A Cultivation Tale: The Godly Punisher

"Uncle, since you know so much about cultivation, you should have lots of cultivation manuals in your study room, right? I want a cultivation manual and a Supernal Battle Entity-grade battle-class methodology manual. I want to start cultivating" Alex said hurriedly.

"Haha!" his uncle broke into laughter. "It's an A-grade battle-class methodology manual you mentioned like that. I don't have such wealth to purchase such. It's something that experts from the High God-emperor stage could have. Even if they do sell one out, it should cost more than a thousand billion sapphirstone" Houston said.

Alex trembled.

So it has such value. Also, it must be exceedingly rare since it had such a price tag.

The currency used in this world is called sapphirstone, it's an octahedral crystal that comes in five colors. They are:

- yellow,

- cerulean,

- purple,

- silver and

- gold.

These colors correspond to:

- common-quality,

- good-quality,

- rare-quality,

- supreme-quality and

- peerless-quality.

Their value for exchange are:

A cerulean sapphirstone can be exchanged for a hundred yellow sapphirstone.

A purple sapphirstone can be exchanged for a hundred cerulean sapphirstone and ten thousand yellow sapphirstone.

A silver sapphirstone can be exchanged for a million purple sapphirstone or hundred million cerulean sapphirstone or one billion yellow sapphirstone.

A gold sapphirstone can be exchanged for a billion purple sapphirstone or ten billion sapphirstone or hundred billion yellow sapphirstone.

These sapphirstones are one of the vast minerals found in the earth strata. They converted it to money to trade for goods and services.

Their value depends on their rarity, for example, silver sapphirstones may only be found in a remote region in a continent out of ten thousand continents.

Alex then made a funny angry face at him "What of a Phenomenal Warring King-grade (B-grade) battle-class methodology manual?" he impatiently asked.

Alex's uncle smiled and shook his head. "Come with me, I have a special one for you. There is a manual I purchased for you really long time ago, you would like it, definitely" his uncle replied.

"I hope it's blazing hot or I won't accept it." Alex said with determination. "What a boy, you shall see, put your little mind at ease" he said as he laughed.

Then he brought Alex to a shelf at a corner of his massive bedroom, he opened it and pulled out a metal box. When he opened the box, a large book could be seen within, the book had a thick blank page cover and was fastened.

"Here. go practice" he gave Alex the book and immediately drove him out of his room.

Plak!

The door closed in his face.

Alex was surprised by his uncle's behavior.

"Uncle, if you gave me a trash manual, I swear you wouldn't rest, I would haunt you" he yelled attracting the attention of many of the workers.

They only smiled as they knew he was throwing a childish tantrum.

Alex snorted and left for his room, the moment he got to his room, he immediately unfastened the book and opened it.

The instant he did, the air in his room abruptly turned turbulent. It caused the doors of his wardrobe to swing violently, his curtains blew like a windstorm was occurring in his room.

His room turned disorderly.

Framed artistic drawings and images of sceneries hung on the wall began to fall off. His quilt, bed cover, pillow were flung away by the aggressive wind currents.

strong winds brushed his face causing his long hair to flutter.

Alex was shocked. "What's going on?"

he looked around trying to apprehend what was going on, then he brought his attention back to the book and being an intelligent boy, he recognized that it was a form of residual power emitting from the book that influenced the movement of air in his room.

"How mighty" he subconsciously muttered.

The book had a blank front page, but when he turned to the next page, he saw the words "Wind Element Trinity Methodology: Primordial Wind Conjuring, A-grade" boldly written in it.

"Trinity Methodology? A-grade? Crazy!!! How did my uncle get his hands on this?! The wealth he possesses should never be enough to purchase this book, right?" He asked excitedly.

Great wonder and unfathomable puzzlement filled the black abyss of his eyes.

Alex was elated for many minutes.

When he brought himself back together, he sank his mind into the content of the book ignoring the tumultuousness of the air in his room.

While Alex was reading, he didn't know that strong winds were raging outside the mansion.

The workers were perplexed, they didn't know what was causing these furious winds.

Alex's uncle, now lying in bed knew about all that was happening, he only smiled and closed his eyes drifting to dreamland.

Alex went through the introduction and couldn't help but be greatly marveled. What made him more surprised were the battle-methods.

They were large in numbers and were extremely powerful, as it was part acme-rank, supernal battle-entity grade (A-grade), battle-class methodology.

When one reaches a high cultivation realm, one would be able to use a battle-technique to transform a single breath into immense, terrifying wind currents that can ravage worlds, with a technique at that cultivation stage, one could displace entire oceans and seas with just a sliver of air, It gave the user unrivaled movement-speed, both in flight and on foot and it numerous escape methods seems to have no equal.

They were all simply techniques used by experts from void adept stage, a rank just two stages below the Supreme Alpha Eternal stage.

Alex was extremely incredulous.

The plethoric battle-techniques and speed-techniques listed in the manual were just too mighty.

After feeling incredible for a long time, he sat cross-legged on the floor and began to ponder about the wind.

The first step was comprehending the form, nature and essence of the wind.

"what is wind? wind is air in motion. What is air? An unseen mass of matter present around us. The wind, like the fire element is formless but unseen, it can sometimes be soft and gentle and sometimes, hard and harsh. Nothing can obstruct its path, they would be overcomed, without air, nothing can live…"

As he contemplated the wind, unknowingly, his mind had immersed into a unique state.

In this state, he felt refreshed and relaxed.

His physical senses became stronger, they were augmented beyond human level.

But his mind, or more precisely, his mental faculty was the most heightened, he could now process large amounts of information very fast.

Alex felt extremely awesome in this state.

He liked it very much and felt he didn't need to come out of it. While he was in this state, he picked up details about the strong winds occurring outside the mansion.

He was surprised but recovered from his shock just as quickly.

Many hours later, he stopped his cultivation and closed the book. The instant he did, the gusts vanished.

He saw how his room instantly returned to normal.

He smiled and shook his head, then he kept the book away.

Focusing on the turbulent winds that manifested in his room moments ago, he had gained a complete understanding of the wind, but there was still something missing.

That little thing was the essence of the wind he needed to comprehend.

Once he did, he would be able to perceive an energy called 'Windforce energy' as called in the book.

Alex continued to think about the wind essence contemplatively until a week later, a large mass of air began to gather around him and swirl.

This mass swirled at extreme speed scattering his entire room again, it was like a small typhoon had appeared in his room.

An instant later, a energy, cyan in colour began to flow into Alex's body from the air vortex that gradually increased in size.

This was windforce energy.

Alex had finally understood the essence of the wind.

Now, he had tuned his perception to this energy. He was elated but he didn't stop what he was doing. He directed the glowing threads of cyan energy along his energy pathways to his energyhouse.

Slowly, they accumulated in his energyhouse and increased in quantity.

This energy flowed into Alex's energyhouse for a long time before a boom occurred only in his body, no one else heard the sound.

This boom signified that he had broken through the invisible barrier between a mortal and a cultivator.

He had now entered the initial phase of the entry-stage.

He continued to cultivate until the next morning. This was because he was enjoying the feeling it gave him. A peculiar sensation washed through his body, this sensation felt very divine.

All his pores were opened and began to breathe. He felt anew, like he had casted away his old body and had gained a new one.

He felt he was going through purification.

Not very long, he opened his eyes.

The moment he pulled himself out of the special state he was in, he inhaled a pungent smell of rotten flesh.

Alex trembled, the smell was so powerful that it gave him the urge to vomit hardly. He held his breath and looked at himself, he saw that he was coated in a dark black substance that evolved a strong decaying smell.

Not able to withstand the smell, he rushed into the bathroom to shower.

After showering, Alex felt really good. He had never felt this good before.

Then he remembered the abilities one would automatically gain when one became a cultivator. He quickly tried it out.

He looked within himself and could see a large mass of cyan energy gathered there. He was ecstatic.

Now he was a cultivator and is on the path to become a god like his role model, the caped supreme expert he always dreamt about.

He went to meet his uncle to share the good news. "I can perceive that you have transformed into a cultivator. Congratulations" his uncle said and gave a loving smile.

Alex smiled and nodded.

"Uncle, I can see a mass of cyan energy gathered in my energyhouse. Why is it cyan? Do energies possess different colors?" Alex asked puzzledly.

"Yes, there are different colors. Take the five classic elements for example, which are fire, earth, water, air and wood. pyroforce energy for fire is scarlet, metalforce energy for metal is golden, plantforce energy for wood is green, terraforce energy for earth is yellow, and aquaforce energy for water is blue." His uncle replied.

"Okay. Got that" Alex said.

"Uncle, I started cultivating yesterday noon till this morning, I have gathered a lot of energy but I am still very far from the next boundary, I hope it's not what I think?" Alex said looking at his uncle with hints of strangeness and confusion in his eyes.

"Yea kiddo. I noticed that since you missed dinner last night. So what's that you are thinking. Let me know, will you?" Houston asked with a smile.

"That I am a cultivation aberrant?" Alex asked unsurely with one of his brows furrowed.

"Hmm. Being an aberrant or a deviant is a good thing. It's a good thing that should be celebrated. It shows you are far more unique than your counterparts. About your energy, as you cultivate and accumulate more energy with the aim to enter the next phase or realm, it would increase in quality and quantity. The color too becomes deeper and would undergo a transformation in form" Houston said.

Alex's eyes glowed.

"Really? What transformation is that and at what cultivation stage?" He asked.

"At all cultivation stages. Let me tell you the ones that happen at the the first nine stages of cultivation. The Entry realm, Congeal realm, Earth Adept realm, Skylord realm, Heaven Adept realm, Saint realm, Great Saint realm, Saint Emperor realm and Grand Saint Emperor realm can also be called, flow activation stage, condensation stage, core formation stage, core evolution stage, core transformation stage, core destruction stage, core baptism stage, statute entry stage and statute condensation stage. In these stages, your energy changes from one form to another and this changes are vastly different...." Houston began to tell Alex about the myriad forms energy would take at different cultivation stages.

In the flow activation stage (entry stage) is the stage where you left your human shackles to become a cultivator.

In the condensation stage (congeal stage), your energy thickens as it gains more mass.

In the core formation stage (earth adept stage), your energy becomes a solid lump. This solid is referred to as the core.

In the core evolution stage (skylord realm), the core evolves and one gains the ability to fly.

In the core transformation stage (heaven adept stage), the core of your energies shatter and reassemble taking a new form. They could take any of the shapes of myriad of things.

But these forms they take depends on the will of the cultivator. For example, one whose intent is to sever every bondages that would restrict his freedom with a blade would have his core take the form of an actual blade.

In the core destruction stage (saint stage), the core undergoes destruction. It's a life-or-death stage every cultivator must go through. It's one of the major tribulation stages for all cultivators. If one's core withstands the destruction, the core transcends to a higher realm of cultivation and if they don't, they simply die.

The higher realm of cultivation in this stage is the core allows the cultivator to operate in a higher realm of cultivation.

In the core baptism stage (great saint stage), the core is baptized with statutes.

In the statute entry stage (saint emperor stage). The cultivator starts to cultivate statutes.

In the statute fusion stage (grand saint emperor realm), the statute increases in quality. That is, it increases in density.

Statutes are the basal and principal forms of the energies cultivators cultivate.

Anyone said to cultivate statutes is believed to have blended with the source, with the origin of the energies they cultivate.

These statutes are the fountains, wellsprings of their respective energies.

Cultivators refer to statutes as principal cosmic energies, primordial energies, basal energies, primalforce energies and originforce energies.

For example, pyroforce energy, it principal form is fire statute which can also be called fire originforce energy.

It is vastly more powerful in comparison.

If an expert cultivating pyroforce energy can unleash a fiery attack that possesses the heat of a thousand burning coals. An expert that cultivates fire statutes will produce an attack a thousand times the strength of the attack of the expert that cultivate pyroforce energy.

When his uncle finished explaining to him, Alex's eyes glittered. "That's a god! I shall become a god someday. No! A king of gods and ruler of aberrants" he screamed in his mind.

At this moment, he decided this is the path he would traverse.

The way of gods and deviants.

Then he recalled the image of that powerful figure that had been indelibly branded into his very soul and smiled.

"Uncle. Is there an end to cultivation?" Alex asked.

He needed to know if there was an end to cultivation so that he can judge if that expert he idolized had reached the apex of cultivation.

"I don't know. There is a possibility that there is no end. It has been hypothesized that only someone who has cultivated all the energies in the world can be said to have reached the end of cultivation but this is impossible. No one can cultivate more than ten different energies, the energies would become chaotic in the person's energyhouse and could cause the person to explode or become a cultivation cripple. So to think of reaching the end of cultivation is simply thinking to die, it's basically suicide. But there would always be deviants, the Energy-deviants, they are people who defy the rule of the world and cultivate close to hundreds of different energies. Another group of cultivators called Beyonders, gain enlightenment in seclusion and fuse some of these energies, transforming them into a unique energy that is many times stronger than its constitutive energies. They may join hundreds of different energies together to create new cultivation energies. These new energies may have the strength to rival statutes. But in the end, they were destroyed by tribulations. These tribulations are vastly different from the tribulation that manifests when one broke through into a certain cultivation stage. They are meant for the complete destruction of these abnormal experts." His uncle replied.

Alex's mind shook.

These genius experts were really something, taking such a mighty risk for great power, but it was worth it.

At least, they would be legends.

His eyes glowed when he remembered this was the path he chose, the path of deviants.

But he didn't care one bit about the tribulation that would haunt him forever seeking for his destruction.

His eyes radiated steely determination, nothing would waver the resolution in his heart.