Soul Venerable (Re-written)

 

The next day.

After the duel, Kenji was brought into the Academy’s healing ward. The priest responsible for healing him came from one of the Twelve Main Divine churches, a servant of the Martial God Azlan. Their priest’s healing methods are especially effective towards martial artists who cultivate strength-path. In less than a day, his wounds have completely healed.

In fact, due to the priest’s methods, his muscle tissue became even more durable than before, increasing his defensive properties by a slight amount.

If not for the heavy price for this level of treatment, which was paid by the academy, Kenji would love to injure himself and become a regular.

“Fooling everyone by using a warhammer? Too crude and artless. Even if you want to be a ‘savage’, your battle style is too orderly. A real savage would be a berserker, not a warhammer-wielding brute.” Shion scolded.

Kenji can only accept the criticism in shame. The more he retorts, the more she becomes bossier. In fact, this had already happened for an hour. “What am I supposed to do then, play as a strength-path Swordbreaker who held two greatswords? My skills with them are so bad that even an idiot would notice at first glance!”

“That’s why you’re an idiot. You rely too much on your ‘brain’ that you forgot your fundamental strength. You’re too dumb to realize your own potential.” Shion replied back, while her mind was occupied by her tablet.

“Fine, I get it.” Kenji sighed in defeat. Even though Shion was his captain, he doesn’t want to admit it. His ego felt insulted after being subjugated by a small girl. It was as if someone mocked him for having a small penis, even though his was comparable to a horse. Yet, he can’t show them off to people because that would make him a pervert. He was angry and ashamed of himself but he didn't have anywhere to vent.

“So what’cha doing boss?” Kenji tried to change the topic, only to see Shion was distracted by her tablet.

“Designing a weapon for you. You aren’t fit to be an ascetic monk. Thankfully, you just started on the path of cultivation, you can learn new combat doctrine easily.” Shion showed what’s on her tablet.

“Isn’t this… oi, I can’t learn this weapon at all! You’re digging a pitfall for me aint’cha boss?”

“Nope, I am super serious.” Shion said while taking back the tablet. “Let’s put this matter aside, do you have any idea how I can headhunt these people?” She showed her tablet again, this time, showing multiple pictures of all the first year students that she wanted.

Kenji scratched his cheeks as he realized it was useless in fighting her. Yet, he secretly wanted to get better in order to defeat his antimage captain. He gulped down the burning desire for revenge as he pondered about her request.

“Hmm, aren’t these Violet Sumire, Akane Sakuya and Kubikiri Shirogane of [Violet Sword Blaze], Asahi Moriko of [Blue Wave], Murasaki Ayame, Li Xiao Bai, and Klauss Ludwig of [Radiant Desolation]?” He easily recognizes these high-profile first year elites, yet he frowned upon realizing her desire to ‘headhunt’ them.

“Boss, since you’re a new transfer student, you might be unaware of the unspoken rules of our academy. We don't forcefully steal members from other teams like you did with me. Team members are given great freedom to quit a team they don’t fit in. Even if you can successfully steal them from another team, you have to consider teamwork. If they are unwilling to cooperate with you, we might as well be a pack of loose sand.” Kenji explained.

Even if Kenji is eager to have a dream team consisting of the aces of the top 5 teams, it simply wouldn’t work. Every ‘geniuses’ have their own pride and would prefer to be the captain instead of an underling. Kenji was a special case since he isn’t a part of nobility and knew where to compromise as long as a certain boundary wasn’t crossed.

Others? That would depend on their character and how Shion approaches them.

“Fine, forget about Violet Sword Blaze team, I’ll think of some way since I’ve met them before. What about Blue Wave or Radiant Desolation? Can we take Murasaki Ayame, or at least Klauss Ludwig?” Shion bargained.

“Let me think.” Kenji seriously considers the feasibility of Shion’s request. “Blue Wave members have a strong family bond with each other. The captain and her vice-captain have a long familial master-subordinate relationship, so if you have to take Asahi Moriko, you have to take a bunch of others too.

Radiant Desolation is a team of first year foreign students who have difficulties in blending in with our culture, so it might be possible to steal them. However, I don’t think Li Xiao Bai would agree. His family is a big shot in Qin Empire, the Li Clan is involved with the empire’s military.”

As if he received inspiration, he added “I don’t know about Klauss Ludwig, but maybe we can work things out with Murasaki Ayame. Your liquid metal gunlance has an incredibly high rate of similarity with her clan’s railgun; its power is almost as strong as a real railgun... I think. Perhaps you can discuss something with her?” He indirectly urged Shion to have a discussion with her on his presence.

Kenji was honestly interested in the toys of Galatreon. They were high tech, and the country bumpkin was easily amazed by them. “Boss, if you get a chance to acquire those high tech stuff, please get me one of those cloaking devices. It’s really important for me.” 

Shion can only roll her eyes. “So you can use them for peeking girls while bathing? Oh my, you really are a country bumpkin.”

“You’re not a man, you wouldn’t understand men’s romance!” Kenji immediately retorted.

Shion looked at him with a blank expression. “Wh- what? Did I say something wrong?” Kenji said, blushing.

“Nothing. It’s amazing how stupid people are actually very sharp in certain things.” Shion shook her head, ignoring the giant question mark his face seems to express.

Kenji was expecting Shion to insult him again, but he was delighted when she stopped there. Seeing the captain who suppressed him in all aspects suddenly turned quiet, he silently began appreciating her cute face. 

Her crimson eyes and black sclera might be a turnoff for some, but he knew there are all sorts of body runes and magic eyes out there, it would be rude if he asked. While she might be lacking in terms of chest, her figure was extremely sensual which was highlighted by her skintight shinobi apparel. Showing a moderate amount of geometric-shaped rune-engraved skin in the right places could make the wooden block-like Kenji to feel a certain desire.

“Stop ogling me with your dirty virgin eyes and get up.” Shion closed down her tablet and stood up. “We’re going to have a chat with Murasaki Ayame.”

“But boss… I’m still wounded…” Shion didn’t wait for an answer as she left Kenji on his own. “Damn it.” He cursed. “My chances of peeking at my boss in the bath are slipping away.” The wounded image that he faked so that he could stay longer with Shion was ignored. The damage he suffered wasn’t actually that severe for him, had already fully recovered a few hours ago.

….

 

In the land of sand and fire, the word ‘female’ has a synonymous meaning with slave. Women are treated as objects or commodities to be used or traded. For a female to have a personal room must mean she possessed a special identity.

But here, women are treated equally, if not in higher regards than most male.

Every young hunter was given their own lodging. Male and female dormitory was separated because of the conservative culture of Hartina Kingdom and the southern continent in general. Still, it was rare for a male to visit a female dormitory in this academy due to the high amount of perverts. In fact, the female dormitory was protected by better stealth formation and patrolled by female students for this particular reason.

“Stop using your investigative method to penetrate the stealth formation in every room. Perverts like you are the reason why the female dormitory is given better budgets than the male one.” Shion muttered as they passed through the hallways, Kenji’s presence attracted more attention than what they were comfortable with.

Kenji couldn’t come up with a proper comeback. It was true that due to his strong investigative method, he could ‘sense’ more than the others. “Boss, it was a coincidence! How could we know there wouldn’t be an ambush? As hunters with a bright future, we must always be on guard from ambushes, I’m just taking care of you! Promise!” He spews some bullshit that even he wouldn’t believe as he felt his back drenched in cold sweat.

‘Dangerous! Super dangerous! My investigative method is invisible and silent; how did she know I was trying to peep?’ Kenji tries to calm himself as he retracts his senses. Shion merely shrugs.

A few corridors and floors later, they reached Murasaki Ayame’s room. 

“Room 415, this should be Murasaki Ayame’s.” Kenji commented as the two reached the doors. Just as Kenji was about to knock, the door opened, revealing Murasaki Ayame in her blue-camo pattern military uniform.

“As expected, the thermal signature and spiritual fluctuation match… What do you wan-” Ayame was operating a holographic screen from her computer-like device on her wrist before she realized that there was someone else. “This is…? How is she not emitting thermal signature and spiritual fluctuation?” She muttered to herself while being surprised.

Her holographic screen revealed a humanoid figure with super-hot core temperature and many other metrics, indicating Kenji’s inner strength was far more than what he reveals. However, there was absolutely nothing next to him where Shion should be.  

“I apologize; it was rude of me.” Ayame was smart enough to quickly understand certain things, “Since you’ve come with Wild Savage, it must be for something really important. Please, come inside.”

Kenji looked at Shion, then shrugged. It was rare for him to be invited to a girl’s room, so he was a bit expectant. When he entered, he could feel he had just passed an invisible membrane that blocked his investigative methods, yet, he didn’t put too much thought in it as it was natural. Looking at the interior of her room, Kenji was shocked. It wasn’t like a girls’ room at all!

Various junks were littered in the room. One part of her room was turned into some sort of workshop that he couldn’t recognize. On the desk, there were various unrecognizable contraptions and four thin monitors which revealed different things at once. On the other side of her room, there was another workshop table with various alchemical tools, cylindrical objects, metal spheres and other tools that he couldn’t recognize.

“Yukikaze Shion, was it? It’s nice to finally meet you.” She extended a hand towards Shion after she closed the door. The stealth formation automatically activated, further concealing the interior from prying eyes.  

“Thank you for your kind reception, Murasaki Ayame.” Shion shook her hand. “You have a four-monitor computer rig, that’s incredible.” Shion’s attention was immediately taken by one of the screens which shows a scene of a city siege while the other screens reveal the various statistics for any significant happenings in that war. It seems that she was studying a siege battle.

“How surprising, you actually understood these stuff?” Ayame’s brows were raised. Computer is an information-path artifact rarely found outside of Galatreon. Perhaps, some clans have their own private computers, but they aren’t open to the public.

Shion nodded. “I’ve come here for you.” Liquid metal slither out of her body as it slowly morphed into a gunlance. “I’m sure you know what this means.”

Seeing the rapid transformation of the liquid metal into a gunlance-type assault railgun, Ayame turned silent as she recalled her ancestor.

Murasaki Xion, Karax Richtofen, Dietrich Delcroix, and King Solomon Al-Arsy. They are the four direct disciples of ‘Great Archmage’ Mordred. Their descendants became the very foundation of Galatreon’s Four Clans.

During his lifetime, the ‘Great Archmage’ cultivated refinement-path as his primary and lightning-path as his secondary but in the later stages of the war against Demon King Maximilian, he invented wisdom-path and information-path (the Sacred Alliance still refuses to acknowledge it). The combination of the four allows him to produce the profundity of various paths, but he was most accomplished in these four paths.

The equal number of his cultivation paths and the clans in Galatreon was truly a coincidence. Mordred handed down his lightning-path true inheritance to Murasaki clan due to Murasaki Xion’s mother being his wife, while giving his most treasured refinement-path true inheritance to Karax Richtofen.

That being said, Murasaki clan had the strictest rule regarding their equipment and who carried them, especially if they wanted to go outside of the fortress-city to gain worldly experience. This was because between the four clans, they have the lowest number of clansmen while at the same time, possessing the most number of top tier combatants.

Of course, the Richtofen clan should be considered as the strongest clan in Galatreon due to their role who turned the fortress-city into the holy land of refinement-path, but the best combatants always came from Murasaki Clan due to their cultivation techniques and bloodline’s perfect compatibility with railgun and mecha technology.

In Morgen World, any Murasaki clan members that went out of Galatreon to gather experience are allowed to be killed with justified reason. The killers wouldn’t be held accountable and Galatreon won’t send out retaliatory forces in vengeance but their equipment must be returned as soon as possible. This was because Galatreon valued their technology which tied closely to Murasaki clan’s cultivation secrets. They are willing to protect it at all cost to the point of sending out hunting dogs to hunt them down.

Since Galatreon only has four clans, then these hunting dogs should be from their four clans, right?

Correct, it was the Delcroix clan.

Originally a group of outcasts from the land of sand and fire, their clansmen are put into vicious antimage training far crueler than most other ace troops of other kingdoms or empires. They prefer to die on their mission rather than failing and if they fail, there will always be replacements.

And since they are sent by Galatreon, they are equipped with the best, second only to the Murasaki clansmen’s high-tech artifacts.

That being said, the fact that Shion could openly use railgun weaponry from liquid metal is a question in itself. Liquid metal slime is not overly unique, there are countless variations of magical weapons, but each of the liquid metal slime’s transformations require the blueprints of the weapon. Mere mimicking a certain weapon after seeing it from a distance won’t cut it.

Just like mechas, railgun is not a weapon but a weapon system. Many parts are working together in tandem to achieve their desired effect, each are inherently fragile and maintenance-intensive. Unlike dwarven firearms that use gunpowder-based munitions, railguns can’t be repaired in any random workshop if damaged. Special railgun maintenance tools like the one in Ayame’s room are required.

Of course, since liquid metal could regenerate by itself as long as the blueprints still exist, it might bypass the need of continuous maintenance but since it was a mere imitation, it has reduced damage output compared to the real deal.

Then, Ayame thought of three possibilities that fits Shion’s current situation: one; she stole it from Murasaki clansmen, two; she’s a genius refinement-path expert who managed to refine one on her own, or three; she received one of the most highly sought after Great Archmage Mordred’s inheritance.

Ayame scrapped the first possibility as soon as it crossed her mind. If she actually stole them from her clansmen, then the hunting dogs would be on her tail unceasingly. Every piece of magic machinery product she equipped herself with were manufactured and monitored by Galatreon, it was the same with her other clansmen.

As for the second possibility, perhaps she possessed some level of refinement-path attainment, but it was impossible for her to invent railguns on her own due to her cultivation base.

Everyone has a limited amount of time and those ‘jack-of-all-trades’ are useless in front of true experts. Even if she possessed a one-in-ten thousand years’ talents, it wouldn’t be related to refinement-path because it doesn’t explain her immunity of detections. Ayame quickly deduced that Shion is either an assassin, or an antimage from this simple encounter alone as she was quite familiar with Yukikaze clan herself.

Then, the only logical explanation would be the third, Shion has actually received Mordred's inheritance.  

This caused Ayame to have a severe headache because her ancestor Mordred has two official identities: The Great Archmage and the Devil King.

The ‘Great Archmage’ handed out two official inheritances which became the Murasaki and Richtofen of today. His wisdom-path and information-path inheritances was actually incorporated into Galatreon, thus, anyone who wanted those two will have to attack Galatreon themselves.

Other than those, there are actually no records on how many inheritances the Great Archmage left behind secretly.

Opposite of the ‘Great Archmage’ persona who fought for Morgen World, the ‘Devil King’ was keen on leaving countless inheritances as if he wanted to replicate the Undead Calamity. How does one distinguish between the two? Simple: Great Archmage’s inheritances are related to refinement-path and lightning-path while the Devil King inheritance are connected to necro-path or are blatant taboo to the god’s teachings.

Therefore, Ayame wasn’t sure what Shion received in that inheritance.

Any cultivator is eligible to leave their own inheritances (Minor or True, depending on the person), but most rank 0 would be too embarrassed to leave one, so only those who have reached the end of their cultivation journey usually left them.

Minor Inheritance could be raw resources, artifacts, blueprints, cultivation techniques, a killer move, or other ‘minor’ things including cultivation pointers or insights. They are usually left by cultivators of rank 2 and below.

For cultivators of rank 4 and above, they would usually leave their Secret Plane, their whole life accumulation, or something equivalent in worth. This amount of wealth is too valuable to be given randomly so this type of True Inheritances is usually reserved for their own descendant, thus the name.

The Great Archmage Mordred wasn’t an exception. He adamantly denied putting his True Inheritance inside the Sacred Alliance’s Hall of Heroes, which started the friction between the 4th generation Hero and the Braves. Of course, it eventually escalates into what had happened two years ago, but that’s for another time.

“Did you perchance, received His Majesty’s Minor Inheritance?” Ayame asked, referring to the deceased Great Archmage with a tone of respect.

Shion nodded but did not elaborate further. The best way to lie is to make them guess the answer themselves. “I want to have your cooperation as a team member, is it possible for you to switch teams?” she asked directly. According to the tacit understanding between team captains, poaching team members isn’t appropriate. Team members are the team’s livelihood, taking them means sabotaging their performance.

However, the Academy creates a set of rules that allows any team member to quit from a team, should they feel like it.

Thus, stealing turned into temptation, but what use is tempting if the new member becomes a burden, or asks for far more than what the team could give? This confusing yet simple rule will automatically force the captain and each member to develop trust between each other. Teamwork would be solid and hunter’s survival rate would increase, this was the goal of the Hunter Association.

Since Shion dared to poach Murasaki Ayame from Radiant Desolation, it means she was prepared to deal with Li Xiao Bai and his teammates’ retaliation. But honestly, she wasn’t worried. In her eyes, they are a bunch of children; their politics are boring.

“This is the mission I want to take with Kenji.” Shion revealed her desire to Ayame through her tablet, “With you on our side, the success rate would be very high. Since there’s only the three of us to split the rewards, contribution points and loot will be the least of your worries. Though, I still need one more enslavement-path master as our teammate but the end reward must be higher than your current cut.”

Practical benefits were something that everyone desired, Ayame wasn’t immune to this. “Of course, I can also share information regarding the Great Archmage’s inheritance, if you’d like. Although I couldn’t promise it would be beneficial for you, it might serve as a good reference.”

Murasaki Ayame entered a deep contemplation as the mission the two wanted to accomplish was extremely dangerous. “A war with greenskins, huh? But His Majesty’s inheritance… I need some time to think about this.”