Shu He's Exam - Secrets of Gold

One by one, each sect member to be took their turn measuring their talents on the large formation, after Gang Bo's surprising results there was nothing quite as surprising but each and every one of the other participants were from a sizeable clan, their results didn't fall behind usually having one main element around the 'High, Earth' level, some just pushing to the 'Extreme – Low' level, the ones here were certainly the best talents a clan could send.

All except three of them, the first was currently taking the examination as he sat in the centre plate, his legs tucked beneath his body and hands resting gently on his lap, his posture was immaculate showing he had trained for a long time to achieve it, as the formation activated his long black hair swayed in the wind.

"Fire, Middle Earth; Earth, Lower Earth; Wood, Middle Mortal; Metal, Lower Mortal; Lower Dust"

After the lights died down, Tai Hui gentle stood up and walked out of the formation without any hurry, when he reached the instructor he looked over and pouted slightly.

"Fire is my best. That doesn't seem very scholarly, are you sure it's right?" He asked slightly sullen.

"I'm 100% certain, the elemental compatibilities can reflect a person's nature, however that nature cannot easily be determined just by looking at them, not every fire cultivator is a hothead after all; Maybe you will discover something more about yourself when you attune yourself with the element". Su Wen explained.

Tai Hui held his chin as he pondered, staring deeply at the instructor.

"Maybe so… yes you might be right, I thank you for your guidance" He bowed deeply.

"There's no need to bow, I'm an elder here at this sect and also an instructor, and you are now a junior member, it's my job to teach you anything I can".

"Nether less, I must still do it" Tai Hui shook his head before raising from his bow and walking off in to the pack that had already tested their elements.

All that was left was two people.

Shu He and…

"I… I guess I'll go next" Wei Yu had been fairly silent since the first exam, mostly keeping to himself, he had quietly watched everything go on, feeling a sense of nervousness he hadn't before.

'What if I fail again' was what passed through his head as he rigidly stepped forth on to the formation plate and sat down, he shifted his position multiple times before he managed to get comfortable, he breathed in and out tens of times before he began circulating his qi.

Once more the formation lit up creating a pentagon of light that shined with different colours.

Wei Yu felt his chest tighten as he waited for the instructor to announce the results.

"Water, Upper Earth; Metal, Middle Earth; Earth, Lower Earth; Wood, Middle Dust; Fire, Low Dust"

He listened to each word carefully, and after listening to them all he shook slightly he smiled with joy.

The light receded and the motes of bright energy suffused in to the surroundings, gentle lighting up Wei Yu's figure whose expression was filled with a joyous relief.

"Congratulations, it seems after all this time the Wei family's blood holds strong" Su Wen said as Wei Yu passed by, Wei Yu turned to reply with a hint of confusion on his face.

"Uh… thanks?" He spoke.

Su Wen's eyebrow rose for a second before returning to normal.

"He doesn't know?" He muttered to himself for a second as he watched Wei Yu walk away.

His gaze rested on Wei Yu walked towards the others with a sense of renewed vigour, quickly going to chat to Gang Bo with a smile on his face, one free of cares.

"Hn, I guess it's not my place to tell him" He shook his head while mumbling before looking over to the last participant.

"Shu He? You're the last one".

…

Shu He looked over to Su Wen after he snapped out of a daze, he was continuously worrying about the problem with his golden core flame, yet he couldn't think of a solution, this wasn't P.E class or something after all he couldn't just call in sick, he had to be tested!

He took a deep breath in and out before answering to calm himself.

"Okay" he began walking towards the formation and as soon as he entered the ring he felt the pressure push against his skin, with his 'sense' he could see that the entire cylindrical area that composed of the formation was deeply saturated in Qi which was creating the pressure.

He steadily stepped on to the smooth plate in the middle of the formation, the moment he placed his foot on it he could feel a gentle suction power trying to extract Qi from his body, but there seemed to be a wall between him and the force.

'What a weird feeling, I wonder if this formation can be used in another way, other than testing compatibilities'.

He sat down cross legged, his arms resting on his thighs as he performed his usual ritual to get into a state of meditation, the entire time he watched the twin flames that were flickering gently inside of him.

Like before, Su Wen placed his hand on the plaque to activate the formation.

The light ringing filled Shu He's ears as he tensed up slightly.

'Here we go'…

He felt his Qi gently leave his body like drops of water sliding down a rock, it wasn't an unpleasant sensation, rather the opposite it was like taking a shower after straining your body for a day, the sense of weakness that is somehow comforting.

His azure core flame was being siphoned, yet his gold core flame remained passive, only gently feeding the azure flame which made Shu He feel slightly confident.

'I don't know how much it will affect my results if at all, but hopefully it will be fine'

He watched through he closed eyelids with his sight as his qi entered the formation and reached the point where it copied and propagated it, however something happened that surprised Shu He slightly.

When it intersected with the formations qi, it seemed to struggle as if something was wrong.

'Oh no, it's not going to break is it?!' his heart skipped a beat, but before he could react it managed to copy his qi, and only his qi.

He watched it all flow along the formation, surprised as he saw a very small slither of golden qi mixed among the river of azure.

'It can't reproduce the golden qi?' He watched with utter surprise as the formation began to do its work, the mix of qi created the five beams that began to connect to form the pentagon.

Shu He watched with hope that nothing would go wrong¸ the pentagon began flashing with bright colours as it resembled a piece of abstract art, he couldn't help but feel that the colours were brighter than they had been with the others.

And unfortunately for Shu He, his worries were well founded as he began to feel the golden core flame in his chest stir.

'Shit!'

He tried to remain calm as he focused on the golden core flame and tried to exert his will on it like he would do with the azure qi.

He had found in the past that the golden flame responds to a strong, clear will, yet there are times where it acts up by itself, in this case it seems to be responding to the excessive amounts of qi that is being taken from his body.

*BA-DUM*

The golden core flame sent a beat throughout his body causing it to feel hot.

'STOP!'

The engulfed it in his will, hoping to stifle its action long enough for the formation to finish its job.

But it was like a child trying to hold a bull back by some reigns, a job that felt impossible.

It wasn't long before the formation would finish the examination, yet the flame emitted a pulse that bolstered his azure flame and sent a wave of golden qi directly into the formation!

'NO!'

He could do nothing but watch as the formation greedily sucked up the qi like it was a precious fruit and send it directly in to the pentagon.

For a millisecond, and only for such a small amount of time, the pentagon became as bright as a sun lighting up every corner of the room with a myriad of colours.

'?!' Shu He who was below felt dazzled as he watched it with his sight, it was a sight he hadn't seen with all of the other examinees, he watched that large amount of gold qi pass through each orb and transform into a superbly bright version of the elemental qi! Yet it dissipated the moment after, causing the light to resemble a flash of lightning.

"?" Su Wen looked at the formation and then the plaque in front of him with confusion, a few of the people in the crowd also noticed but simply became confused for a second before dismissing it.

After that single flash, everything ran as normal, the pentagon was formed with stable colours that shined brightly.

Su Wen paused for a moment before sending a glance towards Shu He and then turning back to the plaque, he began reading out the results.

"Wood, Upper Earth; Water, Middle Earth; Fire, Middle Earth; Metal, Upper Dust; Earth, Upper Dust".

'Good, the results don't seem to ridiculous' Shu He breathed a sigh of relief as he stood up basking in the glow of the formation.

Just as he walked out Su Wen spoke to him.

"Junior Shu He, did you do anything while in the formation?"

Shu He mentally reacted like a cat that had its tail stepped on but managed to keep a straight face as he looked at Su Wen and, putting on the best act he could, responded with a confused "No?" his face full of innocence.

"…Never mind then, join the others".

Shu He did as he was told and quickly ran over to where Gang Bo and Wei Yu were talking, his heart almost beating like a war drum.

'That was fricking close! No… I shouldn't assume I'm out of the fire yet' He looked back at the instructor who was looking over the formation.

"Hehe looks like I win".

Just as Shu He made his way over, he heard Gang Bo's voice gloating to him, he looked over to see a smug bald mug looking at him.

"Win what? It's just our compatibility" Shu He waved him away, not wanting to deal with his petty competitiveness right now.

"Nope I'm taking this one" He refused to back down.

"Sure, whatever, do what you want" Shu He sighed.

The two of them had spent three years together so a strange rivalry had formed between the two, though it was mostly started by Gang Bo.

"I need some time to think so I'm not gonna talk" Shu He said as he walked to the back of the pack.

He sat down and leant against the wall, quickly peeking over to Su Wen to see him inspecting every inch of the formation, realising he has some time before they moved on.

He closed his eyes and began to picture the moment his golden qi entered the five orbs.

To him, these moments were now very important to him, because it involved the nature of the gold qi he had been mystified about since he first obtained it!

'First of all, the formation couldn't copy the gold qi…'

That was a key bit of information for him, after all not only could the formation copy normal qi, it could also copy qi of the five elements as he had seen from some of the other members, and even specialised qi as he saw from Bai Lian when she was the first to be tested.

From this he can conclude this gold qi of his exists outside of the categorisation of 'Basic' 'Elementary' and 'Specialised' qi.

'Second of all, the formation did use the golden qi, and it did affect the orbs creating a brighter diagram'.

This was more of a minor bit of information, but it reinforced the idea that this energy was, indeed, qi and not some other kind of information.

'Lastly, when it interacted with the materials inside the orbs…. The Qi it produced was different from before, it was stronger and more volatile, it was transient and carried an air of… perfection'.

He wasn't entirely sure what to make of this, he knows that the golden Qi reinforces his azure qi, making it stronger than before, but this feels like an entirely different transformation…

He remembered watching each and every participant's test, if ones compatibility was higher, the size of the element's colour in the pentagon increased, but its brightness also did; The difference between stages were much bigger than the degrees.

'But even among the ones with an Extreme level of talent in an element, its brightness and colour weren't quite the same… they were duller'.

He watched the formation shine as Su Wen fiddled with it in the distance, him arm supporting his chin.

And then his eyes widened in frightening realisation as his chin slipped causing him to fall on his side, but he didn't care.

'Could it be?' His heart pounded equally with excitement and fear.

A single word rose in his mind.

'Divine'

…

Su Wen pulled his hand away from the metal plaque and gave one more look towards the formation.

'I looked over everything, it's perfectly fine, there's no flaw in the formation from damage or otherwise, I looked for traces of tampering as well but there was nothing at all'.

That single, bright flash was burned into his memory, there was no way he'd overlook such an odd event when it had never happened before.

'This five elements formation is a masterpiece of craftsmanship, let alone a talent examination it can withstand far more powerful, cruel uses, there's no way it would just break on its own'.

He turned and looked over the group of new entrees into the sect, his became slightly happy when he remembered the results that all of them had shown.

'We've gotten some good new seeds this year, some of them exceptional'.

He then looked over to one of them that was slumped over on his side, clearly deep in his own head.

'What kind of posture is that… that child, Shu He… maybe we should keep an eye on him'

Su Wen noted that thought in his mind, a child that can caused the formation to act up like that must have something more to him.

'Those results of his were off as well… I mean it's impossible to trick the formation normally, but when his referral was reported to the sect his talent should have been overall average and that was only 3 years back, did something change?'

He sighed.

'Chao Shi, you picked him up, did you know there was something more to him? Or was it just plain luck? You fool, why'd you have to go lock yourself away when I need to ask you something'.

Eventually he ceased his thoughts and walked over to stand before them all, clapping his hands to get their attention.

"Okay everyone, congratulations your results are stellar, I'm happy to see such talented members enter our sect".

He watched the invigorated eyes of the students in front of him, the smiles creeping up on their faces from the compliments.

"Unfortunately, my job here as an examiner is done as you have all passed" he spoke gently as he pointed towards a hallway on the right.

"If you will, please make your way through this hallway, a protector will guide you to the location where you will be officially inducted into the sect".

"!"

"Finally!"

"I waited years for this!"

The group became excited as they began to chat between one another.

"Now then, since my job here is done I shall be leaving, I hope to see you all in the future, goodbye".

And with that, he turned and left with a speedy stride through a large door.

The group all looked at one another before they began to make their way to the hallway.

It was time for their induction!