Chapter 564 - Bronze Ascension

“An awfully late walk you took, Eric.”

Eric came to an abrupt stop as he slowly walked the steps leading to his bedroom balcony, his hair still wild from a Mach 5 Sprint through howling winds and leaves and pollen that had touched him so lightly. Just enough for deep, refreshing breaths of air he didn’t need to survive, only thrive. Enough to rustle his hair and decorate him with a couple leaves, with all the scents of mountains and grain-heavy fields caressing his form. Now just a single shower away from a good night’s sleep.

And here Hanna was, gazing at him from the steps upon which she sat, drinking an evening cup of herbal tea, wearing a silk robe with a crimson and gold dragon stitched upon it, radiating a cultivator’s protective wards, even now.

Years after she had fallen from on high. Her meridians bound shut to the point that peripheral exercises alone had spared her a slow, agonizing death, even as it aged her far more rapidly than any Energy Storage cultivator should have to bear.

Truths he saw in the exhausted crinkle of her eyes, and the warmth of her smile.

As painful to realize as the mother’s love she felt for him… a tiny flame, perhaps, but her affection was real. Eric understood without being told that he was solace for a precious spark that had been lost to her. And the eyes gazing at him so intently at that moment had never belonged to a fool, as he stood there in bluejeans and wild hair, traces of dirt and perhaps a few droplets of blood guiltily showing in the moonlight gracing them both.

“I can only imagine what wonderful, wild adventures my faerie prince of a boy has gotten up to, tonight.”

Eric blinked, stiffening for only a heartbeat before flashing a cheeky grin.

“Oh, you know, normal things, Aunty Hanna. Killing a few sea monsters, rescuing a few damsels, slapping the faces of a few young masters, putting low-class thugs in their place. Typical adventures for a faerie prince.” He chuckled. “Or perhaps I’m just an out of place boy dreaming of wild and wonderful adventures, now inspired to put it all in writing, even though I have no idea how publishing even works, here.”

Hanna patted his pant leg. “And that’s why you smell of mountain flowers, blood, sweat, and wild Qi.” She dipped her head, eyes twinkling with amusement. “You even captured the sharp bitter scents of a cultivator’s ascension perfectly! If I didn’t know better, I’d think you had actually glimpsed your Dao, tonight. Truly, you have a vivid imagination and will make a wonderful storyteller with your future finance degree.”

Eric chuckled. “I know, right? A couple faerie cantrips, and I can be inspired by all the sights and smells I can imagine,” he cheekily declared, summoning forth a handful of cards and having them dance and twirl between his fingers before erupting in a flash of chilly blue flame.

He closed his eyes and smirked, trying not to be too unnerved by the trick that now came so naturally to him, evoked in a moment of inspiration… and he wasn’t even exactly sure how he had done it, and could only hope that Hanna didn’t ask him to actually summon forth any unusual scents or sounds or images. Because clearly, he had a hell of a lot to work on before he was any sort of level 1 Illusionist equivalent, and he was in the last place in the galaxy that would have any arcane classes on cantrips, he was sure.

Fortunately, Hanna let it go with a gentle gentle pat, and Eric could only hope that wasn’t blood and soil now on the palm of her hand.

Instead, her gaze turned to the heart of her garden, the flower beds perfuming the air with all the delights of spring as her corn grew tall, beans and squash eager to be harvested far sooner than Eric thought they had any right to… but the garden’s warm contentment couldn’t be denied.

Nor the Spiritual Energy flows flowing through it even now.

“I once found that few things are better after an epiphany than meditating in my sect’s garden. Though its a poor substitute, I’ve done my best to mirror it here.”

She flashed him a painfully understanding smile. “Whether it was midnight walks under the stars on a world alien to your kind that inspired your miraculous growth or not, I invite you to make full use of our own garden in whatever way you see fit, tonight, Eric.” She gently patted his cheek. “And congratulations on your breakthrough.”

Eric, cheeks flushed, couldn’t help but bow his head as Hanna quietly went back inside. Not quite sure whether to feel relieved or shamed. Humbled by just how perceptive his foster mother was, a tiny part of him wondering how much she suspected, how much she truly knew.

But at the same time, she was absolutely right.

Eric had enjoyed not one but two breakthroughs this night upon the ladder of ascension, even if he presently strode Evolution’s path, evolving his race after every perilous struggle. And even if his path forward as an actual cultivator had never been less certain, his Dragon Gates sealed with four dimensions worth of gunk and necromantic sewage… he couldn’t deny how incredibly glorious it felt, his lymphatic system absolutely singing with what was now a fantastic 109 Points in Spiritual Energy, over 1300 Qi points, without any NanDushian boost at all. Not that he would hold back from savoring it or the flow of Qi throughout the entire garden.

So he assumed the lotus position and took slow, deep breaths as tears of happiness, relief and dismay all streaming down his cheeks for any number of reasons whil he savored a few precious minutes cycling his Qi. Even if it was little more than deep breathing and encouraging healthy lymphatic flow, just as a mortal might, his handful of cleared peripherals also tingling with what he decided was happiness, and the gunk leaking from his pours that he wicked away effortlessly, thanks to Blood Mastery and his ES Space, was just as stinky as Hanna had implied.

Maybe it was the highly toxic and exceedingly powerful cultivation lozenge that wild cultivator Liang had gifted him. Maybe it was because he had actually broken through to bronze.

Whatever the reason, cleansing himself of impurities left him feeling like a new man. Reborn to savor a second chance to enjoy all of life’s wonders… or take that next step as a cultivator.

And it wasn’t attributes alone that had benefited from his adventures that day, he thought with a smile, slowly unsheathing the mithril blade that he still had secured to his hip.

A blade now blazing with crimson fire that felt more real than the garden all around him.

Infused with five ranks of Dominion. Capable of cleaving through any conniving shadow magics, phasing arts, or multidimensional bullshit, Dominion’s Reach meant it was now an extension of his will, himself, his Domain. What he struck would be cut, unless they were truly quick or tough enough to resist.

“It might not be IceFire, but I can extend it hundreds of yards and cut krakens down to size,” he said to himself with a fond smile, before the night erupted in a brilliant flashing display of blazing fiery moulinets as Eric danced and spun about the garden, now seven feet above the ground, standing upon a smooth surface only he could see. Yet the Spiritual Energy caressed him still, as his blade wove and spun in a fierce exultant dance, even without extending it a single extra inch.

Because he didn’t need to.

And with Quickness over 160 times an Olympian’s, the entire garden seemed to blaze with brilliant flashing pyrotechnics the color of blazing blood to the eyes of any mortal, even those who had only walked a few steps along an immortal’s path, as Eric condensed hours worth of disciplined training in mere minutes, Battletime screaming at maximum as he relived every martial movement in the dance of blades he had mastered so well here… and a half dozen perilous battles with Bronze and Silver opponents that had almost ended with his death, back on Earth.

Then, with a shuddering breath, he resheathed his quenched blade and bowed before invisible opponents only he could see… the air then ringing with the trills and claps of a pair of girls who most definitely should not have been witnessing his performance.

He winced as he sunk back to the ground, eyes widening with dismay as Maja and Ella slipped out of the tree they had been sleeping in, flouncing over to give his bemused form a heartfelt hug.

“That was wonderful, brother!”

“You made the entire garden light up with pretty fire!”

“Were you practicing with your magical sword?” An awed Maja asked.

“No enemy clan would dare fight us with you defending us!” Ella fiercely declared.

“Eric? What’s going on? Why are you guys up?”

Eric froze, cheeks flaring as he forced himself to turn around, but not before making his sheathed blade disappear. Wait! Had he been wearing that when he had had his talk with Hanna?

He suppressed that awful thought as best he could while turning around to smile at a tired-looking Louise, looking cute in nighties and very put out with all three of them.

Maja trilled guiltily.

Eric forced a laugh. “Oh, you know faerie rituals! Now’s the perfect time to enhance the garden’s bounty!”

Louise crossed her arms. “Seriously, Eric? It’s midnight, and you and I have meditation practice with Mother before school even starts. She said it will be a special day, tomorrow. Are you sure your growing ritual can’t wait for the weekend?”

Eric affected a thoughtful nod. “You make an excellent point, Louise. We can do this another time. Right, girls?” Maja and Ella gave guilty nods.

“So, Louise… what made you come out?”

“You mean besides the blazing fiery flare that was lighting up our entire garden?”

Eric winced. “Yeah… that.”

“Was that part of your ritual?”

“Maybe?”

Louise huffed. “Come inside. It’s getting chilly, and if I can’t get a good night’s sleep… You’re doing the dishes for another week!”

“Fine. But I still get triple the ice cream you do.” He flashed a smug grin. “Forever.”

“That’s bullshit!”

Eric laughed. “Night, sis!”

“Night, idiot. Come on, girls, let’s put you to bed. Now stop pouting. You know you can’t go sneaking out like that, every night. Your worrying Mom.”

A guilty trill was the last Eric heard as he made his way up the stairs to his room, taking a quick shower while his thoughts raced.

Had he really forgotten to hide his sword before speaking to his foster mom?

And she had said absolutely nothing?

He suppressed a groan as he slipped between cool cotton sheets, dreading what looks or too serious conversations the next day would bring. But before he let himself slip off into nod, he finally allowed himself a look at his condensed character sheet, and it was all he could do not to leap out of bread, spring out of the house, and shout his triumph to the heavens, when he saw how far he had truly come.

-_____________________________________________________________-

Eric Silver - Level 99 PRISTINE GOLDEN PHOENIX (Adventurer)

(3rd Tier Core Saturation at 85%) You and your progeny may now ascend to Light Gold without any planetary sacrifices needed at all!

Rank 2 ELITE DISCIPLE (Eve’s Chosen)

Level 74 Master Necromancer (You like living, so you have voluntarily locked away your ability to raise the dead!)

Actual Cultivation Path (Free of System Influence :D) – NONE (Yet!)

Your Official Power Equivalent: Rank 41 SILVER – (WOW!)

Physical Characteristics

Strength – 4073 (With Burst of Strength, you can shred pretty much any object, even those reinforced by higher order concepts, if they don’t exceed your WRATH! Super Punch man would be proud! Tungsten-reinforced bank vaults? You’re bursting them with ease!)

Vitality – 4077 (Your Vitality is worthy of a Silver-tier behemoth!)

Finesse – 1866 (You’re now as deadly as a Bronze-tier sniper. Even without all their perks!)

Quickness – 3265 (You’re over 160 times faster than an Olympic Fencer. ABSURD! Good thing Battletime makes pesky things like relativity, inertia, and air resistance strictly optional for you!)

Appearance – 42 (If this were pre-apocalypse, you would star in all your mother’s movies!)

Mental Characteristics

Scholarship – 46 (You’re still yourself, but your thoughts are clear and your memory is sharp!)

Perception – 1815 (A deadly marksman who always spots his prey. No one’s sneaking up on you!)

Willpower – 181 (You were forged in fire, and it shows!)

Charisma – 23 (No comment. This isn’t your path. You didn’t choose the slice-of-life option, so there’s no going backsies this late in the game!!)

Potency Pools

Arcane Potential – 1584 (An Archmage would be proud to make you his prodigy!)

(Mana Pool = 19011)

Spiritual Energy – 109 (A lymphatic system evolved for channeling Spiritual Energy above all else serves you well, Contender!)

Qi Pool = 1310

Psionic Potency – 619 (Despite your flaws, you’re worthy of a Psion Knight’s regard.)

(Psion Pool = 7431)

Soul Reserves – 1823 (You could be a Master Necromancer... You ARE a Master Necromancer!)

Stamina – 40771 Points

Health – 46803 Points

Resistances & Recovery

Physical Resistance – 1624 (At this point, you could charge the Imperium’s Dreadnoughts at sub-light speed and THEY would be the ones to blow up on impact! NOTHING short of Deep Silver opponents or essence-infused attacks is damaging your flesh! With Battletime further cushioning the blows? You’re ABSURD!)

Physical Regeneration – 407 health per second (After triple-heart shots, it’s clear you DO need this!)

Elemental Resistance – 941 (Resistances this high means you’re basically immune to elemental magic, unless Higher Order concepts are in play. No Silver-tier master lacking essence-infused spells is stopping you, Hyperion Blazer!)

Qi Resistance – 807 (Shockingly high! Your Qi Resistance is now MANY TIMES your Spiritual Energy! BE CAREFUL, Body Cultivator! The wise warrior balances resilience with bountiful reserves!)

Mental Resistance – 789 (Even Silver-tier faerie enchantments, persuasion, and illusions will be revealed to you, unless Essences and Higher Order concepts are in play.)

Psionic Resistance – 603 (Dense Neurons mean squid-brains and Psion Lords like Song won’t find you easy prey at all!)

NOTE – Contrary to popular belief, you DO have access to your System Interface sheet abilities and powers!

NOTE – Social Perk use is LIMITED! No more social crutches for you, Eric. Your friendly silver brain worms (who love you truly!) can’t help your painfully Dense Neurons decipher monkey-behaviors in this realm!

-____________________________________________________________-

***

“You did it, Fearless Leader! You broke through to Bronze and finally have enough Spiritual Energy to enjoy those muscles of yours. Not to mention the perfect calamari baster.”

“Ha ha,” Eric chuckled, giving his purring familiar scritches as they relaxed in Bunbun’s luxurious dreadnought suite. Eric grinned and summoned forth a chocolate eclair to go with his ice cream sundae. “This is awesome, Bunz. I love waking dreams. Sweets, for some reason, taste so much sweeter.”

“Totally, BD! Not that you need to worry about savoring every morsel with… what was your Perception again?”

“1815.” Eric couldn’t wipe the smug grin off his features. All the more so when his daughter, who really was asleep and snuggling her favorite bunny in the world, furrowed her pert little brow and twitched her ears. Clearly a tiny bit jealous of her awesome dad.

Eric very pointedly didn’t look at the oversized lump in the blankets beside her.

“Don’t, Eric,” Bunbun consoled. “Just eat your yummy eclair and don’t worry about things a galaxy away.”

Eric sighed, he and his dreaming bunny comfortably seated in the garden portion of the suite that Bunz and their daughter shared, a smirking Bunbun looking fondly at her sleeping form and the beloved daughter holding her.

Eric gently stroked her ears. “So, how is our kiddo, anyway?”

“Good!” Bunbun said with a happy nod, before snuggling into Eric’s lap for more pets. “She enjoys playing admiral and leveling up her Dreadnought skills. And you wouldn’t believe how effective Imperial grade mem-tapes are for flash-learning with our potential. Just one more cute toy those asshole administrators and goblins tried to keep out of our hands.” Bunbun then gave Eric a fierce grin.

“And boy, did they pay for that bit of buggery in the end!”

Eric chuckled, thinking fondly of a certain underground bunker. “Well, if nothing else, we know that even Conceptio thought those assholes were scheming little worms that needed to be put in their place.”

“True,” his familiar commended, before giving Eric a very pointed look. “But you do realize that petty bureaucratic scheming is as much a part of the galactic fundament as the eternal search for power, fame, and good times! Right?”

Eric sighed and nodded. “I know.”

Bunbun snuggled herself against him. “You’re not going to change the mindset of countless cultivating sects, academies and clans. You know that, right? It would be stupid to even try… and Conceptio’s sway begins and ends with the most powerful Contender to step foot on Titan Prime in ages.”

Eric groaned, rubbing his face with his now empty hands. “This is about those cultivators I pissed off, isn’t it?”

His rabbit snorted. “Even Eve was quietly impressed with just how damned ballsy and yeah, stupid you were… not only making dumb, dumb, and dumber look like buffoons while surrendering a priceless clan treasure, but you recorded the whole thing on camera!” Bunbun chortled. “And you’d better believe I downloaded all the files of your adventures, yesterday. Eve and Lilly both had a good chuckle.”

Eric winced. “Wait, you can do that with my tablet, even where I am? Never mind. It’s you. Okay, maybe I shouldn’t be letting our baby see daddy’s more aggressive side.”

Bunbun snorted. “Actually, she thought plopping Rat-face’s head on Malcom Tory’s desk was a great touch. Remember, hero, she’s basically an imprint of me… with your quirky genes now definitely altering how she approaches things, this time around, but with almost all my memories still her own. Well, up to our most recent adventures. So, yeah. We both really, really don’t like dirty scumbags threatening to do bad things to vulnerable kids.”

“Fair point. But still…”

“Yeah, Eric. Maybe don’t declare your foster name before tweaking the noses of young masters?”

Eric scowled. “But I’m supposed to declare myself to be ‘true’ to my cultivation. No lying. No hiding. At least when actually confronted by cultivators and not just trying to walk anonymously around mortals, right?”

Bunbun sighed. “Yeah, Eve actually gave me a very concise minute of her time to let me know that yes, it is complicated, but that no, you don’t actually have to declare yourself to potential hostiles. Not even challenging ‘young masters.’ Especially when you’ve shown off no power or ability. Then, you can hide in plain sight indefinitely without technically breaking any law, no matter how much they try to shame everyone into revealing themselves. And if they start trouble, self-defense is another safe zone. You can defend yourself and still remain anonymous. But the minute you show off your powers or attempt to intimidate or otherwise declare yourself worthy of respect or recognition, then you’re obligated to do so with your true face and intentions.”

Eric sighed. “Somehow, I bet it all works a lot better and you’re a lot less vulnerable if you’re part of a tight academy in the highlands than a sprawling city of over 20 million in NanDushi.

Bunbun chortled, eyes twinkling. “Of course, Eric. You’d be silly to think that the cards won’t always be stacked to keep the elites on top and the up-and-comers in their place or in a shallow grave, somewhere. And that’s not just all the cities of Titan Prime. That’s all planets, everywhere.”

Eric scowled.

“It’s not that deep, Eric. Mostly, it just pops up in the form of annoying roadblocks that slow your success but don’t actually hinder it too much. At least not if your success could profit an entire society like in healthy capitalism, though of course powerful individuals or corporations will then use espionage or legal pretexts to steal or claim all your clever ideas. But on the bright side, the nicer, more elite cultures just buy you out. So take the money and be rich already!

“Anyway, now that you understand the rules you’ll be living by a bit better, you know just to smile and give innocuous bullshit, next time hostile-seeming strangers press you. If they take offense and attack, well, then it’s totally self-defense and you have the right to let loose and even loot their corpses, while still revealing nothing that doesn’t come out of your fist, first. Ha ha.”

Eric grit his jaw. “But I still revealed too much to what is now a clan that no doubt hates me.”

“True.” Bunbun said, before raising a furry digit. “But that’s only if those three idiots are okay with absolutely shattering their futures and their foundations. They definitely had the fear of oblivion put into them when they sensed just the tiniest bit of their potential being torn free to grant you your second Bronze-Tier cultivation level in a single day. And the weight on their souls is real! But a 50% experience point penalty equivalent for the next five levels that they might eventually earn is just the tiniest of roadblocks compared to the utterly shattered ruin that their foundations would become, if they broke their cultivator’s oaths to a faerie prince.”

Bunbun snorted at Eric’s relieved expression.

“Or at least… that’s what they choose to believe.”

Eric winced. “I need to do better.”

“True!” Bunbun said brightly. “So when you embrace your morning cultivation session with Hanna cleansing your peripherals tomorrow morning—and Eve is actually more than a bit impressed with Hanna’s innovative techniques and refusal to surrender to despair, but don’t tell her I said that that—do keep an eye out for the unexpected! You might be surprised at what odd fortunes might hop into your lap.”

Eric blinked at this. “Bun?” he whispered, before taking an unexpected breath and falling back on his feather-stuffed mattress… because he was already awake and feeling utterly and completely refreshed, with no trace of starships, familiars, or daughters anywhere to be found.