Chapter 0139

The group Finally, with a capital F and italics included to emphasize the point, left the guild.

They headed north since that was where the prey and herbs they needed was located.

Despite Finally starting on their journey, Tempest was not happy. The reason for her unhappiness was trailing 10 meters behind them.

“Cheer up Tempest. They aren’t going to do anything to us this close to the guild.” Graden said gently.

“I beat them. Sis Tempest no worry.”

“I’m not worried about them Starm. I just don’t like to see that thieving mug.” Tempest grouched.“That damn Hannah better not try to steal my loot or else!” The idea of letting Hannah benefit even a copper coin from her hard work galled the little charm seller to no end.

“If they steal from us then we’ll just beat them up. If we can’t beat them up now, we’ll beat them up later. Their potential is crap anyways. They won’t be able to get far unless they have phenomenal luck.” Fenix’s comment confused Tempest and she wasn’t the only one. Aside from Graden, everyone else in the group was confused as well.

“Geez, you guys are really stupid. Do you think I slut it up with everyone for the fun of it?” Fenix got really angry when she saw everyone’s identical expression of agreement. They really did think she was an immoral woman driven by her sexual need to accost anyone.

Tempest had only Cardis as an example of a fire mage and her impression was not the best. The manwhore would flirt with any member of the opposite sex, regardless of age. At first, she thought it was his personality. Men flirt all the time. There is nothing wrong with it unless they are married and in some cases that is allowable as long as their spouse is alright with it. Some men are charming flirts but they are very devoted to their wife. It happens.

In the Heavenly Mountains, marriage doesn’t stop a man from flirting.

Except, Tempest sensed a banked sexuality underneath his carefree attitude just waiting for the right woman. She’d seriously worried for that Eva woman should she ever meet Cardis again.

When they first met, Fenix was all over Tempest as well. Coupled with her earlier performance where Tempest had to stop her from quicky, grab and tug, Tempest believe she is the biggest pervert in the guild.

Bei Ting Mao, Yu Li Ming and Starm had all heard rumors about fire mages. It was said the higher the affinities a mages has with the fire elements, the higher their sexual drive. They had Fenix and Graden as an example and Fenix was living up to the rumors. Although Graden have a higher fire affinity, it seems he his temperament leans towards the characteristic of a wood mage.

“How debased do you think I am?” Very debased judging from their expressions. Disgusted by their lack of trust in her and them jumping to the worst conclusion given the slightest insinuation, Fenix turned her back towards her pathetic teammate. She growled out a “Graden, you explain it to them,” then walked away.

Graden tossed her an apologetic look before clarifying the whole situation.

Cultivators from their own domain would rather cultivate in the immortal potential which their domains identify with. The Heavenly Mountains cultivates the body; the Ethereal Depths cultivates the soul; the Mysterious Wasteland cultivates the mind, and the Magus Alliance cultivates the heart.

The strength of the soul and affinities can be tested at birth. The body and the mind can only be tested later in life. Parents want their children to have all the advantage they can get. They want their children to be the shining star, the genius everyone talks about, the amazing cultivator that astounds the Cardinal Realm, blah, blah, blah…

Therefore, the soul and affinities test are done at birth and if the child has a powerful soul or high affinities, they are sent to appropriate domains for training. Cultivating these two aspects at an early age provides only benefits and no disadvantages. When they are at the proper age, they can be tested for the body and the mind. Should they have slightly inferior qualifications, equal qualifications or better qualifications in the body or mind potential, they can change their cultivation method.

Cultivators cultivates the immortal potential their domain identifies with. If they want to cultivate another path aside from the official immortal path of their domain, they have to go to that domain. Each type of immortal potential requires a different type of energy, and the energy tends to stay in a certain region. The Heavenly Mountains has an abundance of qi which makes it faster for body cultivators to progress faster than they would if they were to cultivate in the Magus Alliance. It holds true with the other domains as well.

It is also why no matter how powerful the Heavenly Mountains is, they never tried to invade the other domains. The lack of energy stops them.

The Ethereal Depths and the Magus Alliance get an influx of young foreign cultivators coming to their domain every year to train then head back home once their find out they have a strong aptitude official immortal potential of their domain.

Mages and Soul Practitioners don’t object to the behavior because they don’t have to spend a massive amount of effort searching for cultivators with high potential in the heart and soul.

The five-year trial period of the Eternal Spirit Guild was put into place due to this reason.

It is also because of this reason, the Eternal Spirit Guild implement the group policy and had the recruits sorted through by the Sphere of Spiritual Influence.

The spirits are old creatures that exist at the dawn of creation. Graden emphasize this point to remind everyone the spirits are not as tame, loving or as benevolent people think they are.

The spirits sort out the new recruits using their own criteria and over time, the Eternal Spirit Guild had figured out some of it.

Those who they know are going to switch their immortal path, and those with low affinities are grouped together. The spirits are not going to pour their time and effort into a cultivator who doesn’t intend to cultivate the heart as their immortal path. By this logic, those with high affinities or potential are group together because the spirits do not want their mortal to die an early death nor do they want their teammates to drag down their mortal. Something about a dragon doesn’t live with snakes.

The higher ups in the guild know about the sorting patterns of the spirits. This information is not allowed to spread out.

Since the sorting method isn’t random, it is of highest priority for the new recruits to figure out which group is made up of mages with high affinity and which group is going to change their immortal path.

One easy method to determine the potential of the group is to determine the ratio between the natives and the aliens. The group that have higher natives to aliens ratio have the higher potential. The group composed of recruits hailing from the Magus Alliance aren’t going to change their immortal path unless their other immortal potential is much higher than their current affinities.

Fenix was actually testing the reactions of the new recruits when she was molesting them. Cultivators from the Heavenly Mountains is more conservative when dealing with physical contact, followed by the cultivators from the Mysterious Wasteland and then the Ethereal Depths. Mages are more open in regards to physical contacts.

Graden noted all the reactions each cultivator had to Fenix. He was able to get a good idea about the group composition then extrapolate the data to infer their affinities.

“There is a lot of loopholes in your theory.” Tempest was the one who voiced their doubts over Graden’s theory.

“Yes, I know. Still, it is better than nothing.”

“I suppose.” Tempest conceded.

“Beside, Fenix has high fire affinities. Her judgement is quite accurate.”

“Huh? Graden, you have to keep in mind, we are not from the Magus Alliance. All the common sense you are spouting is mumbo jumbo to us.”

“Ah yes, forgive me. I’ll make sure to explain things instead of assuming you guys know what I am talking about.” Graden looked so apologetic the others couldn’t blame the guy. “Fire mages, especially high affinities fire mages have the ability to detect extreme emotions through their touch. It is how they know if their advances are welcomed or not.”

The rest of the group was still confused.

“Shesh, you are making a muck of things and giving us fire mages a bad name.” Fenix came back from her ‘scouting’ and took over the explanation. “Being a mage herself, my mother was quite strict in her teachings. Due to her strictness, I have a stronger control over my magic. I learned I can send small bursts of mana through a cultivator’s body and receive feedback from my mana. I can tell the general nature of a cultivator by touching them. I can also incite their emotions. I use it mostly to make them angry. Strong cultivators or those with high affinities can block or dampen the effects of my mana. By doing this, we can figure out a group’s general composition. Now do you understand why I was doing what I was doing? It all for the good of the group.” Fenix explain with her meager chest puff out with importance.

The other might have felt remorse for their overly judgemental attitude. Tempest didn’t feel an ounce of guilt. “Oh good. I don’t have to tolerate your touchyfeely ways anymore. After all, you only act like a pervert to test my powers.”

“No way! I need your water mana to counteract my fire mana!” Fenix immediately refuted.

“You don’t need water mana all the time. Holding hands once in a while is good enough.” Tempest countered. It is as far as she was willing to go. Fenix was careful not to cross the line to molestation territory but it was still uncomfortable. If it was one of her sisters hanging all over her, then she’d be quite fine with the situation. As of now, Fenix is too much a weird stranger for Tempest to be comfortable with her embracing her anytime she wants.

“No way. I need the full body experience!” Fenix showed what she meant by glomping onto Tempest.

“No way. Sis Tempest is mine.” Starm sense his position as Tempest’s number thigh hugger in jeopardy so made his position clear by glomping on the available thigh and tried to push Fenix out of the way. “Go after Li Ming. She’s a water mage too.”

Fenix wasn’t kind as the others. She pushed Starm away from her ice bottle. Starm held on tighter. Fenix pushed harder. Until Tempest bashed their heads together, causing them to release her.

“I’m not a bone to be fought over by two dogs.” Tempest said with a huff and walked away, only to be followed by a determined Starm and a very passionate Fenix.

“Sis Tempest wait.”

“Tempest, wait.”