An endless black sky, a vast white ground. Sitting on the ground is Marco Uchiha, in front of him lays Hilda, and on his shoulder sits Ezra.

A look of delight appears on his face as he rises to his feet.

Ezra lifts off his shoulder and begins to fly around.

“Wow, I can’t believe that I’m finally here. In this dimension I control space-time, letting me teleport anywhere I've been before. My very own dimension to do with as I please.”

Gray balls the size of a basketballs float in the air, the boundary between the black sky and white ground.

Waving his hand he can make the gray balls fly around, concentrating he can actually change their shape into anything he wants or even combine them together to make them bigger... But because they are part of the dimension he cannot bring them out.

Seeing the changes Ezra begins clapping her hands. She begins chasing after the balls.

“This place has no spiritual air so I can't cultivate Qi. If I come here without any Qi stones I'll be stuck forever…”

“Ezra come, it's time to leave.”

Hearing his call she flies back and sits on his shoulder.

Bending down he touches Hilda “Kamui”

The portal opens around his eye and sucks them in, distorting their bodies as they disappear.

A portal opens in a cave and the figures of Marco, Hilda, and Ezra appear. As they arrive in the cave the Qi stone turns to dust.

In the cave, five wolves are eating Charles’s corpse. When they see the three of them appear they are momentarily stunned. Coming back to their senses they begin to growl.

“Tsk, foolish” Marcos Mangekyou sharingan flashes before putting all the wolves into an illusion.

Pulling out his saber he cuts off their heads and digs out all five cores. “Three for me, two for you.” he holds two core to Ezra on his shoulder.

Looking at the two cores she begins to pout. She begins to punch Marco in the face as she points at the core and herself.

“Huy Kum!”

“Ah ok ok hold on” he pops a core into his mouth swallows it then pops another till all three of his are gone. Taking one of Ezra's cores he places it into his bag.

He hands the last core up to Ezra “Can you hold it now?”

Seeing the core she continues to punch Marco in the face as she points to the core and herself.

“What? There's only one now, can't you hold it?”

Seeing that he doesn't understand she grabs her chest wrappings then points to the core.

Suddenly it clicks, because of the desperate situation before he stopped caring about eating bloody cores. But Ezra got mad before when he got her clothes wet, and she obviously doesn't want them bloody now. Finally knowing the answer Marco pops the core into his mouth. After cleaning it a few times with his tongue he holds it up to Ezra.

Seeing the saliva on the core she looks at Marco unsatisfied for a moment before finally taking the core. Sitting on his left shoulder she begins to suck on it.

“Ok time for the next phase of the plan.” He takes six Qi stones, the bottle of pills, and the whip out of one bag and puts it into the one with the makeup. Looking around the cave for a moment he finds all four Zhu tokens, he places those into Hilda's bag too.

Drawing his saber he begins to cut Hilda's clothes in various places. After doing so he puts the saber into his bag and he ties Hilda's bag back onto her waist.

Untying his bag he holds it in his hand “Kamui" the bag is sucked into the portal.

“I can use Kamui twice with one stone, but without it my stamina drains really fast and kills my Aura.”

Grabbing Ezra off his shoulder he looks her in the face. “I can't have you be seen so I'm going to send you back to that place ok? You can fly all you want and there's another stone in the bag ok?”

Looking at him for a moment Ezra nods her head.

“Ok be good. Kamui" the portal opens again sucking in Ezra. “That place is bad for cultivators but has no effect on Demonic beast"

Suddenly the sharingan in his left eye deactivates and he closes his right eye. With his left sharingan deactivated half the Qi he used to power his eyes are now free as he doesn't need three full gates to power one eye. But because he deactivated one eye the efficiency of his illusions decreases causing the Qi consumption to double.

His Kamui won't activate as fast now, but because it’s an ability of the right eye the Qi cost won't increase.

Picking Hilda up he leaves the cave.

After walking for a while he sets her down and allows her to awaken.

“Uhhh, my head" she sits up holding her head. In her memories she hit her head while they were escaping, making her memories fuzzy.

“Did we get away?” Hilda looks around.

“yea, but we better get you back to the Zhu sect, too many people have died according to you.”

“Right, yea, we have to go back to the Zhu sect” standing up she looks slightly confused “Thanks for saving me?”

“I can't leave someone in danger when I see them" Marco nods his head “We should get moving, it's still not safe.”

“Right" Hilda looks around for a moment. Even though she feels like something is off, she can't tell what. “This way" Hilda begins to walk towards the town he started in.

Seeing her walk away Marco smirks before following. In the distance, the sun finally sinks below the horizon.

In Zhu mountain sect, Task hall Elder Jun walks through the hall. Disciples greet him as he walks past them, but as he's not in a good he ignores them. Arriving at the assignment desk he stares angrily at the clerk.

“Didn't I tell you to put up an assignment, why haven't you done so??” furious he slams the counter. As he forgot to control his strength a handprint is pressed into the stone.

Panicking the clerk quickly answers “Elder Jun, I did send people on the mission. I sent Brother Charles 10th Gate, Sister Hilda 6th Gate, and brother Hotyu 4th Gate out yesterday shortly after you asked me too.”

Hearing his explanation Elder Jun begins to frown “They left yesterday?? The trip should only take half a day, they should be back by now"

As an outer court elder, he only oversees disciplines at the Qi gathering realm, as the few who step into Foundation establishment become inner court disciples. So from the simple fact he got a 10th gate cultivator to stop cultivating and go on a mission proves he did the best he can, and he can't find fault with him.

“Was there really a great danger, and he wasn't just fooling around like usual…” shaking his head he refuses to believe it “Let me know as soon as they get back.” flaring his sleeves he walks off.

Arriving back in the town the first thing he notices are the dead bodies.

Seeing his gaze she opens her mouth “They're just slaves don't worry”

“How did they become slaves?”

“You have to use a tool called the soul seal, It only works on mortals though. By using the seal you can brand your soul imprint onto theirs, forcing them to obey you.”

“Interesting”

Walking through the village they eventually arrive at a harbor. A large boat and a small boat is docked there. Hopping in the small boat they begin to sail across the river.

Looking at the water Marco becomes apprehensive. While details of the Tori Tori no Mi Model: Phoenix has changed, all the abilities are still the same. He doesn't know if he still has the same weakness for deep water.

During the boat ride the expression of Hilda’s face is constantly changing, like she's in deep thought.

He worried for nothing because after a few hours they manage to cross the river safely.

Running the boat onto land they step off. Hilda waves her hand causing the boat to shrink and fly to her hand.

“The boat is a treasure!?!” shocked Marco opens his left eye a bit wider.

“Of course it is" Hilda places the boat in her bag and begins walking away. “The sect is a few hours from here, let's go.”

Watching her walk away Marco mumbles to himself “She wasn't this rude when she was my captive…” Marco smirks as he follows her.

Walking away from the river a trail leading through the woods appears. No Demonic beast come into view as they walk along the path, and after an hour the base of a mountain comes into view.

“Don't tell me we're going to climb the mountain?”

“Not this one" ignoring him a bit she keeps walking.

As they walk a bit closer a tunnel winding through the base of the mountain can be seen.

As they walk through the tunnel stones embedded into the walls light up, illuminating their path.

Marco looks at the walls and notices they are the same stones used by that slave master in his house.

Hilda occasionally looks back at him with a questioning look on her face.

After walking for more than three hours they finally leave the cave.

In the distance, illuminated in the darkness, is giant a mountain. The top of the mountain has been sheared clean and a large city, sect has been built on top. From the outside, a tall wall surrounds the entire sect. Towards the back of the sect are seven mountain peaks. Leading up towards sect is a large set of stairs.

Not waiting for Marco to admire the view, Hilda keeps walking.

“Hilda" calling out to her causes her to pause for a moment and look back. Seeing this Marco opens his right eye revealing his Mangekyou Sharingan.

Hilda instantly collapses.

“Well, at least I don't have to pretend I don't know you now.” Marco reaches out and touches her body. The Mangekyou Sharingan activates in his left eye as well to speed up the process. “Kamui"

The portal opens and sucks her in, as it does his left eye deactivates and he closes his right.

“I can alter her memories but I can't have her wandering around the sect, that's way too dangerous. Thanks for showing me the way to your sect, Hilda.

Smiling he walks towards the stairs.

The area leading towards the stairs is a forest. As he's been in a forest for the four days he's been alive, he's ready for something new. Because his Aura is 3rd level bronze, or so he calls it, it can keep up with the stamina drain of his three opened gates forming an equilibrium. Only stamina from his walking is being drained, so If he stands still he can keep the three gates open forever.

He hasn't seen a Demonic beast as he walks through the forest, only small critters and birds. After walking for an hour he finally arrives at the base of the stairs.

Two disciples dressed in black robes with golden embroidery stand guard.

“Halt! This is Zhu mountain, what are you doing here?” the boy on the right who appears to be in his early 20s step forward.

“I'm here to join the sect, Is that possible?”

“Join the sect? Why did you come in the middle of the night!” flustered he turns towards the other guard “Go tell Brother Chu we got someone here who wants to join the sect"

Hearing him the guard looks defeated. Turning towards the large set of stairs he begins to run up.

“So, what's your name?” the remaining guard shows a lazy look.

“Marco Uchiha” looking at the guard running up the stairs for a moment, he turns back to the other. Sensing three Qi gates opened he relaxes a bit. “What's your name, and why do you seem so unhappy?”

“I'm Beneha, and who likes doing guard duty" he shakes his head slightly “But I get two low quality spirit stones for taking a night shift”

Assuming spirit stones are what he’s been calling Qi stones, he nods his head.

“Is there anything special I have to do to join the sect?”

“Not for you, because you're already a cultivator you can get in as long as you're not already in a sect. To get non cultivators we normally send people out to find disciples from the nearby towns and cities. They have to be younger than 8 years old and have an affinity with Qi. It's pretty difficult to find people.”

“Oh, that's nice. I was expecting some sort of test"

“You've already opened six gates, and you look younger than me. What test could we give you?”

As he finishes speaking the guard from earlier can be seen walking down the stairs. Behind him is a really fat and greasy middle aged man.

The guard sees Marco's look and smiles “That's brother Chu, he's been in the outer court for over 30 years and still can't break through the 9th gate. If he applies to much pressure he can't deal with the pain, but too little and it won't even budge.”

Hearing this causes Marco's brow to raise in surprise “People have difficulty breaking through gates?”

The guard looks at him like he's crazy “Of course, if that wasn't the case foundation cultivators would be everywhere. Some people lack the talent so their gates are just harder to open, not being able to deal with the pain they become stuck.”

Hearing this Marco becomes silent. If he didn't have the power to heal forcing those gates open would have been impossible. He knows that he will automatically advance in Aura, but he begins to doubt his talent in cultivation.

“Is there any hope for people with no talent?”

“If you have enough spirit stones you can buy a lot of pills.”

Listening to Beneha speak reminds him that he never found out what the pills he has does.

“Does the sect provide pills"

“No, but you can buy some from the pill shop, especially stamina pills. As you know Qi gathering cultivators have a stamina problem hahaha"

Hearing this Marco's face becomes ugly. Are the pills he has for stamina and has he been wasting them this whole time?

At this time the guard and Chu arrive at the base of the stairs.

Opening his mouth saliva begins to pour out “Are you the one who wants to join my Zhu mountain sect?”