Hazelrun Village's worn paths were busy again. Children ran between houses. Farmers tended fields. Dao Chosen practiced Light and Fire techniques on the outskirts.
Some people prepared mass graves for the dead, while others continued their work
Can't these birds be quieter?
Lyn approached a small market area. Several stalls had opened. Fresh produce, basic materials, and low-tier shards were on display.
He weighed the bag of ash fragments inside his Vessel Sea.
If I exchange all of it for contribution tokens, I can afford food and maybe buy one Rank One Information Shard. Losing memory is perhaps worse than whatever happened a few days ago, he sighed.
Even after he robbed the miners, it wasn't enough.
A miner's wage was merely two to three contribution tokens a day. Some had tokens on them when he looted the bodies.
Some did not. Such was the nature of gambling with the dead. You took what you could find and called it profit.
Ashen Light Sect sold knowledge through Light Information Shards, Rank One or Two, which stored maps, politics, and cultivation texts. More important information was stored in books.
Both options were expensive, especially the written ones.
Lyn swallowed his irritation.
He reached the contribution office and greeted the elder on duty, a stern man with three gray braids and faint Fire Essence leaking from his body. Based on the Essence leak, he was a Rank Four Stage One Dao Chosen.
"What do you want?" the elder asked, uninterested, as he organized materials in his workshop.
"I came to exchange material," Lyn said.
"Show it."
The elder finished arranging the materials deeper in the office and stepped forward, stopping behind the desk. He leaned in to examine the material.
"Well then, show me the material you want to exchange. Open your Shard Gate," the old man said impatiently.
Lyn opened a Shard Gate the size of a fingernail and let a single ash fragment emerge. The elder's eyes widened.
"Rank Four ashrain residue!... How did you obtain this!?"
Lyn bowed his head. "I... overslept, Elder. But when I woke, the ridge was covered. I collected what little remained."
The elder clicked his tongue. "You slept through an ashrain! Lucky fool. A miner, huh?"
In his mind, the elder thought,
But how did this junior collect Rank Four material while having Rank Three cultivation? Hmph. He is either a Rank Four Dao Chosen pretending to be Rank Three, or he has an appropriate method to harvest the ashrain even though he is Rank Three. He must be quite rich if he has such a technique. But that isn't possible; he's a miner! …. A Rank Four working as a miner? Are the higher-ups not wasting people like this?
Lyn lowered his gaze but said nothing.
The elder examined the ash, nodded, and accepted the rest. Lyn received a small bag of contribution tokens.
Far less than he expected. He should be grateful that the elder forgot to check his Truth Carvings.
Long ago, a Dao Chosen had faked his carvings and caused a disaster for the entire region. The sect had procedures now. But elders grew lazy, and procedures grew rusty.
The elder was suspicious of how Lyn had managed to collect Rank Four material. For all he knew, this material could even be fake. Usually, rich Dao Chosen would not be found in villages such as Hazelrun.
Lyn hid his annoyance.
He bowed and left.
He went deeper into the market, to a stall selling simple bread and dried meat. Half of his contribution tokens vanished.
Then he approached the Light Path stall. A young disciple stood there, around twelve to fifteen years of age, bored and watching the sky.
"I want to buy a Rank One Light Information Shard," Lyn said quietly.
The disciple shook, startled from his daydream.
"Of course, of course!"
The disciple lifted a shard shaped like a piece of thin glass and held it out.
Lyn paid.
He stored the shard inside his Vessel Sea, letting it float among the others. The usual, faint resistance as a new shard settled into the Sea's power was absent.
It felt like sliding a key into a perfectly oiled lock. He noted the oddity, then dismissed it.
The shard was cheap; maybe it was just low quality
He took a deep breath and opened it inside his mind.
Information flooded into him:
Ashen Light Sect's map. Resource point classifications. Names of important local elders and disciples. Rank systems. Truth carving theory. Cultivation bottlenecks. Regional politics. etc..
Lyn absorbed every detail but remained expressionless.
So this is the world I must climb.
He walked back home slowly.
Night fell over Hazelrun Village. Lanterns flickered. Crickets chirped.
Inside his hut, Lyn sat cross-legged and stared inward at his Vessel Realm.
The Sea rested calmly. The shards floated above it. The Sky held his Light Truth Carvings, which formed as dwarf stars.
And above all of them...
A silent golden star. Unlike the rest of his Truth Carvings, which had formed a cluster, the golden star was rogue. It was unknown which path it belonged to.
When Truth Carvings solidify, they become dwarf stars… they gather by path. Like a family. Light stays with Light. But this one… It stands alone. Is it even a dwarf star?
Lyn studied it for a long time.
It gave off no qi. Created no carving reaction. Ignored the Sea entirely. It behaved like nothing he knew.
He closed his eyes.
Tomorrow, he would go to the sect's library.
He would risk more contribution tokens.
He needed to understand what he carried.
He needed to know why Heaven reacted so violently…
*****
Morning had already come. Lyn was excited as well as anxious. The first thing that came to his mind was the sect's library.
Even though I know how this world semi-functions based on the Rank One Information Shard I bought, it isn't enough,
I still need to figure out more about this world. What I got was only the basics.
He sat down on the edge of his bed. His movements were calm, but his thoughts were not.
The Rank One Light Information Shard had been useful. It explained the surface rules. It explained what people were allowed to know.
Cultivation in this world did not begin with breathing techniques or tempering the body. It began with birth.
People were divided into Dao Chosen and Rootless.
Dao Chosen were born with a Vessel Realm. It was an inner organ that existed beyond flesh, anchored near the heart. Without it, no power could be stored, shaped, or converted. Rootless people lacked this organ.
Forced awakenings were rare and dangerous. more than half of those who attempted it died. The rest were left unstable.
Inside every Vessel Realm existed two spaces:
The Sea and the Sky.
The Sea was milky white and endless; this does not mean that one can store infinite stuff in the Vessel Realm.
If one goes over their ranks limit, there is a dire punishment.
It had no visible shores. It stored neutral power and Heavenly Shards. When nothing was happening, the Sea was calm and inert.
The Sky stretched above it, vast and empty. It could not store power or shards. It existed only for Truth Carvings.
Truth Carvings were condensed understanding. They appeared as dwarf stars in the Sky of the Vessel Realm. Each dwarf star represented authority over a specific path, such as Light or Fire.
They dictated how power behaved once it was used.
Two cultivators could activate the same shard using the same amount of Sea. The one with more Truth Carvings would always produce a stronger and more precise effect.
Heavenly Shards were the tools of cultivation, crystallized, glass-like fragments of law that allowed cultivators to act on the world: attack, defense, concealment, movement, storage, etc.
A shard did not teach its path. It did not grant comprehension. It only worked.
But every shard demanded Essence.
Essence did not exist as a natural reservoir. It was born only when the Sea stirred and began to move.
Once awakened, even at rest, the Sea produced a faint, constant flow of Essence inside the body.
When a shard was activated, that flow surged, and neutral Sea power converted into Essence in overwhelming volumes for as long as the effect lasted.
Essence escaped easily if left unchecked.
That subtle leakage exposed a cultivator's rank and path to anyone perceptive enough to sense it.
Those who lacked the discipline to suppress it walked through the world announcing themselves without pause.
Rank measured how much a Vessel Realm could endure.
Advancement was not free nor easy. Due to its difficulty, many willingly stopped cultivating out of fear.
When a cultivator reached a threshold, Heaven responded. It descended with Heavenly Blockades, three trials for every major rank.
These blockades could be activated by the cultivator like a mental button(if they have the required amount of Truth carvings).
If it was not activated, the Dao Chosen did not advance, and there was even a possibility of decay.
Lyn slowly exhaled.
This was the law of this world.
Incomplete.
None of it explained why his Vessel could accept Rank Four material without strain. None of it explained a Truth Carving that produced no reaction. None of it explained why Heaven had reacted so violently that day.
He stood up.
If answers exist...they won't be in what they sell; however, I still need to try everything.
He stepped outside his hut and closed the door.
Deeper in the village was a library. It was costly to enter, as it was the sect's library. Unlike buying an Information Shard from the market, here every piece of information was stored in written books.
One couldn't read anything inside them due to the library's formation.
Only once you paid enough contribution tokens or had a high enough rank would you be able to read what was written inside. Obviously, it held much more information than an Information Shard from the market.
Lyn scratched his head before setting off to the library
Currently, I should have enough contribution tokens to enter the library and still keep enough for food and basic needs.
After some time, he stood in front of the library.
It was different from the surrounding buildings. Most structures were made of wood, brick, or stone, but the library was built from wood-refining ore.
When properly refined and molded, this ore greatly strengthened formations.
Formations were simply area effects created through combinations of shards and specific materials.
In this case, the library's formation was built directly into the walls, molded so that its effect only applied inside the building.
The building itself looked plain and ordinary, aside from its dark material, similar to blackened wood from Earth.
Not many people visited the library due to its cost[1]. Even after gaining contribution tokens from his exchange, Lyn did not feel confident.
Six contribution tokens had gone to food, fifteen to a Rank One Information Shard[2], and now fifteen more for the library... he would be broke after this.
Nonetheless, I need more information.
He opened the library door. A cold chill brushed against him. It was noticeably colder inside than outside.
Ahead was another door, and to the right stood a disciple. He looked to be in his mid-twenties, with long hair and a sharp, stern gaze.
"Welcome. Name, path, inner sect, sect or outer, and fifteen contribution tokens."
Lyn scoffed internally but smiled outwardly.
"Of course, sir. My name is Lyn. I primarily cultivate Light Path, and I am an outer disciple. I work in the mines. And here are fifteen contribution tokens," he said, adding a slight nervous tone to sound harmless.
Outer disciples were rarely worth attention; they had much lower status. They usually farmed the land, mined materials, and did other physical work.
The disciple then said,
"Rank Three? You can have the key to the Basic Section. One-hour duration. After one hour, the formation will expire, and you will no longer be able to read the books. Don't even dare to copy the information, steal, or anything in between. The formation will be triggered and paralyze you for a time." He looked at Lyn almost with hatred.
One could guess that while one was paralyzed, he would be killed by the disciple. It would be a righteous action in the eyes of the sect. Additionally, he would be rewarded for it.
"Of course."
The disciple gave him an iron key with "Section Basics" engraved in golden letters, glowing faintly.
The door in front of Lyn opened automatically. Lyn entered, and the door behind him closed. Three different doors were now present, all made of an unknown material. On the left, "Section Basics" was written. In the middle, "Section Experienced." On the right, "Section Honorable."
Lyn didn't waste time asking questions and put the key in the Section Basics door. The door opened, and he entered.
So many books... how come this space looks so much bigger than the building from the outside? Most likely a Space Path technique.
He continued wandering deeper. There were many sections: shard theory, history of the known world, maps, politics, basic information on formations, basic insights on fighting techniques, naming ideas, what to look for, and so on. None of it had much value to him right now.
Is there no section about natural disasters? he frowned.
He walked even further.
His eyes brightened. A section called "Rifts and Disasters."
[1] average people had little contribution points, unlike soldiers and other important positions, similar to capitalism, those whose skill had value were rewarded more
[2] All shards cost depends on what type they are, what information is stored inside, where they were brought, how they were created etc.