---
[YOUR NEW SKILL]
Skill Type: Void Sense (Passive)
Skill Rank: F
Skill Description: You will be aware of the flow of Aether and other people's cultivation signatures approximately 30m from you. You'll be able to identify any people that are hiding their presence and you will know about approximately what your cultivation rank is. You can also sense if there's anything wrong with the Void Aether flowing through your body.
Important Note: This skill did not exist before in the game. It seems to be an effect from cultivating differently than other players do. The system keeps track of this as an observation.
The system thought it was rude. I thought this was my first time creating a real advantage in this body since I woke up.
---
Day #20
It's finished [...]
I discovered it today on Day 20 at 2:47 a.m [...] while I was on my eighty-ninth circulation cycle. At the time I began to notice a subtle change in my meridian network, the type of change one feels when they turn a key in a lock. The energy pathways that had reacted to the Void Aether in my body as if they were trying to reject it as if it were an alien substance (even though I know it was never that) suddenly no longer resisted. The energy pathways went from fighting the Void Aether to accepting the Void Aether. The energy pathways may not process the Void Aether the same way the healthy Core's energy pathways do but they now can carry it the same way that rivers can carry water (which is not perfectly). I successfully completed the ninetieth circulation cycle and also the ninety-first.Even though I still felt the pain in my hands and the burning pain in my forearms, I could tell it was different from before. It felt less like acid, more like exercise. There was less damage and more strain on my body.
I forced myself to complete all one hundred circulations.
---
*Completed Hidden Quest*
**Quest: The Fractured Path**
**Status: Complete**
**Circulation Count: 100/100**
**Collecting Reward...**
**Reward: Void Meridian Network (Permanent)**
- Your Meridian Network now has a permanent adaptation to allow Void Aether to flow through your body without being attached to your core.
- Your Void Aether throughput is now increased by 200%.
- The rate of degradation for your Meridian Network is now decreased by 80%.
- You have established a fundamental foundation for advanced Void techniques.
**Rank Update: Initiate (F+) - Acolyte (E-)**
**Note:** You completed this in 20 days, a task that would normally require 6-8 years to complete. Therefore, the system has no choice but to acknowledge this achievement.
The system is not happy with this acknowledgment and has filed an objection – I don't know who, but they have filed a formal objection.
---
E-minus.
Not E-rank. The "minus" was significant; it meant I had now crossed into the Acolyte territory, however, I was very low on the ranking scale. Meaning that I was equivalent to someone who had $1,001 in their bank account because they were considered a thousandaire. However, this rank allowed me access to areas that were previously unavailable to me, as Acolyte was the minimum requirement for admission into the academy. Also, Acolyte was the absolute minimum that any Valdrake heir was able to survive without causing immediate political repercussions.
The fact remained that I still lagged behind Cedric by three full ranks, however, I was now no longer below the minimum. I did have limited access, however, I was at least in the building.I entered through the service entrance, but will now be showing you items that are sold inside.
The Void Meridian Network reward is the only reason I am here today! I will be adapting to become permanent, this will allow me to channel Void Aether through my meridians for all time! And now that adaptation has occurred, I will be able to channel without the continued degradation of my blood vessels which I have been experiencing for three weeks, gradual deterioration due to the effects of training and previous exposure, but future training will not create the same effects and this means my scars are forever, they will not be further compounded through future training; I may continue to grow as a person, but it will be slow and painful.
I was going to start out with a set of scars on my fingers and work my way up from there. I picked up a practice sword and began training again. I could finally feel Void Aether flowing smoothly into my meridians, my blood vessels had healed, and I could channel that energy into my practice sword now.
I swung my practice sword through the air. It blurred as it swung and I heard the sound of a blade cutting through the air – not just the sound of something cutting, but it also was the sound of Void Aether flowing behind the blade. Just for one moment, my practice sword felt as thought it were another part of my body – there was no separation; I could feel every detail and micro-movement of my sword and my hand.
I knew what it felt like to cultivate Void Aether properly. I no longer felt the pain and suffering of forcing energy down broken channels – from channeling through the broken channels it now felt as if I were cultivating Void Aether according to the natural flow of energy. That energy and my body were in total harmony; the world will be at my command because I earned that command.
It lasted three seconds.After feeling the strain catch up and my arms burn, I needed to take a few minutes to breathe and calm down as my body was shaking from exhaustion.
But for just three seconds of those three minutes, I remember what it was like to be strong; for just those three seconds, I didn't feel like I was just a dead man pretending to be an archvillain in a world of people who wanted him dead.
In those three seconds, I felt stronger than I had in a long time.
---
Day 21: the last night.
Everything has been packed. All of Cedric's clothing was organized into three large trunks by some servitors that showed up without prior notice, did their work silently and skillfully, then disappeared like efficient phantoms. All of Cedric's practised swords were returned to their racked positions. The old cultivation book Cedric had been hiding was put away in a secret compartment in the floor of Cedric's bedroom. I am not taking it to the Academy where anyone may see it.
Sera's sketch is staying with me. It is inside of my coat, pressed against my heart.
I am now standing at the window of Cedric's bedroom, which he occupied for 17 years, and as of tomorrow, there will be no one in this room. The rolling estate beneath me is going on forever, and as far as I can see, there is grass that seems to glow a little due to the leyline that is feeding it. The full moon is right above my head and looks larger and slightly differently than it did back home.
This place is amazing! The beauty of this world surrounds me, and I sometimes forget all of that because of the flags of death and the constant drum beats of survival that always run through my senses.The world I was looking at was impossibly beautiful, painfully so. It looked like a world created by someone who loved every blade of grass and every star in the night sky and every shade of moonlight on dark stone.
I was looking at a world created by someone, whether it was a bankrupt South Korean game studio or something bigger and more complex than my mind could comprehend, there was great love poured into this world that made the moonlight blue and the grass glow and the air taste of possibility.
And in that world I just stared at, a boy named Cedric was born into the world knowing he would die.
I turned away from the world outside and back inside the room.
---
NOTICE
Departure Event to Astral Zenith Academy
08:00 AM Tomorrow Morning
The following characters will be at the academy when you arrive:
> Seraphina Luvel Seraphel (Heroine #1)
> Liora Ashveil (Heroine #2)
> Elara Rosevine Thornecroft (Heroine #3)
> Nyx Ashara Silvaine (Heroine #4)
> Aiden Crest (Protagonist #1)
> Draven Kaelthar (Protagonist #2)
> Lucien Drakeveil (Protagonist #3)
Death Flag #1 will activate upon Enrollment.
The System wishes you luck.
This is a lie. The System does not wish you luck,
The System wishes you to comply. But since you
aren't going to comply, the System wishes you luck.
---
I dismissed the message and sat back down on the edge of the bed.
When I walked into the school tomorrow, I would be surrounded by people who had known Cedric Valdrake for years. People who had grown up with fear, hatred, and competition with him. People whose story-scripted roles I'd memorized, and whose real-life personalities I had yet to meet.
These heroes were supposed to kill me.
These heroines were supposed to hate me.
There was a professor who was secretly a cultist.
The headmaster was watching me closely.
Somewhere among them was a commoner boy with hidden bloodlines and the weight of the world on his shoulders, waiting for the moment the Script told him to extinguish the villain's story.
Aiden Crest. The hero of Route 1.
The boy who killed Cedric Valdrake in four of the seven playthroughs.
I lay back on the silk bed sheets, and looked up at the ceiling — the Valdrake family crest, the circle of darkness swallowing an ornate crown; it was the symbol I'd seen on buttons, doors, and in archways every day for three weeks, and it felt more like a brand on my body than a family symbol now.
Three weeks ago, I was a dead man with a 2.3% chance of survival, and I couldn't hold a sword without it quaking in my hands.
Today, I was an E-minus cultivator with scarred hands, a permanently linked Void Meridian Network, an emergent sensory ability that the system can't classify, a dead girl's drawing on my chest, a sentient weapon in waiting behind a sealed door, and 47 death flags standing in the way of me achieving a future that the game could not have prepared for.
Most likely my probability has improved, but I didn't request the Ledger to recheck my odds. Certain numbers are best left uncalculated.
I closed my eyes.
Tomorrow, the villain goes to school.