The Villain's Sword Is Sharp

6 weeks ago in a grand hall in the Rank 3 district...

"I assume most of you have seen clips from the newcomers' tournament?"

The newcomers' tournament was always recorded using multiple Anima,

"If you have seen the clips, you will have seen Erik Baldur. All of us questioned the Aalto faction's decision when we heard they'd recruited a Rank 1 newcomer, but he definitely looks like a good seed. On the other hand, we have a gap. We won't have any strong talents awakening for the next 4 years but we can't just let the other factions seize dominance during this time. I suggest we recruit external talents too."

Sven Friberg voiced his opinion, but everyone else had varying thoughts,

"We'll be fine even if we don't recruit anyone; we're an established faction and just one newcomer can't shake us. Besides, recruiting Rank 1s will just burn resources – we've seen this time and time again."

"I think there's still a couple of good talents from the disciples that entered two years ago."

"No, we should recruit someone whose Erik's age. Even if they don't develop into a good talent, they can at least compete a bit with him, take some of his resources and slow his growth."

After hearing the opinions, Sven responded,

"I concur. After all, the best talents from the group 2 years ago have already been taken, but we can still get in early to try and poach a promising newcomer this year. Even if they're not established, they still have potential and can restrict Erik."

Some others still disagreed, but they were some of the smaller figures in the hall. Most of the important people agreed with Sven's suggestion and one of them – a bald man with a thick orange beard – added,

"This was actually quite an entertaining newcomers' tournament – Erik isn't this year's only good prospect. In fact, I believe there are 2 people who are at least, or maybe even more promising than he is."

"Oh?"

Most of the hall expressed surprise. After all, if the Aalto faction decided to rock the boat and recruit a newcomer early, they should've been an outstanding newcomer who was unmatched by anyone in their class.

Everyone at the meeting waited for Jorge to continue, but he stroked his orange beard and let their anticipation grow. Just as someone was about to urge him to speak, he opened his mouth,

"Lukas Brink and Isaac Dahl. The former is a natural first class talent who reached Rank 2 before the tournament and reached the semi-finals. The latter was the one who eliminated him – a third class talent who wields a sword with precision, fights intelligently, and was only narrowly defeated by Erik in the finals. In fact, I don't think he was defeated at all. If you've seen the finals, you know what I mean."

After saying his piece, Jorge dug a bronze pipe out of his pocket, lit it and started to puff while the discussion developed around him.

"The first class talent sounds like a good option. We know he'll make big gains from any resources we invest in him and, if we're lucky, he could even turn into the sect's next Rank 5."

Another elder snorted,

"I know a bit about Lukas Brink – my son was assigned to tutor him after all. So what if he's a first class talent? He'll reach Rank 4, get schemed against and die. He lacks intelligence and, most importantly, he lacks the right temperament to succeed in cultivation! His arrogance will turn him into a troublemaker who just makes problems for our faction."

Another elder spoke. He was a known rival of the previous grey-haired old man, so he naturally disagreed,

"Nonsense! If he lacks temperament, then we can train him! He's only a child so it's understandable if his attitude isn't perfect. As long as he has talent, we can still polish and refine him until he becomes a gem!"

A woman in her mid-twenties with a red butterfly hairpin added,

"What's most important is: has Isaac Dahl improved his talent yet or can he still do it?"

Jorge took the pipe out of his mouth, exhaled a long breath of smoke, then replied,

"No. He can still improve to second or first class."

That immediately sparked great discussion in the hall and everyone quickly split into 2 sides: one which supported Isaac and one which argued Lukas was better. In the end, the sides had rather even numbers of people, but the side supporting Isaac included the majority of elders and important people in the hall. Many of them had second class talent and had reached their positions through intelligence and guile, so they favoured Isaac's cunning and dedicated personality compared to Lukas' raw talent.

Among these elders was Sven Friberg, Johan and Lara's father. Maya was absent due to important sect duties so Sven represented the Friberg family today, making him the most authoritative figure here since the faction head, Martin Sundersen, didn't attend either.

This was enough to tip the scales firmly in Isaac's favour. After everybody had settled down, Sven announced,

"Then it's settled. We will recruit Isaac Dahl into the Sundersen faction."

*************************

Present day, 4th floor of the Cultivation Pagoda.

Isaac sat on the mattress in a completely calm state. His eyes were closed and his expression was as still as the words on a page while his will sunk down towards the Qi Core in his stomach.

The core was full of azure blue liquid Qi, but Isaac's will was formless and intangible, so it effortlessly floated to the centre of the liquid. Then, suddenly, it began to spin.

It created a spherical vortex in the centre of the Qi Core, and Isaac commanded it to start interacting with his Qi. As soon as he commanded this, the vortex pushed all the surrounding Qi away and created an empty space in the middle of the core.

The Qi around the vortex began to spin, and the vortex slowly grew quicker and larger. The Qi span faster and was compressed more. Its colour began to change and become paler, but there were many streaks of black in the mixture.

Isaac saw this and put even more effort into the vortex. His expression was no longer calm: his eyes were clamped shut and sweat began to form on his furrowed brows while his lips were pulled into a grimace.

The walls grew paler and the black streaks became more obvious. Suddenly, a small portion split from Isaac's will, dived into the liquid Qi, and scooped up a streak of black. Then it re-emerged while carrying a few drops of black liquid.

This liquid impurity was much worse than the gaseous impurities Isaac had expelled in previous breakthroughs, so he carefully brought it through his Qi Veins and expelled it from the meridian points in his little finger. Outside, several black drops dripped from Isaac's finger and fell on the mattress with a sizzle, burning small holes in it.

Meanwhile, the small portion of Isaac's will was already speeding back to his Qi Core. It scooped another streak of black from the rapidly spinning Qi and brought it away again.

He continued to repeat this process over and over again until he couldn't see any more black.

By this time, sweat covered his forehead and he felt slightly nauseous. After all, he'd been maintaining the large, spinning vortex of will this whole time. Now, however, was the hardest part.

He massively increased the vortex's spinning speed and he could see his Qi Core walls start to flake and crumble under the force of the spinning Qi. These were the 2 layers of blue paste he'd created in his previous breakthroughs: they were broken into flakes which dropped into the white-blue Qi, causing it to turn a deeper blue and become thicker in texture.

After all the paste was stripped away, Isaac felt his Qi Core groaning and creaking. He knew he had to act quickly.

He spun his liquid Qi rapidly, causing the paste to quickly dissolve in it and form a smooth mixture. Then he stopped spinning the vortex and caused it to rapidly expand instead.

The Qi was pushed hard against his Qi Core walls and got compressed. Its colour quickly turned back to white-blue as it began to solidify.

Isaac exerted all his willpower to compress the Qi as much as possible and, after an indeterminable amount of time, it finally turned into a solid layer on the inside of his Qi Core! This two-layered Qi Core was the sign of a Rank 2!