This is a success. You know, little Mir, when I was crippled, I couldn’t work like this anymore. Now that I can finally go back to it, I truly understand the value of this art. You only understand the value of something after you lose it once, it is sad but true. I am eternally grateful to you for…

-It was business, let us not mention it anymore. That being said, elder, I find myself with a question. What does this change to the item? It doesn’t seem any different to me…

-Try swinging it a bit then.”

Mir took the knife and swung it a few times, slashing the air. He was perplexed. The feeling was entirely different from a normal knife. It felt like slicing the air was possible. Mir turned to the elder. Even with his sight, he had no idea what changed. He understood the process but not its benefits. This was a first.