Chapter 59: A Sin

What did it mean to become truly Immortal?

Immortality was a myth.

There was no such thing as true Immortality. Anything that had a beginning would have an end.

That was the rule of Creation and Destruction.

A law of nature—even the Gods had to follow it.

Becoming an Immortal didn’t make a creature invincible, but it did make them hard to kill.

When evolving one’s core from the peak of the Diamond Rank to the Immortal Rank, the basic process stayed the same.

It involved making tiny cracks appear on the surface of the core using mana pressure from within and outside the core.

Then, those cracks had to be filled with mana, and the core had to be compressed again for it to evolve into the next rank.

That was what could be called the standard foundational procedure.

The only difference was that while ranking up to Immortal, one had to become one with nature during this process.

And what did that mean?

When the core was compressed to its maximum extent, with cracks appearing throughout its surface, instead of directly patching those cracks, a new step had to be added.

The person had to open all the meridians in his body—in the literal sense.

One had to tear apart every cell on the skin and make the mana meridians come into direct contact with the mana in nature.

The mana was not to be converted while being absorbed in the meridians.

No.

The mana in nature had to directly enter the meridians without going through the absorption process, and that was done by tearing apart those meridians.

Micro-tears had to be made in all the meridians to make it possible for the surrounding mana to enter the mana core in its purest and most natural form.

This step itself could cause a slow, painful death for many.

Tearing apart the skin cells alone could lead to severe bleeding, resulting in massive blood loss.

Though people at the peak of the Diamond Rank had higher self-healing powers, those powers had to keep up with the destruction of the body.

And not only that—the damaged cells couldn’t be repaired until the entire process of ranking up was finished.

So even if you could heal the damage done to the body, you still had to survive until the entire procedure was completed.

And while surviving, you had to have enough willpower to actually control your body while going through the agonizing pain of tearing your skin apart.

This was still only the primary pain.

Causing micro-tears in your meridians resulted in another round of intense pain.

Pain might be an understated word for the brutality your body went through.

And even if someone could survive all that pain and suffering, being able to actually control their meridians well enough to create micro-tears without completely breaking them was a challenge for many.

Not exactly a challenge, but—

A near-impossible task.

If a cultivator managed to pass these steps, he then had to make the mana enter his core through the cracks.

It had to be noted that the normal process involved the mana core absorbing mana through the meridians, but here, the purest form of natural mana directly entered the core—not through absorption, but through the damage sustained by the core.

This made the mana essence within the core unstable, as the foreign mana directly crashed with one’s own mana signature.

It was like pollution entering the system.

The mana core naturally tried to repel this mana, but the cultivator had to stop that repulsion.

He had to make his mana essence learn to coexist with the natural mana and then evolve his core, thereby becoming one with nature.

Well, there were still a few steps in between, but I would keep them aside for now.

The reason I was remembering all these details was—

According to my guess, I had scored pretty well in the tests, both the theory and the practical examination.

And my identity wasn’t a simple one either.

The disappointment of the Frost Dukedom, the spoiled noble brat, the…

There were many names attached to my identity. And here I was, appearing out of nowhere, giving the entrance test through the commoners’ section and becoming eligible for admission into the academy.

Not only eligible, but I seemed to have passed with flying colours.

It must have been suspicious for the academy staff—for an utter failure of a noble brat to display the level of competence I had shown.

The theory exam had questions heavily related to mana. To answer them, one didn’t have to know the official concepts, but simply describe the sensations they felt when interacting with mana in different situations.

And for someone like me, whose mana control was unparalleled—not only among people of my rank but in the entire world—

Well, the test wasn’t even worth my attention.

As for the practical exam—

Sigh.

My opponent was an academy instructor, an intern, I guess.

Being at Silver 2, the guy wasn’t even worth lifting my blade against.

From the hellish training I had undergone under Arthur, my body had become like a living weapon.

Even creatures at my own rank couldn’t defeat me, so was there any reason I would lose to someone a tier below me?

Yes, in the last year, I had ranked up to become a Silver-core cultivator.

I was at Silver 3 at the moment, with my core already showing signs of wanting to evolve to the next rank.

But I had suppressed that desire—for now.

As for the result of that fight—it felt more like I was the one assessing the person before me.

I had beaten him with my bare hands, teaching him to improve his techniques during the fight.

Maybe that was insulting to him, as the guy became more brutal in his ways of attacking me.

And…I wasn’t someone who could backoff!

I had to thrash him a few times, before knocking him off.

That display, along with everything else, seemed to have attracted the attention of the Headmaster.

Haa…

The sins of being strong!

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