Free Tier - Accidental Champion (Book 7) - Chapter 12 - Cultivator

This notification has been translated from a competing System Version.

You have discovered your Reality Core.

You have gained a new energy source: Reality Energy.

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Translating related information…

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You have already partially adapted to the new energies inside of you when you underwent the process of expelling some of the impurities from your body.

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The following translated notification regards what you experienced before discovering your Reality Core.

You have expelled 10% of the impurities in your body.

Congratulations!

You have advanced from Tier 1 to Tier 2.

You body, mind, and spirit have been enhanced. Continue cultivating and cycling energy for further enhancements.

With training and diligence, your core will soon be revealed.

Now that you have started to build your foundation, you have taken the first step of many as a Cultivator on the Path of Cultivation.

Xavier blinked at the notifications before him. His forehead creased, and he frowned.

“Reality Core?” He looked inside himself, at the dense ball of translucent energy inside the unknown core.

Xavier had never heard of Reality Energy before. Though he supposed that was no surprise, considering this wasn’t supposed to be “compatible” with his universe.

But the questions that the notification had answered had only created more questions.

Usually, when he revealed a new core, he unlocked a Spell Quest. He’d been hoping that would be the case. Hoping he could once again cast a spell—any spell—without the need to draw thousands of runes in an intricate pattern. But, even though he’d been excited for that prospect, he hadn’t really expected it.

The first of many questions he now had was about the percent of impurities he’d expelled from his body.

How could it be only 10 percent!? I got rid of everything! Every last bit! At least, I thought I had…

That foul-smelling black sludge still sat in a pool outside the barrier of his time dilation field. He turned his gaze to it with a sniff, even though he couldn’t smell in here.

He imagined that pool being nine times larger.

That’s… That’s how much is left inside me?

He shuddered, then pushed that thought down.

It wasn’t the impurities that held his interest. It was what the last notification said.

You have advanced from Tier 1 to Tier 2.

Advancement went from F Grade to A Grade. There were rumours there was something after A Grade—S Grade, Xavier had discovered it was thought to be called. The rumour was that the most powerful man in the universe was actually S Grade and not A Grade, but Xavier didn’t know whether that was true, and Adranial hadn’t told him one way or another.

But he’d never heard of Tiers before.

It was a completely different path of advancement. One that apparently relied more on cultivation than Mastery Points. It made him wonder, not for the first time, what Mastery Points really were.

The way Xavier had understood things, the way the older version of him had explained it, was that the System didn’t change the way energy and power worked, it simply helped describe and channel it, and provided Denizens with information and blueprints for spells and pushed them toward advancing, while changing the environment to cause more conflict.

Just how it had changed Earth’s environment, altering the world and making it larger, filling it with more ambient Celestial Energy, and turning its animals into beasts.

Maybe Mastery Points are a different kind of energy too… Maybe the System altered the universe more than that older version of me knew…

Xavier stopped himself from getting off track.

Wherever this Reality Energy had come from, it was inside of him now. The subatomic dot of energy that had entered him when he’d been shattered back in the Arakashinai Queen’s chamber must have been this.

That tiny spark of energy had settled deep within him. It must have done something subtle to his mind, body, and spirit. Something that allowed him to sense the impurities within him—but doing that had only become possible after the gruelling stretching of Xavier’s energy channels, and the enhancement of his spiritual sense.

Before those impurities were expelled, I don’t think this core had yet formed. I don’t think the energy could reach it. I was examining the energy closely as I cycled it through my body, I would have noticed—unless the amount was so miniscule I couldn’t notice it yet, like with my undiscovered cores…

Either way, it wasn’t until I’d expelled the impurities that more energy was taken into the Reality Core, allowing it to grow while I was in that training-trance for over a year and a half. But… Even with energy entering that core, the power of my body hasn’t increased since the impurities were expelled.

But the reason for that was easily explained. Even the notification had told him to continue cultivating and cycling energy for further enhancements.

Xavier brought up the final part of the notification.

Now that you have started to build your foundation, you have taken the first step of many as a Cultivator on the Path of Cultivation.

The Path of Cultivation.

Xavier released a long breath, taking in everything that he’d just discovered, everything that had happened to him, as best he could. He hadn’t yet repaired his shattered cores. He hadn’t regained the ability to cast his spells or even use his Storage Ring.

But he had gained something no one in his universe—in his corner of the multiverse—had access to.

He was no longer only a Denizen of the Greater Universe…

Now, he was also a Cultivator, on the Path of Cultivation.

He just wished he had a better idea of what that meant.

“Hey, System, you got any more information for me about all this?” Xavier asked, facing the sky. He tilted his head to the side as he could have sworn he felt a presence close by—the eyes of the System on him—but that feeling quickly fled, and only silence came in answer to his question.

Xavier’s fingers itched. He had the sudden craving for coffee and good food. Lots of it, despite no longer needing to eat and drink. He looked over at the backpack filled with supplies that he hadn’t touched since he’d expelled the impurities from his body. The supplies in there should last for years even outside a spatial storage device, so they should still be good.

To his dismay, however, the only coffee he had access to was instant coffee he had to make in a pot, boiling the water over a fire. It was either drink the poor excuse for coffee black or add powdered milk.

Xavier sniffed at the very idea. He wasn’t that desperate.

The food inside that pack wasn’t especially appetising either. They reminded him of army rations. The supplies had been bought through the System Shop and were mostly dehydrated foods and small cubes that expanded in water to become something that only resembled soup.

As he’d been training, before he’d expelled the impurities, they’d been exactly what he needed as they were packed with vital nutrients. The taste hadn’t bothered him, for he’d only eaten to sustain himself.

But now that he didn’t need to eat, he was craving something good.

There were still more notifications for him to look at—the ones he’d ignored while he’d been training. Still more things for him to do inside that clearing, within that time dilation field, but Xavier picked himself up from the ground and swung the backpack’s straps over his shoulders.

After the mind-blowing discovery of his new core that shouldn’t exist in this universe, he found himself both exhilarated and… Exhausted.

It wasn’t often Xavier craved company, and he had Bones and even Rhaalir if he needed to talk to someone, but in that moment, he wanted nothing more than to return to Collinsville, drink a decent cup of coffee, eat a decent meal, and have a relaxing chat with his friends.

He’d spent far too long on his own.

~

 The tavern in Collinsville had come a long way since the last time he’d stepped inside it.

Xavier’s entrance into the town caused a stir. There were even more people here than when he’d abruptly been returned to the city from the Tower of Champions. The months he’d spent in that clearing—the ones that had passed for others, and not just himself inside his time dilation field—had stretched the borders of the city farther into the forest.

The organic city that had originated from a seed had simply grown outward. The walls had slowly been pushed along the earth, as though they were the city’s roots stretching farther from its centre as it aged, bit by bit, day by day.

The guards on the wall had stared at him. A crowd had gathered by the time he’d walked through the gate. He could have flown over, even with the backpack, but that would only cause more eyes on him. As much as he’d been craving the company of familiar faces, a few good friends, he didn’t like having everyone’s attention on him when he was simply off to get a coffee and a bite to eat.

He supposed it was understandable, given he was essentially their leader, but it still felt strange to him.

Xavier was only really used to having this much attention directed toward him when he was in the middle of combat, or he supposed when he was giving a speech to the town—something he hadn’t done for a long, long while.

When I get my spells working again, that might have to change if I want to take advantage of Territory Defence.

No one approached him or tried to talk to him. Even John Hammond onto gave him a curt nod as he passed through. Word had spread that the mysterious, absent leader had been training in seclusion and only wished to be spoken to when he addressed others.

At least I can take advantage of that…

Xavier had paused just over the threshold of the tavern’s entrance.

On entering, all eyes turned to him, the whole common room going silent for a stretch before everyone turned back to their meals. The excited chatter of the lunchtime rush he’d stepped into turned more subdued with more than one hushed conversation around the different tables.

They know I can hear everything they say, right?

In the corners, he did notice a few scattered privacy bubbles. There was a crystal at the centre of the tables. Where the privacy bubbles were activated, the crystal glowed. That was definitely a new addition.

He filtered out the general conversations as citizens of his city that he’d never seen before starting chatting about him and the rumours that surrounded their leader and walked straight to a corner table that was free.

The tavern was twice the size as the last time he’d been there. The building had been grown, like all building in the Seed Sanctuary city, and it must have expanded toward the need.

There will be other taverns now too, given how big Collinsville has become in my many absences.

A young waitress came over; she must have only been fifteen—just under System age—as a quick scan confirmed she was Level 0. He supposed this was a good place to work before you were integrated into the System, though the man behind the bar was definitely old enough to be integrated.

The girl had wide eyes as she tried not to stare at him, taking his order. To his dismay, he could sense a bit of fear in her. Whether it was fear of embarrassment, of messing up the leader’s order, or genuine fear of a powerful Denizen, he didn’t know.

He hoped it wasn’t the last.

For a moment Xavier worried he was giving off an intimidating aura. That hadn’t been something that could happen when his cores were shattered, and before that he had always had his veil up, unless he wanted to use his aura for something intentional.

But now, Xavier had a new core—his Reality Core. It only took a fraction of a second for him to examine that core to find no energy was escaping it like it would from one of his more “normal” cores. After checking, he felt slightly foolish.

I would have noticed if I was giving off an aura. It would have been more obvious to me than if I were bleeding.

Xavier considered saying something to calm the girl’s nerves, but he’d probably just embarrass her, so he pretended not to notice her emotional state and ordered in what he hoped was a calm voice.

When Xavier’s coffee arrived, the tavern’s mood seemed to return to normal. The novelty of having their leader enter the establishment died down the longer he sat in the corner quietly.

He couldn’t contact his old party members with their Communication Stones, so he hadn’t alerted them that he was here. At one point Howard had given him a Communicator, one of the ones they’d gotten from Famarial. He’d used that whenever he’d wanted specific supplies taken to the clearing. He could have contacted his old party with that, but he figured they’d soon know he was here.

Besides, him being here wasn’t exactly an emergency. He didn’t want to pull them away from whatever they might be doing if it was important. He didn’t even know if they were in town.

After he took his first sip of coffee, Justin and Siobhan entered the tavern and quickly spotted him. Justin had an excited, beaming smile. Siobhan’s smile was warm, though there was a hint worry in her eyes. This was the first time Xavier had returned to the city. Earth, and the Silver River sector at large—even if they weren’t aware of it—were relying on him returning stronger from his setback.

Strong enough to defeat the World Destroyer.

Otherwise everyone would have to be evacuated to a neighbouring sector, a task Xavier didn’t think was even possible with trillions upon trillions of people in their galaxy.

Other than Empress Larona—and Adranial—his old party were the only ones who knew about what had happened to him, and what was at stake. Though they believed in him, he couldn’t help but feel their worry and fears.

They’d been worried about what would happen to Earth before his cores had shattered.

They sat down across from him. Before anyone said a word, Siobhan reached over to the Crystal in the middle of the table and fed Spirit Energy into it, activating the privacy bubble.

The moment she did, her eyes went glassy—though in a different way to how when people looked at notifications. When they refocused, she pursed her lips and stared at Xavier.

She was checking my cores, and she didn’t like what she saw. That means, despite no veil, she can’t sense the Reality Core…

That was good information to have. As he wasn’t giving off any energy, that meant he wouldn’t attract people scanning him with their spiritual sense. Or their Aura Sight, as it was more commonly called. Though Xavier thought what he was developing was broader than simply sensing auras, which was why he referred to it as a spiritual sense in the first place.

“So, have you made any progress?” Siobhan asked without preamble.