PtM 16 - Chapter 17: Immortal White

So I changed my mind. Because of how the chapters work out, I'm going to release 4 chapters this week and next week. I'll release the third chapter today. 

In other news, Book 15 is out on Amazon and KU. I would be eternally grateful if you left a review or rating or upvoted positive reviews on it.

--

Cha Ming had been to the Law Trial Complex many times over the years, sometimes to touch up on his training and sometimes to pay a visit to Huxian. Like body trials, the law trials were separated into three segments: domain, strength, and combat.

In the first trial, one would be faced with a series of non-lethal puzzles that one would need to use their domain and concepts to break through. In the strength trial, techniques and artifacts could be utilized to break down barriers, while in the combat trial, everything but body cultivation, divine abilities, and soul cultivation was allowed.

Huxian greeted Cha Ming as he arrived on the premises. He looked like he was on vacation, as he was wearing a floral print shirt and slurping on a fruit smoothie. The aura he was emanating was unmistakeable, however.

“Not bad,” Cha Ming said, looking Huxian over. “Not bad at all.”

“I finally broke through to the rune gathering realm,” Huxian said, giving Cha Ming a thumbs up. “And I’ve got to say, the three months of seclusion was hell, but the feeling is pretty awesome.” He held out his hand, and his dominion and domain overlapped to mold the spatial energies in front of him with the help of a silver rune that floated around his head.

Six crystalline arrows appeared in the palm of his hand. They were practically weightless and so sharp that even Cha Ming felt threatened by them. “How long will those last?” Cha Ming asked curiously.

“About three hours,” Huxian said. “I’d need to add some stabilizing ingredients if I want anything permanent. Not bad though, right?”

Cha Ming grabbed one of the arrows and flicked it with his finger. It shattered and scattered in the wind. “They’re fairly brittle.”

“It’s a trade-off,” Huxian said. “I’d like to see a fusion-realm demon take one of those. So. What’s up? Did you finally decide that beating things up with a stick and torching yourself every day was getting boring?”

“I’ve essentially been told to stop neglecting my law training,” Cha Ming said. “My body training is progressing quite nicely, and I’m unlikely to make any major breakthroughs for the next few years. So here I am.”

“Nice!” Huxian said, rubbing his palms together. “What’s it going to be? Trial grinding over and over until you finally realize you need a trainer or are you going to bite the bullet and take one right away.”

“Actually, I was recommended a very specific instructor,” Cha Ming said.

“Really now,” Huxian said. “Let me guess. It’s Immortal Shadowflame.”

“It was told Immortal White was the best,” Cha Ming said. The moment the words left his lips, the atmosphere in the entire Trial Hall changed. “What? What did I say?”

Huxian jumped up, shrank into half fox form, and grabbed Cha Ming by the collar like an angry toddler. “Why? Why would you even consider training with that madman?”

“What, train with Immortal White?” Cha Ming said.

“Stop saying his name!” Huxian said. He looked around warily, and seeing that the devil hadn’t answered his summons, he hopped off Cha Ming’s chest and brushed himself off. “He Who Must Not Be Named is not a good choice, Cha Ming. Pick someone else.”

“Are you sure you’re not overexaggerating?” Cha Ming asked. Huxian’s reaction had piqued his curiosity. Immortal White was quite something if he was able to get this kind of reaction from such a wide audience.

“People have died training with him,” Huxian said.

“Really now?” Cha Ming asked. “Tell me all the juicy details?” If that was the case, he’d have to reconsider following Godking Heavenbind’s recommendation.

Huxian coughed uncomfortably. “No one really knows what happened, and in the end, he wasn’t punished, so it probably wasn’t his fault. But look, people did die. A lot of them. And people back out of his training all the time. That tells you something, doesn’t it?”

Cha Ming was unconvinced. “The law trials aren’t lethal. How do people die so easily?”

“He lets you tackle those on your own, actually,” Huxian said. “He doesn’t do trials, because he thinks the lack of life-threatening danger isn’t enough to spur growth.”

Cha Ming whistled softly. “That’s some hardcore training, Huxian. I’m not going to lie to you, I’m a little excited at the prospect.” And it wasn’t just the Savage Deity Seed talking this time. All three of his auras were dancing around excitedly in his spiritual sea.

“As your brother, I’m asking you to reconsider,” Huxian said. “Just… relax for a bit. You’ve been training for 4 years. That’s basically forty years with time acceleration. We’ll have a barbecue at my place and de-stress for a while.”

Cha Ming groaned. “You know how I feel about people.”

“Then we’ll do it alone!” Huxian said. He appeared at Cha Ming’s side, turned him around, and began walking towards the exit. “Just take a bit of time off before you get back to training. Think about it. If you really feel strongly about it, I won’t stop you from training with He Who Must Not Be Named.”

Cha Ming considered it for all of three seconds before shooting the idea down. “Naw, I’m good. I’ll go see him.” He pushed past Huxian towards the address he’d been given.

“But consider the risks!” Huxian said.

“All you need to do is make a good case and I’ll listen to you, Huxian,” Cha Ming said. “Godking Heavenbind suggested him, and he’s the best body trainer. Tell me, Huxian – you said people died, and many people dropped out. But what about those that didn’t? How are they doing now?” There had to be a reason that people continued seeking him out despite his fierce reputation.

“That…” Huxian grimaced. “Okay. Fine. Let me show you.” He grabbed Cha Ming’s wrist, and they appeared a short distance away from the Law Trials leaderboard. Cha Ming was at the bottom of the rankings, as he’d barely passed the green trials before giving up. “First place. Daoist Felicity. She’s cleared three violet trials and one violet gold trial. There’s also Daoist Morning Light in 10th place. He’s passed one violet gold trial, one violet trial, and one blue trial.”

“It’s unusual to be so weak on one but so strong on the other,” Cha Ming said. “Is there a reason for that?”

“He has a crippled yang constitution, which makes him really good at techniques, but physically feeble,” Huxian said. “He has weak stamina, so he does poorly in the battle trials, but he has strong fire techniques, so he does well on the strength trials.”

“Two of the top ten then,” Cha Ming said, stroking his chin. “Not bad. Not bad at all.”

“I guess,” Huxian said. “But let me tell you – out of the fifty students he’s trained, two have gotten into the top ten. Five have gotten into the top fifty. But then twenty have dropped out of his training, and he’s failed fifteen and refused to continue training them. As for the last eight, they died. Eight out of fifty. It might not sound like a lot, but when you consider that only two hundred cultivators have died since the entrance trial, he’s the third leading cause of death in the Heartforge Realm, statistically speaking.”

“What are the first and second, out of curiosity?” Cha Ming asked.

“Monster attacks and vehicular accidents,” Huxian said.

“Cultivators die for vehicular accidents?” Cha Ming asked. “How does that even work?”

“Never mind how people die zipping around on fragile vehicles moving ten to a hundred times faster than they normally could, sometimes through the unstable void,” Huxian said. “Like I was saying, he’s doing better than failed breakthroughs, disease, and suicide, which are the usual runners up in transcendent planes, but he’s still vicious enough to make the rankings.”

“Eight out of fifty isn’t that high,” Cha Ming said.

“Fine. Fine,” Huxian said. “Just don’t say I didn’t warn you. Also remember that this poor life is connected to yours. If you die, I die, which isn’t a big deal if you’re doing something worthwhile, but this....” He sighed then. “What a coincidence. You came here today to start up the law trials, and my instructor just told me I should stop slacking off and go to the body trials. Said it would help my law comprehension.”

It was then that Cha Ming realized he’d misunderstood Huxian. He looked to be relaxing all the time but was actually serious about his training. He didn’t have the foundations as a qi cultivator that Cha Ming did, so improving slowly was only natural. To have reached the Rune Gathering Realm in such a short time without a foundation was actually quite impressive. It was well known that spatial laws were extremely difficult to comprehend.

In the end, Cha Ming took up Huxian on his offer. They spent a week relaxing at his residence and ignored everyone else. Even the friendly neighborhood paper tiger, who came with cinnamon buns, was ignored.

They just sat there and watched movies and played video games. Because yes, they had those things in the Heartforge Realm, and they were free. Huxian’s guess were that they were some kind of cruel test to tempt people to waste their time on frivolities. Or maybe relaxing was simply beneficial and complemented their training. It was anyone’s guess.

Following their short respite, they returned to their training. Their brief vacation only reaffirmed Cha Ming’s belief that Godking Heavenbind would never recommend him to anyone less than excellent. If he said Immortal White was the best thing since sliced bread, then he was. Besides, Cha Ming was already used to crazy, data driven training, and apparently, Immortal White collaborated on research with his demigod instructor. That meant they would have similar approaches, didn’t it?

All his theories were thrown out the window the moment he knocked on the door of Immortal White’s training and research facility. The door opened wide, revealing a dark interior.

Cha Ming stepped inside, and a gust of wind was the only indication that the door had closed. He blinked, and the world turned white. Two illusory eyes with irises that were half white and half black in the style of a yin and yang appeared and looked upon him with disdain.

“Immortal White?” Cha Ming asked. The two eyes did not blink, and neither did they respond to his question. “Immortal White, I am Daoist Clear Sky, and I came with an invitation from Godking Heavenbind.” He took out the letter, only to see it picked up and torn apart by an invisible force.

“I know who you are,” the owner of the eyes said. They faded as white-robed figure with a full head of long white hair and yin-yang eyes walked out from the blank nothingness. The immortal’s movements were slow, but every step caused Cha Ming’s law core to shiver with fear. “Heavenbind mentioned you. A five-element cultivator with creation and destruction runes. A brush-type soul-bound treasure that doubles up as a realm treasure with a variable form that can be split at will. All prized abilities. Self-created martial art. Self-created cultivation technique. Cultivates both Seventy-Two Earthly and Thirty-Six Heavenly Transformations.”

Cha Ming had not expected such thorough research on Immortal White’s part. “That is correct, Immortal White.”

Immortal White continued walking until he was just a few feet away from Cha Ming. “Daoist Clear Sky, I confess myself confused. Why exactly do you call yourself a Daoist when your law domain is so clearly lacking, and you perform so poorly in the law trials? I’ve read your files and see that you spent the last four years neglecting your law training to focus on body refining. Shouldn’t you call yourself Demigod Clear Sky? Or something else entirely unrelated to Daoism, at least?” Cha Ming opened his mouth to answer but found invisible strings sewing his mouth shut. “It was a rhetorical question meant to shame you. I have questions. Answer them. First, you cultivate the five elements, dual creation and destruction. You carved your core eight times, resulting in usually thick qi, therefore requiring immortal jades to condense your runes. Is that correct?”

“Yes,” Cha Ming answered.

“You currently have three auras, one of which is tied to creation?”

“Yes.”

“You have a variable soul bound treasure that can adopt stored forms,” Immortal White said. “It doubles up as a Realm Treasure, or so Godking Heavenbind tells me. “Tell me its forms.”

“Clear Sky Brush, Savage Deity War Staff, Ninesky Seal,” Cha Ming said.

“Three forms?” Immortal White said, looking pleased. “Not bad.”

“Clear Sky Carving Knife, Clear Sky Cauldron, Clear Sky Hammer, and Iridescent Grandmist Flame,” Cha Ming continued.

Immortal White looked up. “Now that’s interesting. Very interesting.” The way he said it made Cha Ming shiver.

“Why is that interesting, exactly, Immortal White?” Cha Ming asked. “If I may ask.”

“There will be time for questions later,” Immortal White said. “For now, answer mine. Strongest qi related abilities?”

“A self-made ability called Descent of the Five Sovereigns,” Cha Ming said.

“Execute it on the palm of your hand,” Immortal White said. “In miniature, if that wasn’t clear.”

Cha Ming frowned but did as he was told. Such a technique wouldn’t have nearly as much power as when he executed it in person, but an experienced immortal could probably deduce many things from it. It took three seconds for him to summon the full technique with all its hidden intents.

“Slow. Incomplete,” Immortal White said. “Made by mashing up five techniques, so not a unique creation. Hm?” He motioned over to Cha Ming’s projected technique and summoned it over, completely cutting off its connection with Cha Ming. “Are these the auras of the Star Point Monarchs? I thought one of them died. I must be behind on current affairs.”

“You are not,” Cha Ming said. “The Inkwell Plane, which I came from, is made from a remnant of the Inkwell Monarch. I happened to obtain the incomplete forms of their signature techniques, as well as their aura and blessing.”

“Hm…” Immortal White looked at the technique a little longer, then crushed it. “Domain manipulation, terrible. Domain manipulation technique, non-existent, true or false?”

“It’s possible to manipulate your domain and not just use it to control your surroundings?” Cha Ming asked.

“Yet you are a craftsman,” Immortal White continued. “I can respect that. What crafts do you practice?”

“Talisman arts, formation arts, and runic alchemy,” Cha Ming said. “I am moderately competent in the field of Spiritual Blacksmithing.”

“Anything with runes then,” Immortal White said, scratching his chin. “I suppose that’s a good foundation. Your domains and runes are quite powerful, and your variable treasure grants you many options. All things considered, Clear Sky is not a bad name, because you are essentially a blank canvas.”

Immortal White walked around Cha Ming all the while shaking his head. He wasn’t even looking directly at him. And the way the shadows blended in this world of white, it felt quite strange.

Then a different law and order imposed itself upon the room, and things became even stranger. Walls began to grow out of thin air like grass. The five elements mixed and combined to form a simple office space complete with many book shelves.

“The Dao I have picked is not one for the short-sighed,” Immortal White said. “I seek true, unrestrained creation, and the reason why I come here to teach is to find new ideas. I am first and foremost a researcher, and I consider myself a competent instructor, which is more than I can say for most of the instructors in this realm.”

He flicked his sleeve, and the bookshelf expanded endlessly. Cha Ming looked up and saw that the sky was mirror. Was it an illusion? Was it reality? With Cha Ming’s understanding of laws, he couldn’t be certain.

He looked back down and saw that Immortal White was gone. Where he’d been standing were two books, one black and one white, both with gold writing, stacked up on top of each other. And on top of those lay a circlet.

“If I am to accept you as a student, I need to test your determination,” a voice said from the void. “It is my evaluation that your ability to comprehend laws has been hampered by the damage to your soul. It is possible for you to compensate by mastering these two abilities.

“But first you will transfer me 70,000 points. The first 10,000 points are for the Initial Law-Stitching Grade Artifact, Mind Guard Circlet, which you will wear before learning them. I am aware that this will conflict with your divine ability, but you must bear with it.

“Thirty-thousand points are for the first five layers of the Immortal Grade Technique: Law Breaking Eye. The next thirty-thousand points are for the first five layers of the immortal Grade Technique: All-Creation Eye. You will provide me with the points before you learn the techniques, and I will not refund them.”

Cha Ming frowned. “Are these from the library?”

“I have a special arrangement with Immortal Heartlock,” Immortal White said. “But that isn’t any of your business. Well? I give you ten seconds to consider.”

What Immortal White was looking for was clearly trust. Cha Ming could only grit his teeth and accept. He first placed a drop of blood in the circlet. It faded from existence and appeared on his head. Its presence immediately suppressed his divine ability, Crown of the Starry Sky.

Immortal White said nothing, and Cha Ming could only assume this was part of the test. Perhaps the immortal wanted to see his baseline comprehension ability without his divine ability.

He picked up the black book with golden text. While it was technically an immortal technique, it had been split into nine layers. The first five consisted of qi condensation all the way to rune gathering.

It’s a third-eye technique, Cha Ming realized as he studied the book. Reading it brough him into a mental world filled with runes that were in the process of decomposing. Formations that were falling apart here, and law-structures not unlike those he’d seen in the Dao Origins were crumbling like skyscrapers in a post-apocalyptic world.

He quickly found the key to comprehending the technique. There was a street leading through this breaking world, and he simply had to walk to the end of it and survive to understand. But as he did so, waves of energy began attacking his mind.

His eyes itched. The center of his forehead burned. He wanted to gouge the illusory projection of an eye from out of his head. This was clearly just one of the barriers preventing him from learning the technique, so he kept on walking, regardless of the obstructions that appeared in his way.

His every step brought ruin and plague and death. Sometimes, a street or skyscraper would collapse into a gaping hole. Other times, building would topple over like giant dominos fit for a deity. Wherever he looked, laws crumbled and fell apart.

It took three days of wandering before he reached the end of the road, where a final test remained: An eye was floating there, watching him. Every time it blinked, Cha Ming lost consciousness, and every time it opened, he awakened.

Cha Ming could feel his body and inner universe collapsing every time.

Standing before the eye, Cha Ming knew that if he stepped back and gave up on learning this technique, he would be perfectly fine. By taking a step forward, he could master the technique, but forcing it came with great risk.

Do I trust him, or do I not? Cha Ming though. Immortal White had claimed he could do it, but then again, he did not know Cha Ming very well.

In the end, he decided to trust Heavenbind’s recommendation. He braced himself and pushed forward. The world began to fall apart around Cha Ming as he reached out for the eye.

The middle of his forehead burned. It was like a wedge had been inserted inside his brains, and tools were being used to rewrite his gray matter.

If he kept on going, his head burst open like a melon, and the consequences wouldn’t be limited to his physical body. His very soul would be damaged.

But Cha Ming did not relent. He growled and reached for the eye. The moment his hand touched it, his body began to disintegrate. His arms, his legs, and even his torso began to fade from existence.

Then he woke with a splitting headache and a burning sensation on his forehead. “Well done,” came Immortal White’s voice. A mirror appeared in the room and floated over.

Cha Ming blinked when he saw his reflection. At the center of his forehead was the black outline of a third eye, in the exact same location his Sacred Eye normally occupied when he activated his Crown of the Starry Sky. He knew without a doubt that these two techniques were incompatible.

Immortal White had already vanished again, and Cha Ming was left with the white book with gold lettering and a door ten feet to the left that would take him out of here. This door, he could sense, was unique. It would undo what had just been done. The damage need not be permanent, and all he would lose were his points.

“But if I keep going, the damage might be irreparable,” Cha Ming muttered as he felt at the sore spot on his forehead. He shivered, but ultimately chose to open the next book.

The pressure on Cha Ming’s mind redoubled the moment he entered the technique’s mindscape. The pressure was slowly increasing – he needed to learn All-Creation Eye as quickly as possible.

Like Law-Destruction Eye, All-Creation Eye was an immortal-grade third-eye technique with nine layers. Except instead of aiding him in seeing flaws and breaking his opponents’ techniques, this one would improve his ability to see where creation qi could be utilized and enhance his ability to manipulate it.

This time, there was no ruined world. There was only whiteness all around him. Cha Ming realized that there was no road he needed to walk here. Instead, he needed to create it.

Cha Ming was an old hand at creating something from nothing. A paving stone appeared beneath his feet. He took one step forward, then another, and soon, a complete road was being assembled as he travelled.

He continued walking, and as he did, it wasn’t just a road that appeared, but a forest on either side with five complete elements and five complete laws. The sun shone overhead, as did a clear blue sky.

There were birds and bees and rivers and lakes. Learning this technique came naturally. The only problem was the pressure he felt.

The further he walked, the greater the pressure he felt in the middle of his forehead. The technique is conflicting, Cha Ming realized. He moved to dispel the technique, but then froze when he realized that in this place, his subconscious was overly active.

Cha Ming was forced to pause and reason over why this was. There was no reason for Immortal White to sabotage him, especially considering that Godking Heavenbind had recommended him. This meant that there must be a way for this to work, even if he didn’t already know it.

But why did I try to dispel it? Cha Ming wondered. He inspected his body and found nothing, but when he inspected his soul, he found the culprit. It was the Savage Deity Seed, which had been on the back foot, that didn’t want him learning this.

The real question was why. Was it because it endangered his survival, or because it was getting nervous about the growth of his Seed of Iridescence and his Seed of Inspiration?

He ultimately decided that the Savage Deity Seed was more concerned with survival than anything else. That meant that this situation was truly life threatening. What’s worse, he couldn’t even rely on his strong intuition to guide him.

This was, in essence, a second part to the test of trust. There was a big difference between deciding to cultivate a single technique and accepting advice that might well kill him or result in permanent damage.

Then again, my Law-Destruction Eye is unstable, Cha Ming thought. My cultivation is balanced, and I have both creation and destruction runes that balance each other out. It stands to reason that to stabilize Law-Destruction Eye, I would need a creation-based ability. And that, in itself, would invite rejection.

Cha Ming decided to press onward despite the mounting pressure and the threat to his life. A paradise built itself up around him and grew to the size of a small city. This continued until the world grew to the size of a large country, then began to crack as the conflict between both third eye techniques reached a breaking point.

He could only fix these cracks and put up with upon wave of destructive energy. It was painful to resist them, but he needed to have faith in himself. Faith that he could pull through and complete this daunting task.

He gritted his teeth and pressed onwards, and when the pain became blinding, he began to see light interspersed in the darkness invading his mind. No, not light, he realized. Starlight! His Crown of the Starry Sky… was activating! This normally wouldn’t be possible, because he was wearing a blood bound circlet, which was occupying the same spot his Crown of the Starry Sky would.

The farther he walked, the more certain he became. Increasing amounts of starlight poured in through the cracks, alleviating the strain on his mind and spirit. The starlight was helping him regulate the Law Destruction Eye and All-Creation Eye techniques.

At the edge of this world was a portal, and by the time he arrived, most of the illusory world had fallen apart. He saw that If he walked through the portal, he would master the technique. But every step he took would threaten to consume him.

There were five hundred steps between him and the exit, and the cracks were nothing more than tiny fissures. The fissures expanded as he walked, and when three hundred steps remained, the path on either side of him crumbled.

He continued undaunted until pieces of the small pathway remaining fell through, leaving only tiny islands in the void leading up to the door. By then, only a hundred steps remained, and a crack appeared on the Mind Guard Circlet.

When fifty steps remained, a few more cracks appeared, and his third eye began to throb.

When ten steps remained, the mind guard circlet warped and twisted and threatened to shatter. The same applied to his eye. He felt that if he took another step, his law destruction eye would fade from existence.

By now, the amount of starlight he could channel had reached its peak and even pushed past it. It provided him with a strong intuition that told him that while danger was up ahead, there was also opportunity. So he forced himself onward despite the risks and chose, once again, to trust Immortal White.

Three steps from the exit, the circlet crumbled to pieces.

Two steps from the exit, Cha Ming’s law destruction eye broke into eight parts.

Only one step remained, and all hope seemed lost. He did not want to give in, but it didn’t seem he had any other options.

That was when he felt a surge of immortal energy rush into him and stabilize his mind and spirit, giving him just enough strength to push through that door. He screamed as his mind returned to his body and he returned to the real world once again.

This time, the pain wasn’t illusory. His eyes were bleeding, and he couldn’t see. He felt like he’d been stabbed in the brain by a hot poker.

But he could also feel that the pain was lessening. Something had changed inside his Crown of the Starry Sky. His divine ability was evolving, and so were the two techniques!

“The Law Destruction Eye technique and the All-Creation Eye Technique are substandard compared to other options,” Immortal White said. He was seated in front of Cha Ming, observing the reconstruction process. “But they have a few advantages compared to other techniques.

“First, they are easy to understand. They are divided into nine tiers, and therefore they are cheaper, at least in the early stages. Second, they play to the strengths of your runes. The techniques are very useful for assembling thing and taking them apart.

“Third, while these techniques conflict, it is possible to fuse them together. This can only be done if one has both a creation domain and destruction domain, which is a rarity. The odds of success are normally low, but your Crown of the Starry Sky is a powerful mental shielding and vision regulating ability. I was reasonably confident in forcing the fusion. If you’d failed, I was confident in negating most of the damage.

“In the end, you failed, but you were close enough that I was able to use my mastery over the five elements to help you along and force the transformation, thereby upgrading your divine ability enough that you could fuse both techniques.”

Then, for the first time since Cha Ming had knocked on the door, Immortal White smiled. “You followed my instructions despite the risks, Clear Sky. You trusted me. I will not forget this. What you have just condensed is the very powerful variant third-eye ability called All-Heaven’s Eye.

“Its ability to perceive laws, whether it to destroy, create, or comprehend them, is unmatched among all third eye abilities. This will make up for some the time you’ve lost and will also help offset the sorry state of your soul.

“And once your soul heals…” Immortal White’s smile widened into a grin. “I have no doubt that we’ll have a third little monster in our research group.”