Book 3: Chapter 1

The Reaper Beast roared from less than fifty feet away, the jaws of its crocodilian head billowing steam into the crisp spring air as its twin sets of eyes filled with rage. It beat the chest of its baboon-like body in a challenge and my Flame stirred slowly in response.It wasn’t an Awakened Reaper Beast like I’d hoped, but it was a big one, standing at least two stories tall and as wide as a house.

, I thought as readied my axe and Phalanx Glaive.

I was on a short timeline and every minute would count.

Settling into a semi-meditative state, I split my consciousness and focused on the two [Spectral Forms] in my mind’s eye. On one side was the familiar red-hued body of the Demon that was my alter ego, the personification of my [Demon], [Beast] and [Giant] forms combined. It was a fearsome looking creature at over twelve feet tall, bull’s horns, fangs, claws and a demonic visage that just barely resembled my own.

In stark contrast, the blue-hued Struggler that stood opposite him had a face and form that resembled mine in every detail. They both looked back at me expectantly, mentally urging me to pick one of them to embody with my [Inner Soul Projection] technique.

But I wasn’t after that today.

I’d already mastered [Inner Soul Projection] over the last two months and was chasing the next ability on the cultivation tier.

[Secondary Soul Germination]

But for that I needed to know exactly what my Secondary Soul was.

I had but an inking, one that I hoped today to prove true.

Except there was only one problem.

I had no clue how to do it.

I thought looking at the both of them. Was it even possible?

Before I could get another thought out, the Reaper Beast let loose a final roar and began to charge, shaking the ground like an earthquake.

…this was the scenario I’d been gunning for, but now it was beginning to feel like a bad idea. For weeks I’d been trying to advance to the 9th Tier of the Core Realm to germinate my Secondary Soul, which, by my research should be the culmination of the Demon and Struggler forms in my split spirit combined as one. But so far, I wasn’t having much luck. The panic of a Reaper Beast bearing down on me was the catalyst I thought might lead me to a breakthrough, but all it seemed to be doing so far was make the Demon leer at me while the Struggler pointed in the direction of the beast with concern.

, I thought. All three of us were—the two images in my mind being mere mirrors of my inner self.

“Come on!” I shouted out loud. “I need the full strength of the Demon as well the Struggler to kill this thing! Combine you two! Do something!”

They stared back at me and shrugged.

I considered jumping into the Demon form and then trying to summon the Struggler thereafter. But I’d done that once before and nearly lost my mind. Way too dangerous. Perhaps the other way instead around?

“Max…” Sᴇaʀᴄh the NʘvᴇlFɪre.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of nøvels early and in the highest quality.

The call came from Fia, who’d come to act as my safety net. Her gorgeous face was creased with worry as she hovered in midair thirty feet off the ground. Her robes billowed with the power of the Qi technique that held her aloft as three blades hovered about her in a defensive formation, ready to act on my command.

“I think the one that needs do something now!” she shouted.

She was right.

The Reaper Beast was nearly on top of me.

, I thought.

No time left now.

I entered the form of the Struggler and used my [Inner Soul Projection] to manifest a ghostly image of him outside my true body. In my mind’s eye I tried to dive inside my Demon form next, but the hulking beast merely folded his arms and turned his back to me as if insulted I hadn’t picked him first. The result was me doing absolutely nothing as the beast snapped me up inside its car-sized jaws.

“Max!!” Fia cried and began laying into the creature with beams of radiant light.

But that did little to deter it as the monster began to savage me in its jaws, whipping its head from side to side like a dog chewing its favorite play toy. For me it turned my world into a rollercoaster ride that I couldn’t wait to get off. Frenzy cycled through my meridians, bolstering my [Steel Skin] and [Steel Core] techniques—preserving me from being punctured by its razor-sharp teeth and crushing jaws.

Still, I let the desperation of the predicament steep inside my mind and urged the Demon to grant me his strength and merge with my [Projected] Struggler form. But when I glimpsed back into the realm of my inner soul, the bastard had gone and disappeared.

I thought.

The idiocy of the idea irritated me and I finally gave up on my little experiment.

“[Wrath of a Thousand Slain Souls]!”

Bolts of blue lightning ripped from my body as I annunciated the technique, sending the Reaper Beast convulsing and howling in pain. The brief reprieve allowed me to break myself from its jaws, and I used my Axe and Phalanx Glaive both to cut a healthy swath of destruction through its torso. The beast roared in pain as my ghostly [Inner Soul Projection] cut through it. It didn’t really add anything to my attack however—its effects were limited to impacting the spiritual realm, but it didn’t need to either. The strength of my normal techniques alone was enough to cause the beast to fall dead after three more hits.

As I stood back from my handiwork, I slowly cultivated the Frenzy my [Bloodlust] had triggered, trying to gain at least something from the failed attempt. Fia touched down on the ground next to me and shook her head.

“I presume it didn’t work?”

I let out a sigh. “Yep. No dice again.”

Fia folded her arms as she looked at the massive beast.

“Amazing,” she said. “It wasn’t too long ago that one of these things nearly killed the two of us combined. Now you use them as practice fodder.”

It was true. About a year ago when I first met Fia we had to kill two of the things back to back. It had taken us both pushing ourselves to our limits to survive but now I could literally eat these things for breakfast.

“Yeah…” I said chuckling as I draped my arm around her shoulders. “A different time and a different place. We’ve come a long way since then.”

“We have,” she said, beaming up at me with a smile, but then her smile faded. “We have a much longer way to go though. Like three years longer.”

Her words caused a heaviness to fill my soul.

“It won’t be that long,” I said. “I promise you. I’ll bust through that academy and come back a Diamon Bracket Legionnaire in no time.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

She laughed as I laid on a cheesy grin, letting her know I was taking the mammoth task ahead of me lightly, only in jest. And it was true for the most part. I still planned to be back in record time, but I wasn’t going to underestimate the unknown challenges that lay ahead.

I’d barely been outside of Jurin province and now I was about to head into space to attend some military academy that literally killed more students than they graduated and if I were lucky enough to survive, I’d then be sent on a suicide mission to tour the Hell Worlds of the Cursed Stars.

The thought alone triggered [Odds Against Me] but I had no clue what the reality of it would truly entail. It didn’t matter though. I had no choice but to succeed in it all. Graduating from the academy and surviving a single tour was what I needed to gain the Imperial status to return to Earth as a big shot that no one could deny.

Not even the Warden, or even the Princess herself in time.

But more than that, it was the status I needed to marry Fia.

“I believe you will do just that,” Fia said, her smile returning. “Your work ethic alone should see you through. Here it is, your last day and you’re still out here training, trying to achieve a breakthrough.”

I smiled with her. “My last day was yesterday. Today is , day, remember?”

She huffed out a sigh and I could sense a nervous fear, bubble up within her. “Yes, and I wish you wouldn’t remind me. Five months went by too quickly.”

The months had indeed flown by, but we had made the most of them.

After Yu Li and Gui Zu’s wedding, we waited a month before having an engagement tea ceremony of our own. It was a much less festive and more formal affair, attended to by Fia’s family as well as the Warden and even a representative from the Princess herself to officiate. In truth it hadn’t been comfortable for either of us, but after the formalities, we enjoyed a neighborhood block party that melted all the stuffiness and legality away.

We still couldn’t live together, but being betrothed allowed us to be together in public openly and we made the most of it, enjoying date nights in the city and saving the secret rendezvous in the wilderness for when our bodies couldn’t take the physical separation anymore. The thought of that made me give Fia a suggestive stare.

“What?” she said as I leered at her.

“You what…”

“What?” she said. “?”

I shrugged. “Your call, but it will be three long years before we can be together again.”

She sighed exasperated but gave me a mischievous little grin. “You’re insufferable, you know that?”

“I try,” I said and pulled her into my arms and gave her a long kiss.

We retreated to our secret lakeside beach and then melted into one another, sharing in a bittersweet intimacy that neither of us wanted to end. When it finally did, we lay together holding each other and looking up at the morning sky.

“You’ll be up there soon,” Fia said. “Out amongst the stars. I’m not sure I can do without you for three years, Max.”

“Well at least you’ll know where to look for me.”

She swatted me playfully as I cracked a laugh.

“Alright come on, you,” she said like she was my mother. “You need to make your final rounds of goodbyes. And that includes my parents.”

I groaned inwardly at the thought of that.

Not that I didn’t want to see them, but more I wasn’t sure if they wanted to see me. Things had not been going well for the Dong family of late and while Fia’s mother, the Lady Silver Moon, still readily accepted me I knew her old man, Master Hei Dong, blamed me for most of what had happened to them.

And he wasn’t wrong in doing so.

It included the Lady Silver Moon’s Dantian being crippled by Master Lo Feng and Master Hei Dong losing his position as the Vice Warden of Jurin Province. All of it was fall out from me pinning the blame for my destruction of the Fire Bird sect on the Silver Leaf Clan. A bonehead move in hindsight and one that I was now desperate to make up for.

I still didn’t know how they truly felt about it all.

But they seemed to be keeping the peace for Fia’s sake.

“We’ll stop by your parents on our way up to the sky port,” I said, hoping to buy us some more time to collect my thoughts. “We’ll say goodbye to everyone else until then.”

* * *

My departing skiff to the starship hovering in orbit somewhere high above was in the late afternoon. Still being early morning, it gave me ample time to double check my belongings and ensure I had everything I would need for my trip across the stars.

Besides a few sets of robes there actually wasn’t much else to take. I’d already memorized my cultivation manuals as well as the shuras from Threja’s sword, who I now knew as Venja. If anything, I wished I could have brought her along for the trip, if only to have some decent company the entire time.

But she was still needed to protect the bunker out in the wild. I’d destroyed the cosmic gate that linked the demons of the Bloodmoon to the Earth, but there were still normal demons on the surface to defend against and not to mention what else could transpire while I was gone. I wrapped my non-sentient version of Venja—my homemade Phalanx Glaive—in cloth for my travels instead. I slung it on my back along with my axe and prepared to start my journey.

“All ready?” Fia asked as she waited for me just outside what would one day become ‘our’ apartment upon my return.

I nodded and closed the door. “Let’s go say goodbye.”

* * *

Everyone in the square had gathered for me and I could barely hold back the tears that tugged on my eyes as they all presented me with small gifts to fill my half-empty duffle bag. Yu Li was crying by the time she finished hugging me, which seemed to last for an hour.

“You don’t be stupid out there, you hear me?” she said, wiping her eyes. “You make sure you come home.”

“I will, Yu Li,” I said and then reaching down I lifted the not so little Su Ling into my arms as well. “Uncle will be back soon, okay?”

The little girl rested her head against my chest sweetly. “Okie… unkie Max.”

My heart melted just a little bit more as I kissed her on the forehead.

Gui Zu stepped in next with an almighty hug, the big man squeezing me hard as he slapped me on the back. “You don’t worry about a thing, brother. Jian Yi and I have everything under control. You just focus on your studies…and staying alive.”

I chucked at the last part, even though it wasn’t a joke. “Thanks, Gui Zu. I appreciate it, man.”

Jian Yi, in her formal barrister robes approached me next.

“The day has finally come,” she said with a bow and then presented me with a small envelope held in both hands. “Your travel and identification documents, safely saved as promised.”

As soon as I’d received the formal invitation letter and transit pass from the Du Gok Bhong Legionnaire Academy, I’d asked Jian Yi to hold them for me. I didn’t trust myself not to lose something so important over the five-months of waiting for the Academy’s intake to commence.

But now that day was finally here.

“Thank you, Jian Yi,” I said accepting them with a bow and then forced her to give me a hug, which she accepted warmly despite not having the natural inclination to initiate one on her own. As she stepped back, I looked for the next two members of my inner circle, Zu Tien and Kelsey.

They both now wore small pins on their robes that signified them as Second Vice Wardens of the Terran Sect, serving under Gui Zu. Zu Tien fell to her knees in a kowtow, pressing her head against the ground.

“My very best wishes for your success, Sect Leader,” she said. “May you return to us strong and whole.”

“Thanks, Zu Tien,” I said acknowledging her bow with one of my own.

When I looked to Kelsey, all she gave me was a smile.

“Don’t expect me to bow to you like that,” she said in English. “But I will give you one of these.”

She grabbed me about the waist and lifted me off the ground in a bear hug that gave Gui Zu a run for his money. I couldn’t hold back my laugh as she set me back down again and I bopped her playfully on the jaw as she grinned from ear to ear.

“I’m going to miss your punk-ass,” I said to her in English as well and then gave her a proper hug, squeezing her tight. “You remember to check back on the bunker every couple of weeks, okay? You’re their warden now.”

“Got it,” she said. “And you don’t need to remind me. My mom and Colonel Harris have me on a tight schedule of supply runs. We’ll be looking to build out the village proper this summer on the surface. Hopefully by the time you come back it’ll look like this place out there.”

I smiled at that, envisioning the people of the bunker finally being able to live outside and free. “Nice. And remember to not get too carried away when you’re back here either. Listen to Gui Zu and Jian Yi. They’ll keep you out of trouble.”

She slammed a fist into her palm. “Don’t worry. I’ll save my Frenzy for the demons.”

I stepped back and marveled at her for a moment. Kelsey was still young, a blonde-haired teenager with a face to match, but with the body of a mini berserker now. She was a Low-Tier Core Realm Cultivator, well equipped to protect the bunker and even the people here in my absence. Although when it came to being in the city, she’d have to rely on her fighting skills more than her raw power. Like me, she would need to grow her reputation first or risk being called out as a demonic cultivator…or worse, what she truly was, a Berserker.

“No beasting out in the city,” I reminded her. “And join up for the wooden bracket tournament as soon as it opens. Rank up to Iron as soon as you can afterwards. But don’t go hog wild on people weaker than you. You’ll draw too much attention.”

“Got it,” she said. “I’ll try not to break any of your records too.”

I gave her another grin as she winked. “You go kick ass, Little Sis.”

“You too, Big Bro.”

I finally turned to the rest of the crowd that had gathered together and received bows and well wishes from each of them. When we were finally done it felt like nearly an hour had passed.

Finally, Yu Li stepped next to Fia and bumped hips with her as she held Su Ling.

“And don’t you worry about her either, Max,” Yu Li said to me while grinning at Fia. “We’ll all take good care of Autie Fia while you’re gone.”

Everyone laughed at that and Fia blushed while shaking her head with a smile.

It warmed my heart to see how warm their relationship had grown in just a few months, but I suppose Fia being Su Ling’s actual blood aunt was a good reason for that. Even now, Fia visited daily to give Su Ling her first lessons in cultivation and the basics of the Silver Leaf Clan martial arts.

“Thank you, Yu Li,” Fia said hugging her. “You know I’m going to need quite a few of these when those lonely days take hold.”

“We got you, my Lady,” Gui Zu said warmly, caressing Fia on the back.

Fia wiped a small tear from her eye as she choked back a sob with a laugh. “Thank you, Gui Zu.”

She then looked up at me. “Well, one last stop. Are you ready?”

, I wanted to say, but stifled that with a cheery smile and a nod.

“We saved the best for last,” I said, which made Fia smile.

It was time to go see Mom and Dad.