“It is worth selling, but you’ll have to take some of the ocean water with you. Otherwise, the Essence will leak out as the plant dries, eventually leaving it as nothing more than a dried out weed.”
Roy sighed when he heard that. It would mean having to give up one of his canteens. He decided that for now, he would leave it unless he found some way of transporting it. Walking back up to the shoreline, he decided that the first thing he had to do was find somewhere to leave his clothes to dry. Then he would sit and cultivate. He’d lost a day to moping around, and now subsequently had a day less to advance.
He could feel that his core was growing stronger, but he still hadn’t pushed it to the point where he could break through.
Walking along the beach, Roy made sure to fetch the two cores he’d collected and stuck them in the pockets of his outer robe. He was still dressed in his underwear and was glad that there was no one else around to see him this way. This had taught him a valuable lesson about being prepared. As soon as he was ready to move on to the town Geon had mentioned, he would buy several sets of clothes.
He finally found a flat shelf of stone hanging out over the ocean and laid his robe down on it, weighing them down with smaller stones so that the breeze didn’t drag them away. He sat down next to it and got into his cycling position.
The Power Essence gathered along the shoreline filled his senses as soon as he reached out to it, but this time when he started pulling it to him, he kept himself open to everything. The last time, the two Beasts had managed to sneak up on him. This time, he wouldn’t allow that to happen.
He sat there for the next couple of hours, cycling and refining. His body had long since been dried by the ocean breeze and sun overhead, but he stayed in the same spot, pulling in Essence and cycling to refine it. Finally, he cycled the last of the Essence through the pattern around his core and opened his eyes.
His core was completely full of refined Essence. Blowing out a deep breath, Roy waited. Nothing happened. He felt his excitement at having finally filled his core with refined Essence fade then, and panic begin to set in.
Why wasn’t he advancing? He’d done everything right, hadn’t he?
“Geon, why am I not advancing?” he finally thought to ask.
“What, were you expecting to advance as soon as you filled your core? In case you’ve forgotten, you’ve done that before. Now that your core is full, you have to start pushing at the boundaries of what you can hold.”
“Are you sure that’s safe? The last time I tried to pull in more than I could handle, I almost exploded.”
“If you remember correctly, that was when you filled it with unrefined Essence. Overloading on that would have caused instability. Using refined Essence will not give you any of the same problems…at least that’s what I think. My memory is getting hazier by the day, so I could be wrong.”
Sighing, Roy closed his eyes once again and focused on pulling in the Power Essence. There wasn’t much left after his cycling, but there were still a few scraps he could pull in. Breathing according to the technique, Roy pulled the wisps of essence into himself, cycling it through his channels and towards his core.
He’d been expecting his core to reject the Essence, but to his shock, the purified Essence compressed, making room for the new Essence. He then felt something he hadn’t before, a slight straining at the bounds of the core. A grin touched his lips when he felt that and he knew what it meant. He’d finally found the way to advancement.
Now it was just a matter of finding enough Essence to push him over the edge. For now, the Essence was all gone. He would have to leave it and come back tomorrow, once the Essence had had a chance to gather once more.
Pulling on his now dry clothes, Roy wondered what he should do for the rest of the day. There were many things that needed to be done, but he couldn’t decide which was the most important. Finally, he decided to ask Geon his opinion. It was hard to have to keep reminding himself that he had a constant companion when the core would go silent for hours on end.
“What do you think is the most important thing for me to learn right now?” he asked, slipping his arm into his outer robe and tying it with his Belt.
“I would say that developing a proper Physical technique is the most important. You can work on your martial combat as well, but you should devote more time to developing an actual technique. Right now, the best you can do is coat your limbs in Essence. And while it has been getting the job done, it’s wasteful and not nearly as effective as it would be otherwise.”
“How would I go about developing a proper technique, though?” he asked, heading up the beach and looking for a good spot to train.
“No idea. Trial and error for now. Remember what I said. The Crater would be the best place for you to study Power Essence. I don’t know why we’re still wasting time here.”
“Yes, but you also said that it’s full of dangerous Beasts and is being used as a battleground between four different clans.”
Roy found a spot that was shaded from the sun by an overhanging tree with large, broad leaves that spread out in strips from the trunk. He’d never seen a tree quite like it, as it seemed to lack any branches, but he wasn’t picky. The shade provided was welcome, and he settled into one of the beginner fighting stances shown in his book on martial combat.
“I did, but as I said, there is no safe path forward. If you want power, you have to take some risks,” Geon replied.
Roy began to move through the set of stances. This was all footwork, as the book called it. It would help improve his speed, reflexes, and base. It would make him stronger as a fighter and as a Martial Artist.
“But I’ll never make it there before my time runs out. How long will I have after I advance to 1st Dan? And when will it end?”
“I have no idea. I’ll only be able to tell you once you advance. As for how long you’ll have to keep pushing like this, I’m not entirely sure. I would guess until your body can handle the physical strain of containing me. That could be Yellow, Orange, Green, or even higher, as far as I know.
But yes, you are right that we can’t make it to The Crater before your time runs out. So we’re going to have to do that before you do. As for figuring out your first technique, it can’t be too difficult. You’re smart and resourceful. I’m sure you can do it.”
With that said, Geon went silent once more, leaving Roy to parcel out his thoughts. From what he’d read, he knew there were several different types of techniques when it came to the Martial Arts. The section in his book on techniques had explained all that to him in great detail, and he knew exactly which technique he would need to succeed: a Conqueror technique.
Roy didn’t actually know anyone who could use a Conqueror technique. Not even Shah Korgo, head of the Shah clan had that kind of power. Regardless of that, Roy knew that in order to destroy the Shah clan, he would have to master all nine aspects of the Martial Arts in his chosen Path. And the first step was to create and master a Physical technique. Before he could even start that, he would have to figure out what he wanted the technique to do.
Stopping his training, Roy wiped at his forehead and decided that in order to better understand how to develop his technique, he would have to read the book he’d brought along. It detailed Water Essence techniques, but studying that should give him a better understanding of what steps needed to be taken.
It was then that his stomach let out a loud growling sound, reminding him that he had not eaten in over a day. Suddenly realizing how ravenous he was, Roy allowed a sheepish grin to touch his lips.
It wouldn’t do to die of starvation.