Seifr sat in the bleachers with a quill and parchment in hand. He was currently drawing crude sketches of the movements that the Class 4 Early Nascent Realm disciples were making in the sparring ring. Over the last couple weeks, he had been using his free time to almost exclusively take notes of the abilities of the stronger students who could potentially be his opponents in the upcoming tournament.

At first he had just come to jot down strengths and weaknesses of the individuals, but slowly over the first week, he had started to analyze the Kung Fu techniques they were using. Only the foundation was taught at the 2nd Class, and the 3rd Class focused more on grappling. Seifr figured that he had spent more time, already, on the fundamentals than the average student learning the more advanced techniques had, so what was the harm in doing his own personal research?

The current student pair had actually been quite informative, with one of them even doing the proper version of the spin kick he had executed in the heat of the battle with Raeq a couple weeks ago. Since their sparring match, Seifr had to tone it down a notch because none of the other 2nd Class students would spar with him at that intensity, and Raeq said he wanted to save their next bout for the tournament. Seifr found himself spending more time with Raeq, and by extension Seth started hanging out with Raeq as well, as the weeks went on.

Seifr did not neglect his actual duties of exercising and lectures. Instead, he incorporated his self study as if it was another lecture, just with no real guidance. He would sketch the movements and make the notes. Then on his next Kung Fu lecture, he would attempt to perform the moves on the dummy after the official time was up and the instructor had left. Some of the other students thought he was making things up as he was going on and was bound to mess up his foundation, but Seifr did not ingrain any movements into his muscle memory until he had tweaked them to a point where they felt natural, flowed easily, and just had a sense of "rightness" to them. It was only a few moves out of the plethora he had recorded, but he was still quite satisfied with it. It meant he had a hidden card up his sleeve, and he had a habit of trying to win fights with deception and speed.

Seifr finished drawing the sketch and looked back up at the duo. As he looked up, his gaze focused on the opposite bleachers and his eyes inadvertently locked with Kohl's, who was sitting with a group of 3rd Class disciples. Seifr felt a knot in the pit of his stomach as he saw that Celia was sitting next to him. It did not appear that they were together, but Seifr could not hide the grimace on his face as his eyes darted between the two.

Kohl's eyes widened in understanding, and his mouth twisted up into a sinister grin. He leaned over to Celia, who was talking animatedly to another student on the other side of her, and tapped on her shoulder. She looked at Kohl inquisitively, and he leaned forward and whispered something in her ear. Kohl locked eyes with Seifr as he spoke into her ear, and she started to giggle. He pointed in Seifr's direction, and to Seifr's horror, she looked right at him and shrugged her shoulders. Kohl said something else, and she smiled and playfully swatted at his shoulder before turning back to her friend. Kohl smirked at Seifr across the stage.

Seifr felt sick to his stomach and suddenly stood up. He stood there frozen for a second staring and Kohl and Celia in their group, mind blank, before he rushed off. He had an inexplicable feeling of dread rising up within him, and a sudden rage like he had never experienced before. His blood was boiling, and he started seeing red in his vision. He felt waves of Spiritual Energy and heat emanating off of his body. I need to hit something!

Seifr stormed back to the 2nd Class Hall, immediately ran up to a training dummy, and began to attempt to pummel it into oblivion. He was throwing wild swings that were nowhere close to being foundationally sound. After he calmed his mind down a bit, he focused his attention into making proper strikes. The rage was still there, and it was fueling his strength and stamina.

Seifr's cultivation base suddenly dropped two whole stages, a phenomenon he had never even known was possible. He went from the 7th Stage Mortal Realm back to the 5th Stage Mortal Realm. An aura of Spiritual Energy rose up from his body and physically manifested into fire as it burned off of him, encapsulating the training dummy, a construct built to take punishment from a disciple much stronger than the students who were wailing on them, and disintegrated it into ash.

Seifr froze on the spot with his fist extended to where the training dummy's head should have been and stared at the pile of ash on the ground. He had not noticed when he stormed into the hall, but the room was occupied with quite a lot of other disciples being lectured by an instructor down on the far end. All noise ceased as they had stopped to look at Seifr's fury initially, and then remained paralyzed on the spot, the instructor included, when they witnessed the obliteration of the training dummy.

Suddenly, the doors to the hall slammed open as Master Kveld materialized out of seemingly nowhere in a stance ready to bring destruction on any threats. He looked around the hall, scanning for possible intruders into his domain, and relaxed only when he discovered the pile of ash next to Seifr. He looked up at Seifr who looked back at him. Master Kveld's expression changed suddenly, and he practically teleported next to Seifr to catch him as the young man passed out and collapsed to the floor.

~

Seifr woke up feeling incomparably comfortable. He had never felt so warm and cozy in his life. He stretched lazily as he emitted out a yawn. He opened his eyes, and then scrambled to his feet in astonishment. He had no idea where he was or how he had gotten there. He looked around for clues, but all he found was that he was in a very spacious room laid out on a couch. There were comfy chairs, a desk, and some book cases close by. Obviously I'm in one of the instructor's office. He looked the other direction and discovered a floor-to-ceiling window looking out over the campus from what appeared to be the fourth floor.

Seifr's memory of what had happened began to return to him. So Master Kveld appearing literally out of thin air wasn't a dream. Seifr touched his forehead while thinking. Did I set that training dummy on fire and instantly burn it to ash? That memory definitely seemed like it was a dream, but clearly it was not.

As Seifr was standing there contemplating the events that had transpired, Master Kveld rushed into the room like a whirlwind and arrived in front of Seifr. He handed Seifr a clear crystal with an incomparably serious look on his face. Seifr was extremely confused about what was going.

"Channel your ki into that crystal as much as you can," Master Kveld instructed Seifr. Seifr was slightly taken aback at the abruptness, but he readily complied with the order. Master Kveld placed his two prominent fingers on Seifr's wrist to feel his pulse while he concentrated his vision on the crystal. After approximately a minute had gone by, Master Kveld removed his fingers, and then plucked the crystal out of Seifr's hands and put it in his pocket. He glanced at Seifr and indicated for him to take a seat in one of the comfy chairs.

"Ok, so you're not able to manifest your ki as fire. That crystal would have bloomed with color if you had been able to - red to be exact, fiery red. No, I suspect there is a completely different, though also unheard of, phenomenon going on here." Master Kveld paused and stared at Seifr over his steepled fingers. The two sat there for several minutes before Seifr began to fidget under the scrutiny. Seifr's fidgeting seemed to bring Master Kveld out of his ruminations. "Do you know what actually happens to the ki that is burned off when you intake Spiritual Energy?"

Seifr gaped for a second, not understanding this turn of the conversation. "I thought it was just the energy being expended as it refined the muscles and compressed itself."

"That's the short answer we tell the beginning cultivators. That's not actually what happens. What really happens is that a significant portion of what's burned off is simply lost through dispersion. Usually 19 out of 20% of burned off ki will simply be lost. The other 1% is impurities being burned out of the Spiritual Energy. Based on one's natural, latent talent, the impurities that are being burned off will be more significant. I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing that your body is working differently. Previously your father mentioned a 90% burn rate, and I'm sure he doesn't know the truth of the matter - most people below the Sky Realm have no idea - but it would appear that you're burning an absolutely astonishing level of impurities out of your ki. What happened in the 2nd Class Hall was that you instantly burned two full stages worth of impurities out of your dantian instantly. Literally burned them, and purified your ki. I would guess that if you evaluated your abilities right now, you would actually be stronger than you were before." Master Kveld revealed some of the more intricate secrets to the world of cultivation that left Seifr's mind reeling with the implications.

"So what you're saying, Master, is that my slower cultivation speed is actually better for me, and that when I had the breakthrough several weeks ago, that was actually detrimental to my cultivation?" Seifr asked.

"Yes and no, in a way. Your ki is more pure; it's denser. It has more explosiveness to it. If it were a knife compared to another knife, your ki is a sharpened steel dagger, and the other cultivators of your level are dull iron. That's not to say that they will forever have such impure ki. In order to advance from the Sky Realm to the Heaven Realm, there is actually very little difference in the amount of absolute ki in the dantian. The cultivators are actually just infinitely burning impurities and refining pure ki through a different set of meditation than what you're currently doing. It would just appear that your body naturally refines the ki itself, and it's considerably more pure even than a Heaven Realm cultivator. Someone at the peak of the Heaven Realm would only have 60% impurities burned away in comparison to your 90%."

Seifr sat there in thought for a second, then looked up sharply at Master Kveld and exclaimed in shock, "If it takes more and more Spiritual Energy accumulation to advance in stages and realms, and I continue to naturally burn 90% impurities, then my cultivation speed will eventually come to a near standstill!" Seifr nearly jumped out of the seat and began to pace, but being in Master Kveld's presence kept him in his chair.

Master Kveld nodded his head slowly and replied, "Yes, but also think about it this way. Once you reach the Mid Earth Realm, you'll practically catapult to the Peak of the Heaven Realm with simply needing to satisfy the bottlenecks at the initial Sky and Heaven Realms. At that time, you could possibly be unmatched across all the Heavens and Earth." Master Kveld knew that setting a long-term goal could help to curb the feelings of despair that could potentially rear up inside of Seifr. He had never met an individual quite as unique as the youth, and he was actually quite looking forward to what he would accomplish. "I'll make this deal with you, also: if you are the winner of any tournament, I will use it as an excuse to 'reward' you with private tutorship. Your natural talent is shocking, to say the least, but I can't play favorites or appear to play favorites. So even though you technically are high in my esteem, you still have to work for your accolades."

Seifr stood up and bowed to the headmaster. "Thank you, Master, for the opportunity. Your disciple won't disappoint you." There was an even fiercer determination welling up within Seifr's gut. I will prevail.