The Manifestation of The Origination

Oji was a convincing actor at least, and he was the only one who could see the words of the script, so to the class and even to Akemi it sounded as if he was freelancing his explanation. It was an important skill for a capable warrior after all. Make the enemy think your dodging left when your dodging right and you'll create a window big enough to throw a counter in before they recover from attacking thin air. That required acting skills, same as this.

"You are preparing to enter the Origination Realm, to embark on your own journey of Cultivation. It is a long journey, full of thorns and hardships. Many will spend the entirety of their lives struggling for every breakthrough. Others will manage to continue climbing if they pay attention to their foundations. Some few are simply destined to rise, with a shining future. It isn't fair, and it isn't pretty, but such is the harsh reality of this world."

Oji always felt rather sick at this point. It felt like these words were directed at him with the express purpose of breaking him down. But there was a shocking amount of truth to them in some ways. It just didn't mean that there wasn't an equal and opposite truth that with enough strength of the soul and spirit, enough sheer grit and determination, that a man couldn't overturn Fate and forge his own Destiny.

"There are however, 7 points at which the Heavens see fit to bless us with the opportunity to reforge our own foundations with the force and power required to break through the limits that try to shackle us. The entry points of each Realm allow us to connect to the Essences that will shape our Cultivation. These connections are known as our Manifestations."

At this point the lecture notes instructed Oji to release his own Manifestation as the example. Another instructor might have invited the teacher to do the same, but since Oji was scripted and more or less clueless the Elder who wrote the script had to base everything off Oji's Manifestation. Of course, it was a doozy of an example. Oji's Manifestation was almost painfully simple. It was nothing more than a hand closed into a blackened fist. It did, however, radiate the Essence of Evil.

"My Manifestation of Origination is among the simpler, but even so it still grants form and identity to my Essence. Identity is the absolute foundation of Essence. Essence does not exist separate from being the identity of something. My Manifestation falls under the scope of what is called the Essence of Evil, though it does not require that I, myself, be Evil. Instead it is my Manifestation that identifies with the brutality and hatred of Evil, which I unleash when I decimate my foes. In such a way, the form and identity of my Essence comes to give me strength. In such a roundabout way, the Manifestation that you will connect with will give form and identity to your Potential and turn it into usable strength."

Oji thought it was a load of nonsense. Academic theory that hardly mattered in a real fight. Some people went straight for overly complex crap like Wisdom's self driving carriages. Even if you understand what it is and how it works, how is that supposed to help make you stronger? How would you unleash that strength when you were surprised by an attacker while setting up camp? The single most important role that a Manifestation had to Oji was accessibility and application in a fight. His Manifestation was nearly ideal in that manner. At least among the Manifestations that had any reaction to him.

"In order to form a Manifestation you must meditate to project yourself into the Essence Sea that lies overlaid on our own world. The other side of the coin if you will. There are many depths to the Sea of course, and the pressure will grow on your projection the deeper you go. Of course, the deeper you go in than the stronger the Manifestations you will find. Which doesn't mean that it will be suitable, or that it will give you an overwhelming advantage over one who couldn't make it any deeper. The most vital part is to find a Manifestation that suits you."

This part Oji could remember. He'd entered the Essence Sea and had drowned on his first attempt. On his second, his projection had been crushed after diving what felt like a couple hundred feet. His third attempt had made it to the first Manifestations at 250 feet deep. Almost 100 tries later Oji had searched enough of the Essence Sea's shallowest area to know he couldn't go deeper than about 400 feet and to have found what he wanted within range of that depth. Nothing had ever tried his patience nearly so much, or forced him to accept his limits so easily.

"And figuring out what kind of Manifestation you want, truly depends on you. If you are a timid and meek woman, than my tyrannical and abrasive selection isn't for you. The Essence won't circulate well for you because you have no way to connect to it properly. If you are an aggressive and fierce warrior, than a flowery selection from Wisdom Essence doubtless won't work well either. Once you know what suits you, it becomes a question of what you want. With my own connection, I had the choice of War, Famine or Evil Essence. Famine would have given me near invulnerability, War the ability to destroy any defense, but Evil gave a balance of attack and defense, while keeping both high. For my purposes that is easily the best."

'After all,' Oji thought, 'sometimes you can't avoid taking the other guy's shot. So it helps to be able to tank at least a few if you have to, even if the basic idea is to hit him enough to take him down before he gets to hit back once.'

Then the lecture continued for an hour, instructing the students on the basics of meditating in order to project themselves into the Essence Sea. It took a special skill to maintain long dives or great depths. So much so that one of Oji's qualifications to look for was the ability to dive to 1,500 feet in the Essence Sea or the ability to maintain a dive of unknown depth for an hour. When he finished his lecture he unlocked the hall and told them to begin their meditation.