The Undying Immortal System

By the end of the second month, both boys had seen significant improvements in their ability to cultivate.

After absorbing the knowledge I had stored in the memory orb, Mo gained a deeper understanding of the correct way to use the Earth Heart Mantra, and he was able to fix dozens of minor errors in his use of it without my guidance. This didn’t affect his rate of advancement much, so he was still only able to reach Martial Disciple 4 during this period, but there was an all-around improvement to his cultivation base that increased the purity of his qi by a large margin.

Liang’s improvements, on the other hand, were a bit more limited in scope, but they were much more significant. Absorbing the information from the orb allowed him to finally comprehend the basics of how to manipulate and cultivate qi. Since the orb didn’t contain any explicit memories of me actually cultivating the technique, putting what he learned from the orb into practice took him a bit of time, but by the end of the second month, he was able to reach Martial Disciple 2.

For this achievement, both boys were rewarded with an hour in the Affinity Room. They both eventually chose to spend this time raising their earth affinities, but while Mo had done so directly, Liang had needed convincing. He had originally wanted to spend the time raising his lightning affinity, and it was only after a passionate argument from Mo that he begrudgingly decided to go with earth as well.

Absorbing essence in this Rank 1 formation for only an hour didn’t have any noticeable effect on Mo, but it granted Liang a low nine-star earth affinity. Seeing this, I couldn’t help but feel that some type of feedback mechanism was needed to show a person’s improvements. I could easily see Mo becoming discouraged if he came here several times and didn’t see any noticeable improvements to his affinities.

In any case, while this short time in the Affinity Room didn’t have much of an effect on Mo, it had a transformative effect on Liang. Using his new affinity, Liang started rushing his cultivation as much as possible and didn’t give any thought at all to the purity of his foundation. After only a couple of days, he was already on the verge of his next breakthrough.

However, before that could happen, the three of us left our house to attend the second round of challenges between the normal and elite Disciples.

Throughout the second month, I continued to attend the combat training for the normal Disciples, and I kept a log of anyone who I felt I might want to recruit.

During this time, the instructor targeted several Disciples who hadn’t yet started to cultivate and decided to ‘remove’ them from the class. I did nothing to stop him from carrying out these ‘lessons’ as normal, but at the last moment, I would always block the killing strike. I had already let one kid die this year, and I wanted to avoid more bloodshed if possible.

Still, I wasn’t willing to recruit all of these people into my clan. Maybe I should have, but I just didn’t have the infrastructure in place to support a large number of children with zero aptitude for cultivation. I was already struggling with providing a suitable training environment for Liang and Mo. Once this three-month training camp was over, I wouldn’t even have a place for them to live, so I couldn’t help but feel that recruiting too many Disciples too early was a bad idea.

Instead, I simply saved their lives, gave them a Healing Pill and some gold, and deposited them outside the walls of the Su Clan’s compound. I don’t know what happened to them after that. Maybe I should have done more, but I didn’t owe them anything. Saving their lives was enough.

At the second month’s challenge, I set up my platform on the north side of the arena again, but this time I didn’t add any extra chairs. I only left the places for Liang and Mo.

When Grandmasters saw my recruits, they were somewhat smug and dismissive of my efforts. Liang was a Martial Disciple 2, and Mo was a Martial Disciple 4. The elites were also all only Martial Disciple 4, but with their higher affinities and better techniques, they were able to achieve much firmer foundations than either of the boys.

As for the normal Disciples, they were a mix of everything from Martial Disciple 2 to 6. The lack of any Martial Disciples 1s was a clear indication that anyone who hadn’t been able to start cultivating by this point had already been culled from the herd.

When it came time for the challenges, two boys and one girl stepped forward. They were all either Martial Disciple 5 or 6, and they were all swiftly defeated. However, this time, the elites did not immediately kill their opponents. They first looked to the balcony to see what their elders wanted them to do.

In an apparent concession to my sensibilities, none of these Disciples were killed. However, immediately following their matches, two of them were exiled. On their way out, I not only slipped them a Healing Pill and a few gold, but I also forced an Energy Expulsion Pill down their throats to forcibly clear out their wrecked cultivation bases.

After these fights, the elites then fought against each other, and I got a better sense of the level of their combat proficiency. It wasn’t great, but it was clear to me that they were spending at least as much time learning to fight as they were spending on learning to cultivate.

Once all the challenges were settled, the Grandmasters looked to see if I wanted to offer anyone a position in my retinue, but I waved them off.

The following month, the growth of my Disciples rapidly increased. Using the knowledge from the orb and the help of a single boost to his earth affinity, Mo was able to climb to Martial Disciple 7 while maintaining a solid foundation. Liang, however, had given up on any pretense of maintaining even a semblance of qi purity and rushed all the way to Martial Disciple 8.

While this wasn’t the ideal way to cultivate, Liang was actually doing what I wanted him to do. I wanted the boys to rush and experience the problems that a weak foundation would create, but watching everything unfold reinforced the notion that I needed to tie the amount of time a person was given in the Affinity Room to the purity of their cultivation.

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Not with Low-Yellow techniques, though. With Low-, and even Mid-Yellow techniques I wanted them to rush, but with High- and Peak-Yellow techniques, I would want them to take their time and learn to cultivate properly.

I didn’t bother teaching them any martial skills during this time, and I didn’t even teach them to move their qi around in their energy body when attacking and defending. I wanted them to focus on the basics of cultivation. However, they both continued working on their physical conditioning in the workout room, and this included several sparring matches a week. These bouts didn’t lead to either of them becoming particularly skilled at fighting, but they did teach the boys to throw a punch.

In the third and final challenge between the normal and elite Disciples, over half a dozen normal Disciples issued a challenge against an elite, but none of them succeeded. Again, none of these normal Disciples were killed, and this time, the Grandmasters appeared to be more than happy with this result. It seemed like the clan had deemed that anyone capable of surviving this long was worth the effort of keeping around.

After that, the elites challenged each other to lock in their final rankings amongst themselves. Then, before the elder in the arena could signal the end of the competition, something happened that I didn’t expect.

Liang stood up.

“I want to issue a challenge.”

The elder in charge looked to YuanFei who nodded in agreement. Then, the elder turned to Liang.

“Who do you wish to challenge?”

Liang’s eyes roamed across the faces of the elites, evaluating them. Eventually, they landed on the one who had shown the greatest potential during the previous challenges.

Liang pointed to the other boy. “Him!”

The elite smirked and walked into the arena.

The elder gave a quick speech about fists having no eyes and began the fight.

Less than three seconds later, the fight was over, and Liang was lying on the ground, bleeding out.

Before going in for the final blow, the elite looked up to one of the Grandmasters on the balcony.

After rubbing his chin in thought, the Grandmaster looked at me, and vindictiveness swelled up within him. Then, he turned back to the elite.

The Grandmaster started to move his head to nod for the elite to end Liang’s life, but I quickly flared my qi and used a technique to control a thin vine, pointing it directly at the Grandmaster’s heart. The railing of the balcony hid this from the view of the Disciples below, but my threat was clear to all the Grandmasters.

The man who was about to sentence Liang to death froze in shock.

Next to him, YuanKong snorted at me in derision.

“You shouldn’t interfere in a fight between juniors. It is disgraceful for a Grandmaster to act in such a fashion.”

My only response was a twitch of my finger that raised another vine pointed at his heart as well.

This broke the original Grandmaster from his stupor, and he quickly shook his head to stop his disciple from killing Liang.

Once both boys were back in their seats, I relaxed my hold on my qi and allowed the vines to drop back down and rest against the balcony railing.

This caused YuanKong to shake his head in disgust. “Disgraceful.”

I wanted to kill the man, I really did, but I held myself back. Killing him would serve no purpose, and it would only make accomplishing my goals more difficult.

With Liang’s challenge settled, the elder in the arena gave a closing speech about the glory of the Su Clan and how with their training now over, it was time for everyone to work toward the betterment of the clan. As the elder spoke, I kept a close eye on the Disciples and monitored their reactions to better understand how each person felt about what they were hearing.

Once the speech was over, I jumped down onto the stage.

“I have decided to recruit three more Disciples. If you wish to join me, step forward.”

In the past, I had gotten the sense that many of the Disciples considered Liang and Mo to be only one step removed from the elites. They might not be quite as good as a true elite, but they were still getting special training and had been placed on a pedestal above the normal grunts. However, Liang’s quick defeat had disabused them of any such notion. Many of them now saw my recruits as beneath even the normal Disciples.

Because of this, no one was quick to accept my offer, but after a long moment, a tall, broad-shouldered boy stepped forward. He glanced from the clan’s elders to me and gave a deep bow.

“I am willing to join you.”

The moment he said this, one of the girls rushed forward to stand by his side.

“I’ll join you as well.”

I didn’t signal my acceptance of them immediately. I wanted to see if any others would step forward first, but when none did, I waved for them to join Mo and Liang.

While I had wanted to recruit a total of five Disciples this first year, I wasn’t upset to leave with only four. There was still a lot I needed to do to create a proper training regime, so having one less recruit to worry about wasn’t a huge loss. At any rate, I wasn’t going to force anyone to join me.

Once both of the new recruits took up positions next to Mo and Liang, I turned and moved to retake my position on the balcony. Before I could, another shout echoed out and stopped me.

“I wish to join you as well.”

I turned around and looked in the direction the voice had come from.

ShouLi had stood from her seat and was staring at me with her hand firmly balled into fists by her side.

Just as I was about to respond, one of the elders interrupted me.

“What!”

I looked back to see that it was the elder who had originally chosen her as his disciple. He continued shouting something, but I didn’t pay it any mind. Instead, I carefully studied the girl in front of me.

Like everyone else here, ShouLi was 16 years old, but her blessing-enhanced skin made her look only 13 or 14. Unlike everyone else, she had been dressed in a tight, form-fitting robe and was wearing a thin layer of makeup to further enhance her natural beauty.

As she stood before me, she swayed slightly. At first, I thought that this might be because of the psychological pressure she was under, but I soon saw faint hints of bruising peeking out from her cuffs and neckline. A glance at her feet showed that they had been broken and bound to make them smaller and more delicate.

The man behind me had continued his shouting, so I flared my qi and used a heavy wave of energy to silence him. Then, I returned my focus to the ShouLi.

“Why?”

Tears welled up in her eyes.

“Because I do not wish to be sold off like chattel to some man I’ve never even seen.”

I stared at her and assessed her mental condition as best I could.

Her answer wasn’t a complete lie, but it hid a deeper truth. The decision to stand up and seek refuge with me didn’t seem to be entirely her choice.

I turned and stared at YuanFei.

His nostrils were flared, and he was glaring at the girl, putting on a decent act of being angry, but I could tell that he was elated. The only person on the balcony who showed even the slightest hint of real anger was the man who had been berating the girl. The rest of them were only showing signs of happiness and greed.

Turning back to ShouLi, I knew that accepting her into my clan would likely mean placing a snake into my new garden, but even if she had ulterior motives, I still sympathized with her situation.

In any case, even if her presence stirred up a bit of a storm, it wouldn’t necessarily be a problem. My clan would need to face challenges and tribulations to forge them into a united whole.

Making my decision, I waved for ShouLi to take a position with the others, finalizing the first group of recruits for my new clan.