[MA] 304. In His Bones (Patreon)

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[Notice: There will be no chapters on this month's last week-ish (09/23 to 09/29)

Chapters this week: 3/3 (the previous chapter, which said 1/3, was incorrect; it was already 2/3 on Thursday)

Next chapter: Tuesday]

When the world came back into focus, Shen found himself being carried by Wu Bai. The big cultivator had placed the heavily armored Shen directly on his arms and piled a few others on top, including Alicia.

Shen looked around to check for immediate threats and relaxed when he found none.

Wu Bai was running deeper into the absolute darkness surrounding the Void Farm. The farm was in a special superimposed space as ample as the Voided Subnode, yet the Void had only cared to create anything in the area the farm occupied. Everything else was a strange mix of nothingness and hints of existence, like the invisible ground on which Wu Bai ran.

The Wild Shift was still going on, but it didn't matter in the darkness because there were no Voided Continuums or Law Exclusion Zones in that place. Not that it improved things, either. The dark place was partly the Void, so while Reality's Laws were present, they felt weak, faint, and unreachable. The sensory feedback was slightly worse than even in the Wild Shift; Shen couldn't feel anything beyond his body using his sixth sense, his Law vision was gone, and it felt like his mind would break when he tried to push his Laws beyond himself. In that place, his reach would be limited to his physical self and any object he touched. He also couldn't push qi out of his body.

And yet, despite all that, Shen felt good.

His memories from everything that had happened after the Wild Shift started were like a dream, distant and blurry. However, they were very real.

He felt it in his bones.

Shen had changed. He still had to explore the specifics but could tell he was stronger. More present. Centered. His existence felt less... Less ephemeral, somehow. Wholer. Truer.

Even his connections to his Laws had benefitted. He had pulled only one Law, True Boundlessness, into a socket. However, the Law was inseparable from the other six after he integrated with his Path's Image during his last breakthrough. Even its anti-boundary nature wasn't strong enough to wholly subvert that. So his Path's Laws became a more crucial part of his existence, and it heightened his connection to them.

They felt more like part of himself, more like a natural limb, than ever before. In fact, just feeling them inside himself gave him hints of how he could progress his mastery over every one of them. He couldn't do it right now because it would be an introspective exercise, but it was already impressive, and he guessed feeling the Laws affecting the world would further improve his insights.

His gains didn't stop there, either. Mind-wise, he felt as good as before entering the farm, despite being under even greater mental pressure than before he had fainted. His existence was still anchored to the Void Farm—it was a weird feeling, like being homesick—but even with his reach suppressed, the sensory oppression, and soul pressure, he was alright.

The Will-Path Merging technique that Karlov—

Recalling the half-dragon made Shen snap his neck as he quickly turned his head, searching for Karlov. He wasn't sure if it was a blessing or a curse that he couldn't see the B-rank from this position. He sighed in relief nonetheless.

Just remembering the technique he had been taught filled him with dread and wonder. His paranoid self hadn't been able to analyze it properly, but he could now tell it was at least A-rank. The signs of Karlov manipulating Shen's decision to use the technique despite his distrustful state were also obvious. That was a very dangerous half-dragon.

Well, he would have time to think later. Now, his troops were retreating, and he had a role to fill.

"You can put me down now," Shen told Wu Bai.

The air in that darkness was so thin that sound couldn't propagate through it. Shen forced his armor to vibrate according to his words, and Wu Bai felt it on his hands. Everyone had been taught how to translate such vibrations back into words. The cultivator sighed in relief as he juggled the four other people in his arms to put his commander on the ground.

Shen nodded and extended his arms to get the people from Wu Bai's arms, especially Alicia, but something stopped him.

* - * - *

Abbav frowned while talking to First Lieutenant Zyn.

Lieutenant Shen had awakened and was perfectly aware of himself. That wouldn't do. Abbav immediately increased the pressure on the boy, who was supposed to be undergoing Stress Discipline training.

Yet, the draggor found himself frowning deeper. Lieutenant Shen was resisting a lot. Soon, he was taking the full brunt of Abbav's tricks with little noticeable effects, despite all the other factors affecting his mind.

Abbav instantly realized what had happened during the period he had forgotten: he had initiated the boy into the Self-Realization Rituals.

A Realization Impartation could also explain this instantaneous improvement. However, Abbav knew he hadn't revealed his Realization to the world, or Zyn would've felt it and informed him. That only left the rituals.

Yet, Abbav couldn't even start guessing why he would share the very closely guarded and valuable Baptism of Self with the boy.

He followed the threads. Shen's Raw Self needed to be amazingly strong to cause that much of an improvement—

No. This wasn't the effect of a Baptism of Self. Abbav felt no connection to the boy where one would be if he Baptized him. In fact, Lieutenant Shen's willpower had been strong enough before, and in retrospect, it fitted him already being Baptized.

Instead, Abbav had taught the boy how to do a Will-Path Merging.

Not that it explained everything, either. The lieutenant's improvement was too significant—though not substantial enough to be the effect of the third ritual, which could only be used at B-rank anyway. Lieutenant Shen had done something that improved his willpower beyond the second ritual's theoretical limits and enlightened Abbav enough for his mind to widen.

Abbav wondered if he could turn Shen into a Test Subject for some research but didn't dare entertain the notion for long. Nothing would justify that. He would have to go crazy at prospective rewards to ever touch someone with dragon genes with an A-rank dragon on the way, especially after daring to read the boy's memories on such a flimsy justification.

His hatred for dragons really blinded him sometimes—making it essential to care about Zyn's perspective on this Experionary Training.

"We have a situation," Abbav told Zyn, interrupting the First Lieutenant's report on the events of the last few seconds.

"Yes, Captain?" Zyn replied, trying but failing to hide how annoyed he felt at the sudden change of subject.

"I can't keep Lieutenant Shen under Stress Discipline training."

Abbav's skills to induce fear into others were nowhere as good as his ability to kill people, but they were still impressive. Even so, they would bring almost no benefit for someone with as strong willpower as Lieutenant Shen currently had. It was meant for, at most, weak B-ranks if enough external factors pressured their minds. Shen had surpassed that.

The issue was that if Shen kept a clear mind, he might positively affect the others. That wouldn't do. Abbav found little pleasure in anything other than his research, and this was one of them. Making people improve through controlled suffering was entertaining and sometimes revealed interesting data for later use.

Besides, Zyn would oppose his troops becoming weaker than Abbav could make them, and Abbav was currently following the First Lieutenant's lead.

"What do you mean, Captain?" Zyn asked hesitantly.

Abbav understood what Zyn feared and replied, "It has nothing to do with whatever I saw in Lieutenant Shen's memories. I assure you I forgot everything. But whatever happened, his willpower improved by leaps and bounds. I'm incapable of affecting him as much as we need. He'll keep most of his reasoning."

Zyn didn't hide his surprise. "Are you sure? Captain?"

"Yes."

There was a few moments of silence before Zyn asked, "Are you asking me for my input on it, Captain?"

"Yes."

"You claimed you can't affect him enough. Is there no solution for that, Captain?"

"No. Only direct interfering with his mind would work. That is not within the permissible scope of this Stress Discipline exercise."

The First Lieutenant sighed. "Then I see only two ways out. One, we remove him from the Expeditionary Training. I greatly dislike the idea, but it's better than having him negatively affect the benefits everyone else can get. Two, we let Lieutenant Shen in on some of the Expeditionary Training's secrets and order him to behave appropriately. I consider field clearance expansion an aberration, but this seems like one of the edge cases where it's acceptable. He'll need limited second-tier leadership clearance."

Unlike Zyn, Abbav greatly liked the idea of sending Lieutenant Shen away. Zyn hadn't felt Reality's warning, so he wasn't aware of how dangerous the boy's presence here was. Then again, without Shen's paranoia, he shouldn't try to escape into the Void.

Nevertheless, that wasn't for Abbav to decide. "Lieutenant Shen has a domain. He almost escaped into the Void. He's a first-class talent, and Reality issued a warning. Keeping him here might be dangerous."

To Abbav's surprise, the First Lieutenant didn't panic. He only shook his head in defeat. "I told the Investigation Department to look deeper into him, but they claimed they couldn't touch the boy because of his B-rank Monitoring. I want to make an official complaint. Their laziness and unwillingness to make a few people upset risked countless lives."

"I'll forward the complaint, but it won't hold during a Calamity. You know that."

"I hate politics, Captain, but I'll allow myself to use a complaint as a statement: some things are too important to be set aside even in the face of a Calamity."

"So be it." Abbav approved of that. He would ask to personally investigate the matter and punish the responsible. "About the boy?"

"I'm very against sending him away, Captain. The sum of factors that make Reality care about him using a domain here are incredibly rare, but he's in the front lines now. We don't leave things to chance here; you taught me that."

"I see."

Zyn had a point. Coincidences and statistical data were empty words on the front lines, at least when it came to the environment and the Void's decisions. The Void messed with everything. Lieutenant Shen was as unlikely to find himself in another situation that made stepping into the Void dangerous as he was likely to find it every other day.

It might happen on his way to safety. Removing him from this Stillborn Phasespace necessarily meant returning him to the Voided Subnode first. He would have to stay there for a few moments while Abbav created a portal to the local base of operations. A Void Storm might strike in those few instants, and a Counternode might blossom beside Shen. The two things together might corrupt the ring affecting his mind and soul. The only way for him to cut the connection would be to use his domain.

If Shen did that before Abbav reacted—and the Void might distract Abbav in some way—while inside a Law Exclusion Zone that affected his Path, he would feel how he could phase jump into the Void for a split second. As a Void-tainted individual, that would make him immune to Law Exclusion Zones until he left this Voided Subnode. He would suddenly know that and be tempted to do it.

The odds of that happening in Alliance territory? Null—or as null as the Void suddenly swallowing a planet without forewarning.

On the front lines? It might suddenly start happening daily to every living being with an artifact connected to their minds for millions of years—or not at all until the end of times.

Of course, the military didn't base all its plans on fear of Statistical Abnegation. That was just another of the Void's abilities. But they also didn't take any chances that could be easily avoided, especially when all it took was talking to somebody to make them aware of the risks.

"We could still send him away after telling him the bare minimum," Abbav insisted.

Thinking of Statistical Abnegation made him focus on his mental improvement, which was unlikely to happen before A-rank. The more he thought about it, the more he wanted to learn, and the closer he stepped into dangerous territory—into researching-Shen land.

What if whatever the boy had going for him and had benefitted Abbav was related to a vital dragon secret? Shen had dragon genes. It was possible.

Abbav wanted to take a peak.

Just a little one. For a moment. He could set up a simple experiment that would last a second and let him learn a few things about the test subject. It wouldn't even notice—

No. Not a test subject; Lieutenant Shen. Not it; he.

"If you insist, Captain," Zyn replied, unconvinced.

Abbav should insist.

But maybe he would learn enough just from watching Shen. Keeping the lieutenant close would be arguably safer for the boy himself. Abbav could stop him from using his domain with ease. It would benefit everyone in that Reality Node. Perhaps even the whole universe if you looked at it from the right angle.

Still, Abbav wouldn't decide that. He could tell how involved he was. He had argued, but the matter was now in Zyn's hands.

"This is your brigade, First Lieutenant," Abbav said. "Do as you will. But you'll be the one to lie to him." Talents were barred from some truths, after all.

Zyn was annoyed at how randomly Abbav switched between giving orders and letting Zyn take command. Abbav suppressed a smile. At least that was going as expected. Not all Stress Discipline training was made equal, after all.

Zyn's willpower could still improve a little more, especially now that a subordinate was considerably stronger on that front. Abbav would focus on that.

Helping the First Lieutenant would keep Abbav's mind out of matters best left alone.

* - * - *

The pressure on Shen's mind suddenly increased absurdly. His thinking slowed, and it became very challenging to analyze some things. The heightened connection to his Laws felt beyond him. Still, he at least retained most of his ability to reason.

That wasn't the reason he didn't take Alicia from Wu Bai's arms; it was Karlov.

The half-dragon simply appeared before Shen, blocking his way.

Karlov's presence made Shen very uncomfortable and anxious. Shen didn't fear for his life, not in a direct assault, but had ambivalent feelings about the Lieutenant Specialist—who should actually be at least a Captain, considering he was B-rank.

On the one hand, the Will-Path Merging technique was beautiful, powerful, and supposedly a closely guarded secret. Shen could even tell in hindsight how it saved him from single-mindedly pursuing omnipotence to the detriment of his every other belief.

On the other hand, it hadn't been a gift as much as a convenient tool that Karlov allowed Shen to misuse. He had allowed Shen to push True Boundlessness into the conceptual sphere that represented himself. Shen had almost been unmade. He would be gone without pure instinct and quick thinking at the last moment. The B-rank evidently didn't care about Shen's survival as much as he claimed.

The half-dragon's methods made Shen feel like an ant that had barely caught the fancy of a disinterested giant. Shen had earned a glance and maybe a sugar cube, but that was all. The giant wouldn't go out of its way to keep the ant alive if it headed toward destruction on its own. Karlov felt no connection to Shen besides whatever had caught his fancy.

It reminded Shen of drow training, except the drow cared about their charges in their own way. Liya would've stopped Shen from killing himself. He was drow, after all.

Shen hated what had happened with a force. He had been manipulated. Treated as an object. And yet, he couldn't deny the benefits. After the episode with the Pure Yin-Yang Water, he knew some things could only happen without forewarning.

What if this Will-Path Merging thing was one of them?

Until he found out more, he would keep his anger under control. But if everything had just been the fruit of Karlov's twisted sickness...

Shen didn't mind adding a name to his kill list.

Karlov didn't stay for long. He touched Shen for his words to be felt in the latter's armor, said, "Commander's orders: your presence is required," and left as suddenly as he had appeared.

Karlov could've used his domain instead of touching Shen but was keeping it a secret. Shen wouldn't spill the beans to anyone. In fact, he would pretend he knew nothing about Karlov at all. He would research the Will-Path Merging using channels he could trust.

The less contact he had with the B-rank half-dragon who treated him like an ant, the better.

Shen informed Wu Bai of his impending absence, kept the guy in charge of the battalion, and headed toward Zyn.

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