Master of the System

Time flies by when one is having fun. The saying was true for Grandpa Vremya and Azalea. In the blink of an eye, two hundred and fifty years passed by in an instant, and Grandpa Vremya was lying on his deathbed. To be more accurate, he was sitting on a cushion with the last of his vitality draining out of him. Azalea was standing beside him with a grim expression on her face. The next three minutes determined whether he’d live for another five hundred years or die of old age. Although Grandpa Vremya always radiated an air of extreme confidence bordering on arrogance, Azalea was still worried about his chances.

Sixty years ago, Azalea surpassed her bottleneck, becoming a nascent-soul cultivator. In the process, she had failed three times, and during one of the times, she had almost lost her life. If it weren’t for Grandpa Vremya, she wouldn’t be alive right now. He had obtained a legendary fruit for her; not only did it bring her back from the brink of death, but it also reformed her meridians, helping her succeed in her next attempt at breaking through. To get a legendary fruit capable of helping someone reach the nascent-soul stage, usually, one had to struggle arduously for many years before chancing upon it. However, Grandpa Vremya was different. He valiantly went to the nearest fancy auction house, which happened to be owned by the Heavenly Golden River merchant group, and bought the fruit, flexing his tremendous financial muscles.

Azalea had tried to convince Grandpa Vremya to use external aids to form his nascent soul. Since he could afford to buy her a fruit, it made sense that he could buy himself some as well. Even if it wasn’t a legendary fruit, he could’ve bought medicinal pills or spiritual steroids to help himself; however, he had rejected the suggestion, claiming he didn’t want to ingest any impurities. Azalea bit her lower lip. Other than him not using external aids, Azalea was also worried because she didn’t know whether or not Grandpa Vremya was serious about his method of nurturing his nascent soul. No matter how many books she read in the library, none of them included anything about watching rivers to form a nascent soul.

The seconds ticked by like hours, and Grandpa Vremya’s vitality dropped even lower, nearly disappearing altogether. Then, it expanded. His vitality blossomed, and his body, which had become saggy again over the years, regained its vigor. Once again, he looked like a fifty-year-old man with gray hair. His eyes shot open, and he glanced at Azalea. His eyes were deep, and looking at them made her soul feel as if it was being sucked out of her body. “I told you I’d succeed,” Grandpa Vremya said and climbed to his feet. The process of forming a nascent soul was simple. The golden core acted like a chicken egg. Nourishing the golden core with spiritual energy caused the embryo inside the egg to grow and form a fetus. The fetus was able to experience the world through the cultivator’s senses. If the world seemed like it was a place the fetus would like to be born, then the chances of a nascent soul breaking out of the golden core was increased. With the idyllic worldview Grandpa Vremya had painted for his nascent soul, there was practically zero chance of failing. Despite him explaining this to Azalea, she still chose to worry over nothing.

“Congratulations,” Azalea said, her shoulder slumping down. All the anxiety weighing her down had vanished. “Now that you’ve formed your nascent soul, I suppose there’ll be less journeying outside of the sect?”

Grandpa Vremya shook his head. “To successfully reach the soul-seed stage, the nascent soul needs even more experience. The soul seed is a condensation of a nascent soul’s understandings and values. The easiest way to reach immortality is to use your experiences to influence your nascent soul’s personality into one of unyielding perseverance and discipline.”

Azalea tilted her head. “Unyielding perseverance and discipline sound like something you gain by sitting inside your abode and cultivating all day like you used to do before forming a golden core.”

“Right,” Grandpa Vremya said. “They are. The harder way to reach immortality is by facing countless challenges and conquering them all, never losing once. In fact, it’s the only true way to the peak of cultivation. Your nascent soul must be so domineering that even the heavens have to kneel before it.”

“You? Conquering and dominating?” Azalea asked, her eyes widening. Did Grandpa Vremya’s soul get replaced during his breakthrough? “Do you mean through wealth?”

“No,” Grandpa Vremya said. “Through combat.”

Azalea scratched her head. If Grandpa Vremya’s words were true, then didn’t that mean he’d need opponents equal to him? “But who are you going to fight? The Sun Cactus Sect and the Ten Faces Sect were vassalized so long ago. No new powers have stepped in to fill their place either.” An odd expression appeared on her face. “Are you going to challenge the elders of our sect?”

Grandpa Vremya snorted. “No. They’re too weak,” he said and shook his head. “I am destined for greatness. There’s no doubt in my mind there’ll be lots of people to fight.”

Azalea scratched her head. She had always assumed Grandpa Vremya to be superstitious with his talk of karma, but she didn’t expect him to be off-the-rockers crazy when it came to his destiny. The Moon Lotus Sect was the strongest in the world. Where would these enemies come from? “You’re going to the demonic battleground?”

“It’s too bloody there,” Grandpa Vremya said and shook his head. “I’m fighting to win, not increase my bad karma.”

Azalea nodded, slowly. “Right. Whatever you say.”

***

Roger climbed out of the ice box and shivered away the freezing sensation within his body. Trips in space took long amounts of time. If a mortal sat in the steering wheel and drove the spaceship, they’d die before getting anywhere significant. It wasn’t much different for cultivators either; that was why there were multiple pilots on a flight. Only one pilot was awake at a time while the others entered the ice box, a marvelous piece of technology capable of freezing someone to preserve their longevity.

Had the spaceship successfully reached the coordinates he had inputted? Once a pilot inputted coordinates, the other pilots wouldn’t change them unless something major happened like the discovery of something else on the way there. The last time he was conscious, the spaceship was still evaluating how large the spatial rend was. Roger approached the main dashboard and pressed on the folder that said, “Read me.” Before a pilot put themselves in the ice box, they’d compile a log of all the things they did.

Roger read through his coworker’s report and nodded. After he went to sleep in the ice box, a year had passed, but the spaceship still hadn’t fully mapped out the length or width of the spatial rend. The pilot of that time got impatient and dug a tunnel instead, creating a semi-stable pathway into and through the rend. The space inside was exactly like the space outside but included a bunch of unknown stars and planets. Perhaps a whole galaxy had been hidden away by the spatial rend. The spaceship continued towards the coordinates without bumping into anything. The next three captain logs didn’t include anything of significance, but the last log had one important line: approaching a solar system with a planet likely containing intelligent life.

Roger looked up and through the window, but he only saw the emptiness of space around him. The ship was three days away from the coordinates, but there wasn’t any planet in sight. Then, he stopped relying on his faulty human eyes and examined the data received by the spaceship. There were tons of data points, and after going through them, Roger came to the same conclusion as the last pilot. The spiritual fluctuations coming from the direction of the coordinates indicated a planet filled with intelligent beings; perhaps, they might’ve even been cultivators. There was a notable lack of other signals though, suggesting a lack of progress in the technological side of the planet’s growth—which was perfect for the crew. They’d be able to safely examine the planet from afar.

Roger leaned back and placed a piece of bubblegum into his mouth. Hopefully, this trip would be fruitful enough for him to retire. The ice box wasn’t a fun place to be.