Truthful Transmigration

Before John moved on from the Golden Tomb Guardians, Deirdre came to see him. They had become friends after they first met, and they had remained friends after she reached her current form. An unfortunate turn in Deirdre’s cultivation had put her in a perilous situation, and Cuah’arn called upon John for help. However, he wasn’t able to restrain her spiritual energy, and the actual Deirdre died.

“How are you doing?” John asked. They had already interacted publicly, of course, but that didn’t give them much chance to really talk.

“Not as well I’d like to be. At least, in terms of cultivation,” Deirdre admitted. “I’m the last to join the ‘club’, and I’m last to reach the Ascending Soul Phase. Or rather, the issue is that I’m having trouble.”

“Well, you know that I’m not going to be much help with light element insights. So what troubles are you experiencing?”

“I find myself lacking some needed experience. The me who is Odette, I mean,” she clarified. “I have memories of early cultivation that I can make use of, but they’re not really mine. I was able to advance to the Consolidated Soul Phase, but I can tell the Ascending Soul Phase is going to be more difficult. I think what I’m missing is that early experience.”

John nodded. “So you came to me, three time participant in the Spiritual Collection Phase. What precisely do you think you need?”

“Well, if possible… I’d like to experience early cultivation safely. Without destroying what I already have.”

John nodded. “Well, though I’ve never really done it on purpose I can draw from my experiences and provide the former option to you. But, if you don’t want to actually reset your cultivation I think I’ll be of less help. I can still suggest a few things, though.”

“Such as?” Deirdre asked.

“You can suppress your cultivation and spar with people. I don’t know if that will gain you the insights you want, but I think you’d figure out fairly quickly if it was helpful. Other than that… watch others,” John suggested. “See how they grow in early cultivation, their successes and their struggles. Teach and guide them.”

Deirdre frowned. “I do teach people but… usually those who are more advanced. Aside from giving classes to large groups, at least. Such sessions don’t leave much room for personal attention.”

“Right, well, that’s what I would suggest,” John said. “Though if you are going to restart your cultivation, sooner is better than later.”

“I’d very much like to avoid that,” Deirdre said.

“Don’t be afraid to ask others for help as well,” John said. “Cuah’arn already knows about your transmigration, and a spirit beast will provide a different perspective. But since you’ve pinpointed the problem, you can always ask others about the issue. Saying you feel distant from your ealy cultivation and it’s holding you back is still truthful. And I wouldn’t worry too much, since knowing your area of weakness means you’re on the path to success.”

“Thank you,” Deirdre said. “I feel quite a bit better. And good luck with the rest of your training journey.”

“I appreciate it,” John said. “Though at least I shouldn’t expect to lose so badly elsewhere.”

-----

The path from the Golden Tomb Guardians to the Milanovic clan was almost a direct line south from the Sunfields into the Green Sands. However, that also placed Zolvolj directly in the path. Because of that, any actual roads went around to the west.

So as to not make things unnecessarily difficult on his traveling companions, they took the normal route, even though they could have saved some time. There were situations where it was worth it, and other situations where there was sufficient time that avoiding trouble was better.

The chances of John and his group running into trouble they could not handle was quite small, but if there was going to be anything having it occur away from the roads would be far worse. And John didn’t mind spending a couple extra days in the Green Sands anyway.

He’d come a long way from his early experience with the Green Sands. The first time, he had been a darkness and earth cultivators, especially weak to the surrounding heat. An enchanted carriage had barely made the journey tolerable. He’d learned to resist the heat, channeling it away from him- generally into the ground below. That had been the best option at the time, but now he had far greater experience- and he had a fire totem.

Any level of heat that wouldn’t be deadly to non-cultivators was a pleasant warmth to him. Though each element was different from the others, they were all comfortable in their own ways. Except light, currently, but that was the final step.

Among his escort were Ayhan and Lir, as the former urchins were some of the most prominent members of the Six Elements Crossroads. There were a few people who had joined with higher cultivations, but there weren’t any who had been with the sect longer than them.

They had been with John half of their lives, more or less, and over that decade and a half trust had grown between them. That was more important than slightly higher cultivations.

Ayhan had each of the core elements except for fire. He was still much more comfortable than John had been, both due to his greater cultivation and having water as a dominating element. However, if he focused on dealing with the fire element not by destroying it but guiding it as practice for his next totem he would benefit from the travel more.

John made sure to give everyone traveling along proper guidance, and while there were people more knowledgeable than him in individual elements, now that he was properly in the Ascending Soul Phase he was in a fairly unique place. John didn’t know of anyone who had successfully completed a cycle of core elements beyond himself and Raul. Not that he thought it was impossible, but the idea was only just being seen as viable within the region, and they were at the leading edge of the wave.

The group traveling with John were nominally there to guard him, but without any Consolidated Soul Phase cultivators among them it would be quite difficult for them to do more than support him. The Six Elements Crossroads was lacking top ranking cultivators aside from John, though he was quite confident they were on the path to overcoming that issue within the next decade or two.

There weren’t actually many dangers, going from allied sect to allied sect. The region wasn’t perfectly free of conflict, and wild beasts and other natural dangers still existed, but these were the most peaceful days in some time. John simply enjoyed the sun reflecting off the beautiful sand, and he was even able to enjoy the heat as they traveled.

-----

Though John would have preferred to go directly to see Steve and Yustina, he couldn’t just ignore the rest of the clan. Aside from political reasons, he was still quite fond of some of the leadership, so he was willing to go through the appropriate process for a visiting sect head.

Alina had long been in control of the clan, even though she had made some unpopular decisions long in the past. One of those was choosing her own husband. That was what had set off the first real interactions between the Tenebach clan and the Milanovic clan, and Tempkeit had long since integrated into the Milanovic clan.

The reason Alina maintained control of the clan was in part due to the drive that let her make such a decision to begin with. She had chosen what was best for her, and she would always act in ways she thought were best for the clan. With the support of Steve and Yustina, it would be pretty much impossible to displace her, though she had also established herself as a central pillar of the clan and would maintain that position without them.

As long as they didn’t express displeasure with her, of course. There was only so much people would be willing to act against two Ascending Soul Phase cultivators. Not that John thought such a situation was likely, as they were quite happy with the way she was running things. Or rather, Yustina was happy and Steve honestly didn’t care about the clan politics.

Like the other core factions of the alliance, the Milanovic clan was the strongest power in their surroundings. They could shape the Green Sands as they pleased… but importantly, they used that power to promote general power and unity rather than directly enriching themselves. If another crisis came and they were the only competent faction in the region, they knew how much they would regret it.

John found the lifespans of cultivators quite interesting. Short term growth could be quite important to them in certain circumstances, but they were always going to be around for the long term. That didn’t mean nobody was corrupt or that they never prioritized the wrong things, but time made the value of their choices abundantly clear. They would nearly always live long enough to experience the consequences of their actions.

-----

John intended to spar with both Steve and Yustina separately. Though he did also consider fighting them together. He would obviously lose that, but he might learn something. That was only relevant if he held his own against them individually well enough.

Though they were single element cultivators, that didn’t necessarily make them weaker than his own path. Among other things their earlier successes in the Ascending Soul Phase put them at a higher rank than John, and even a slight edge in power could be turned into a great advantage by those otherwise similar in ability.

Steve was John’s first target. They were most experienced fighting against each other, but John hadn’t had a proper battle where he also had control over fire.

Knowing that Steve’s power tended to grow over the course of a fight, John started out the gate with aggressive offense. They fought on the slopes of Zolvolj, since they didn’t want to cause any damage to the clan grounds. The volcano itself was sufficiently pitted and cracked already, so it wasn’t as if they would mar some sort of pristine landscape.

Knowing that Steve would be able to counter water element attacks, John focused on air and darkness offensively. A combination of lightning charged around his sword and the technique Gravity Blade that made it difficult for Steve to parry his attack and immediately disengage meant he was able to keep up constant pressure.

Even moments after the battle began, Steve was surrounded by a constant pillar of fire. Weaker ranged attacks wouldn’t penetrate, but fighting inside the area would wear down John. He protected himself with the water element, but he also made certain to channel away the heat so that it didn’t build up.

Though Steve tended to heat up during a battle, he still came out swinging. His attacks melted the ground around them, and there was constant pressure from both sides as they tried to break through the other’s defenses, landing a solid blow.

Rather than it being a weakness, Steve had learned to use the way he overheated during combat to further his own advantage, as it was simply more power for him to expel. It was a risky maneuver that showed his mastery over the element, maximizing its effectiveness.

Soon enough, Steve’s attacks began to overwhelm John, and it was all he could do to channel the power away from himself. He had a plan, however. He drew his opponent after him, traversing through the battlefield they had already fought in.

When he felt the time was right, John reached out to draw upon all of the fire element he’d channeled into the ground, forcing it towards Steve. At some point in the past, the maneuver might have worked. However, he had underestimated the changes Steve had undergone as he advanced to the Ascending Soul Phase.

John had never intended to defeat his friend with only fire element. That would have been simple arrogance. Instead, the intention was to disrupt Steve’s flow of energy with a sudden surge. John was ready to take advantage of the moment, filling his sword with icy water element… but rather than his spiritual energy being disrupted, Steve began to pull in all the stored heat in the surroundings as well.

A moment later John found himself standing alone on a pillar of hot stone, swirling flames having melted everything around him for twenty meters. Unfortunately, he couldn’t say that he protected himself from the assault- it was clear that the attack was targeted around him precisely because of how devastating it would have been.

“You win,” John conceded. “I thought I would at least cause you to stumble a little…”

Steve shook his head. “You’d need a much greater surge than that to throw me off. And while I didn’t pick up on what your plan was, I still saw where all that heat was going.”

John wondered what his loss said for his chances against Yustina. She was much more skilled… but she was less focused on overwhelming power. The same trick would have failed against her for entirely different reasons, but John didn’t know if he had a particularly better option against Steve except to try to beat him in a battle of attrition- and most likely Steve would have found a moment to overpower him anyway.