ALL NOVEL 413. A Boon and a Test
The day passed without any noteworthy events. Shen and E'livia relaxed a little, grabbed some food, and talked. She then taught him some more Galan.
Eventually, he reached the level of understanding over half the things he heard—and by that, he meant advanced-level stuff, including complex words and sentence structures. That more or less concluded her business. From then on, he could learn by listening to people's conversations and filling the gaps using context. From now on, they would only speak in Galan to help him, and he would also pay attention to conversations around him.
Surprisingly, E'livia decided to get to sleep that night. The day before, Shen had gone to sleep only because he had been affected by the Bluefrost. She was different.
She explained, "Sleeping is a privilege in the Myriad Worlds, and one every cultivator tries to indulge in as much as possible. I mean, a balance is needed, but who has time to sleep every day? So we do it whenever we can. As you must've noticed by now, the Axioms— Oh, you can't cultivate."
"I can now," he countered. "That's why I want to meditate once the fight is over."
"Hmm. Interesting." She was curious but didn't pry. "Anywho, Laws and Concepts are harder to touch in the Myriad Worlds compared to the ————— you come from. Here, a cultivator's mind kinda gets molded into seeing the world through the wrong perspective, far away from the underlying rules of Reality, if they go too long without resting the mind. There are all sorts of techniques to shut off your mind while keeping some attention to the surroundings, but from C-rank onwards, almost anyone has enough awareness of their surroundings even as they sleep. We holin only need two to four hours of sleep to 'reset' our mind for a few weeks."
"You slept yesterday," Shen countered. "Why are you sleeping again tonight?"
She smiled cheekily. "I like to sleep."
Her answer was simple yet profound. It reminded him of her words when she tried to drag him into a Truth and Axiom Debate: "To protect one's ego in the face of reality is to protect the false before the Truth! No cultivator can get far in the Path if they only care about protecting their public image!"
He could now recognize her words had also helped him in his earlier enlightenment. If he could even call that enlightenment truly "his." It had taken A-rank's Realization interfering with his Heavenly Tribulation, an ancient song, some words she had thrown at him, a fellow C-rank's wisdom, an A- Eternal Molten Bluefrost, and maybe even the tribulation itself affecting his willpower. As E'livia had said, in a way, Shen had found enlightenment by letting go of his ego, his cemented perception of Reality, to go for a deeper Truth. Only then had he touched his essence, whatever it was.
Meanwhile, E'livia was okay sleeping because she enjoyed it. She was as flawed as any person but closer to her essence than Shen had ever been.
She only walked a True Path, yet he had taken such grand illuminations to reach a similar state of affairs!
That showed how lacking he was. Even as he stood in a similar place as others, they surpassed him. Not only was E'livia's Path closer to her Truth than he had been, but also, without an overpowered weapon, his True Center would've faltered against T'onir's Freedom Fighting.
Shen suddenly frowned as he noticed something terribly wrong about his previous True Center.
It was called True Center and, theoretically, made him closer to his True Self. Yet, Shen had walked astray of his True Path to develop that True Center. He had walked astray of his truest self, his essence, who he was.
He was sure his True Center had advantages, but it also meant giving up on some things. He had constrained himself in unnatural ways to counter-balance his Will—
Lightning flared, and his memory was blocked. He even forgot the conclusion he was almost reaching.
Instead, he concluded his True Center had been both a boon and a test.
His True Center had been good for him. He just knew it had saved him countless times and given him strength. But if things had gone differently during this tribulation, he would be condemned to never be his most authentic self. He would never have been as "pure" as E'livia.
Yet, for some reason, he had considered his True Center a purer expression of his existence. Sure, in a way, it had been that. Pure, he meant. But a logical purity, which was only one Path ahead.
One of many.
The thing was, E'livia's grandmother had withheld a piece of information; Shen could easily infer that there were multiple Paths to Supremacy.
The Heavens were made of everyone's desires or something like that, and not everyone would want to reach the peak the same way. Not everyone could walk the same Path, considering their bodies and souls weren't all equal. There was a Wider Path one had to tread, leading from mortality to Supremacy, sanctioned by the Heavens, but it had different arteries leading to the same place. Each artery, each Path, had its particularities.
E'livia's True Path, which he had also walked in the past, was the common Path. He dubbed it the Path of Acceptance. She walked ahead imposing herself upon Reality, and forcing it to accept who she was. She also accepted herself. There was no need to change anything in her existential structure for extra power or big secrets. She was content with who she was and would make Reality bow to her through sheer effort.
Shen's most recent former Path had been one of mind—which he dubbed the Path of Vision. He wasn't sure of the details but knew he had used logic and reason to try to find an unnatural balance within himself to go against Reality. It honed and was honed by his willpower to make his Vision of who he should be reign supreme.
Shen's current Path was the Path of Essence. He was becoming one with his essence regardless of what Reality thought, modifying himself in ways he didn't even comprehend. He had only reached it by forgoing both the Path of Acceptance and the Path of Reason. He didn't know if it meant this Path was superior or just different.
T'onir's Freedom Fighting also felt like a Path, yet not entirely. Shen would group it together with the Anti-Path thing that E'livia had mentioned. Who knows how exactly they worked?
Whatever the case, he bet this was what this Heavenly Tribulation was about: Paths. And he was probably killing it.
In fact, he felt he could figure out the rest of his Will very quickly if he put his mind to it, but he wouldn't. Not yet. He was learning so much! He would at least get to know E'livia for a few months before taking the next step.
Those thoughts went through his head in a few instants. Then, he said, "Sleeping after what I went through sounds like a great idea."
E'livia and he lay in their bed and fell asleep immediately.
Shen noticed nothing different in his mind the next morning. After a light breakfast, he found a way to contact the City Lord, set up the time and place for their fight—above the nearest ocean in the afternoon—and waited for him there.
E'livia wasn't helping, though she thought she was in her own way. "Remember, I'll save you. Fight to your heart's content. Everyone loses all the time."
That had annoyed Shen at first, but now he found it funny. She was more anxious than him, and that was her way of overflowing her emotions. That she funneled it in a way that displayed concern for his safety was cute and almost endearing.
The City Lord arrived at the appointed time, clad in dark gray armor, wielding two small hammers that looked like maintenance tools. Everything was C+, though.
A dozen C-rank Defenders had come with him, but they kept their distance. They were here to watch the show, not do anything.
"Shen," Pagarti said with an almost unnoticeable nod. "Are you ready?"
Their relationship was strained after Shen's earlier lack of decorum. Shen was confident he might fix it if he wanted... but he didn't. He would fight Pagarti and move on to other matters. He wouldn't even be here if he didn't like fighting as much as he did.
Shen cupped his fists before his body and nodded. "I am." Un'Re left his body-soul through his neck and floated beside him.
The City Lord looked at the spear with interest. Shen still didn't get what was so impressive about it, except maybe for the fact that it had changed with him.
Its three core Laws had become an unidentifiable mix in the spear, though supposedly, only he could feel it. It was indeed an extension of him.
Pagarti only stared for a few seconds, then turned to E'livia, bowing his head. "Would you mind announcing the beginning of the fight?"
His politeness made it obvious that he knew who she was. He wouldn't blow her cover, but he was also not stupid enough to use the opportunity to be impolite to her. The Gardener Sect still ruled the place.
"Yeah, sure," E'livia said and flew high above Shen and Pagarti, who moved a couple of miles away from each other. Then, almost randomly, she said, "Fight."
The world was painted gray as Pagarti's domain covered everything within Shen's senses. It tainted the world to make everything look like a nail, and above them all, the phantom of a Hammer that looked more real than Reality itself.
Shen himself felt Reality whispering for him to change into a nail. Suggesting he was no drow but something to be hammered down at the Hammer's convenience.
Shen didn't even need his domain or willpower to counter it. Only Realizations and maybe the Void could pierce his perfectly whole One Self to affect his mind.
He tried to deploy his aura but failed; as E'livia had said, Pagarti had been prepared to block it. So, he grabbed his spear and rushed towards Pagarti.
His ease of movement surprised both E'livia and the man. Shen snickered. So much for a strong domain—
The Hammer fell down faster than Shen could fully process.
It impossibly struck Shen from all sides at once, trying to crush his entire existence. His One Self resisted for a moment, but that Hammer was no mere Hammer. It was Path and domain pushed to an extreme that forced Reality to concede to it almost like a Realization. Meanwhile, Shen hadn't even mastered a Law yet. His existence was unique and maybe strong in some ways, but in sheer, direct power, it was simply too weak to resist.
It was as if his existence was a high-grade Truth, and his power was a low-grade Truth.
Pagarti's existence was whatever, but his power, his superior domain, was a very-high-grade Truth.
When the very-high-grade Truth struck Shen, Shen's high-grade existence wasn't enough to resist. Thus, in the end, power reigned supreme.
Shen smiled at the recognition of Power's sovereignty in Reality, even as he was turned into a pancake.
Just before he was gone, he felt E'livia's domain cover everything, pushing Pagarti's away. He also noticed she teleport to stand before him. Then, he was as good as dead, as his body and soul were harmed beyond recognition.
Yet, as long as a single blood drop remained and was given time to heal, so would Shen.
He still had instincts and used his qi to heal. When he returned to himself, Pagarti and his people were nowhere to be found. Un'Re had been pushed away but was still intact. His cultivator robe was also whole only because Pagarti had circumvented its protections with his domain.
"I asked them to leave," E'livia explained, looking worried at him. "This City Lord was stronger than I thought. He might've killed you if I got distracted in a fight."
Shen smiled as he willed his spear to come to him. "It was no Anti-Path that infected him. If that were the case, he could've just asked someone else with a domain to remove it. But it was my aura that did the trick. He had been infected by a Path with Absolute Horizon."
The name of the domain ability had come to Shen as he healed. It was an ability of willpower, perfectly compatible with his Path of Vision.
His loss was irrelevant to him. He had been crushed by a superior Power. That was okay. More importantly, it confirmed to him that there were many Paths to Supremacy, and his Path of Essence was the best.
Oh, yes, it was the best. Shen had resisted Pagarti's oppressive domain for a moment just by existing the way he did. Once he also mastered his Laws, which were part of him, but holding his Whole One Self back...
He chuckled. That would be fun.
As for using his domain? Now wasn't the time yet. He had just got a benchmark of his weakness and would now check his comprehension. Then, it would be time to see how far his Domain of Infinite Improvement could push him. He bet the things he had lived in the Myriad Worlds would allow him to reach great heights.
"Are you free to watch over me as I meditate now?" he asked.
E'livia looked confused by his carefree attitude but nodded. "Sure, why not?"
Shen sat midair and stared at the world around him.