Chapter 190: Jealousy in the Mines

Chapter 190: Jealousy in the Mines

The battle for Romastir had been easy, which actually left Zae Zin Nim strangely unsatisfied. There were opponents out there as far above her as she was above the weak crystalliers, and she needed to work to be ready for them. Kai seemed to feel the same, so they cultivated and trained aggressively as they flew back toward Yulthens.

Before they actually entered the city, however, they needed to stop at the mines. It was her first visit and she was frankly repulsed, even after being prepared by Kai's descriptions. These people literally lived in filth in a hole in the ground, eating disgusting food that was apparently an improvement on what they'd been eating before.

And yet these were peasants she couldn't blame for their position. It made her think about all the other peasants she'd dismissed in her life, and just how similar they might be.

Clearly Kai was returning to friends, since he seemed to develop bonds wherever he went. Zae Zin Nim kept her distance and regarded them skeptically. Some of them were comparable to crystalliers, especially once past the 99 Power barrier and developing some cultivation. That didn't mean she wanted anything to do with them, particularly the one named Maggle who kept making jokes. The strongest among them was clearly an old man named Kraetius, who struck her as someone whose cultivation had been broken and, despite all his training, had never really recovered.

And Nirka... Nirka was the one who really got under her skin.

Even though Zae Zin Nim wasn't particularly experienced, it was obvious that this woman and Kai were in a relationship by the way they greeted one another. It galled her, more than she expected and perhaps more than it had a right to. What did it matter if she cared about Kai? She'd never made any kind of proposal and he had the right to do what he wanted.

None of that helped, especially at night when she realized they slept together. Just what did he see in a woman like that? Even pettier, Nirka barely looked at Zae Zin Nim except to notice her scars. Like she wasn't a threat or a rival, not even a concern.

And perhaps she wasn't. Zae Zin Nim had believed that she could wait until she reached the next stage and restored her former beauty, then ask Kai for something more. He had never philandered or ran around, so she'd thought she had time, and yet... and a woman like that!

Zae Zin Nim glowered at the peasant woman and examined her soul again.Foolloow new stories at novelhall.come: Nirka of N District

Total Power: 122

Crystal Cultivation: 120 (11)

Physique Level: E-5 (95)

Soul Level: 4 (16)

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Total Power: 415

Cultivation: Nascent Foundation 27% (260)

Coldfire Corona: 31 (41)

Blackblood Physique Level: E-3 (89)

Soul Level: 5 (25)

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She had more than 400 Power, putting her in the same range as the Diamond Crystalliers. Maybe not enough to defeat Ren Ziq Quen and his Transcendent Divine Body, but much closer. And yet it wasn't enough to turn Kai's head, or maybe gain anyone's interest, or maybe she was being a foolish girl when she should have focused solely on her own growth...

Zae Zin Nim cultivated with that uncomfortable thought until they finished their training in the mines and continued on to Yulthens. Unfortunately, they didn't go alone: a decent number of workers left with them, all with various assignments. There were two other crystal mines in the region that needed to be liberated to increase their forces, after all. As far as she was concerned, Maggle's purpose was to annoy her and Nirka's purpose was to make her miserable.

Their arrival in Yulthens was everything she had expected, in the worst way. Nirka gawked at everything and would have blown their cover if anyone had any sense. At least there was a real anger in her - a rage that wanted to tear down everything that had been built on top of her.

Zae Zin Nim could respect that, even if it didn't make things any easier.

Once they returned to Orillia's estate, Zae Zin Nim had a direct role to play in arming the peasants. She finally met the boy named Gundle, and was surprised to see that Kai hadn't overstated the boy's ability. He had an easy facility with qi that only appeared in a gifted few, except that it had been developed in toxic acid pits. She wondered if he would have been stronger if he had been raised in an ideal environment, or if that would have hindered what made him unique.

The only negative point was that the child had tactlessly asked her about all her scars. Where she would once have punished him, she just said that she had been cut in battle, which made the boy's eyes widen. He seemed so impressed that she was charmed despite herself. To a child the scars weren't marring her beauty, they were just funny lines.

In any case, their task was to develop the instinctual acid cultivation found in the pits into a combat ability. Her initial stance was skepticism, but anything was a weapon to an unarmed man, and acid did have intrinsic offensive power.

She had expected to resent spending her time on it, and to her surprise came to enjoy it. Working on such a radically different power led her to reconsider her own and deepen her own cultivation. The ability wasn't entirely pure qi, since it found its form within another substance, but that didn't necessarily make it weak. There were lessons for her to learn as she tried to improve her Coldfire Corona.

Two weeks doing nothing but training and working on her cultivation should have been ideal. There was nothing she needed more than that power. And yet, for the first time in her life, Zae Zin Nim wondered if that was really true.