16 Episode 16

The trainees all went to their spots, some were excited, others were nervous. As they stood there, Elder Janis walked up to his spot in front of them. He looked at all of the trainees one by one, however only three people caught his eye. There were two teens, one from Jamaica and the other from Brazil. His eyes lingered on those two as he double checked their body's cultivation himself. Then at last his eyes landed on Jacq while he pondered to himself, "I swear those two had some Spiritual Energies for a brief moment. Oh well, they will have to prove themselves on the field anyway. Now this small boy does look interesting, only one to stand up and speak back to me. Let's see what surprises he can bring us. Sigh, if only one of these trainees comes back as a primary elemental Spirit Root then my Spirit Stones will be guaranteed."

He cleared his throat before speaking to the mass, "The time of the competition is almost upon us. I will make this clear. Many of you, if not all, will die. There are one thousand of you here, but the whole point of this competition is to survive the six months AND bring back the Outer Disciple token that is placed on Gyoaph." As he spoke, he heard murmuring of the trainees.

"So all we have to do is find the tokens and then survive for six months?"

"That sounds easy enough."

"There has to be more to it than this.."

The trainees were confused, some expected it to be harder than what he just said, but others were happy to see such a simple mission.

Elder Janis raised his hand to calm everyone down. "Oh, let me clarify. There are one thousand of you. But there are only one hundred and fifty tokens. The ones without tokens will be fed to our Sect's Guardian Beast as a sacrifice for us investing on your planet," he said slowly. He paid close attention to the three from before, but only Jacq seemed shocked. Taking note of this, he decided to keep an eye on the other two when/if, they returned back from the competition.

After he spoke, people started speaking louder. Clearly everyone was upset about this, but what could they do? With a sharp glance from the eighteen elders, everyone present shut their mouth and waited for Elder Janis to speak further.

"Everything is allowed in this competition. Kill, steal, kidnap, even foul play. Anything you need to ensure you receive a token and survive the six months is fair game. This will introduce you to the Cultivation World, so that way we do not need to invest more time on you. You will encounter many Spiritual Herbs and Natural Treasures, use these to start your cultivation. The stronger you get, the more chance you have to survive! The top ten people with the highest cultivation will have a chance to compete with the Inner Disciples to take their place as an Inner Disciple! I expect a very small amount of you to even start cultivating during this training, but remember: The stronger you become, the more the sect will put it's focus on you. If you do well enough, maybe a few years in the future, you can become a Core Disciple!" he replied once the training camp was silent.

The silence was too much for people. They could only think about their short life as they knew the conditions stated were just impossible for them. Some people were not blind to see that the ones who would survive would definitely not be them. Other people had eyes full of greed, they were ready to murder their way to become an Inner Disciple. They would surely be living in a paradise if they became strong enough.

"Well Jacq, you should steel your heart. You will need to kill to become stronger. I know it will be tough for you, but you will be forced to kill if you do not want to die prematurely," Nero said after Elder Janis had spoken.

Jacq nodded his head, "We will see when the time comes..."

"The tokens are scattered across the planet. Your bracelets will allow you to sense which way the tokens are. You will naturally need to adapt to survive. With that being said, I shall see you all in six months!" as Elder Janis finished speaking, he waved his hand. Suddenly the floor beneath the trainees vanished.

"Aaaaaa!!! WHAT THE FUCK!!!!"

"Kyaaa!!!!!'

Screams could be heard as the participants fell down. They could not comprehend what had just happened. Were they going to die just like this? What would happen to the competition as they all would surely become meat paste from dropping at such great height. For the next thirty minutes, all that could be heard was cries, screams and vulgar languages. Some people even fainted from a sudden shock.

"Don't worry Jacq, from the sound of things, I doubt the old fart would kill you all after all of this hard work. I am sure there is a way for you all to survive. At worst, some will die and this will be the first test," Nero said after analyzing the situation.

Jacq was hugging himself as the pressure of falling so fast was also just as cold. He could feel the cold enter his skin, he looked around and saw the other people struggling to stay conscious. After hearing what Nero said, Jacq looked down at his bracelet. He felt that Nero should be correct. There was no way that Elder Janis would kill them off that fast. As he stared, the bracelet started to glow. Slowly a sphere was made of a semi transparent light that surrounded him. As soon as the sphere surrounded him fully, the air pressure and cold receded. The speed of his descent also reduced, now he could see clearly below him.

As he stared down, he could see the shapes of the trees below. He looked further and noticed that he was headed towards a forest. The forest spread in all directions, the end was too far to see. To the north was a mountain range which he could barely make at the edge of the forest. On his east was a vast body of water, which had the sunlight shining on the surface of the water. To the west he saw streams, it seemed as if the forest was at the edge of some territory. He looked at the south end and saw that the forest had started to become more dense, as if it was turning into a swamp.

After getting a decent idea of his geography, Jacq waited for his fall to end. All the while he kept an eye on where other people were landing as well as any possible dangers such as animals or sharp tree branches. It would be a shame to die as soon as the competition started he thought. As he landed, Jacq quickly got to his feet and made a dash towards a tree with a thick trunk. Looking around, he saw he was in a forest, all around he heard howling of wild animals, sometimes he would even hear the cry of an unfortunate trainee.

"First thing's first kiddo, know your situation. Gather what you need to survive, understand where you lack and what you can afford to use," Nero's voice rang in as he coached Jacq.

"You got it boss!" Although this was a lot to take in, Jacq was pretty excited. He had never been in a forest before, much less one with such a dangerous feeling as this one. Jacq slowly got his thoughts together and made circles around the tree, slowly expanding his circle to cover more of the area around him while using the tree trunk as his base. When he initially got close to the tree, he noticed there was a small hole at the bottom which was covered by a bush. This would make the perfect place for him to camp and adjust himself to the new environment.

After making a note of everything around him, Jacq hurried back to the hole in the tree. As he pulled the bush to cover the entrance, he noticed there was a small berry on one of the bush's branch.

"Oh nice one! Know what that is Jacq?" Nero asked Jacq curiously, almost as if testing his knowledge.

Jacq took a closer look at the berry. It was roughly one centimeter in diameter, the color was a dark green with some sprinkles of red on it. Jacq brought it close to smell it, "The smell is nice, and judging by it's appearance as well as the smell, this is the Gnomes Mint Berry. It is very good for those who are yet to enter cultivation yet as this will increase the size of their three dantian. Three berries would be ideal to increase the lower, middle and upper dantian in size, which would allow them to hold more Spiritual Energy."

"Good! Looks like all that knowledge wasn't wasted! It's good to see a smart boy, but as time passes, I hope you become clever as well," Nero praised Jacq. "Now I recommend you eat it and start using the Quasi God's Cultivation for best effects!"

"Alright then! Here goes nothing!" Jacq replied back excitedly. He could finally take the first step in cultivating, expanding his dantian. Most people used pills called Dantian Expansion Pills. These pills were easy to make, but having more than four would have a bad effect on their dantian. Due to this, many cultivators would have a normal size dantian, the ones who took these pills would have a dantian a size bigger.

But the Gnomes Mint Berry was special, this was something that could be classified as a Heavenly Treasure by major sects on the 8th Star of Solis. This berry could be used without concocting it into a pill, you could simply eat the berry as is with no negative effects. The Gnomes Mint Berry expands the dantian by a large margin, having one was already a big boost. This was the same as eating a whole bottle of Dantian Expansion Pills! One had to know a whole bottle had twenty pills in it! The berries would lose their effect after the third one as there are only three dantian and each could only be expanded once by the berry. But the rarity of the berry was so high, it was impossible to even see one, much less three.

Jacq took a look around him, making sure everything was clear and he was hidden before he placed the berry in his mouth.