The breathing technique that he used was a yogic breathing technique designed to help focus the mind. You would focus on the breath, not controlling it, but observing it. This allowed you to focus to the exclusion of everything else. Because it helped focus the mind but required not actual work Endrian felt it was perfect.

He thought about different ways to visualize the mana going into his core, actually one of the first was creating a whirlpool. However, he gained some inspiration from the concept of the different levels. If it was based on solar systems and galaxies then why not visualize a singularity or black hole at the center of his core. The only problem was he didn’t really understand much about black holes or singularities other than they had a massive gravity that drew everything to them. Well from what he understood a singularity was just the center of a black hole and was theoretically what formed the black hole so for his purposes they should work interchangeably. Thinking to here he decided to go with a mana singularity that drew all mana in. This allowed him to get a three-dimensional draw from all mana and if his assumption was right then he could increase the range and the strength of his visualization beyond what most people could imagine.

After deciding on these techniques he put them into action. For the first few minutes, it was hard to maintain focus on his breathing but everything eventually settled down and his mind relaxed. When he became relaxed he opened up his awareness to the mana around him. Then he started to visualize a single point deep in the core of where his condensed mana would be stored. He pictured the ridiculous gravity that would be generated and how it would draw any mana in its reach to it. He spent some time solidifying this visualization and after a few minutes, it took hold. It felt kind of like a click where it went from being pretend to being real. As soon as it became real his awareness of the mana showed that it was flooding over towards him. Initially, it was slow but as he reinforced the visualization the pull became faster and stronger. There was no requesting the mana to come to him, it was just drawn there inexorably.

He focused on his core and found that it was filling up fast. He had already reached the second rank of the second level after just an hour of starting the visualization. Unfortunately, it was still a bunch of different mana and hadn’t been condensed into the golden mana. So he stopped drawing in mana and visualized what he had in his core moving through his body. After he had developed a pattern that cycled the new mana through every part of his body it finally returned and it had been condensed to the golden mana. As soon as it hit his core from the circuit around his body it was like an explosion went off in his mind and his heart.

The rightness of how it felt. How it merged with him and could effortlessly be controlled. Hell, the power he felt was on a completely different level from what he had experienced either time when he cultivated in the condensing level. It was like chocolate, caffeine, speed, and the best sex ever had all been rolled into one delicious ball and dropped in his body. As soon as he completed the cycle, his eye popped open and the breath that he had been holding burst out while he panted “Holy shit!” After a few seconds, he regained some of his composure but he was still trying to wrap his mind around the differences. The way his core resonated with his body. How every cell in his body was singing for joy. It was truly mind-blowing. “Fuck me sideways with a big black dildo. There is no comparison.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

In the heavens, all the gods were rolling. Azmera looked at the chosen champion and said “This! This is why cultivators sit for thousands of years and do nothing.”

Phunagiox responded to Azmera and said immediately after her “Nope! This! This is how we get thousand-year-old virgins sitting in a cave saying ‘Please sir, may I have another’” this of course caused another round of hysteria with the other gods that were watching.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Endrian took a moment to look at his cultivation level and he could tell that he was already back to the beginning of the first rank of the second level after the refinement of his mana. He then spent the next hour or so working his breathing exercise just so he could calm down and regain his composure. Finally, he was able to calm down enough to get some rest. He was looking forward to tomorrow so that he could test out his new cultivation.

Waking up the next day Endrian cleaned himself up and then started walking through the Tai Chi forms. He could instantly tell the differences in his body and had to spend some time on each form performing it slowly to assure his control becoming accustomed to his new strength. After he finished his forms he changed out of his workout clothes getting dressed and ready for school.

In his excitement at his new cultivation and the effects it was having on him he had ignored the fact that he had a new class to go to. On the way to school, however, he had been thinking of what he needed to do first. This had inevitably made him think of his new class which made him cringe inside. He remembered on the page, the one with the teacher in charge and the student names, that was handed out yesterday there was a room and a rough time marked. He hadn’t paid attention to it at the time, but the benefits of an eidetic memory were that he wasn’t required to pay attention he just needed to see it once. So he knew that he needed to be in the classroom by what was termed early morning, which correlated to the sun being just above the horizon. Looking to the sky and based on the color of the sky Endrian sighed to himself and headed to the classroom. He was already going to be a little late so he didn’t rush.

Arriving at the room he found a curtain drawn across the doorway and he could hear Chiyo’s voice coming from inside. Without pausing he moved aside the curtains and walked in only to have the room go quiet and everyone stare at him. He paused for a moment and then looked at Chiyo and said “I apologize for my tardiness.” Then he found a seat that was empty that was at the back of the class glancing at Chiyo she made a gesture to the chair and proceeded with her lecture.

“As I was saying this class is not just for your edification. It will teach you about responsibility,” at this, she pointedly looked at Endrian, “ it will teach you about social graces and etiquette, and finally, it will help you determine a direction for your studies based on your skills and interests.”

She glanced around the room and verified that all eyes were on her and paying attention. “Something to be aware of is that for every winter that you are in this school there will be a competition between the schools from our empire. There are a total of 15 different schools in our Empire. The competition includes multiple different events including mana control, sparring, single combat vs. tiered beasts, group combat vs. tiered beasts and more.” Upon hearing this most of the kids were excited and looking at each other with a gleam in their eyes as they imagined glories and fame. Chiyo paused to allowed the excitement to build and then continued. “So, everyone will need to do their best and work hard so that they can earn a spot in the competition.” After she said this, the students were excitedly chattering with people sitting by them. Well, everyone except for Endrian who had a rather bored and slightly annoyed look on his face which deterred anyone from approaching him. Oricia was in another part of the class chatting excitedly with some of the other girls in the class and every now and then she would cast a glance at Endrian. After a few breaths for everyone to make their exclamations and have delusions of grandeur, Chiyo continued on.

“Now that everyone is here let’s go around and introduce yourselves to everyone. Tell them a little about your family and personal interests. Let's start with you,” she said while pointing to a girl in the front of the class and all the way to Endrian’s left.

“My name is Arianna Sleensild. I am…” at this point, Endrian tuned them out because honestly, everyone in this room was a noble and no matter how nice they were there would always be the doubt that they working an angle or would sabotage his efforts to develop people that he could trust with his life. He also knew himself well enough to know that he sucked at politics and unfortunately working with nobles would inherently involve politics. Now although he was tuning out what was said he wasn’t completely ignoring things. He had figured out the two people he needed to pay attention to before he needed to introduce himself so he wouldn’t be caught in the embarrassing situation of being clueless when it was his time.

Endrian proceeded to plan out what he needed to do today besides his classes. He first wanted to go to the library and see if he could find any references to beings called Immortals. He assumed that Immortal Hue he met was an Immortal ranked cultivator but he wanted to try and understand what was driving him to place this AI thing in his head. So far the cultivation information seemed right on but best to make sure that these people weren’t the type to play pranks for their own amusement. He also wanted to see about implanting another concept but he wasn’t really sure what he wanted. He also needed to get some more information about these abominations. If what Immortal Hue said was to be believed and you couple that with the prophecy then information is going to be key. At this time one of the two people he had been paying attention to had just finished talking and he realized that he was next.

“Hi, my name is Endrian. I’m a commoner, I like reading in the library.” There that should make me sufficiently boring and worthless for people to be interested in. If Chiyo want’s to treat me like a child then I will act like one.

Chiyo seeing Endrian being reticent decided to try and prompt him to bring out more information hoping that she could get him engaged with the class more. “That’s wonderful that you enjoy going to the library. So what do you like about the library?” She asked this hoping it would be reading stories about adventure or prides rescuing the noble male from a horrible monster, etc.

“I like reading the dictionary in there. Did you know that I was finally able to learn every proper curse word? It took for fucking ever to track it down but it was so worth it.” While wearing an innocent smile Endrian laughed to himself ‘If nothing else it was worth it just for the priceless look of most of the people in the classroom.’

After a second of shock, Chiyo said “Endrian! We do not say those words here, and why would you waste time looking for that. No, you know what, see me after class.” At this, the class gave a collective “Ooooh.”

After this incident class continued on until mid-morning with Chiyo going over different classes that the school had available. There were classes on noble etiquette, dining etiquette, sparring etiquette, sewing, art, music, and dancing. There were classes for cultivation where if you showed your worth might warrant a personal instructor. There were some more interesting classes like alchemy, arrays, sparring, hunting, group combat tactics, wilderness survival, and flying ship navigation and management. Finally, there were classes for math, writing and grammar, herbology, wildlife studies, accounting, and merchant economics. As Chiyo described these classes and what they covered different people would perk up with interest in the classes. Overall the class was quite informative.

After class, all the kids funneled out and headed to their next course. These were courses that were assigned to all new students that were new. These courses were math, writing and grammar, and one of the following: sewing, art, music, or dancing. All the first years picked up their class schedules when they checked in during the opening ceremonies as well as got a map of the school and if needed accommodations were assigned. Endrian was not a part of this but he still knew where he needed to go. First, however, he had to have his talk with Chiyo.

“I would like for you to explain to me, Endrian, why you thought it pertinent to start cursing in my class?” she asked with a glare.

“Well, honestly, it wasn’t my intention at first. I just wanted to give a basic boring introduction so that everyone would leave me alone. Unfortunately, you asked a follow-on question to which I reacted to and then embellished to make sure you didn’t ask any more questions.” Endrian replied curtly.

“That was extremely disrespectful and rude not to mention disrupting the class what made you feel that this was okay?” she asked while feeling somewhat perplexed and irritated.

“Well, I tried to be courteous yesterday when I asked you take me out of the class. I was still courteous when I initially answered your question. However, neither worked as you didn’t remove me from the class and didn’t let me fall into obscurity so if courtesy doesn’t work what’s left?” Endrian said with some condescension.

“Look I am doing this for your own good. You need to interact with people your age, build relationships-” she started to get on her soapbox, however, Endrian cut her off.

“Stop. You may be right or you may not be, but the brilliance of what you are saying is that you don’t have to live with the consequences of your good intentions. I Do.” Before he could continue Chiyo jumped in.

“You are too young to know what is good for you. That is why we, as adults, make these decisions for you.” Chiyo said with aggressively.

Finally getting mad Endrian let loose his emotions “No one makes decisions for me! You don’t know what goes on in my head or what I have experienced! I have survived a beast attack, living in the wild, saving my sisters, Killing….” he closed his eyes and was breathing hard trying to calm down as anger, regret and self-persecution filled him. A tear leaked out of one of his eyes. After a second or two he was able to take all that emotion and shove it in its box and then he continued.

“Listen, I like you Chiyo and I understand that you are doing what you think is best for me, but I don’t work like that. You can discuss options with me and make recommendations but at the end of the day it is and always will be my decision. Nobody can ever take that from me. I will come to this class because I think there may be benefits from coming here. If nothing else the information today was very helpful. However, don’t take that as me saying I will participate actively with the other kids and don’t try and force me to or you will get a reaction similar to what you got in class earlier. If this upsets you and you feel you need to talk to my parents, I understand, but it will change nothing.” Endrian paused and looked her in her eyes with resolve so she would hopefully understand that he meant what he said. “On that note, I do have another class to get to.” After which he turned and left leaving a stunned Chiyo staring at him walking away.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

As Chiyo stared at the small back that walked away from her wasn’t sure if she was angry, confused, impressed, embarrassed or really what emotions she was feeling. She did, however, finally understand why her sister took such interest in him. He was both infuriating and intriguing.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Next was weapons practice. He debated about hiding the fact that he got his cultivation back but decided that hiding it was pointless. He figured that Kyuuthia would check him since she was anxious to get back to the schedule. It had only been a couple of days but she was chomping at the bit to expand his understanding and start sparring. Endrian was sure it also had nothing to do with Esalana harassing her every day so she could take over.

So when he arrived and Kyuuthia let out an audible sigh of relief he knew that it was pointless. Smiling, Endrian said “I had a bit of insight and was able to recover some of my cultivation so we should be able to move back to what we were working on. However, I would like to start slow to verify the differences between my mana now and where I was before.”

Nodding her head and saying “That’s a good plan. Let’s start off with some spear forms and then move on to movement technique and see how everything works. Then we’ll cycle through all the weapons to make sure there are no major changes.”

Hearing this Endrian sighed in defeat and then moved to take up the practice spear. They spent the rest of the time until lunch going through different forms and some movement techniques. He also had the inspiration to use his growing control of the metal element when he was using the chain weapon as he thought it could be really amazing if he used it like that. Unfortunately for Endrian as soon as he used his element to manipulate the trajectories of the chain he got smacked on the back of his head by Kyuuthia who said “If you are going to learn a weapon you need to understand it before controlling it otherwise you waste mana and time.”

Feeling dejected he went through the rest of the form for the chain weapon and managed not to beat himself up too much but still felt like he didn’t like this form of weapon if he couldn’t control it with his mind and he really didn’t feel like putting in the effort for something that he didn’t like.

Other than the forms he went through his movement techniques, unarmed at first and then with the different weapons to make sure he could integrate the movement into a part of the forms.

‘Okay,’ he thought to himself ‘let’s use half the power I normally use and then we can ramp up from there if necessary.’

He started the movement technique which used mana to enhance the muscles in his legs which allowed him to push off faster and with each step speed up and adjust directions. He would only be going in a straight line this time as he tested it out. With these movement techniques, he usually thought two steps ahead sometimes three so that he was ready to make adjustments in case something went wrong.

He cycled half of the amount of mana that he normally used into both his legs and down to his feet. Pushing off his body accelerated forward at a speed he was unprepared for. This, in turn, caused him to face plant since he didn’t generate enough friction with his foot to actually move forward. He looked at where he had stepped and he could see the grass and dirt were torn out.

Standing up and wiping off the grass and dirt that was on his face and body he looked over to see Kyuuthia laughing at him.

He next attempt he dropped the power down to a fifth of what he had used before he regained his cultivation and leaned forward while paying close attention to his footing. This turned out much better. The second step which used a fifth of the original power worked pretty well though he was a little off balance. Still, a marked improvement. Looking up to see where Kyuuthia was, all he saw was a hand larger than his head.

‘Come on! That’s not ri-’ he never got the chance to finish the thought as he was smacked on his forehead by the hand. This caused his body to flip in the air three times, his mind completely stunned, before landing on his back and losing consciousness.

He woke up to a shockingly large amount of cold water landing on his body. “Remember to pay attention to where you’re going. Movement without awareness is deadly.” Kyuuthia said without a shred of remorse.

After a few more attempts and stopping after the first step so he was not in Kyuuthia’s range, he got more comfortable with it. He realized that he needed to only use a tenth of the amount of mana that he had used previously and he would still have better results. That was a massive saving and would increase his ability to fight prolonged fights. Endrian spent the rest of the time practicing his movement technique with the different weapons and fending off an attack by Kyuuthia when he got in range. It was a helpful practice if painful.

After his weapons training was lunch and then cultivation. When he arrived at the cultivation class he had some lingering fears about meeting Immortal Hue, so he was a little hesitant to enter the room. However, when he did there was no one there and just a message on the wall saying that he was free to study or self-practice or self-study. Since he had the time Endrian decided to work on a more efficient way to absorb the mana into the golden nature mana. Afterall moving up and down ranks would be irritating at best. This was more difficult for him to be able to work with as he had to maintain the visualization to absorb mana and at the same time operate the technique to circulate the mana through his body. Working on both techniques simultaneously was not working well for him. It did bring up a memory that always made him chuckle though.

He was working for a company when he was just starting out and he used to brag about his ability to multitask. One of his co-workers was also pretty good at multitasking. When he talked to his co-worker about it the response he got was “I don’t multitask, I just switch back and forth between tasks very quickly.”

The reason he thought of this was this is exactly what he was doing. Every time Endrian circulated his mana he would lose his visualization technique and every time he focused on the visualization technique he would lose his circulation. The first time he did this midway through a circulation when his mind switched back to the circulation all of the mana he had just absorbed was gone. He spent the rest of his class time working on these techniques.

His last class today was his array class. Lailah was in the class and had drawn up some pictures of the different components of the arrays. These different components had similar functions to electronic components you would find on a circuit board. One was a power supply, one was a capacitor, there were resistors and shunts which helped control the amount of mana being used, he hadn’t seen any logic devices like transistors or the different logic gates but then again most of the arrays he was working on we simplistic single use arrays. The functional aspects of the arrays were starting to become more clear. There were elemental components and output portions as well as safety valves in case of a failure. Honestly the more he learned the more intrigued he was about how the arrays were so logical. If they followed logical progressions then there should be logic gates and feedback sensors for arrays as well so that they can respond to stimuli. Thinking as such he decided to talk to Lialah about his assumptions.

“Lailah, I feel that I am making progress with these arrays. I haven’t blown one up for a while now and am able to easily make arrays that can perform functions like creating a small fire, wind, light, and different elemental functions but all of these require being toggled on or off and require me to provide mana for the on and off function. I think there should be ways to make the array activate based on external stimulus. In other words, program a response based on outside factors. Do you know anything about this?” Endrian asked.

“Yes, there are these functions that you have mentioned. Honestly, they are supposed to be for second or third-year array students. Of course, most students don’t take array classes until their second or third year anyway,” she said as she trailed off unsure of what to say.

“Are there books that cover these materials that I can research?” Endrian asked hopefully.

“Oh, yes. Yes, they can be found in the library they are surprisingly labeled intermediate array patterns and advanced array patterns,” she said with a smile. Then she started biting her lip she looked away and mumbled “I’m not sure if you are allowed to read those books though since you are so young. Hmm, maybe I can talk to academy head Chiyo and get permission for him.”

Even though she was mumbling to herself Endrian was able to clearly hear it. He realized that if Chiyo heard about this she would probably try to use it to force him to do things that were ‘in his best interest,’ which would just piss him off. So, he decided to see if he could work something on Lailah.

“Lailah, I would prefer you didn’t talk to Chiyo about this. She is currently trying to force me to do things I don’t want to do and this would be just the kind of ammo she would need.” He said with an irritated look.

When Lailah heard this her eyes got big and she seemed quite surprised and indignant. It took a second for Endrian to realize that he had said something quite ambiguous and he quickly clarified. “Oh, no no no. Sorry no. Ha ha ha. What Chiyo is doing is forcing me to go to a class to interact with other kids my age. She also was kind enough to put me into a class filled with nothing but nobles hoping I could build some connections or something I guess.”

Hearing this Lailah relaxed and gave Endrian an irritated look. “Okay, but be more careful with your words. It’s easy for people to misunderstand. As for the books, I will figure something out for you.”

“Thanks,” Endrian said with a sweet smile.