First Day of Class

Laying in bed, with his eyes still closed, as the morning breeze enters the window, Phoenix smiles sheepishly.

Ahh yes. Sleep...is my sustenance.

Good heavens I love sleep. All of my stress, all of my worries, drift away with sleep, he thought. If I could pick a lifestyle, it would be to sleep all day.

The soft pillow perfectly cushioned his head. He felt like his whole body was laying on a cloud. His consciousness begins to drift into a deeper slumber.

"Phoenix, wake up. We have an hour to eat before class starts." Tyrmes enters Phoenix's room fully dressed in a turquoise turtleneck, black drape coat, and grey joggers. He checks himself in Phoenix's mirror, fixing some of his loose hair strands even though he just did in his own room, then returns his gaze at the boy lying in the bed.

"5 more minutes..." Phoenix mumbles through his pillow. He lifts his head for a moment to flip his pillow to the cool side before going completely boneless.

"Phoenix last time you said that we were an hour late." Shaking his head in disapproval, Tyrmes walks over to the other side of the bed, where Phoenix was facing. No reply.

"..."

"...Are you falling back to sleep? Oh no, you don't!" Tyrmes gets a running start and leaps onto Phoenix.

"Arrgggg fine! Get off of me!" Phoenix relents to Tyrmes's harassing. After Tyrmes gets off his back, Phoenix gets up and puts on a pair of blue basketball shorts.

After looking at Phoenix's mismatched socks, oversized t-shirt, and shorts, nothing could hide the visible irritation on Tyrmes's face. "It's a good thing I haven't eaten breakfast or I would have thrown up just now looking at that outfit."

"Keep talking and you won't have to eat breakfast."

"Ey, bro, c'mon man…" Tyrmes starts pleading with puppy dog eyes.

Putting on the apron, Phoenix goes to the sink to wash his hands before starting to cook. Soon the house is filled with the smell of freshly cooked omelets.

Instantaneously after the aroma of omelets began to drift through the house, Xudong comes out of his room wearing nothing but a pair of boxers with little pink cats on them.

"Morning brothers! Something smells mighty delicious!"

Tyrmes nearly vomits for the second time as he watches Xudong prance down the hallway wearing just a pair of cat boxers.

"Ugh...What the heck is wrong with you? Go back to your room and change quickly before I call campus security!"

"Oops! I guess I forgot to change haha." He turns around and prances back into his room.

They quickly eat breakfast and head for their first class. The classes weren't hard to follow, they could select a class and a dot would show up on the map with their location and the destination.

"It says here that the first class is Fundamentals at this location." Tyrmes points to a building on the map nearby. All three notice that more people start to show up the farther they go from their dormitory. Which they didn't really care about.

Kids of all sorts of ages from 14 to 18 were around campus. Tyrmes is intrigued by all the various types of outfits that they were wearing. He slows down whenever he encounters someone with a good sense of fashion to take mental notes which annoys Phoenix and Xudong to no end.

As they enter the building, they see that many other kids had arrived. All three quickly find some seats in the back. In a few minutes, the clacking of heels resounds through the class. Various pens and pencils can be heard clattering down the rows as the boys' with wide eyes notice their teacher walk in. Her sparkling black hair flowed down to her waist, covering the back of her intricate light-turquoise robe. Her face was like a blossoming rose, with her big, round eyes, her fair snow skin, and her red cherry lips. "Good morning class!" She says in a cheerful manner, her voice like a soothing bell.

"My name is Valerie and I will be teaching you basic Foundations." The second she begins to turn around to write on the board, one could see all the boys in the class simultaneously lean forward in their chairs, mouths drooling as they tried to engrain their every curve of their teacher's enticing figure into their mind.

Our teacher is really beautiful. Remembering how all sorts of attractive women scrutinized him at his mom's workplace, Phoenix only took a short glance before returning to his notes. He sees Xudong scribbles notes nonstop, his entire focus was on the blackboard. meanwhile, Tyrmes gives up on learning and instead begins drawing the teacher's beautifully crafted outfit in a crazed frenzy. He scribbles all sorts of weird diagrams and symbols and calculations across his paper while mumbling to himself.

"The next subject I want to go over is levels. It's universally known that there are 100 levels in the world of cultivation. Does anyone disagree? But did you know that each level is progressively harder to get to? This is with the exception of relying on stronger techniques, items, or artifacts.

Most of you know the basic cultivation technique. Everyone, try to follow along with me. Sit down, close your eyes, and draw your surrounding energy up into the point between your eyebrows, with is your sea of mind. To level up, you must gather enough energy there to break through the next level. You should be able to feel a crackling between your eyebrows as your sea of mind become slightly larger."

Instead of participating with the class, Phoenix, Xudong, and Tyrmes continue to write heated notes as Ms. Valerie continues to talk.

"As you progress, it gets more and more difficult to fill the sea of mind, or spiritual sea with energy. Without proper resources or stronger absorption techniques, one day, your spiritual sea will fill up at a snail's pace and you will stop leveling up." She notices a girl sitting in the front with her hand raised. " Yes, you have a question?"

Why do we cultivate?" The girl asked

"Good question!" Valerie gives her a warm smile, making the girl blush, "There are many reasons why people cultivate. Reason number one, you live longer. If your body becomes stronger, you will live much longer than a non-cultivator. Many peak cultivators have lived for 200 years.

Reason number two, you maintain a youthful appearance. After your body reaches its peak state, usually for people it's in their mid- 20's, and they're a powerful cultivator, they stop aging. Our bodies experience a miraculous change as we continue to cultivate to higher levels which rejuvenates our cells to keep us at our peak appearance. Only when we're near the end of our life will our cells start to age again. You also become more attractive as you cultivate. As the saying goes, the closer it is to nature, the more beautiful it is. You are taking in energy from nature, making you closer to nature.

Reason number three, you become much more powerful. Our headmaster, Lord Zhang is level 87 which is already the level of a peak expert on the continent. Truth be told, he gets moody when people ask him about his age because he's looked so old for so many years. Nobody dares to anymore because the last person who asked was beaten until his own mother couldn't recognize him. That person was the head of a well-renowned clan. Regardless, he was beaten and not he, nor his clan could do anything to Lord Zhang. The higher your level, the bigger the difference is in strength. The disparity between level 4 and 5 is much smaller than the disparity between a level 79 and 80. Usually, people with higher levels have more energy in their sea of mind that they can use. Your gift also grows with your levels. A level 10 gift of water could control a small stream of water while a level 80 gift of water could probably summon enough water to flood a small city.

There are a few more specifics about leveling but you don't need to know them for now. Once you become strong enough, you will find out. Age and talent both play a role in cultivation. The earlier you begin, the better chance you have at reaching the pinnacle."

Phoenix and Xudong both clench their fists in determination and nod to each other, knowing what the other was thinking. It's not too late.

"Ms. Valerie, I have a question." Phoenix raises his hand.

Valerie's eyes look up at the hand with a perplexing expression.

I thought that was a girl raising her hand for some reason.

"Yes?"

"So my question is. For the longest time, the highest leveled person on the continent of Kalur would be 99 at the highest, and they would always die of age before they reached 100. How do we even know there's a level 100 if we've never heard of one?"

Seeing Valerie's blossoming smile towards Phoenix, all the male students become envious at once. She walks back to the center of the class, her heels clack as she goes and finally she stands in front of everyone with a serious expression.

"To answer the young man's question, I will have to tell you all about the 9 legendary heroes. The first 9 to ever harness what we call gifts."

The entire class goes silent as Valerie begins her story.

"Nearly 400 years ago, mankind began a major war with demonkind. It lasted a whole 100 years. Countless millions of people died due to the demon's abnormal strength and numbers.

When humanity was on its brink, 9 heroes appeared with miraculous powers. Our city, Griffin is named after one of the heroes. He had the Gift of Giants which allowed him to grow as tall as a building and granted him abnormal strength. The other heroes have cities named after them as well. One in each surrounding territory of our Imperial Empire.

These 9 heroes appeared out of nowhere and swept the armies of demonkind. The "gift" that the 9 heroes brought to humanity saved it from the brink of extinction. And like fire to the ancient humans, the "gift" gave us a chance to progress further, even allowing us to develop the cultivation system that we have now. Just as quickly as they appeared, the heroes disappeared. Some say that they wanted to live out their lives in peace. Others argued that they never existed and that humans got the "gift" on their own and made up the 9 heroes to scare the demon armies away. This is where that young man's question comes in." She says as everyone looks at Phoenix.

"It's said that the legendary heroes had a leader. Nobody ever knew his name, not even the other heroes and he was called 'Z'. That's why there is a city in the southwest territories called Z-city where they memorialize that mysterious hero. Z's feats were like that of a diety's. It was said he could flip his palm, and the land and sky would start to quake and tremble. He could punch the air on a rainy day and the clouds would dissipate for hundreds of miles. He is said to have gone against a one million strong demon army by himself and eradicated them all with a single flick of his sleeve. One rumor even said that he created the continent that we live on today by piecing multiple smaller continents together. He had all of those feats but nobody, not even the other 8 heroes knew his name, or his gift. Apparently he always wore a mask, and his powers were so strong that there was no way to determine his gift…Legends say that Z, had broken through to level 100 and was the first human to become a god."

"Wow…" The class exclaim in wonder.

"It's also said that Z is also exceedingly handsome, even though nobody knows what his name or gift is, a few have said to have seen his face. " Ms. Valerie adds. Her tone is a little strange.

Is Ms. Valerie… blushing? Phoenix gapes as he notices her face turn a hint redder.

"Okay, the class is over!" Valerie claps her hands together and rushes out of the class in a flurried manner. Everyone sits there awkwardly for a moment not knowing what exactly to make of her action. They all begin to slowly shuffle out of the building.

"Well that was weird and interesting." Phoenix comments as the three boys are leaving the building.

"This Z guy sounds like an introvert," Xudong says in a straightforward manner.

"Don't let Ms. Valerie hear you saying that. I think she might have a crush on him."

"Next on our schedule is combat training...This should be fun." Tyrmes mutters unenthusiastically while fiddling with his watch.

Phoenix looks at Tyrmes's outfit for a moment before asking, "Are you really going to wear that in combat?"

"Well, are you going to wear THAT in combat?" Gesturing to Phoenix's loose outfit, Tyrmes retorts.

"Touché."

As they near the designated location, they see a magnificent marble gate. They walk through the marble gate and find a spacious courtyard with many types of weapons placed on wooden racks. Sandy gravel covers the span of the courtyard with some occasional large grey rocks. Scattered across the courtyard on the far end are elevated stone platforms for what they assume to be fighting rings.

A tough burly man stands in the middle of the courtyard with his arms crossed in front of him as he scans the approaching students. He is bald, with a thick, black curly mustache resembling two fishhooks, and wearing a beige tank top and camouflage pants. His legs were so muscular that everyone could see each individual muscle through the cotton fabric. A crowd begins to form around the man as the students in the combat training arrive. After about 20 kids or so arrived, the man begins to speak.

"Attention!"

Everyone unconsciously stands up straight and looks forward. No one dared to say a single word, waiting for the man to give his orders.

"Listen up here you maggots! My name is Lt. Dan, but here you will call me by 'Sir'. Is that understood?" He said aggressively, as spit flew uncontrollably out onto some unfortunate kids in the front.

"Yes, Sir!" They reply in unison. Some scoot back involuntarily after witnessing the victims in the front row.

"Start from now, you will add 'sir' after every yes, every no and every sentence you answer to me. Is that understood?"

"Sir, yes, sir!"

"Good! Let's begin." Lt. Dan takes a few steps back and demonstrates a series of techniques.

Throughout the whole demonstration, everyone watches closely as they hold their breaths.

Lt. Dan's movements are profound and quick. A louder and louder "boom" follows every punch and kick. After a few more movements, the area around the courtyard is howling like an angry dragon and the gales begin forcing some of the students to step backward. Finally, he finishes with a loud punch towards nearby dummy.

Boom! The wooden dummy is torn to shreds by the force of wind following the punch. A pile of wood chips slowly rain down from the sky, leaving everyone with gaping mouths.

"This technique is called Wind Compounding. Techniques like this are called Basic Techniques because everyone is able to learn them. With these Basic Techniques, even if you don't have a strong gift, you are able to stay alive or even have a higher chance of winning in a battle."

Lt. Dan punches out in front of him, releasing a shockwave. Its echoes reverberate around the courtyard.

"With just raw physical power, this is near impossible to do. But if you learn to control the spiritual power in your spiritual sea, and apply it to this series of movements, you can build up enough momentum to release an attack of this magnitude. With more training, you can even extend the attack to your weapon.

This is the power of physical training, paired with spiritual power."

He pointed towards a wall in the distance. Elaborate figures were engrained onto the marble as if they were alive. "The steps for the technique are on that wall, it's up to you what you get out of this class. I'll check on you all in two hours. Whoever progresses the furthest will get a reward from me, everyone else will run 50 laps around the courtyard. Go!"

"Sir, yes, sir!" Everyone makes a dash for the wall. The desperation shone on their faces clearly showing that none of them wanted to run 50 laps.

"This class is crazy!" Tyrmes huffs and puffs as he runs towards the wall. Looking to his sides, he finds that Phoenix and Xudong are fired up, the flames burning in their eyes as they ran.

That basic technique really speaks to both of them. Tyrmes thinks. Since their gifts aren't effective in combat. I shouldn't dawdle either! He runs faster.

All the kids are out of breath as they run over to the wall. Their eyes are all focused on the profound drawings ahead of them.

Phoenix takes a seat on the ground. He begins by performing the absorption technique that Ms. Valerie taught him. Taking deep breaths, he focuses on the point between his eyebrows.

A heavy pressure weighs down on Phoenix's sea of mind or spiritual sea. This is officially his first time cultivating with a proper technique. Before, when he was young, he had just fooled around with the energy in his surroundings. Now, he focused all of the surrounding energy to enter his spiritual sea.

What? He frowns as he hovers his sense over the spiritual sea. The energy is being blocked by something.

Was it because I haven't cultivated in years? What was going on? He continues to try and force the energy to enter his dantian, but he can feel an invisible barrier there.

He looks over at Xudong and sees that he is frowning as well. It really is because we haven't cultivated in years. He has to think of something to break the barrier.

There's no way I'm going to give up like this after all these years! I'm not going to let some stupid gift hold me back anymore!

All sorts of ideas flash through Phoenix's head as he tries to find a way to break the barrier in his mind. Suddenly, an answer comes to him.

Will it work?

It seems improbable...but let's give it a try.

He activates his gift.