There was no rationale for fantasizing about what could have been.
I knew that to be true for the simplest reason.
There was no going back to the past.
My birth circumstances were what they were.
My Origin Aspect was what it was.
The Aspects I formed were what they were.
The Path I walked on was one whose every stride I willingly made.
My endless [Exertion] routines were what they were.
That's why it was so interesting to finally glimpse a different perspective with full knowledge of the hows and whys.
My Essence pulsed once again, and uncontrollably, my [Will] summarily vanished.
That was it.
The exhaustion, just mere seconds ago feeling like a refreshing breeze, hit me like a red-tinted airstream straight out of the Red Sand Realm, and my thoughts were wholly consumed by an unending desire to...
Let go.
To allow my head to rest on the soft-looking pages of the book I was reading.
I resisted.
Or I tried.
It was hopeless.
My eyelids grew heavier and heavier, my neck found it harder and harder to hold my heavier and heavier head, my mind grew muddier and muddier...
It was relentless.
Ultimately, it was only a sliver of my [Will] freeing itself from the turmoil taking place inside my Essence that enabled me to put up a modicum of resistance against my unrelenting exhaustion.
It was in this in-between state that I hazily glimpsed the reality others lived in.
Laziness, not born out of a lack of drive, but a lack of [Will].
As for why my own [Will] became what it was, again, it was for the simplest reason that if I hadn't forged a [Will] that didn't allow exhaustion, hunger, pain, anything, to affect me...
I wouldn't be here.
My miraculous [Will] Aspect formation to save myself from the broken shell that was my own body following Volow's ceiling collapse had simply been the natural next step to the way of life that was forced upon me from birth.
I had been [Worthy] of the [Will] Aspect.
Aspect Advanced: [Will] (Tier 1) ➞ [Will] (Tier 2)
And as such an intrinsic part of what defined my Path, for my [Will] Aspect to advance to Tier 2 prior to the five Aspects that I formed and advanced to Tier 1 before it...
It felt like a natural Essence development.
For what truly defined my Path wasn't solely relentless [Exertion]s, it was also the [Will] to carry them out.
That the combination of the two duly led to an Essence disorder normally reserved for Essence entities having undergone intensive Essence development characterized by an abundance of Aspect advancements and formations only served to prove its development potential and effectiveness.
As the glimpse of [Transcendence] swiftly faded into nothing, I slipped into communion and felt my Essence heave from the residual Aspect advancement disorder, the signs associated with an early Essence overdevelopment disorder having worsened back to what they were like a month ago.
[Guided] (Origin)
[Exertion] (Tier 2)
[Cycle] (Tier 1)
[Insight] (Tier 1)
[Perception] (Tier 1)
[Tempering] (Tier 1)
[Darkness] (Tier 1)
[Will] (Tier 2)
[Focus] (Tier 0)
That advancement had cost me a month's worth of anti-overdevelopment [Exertion] routine, and from today onwards, I would have to be even more careful with my Essence development.
Nevertheless, manifesting my [Will] to elevate my [Focus], [Perception], and [Insight] was all it took to vindicate everything.
The energy needed to maintain my [Will] manifestation had noticeably lessened.
The potency of [Will]ing for something to be the way I wanted had clearly increased.
From healing to studying to fighting to flying, manifesting my [Will] to achieve what I could not otherwise accomplish without it had long become something akin to establishing and maintaining my [Cycle] to sustain myself.
It became a part of me.
And with my [Will] Aspect having now advanced to Tier 2, it was only logical to assume that my previous bests weren't my limits anymore.
Not that, with my worsened early Essence overdevelopment disorder, I could recklessly unleash everything I had until I blacked out from over[Exertion]...
If only I could [Will] my Essence to settle down, things would be so much easier...
For a moment, I indulged myself with dreams about a future where all my greatest fantasies came alive.
A [Cycle] that sustained me so much that I could brazenly manifest my [Will] without worrying about the energy drain.
A [Will] that could interact with my Essence, capable of healing any Essence disorders.
[Insight]s such that the secrets of Essence evolutions unveiled themselves without me having to do anything.
The fundamental truth of [Exertion] being effortlessly supplanted by the fundamental truth of [Cultivation].
[Darkness] synthesized into [Secrecy]...
[Perception] synthesized into [Awareness]...
Then [Guided] urged me to go back to reading the dry and monotonous "Monograph On Vascular Structures".
I may have just gotten one step closer to brute-forcing my way through the healer qualification examination, but earning that qualification had never been an end unto itself.
It was simply a natural development of my Path.
◇ ◈ ◈ ◆ ◆ ◆ ◈ ◈ ◇
The moment I stepped into the examination hall, my gaze homed in on a familiar figure I remembered from my final interview before I officially joined the Faith Of The Aspects as a Seeker Acolyte.
Long white hair, casual demeanor, emotionless, wizened face, Human, female.
Caught in a dilemma between indulging my curiosity and my indifference, I ultimately made up my mind and flew straight towards her.
"Fancy meeting you here," I said with barely restrained gloating. "I'm not in trouble, am I? Why don't I submit myself to an [Interrogation] first, right here and now? Ask me if I think I aced my whole Sentinel Initiate examination."
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"Did you?" she coolly asked, the faintest shadow of a smile lighting her weathered features.
"Well, how should I say it?" I put on my best smug look.
"I wrote the full list of Sentinel Initiate protocols in barely an hour, whereas the others took the full four hours."
"I achieved a draw for my combat assessment against Warrior Vingon."
"And guess what? For my assignment, I was independently dispatched to send a shipment order to a lower-floor supplier, which I completed in less than a day while catching the faulty supply package the moment it was handed to me."
"As for this final interview? What could you possibly ask me that could deny me from becoming a Sentinel Initiate? There's no way you would ask if I knowingly stole from fellow Faith members while they were sleeping as a form of [Exertion], right?"
"Did you?" she repeated, my humor getting through her tough facade.
"Hahaha, there's no way I would have done something like that!" I strongly denied the [Truth] with my fakest laughter.
"What do you take me for? A prodigy that's always on the verge of entering a state of Essence overdevelopment? The youngest Faith member to have attained the status of Seeker, Sentinel, and soon to be healer in centuries in this branch?"
"I'm so free of guilt that you could ask me about it right now, and I would only flare my [Will] accidentally to see whether I can resist your [Interrogation] before admitting that I may have done that. That doesn't count as a confession yet, does it?"
"Does it?"
Right as I was about to get the sole individual I was fairly confident belonged to the Faith's unofficial third Path to make me go through a proper [Interrogation], the door she was guarding swung open, revealing Beli.
"No talking," the Human female reminded me right as I was about to open my mouth to ask how her final interview went.
Wisely, I did just that and kept my mouth shut, only exchanging a nod of acknowledgment with Beli before she left the examination hall altogether.
"Honorary Sentinel Initiate trainee Solaena, your presence is called upon. Please enter for your final interview."
A wave of her hand was all the authorization I needed to enter a familiar interview room of the same design as the one in which I had my Seeker Acolyte's interview.
Inside, Warrior Leo and a massive Aken covered in dense red scales reflecting the surrounding light with a metallic sheen sized me up as I flew and landed directly onto the stupidly oversized giant-sized chair I was meant to sit on.
Like in my Seeker Acolyte's interview, it was the Human female who closed the door behind me prior to taking a third seat at the examiners' table.
Three examiners instead of two.
That was an interesting difference, though it could reasonably be explained by the fact that, unlike those undergoing the Seeker Acolyte examination, Initiate trainees had been personally trained by a Warrior of the Faith for months.
"Should I refer to you as Acolyte Solaena, or Initiate trainee Solaena?" The Aken opened up once the Human female signaled that she was ready.
"Initiate trainee, sir."
"Let us dispense with formality; those are only pertinent when the interviewee isn't already a member of the Faith. And I think I'll refer to you as Acolyte Solaena instead, if you don't mind." He looked me straight in the eyes as he said that.
"Alright." I shrugged, pretty indifferent to whatever he was implying or whatever sort of psychological trick he was trying to pull off.
"Perfect. So, Acolyte Solaena, you are aware that Seeker and Sentinel are two distinct Paths, right?"
"I am aware, yes."
"Then let us terminate this interview and deny you your Sentinel Initiate rank, should we? It wouldn't do for you to have a step in two distinct Paths, after all," he calmly delivered, not blinking once.
Damn.
I leaned on [Guided] for some advice on how to answer that.
"If there is such a rule that no Faith member may earn simultaneous ranks for both the Seeker and Sentinel Paths, then I would agree." The answer turned out to be sound logic.
"What would be your opinion on such a rule existing?" He followed up in a matter of seconds.
Why were the questions so irrelevant to my Sentinel Initiate examination?
"My opinion would vary depending on whether it hinders my Path and Essence development, which I intend to complement with Sentinel assignments."
"How do you think Seekers serving as Sentinels are treated by their fellow Sentinels?"
"I would hazard a guess as to them being recognized for both their broader knowledge of the world and their lack of dedication towards the Sentinel Path."
"And what would you tell those who hold such an assumption about you?"
"I would either reveal my upcoming healer qualification and the thousands of books I had read to learn about their entire anatomy, from their genitalia to their bone and muscle structure, or I would simply prove my worth as a Sentinel. Depends."
He paused for a moment, still staring at me without having blinked once, then finally relented with a slight nod.
"Use your healer qualification when you earn it. Sentinels with the healer qualification have the wondrous ability of shutting down any argument when they start demonstrating they can help you survive having your heart blown up."
"Sure." I returned his nod.
"Warrior Leo, your thoughts on this honorary Initiate trainee you inducted mid-promotion?" He turned to look at the one who taught this entire promotion and made the final decision to integrate me with it.
"If I were to judge her solely in her capacity as an Initiate trainee, Guardian Aigenion, I wouldn't suspect for a single second that she had anything to do with the Seeker Path," Leo started.
"In half the time it generally takes a trainee to become qualified to take the examination, she flew past the eligibility threshold and went on to display certain capabilities touching on Warrior rank territory."
"Her [Will] to endure and persevere through exhaustion and pain is, by an extremely large margin, her most notable trait, and she is only beginning to master it."
"In terms of dedication, I would reserve judgment until she grows older, but from what I witnessed, she did not let herself give in to laziness or complacency a single time, which only further demonstrates her extraordinary [Will]."
"In the end, I only have praise for Acolyte Solaena, and I cannot wait to see how far she will go," he finished.
It felt good to be praised.
Not that what he praised me for was anything I personally perceived as praiseworthy.
Was that what being humble felt like...?
"Exij, anything you wish to add?" He turned to the old Human female, and just like that, I finally got her name, causing the shadow of a grin to pass across my lips.
She caught it.
"Acolyte Solaena, have you ever knowingly stolen from fellow Faith members while they were sleeping?"
"I..." My [Will] flared with a pulse of force that sent the dust and air around me swirling in visible eddies, instantly freeing me from the devious influence of what I strongly suspected to be an [Interrogation] Aspect. "...would never do something like that."
"If any faction was foolish enough to allow such a prodigious fairy to join the Faith for the sole reason that her age absolves her of any doubts as to her loyalties, I would wish for all enemies of the Faith to be as stupid," Exij finished, her eyes expressing her amusement at the situation.
"That's that." Guardian Aigenion's hands went to leaf through what I suspected to be my examination record. "Now, as for your Sentinel Initiate examination."
"You passed your protocols with flying colors, and visibly restrained yourself from extending those protocols to include what Initiates aren't meant to be aware of."
"Your combat assessment is a draw against Warrior Vingon due to mutual inability to end the duel. A draw achieved despite repeated disadvantageous forced engagements on your part, which only ended when you completely ran out of energy and took to ascending upwards until Warrior Vingon couldn't hope to catch you."
"Your assignment, a logistics run, was successfully carried out in less than half the time you were provided, with no observed protocol transgressions."
Dropping my examination papers, Guardian Aigenion stared at me with a strangely resigned look.
"If all our Initiates were like you, we would have transformed Red Sand Rift City into our personal playground long ago. Let us cut this pointless interview short; you earned your Sentinel Initiate rank, congratulations, Initiate Solaena," he concluded.
Hearing these words, words I had expected to hear, when hardly eight minutes had passed since my interview started, felt stranger than I anticipated.
Because it was too easy.
I even knew how to follow up on such a sudden end, uttering the only words that were appropriate. "I will not disappoint."
"I wouldn't mind seeing some disappointments marring your profile, Initiate. Mistakes are how one learns lifelong lessons."
While he said that, Exij stood up and went straight for the door, opening and closing it behind her.
"Talking about disappointments and mistakes, what do you think about joining the Red Sand Realm expedition? They can surely find a use for a Seeker Sentinel fairy with a healer qualification."
"I refuse categorically," I stated, offering no leeway at all. "Even if you found a cure to Essence overdevelopment, I wouldn't go. If I'm forced to go, please take away my Initiate rank."
"Hehe." Leo chuckled at my answer, while Guardian Aigenion had his strange scale-covered facial features somehow loosen up.
"Dismissed," he ultimately said, and I happily took off, opening the door by landing on its handle, pushing it downwards, and pulling backward.
It was always such a bother...
Before returning to my anti-overdevelopment [Exertion] routine, however, I turned towards Exij, standing in the same place she had been when I arrived, and asked a question I really wanted to know the answer to.
"What's the third Path of the Faith, and can I take its examination?"
"Prodigious you might be, you are still too young to be made aware of such hidden knowledge," she cryptically answered after silently staring at me for a long sixteen seconds. "Ask again when you have a decade of faithful service to your name, maybe then you'll see through the veil."
I noted how she intoned "veil" differently, thanked her, then vacated the examination hall.
Now that I had become a Sentinel Initiate, there were a bunch of new [Exertion]s I could add to my routine, from logistics runs to independent patrols to intelligence collection.
And that wasn't even mentioning me finally gaining official access to the Sentinel training grounds.
If only this damn Essence overdevelopment disorder could resolve itself...
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