Solaena's [Guided] Journey (Fantasy LitRPG)

"As always, your observations can touch on all facets of the duel, what came before, what came after; it only needs to be relevant to the actual duel," I mechanically clarified, not wanting a repeat of a messy debate about whether poisoning someone else's food beforehand was going too far.

It wasn't.

Getting poisoned, showing up intoxicated, or whatever impaired one's combat readiness was fair game.

Just like adapting one's equipment to counter the core techniques employed by their designated duel opponents was something to be expected at this point in their Initiate trainee training timeline.

Arguably, nothing raised the importance of this point more than the net revolution brought about by Meserna some months ago, as it effectively offered a weapon Solaena had to be absolutely wary of.

Thus the cycle of adaptation went, with Solaena's sure-win mutual exhaustion tactic still remaining absurdly successful, but if her opponent ever caught her with their growing collection of net weapons, she could struggle all she wanted, but she would still be bound and captured.

The day she could summarily cut her way out of a metal-thread net to solve that absolute weakness was still very far away.

"It's not the first time one of Solaena's pinpricks leads to a lethal injury," one of the trainees spoke up, following the protocol of first stating a factual observation, and only then reporting their opinion. "So, shouldn't forming an Aspect capable of stabilizing lethal wounds be a priority?"

"Who doesn't want to form the [Will] Aspect?" I asked back, meaningfully staring at all remaining nineteen individuals of this promotion, who confidently held my gaze.

"You're all soon to be undergoing your Initiate examination. Do I really need to reexplain what Initiates are expected to be able to do?"

"You're expected to be capable of dealing with any and all manners of basic brawls, not counter assassinations, not commanding other Sentinels, not anything other than basic combat, that's it."

"You're asking me about forming an Aspect to deal with lethal injuries. My answer to this observation is that Warriors are actually required to have an answer ready for every situation, from debilitating poisoning to lethal injury to the loss of our dominant hand, shitty as our answer might be."

"So I'll say that for one last time, focus on your foundation first before basing your Path on something like countering combat archetypes, be it assassins, duelists, swarmers, or berserkers."

"Next observation," I called.

"Beli didn't reinforce her vital spots when it was obviously warranted against Solaena. She should have hidden metal plates over her vital spots. She stubbornly held onto her flexibility."

"Counter?" I asked, wanting more out of that answer than such an incomplete observation.

Solaena herself raised her hand to speak. "I would never have missed any noticeable reduction in her neck and head range of motion, which would have only made her less able to keep tracking me and preventing me from diving."

"Beli?" I looked at Beli for her response.

"I already lost last time after reinforcing my joints, and I lost even quicker than when I gave myself the flexibility and lighter equipment load needed to properly answer her circling tactic," she beautifully summarized her reasoning.

"Counter?"

"She pretty much lost before the fight even started..."

"Taking only nets with her was an odd decision..."

"Why didn't she go with the wall shield tactic if she didn't have a proper answer to..."

As always, when Solaena won, all the observations eventually simmered down to the same thing.

Her opponent tried something, it inconveniently didn't work, and thus, they had better bring a couple of wall shields and put their back against them next time.

Her circling tactic was simply that unbeatable in a duel setting.

"Order," I uttered, quieting the debate, and stared at Beli. "What would you change for your next duel against Solaena?"

"I still don't believe bringing three wall shields to build a makeshift wall is a proper solution, so I would go with lightening my equipment load to its lowest threshold, leaving me with only my bodysuit. Then I would try to bottom her energy out expeditiously by chasing after her with light nets so that her [Cycle] doesn't have time to widen the [Recovery] gap between us."

"An Initiate-worthy answer." I breathed a sigh of relief at not having to persuade another trainee of the necessity to plan with less rather than more. "Heard that, Edystus? Less is more. Don't stubbornly continue to encumber yourself."

Edystus evaded my gaze.

"Solaena, your turn." I turned to the victor, whom I never let go without clearly stating one thing they could have done better.

"I should have gone out of my comfort zone and attempted some dives through the net throws."

Evidently, she picked her flaw from a training perspective, always looking towards the future to the point of neglecting how stupid it would have been to actually go through with that in a duel setting.

Not that I expected anything else out of someone who formed the [Will] Aspect so young and kept on piling more "[Exertion]s"—as she called them—on her plate.

Seeker, Sentinel, healer...

Add to that what she told me about the meaning of her name and the tale it originated from, and it honestly wouldn't surprise me if she somehow fundamentally formed the [Ambition] Aspect or synthesized it from her [Will] Aspect, instead of synthesizing it the usual way, with the [Talent], [Determination], and whatnot other Aspects.

Still, for now, she was just a talented and motivated Initiate trainee that I was in charge of, showing her the ropes of being a proper Sentinel.

"What I would have wanted to see you try instead is to take opportunistic dives at her arms' joints, which could have caused Beli to grow more careful, making you waste even less energy while she was chasing you..."

◇ ◈ ◈ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◈ ◈ ◇

Deep in a state of communion with my Essence, I recognized the churning and swelling of my Essence for what it was.

The signs had already faintly manifested when I went to sleep, but now they had grown unmistakable.

That, plus the fact that over the last few days, the world, or rather my [Perception] of it, had never ceased to grow progressively more...

Different.

Clearer.

Sharper.

More contrasted.

Everything was pointing towards a conclusion I had long foreseen eventually transpiring despite my Essence already being encumbered by eight Aspects.

I was forming a new Aspect.

And not just any Aspect.

I was forming the [Focus] Aspect.

An Aspect I so evidently desired to be part of my Path that the option of preventing its formation, like those born as Pure Essence Entities had to seriously consider lest they hinder their future Essence development, did not even cross my mind.

Truthfully, it was a bizarre occurrence that I hadn't formed it earlier, ever [Focus]ed as I was when I had to perfectly follow [Guided]'s instructions or whenever I relentlessly went through my [Exertion] routine.

The only rationale I could begrudgingly come up with to explain such a late formation was a curious combination of, firstly, my other Aspect formations having continuously supplanted it and increased its formation difficulty, and secondly...

That what I actually understood as a state of [Focus] fundamentally diverged from the concept of a state of [Focus] embodied by the [Focus] Aspect, due to it being akin to my natural state.

If I was always [Focus]ed, then I somehow wasn't [Focus]ed.

Yeah...

It was a rationale I didn't have much confidence in, but what other explanation could there be?

Something about [Guided] "forcing" me into a state of [Focus], thus my [Focus] not being voluntary?

That interpretation was even more stupid than my already idiotic analysis...

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

In any event, the signs all being there and the formation of my ninth Aspect being only a matter of time, I happily launched myself into my routine of anti-overdevelopment [Exertion]s.

One that [Guided] informed me I was already overshooting with my [Cycle].

I immediately corrected it, reducing my pulling area so that it strictly kept to the surface of my skin.

It wasn't about pushing my [Cycle] above and beyond anymore.

Now, it was a slow and steady grind towards mastery, with all the new [Exertion] troubles that implied, from failing to hold back to growing frustrated about failing to achieve something I only needed to push a bit more to succeed at.

But no.

Because battling Essence overdevelopment was like that.

It was a slow, obtuse, and different kind of [Exertion] routine altogether.

If one avoided mentioning the regular outbursts of [Will] manifestation I was [Guided] to employ to drain my energy, that was.

The thrill of suddenly accelerating from nothing to speeding through more or less crowded corridors never diminished, quite the opposite, as it stood as one of the last reminders of how it felt to give it my everything every second.

Then I arrived at the sanctuary, and the dullness of my anti-overdevelopment [Exertion] routine reaffirmed itself like a set of heavy plate armor and a backpack filled with metal scraps when I found myself picking yet another book from yet another bookshelf and flying atop it to start reading and taking notes...

My first book of the day turned out to be "The Mathematics Of Essence - Volume 4", a fraudulently exciting name for what was a book series filled with eye-gouging amounts of Essence problems whose expected answers could only be attained through dreary applied mathematics.

The simplified, linear, and triangular number tables had long been purged from my mind to be replaced by Aspect- and constraint-specific series of numbers that I needed to formulate and then apply to the relevant Essence values I was provided, such as Aspect advancement time or Aspect effectiveness increase.

Values that evidently had no basis in reality, all so that the one solving the puzzle, me, had no other choice but to reverse-engineer a proper table that would only be usable for this one problem.

And then, on the answer pages, the author dared to present much more realistic sets of values along with criticisms of how they related to practical scenarios.

In the hour it took me to go through three problems, I was already totally wiped out of enthusiasm for the rest, and instead of forcing myself to continue, I jumped from the top of the bookshelf I was located on and grabbed another book.

"Essence Is Not Governed By Mathematics", this one was called, a perfect pseudo-antithesis to the dozens of volumes that made up "The Mathematics Of Essence" series.

I took a guilty pleasure in opening its pages to unravel the unorthodox opinions it held within.

Fascinatingly, two hours later, I closed the book with a satisfying clap of air and a lot more thoughts than I initially believed such a book would invoke.

What this book taught me, in no uncertain terms when applied to my circumstances, was that I could have synthesized the [Cultivation] Aspect with my [Exertion], [Cycle], and [Tempering] Aspects at Tier 0.

Most certainly, forming such a high-order Aspect as a fundamental one might truly be a bit of a stretch, but the possibility still existed.

If one adhered to the dual theory of manifested circumstances and Origin perspective, that was.

The easiest theory to accept by far was the theory of manifested circumstances.

It stated that under extreme circumstances, ranging from entering a state of enlightenment to truly believing that unless one achieved something, their existence would come to an end, one's Essence ought to manifest a similarly extreme Essence disorder that would pave the way for the impossible to occur.

As of my present knowledge, this theory, while unreliable and extremely difficult to produce solid studies on, had nothing going against its nature.

One's Essence wasn't some kind of wild animal; it was the truest expression of one's Path, and if this Path had the slightest foundation for something like synthesizing the [Cultivation] to occur, then it ought to be possible.

The theory of Origin perspective, however...

That was another thing altogether.

Its principle, that of every Aspect having the potential to become an Origin Aspect formed by an Origin Essence Entity, while arguably plausible, was way too... theoretical to be relied upon.

That this fickle belief was then used to prove that Aspect formation—extended to Aspect synthesis—difficulty fluctuated based on perspective, somehow in turn proven by a newborn Origin Essence Entity "probably" holding the strangest perspectives of reality...

That was one heck of a theory to ascribe to.

I could accept the possibility of synthesizing the [Cultivation] Aspect with my current Path, and could barely imagine synthesizing it through relentless [Exertion]s focused entirely on it over decades.

I couldn't affirm that an Origin Essence Entity, be it a fairy or not, was ever born with the [Cultivation] Aspect as their Origin Aspect.

Apart from that part, this "Essence Is Not Governed By Mathematics" book actually gave me plenty of small divergent outlooks on Aspect advancement and Aspect formation difficulties that I happily stuffed alongside the hundreds of others I had already garnered.

After all, who knew, right?

Maybe Aspect formation difficulty was truly defined by one's intangible talents.

Maybe eating Essence-dense food genuinely allowed one's Essence to grow faster.

Maybe Aspect synergies and overlaps truly did influence Aspect advancement difficulties.

Maybe the field of mathematics was too incompatible with the complexity entailed by the laws of nature, which Essence encompassed.

Maybe.

Aspect Formed: [Focus] (Tier 0)

Or maybe the [Truth] was something I simply wasn't able to touch yet or even imagine for lack of knowledge, of wisdom, of imagination, and overall, of Essence development.

Because it all came down to Essence development in the end.

At least, it seemed my thoughts were [Guided] that way for whatever reason...

Was it because I simply didn't care what the [Truth] was, so long as I continued to develop my Essence unimpeded?

Oh well.

I realistically only had one way to find out.

I jumped and put "Essence Is Not Governed By Mathematics" back where I found it, then returned to the top of my bookshelf to resume my "The Mathematics Of Essence - Volume 4" exercises.

Essence development through [Exertion]s.

Also, I badly hoped this Aspect formation hadn't set me back months of recuperation from my early Essence overdevelopment disorder.

◇ ◈ ◈ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◈ ◈ ◇

As the Red Sand Realm expedition drew closer, I could feel things change.

My [Darkness] synthesis and [Perception] [Exertion]s were all about feeling changes, after all.

The infirmary was preparing for a temporary lack of healers, to the extent that I was told to be ready to intervene in my capacity as a health apprentice if too many patients flowed in.

The Sentinel training grounds became pretty much permanently occupied by Sentinels wearing Red Sand Realm-adapted gear going through the same drills we were incessantly made to perform as Initiate trainees.

The corridors became rife with logistics people transporting one crate after another, preparing supplies, and making the most of the opportunity to conduct a Prime Temple-wide inventory.

Everyone was now whispering only about what the Red Sand Realm was like, how messy the politics was increasingly becoming, how some factions had already had their leadership mysteriously disappear, how the paste supply issue had exploded into full-blown paste unavailability...

Curiously, it felt—or at least, there were hints of a resemblance—like I was thrown back into the period of time during which strange occurrences started being mentioned back in Volow, before the ceiling collapsed and the small settlement I was born in became a mass open grave.

Since then, while I, anyone else who miraculously survived, and those who had listened to their [Intuition] and left beforehand went on to live, Volow's ruinous ending became nothing but a forgotten footnote in a report no one could be bothered to classify as a historical event.

Volow's ceiling collapse was simply another data point.

That's just how life was, I learned.

Settlements emerged and vanished like the dunes shifted in the Red Desert, and in the end, only Red Sand Rift City endured, leading to a vicious feedback cycle where the Red Sand Sector didn't have any prospect of ever developing to become something other than a barren and isolated Sector.

And the worst was that even if the neighboring Sectors miraculously decided to massively invest in developing it, building transportation infrastructure that would ease the months-long journey, subsidizing interested Rifter Guilds to set up outposts and deploy personnel, revitalizing the inter-Sector trade economy...

History proved it would all eventually come crashing down.

It had been tried before, when the Red Sand Realm and the dilapidated Red Sand Rift industrial complex still produced caravans' worth of Essence sand, a resource that had uses in all crafting fields for those who knew how to employ it.

But there was a reason the Red Sand Sector came to be qualified as a barren Sector, as every entity, be it a powerhouse, a faction like the Faith, the Nexus Order, or economic factions that had the means to develop it, ultimately refused to do so.

It wasn't worth it.

Too much hassle.

No guarantees.

No benefits.

And... I agreed with everything.

I agreed to such a degree that I came to doubt the "selfless heroism" I initially associated with the tale my name originated from.

Helping others without expecting any returns looked to be more and more of a fantasy, with the reality of Civilization being that even a refuge for children served some manner of selfish purpose.

Like gathering gullible manpower that could be exploited and remain none the wiser for years.

Seen through a lens of interest, even the act of saving a city could later be utilized as leverage to obtain rewards.

Civilization was like that.

It was presented to me through hundreds of books as a huge, conflicting web of interests that could eventually bring both prosperity and misery.

It depended on where you stood, who your parents were, how powerless or powerful you were, how much authority you wielded, what your intentions were, how low you were willing to go, how willing you were to compromise...

And if this very situation the Prime Temple was going through taught me anything in an unmistakable manner, it was that no one was fully removed from this web of interests, regardless of how indifferent and irrelevant they were to the ongoing events.

I lived in the Prime Temple, and so I was affected by the Faith's interest in seeing this expedition succeed, which was itself motivated by Red Sand's interest in making the most of an ecological pocket they discovered, but which they knew ran against the interests of many other factions who didn't desire to see them rise further...

Interests.

Civilization.

Two concepts tightly bound together in theory and practice alike.

Except, compared to the elusive and intangible concept that was Civilization, interests were something many had already comprehensively studied.

How they could be manipulated.

How they could be bent to one's [Will].

How they could be reconciled.

And the knowledge from such studies ended up filling entire sections of the Seeker sanctuary.

Not that I had the time to delve into those sections in any meaningful way yet.

For the sake of not being completely ignorant, however, I read the various primers available for these sections, which turned out to be a marvelous idea, as it now provided me with shallow [Insights] on the shifting interests around me.

Still, the more I considered how extensive this web of interests that steered Civilization truly was, the more I grew curious about the sort of advanced and historical knowledge the Politics, Economics, and Socio-Cultural sections held.

When the primers had already introduced me to the vague concepts of diplomacy, lobbying, leverage, propaganda, information control, narrative shaping, deterrence, trade, incentives, bribery, and so many other ways to manipulate interests, I really couldn't help it.

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