Dismissing the rare, almost cosmic event that has taken place, I go through the unnecessarily large entranceway. Cosy lighting fills the hall from the candles on the wooden holders, the quaint atmosphere calming my beating heart. This is what stops the Manor from feeling like a dark and cold prison, even though that’s what it is. It reminds me of home, huge and on top of a mountain peak, but still warm and welcoming. A sight to behold, a world of difference from the usual environment of Haya Vaan. Too bad it doesn’t exist anymore, destroyed in a blaze of bright blue fire.

Took me months to learn the layout of this house off by heart, and the Rei Ui’s Manor is at least twice as big, which is downright insane. But I can’t say it’s unnecessary for them, their Sect needing 100s of people to manage, house and feed.

Walking through the ambient halls, I’m reminded that most of the Manor is empty. Many a useless room are scattered throughout with little more than the most basic of furniture inside. That’s my main problem with big houses, there’s so much wasted and needless space.

Commoners outside the cities of the Empire live in one room houses made of dry mud and rocks with their family, so it’s possible. Not comfortable, I imagine, but comfort isn’t always good. Prolonged comfort brings about weakness, which may be the reason why the Empire has dwindled these past few years. Without an enemy to fight, we as a collective have grown soft.

The Fortress in the south hasn’t been sieged in 100 years by the Demons in the Tundra beyond, so the sense of urgency in the Empire has been lost. And now is not the time for urgency to be lost. The seal will one day disappear, and this half of the world may succumb to the Darkness if we don’t have the strength to fight it.

Speeding through the centre courtyard where most of our training takes place, I try to avoid any of our servants when we pass them by, my probable stench warding them off anyway. Knowing what I’m like, it doesn’t surprise them, so when I come home looking all sweaty with bloodshot eyes, they know to avoid me lest their noses get assaulted with the scent of strong wine, sweat and other curious substances.

Through the back entrance of the Manor sits a small forest area with a clean stone path cutting through the middle. Walking down the path, the late-autumn winds blow the few dry yellow and orange leaves onto it to be trampled on by me with a satisfying crunch. The trees seem deprived of life, the coming winter bound to bury them in snow, but it’s consolation knowing that in the summer the trees will be full of life once again. Still depressing, but at least I don’t live in the region of Oo Ann. Trees are downright mythological over there.

There are pro’s to living on a cold and wet mountain, and that’s the many hot springs which are found here. I know that means we may be living on a damn volcano, but I prefer not to think about that. If it shows signs of ever erupting, there are people in the Rei Ui that can suppress it. Supposedly. I’d like to think so, anyway.

“Hiya Jack!”

Snapping out of my trance, I see a petite figure dressed in a dark red dress robe with a small sash around her waist running up to me from the misty air that steams from the spring. Her sleeves are long and billowy, flopping in the gentle breeze. Trailing behind her, her long brown ponytail arcs in the air as she skips. Once she gets close enough, she considers jump-hugging me, but backs off as she takes a breath through her nose. Her smile disappears and her face scrunches up, eyes asking, ‘This again?’.

“Jack! You smell like wine again, and,” she sniffs the air again, her brunette brow raised in confusion. “Something else? What else have you been doing, huh?” She shoots me an incredulous stare.

“It’s just sweat. It was a long day yesterday full of drinking and partying. Plus, Dra’xx just made me run up half the damn mountain, so I’m not surprised I smell like donkey dick.”

My breathing is still wheezy and shallow, and my legs are on the verge of collapsing beneath me.

“If you insi—" She points at my face in horror, then grabs me by the shoulders and looks me in the eyes with a worried expression. “What happened to your cheek? Are you okay? Do you want me to heal it? Who did this?”

“Woah calm down! It’s not that bad. Promise. Just got into a little scuffle last night, is all.” I take one of her hands and hold it in both of mine while looking into her eyes with the most easy-going smile I can muster. She exhales out her nose and drops her shoulders, her tension deflating. But when she reaches out to caress my right cheek, she tenses again in horror.

“Energy Essence? A cultivator did this?”

Although she used energy, the woman held back a whole lot, otherwise I’d be a red splat of the wall of the Imperial Inn. I’ll cover for her as thanks for not turning me into crimson paint. Also because I feel very, very bad for what I did.

“Yeah, got in a little drunken scuffle last night is all. Bastard got a good hit on me, but I scared him off with my Aura. He was at the beginning of the Mortal Realm like me, but it wasn’t strong enough to resist mine.”

“You could’ve used your Aura from the beginning! This is why I didn’t want you to go out last night. It’s too dangerous. I’ll heal it for you.”

Aia places her palm on my cheek, the slight sting being calmed by a wave of cyan energy flowing into my face.

“Your cheekbones cracked a little, I’m surprised you didn’t get a concussion. You should’ve let one of us come with you, it’s far too dangerous to go out alone. Especially in this city at night!”

“It’s fine, Aia, I wasn’t alone, I was with some cultivator buddies last night.”

That’s not a lie. My acquaintances are quite powerful indeed.

“And they didn’t help you? For Heaven’s sake, I’m just glad you’re okay. Don’t you ever come home with an injury again, okay?”

“Okay, I’ll promise you that,” Aia lets go of my face and I let go of her hand. The pain in my cheek has subsided and I’ve half the mind to ask her to heal the rest of my body, but I deserve most of the pain I’ve received today. Well, I deserve all of it, if I’m being honest. “I’ll be off to have a bath then, are there spare male robes in the storage chest?”

“Ah, no, not male. I can go fetch some robes from your room if you want,” Seeing my hesitance to have her fetch my clothes, she reassures me. “It’s fine, I’m done with my work for today. That’s why I was just in the bath. I’ll go get them; you get in the bath.”

After saying that, she walks off with a smile on her face. I feel bad for making her do a servant’s work, but Aia doesn’t see it like that. She sees it doing a simple favour for a friend. I wish I could be that way, unsullied by constant games of face and politics. But the thought also forms a deep pit in my stomach. This world doesn’t take kindly to compassion and selflessness, and that goes double for cultivators. Purity is endearing, but also terrifying.

Taking my eyes off her now distant figure, I continue onwards to have me a nice bath.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Naked for the second time today, I lower myself into the clear steamy water. It’s nice and deep, going up to my waist. The warm water streaming into the pool from a wooden pipe is the only noise besides from my breathing. According to Aia, breathing in steam is good for the lungs, but I don’t know the validity of that. In fact, I feel lightheaded, enough so that I want to get out, but Aia hasn’t come back with my clothes. I checked the wooden chest and they were all woman’s clothing. Now, I’m not about to wear a damn dress robe for even a second. If anyone chances upon me wearing that, my reputation would be in tatters.

My eyelids begin to weigh on me, the warm and relaxing water acting as a blanket. I didn’t get much sleep last night, so maybe I’ll take a nap after all. Aia can be my wake-up call, so I won’t oversleep. Or drown, hopefully. Closing my eyes, I submit to the lull of slumber.

“Hey, Jack!”

My eyes snapping open in surprise, I look around to find nobody there. Weird, it sounded like Aia was right next to me. The fuck? A soft electric current flows through my body as a chipper voice sounds out within my mind. I’m used to be being deafened by Dra’xx, so this is a welcome change of pace.

“Here you are!”

A bundle of ocean blue cloth falls from the sky and lands on top of the wooden chest. Damn cultivators. Never do things normally, do they? Always gotta show off how they can make things fly with a mere thought, instead of just chucking things over to me or passing them to me by hand. I’m not jealous. Me? Jealous? No, that doesn’t happen. Impossible.

I’ve soaked here for long enough. Time to get out. I want to get some reading done before training. Afterwards, I’d probably have to get another bath, unless it’s not a physical exercise. Dra’xx said he had something ‘special’ planned, which is utterly terrifying. Either it’s something to do with energy or something to do with fighting someone way out of my league. I don't like either of those.

I stand up, dripping with steaming water and step out the spring. There are towels on the wooden rack next to the storage chest, but I want to try something. I close my eyes and release a tiny amount of energy from my Dantian and circulate it around my body, taking care not to let any out. I release another tiny bit and circulate it. I repeat that another few times until I have a sizeable amount of energy circulating within me. There are ways to avoid triggering the Seal of Suppression and this is one of them.

Detonating the energy in my body, fire bursts out of me in a scorching explosion. Not a very big one, mind you, but enough to dry me completely, hair and all. In fact, the air around me is sweltering. I put my robes on and leave the hot spring before I get sweaty again.

These robes always have obnoxiously big sleeves. As a cultivator, robes are great to train in and carry stuff in, but for me, they’re just baggy sweat boxes that are too heavy for me to sprint in. I’ll never say that last part out loud though. Bia’xx would have a field day with it…

Speaking of Bia’xx, she should be in the library. I’d better warn her that the Rei Ui might come knocking on our door soon enough. If Dra’xx and Aia knew the basics of how to navigate a political minefield, I’d have them help me with it, but they don’t know the first thing about politics. Bia’xx, although less powerful, is a far, far better option to ask to help me out.

Entering the Manor through the back entrance, I head to the west wing, where the Manor Archive sits. I enter through the wooden door. It’s not a very big room, relative to the Rei Ui’s Library, but it’s the biggest room in the Manor, packed with filled bookshelves lining the walls and stacked in neat rows along the centre. Candlelight brightens the room, but not to the level where you can read in comfort, which is why I take my books back to my room instead. But Bia’xx, who’s sitting in a cushioned wooden chair in the far corner of the room seems to have better eyesight than I, reading calmly with an oil lamp burning on the wall behind her.

“Hi, Bi—”

“Shut up, I’m reading.” She says sternly.

Okay, off to a great start.

“Just wanted to warn you that the Rei Ui might invite me over for a nice chat sometime soon. If they do, I may need you to come with.”

“Why would they call you over, you scam one of them out their money, or,” she takes her attention off her book and stares into my eyes. “You fuck one of their women?"

My brows raising in surprise of the accuracy in her guess, I decide to swallow my pride and admit to my wrongdoing.

“Yeah, I might—keyword being might—might have done that.”

Well, I say ‘admit to my wrongdoing’ but it turns out that’s more than I’m capable of. As I walk closer to the bookshelf I last saw the book, ‘History of the Adherents’ on, she responds.

“Fine. I find the messes you somehow get yourself in to be entertaining,” She smiles and flips her long brown hair out of her eyes. “Now, shut up. I’m busy.”

Yeah, define ‘busy’ for me. Rolling my eyes, I find the book I was looking for. A tattered and withered pile of yellowed paper kept together by an ancient animal skin. I’m not sure if this is even translated into Havaan, so I open it and find it somewhat legible. Works for me. I bring it back to my room with me, the texture of the skin in my hand making me feel uncomfortable. The book is quite thin so it’s not heavy, but I’d rather not hold this for any longer than I need to.

I suppose this'll help me stop feeling bad.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Reading from where I last left off, I found myself scratching my head at the nonsense on the pages. For 2 hours I’ve tried to decipher the religious babble the unknown author keeps spouting on about to no avail.

The concept of balance is what I find most baffling, and it seems that's the Adherents’ goal. To achieve for perfect balance of Dark and Light, the balance of Fire and Ice, the balance of Life and Death. Balance, balance, balance. If I had a copper for every time the word ‘balance’ appears in this book, I’d be rich enough to buy the Empire twice over. A balance of Light and Dark, two opposing forces, will never exist. You cannot ‘tame the Darkness’ like the Adherents believe. No wonder they’re considered heretics, bloody Demon sympathisers.

“Jack!”

I recoil at the sudden shock running through my body and the headache inducing shout within my mind. These people seem to have made a habit out of invading my mind and I’m not sure I like it.

“Tone it the fuck down, please."

“It’s evenin’, boy. Get down t’ the courtyard.”

Dra’xx switches to an inside voice filled with barely suppressed elation. He seems to be in a good mood for once. I don’t know what to expect. I make my way down to the courtyard with a strange weight of worry on my shoulders.

As I enter the courtyard through the sliding doors, I’m met with the expectant gazes of the four residents of the Cal Mira Manor. Dra’xx stands in the centre of the courtyard with his two battle axes, each in one hand, excited. Cla’xx stands tall behind him with his arms cross, trying not to look worried and failing, the slight arc in his brow giving him away.

Everyone is in full battle gear instead of the usual robes, Fortified steel and chainmail covering their bodies. Aia seems chipper as usual, her dual short swords sheathed at her hips. Bia’xx stands tall with a stoic expression, seemingly just finishing sharpening her longsword. Dra’xx prompts Cla’xx to walk over to me and give me my own weapon, a short sword made from a glass-like material. At first glance, the sword looks like it’d shatter upon striking someone, but it’s Fortified with Godly Energy, so there’s nothing that’ll ever break it around these parts.

“Boy, get yerself some armour. You’ll need it fer what we’re doin’ today.”

“Can I ask why?”

“‘Course, it’s ‘cause we’re gonna be doin’ some all-out fightin’ today. Yer gonna be showin’ me what yer capable of, n’ Cla’xx’ll be our referee. A letter from n’ old friend gettin’ a new disciple inspired this little idea of mine. I’m not about to let that old bastard’s disciples best my own, so yer performance now’ll be determinin’ if I’ve been too lax in trainin’ yers lately or not.”

That’s what that letter was! Fuck.

“Hold on, I can’t use energy, you bald—”

“That’s why we're gonna have two matches, boy,” he spins his stupidly big and scary battle axe on his finger like it’s a damn ball. “One without energy, one with. I wanna see if yer capable of defendin’ yerself against someone on my level, boy. It’ll help calm my poor old heart.” He says sarcastically. He knows damn well I can defend myself against almost every non-cultivator, he just wants to fight again. Bloody battle maniac. Well, whatever. It’s been a while since I’ve had a good, no holds barred fight. In normal spars, they treat me like a toddler as not to shatter every bone in my body.

I fully expect a broken bone or two after this, but for some reason, a nervous smile can’t help but creep onto my face.