The word ‘genius’ is thrown around far too often. Almost every child of a noble family who shows even the slightest bit of talent for cultivating is instantly touted as being a ‘peerless genius.’ I’ve even been asked multiple times whether I consider my student Telram to be a genius. In many ways this infuriates even me more than when noble families insist on calling their talented children geniuses because I know how hard Telram worked to get where he is now. He is certainly talented, more than many who are given the title of ‘genius.’ Especially when it comes to his special soul but for everything else, he works day in, day out. Ever since he first showed up at my door and asked me to train him, he has never taken so much as a single day off. So, I ask you how many of these so-called geniuses can claim the same?

Excerpt from the memoirs of Gerald Rence

Iris scowled at her teacher as he went about preparing dinner. She was starting to think that there was nothing that he couldn’t do. Normally men didn’t know how to cook so she had been certain that he had been joking about having to eat his cooking but that had turned out to be completely false. In fact, from what she could tell he was actually a much better cook than she was (which wasn’t actually that difficult). However, some of the ingredients that he was using looked a bit odd to her. She had never seen someone use such well ground meat in a dish before and she was pretty sure that some of the other ingredients that he was using were poisonous but Gerry- who had been waiting for them when they had entered- didn’t seem to be worried.

“So, did you manage to get the Affinity Stones from the mayor?” Telram asked as he diced a couple of carrots so quickly that all Iris could see was a blur. Affinity Stones were one of the methods that cultivators could use to determine what Elemental Affinities they had and how strong those Affinities were. Now that Telram had reached the 8th Layer of the Core Formation Stage he needed to know what his Elemental Affinities were so that he could start preparing to make the new cultivation technique that he needed for when he reached the Ascendant Realm.

“What?” Gerry snorted. “No, I made a proper Affinity Altar. Exactly what did you think I’d been working on for the past few weeks?”

“Oh, of course that’s what you were doing,” Telram groaned. He honestly felt like slapping himself on the forehead. The Affinity Stones that Henry (the mayor not Telram’s student) owned were the only ones in the village since they were a relatively expensive item to obtain. As such borrowing them every time they needed them was going to be a pain especially since the students would eventually need to know their Affinities as well.

“Affinity Stones are all very well and good if you just want to know what Elemental Affinities someone had but they are far from the best way of doing so,” Gerry explained when Iris asked him what the difference between an Affinity Stone and an Affinity Altar was. “A single Affinity Stone is made from a Beast Core from an Elemental Mana Beast and can only be used to detect an Elemental Affinity from a single Element and only if that Elemental Affinity is at least Mid-tier. A proper Affinity Altar on the other hand is made of several Elemental Beast Cores that are set into a large surface that has been heavily Inscribed. This allows the Affinity Altar to detect multiple Affinities at once as well as how high each affinity is much more accurately than a single Affinity Stone. It also means that we can use it whenever we want instead of having to ask Henry to borrow his Affinity Stones.”

“So, is it alright if I use it after dinner?” Telram asked as he slowly stirred the reddish mixture of ingredients that he had added to the pot. Despite Iris’ nervousness at some of the things that Telram had added what Telram was cooking did smell delicious and as she watched Telram smiled at her before sprinkling a fragrant mixture of herbs over the whole thing that only served to make her mouth water even more.

“Of course,” Gerry snorted. “Why else would I have made it now if not so that you could use it?”

Telram grinned at the old man happily making Gerry roll his eyes in irritation. He still wasn’t happy with Telram’s decision to make his own cultivation technique. However, if anyone living today could make their own cultivation technique then Gerry believed that Telram was that person.

Before anyone else could continue the conversation, they were interrupted by someone else entering the room.

“Hello everyone,” Lily said with a smile as they all turned towards her. Although she was still just as pale and thin as she was yesterday it was obvious that she had more energy. It would be a long time before she fully recovered but seeing the light in her eyes Gerry knew that he would be able to see the vibrant’ strong woman that he had trained once again.

“Hey mum,” Telram greeted her as she walked across the room towards him. She still had to use a walking stick to get around the house, but he could see that she was relying on it far less than she had been yesterday. In a few days she would probably be able to walk around the house without using it and even be able to walk to the market and back without having to use the wheelchair that he had made for her in a couple of weeks.

“Is that your special dish that I smell dear?” Lily asked her son as she took a seat at the table next to Iris who was looking at her with wide eyes.

“Yeah, this is a special occasion after all,” Telram chuckled. He didn’t cook his spaghetti bolognaise often, especially not since he had started training his students. But seeing as it was the day after they had cured his mother and his spaghetti bolognaise was her favourite thing that he cooked.

“Well I’m looking forward to it then,” Lily replied happily. “I actually have a proper appetite for the first time in years.”

“That’s a good sign,” Gerry told her. He had already checked in on her earlier, so he knew that they hadn’t missed anything that cause her problems later when they had recreated her Mana Core. Still it was always good to hear from the patient as well in these situations.

“Aunty Lily,” Iris said in a small voice as she looked at Telram’s mother who turned towards her with a gentle smile on her face. “Are you really cured?”

“Well we’ll just have to see dear,” Lily replied with a gentle smile on her face as she patted the small girl on the head with a bony hand. “But I can tell you that I feel even better now that you’re here.”

Iris sobbed as Lily pulled her into a hug. Lily had become the closest thing to a mother that Iris had even if the girl wouldn’t admit it to anyone and it had become increasingly hard for the girl to see her weakening until eventually, she had stopped dropping by for dinner.

Some time later Fergus and Aran walked into the room followed by Willa who immediately sat down at Lily’s feet and looked up at her happily. Lily smiled as Willa met her gaze with her honey coloured eyes.

“Thank you for your help Willa,” Lily told the massive white wolf who just nodded in reply. While Willa couldn’t speak it wasn’t for any lack of intelligence. In fact, Telram was certain that both of the Mana Beasts in the room were at least as intelligent as most people and smarter than some.

“It’s good to see you up and about my dear,” Fergus told her with a wide smile on his face.

“Thank you, Fergus,” Lily nodded before frowning slightly when she realised someone was still missing. “May I ask where Diane is?”

“Ah, yeah she’s taking the night classes tonight,” Telram replied. “I hear that they’ve actually gotten pretty popular lately.”

“They have indeed,” Gerry laughed. “And that’s despite Polly’s best efforts.”

Everyone present including Iris grimaced at the mention of the annoying woman. Despite the fact that both Henry and Warren had both decided to support the school that Telram had made (Warren had even shown up to the night classes a few times) Polly still did everything that she could to try and sabotage what they were doing. Iris wasn’t fond of the nosy woman either although her dislike was for slightly different reasons.

Not long after her parents had died Polly had started making a fuss about Iris continuing to live in her parent’s house. However, this wasn’t because Polly didn’t like the idea of iris living on her own but more because the house was actually something that had been specifically set aside for the village healers and now that Iris’ parents were dead Polly wanted to replace them as quickly as possible which meant that Iris would’ve had to find somewhere else to live. Naturally the girl had refused which had made the rotund woman throw a fit like she was the child instead of Iris and had tried to force her out. As one might expect when the other villagers heard about this, they had immediately moved to Iris’ defence which had only further angered the ever-arrogant Polly, but Henry had stepped in before things had gotten any worse than they already were. Honestly Iris didn’t really understand why Henry put up with Polly. It was pretty obvious that he didn’t actually like her that much, but adults often seemed to do things that she didn’t really understand.

“I can’t stand that woman,” Lily grumbled causing everyone to look at her in surprise. It wasn’t actually very often that she had anything bad to say about people but then again, they didn’t like Polly either, so they all decided that it was time to change the subject.

Thankfully Telram’s spaghetti bolognaise was almost done so he asked them to get ready for dinner while he cooked the spaghetti. Like most of the specialised ingredients that went into this dish the pasta was something that Telram had made himself. While there were pasta dishes on Nerrus none of them quite used the right sort of pasta, so he had been forced to work something out for himself.

After serving everyone Telram sat down next to Iris who was looking down at the meal like she was half starved. It was actually quite a funny sight since unlike the first night that she had eaten with them she had put on weight and now looked like a healthy young girl instead of a starved waif. This was partially because of the increased amount of exercise that she had been getting since she had been going to school and partially because Aran, Telram and Lily had been making sure that she always had enough to eat. Even when she was at her weakest Lily had made a point of making a lunch for both Telram and Iris which had only served to further propel her into Iris’ good graces and Aran and Telram always made sure to bring her some of the extra meat that they had when they went hunting. No, this time the starving look on her face was because she had been watching her teacher prepare this meal for almost an hour now and was excited to finally taste this strange new meal that he had made.

As soon as the savory and slightly tangy meat sauce touched her tongue Iris started digging in with gusto. It wasn’t perhaps the best thing she had ever tasted but it was definitely in the top five. Seeing her enjoying the meal that he had made Telram smiled happily. It was seeing someone enjoying the food that made the months of experimenting worthwhile. The whole thing had begun one day while he was out hunting in the forest with his father. He had spotted a strangely familiar looking vine wrapped around a tree and had picked some of the fruit which resembled a tomato on a whim.

Unfortunately, his mother had told him that the fruit that he had picked was poisonous, so he was forced to throw it away. But he secretly kept one which he crushed and cooked in a pan before very carefully tasting a bit trusting that his body strengthening technique would provide some resistance to any poison that remained. However, while the cooking had indeed destroyed any of the poison that was in the fruit the flavour was quite different from what he had been expecting. In fact, it was downright unpleasant and incredibly bitter. But he had refused to give up and tried several different things to make it more palatable all because he wanted to be able to make spaghetti bolognaise which had been one of his favourite things to cook for himself in his previous life.

Eventually he managed to come across a mixture of ingredients that gave the sauce that he was trying to make the flavour that he was after and the next day he offered to cook dinner for everyone and then kicked them out of the house when they agreed stating that he wanted to surprise them. When they took the first bite of the strange meal Telram knew that all of his hard work had been worthwhile even when he had to explain what he had made it from. Of course he had been forced to come up with a story to explain how he had ‘come up with the idea’ of making the bolognaise but thankfully there had been a traveling merchant from a far off country visiting Palamar and Telram had suggested that he had gotten the idea from him.

After they had finished their meals and cleaned away the dishes Gerry stood up and went to his room to retrieve the Affinity Altar which was actually smaller than Telram had expected considering the name. It basically looked like a small wooden coffee table with four different coloured Best Cores embedded in it and covered in Inscriptions. In the very centre there was an empty space that was a bit larger than Telram’s hand

“Alright,” he said as he sat down in front of the strange device. “I take it I just place my hand in the centre bit and channel my Mana into the Inscriptions?”

“That’s right when you do that the Cores that you share an Affinity with will light up as will a part of the Inscription which will show how strong your Affinity is for that particular element,” Gerry replied with a nod.

“Okay,” Telram nodded as he did as he was asked. To his surprise all four of the Cores lit up. From what he had heard from Gerry and the others normally when someone had their Affinities tested for the first time at the 8th Layer like him they could only light up one or if they were lucky two of the Beast Cores.

Gerry also frowned slightly when he saw this and leaned over so that he could take a closer look at the measurements for how powerful Telram’s Affinities were supposed to be. He was starting to think that he had made a mistake when he had made the Altar. However, those doubts faded slightly when he saw that every single one of Telram’s Affinities were being ranked at Minor and even then, they were barely at Minor Level.

“Enlightened Soul,” the old man murmured as he realised what he must be looking at.

“I beg your pardon,” Telram said as he stared at his master. “What’s an Enlightened Soul?”

“I’m not entirely sure of that myself,” Gerry replied as the others looked at him with confused looks on their faces. “I’ve only really heard rumours about them myself.”

“Well what rumours have you heard?” Telram asked.

“That someone with an Enlightened Soul has an equal Affinity for all 4 of the Elements,” Gerry replied. “They also have more soul energy than normal as well which explains a lot. But other than that most people consider having an Enlightened Soul to be a disadvantage since their Affinities are usually so low that they can’t use most Ascendant Realm cultivation techniques.”

“Because most of them usually require the cultivator to have at least a Low ranked Affinity with one or more of the Elements, right?” Telram asked as he rubbed his chin in thought.

“Right,” Gerry sighed. “Which means that they have to spend a long time increasing their Elemental Affinities so that they can enter the Ascendant Realm. In fact, most of them never manage to become Ascendant Realm cultivators because of how difficult it is to increase your Elemental Affinities when you’re still in the Human Realm.”

Telram nodded thoughtfully at this. The most common methods of increasing your Elemental Affinities were cultivating for an extended period of time in a Mana Land of that particular Elemental Affinity which was exceedingly dangerous for someone who wasn’t in the Ascendant Realm or by absorbing the Mana from Elemental Beast Cores which was both inefficient and very expensive.

“Well then it’s a good thing that I’m going to make my own cultivation technique isn’t it,” he said eventually making those who weren’t aware that he was planning on doing that blink in surprise.

“Wait, what!?” Lily shouted when she had finished processing what her son had just said making everyone jump in surprise. It had been years since Lily had been able to raise her voice that loud. Still it did make sense that she was the first one to shout when they considered that she had damaged her Mana Core because of an incomplete cultivation technique. “Do you want to damage your Core the way that I did!?”

“I’ll be fine mother,” Telram calmly. “I’ve been studying Ascendant Realm cultivation techniques for years now as well as the report that Gerry made when you damaged your Core so I’m pretty sure that I’ve figured out everything that I need to so that I don’t damage my Mana Core.”

“And what if you’re wrong,” Aran asked angrily. “Gerry say something!”

“I’ve seen the notes,” Gerry sighed. “And he’s covered everything that I can think of that could go wrong. Since we now know that he’s going to have problems progressing if he does what everyone else does. I think that he should give it a try at the very least.”

“That’s all very well and good,” Fergus replied. “But does he even have an idea of what he’s going to use as a base concept?”

“Actually yes,” Telram nodded. “I do.”