The Third Scene: Intensive Courses
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All compulsory and elective subjects had been marked; the four main categories were physical techniques, soul, faith imprints, and the application of faith power.
Sang Sang swiftly skimmed through the list, her mind already forming an understanding, and she frowned slightly. Little Jin began to analyze.
[Physical techniques involve strengthening the body and attack skills, which is your weakness. Not only have you never been exposed to physical techniques, but the gene serums from your low-level civilization have left residual toxins that need to be cleared, and this will take time.]
[Soul development includes expanding the brain domain, enhancing mental focus, mastering laws, and cultivating energy cores. Your use of mental power has never been weak, and your compatibility with laws is broad. The laws here have diverse sources, so reaching the requirement shouldn’t be difficult.]
[Faith imprints serve as mediums for faith, law imprints, purification of intent, refining faith, faith channels, and storing faith. Your medium is painting, and you’ve already grasped the basics of the others. You only need to make minor adjustments according to the temple's rules.]
[The application of faith power is an essential skill for a saintess, divided into two major series: the Holy Light Sermon and Holy Light Judgment. The Holy Light Sermon is for healing internal and external injuries, purification, and support. Holy Light Judgment serves as attack and restraint. As long as you master the properties of faith power, your experience with mental power usage will help, and you can use virtual space to improve proficiency. I believe you’ll learn it within the specified time.]
Sang Sang mused to herself, ‘Fortunately, though the number of requirements looks terrifying, only basic mastery is required, not expertise. Personal cultivation only needs to reach the pinnacle of the Heavenly Tier, the ninth level of saintess, with no compulsory breakthrough to stellar tier.’
Time in the temple was eight months per year, sequentially named Water, Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, Light, Darkness, and Void. Each month had fifty days, each day forty hours, each hour a hundred minutes, each minute a hundred seconds. Converted to Galactic Planet time, one year here was about ten years, plenty enough.
Yet some compulsory subjects felt odd.
“Strengthening genes in the physical technique category, cultivating inner energy to promote cellular regeneration and evolution—I understand why that’s essential. But why are all forms of combat—fists, blades, swords, cold weapons, mechs, war machines, and hot weapons—compulsory? The saintess is a healer, a nurse protected by the knights; even on the battlefield, she wouldn’t be at the front lines.” Sang Sang wasn’t sure, “And elemental energy attacks like wind, fire, thunder, water, wood, aren’t those soul-type spells?”
Senna replied with a question, “Are you content to drift along as an ordinary saintess, not aiming for one of the eight seats, or even the chief saintess?”
Sang Sang said, “Of course I want to be the best.”
Senna spread her hands, “Exactly. If you want to be a seat-holding saintess, your knowledge must be comprehensive. Ideally, you’d master the eighteen common types of cold weapons—not necessarily with great skill, but at least enough for basic understanding and familiarity with inner energy channels. For hot weapons, you need a basic grasp—not for the battlefield, but to reach every corner of faith, leaving no follower behind.”
The more you know, the more support states you can provide.
Sang Sang nodded, “I see.”
“As for elemental energy attacks, they are fundamentally different from soul-type spells,” Senna said, then looked at Sang Sang strangely, suddenly realizing, “Your star system is too remote, with few powerful beings, so it’s normal you haven’t heard of this. You can check the universal behavioral code. Unless absolutely necessary, the use of elemental energy advocates the inner energy first principle…”
Although energy in the universe is constantly generated, it remains finite. Excessive depletion causes the universe to shrink and age. The current universe is in its growth phase, but as more people cultivate and powerful beings multiply, energy consumption increases. To preserve the environment, every member of the Civilized Alliance must cultivate inner energy—physical techniques.
Inner energy differs from mental power, psychic force, stellar force, and other soul-type powers. While both absorb external energy and condense it for evolution, soul power cultivation is purely consumptive, only intake with no output. In contrast, inner energy cultivation returns elemental energy to the environment when outputting inner energy, creating a sustainable, green cycle.
Sang Sang glanced at Little Jin, puzzled, “Since physical techniques are advocated, why are over eighty percent of the top hundred most influential powerhouses soul cultivators?”
“Whether psychic force or stellar force, at the same level, soul energy has greater advantages than inner energy, with higher compatibility for laws. Famous pure physical cultivators are mostly those without soul talent,” Senna smiled knowingly, “Saintly professions require a measure of selfless dedication.”
Sang Sang understood, “I see. When does the instruction begin?”
Senna: “No further questions?”
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Sang Sang thought for a moment and uncertainly asked, “Can I choose my courses? I have no foundation in physical techniques, and yesterday discovered gene toxins—those need to be dealt with first.”
Senna stared at Sang Sang in silence for a moment, then suddenly smiled, “The instructor will tailor the most suitable curriculum for you based on your situation.”
Sang Sang pressed her lips together, “Alright, I’m ready for class anytime.”
Senna didn’t take Sang Sang to the teaching area, but instead went to Sang Sang’s cultivation room and installed a fixed teleportation portal on the wall.
“Your instructor is already waiting at home. He’s the best in the Sprout District, a true all-rounder, personally appointed by Lord Anthony, and has only you as a student. Remember this coordinate—it’s a fixed teleportation point he opened for you.”
The portal activated, rippling across the wall like water, faintly revealing the scenery on the other side.
It wasn’t the room next to the meditation chamber, but a plaza filled with lightning and chaotic, violent energy.
Senna stepped through.
“Lord Aslan, pardon the interruption. I’ve brought the saintess candidate, Sang Redleaf…”
Sang Sang extended her finger into the portal, watching as the transparent light curtain devoured it, leaving rings of ripples. She felt restless—judging from the spatial node, this place was extremely far from the dormitory in the Forest of All Life, equivalent to the distance from the galaxy to a tertiary civilization.
The fixed spatial portal bridged such an enormous distance with stable spatial fluctuations—truly astounding. Even more remarkable was that the Forest of All Life was the elementary school dormitory of the Divine Academy, and Aslan’s residence was in the teachers’ residential district, both part of the same academy, yet the distance was measured in star systems—the entire star domain was one academy!
Sang Sang looked at the wild lightning, tucked Little Jin into her sleeve, took a deep breath, and followed.
The next instant, Sang Sang felt her body grow heavy, as though heaven and earth pressed down upon her. Her bones creaked, nearly shattering, and she almost collapsed. She quickly activated her psychic force, expanded her domain, and steadied herself, wiping sweat from her brow.
Such intense gravity!
Little Jin crawled out of her sleeve: [The gravity is 18.7 times that of Tianshi Star. Strange—this person feels very powerful, but the cultivation scan shows he hasn’t even reached the Stellar Tier.]
Sang Sang squinted. The lightning faded, and the violent energy receded, revealing at the center of the plaza a strong young man with a bare torso. He felt much stronger than Sang Sang herself, but indeed not as strong as Senna. Yet there was a peculiar familiarity that drew her to probe with psychic force.
Perhaps sensing Sang Sang’s probe, the man turned his head.
She’d been discovered!
Sang Sang gasped as if struck hard in the head. Her psychic force snapped back in agony, sending a chill through her as she felt exposed from within, reminiscent of yesterday’s full-body scan.
[Don’t randomly release psychic force, Sang Sang. If someone is much stronger, no ability will save you.] Little Jin’s eyes flashed red. [Odd—never seen the name Aslan on the public net. The strongest instructor? I’ll investigate.]
A dark light flickered around Aslan as he donned a black leather armor. His cold face remained expressionless. He nodded to Senna and said to Sang Sang, “Sang Redleaf, follow me.”
Senna stayed where she was and smiled encouragingly at Sang Sang, “Go on.”
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Sang Sang took a deep breath and followed.
The plaza was vast. Though tall buildings could be seen in the distance, no matter how she walked, the end never seemed to draw nearer—it was like chasing a mountain on the horizon.
Aslan walked steadily, but his stride grew ever larger—one meter, ten meters, a hundred meters—until he became a tiny black dot far ahead.
Sang Sang ran, even flew, but the distance still widened.
Little Jin buzzed up and down, cheering her on: [Don’t worry, I’ve locked onto him. You won’t lose track.]
“This won’t do.” Sang Sang stopped, frowned, and thought. Psychic force surged as she expanded her domain, arranged a stack of healing art cards within it to restore her psychic energy, and from the countless overlapping laws found the invisible lines belonging to space. Following the shortest route, she stepped on spatial nodes and caught up.
The gap finally closed, until they nearly overlapped.
“We’re here.”
Heavenly music!
Sang Sang exhaled, her domain dissipated and she sank to the ground, healing art cards falling into her hand. The psychic energy expended exceeded the recovery rate of the cards—she was drained, and even one more second would have pushed her into exhaustion.
Half a minute later, Sang Sang had recovered a little. She reopened her domain, close to her body. “Sorry to have kept you waiting.”
Aslan shook his head. With a flip of his hand, the healing art cards she’d been holding appeared in his palm.
He examined each card, his fingertips gently tracing the images.
“These were all drawn by you?”
Sang Sang replied, “Yes.”
Aslan returned the cards to her. “Your foundation is solid—not the result of taking drugs.”
Sang Sang inserted the cards into a special pouch at her waist, one by one. “Where I come from, we can’t even find soul-type serums, and even gene serums from tertiary civilizations contain toxins.”
“Gene toxins can be removed.” Aslan led Sang Sang into a building shaped like an inverted sea bowl, tossed out a sentence, and turned to leave: “You’ll train here from now on. I’ve given you access; set the gravity yourself. For now, recover your psychic energy as quickly as possible.”
Sang Sang wasted no time, raising her healing barrier.
Little Jin set the gravity to match Tianshi Star, then darted about, touching everything. Doors opened in the walls, leading either to training chambers or revealing intricate instruments, all kinds of high-tech wonders that made him drool.
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