30 Pact
A week had passed since the ranking tournament and room registration. The gang had started to get used to the daily life of the academy. They were allowed to choose which lessons they wanted to attend and you could choose not to take any lessons at all. The food and drinks that the academy provided were all Qi infused. If not for the fact that Shang Yang and Ye Xiu were able to provide money for the group, they would've been poor a long time ago.
The food had definitely sped up their cultivation, most cultivators ate Qi infused foods not just for the speed of cultivation but due to the lack of impurities found in them. Most foods that haven't gone through the hands of a Spirit Cook contains a minuscule amount of impurities and toxins within them. Eating these mortal foods in excess would lead to toxin buildup in the body which would take time to get rid of.
Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu had visited their smithing teacher when they had free time to continue their lessons. Shang Yang had tried to reserve a slot for the four of them in the gravity rooms however it was packed full with the older students so she eventually gave up. Not being able to enter the room was fine for Xiao Tu and Ye Xiu because their fathers had given them gravity altering bracelets and anklets to use for training. They were able to adjust the gravity up to five times the current gravity.
The only downside to the bracelets was that it had to constantly use Qi to keep it powered. This left people slightly tired if they didn't have a fast enough Qi recovery speed or if they didn't have a high Qi capacity.
Their group's total Qi capacity was currently the same amount as twenty cultivators in the fifth stage of Qi Cleansing. They had a high capacity due to their cultivation technique, body type and 'talent.' An average cultivator in the fifth stage of Qi cleansing could use the accessories for six hours at most. The Qi drain from the accessories didn't bother them so they shared it with each other so even if they were unable to use the gravity room, they'd be able to train in similar conditions.
The academy offered a huge amount of different classes they could take. There were classes ranging from all types of obscure weapons to things such as tracking and survival lessons. The four of them took survival lessons to learn how to skin, dismantle or cook a Qi beast that they might catch. To be truthful, Shi Die didn't really need to take the lessons because of his years of experience in the wild but he continued the lessons so he could be with his friends.
Besides the survival lessons, they had also taken classes for their specific weapons. All of them had joined the same class for close-combat fighting so they met up frequently during the day.
Since it had only been a week since they started lessons, they had not been able to take all the classes they wanted or needed because some lesson's times overlapped with each other.
Besides learning new things in the academy, the group had also explored the academy grounds to see what they could use for training. They had seen a field with arena platforms with lots of students sparring and fighting. The duelling system there worked on the fact that whoever won would be given a prize by the loser.
Official duels for ranks would need to have a teacher overseeing the match for the rankings to be actually changed. These matches usually had crowds of students to watch especially when it came to the higher ranked students of the academy.
The ranking system gave many benefits to the students who stood at the top. They had a special place for training, have a monthly quota of pills given to them and numerous other things. One of the greatest benefits was the lack of restrictions on those students. They were free to leave the academy premises at any time to visit families or et cetera and the school wouldn't bat an eyelid at them.
Besides the arena grounds, there was the academy library. The library had three floors. The ground floor was public to all students that wished to peruse manuals that the academy has deemed appropriate to show the masses. The second floor was for those that had won an event, placed high on the ranking board or has paid academic points to the librarian.
Dependent on the techniques and manuals copied by the librarian, the number of academic points paid will differ. Different techniques and manuals would have different prices.
The third floor was apparently for those who had contributed heavily to the school and not even teachers were allowed up without permission.
Every single thing in the library that is taken out from the library is actually a copy of the thing in question. This way the academy can keep the original safe without losing and more copies of it can be made.
There was a building that had multiple rooms with a similar amount of students around just like the gravity room building. The rooms in the building apparently had a higher Qi density than the outside so that students would be able to cultivate faster. Ye Xiu had entered one of these rooms and noticed that the Qi density was hundreds of times lower than the Locket Dimension's Qi density.
Finding this out, he decided that he wanted to tell his friends about the Locket Dimension so that they could share the space and reap the benefits together. Ye Xiu decided to look for the wills of his predecessors to see whether they would prohibit him from being allowed to grant access to the training grounds to his friends.
Searching through the office had yielded results. There was a scroll that detailed rules for any situations that his successor had stumbled upon.
1. If the successor has any friends he explicitly trusts and wishes to grant them access, a soul pact would need to be sworn to the successor. Once a soul pact to not reveal any information, have any despicable designs or any malicious feelings towards the successor has been sworn, then said people may be allowed to enter the Dimension.
2. The successor has no need to worry about anybody attempting thievery of the Locket due to it being bound to the successor's soul. Only when the successor's soul is devoured or destroyed may the locket be removed from his person.
3. Any attempt to enter the Dimension through other means besides successor's Locket will be made known to the people inside or the successor even if they are not inside the Dimension. Any enemies able to breach the defences and tear a hole to get into Dimension must be treated with utmost caution and shouldn't be approached unless specific signals known to allies has been seen.
Further rules will be shown when the successor is deemed ready for further functions of the Dimension.
Ye Xiu scanned through the rules once again before breathing a sigh of relief. The soul pact that the rules had mentioned was one that everyone knew not to break. Breaking it would mean the destruction of the person's soul. Nobody knows how the person's soul would be destroyed because nobody dared to test it out.
He left the Dimension quickly and waited for everyone to get back to their dorm room so that he could ask them to swear the pact. Ye Xiu didn't want them to swear the pact but it was the only way that he could give them the benefits fo the Dimension instead of hoarding it all for himself.
Everybody had returned to the dormitory for rest. Ye Xiu had substituted his sleep for meditation even though the others continued sleeping instead when he had arrived at the academy. After the first few days of the academy, he decided that meditation was a better alternative to sleeping. He had started to notice the deeper intricacies of what awaited during meditation.
His father had repeatedly told him that meditation would be better than sleep but the matter was always put away into a small corner of Ye Xiu's mind. Yes, he did eidetic memory but you don't recall something unless you want to recall that memory. Due to that, he never bothered to try meditating. besides on the days, Lao Lan and Lao Xiu had told him to meditate for.
Ye Xiu knew that he had his own flaws. One of the biggest being that he loved to dismiss things for later but never going back to them.
Before they went to sleep, Ye Xiu decided to stop his meditation to tell everyone what he had planned for them.
"Can you all gather around my bed here? I need to tell you guys something very important."
Shi Die tilted his head to the side in confusion as he sat down on Ye Xiu's bed, bouncing on it lightly. "What's so important that you need to gather us around?"
Ye Xiu's face turned solemn as he spoke, "You know how I told you guys about the higher Qi density building in the academy? Well... I actually have a better alternative to those rooms."
Xiao Tu's curiosity was aflame. "How'd you manage to find something that could be better than the rooms in the academy? As far as I was concerned it should be really hard to find something that can help us increase the density of the surroundings. There's a reason a lot of students go to the building for a reason you know."
Ye Xiu bobbed his head up and down. "When I was three years old, I had stumbled upon this object. This object has a dimensional space, similar to what our rings have. This dimensional space, however, can hold living things so that means we can go inside of it. The dimensional space has a higher Qi density than the building so I thought that we could use it together."
Shang Yang blinked a few times. "If you had this the whole time, how are you not in a higher stage of cultivation than us?"
Ye Xiu scratched his in embarrassment. "I didn't want to get a head-start without you guys. It felt unfair to have an advantage over you guys even if you didn't know anything about it. I can tell you guys now because you are all informed about the higher Qi density rooms so it's the best time to tell you all about it."
Shi Die pouted. "You should've just used everything you had at your disposal. It's a dog eat dog world. It doesn't matter what is fair and what is unfair. What matters is that you survive."
The other two nodded at Shi Die's words. Ye Xiu decided to keep on going with what he had to say.
"Anyway, I'm only telling you guys about the Dimension but the three of you have to swear a Soul Pact to never tell others about the dimension, to not have malicious thoughts about me or any despicable designs. You have to swear the Soul Pact in order to enter the dimension and even then with my permission."
Xiao Tu didn't hesitate before speaking the words necessary for a Soul Pact. "I, Xiao Tu, swear to my friend Ye Xiu that I will never betray him to anyone unless he gives his explicit permission. I will not have any malicious thoughts or despicable designs towards him. I will protect him to the best of my ability. I shall not tell anyone of his secrets unless told to. If I break this oath, may the heavens strike me down."
Ye Xiu opened his mouth to protest. "Wait! You didn't have to swear those to me! What if you can't protect me?"
Xiao Tu just shook his head. "I promised myself that if I wasn't able to protect my loved ones then there's no point to cultivating in the first place."
Shi Die and Shang Yang looked at Xiao Tu's determination to protect before swearing the exact same to Ye Xiu.
Ye Xiu started crying but tried to speak as he did. "I, Ye Xiu, swear to my friends Shang Yang, Xiao Tu and Shi Die, that our friendship shall never waver even in the direst of situations. I will protect them to the best of my ability and I shan't betray them unless explicitly told to. Their secrets are theirs and mine to protect and shall not be spread without permission. If I break this oath, may the heavens strike me down."
The other three proceeded to swear to each other just like Ye Xiu did. As the oath swearing session was finished. thunder could be heard near the academy before disappearing shortly after.
Xiao Tu was slightly impatient after the swearing. "Are we going to check out this Dimension of yours now? I can't believe you kept this a secret from us for so long! I don't blame you, but this Dimension must really be something if you required us to swear a pact."
With that, they entered the Dimension together when Ye Xiu grabbed ahold of their hands.
