Chapter 3: Realization
The Roamer
CHAPTER 3: realization
"You can head on back to your cell, for it seems that the other opponent lost his mind at the end of the battle." Said the person who was previously floating in the air while introducing Aeollus and the elder. While he didn't seem to really care about the elder dying, he did seem a bit disappointed, but Aeollus couldn't quite understand why he was so disappointed.
On the other hand, in his mind, Aeollus was having a mental breakdown. 'At the end of the battle, those words that he muttered resembled those of elder Cane, the wistful elder' Aeollus thought over and over again.
"It can't be, did I truly witness the end of a life with my own eyes? Not only did someone die for the first time in my life, it was someone that I had known…" muttered Aeollus, as he did not have the confidence to speak out loud.
"Brat, I said you can return to your cell now, unless you wish to receive a certain whipping?" said the man, who then began to float in the sky. Suddenly, wind began to revolve around him, and mini hurricanes seemed to form around him, with killing intent that pierced through the heavens.
'This… Cultivation can reach such a level?!' Thought Aeollus, as he was truly surprised that not only could humans fly, but they could even summon mini hurricanes and fill them with killing intent! This was truly a surprise for Aeollus, who had really never seen or heard of such a thing before.
"No sir, I'll be heading back now."
As Aeollus said this, he turned around and began to head back towards the cell.
The man floating in the sky turned around towards the audience and said "Sorry for the inconvenience, for it seems that one of the slaves did not have the will to live or fight anymore, so we will immediately bring in a new fight to pay you back!", while shoving Aeollus into the cell with a jolt of electricity.
As soon as Aeollus was in the cell, everything outside the cell turned black, and it began to shake. After about a minute or two, he could see outside the cell and see that he was in a different location!
'His cultivation allowed him to even warp locations, furthermore, something as big as this cell!?' Aeollus thought to himself. It was truly unbelievable that he had learned almost nothing about cultivation back in the village, yet it seemed to have so many uses even if you didn't fight!
After a while, he realized it was night time, and he was back where his original cell was located, except the cell now had a window and bookshelf, as if it had never been different.
He then walked towards the bookshelf, and picked up a book. Since the bookshelf only had about a dozen books, there wasn't much of a variety to pick from, so he just picked some big green book that seemed to be the closest.
However, as soon as Aeollus laid eyes on the title of the book, his eyes widened to a state that they had never reached before.
"The disparity in cultivation" was the title, and as soon as he flipped it open, the table of contents showed a total of 246 pages, which were all about cultivating the human psyche!
"This is truly a treasure trove for someone such as me, and these dozen or so books should last me quite a bit!" he said out loud, which immediately awarded him with a "SHUT UP!" from another slave.
Aeollus embarrassingly began to lower his head, but raised it back up again.
'Now that I know peace is not a viable option with these people, I cannot back down anymore in hopes of peace. Starting today, I will cultivate with all the information these books grant me, and by the end of it all, I'll be one of the strongest slaves in this prison!' He thought to himself, and imagined the future along with it.
"Elder had come here weeks before me, and even took the hit for me… he was the one who was in charge of me, and had always taught me to keep a balance between peace and knowledge in my mind, yet he is also the person who told me not even an hour ago that peace won't work anymore…" Aeollus muttered to himself.
It truly was ironic that such a turn of events could occur, while also saddening.
"For the elder and the rest of the villagers, I'll take the hit from now on and stray from the path of peace, and become strong enough to force peace around me!" he yelled out loud, which earned him a jolt from a guard nearby.
With all these thoughts in his head, and all his recent experiences that had occured, his path of true understanding of cultivation had begun as a slave.
--- Sequence 2 ---
Four months had passed, and Aeollus had read and learnt all the books had to offer. Within the books, there seemed to be an explanation about something called a 'birth date', and from that he thoroughly understood that he was ten and a half according to the birth system.
While cultivating with the books, he still had to fight to the death everyday with someone. At first, he saw it as a hindrance, but after a while he began to use the battles to use what he had learned through the books, which honed his senses of battle and engraved them into his soul.
Along with using it to cultivate, he saw battles to the death as vulgar at first, and still didn't want to take lives, but living here for such a long period of time truly honed him and shattered his ideals of peace, making him comfortable with taking lives.
One of the books he had read had taught him about mantra, a symbol that represented a type of energy, and how he could engrave them into his soul to form his own techniques which came from the soul. About two months deep into his cultivation, he had learned to float a bit because of mantra, although it only lasted about two seconds.
Comparing himself to the other slaves, he had now reached an average level in cultivation, and could compare with the rest. When it came to applying his skills in cultivation in battle, he quickly adapted to it and became better than most of the slaves, as he was a bit too young to rely on his physical body.
One of the main things he understood was that all attacks and techniques had an affinity with some part in life. The main affinity he understood was wind, and that it related to being free and unrestrained. His comprehension of the rest couldn't even come close to his understanding of wind, which thoroughly changed his mindset to a more calm and passive tone.
"Are you ready to fight? This time, you are fighting one of the top five hundred slaves, more specifically being number 423!" said the old geezer across from his cell. At first, after he demanded some wood in exchange for teaching him about the prison, Aeollus thought that he was stingy, which he was, but he also had a good side to him.
"Yeah, I'll finish the job in one fell swoop." said Aeollus in a tone that only he and the geezer could hear.
"Listen brat, if you beat him, you get to move on to a better cell, but it also increases the risk, as the deeper you move into the prison, the less strict the rules get. At the very center of the prison, the only rules are to not cause harm to guards and to not escape, so there have been many killings in the center!" said the geezer in a tone which was very strict and serious.
"Don't worry about it, it will benefit me. If they all have cultivations that are as profound as mine, no, even more profound than mine, then if I can get ahold of their spirit and blood, I can go through an evolution of cultivation that almost none have gone through in this prison." said Aeollus calmly, while truly wishing to further his cultivation so that none could cause him trouble anymore.
"Brat, I have a feeling that you might leave this cell and advance into a better cell deeper into the prison, so take this with you" said the geezer as he handed Aeollus some sort of parchment.
At first, Aeollus thought it was just some note that was supposed to help him get on the good side of the guards deep inside, but as he laid his eyes on it, he was surprised deeply!
For on the top left corner of the parchment, there was a stamp of royalty, with a dog carved onto it!
Throughout the months of reading books, he learned that stamps on documents or other items represented that the cultivation they had on them were above average, and the creature on the stamp was a type of ranking.
The lowest level would be a rat, representing that it reached the lowest level of filth, barely above average.
The second lowest layer would be a dog, representing that they were more vicious than a rat, a bit more above average than the rat.
The third layer was a tiger, which stood above the dog and rat, ranking higher in the world of cultivation, and even these were somewhat rare in this world.
The fourth layer would be a lion, which represented the king of the jungle, which showed that it was the best that most normal people would ever achieve.
The fifth layer was a rhino, which stood above the lion, and showed that the people who could achieve such a technique were ones who would have influence, though not much.
The sixth layer was a bird soaring through the skies, and the skies represented all the layers below it.
The seventh would be a divine bird, which would peck on the little bird below it. Anyone who could achieve such a level would usually be considered the best in towns, but definitely not the majority of the world.
The eighth layer would be an angel, when someone can reach shaking influence, and become the best in a city, and maybe even a capital if strong enough.
The ninth layer would reach higher, and had a deity carved onto it. People who had this type of object and cultivated what was on it would at least be the strongest within a capital, and might even be the strongest within a region!
The final layer, which can be called the tenth layer, had a god on it, and it could be any of the gods above their lands or below! People who had ever reached this level numbered around ten thousand in all of history, but they stopped counting people who reached this level about two centuries ago, so nobody knows how many people had reached this level now.
Before, Aeollus was just cultivating the basics of cultivation, the very foundations. Even getting a rat would be considered lucky for him, yet he got a stamp with a dog on it! To him, this was enough to flip his world around, as he could now begin to compete with people who weren't slaves in this world, though it would probably just be limited to small village people.
"Thank you so much old geezer, but how did you get something like this into the prison?" Aeollus said towards the geezer while expressing his gratitude.
"Heh heh, I just hid it inside my skin, as I had fused with it before I entered this prison!" Yelled the geezer, who Aeollus slapped right after for being too loud.
"Oi, respect the person who gave you something that you wouldn't achieve in all your life as a slave!" said the geezer who was seemingly angry.
"Sorry, can't be attracting guards now can we?" Said Aeollus, who clearly was unsettled after the loud yell, worried that some guards might come and take away the second layer scroll.
"Still, don't be too happy, as this isn't a technique, but just an attack. Though it isn't bad, it still is far from enough to guarantee you a good time deep in the prison." muttered the old geezer. "Besides, if you end up dying and lose the parchment, then it'll all be useless anyway, so be wary youngin!" said the old man in a serious tone which even Aeollus took seriously.
"I'll try my hardest to win this battle and walk out of the arena alive." said Aeollus in as confident a tone as he could muster.
"Don't think that I'm giving this to you for free though, as I require that you bring me five of the books that you have been reading these past few months!" said the geezer in a strict tone, clearly not intending to give away a second layer attack for nothing.
"Fine, I've already cultivated everything those dusty things had to offer anyway, shouldn't be much of an issue." said Aeollus, as he crossed the hallway to grab five books.
As he was dumping the five books onto the geezer, a guard came from behind him and zapped him back into his cell. "Time to fight little brat!" Yelled the guard in the language that Aeollus previously didn't understand, though he did understand now thanks to one of the books concerning world languages.
As he was forced into the cell by the guard who was still stronger than him, the world turned dark outside the cell until he heard the familiar words that he would hear everyday:
"Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the arena!"
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
EXPLANATION
I didn't go too in-depth in techniques and attacks, so basically this is it.
Attack: Just a simple move that usually has some sort of cultivation along with it.
EX: Fireball
Technique: Something that uses his whole body and can continuously be used during the whole battle. EX: some sort of form a person maintains during a battle.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ABOUT ME
Name: Abdul Kareem
Age: 13 (Almost 14)
Occupation: Middle school
Goal: Idk, I'm just making a novel for now
Location: Why would I say that?
Relations: I'm not married (duh)
Anyway, as a side note, this is my first novel I've ever tried writing. Thanks for being with me on this first experience! :D