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“Ye… Yes,” I said, slightly disoriented from the change in scenery.

We had moved from the middle of a bustling city to the outskirts of a small village surrounded by craggy, rocky hills. Instead of the city’s wide array of eclectic buildings, the village only had a few small stone huts.

The majestic Dragon Peak which had soared above the clouds had disappeared. The bounty of colors from its various features, such as the reds and greens from trees and shrubs to the blues and grays from creeks and rivers, were no more. It had all been replaced by a dull brown solid stone mountain that looked rather squat by comparison.

“Please come with me.” The middle-aged man gestured at one of the nearby stone huts.

Bewildered by our new surroundings, the three of us didn’t move.

“Is this the Earth Peak?” asked Shi YuLong. “Where are all the people?”

“Yes, it is,” the man confirmed. “Let’s get you registered first. Once that is taken care of, I can share a bit of information about the peak on our way to the Trial.”

Not wanting to delay matters, we put our questions aside and followed him obediently.

As we walked, I quickly checked his cultivation. He was a low-level Grandmaster. It felt a bit strange to see a Grandmaster being deferential to fresh new Masters. He was a Grandmaster in the Nine Rivers Sect. Did our position as Master-level Academy students somehow put us above him?

He brought us to one of the small huts near the archway and gestured for us to enter. Inside was a bored-looking young man with his feet up on his desk.

Our guide squeezed in front of us and waved us forward. “Senior brother, another group of students has arrived.”

The ‘senior brother’ waved lazily at us. “Instructor?”

“Grandmaster Yuan,” I answered.

“Names?”

“Su Fang, Lin LiTing, and Shi YuLong.”

He wrote something down on a piece of paper and threw it to our guide.

“Verify them.”

The guide ran out of the hut, and the young man turned his attention back to staring at the ceiling.

We waited in complete silence for several long minutes before the guide returned. When he did, he quickly handed another piece of paper to the young man.

“Take them to the Trial.” He waved us away as he dismissed us from his thoughts.

Our guide took us back outside and started leading us towards the base of the rocky mountain.

Once we were safely away, YuLong snorted. “That guy was a bit of a prick.”

The guide looked horrified at this and quickly shook his head in negation.

“Senior Brother Yang is a grade 2 outer sect disciple and has been growing quickly. He might rise to the inner sect during his next exam. We can’t afford to make him angry.”

“Is this what Instructor Yuan was talking about?” asked LiTing. “There are no rules in the sect, so he can kill anyone he pleases?”

Our guide once again shook his head. “That is only true on Dragon Peak, and to a lesser extent, the outer four mountains. The Peak Master of the Earth Peak is very strict about the rules here. It’s just that they are his rules, not the rules of the sect. Murder is not allowed here, but an inner sect disciple killing a servant disciple like me isn’t considered murder.”

We nodded silently in understanding.

“As Academy students, you have extra protections, but even if you don’t care about me, you should be careful not to anger anyone while you’re here. With the right connections, even an outer sect disciple can make your life miserable once you join the sect.”

Agreeing with his sentiment, I decided to ask about something else.

“Where is everyone? This place feels rather empty.”

The guide breathed slightly in relief at the change of topic before explaining.

“They’re around.” He gestured expansively to the surrounding landscape. “People only come to the Earth Peak to cultivate in seclusion, so they’re locked away in small caves everywhere around here.”

Looking closely at the landscape, I saw darker spots which might have been the caves he was referring to.

“The village has a store to purchase items from the peak and a place to arrange meetings and lessons, but that’s about it. You have to go to Dragon Peak if you want to see people just walking around or do any real trading.”

LiTing looked surprised. “So, everyone on the Earth Peak is just hiding out in some random cave?”

The guide chuckled.

“No, as I said, the only real reason to come here is to cultivate in seclusion. Most disciples are up on Dragon Peak or—” He paused abruptly, cutting himself off. “—elsewhere.”

He didn’t seem to want to say much more, so we quickly hurried on towards the base of the mountain where we were guided into an ornate cave opening. The passageway led downward, deep into the roots of the mountain. While it should have been dark, light was provided by a faint glow coming off the walls surrounding us.

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The passageway ended at a small room where a stone archway provided a view into absolute darkness.

To the side of the arch stood an elderly-looking man. I checked him in energy vision, but he seemed to be nothing but a simple mortal.

“Place all storage items to the side.” The old man pointed at a shelf where two large bags already rested. “You’ll end up in a rather unhealthy state if you try to take them inside with you.”

We followed his order mechanically, but as I processed the statement, a twinge of fear shot through me. Was this Trial contained within a compressed space like a storage bag? What would happen if I entered while the storage space was in my soul?

I looked at the archway leading into darkness carefully. Something from my space affinity suggested to me that it was different from the portals we had passed through previously, but I couldn’t discern any details.

What if my storage space exploded within my soul when I passed through? Was that possible?

My thoughts raced as I tried to decide what to do.

“System,” I subvocalized, “what will happen to my soul if I pass through that portal?”

Cost 100 million credits.

Expensive, but did I have a choice?

“Purchase it.”

Purchase confirmed. 1,906,831,805 credits remaining.

Your storage space is located within your soul. The portal in question leads to an area of expanded physical space. Entering such an area will not affect your soul or anything inside of it.

That was good news. It opened up even more questions, but I wasn’t willing to spend the money necessary to ask them. I got the answer I needed for the moment.

After everyone had removed their storage items, we turned back to the elderly man.

“Can you tell us anything about the Trial? What are we supposed to do? How long will it take?”

“You have a maximum of one day inside, but you may exit at any time. In each room, you need only defeat your opponents to advance. Once they have all been destroyed, the way forward will open.”

I looked at my companions.

“Ready?”

LiTing gave a faint smile and nodded.

YuLong grinned widely. “Let’s do this.”

We stepped through into the darkness.

I appeared alone in a large cave. All the walls were solid stone, and there was only a single passageway leaving this chamber, but it was labeled ‘Exit.’ I had expected the other two to appear alongside me, but appearing alone wasn’t a complete shock.

Large stones were scattered everywhere, and a hulking two-meter-tall stone golem stood in the center of the cavern. It didn’t move. It only stood still as a statue in the middle of the room, but I was certain this was the first opponent I was supposed to defeat.

With the only instructions given being to ‘defeat your opponent,’ my first instinct was to barrel straight toward the stone monstrosity and try to destroy it with a powerful technique.

I quickly curbed this impulse.

I might be facing down a monster, but it wasn’t moving to attack me. There was no meaningful time limit, so I could spend a few minutes taking stock of my situation.

I looked around the room with energy vision, the walls, including the floors and ceiling, were covered in a soft haze. Whatever energies had been used to place me in this location and control the surroundings were completely hidden from me.

The stones scattered about the ground were completely ordinary with no traces of energy. This told me that I only needed to worry about the large stone golem in front of me.

Looking at it in energy vision gave me a far more interesting and detailed picture than normal vision had. It was a strange construction of countless different formations carved into several interlocking pieces of granite. Just one of its arms had over a dozen formations that controlled its movement.

In the center of its torso was what must\'ve been the control center. It was encased in a thick wall of compressed stone. The tiny formations inside this core had threads of qi extending outward, connecting them to the arms and legs.

If I wanted to destroy this thing, the most direct method would be to destroy that central control unit in its chest. If the golem defended itself, that would be a difficult area to hit, but it would no doubt be the most effective. The only other option I could see would be to slowly disable it. First destroying its arms and legs, and only focusing on the control unit once the golem was completely disabled.

The stone the monster was made from was pure granite. By reinforcing my arm and fist, I might be able to break through it, but it wouldn’t be easy. Granite was weak to qi, but that didn’t mean it was easy to punch apart with qi-empowered fists. If I had a complete set of meridians, I would be able to transfer qi from around my body to sufficiently enhance the strength of my attacks. As a mere Martial Master 1, that would be incredibly difficult.

So, what should I do?

We had been told that this was a comprehensive test of everything an earth qi cultivator was supposed to know. The elder outside indicated that the test presented itself as pure combat, but that didn’t mean that I had to resort to fighting, there were other options.

How smart was this stone monster? When would it attack me? Without these answers, it would be difficult to form an ideal plan, but I would do my best.

I walked to a nearby stone and carved the most powerful Qi Gathering Formation I could into it without it breaking apart. Then, I moved around the room, quickly carving similar formations into several other stones. The goal wasn’t to create an area to cultivate. I wanted to quickly drain the room of as much qi as possible.

As I worked, the golem did nothing to stop me. Even when I approached it, it didn’t move. Once the ninth formation was up and running, there was almost no free qi left in the air.

At this point, I moved forward and attacked.

The stone monster responded by moving its arm back to take a large swing and knock me away.

Halfway through its motion, the giant locked up. It had run out of energy and couldn’t draw in any more.

Over the next several seconds, the countless formations throughout its body slowly began to dim until the creature dropped to the ground and fell motionless.

Not wanting to give it a chance to recover, I moved to its chest and started pounding it as hard as I could with my Mountain Destroying Fist.

It took me several blows just to make a crack in its armor. After over two dozen, the stone split apart, and the golem was put down permanently.

As soon as the monster was destroyed, energy flooded into the room. It wasn’t qi. It was essence. A few flickers of the essence touched my body and were quickly absorbed. The rest of it got trapped inside the various Qi Gathering Formations that I had set up around the room.

I went to the first one and simply allowed the essence inside to soak into my body. However, I was running low on qi after the fight, so at the second formation, instead of just collecting the essence, I sat down to cultivate and restore my energy. When I did, something strange happened.

Qi entered my acupoints as normal, but the filters and acupoints that had remained dormant ever since I had started cultivating this Peak-Earth technique finally came to life. As I cultivated, the essence in the formation was not absorbed directly into my body. It was instead pulled in through these acupoints.

That’s when I finally understood what I’d been using for the past several years. It wasn’t simply a qi cultivation technique. It was an essence cultivation technique. But what was its purpose? The instructor hadn’t mentioned anything about cultivating essence, and I didn’t know what effects it might have. Would it still increase my affinities?

Should I continue to cultivate it, or should I just let the essence absorb into my body as normal?

I could come back here at least 9 more times if necessary, so I didn’t feel any pressure to make the ‘correct’ choice. I could afford to do things wrong.

Simply absorbing the essence into my body was the normal, expected approach, but my cultivation technique was specially designed to absorb it into my acupoints. It might’ve been a waste, but I wanted to learn more about what this cultivation technique was doing and why it was doing it.

I decided to continue cultivating the technique. I quickly moved through the room, absorbing the remaining essence trapped within the various formations and sending it into my acupoints.