The Drow Maiden didn't fall for his provocation. "I'll do better than that," she said without emotion. "I'll explain it while giving you perspective on what it means to be a drow."

The world warped, and Shen found himself in a vast room. There were no visible walls as far as his eyes could see and a ceiling so tall it would have clouds on Earth. The floor was made of black metal, barely seen under all the thick metallic tubes that went from everywhere to everywhere.

The tubes fed into the countless coffin-like glass pods mounted on endlessly tall pillars that filled the entire place. There was little space to walk in between, but Shen saw thousands of drow coming and going everywhere with D or even C-level stats.

It reminded him of bees in a honeycomb.

The pods were filled with transparent liquid, each one with a drow that might be in any stage of physical development, from tiny meat bundles to full-grown children. The oldest he could see looked like a twelve-year-old human would.

Shen could barely believe what he was seeing. It looked like a sci-fi picture from modern humanity.

"Welcome to one of our nurseries. We birth drow in a way that human sensibility would call inhumane. Which is technically accurate, I suppose. We simply had no numbers to protect ourselves from the multiverse after the D-rank rift. We had to find a way to change that or face annihilation. This is the latest iteration of that model."

"Why didn't you stop it?" he asked. "Aren't you strong enough already?"

The Maiden chuckled. "No one is ever strong enough in the multiverse until they have an S-rank to protect their race."

The cultivator took that information somberly. It said a lot about the Alliance and what awaited Earth.

She pointed at a nearby pod containing a nail-sized mass of cells.

"That, Shen, is life. It has a soul. It is already a drow.

"I suppose this information has implications about life and abortion, which your race discussed before the assimilation. Knowing the exact moment a soul is born gives us an advantage, but people could still discuss the value of unborn life forever if they wanted. I don't care about your opinion on it; I'll only use this opportunity for you to understand slightly better what being drow means.

"Every individual drow life is valued above even our collective survival. We would also protect each other to death in any situation unless told otherwise by the ones risking their lives. For instance, we would all die here to defend each mass of useless drow in this place.

"As importantly, no drow would ever directly act in a way that would kill another who hasn't betrayed us first. Even planning treason wouldn't be enough to make us consider executing them. In fact, there was a moment while we were on Earth that your death might arguably be considered the best for me and, if the drow were extinct, our entire race. I never entertained the possibility of even leaving you to die to your enemy cultivator's Law fragments.

"You are drow, regardless of whether you were born such."

The Maiden made a pause after that to give weight to her words—and Shen felt it.

Would he value an alien's life over his entire race? He doubted it. How deep did such a certainty have to be etched in someone's beliefs for them to do it? And the Maiden was saying every drow thought like that?

The indoctrination she had talked about was probably much scarier than he could imagine.

That also made him wonder. Would he implement such indoctrination to his people if he fully believed it was the only way to guarantee their survival? Probably. If they broke free one day and resented it, it only meant they had survived until that day.

"Now," she said, "blood essence, the primary reason I brought you here.

"Everything has a point of origin. Reality, cells, us. There's a specific instant in everyone's creation when they come to be. We talked about Aspects and Expressions, but many more nuances exist between them. Essential Origin is that single instant when a sentience receives a soul. Every cell that exists at that moment becomes an essence cell and is intrinsically, especially, uniquely linked to you.

"Every essence cell contains... let us call it the most complete DNA you can have. Everything you are in body, soul, Path, Energy, Sentience, Change, and any other construct is written there. With the right tools, someone strong enough can recreate you from it. Not a copy, you. You would feel like you were two minds sharing the same yet separated existence. Many do that, too, if they can afford it. The best body-swapping rituals use a body grown in such a way.

"Every race has different types of cells in their Essential Origin. In creatures with blood, those cells almost always become blood. Thus, blood essence."

The world warped again, and Shen found himself in another vast room. It was made of black metal like everything else in Tar'Shalon, but the ground was covered by gray sand, and tall, thick trees spread throughout the place at regular and very distant intervals. A few dozen drow, all naked, walked in random directions or sat in meditation before one of the trees.

The trees were dark red with white leaves. Their tops created a sparse bubble around an angry pulsating crimson energy ball. If Shen squeezed his eyes, he could see a drop of blood in the middle of every ball.

As they pulsated, Shen felt his mind wandering. Possibilities and Paths opened before him. He could see himself wielding a huge sword with overwhelming strength, swinging it slowly but unopposed. Whatever it hit—

He shook his head and blocked his non-physical senses. He had been taught to do that when under the influence of someone else's Path. No Path could t infect his, not when he walked a True Path, but it could distract him enough if he was weaker than the other party.

The connection snapped, and he came back to himself.

"A considerably less expensive usage, though not cheap by any measure, is using blood essence to enlighten the new generations. These are Trees of Sacrifice. They preserve the Path contained in a drop of blood essence and broadcast it. The Path eventually gets distorted, and we fell the tree, but it's worth it. Our numbers grow stronger faster at the cost of resources and blood essence, which has kept us alive in a multiverse that would see us killed.

"It also leads to more innovation than any other race we know of. One must walk from one end of this forest to the other before taking anything into their Paths. They do so before taking any Concept at all. It opens their minds to unique possibilities. They also come here on every stat upgrade in search of creative ways of using their power.

"Yet, as important as this is, it is but half the reason to take a drow's blood essence."

The world warped again, and Shen found himself in a small room for a change. It was also made of black metal, but every inch was covered with low-bass magic runes that shone bright white. Every rune was connected to another, and blood ran freely from rune to rune, getting illuminated by the light. It gave the place a strange ambiance.

The Maiden explained, "Half the power of the drop of blood essence you give Tar'Shalon will be absorbed by the living blood in one such room, a defense node, to help fuel our world's defenses.

"This is a sacrifice, but not a terrible one. Your body will always maintain the same amount of essential cells as when your existence originated. Drow have four drops of blood essence. Humans have five. When you lose any amount, you get weakened by a proportional amount for months to years, also depending on how much you lost. Your existence will turn another blood drop into blood essence in time. Ranking up somehow replenishes all your blood essence. If you lose more than half your blood essence, you die."

Shen frowned. "Won't I go to the Summit weakened if I give you my blood essence?"

"Yes. But the collective comes first unless doing so would require us to take one of our lives. Your individual performance isn't as important as the survival of your entire people. You're drow, Shen, whether you like it or not. The Alliance decreed you're my charge, I accepted it, and for us, that means you became drow. The only way out is through death."

His frown deepened. "You understand I'll resent being forced to do this."

The Drow Maiden smiled slightly. "Of course I do. You're a spoiled boy. You think you have the right to decide what to do in any situation just because you exist. Real life doesn't work like that.

"Would you resent a predator for eating your family while you're away? Maybe you would. You're irrational like that. A drow would take revenge but understand that is just the way of things. They would perhaps feel saddened for the loss but never resent an irrational creature for acting according to its instincts.

"But where does rationality start and instinct end? Does that matter? We're sapient, but that is built upon sentience. We act and react according to inputs. People at the top make decisions for you. You can only accept it until you're strong enough to resist. Or maybe my own argument can be used to suggest you should not control your impractical resentment.

"So resent us if you want, Shen.

"Bring revenge if you're ever strong enough for that.

"But until then, obey, for although we would die for you, we don't care how you feel about the responsibilities attached to such a privilege."

The cultivator's frown turned into an emotionless face. He removed all traces of emotion from his face and posture.

He hated it. He hated it with his all. His entire Path wanted him to die fighting the drow for trying to turn him into a slave.

And he would if she answered his next words wrongly.

"You said you would protect me for the antidron. Now, you claim you would do it anyway because I'm drow. I more than repaid you for the supposed privileges I have. Your words oppose each other. Just as your words about resentment. Didn't you resent the Dreamer? Didn't your entire culture revolve around that? You aren't free of resentments; you just select when to feel such."

The Drow Maiden opened her mouth to reply, then froze. Her following words never left her throat. She snapped her mouth shut and looked to the right and below, seemingly past walls and floor.

"You're correct," she said, to Shen's astonishment. "But I shouldn't be able to agree with you. I partially broke free from my indoctrination. My C+++ stats brought unexpected consequences. Now, you pointed out inconsistencies that pushed me further away from it."

Then, she kept silent, frowning while looking in that direction, clearly deep in thought. Shen felt ridiculously confused but gave her space for a while. He lacked too much information to know what to say or do to help.

"So...?" he asked after the silence stretched for minutes.

The Maiden still didn't say anything. In fact, she kept quiet for almost an entire hour. Shen didn't feel anxious due to his emotional control, but he couldn't deny his fear as the air's mana kept getting... polluted.

He hadn't known he could feel emotion from mana, but now, he did.

The mana in the air started confused and angry, then grew furious. Somehow, he was sure it was coming from her. It wasn't just the mana, either. Even the hints into Laws that he could barely begin to feel whenever the Drow Maiden used a Law were affected. But her domain was not deployed.

It was like Reality reflected her feelings, fueled by her impressive willpower, and it trembled.

"So," she said at last with a struggling voice, "we seek our superiors' guidance before our individuality grows into treason."

The world warped one last time.

Shen stood by the Maiden's side in front of an open room.

It was the smallest he had seen in that world. Three drow in simple black garbs, one male and two female, sat on the ground in a semicircle, and the remaining space would only accept a few extra people. A shining white sphere floated above them.

It was such a simple setting, yet he felt overwhelming pressure.

There was no domain covering him that he could feel. The Maiden's rage no longer affected the air around him. The environmental mana stood still. The three drow weren't even looking at him.

Yet, everything he was, every instinct, his Path, it all told him he was in mortal danger.

He had trouble breathing and didn't feel like moving. If he did, it might offend one of the beings in front of him. He didn't dare even Inspect them, but he knew in a way he couldn't even say how that he was an ant in the presence of star-sized giants.

The gap between them couldn't be measured or explained. His life was at their behest. There was absolutely nothing he could do if they decided to extinguish it.

Then, they all looked at him and the Maiden, and the spell broke as if it had been his imagination all along.

Shen took a deep breath.

"Good instincts for a D-rank," a female said without emotion.

"We see you, children," the male added.

"Come on it," the other female commanded, looking straight at the Maiden. "Bring your charge and tell us what ails you so. Sit down and tell us why your domain had to be suppressed by the enchantments meant to protect us from our enemies."