Book 1 Chapter 4: A path to take

Chapter 4: A path to take

"So, how does this all work?" Z asked inquisitively.

"Pretty simple actually…it isn't as complicated as they say it is, it takes detailed amount of time to work with simple potential. In fact the greater the potential, the less known must be given on the person. Seems kinda backwards isn't it?"

Z nodded, not confused but a bit misunderstood.

"I thought you'd nod like that…they all do. In a sense, if you found a small apple you would have to squeeze very…very hard, to get every drop out of it. You'd have to know the best ways to use that small apple, and everything about it…but what of a big apple? You can tell just how much it will produce compared to the smaller apple because it is bigger in every way! It doesn't matter what the big apple holds, just in essence that it has a greater potential then that of the common apple…hopefully…you are not a common apple."

"I shouldn't fall far from the tree…" Z whispered under his breathe with a sigh.

The old mans eyes glinted, and a smile moved like a snake from his lips "You got the spirit kid…don't worry."

With a wave of his hands, the old man cascaded energy down from an unknown place into the room. A heavy pressure came forth over Z, like that of a waterfall falling down onto a pebble from a hundred feet up.

"All you have to do…is withstand the pressure for a certain length of time, every time that the clock tickets a minute, the energy level will rise as you have proved that the previous energy level was incapable of causing you enough pressure for a long enough duration…got it?"

"Okay?" Z rubbed his head.

"Mmm" The old man looked the kid up and down. Just the very first continual wave of energy he had always sent out, always buckled most of everyone to the ground. This was the average reaction of most people, but it would seem this child before him didn't have any troubles what so ever, let alone being able to reply back t o him.

"Lets kick it up a notch" Another smile appeared on the old mans face as his eyes keenly focused on Z.

The energy permeating the room began to give off a light that shrouded everything in warm glow.

Z felt like the pressure increased on his body, and indeed it had but not to the limit that he felt uncomfortable. It felt more like tingling sensations were dancing around his body.

"Hmm…good job so far kiddo, another level…" Past the second energy 'level' that the old man sent out was a heavier more condensed level of energy, if Z could withstand this it would mean he would be amongst the ranks of 'rare finds' amongst the world as a whole. The 4th level could only mean he had a special physique to make up for counteracting the pressure.

*VvrrrRR*

Z finally felt his skin being pressed from all sides like he was within a deep pool of water. His brain was relaying countless sensations coming from across his skin and body. It was a strange phenomenon to watch as his clothes danced to an unknown wind, as the energy and warm glow around the room suffused into a crimson light mixed with azure glows dotting the room.

"How does it feel kiddo?" The old man asked while rubbing his chin.

"It feels…weird, am I underwater?" Z began to slowly rub his arms as best he could. The pressure, like water made his movements slow but none the less he was still able to move. The old man raised his brows.

"Been a minute…get ready young one, this will feel a lot heavier. If I feel it is too much, I will stop at once." All the energy in the room slowly drew together, turning in a thick viscous flow of different colored light. It moved like molasses to the eyes, but in fact was too fast for the eye to follow. It sank over Z as if absorbing him, spreading across his entire body until it was encased in over 5 inches of viscous energy.

Z could hear several bones crack through his body, letting off several pop sounds that cascaded around the room. This time, he couldn't move his limbs whatsoever and thus even if he wanted to speak, he couldn't because of the fact his jaw wouldn't open.

"Do you feel your body responding to the pressure in a certain way? Follow that path, let it show you what it wants to do and go from there" The old man had already long stood up and was watching closely Z.

Indeed as the Old man had said, Z's body felt like it was trying to fight against the pressure. It was like pressing your hand down on your bicep, and then trying to flex. It was this type of feeling, except everywhere.

A thin sliver of energy began to seep into Z's muscles through all his pours, and as it did it was converted into a green energy.

"I feel…like I have water trickling in my veins, no…that's…not right…something light, but not everywhere"

The old man nodded, "it seems your body is drawing the energy around you within…and then converting it into its own type of energy…close your eyes, tell me the color you see within your mind"

Z nodded, and tried his best to close his eyes, "….green…grey?..."

"Nature…metal? Very strange…it could be a plant spirit…" Of course, in a world as a diverse as this, those with a body vessel would choose to train as warriors and those with mental vessels would choose to train as mages. Yet, a third type of vessel rarely seen could also be produced and that was the vessel of the spirit.

A spirit could be anything associative with a interrelated affinities passed from the parents, or they could simply appear in the world. It was a phenomena, and one not many understood. The old man right now, was guessing if it was a metal based plant known in the world. This would make sense, because usually if someone had the affinity for nature it wouldn't go for the other ones like lightning or metal when being born.

Each element had of course its own distinctive properties, but nature, metal, and lightning, were known as the catalyst elements. With Darkness and light being the polar elements. For nature, to concurrently be with metal was strange but not unheard of.

In this world, affinities were only a distinctive movement towards some of the best choices to train in but anyone anywhere could train in whatever element they wanted to. For spirits, it was a specific and innate thing along side being able to train in any element.

If you were born with a nature spirit, you could have the ability to innately summon flowers, or trees, or beasts of plant flesh and oak to fight for you. It was the same as training in an element, to be able to do these things except simply being able to do them right off the bat.

The opposing force to this would be special physiques, hellish and heavenly alike.

"Try my boy…use the energy, work with your body!" The old man was trembling from excitement.

Z slowly lifted his hand as the old man lessened the energy surrounding him by several degrees.

*VrrRRR*

A low hum sounded out like an echo before a protrusion slowly poked its way out from Z's raised hand. It made a pop sound as a segment of what seemed to be bamboo came forth from his hand, and following it was over 6 more popping sounds as more sections came forth.

"HAha…haha…aw…damnit" Z laughed at himself with disappointment.

The old man looked at him inquisitively.

"My…well my last name is Zhu…" Z muttered out silently.

"Oh…Bamboo….haha…your parents, they are from around here I assume and thus I am guessing farm for bamboo or had associative people in the past with this spirit?" The old man rubbed his chin again and sat down slowly.

"i…don't know about in the past, but they are indeed bamboo farmers…I grew up around a bamboo forest all my life."

"So tell me then…what type of bamboo is this then?" The old man returned a smile to his face, knowledgeable eyes already fortelling Z's answer.

"Uhm…" Z's mind reeled. He in fact knew about countless plants, and even more so about bamboo as a whole. His mom and father instructed him at long ends about information passed by word of mouth from their parents who were even more knowledgeable then they.

However, no matter how many times he moved the bamboo rod that had appeared from thin air, or how many times he turned it looking at every detail of it and then some, he still didn't know what type of bamboo it was.

It had a strange fading black going upwards and downwards from each segment, as if it had been blasted by fire and the wisps and points had carved themselves onto the bamboo. Except, that it was smooth.

The parts of it that weren't black had a metallic grey sheen to it as if a thin layer of silver iron had been set into it. It wasn't shiny, but it did give off a low glow.

"Mmm…summon it away, and summon it again…" The old man instructed after a while.

"Okay…uhm…" The energy making up the bamboo slowly faded into the air, dematerialized right before Z's very eyes. He held his hand up again and focused as hard as he could to summon the bamboo rod.

A protrusion slowly came out once more as Z's hand shivered at how hard he was focusing. 4 segments came forth this time, except it stopped at 4 instead of continuing to the previous number. Z looked a little disappointed at it, but the old mans eyes were glowing.

"My god…you lucky little shit" He stood up and paced forward before grabbing the bamboo from Z's hands.

"What…what is it? Its shorter this time" Z said confused.

"No…spirits summon the same way every single time, or not at all because you don't have the energy to do so…unless, you have a shifting spirit…"

"A shifting spirit?" Z was almost instantly attracted to this curious title.

"What would happen if you had a spirit of a boar?" The old man asked right off the bat.

"Uh…well from what others said, you'd turn into one…or summon one?" Z couldn't think of a more direct answer as this.

"True…what if you had the spirit of a flame?" He asked this follow up question in hopes Z wouldn't let him down in his guesses, and in fact Z didn't.

"Oh…shifting, as in a spirit that can change at the owner…no users?... at will. A spirit with no defined aspect, like a material can be shaped into different things. Except it can only be out of that spiritual material?"

The old man raised a brow, "Well looks like I don't need to explain then" He closed his eyes and pretended to nod off, after less then a minute Z had stood up and patted his shoulder "Sir…please tell me more?"

The old man let a smile appear on his face before his eyes opened with little pleased creases around its edges.

"Very astute kiddo…never be a frog in a well. A shifting spirit is indeed a spirit that can change at the users will, especially those spirits of enigmatic elements…it's a very close variant of those with mind vessels, or in such cases those…who can manipulate the elements, with differences of course. You only can manipulate that in which is stored in your soul, rather than gather or manipulate it from the environment. The greater the power of the soul, the wider the container to store spiritually created energy to change into the element your soul makes up…however, not all shifting spirits are like this. In some cases, indeed you have a spirit that can change but unlike the previous 'element' ones I described…these shifting spirits, can naturally do so, because it is apart of their nature too"

"Wait…isn't that sort've the same thing?" Z understood the other points, but the last is what

confused him.

"Say you had a blade for a spirit…yes, in some cases it would be as you summoned it, taking the form of a blade…but in the case of a shifting spirit that was also a blade, the user might be able to manipulate the length of the blade! For you…you should be able to manipulate the length of the bamboo. Understand?"

"Ohhh… I understand now" The small piece of bamboo in his hand didn't feel so light anymore.

"Not only that…but the aspect of your metal alignment as seen with your affinity hasn't shown itself…I assume, when you gain greater strength over your spirit you will be able to create a blade from its end… the long version of the bamboo, should be a staff or in the case of with a blade become a spear…with this smaller version, with the handle a third the length of the staff…it should be a blade!"

Z was very happy to hear this, this meant he was born to wield the spear and sword!

"Hmm….to know that for a fact…we have some other testing to do." The old man from out of thin air made a sphere appear. He threw it towards the ground, and right before it struck the ground it stopped and hovered. Several candles fell from the air and landed in a circle around the small sphere before coming to light. The circle was just big enough for Z to step into, and indeed as the old man waved him forward, Z stepped into the circle.

The candles burst at their tops as the little candle flames erupted into a glorious and mesmerizing purple flame. The flames swirled, and a circle of flame slowly floated up and around Z's body. It floated up and down several times, until the little sphere on the ground glowed brightly. The flames disappeared into thin air as the candles burnt the last of their wax. The little sphere slowly hovered over to the old man who gazed into it deeply.

"Its true…your physique is perfect for the sword, the spear…very flexible, very potentially strong and fast…what a good physique…kid, your destined for something real worth while…but it will also be quite hard on you. You pass…"

"I pass? The exams?" Z already had guessed this from the different looks the man had given him throughout their meeting.

"Duh you little shit…but you all pass the secret testing, so as you may as you wish it…you can come with me to train at a school. One that is very hard to get into."

"i…have to talk to my folks first, I originally only came to test my luck…I hear from the other kids, you'd be gone for quite a few years in school…id like to talk to them first."

"Okay… you're a good kid considering them first even after all that I have said. Alec!" The old man shouted out a name, and seconds later a 40 year old man gave forward from a side door.

"Yeah?" He asked respectfully.

"You take over the proceedings…I only came this once, because I had something to find here amongst the trees…I was only killing time till I left, but unexpectedly found a good hatchling demon. I'll be leaving tonight…take over the exam in my place as you were before.

"Yes your lordship…" The man bowed and began to clean up the room at lightning speed.

"Come kiddo…ill take you to the village you came from, I have some questions from your parents as well."

"Sir…it is still quite a way's away…" Z didn't finish before the old man grabbed him by the shoulder, without so much as a sound the two disappeared from the room.

"That old demon…fuck…" The 40 year old man muttered under his breathe with barely a whisper.