The Essence of Cultivation

Since returning from the extended training under Elder Hua’s guidance at the Demon’s Pass, Quanhao had known that he was close to achieving the Second Revelation of his bodily cultivation.

He just hadn’t expected it to be quite this soon.

Just as was the case with his first Tribulation, this one occurred while he was in deep meditation cultivating his qi. The last few steps prior to reaching the bottleneck that marked the Revelation were always the trickiest – as one progressed in each stage of cultivation, the dantian and the meridians were progressively placed under strain and stress as they reached their present limits to which they could contain qi. Attempting to distill qi from the natural forces of creation in such a state was akin to forcing water into an already-full balloon. It could accommodate some degree of stretch, but to push through one’s limits and achieve the Tribulation required sheer force of will, one that often could only be achieved in meditation.

It was what had so astounded him when Sylar had managed to achieve the First Comprehension back at the Demon’s Pass. Sure, awakening oneself to the First Comprehension was no Revelation, but he knew of no other person who had managed to force open their meridians outside of meditation. What kind of training did he have previously, that he was able to exert both firm and fine control in cultivating his qi while in the thick of battle?

But no. This was not the time for his thoughts to revolve around others. Already, he could feel his spirit stirring, as though emerging from a deep sleep. The world was slowly but surely turning into clarity.

And there, in that half-lucid state, he felt it. There was a vibrancy in the air, a hum that sang to his ears. A pressure loomed before him, but it was not one of intimidation. This was something raw and primal, something greater, something beyond what mortals were meant to achieve.

The Heavenly Dao – or a fragment of it – was just before him. This was a Revelation, lurking just somewhere out of reach.

He could see the landscape ahead of him now. Harsh, jagged mountains, rose up in the distance. It was similar to the site of his first Tribulation in several ways, but he knew that the challenge would be completely different.

This would be his last chance to turn back. The Heavenly Dao was impartial – should he choose to flee and accept that he was not ready to face what awaited him, he could return with his cultivation intact, except that this would be where his Path ended.

He was not ready to accept such a fate.

And so, he continued onward – not quite walking, but neither was it gliding nor swimming. His spirit itself traversed the realm of the Dao, and within moments he emerged into the site of his Tribulation.

-x-x-x-

Quanhao did not know how long it had been since he began his Tribulation, but not once did the pressure around him abate. Despite that, however, he hadn’t yet come across anything attempting to harm him.

Before him, rock formations rose up from the ground as far as the eye could see, and in the distance, great jagged mountains towered over the craggy lands. It was a landscape of endless greys, blacks, and browns, with not a single plant or animal in sight. There was a majesty about the place, a presence that resonated with the foundation of his cultivation. Each time he tried to comprehend just what it was about the place that so struck him, however, it slipped past his mind, leaving an uncanny feeling that was paradoxically both familiar and foreign.

This place was strange. His first Tribulation had been far more direct in its presentation – there had been a powerful boulder before him, and all that he’d needed to do to pass the Tribulation was destroy it.

Of course, that had been easier said than done. It had taken him truly understanding himself and knowing just what it was about the boulder that had made it so peculiar before he managed to successfully make it past the Tribulation.

The lack of a direct challenge was fine, however. During a Tribulation, one never grew thirsty or hungry. Some thought that it was designed this way by the Heavenly Dao, such that a cultivator undergoing a Tribulation could be punished for their sins and arrogance without first falling to something as simple as starvation. Others claimed that it was so that a cultivator could focus on what was truly most important and learn the lesson that the Dao intended to personally enlighten them of.

Perhaps that was the nature of this Tribulation? To leave him stranded here with nothing – no food, no water, no company, not even an enemy that he could fight, and see if he could endure this? That didn’t sound like much of a challenge.

Whatever the challenge was, Quanhao didn’t much care. If the Dao thought something as mundane as that could stop him from forcefully seizing the Revelation and returning to the waking world, it had another thing coming.

To him, what was most important was going forward. He would become stronger, become more, build upon his First Revelation, and catch up with both Guanzhong and Xingling. They’d both been his seniors, but once he completed this trial, they would all be equals who had each achieved their Second Revelations.

Before long, he would further his spiritual cultivation, achieve Core Condensation, and then become a Ranking Disciple himself. He would be as a Guardian, the Path that was his own from the energies he cultivated and from the Revelation he had obtained in the aftermath of his first tribulation.

He was Song Quanhao. Solid, Unstoppable, Exuberant.

And so, though there was no sign of anything that lived in this wasteland of mountains torn asunder, he continued onward.

-x-x-x-

Two hours after Quanhao’s Tribulation began, Sylar found himself in a small guest room within the Righteous Heart Sect.

Rotating shifts had been set up outside of the meditation chambers. Its purpose was twofold – to keep an eye over Quanhao and alert others when he returned, and to ensure that the younger and less experienced members of the sect didn’t unknowingly stray too close to the Tribulation Storm.

From the window of the guest room, he had a clear view of the training compound utilised by the sect’s Seniors. Even from this distance, he could see the Essence drifting out of the room, though it was subtle enough that he wouldn’t have noticed it if he hadn’t been looking. Over the past two hours, the stream had never once abated.

Sylar sighed. He’d intended to stay and catch up with the cultivators he had met over at the Demon’s Pass, but with Quanhao in the middle of a Tribulation, no one was quite in the right mood. Shurui had offered to take charge of Qiyu, and they were now in a separate guest room. Guanzhong and Yao were both on duty overseeing the evening training of outer circle Seniors, and so Sylar was alone.

With nothing left to occupy his thoughts, and unfortunately unable to browse the sect’s library due to the secrets contained within, he was bored.

Today had been eventful. Originally, he had intended simply to hear Elder Yang’s thoughts on the matter of a partnership between his academy and their sect, but now learned of yet another aspect of cultivation. He wasn’t insensitive enough to satisfy his own academic curiosity while the others obviously worried for their friend.

Still, from what they had told him, he could infer that they could feel the subtleties within the pressure of the Tribulation Storm to a far greater degree than himself. They had mentioned the ‘natural energies’ and ‘fundamental forces’ of the world before, that they took into their bodies to be honed into qi. By inference, he knew them to be the Essences. When they spoke of the Tribulation Storm, however, they made no such reference to them, save for the fact that it could somehow lead to Qi Deviation and the crippling of cultivation.

It couldn’t be a coincidence that the Essences refused to register to his senses or to be drawn toward him. The question was why – why could he see them through the Diviner’s sight, but not by the senses that he’d honed since the first day he became aware of his own magic? What composed a Tribulation Storm? Why were Essences even being released into the material world in the first place? And was all this release of Essence the reason for the richness of Transcendentals that this realm had compared to Resham?

Assuming that his earlier hypothesis was true, and that Quanhao’s body now somehow acted as a conduit to the Planes, what exactly did that even mean?

To even be able to address any of that, he had to first answer one simple question: what was a Tribulation?

Sylar Spellsight stood up.

He had work to do.

-x-x-x-

This Tribulation was starting to take a weird turn.

He had to have been walking for days by now, though he knew that time and perception were odd in a Tribulation. There were those who adamantly swore they had endured ten thousand years of lightning bolts raining down from the Heavens as a form of divine punishment, only to find that mere minutes had passed when they returned victorious from their trials. Equally, there were others who had felt as though only hours had passed in their Tribulation, when in reality it had been weeks since it began.

His cultivation was rooted in the energies of the earth, and he always felt most comfortable in the presence of the sturdy stones that composed the entirety of the Penshan mountain. Over the days that he’d been travelling this land, only stopping occasionally to rest, there was something intimately familiar about it that resonated within him.

But all thought of that was left behind as Quanhao stared at the bizarre child-like form before him. His arms were still held before him in a defensive guard, just in case the creature turned out to be deceptively cunning.

The… thing was staring at him in turn, its neck craning upward at the cultivator easily three times its height. It gaped at Quanhao, seemingly equally surprised to come across the cultivator.

The creature was also composed of many little pebbles joined together.

He shifted his posture a little, and the creature flinched, almost leaping backward in fright as though a scared cat. There were empty little indentations where its eyes would be in the contours of the pebbles that made up its body, and within each of them lay a single glistening golden gemstone. There was a single small green-coloured stone that looked different from the others that it clutched tightly in his hands… that, uh, were also made of rocks.

It opened its mouth – because of course it had a mouth – but only a faint rumble came forth as it tried to speak.

There was something peculiar about the creature. He relaxed his posture, although he still maintained some degree of caution in case the true nature of this Tribulation was in testing his ability to recognise danger.

Still, something about the creature told him that that was not the case. There was an… an instinct that sang to him, that told him of the creature’s panic, fear, and fright, and though he had never before seen something like it, there was a sense of camaraderie that he felt with it.

Odd as it sounded, it was almost like a kindred spirit. He relaxed, lowering himself to one knee, and tried to make him as unthreatening as possible.

“Hey there,” he said, grinning. “What’re you doing here, buddy?”

The creature – Pebbles, he decided it would now be called – inspected him cautiously. Quanhao remained in place, trying to assuage its fear and convey as best he could that he was not a threat.

Very slowly, Pebbles moved forward. The mass of gravel that formed its lower body rolled forward almost like a wheel. It stared at him with its gemstone eyes, glittering a brilliant gold amid the darkness of the landscape.

“My name’s Quanhao,” he said. “Song Quanhao. I’m a cultivator, you see, and I’m here for my Tribulation. Do you know what that is?”

Pebbles stared at him. It tilted its head aside, some of its panic now forgotten as it peered at him like a curious child.

Then, it acted.

In a flurry, it waved its arms about, though it still took special care to clutch tightly on that odd stone that it carried. There was the sound of clattering of stones coming from where its mouth would be that he assumed was a rush of words it attempted to communicate.

And, strangely enough, Quanhao felt that he could understand it, though he very much did not speak rock.

There was a panic in there, he discerned. Fear, and a vague sense of hopelessness. It had journeyed for quite some time, and Quanhao was the first person it had come across.

It was… it was lost?

He didn’t know how he knew that. What he knew was that Pebbles was in quite the same situation as him. Something in the depths of his soul told him that this was no deception, that Pebbles was genuinely frightened and lost.

And so, Quanhao made his decision.

“Hey,” he said gently, trying to soothe the panicking Pebbles. “You’re lost too, aren’t you? How ‘bout we travel together?”

Pebbles hesitated. It looked at Quanhao, and then glanced behind him toward the jagged mountains in the distance.

And then, Pebbles lurched forward, held Quanhao’s hands in its own, and it pointed.

“You want to go there?”

Pebbles nodded. It tugged forcefully at Quanhao, and though there was a vague sense of something that spoke of spiritual energy within Pebbles reminiscent of Spirit Beasts, its strength was nothing compared to Quanhao’s own. He barely budged, and Pebbles continued gesturing and pleading with growing desperation.

“Your, uh… your home?” Quanhao asked, surprised even as he said the words. “You think you can go home that way?”

Pebbles nodded fervently. Its gemstone eyes glittered, and Quanhao knew that he could not stand idly by. There was a sense of something familiar in his newfound companion, and though they had never met before, Pebbles evoked in him the same sense of protectiveness that he felt toward each member of his sect.

“Hop on,” Quanhao said, leaning over, presenting his back to Pebbles. With only a moment’s indecision, it wrapped his stony arms over Quanhao’s shoulder, locking itself in place. “Brace yourself, okay? It might be a little uncomfortable, but big brother here is going to bring you back home!”

-x-x-x-

Sylar Spellsight was annoyed with the tools he had at his disposal, but he supposed that this was the best he could do given the circumstances. It wasn’t quite as rigorously analytical as he would like, and there were likely going to be variations between each independent measurement that he was now performing, but taking a large number of individual readings should iron out the inherent measurement error of his methods.

He stared intently at Song Quanhao, still in his meditative posture, and ignored the looks directed his way from the pair of outer circle Seniors that he hadn’t met before. Another Ferin of Earth Essence, he noted, and promptly put another tally mark on the sheet of parchment before him.

Left with boredom and far too much time on his hands, he had decided that merely sitting around and thinking was not going to help him tease apart the latest set of mysteries that the Immortal Lands had teasingly dangled his way. Thus, he had made it back to the training hall, sat himself in the room opposite the meditation chambers, and began to observe.

Observation and measurement were the mage’s most rudimentary crafts, and with just those two tools alone, coupled with logic and the methods of inquiry, their kind had developed the entirety of the field of Essence Studies. From the ancient cave-mages who first discovered Dancing Flames, to the glory days of the lost Rostaran Civilisation that saw mages engaging in interplanar travel, in the end the art and science that was the arcane could be distilled down to those two basic skills. A mage’s training began with learning them, and it served them well all their lives, even if they chose to leave a life in pursuit of the arcane behind them.

A single incense stick was currently burning before him. Already, three of them had been fully burned, and the room was currently filled with a sickeningly sweet odour. He couldn’t open the windows to allow the vapour to disperse – wind was a variable that he absolutely had to account for, and he would rather risk personal discomfort than introduce undue bias to his process of observation.

He eyed the thin markings that he’d placed on the side of the burning stick. Each stick was approximately fifteen to twenty centimetres in length, and though they were each roughly prepared to the same length by the members of the Sect, Sylar could not allow such variation in his experimental design. Thus, he had carefully marked out regular lengths of segments using a broken piece of a separate stick as a standardised measure of length, and used the time taken to burn one unit length of incense stick to demarcate individual intervals of the passage of time.

He would have much preferred even something as simple as an hourglass, but proper transmutation of sand was an extraordinarily difficult feat. Unless one specialised as a transmuter, the transmuted product would likely be more equivalent to chunks of powder rather than the fine grains he needed to fashion an hourglass. All his advanced recording equipment he used to possess back in Nimbria had been purchased from enchanters who specialised in the craft, and since all the methods of their enchantments were kept with the utmost secrecy, Sylar did not know how to even begin recreating one.

Another single Ferin of Water Essence. Sylar quickly put a tally mark in the column corresponding to that Primal Essence. He eyed the burning stick, his body primed with anticipation. The flame grew closer and closer to the next marking, wisps of fine incense trailing out from it, and as soon as the mark disappeared –

He shifted the current sheet of parchment aside, putting the next one before him. It was not a moment too soon – yet another unit of Earth Essence was just released.

“Master Spellsight –“

Sylar growled with annoyance, glaring at the cultivator who moved from his position by the door, and he flinched. Perhaps it might register later that these were technically his seniors in the art of cultivation, since achieving a First Revelation was apparently the requirement for making it to the rank of Senior, but at this present moment they were interfering with his experiment. Even the slightest movement could affect the experimental conditions, and he did not want something as minor as someone speaking disturbing the air in the room, and thereby affecting the burning of the incense stick he used to keep time.

The pair of cultivators wisely fell silent, looking helplessly at each other. Sylar had earlier told them that he was perfectly content with watching over Quanhao himself, and that they could feel free to leave if they wanted. They had refused to budge, however, stating something about how Ranking Disciple Guanzhong had assigned them to this watch, and –

In that moment, a single Ferin of Form Essence was released, and were he not paying attention Sylar would have surely missed it.

Planes! He wanted to curse, but wisely kept his mouth shut lest his own actions skew his measurements. Quickly, he noted that down as well, and returned to focusing on the recording of his observations.

How many sheets of parchment had he gone through already? With his tools, each interval of time became discrete blocks, within which he had recorded the amount of each type of Essence released. Given a large enough number of recordings, it should trend toward a continuous function, but he could only truly begin to analyse his data once he stopped his observations and brought out the previous sheets to consolidate and plot the values.

For now, he was ignoring the questions of why the Essences were oddly blind to his mage senses and why they couldn’t be drawn toward him. Answering that could come later, once he measured what was measurable, and refined his hypothesis in light of whatever findings came from this experiment.

What he wanted to address now was simple: were there any trends that he could notice in the rate in which the various Essences were being released?

With that single question in mind, he continued with his work, ignoring the sect members staring at him perturbed.

-x-x-x-

Quanhao carefully climbed further up the outcroppings of stone. Pebbles had leapt off from his back almost as soon as they reached the mountain that it had directed Quanhao toward, hurriedly urging him to proceed up. It was perfectly at ease scaling the cliff – in fact, it almost seemed as though Pebbles was more comfortable doing so than traversing the ground.

He gritted his teeth, finding another sturdy-looking handhold. He was no stranger to climbing, since it was a necessary exercise for sect members from the time that they were juniors, but these mountains were inclined at an extreme angle, and haphazardly strewn about in a way that no natural mountain should be.

Pebbles didn’t explicitly say it – or perhaps it did, but Quanhao simply couldn’t understand it – but he got the vague sense that its home lay somewhere at the very peak.

“Grrrlwrr…” Pebbles rumbled, a sound that might have been intimidating if it came from any other creature, but Quanhao knew that his companion in this land was trying to encourage him.

Quanhao focused, and brought his strength to bear. Drawing upon his qi, he tapped on his First Revelation, intending to fling himself upward in a burst of strength to the next foothold he spied. Earth was a powerful element, steady and certain, and bringing this aspect of it to bear through unity with the qi he had refined gave one extraordinary strength and durability.

The natural energies of earth answered him almost immediately, and he almost slipped in surprise. Never before had he felt this in connection with the earth in his training, not even when he had been presented with the rare pills procured by Elder Yang himself that was meant to boost one’s awareness of the earth as he cultivated. In a blazing rush of fury, his finely-honed qi flared outward, drawing in the energy all around him as a tide, empowering his body with supernatural strength.

He flung himself far higher than he intended, and he had to react on pure instinct to catch a second nearby handhold. For several instants, he stood there, still empowered by his Revelation, eyes wide with surprise and stunned at what he had achieved.

How?

Pebbles, too, seemed taken aback by what he had done. Then, it made a yelp – or the rock equivalent of such – and urged him to hurry, rumbling his way up the cliff face.

That burst of power had left him far more exhausted than normal, however. He frowned. So, that’s how it’s gonna be, huh?

He gritted his teeth.

Then, ignoring the pain and fatigue, he pushed himself up once more. Then again, and again, and again.

His arms ached, and the very core of his dantian was burning, but he would not yield. He was Song Quanhao, one who walked the Path of the Guardian. He was solid and unstoppable as the earth, and he would endure.

-x-x-x-

He was well past more than two dozen incense sticks by now.

All things considered, he was generating good-quality data; as best as he could with his present tools, anyway. There had been a change of watch in that time, but the first pair must have quietly conveyed that there were to be no disturbances while Sylar took his observations, because they remained silent for most of their three hour-long shift so far.

A full analysis of the data would come later, when he had the opportunity to compile everything together. Already, however, he had a vague sense that he had discovered something that might be of value in answering his earlier questions. It wasn’t exactly a constant stream of Essence – it ebbed and waned, and once he put all his readings together, he was fairly certain that there were peaks and troughs to the Essences being released. The actual proportional change wasn’t that large of a difference – perhaps a 1.5-fold increase at the peaks compared to average baseline – but it was significant.

But that wasn’t what was most surprising to him. Water, Form, and Spirit Essences came much slower than Earth Essence, but there wasn’t quite a clear relationship as to when they ebbed and waned. In fact, for one particular interval, there had been a full four Ferins of Form Essence released, whereas the average was somewhere in the range of one Ferin per two standard time intervals.

Was it mere stochastic chance, or did something else govern the variations in their rates?

For each question he might have an answer for, it seemed that he would receive another in turn.

He rubbed at one eye tiredly before proceeding to the other, always keeping one perfectly fixed on Quanhao. He did not want to miss even a single tally. Several hours must have passed since he began at this work, and by now it was well into the dead of night.

Qiyu and Shurui had come by at some point – Qiyu had wanted to say goodnight to her teacher before she went to bed, bless her soul – but thankfully the ones on guard at the time had quietly told them that he wasn’t to be bothered.

Qiyu had stared at him, took it to be another one of her teacher’s oddities, and simply accepted it as fact. Shurui had seemed beyond perplexed and more than a little concerned by the mess of parchment and burnt incense sticks, but his worthy apprentice wisely told her that he was doing important work.

He wasn’t sure if she fully believed it, but they departed all the same without unnecessarily affecting his work.

Sylar frowned as he continued observing Quanhao. There was a sudden change in the dynamics of the Essence flow – a chain of four Ferins of Water Essences. One Earth, and then Water. Form. Water. Spirit. Water again.

Abruptly, Water Essence became the major Essence being released, while Earth had slowed to a trickle.

Just what was all this data supposed to mean?

-x-x-x-

“Which way?” Quanhao urged.

From its perch on his back, Pebbles steered him in the direction of its home. It was still at an upward incline, but at least this could now be traversed by foot. Quanhao’s qi was settled back into its basal state – there was no telling what lay ahead further in this Tribulation, and he wanted to save the extra power granted by application of the First Revelation if he needed it.

Ahead of him was yet another surprise. Though he had seen nothing but rocks and stones thus far, just before him was now a vast stretch of boggy marshland.

Pebbles clutched tightly onto Quanhao, shaking slightly. It was afraid of this new terrain, Quanhao realised. Still, he didn’t slow down as he dashed into the muck, stirring up stray splashes of mud and dirt with each step.

Suddenly, a sense of danger flashed past him. Driven by instinct, he diverted his course, tumbling at an angle to dodge. Pebbles screamed with the sound of a cacophony of rocks smashing together, as Quanhao collided into the base of the swamp. He intended to find his footing as quickly as he could, to turn back and face whatever adversary had attacked him, but –

What in the –

Something was dragging him down. A weight clamped by his feet, and though the mire had gone no further than the middle of his shin before, the entire ground beneath the muck suddenly sank downward. Surprised, he lost his footing, as something surprisingly strong clamped around his ankles.

Within instants, he was beneath the surface of the marsh, unable to breathe. It took every instinct he had not to thrash and flail. He forced his eyes to remain open, his movements sluggish even as he fell into a defensive stance and tried to assess his current situation.

There were things in the water, he realised.

No, even that wasn’t quite right. There was water in the water.

A dirty-green living vortex of torrential water charged toward him, and he braced himself hard as an arm slammed against him. He tried to move, to budge, but down by his feet, he was sinking ever deeper into the earth. He bent his knees and kicked downward, intending to push himself above the surface in order to have a fair fight against the creature now attacking him.

Except…

Why – why couldn’t he move?!

He looked downward.

More of them beneath him!

A pair of smaller shifting embodiments of water were latching onto his feet, pulling him downward. He winced, and flared on his qi, trying to bring it into unity with the earth elemental energy that had been ever-present in the Tribulation realm for a burst of strength.

But now, deep in the bog – and sinking ever deeper by the instant – the majesty and stoic power of the earth that he had beheld was nowhere to be found. That vague sense of greater power felt so far in the distance. He tried to pull it in as much as he could, to be as the Earth did, to become the mountain that moved as he had sworn that he would, but…

A force slammed into him, and he gasped. Murky water rushed past his lips, and he gave a choked gasp, attempting to regain control of himself.

It was to no avail. More of them were swarming him now.

Though the earth was sure and steadfast, it was unchanging. It could be drowned beneath the tides.

Song Quanhao sank into the bog, deeper and deeper; deeper and deeper…

-x-x-x-

Quanhao writhed and screamed.

Sylar nearly leapt from his seat in shock. The Seniors closer to the meditation chamber were the first to react.

“Go! Fetch the Elder!”

One immediately sprinted away, a trail of ambient Wind Essence coursing along his body as he actively drew upon the power of his First Revelation. He couldn’t fly in the same way that Elder Hua had, but his body seemed almost lighter on his feet, and he hastened out the door to call for assistance.

Sylar tried to draw close, but the Tribulation Storm was raging stronger than before, and the pressure emanating from Quanhao was immense. The Senior halted him in his tracks, barring his entry with an outstretched hand, and shook his head firmly.

“What’s happening to him?” he asked with worry, glancing at his recent acquaintance. He only met Quanhao for a brief period of time, but he was quite fond of him. He was ever jovial, dependable in battle, and had a fiercely protective spirit. To see him gasping and trembling as he was now…

Essences were still being released, but there was now a frenzy to what was already an inexplicable phenomenon. There was a sense of discordance about it, as Water and Earth flared outward, faster than they had been before, and Form and Spirit trailed along with them. They were somehow being caught within the Storm, unable to escape or dissipate. There was almost a physicality to the Tribulation Storm now, and Sylar swore that he saw little arcs of a lightning-like darkened streak flare for brief instants around Quanhao.

“No… if this carries on…” the Senior fretted, staring at Quanhao with helplessness. “Senior Song will…”

-x-x-x-

Darkness.

His mind was a fog. It was peaceful here.

His strength was waning. Pain was fading. The pressure he felt was dissipating away.

He was drifting… drifting away…

His muscles loosened. He slumped over. There was a weightlessness to him, a freedom he never before experienced.

He was forgetting… forgetting something important…

His vision came as flashes of the barest instants at a time. He was looking upward… or at least, he thought that direction was up. It was hard to tell – he was so far beneath the surface...

And it was in that brief instant of consciousness that he saw it.

Pebbles – brave little Pebbles – was grappling with the beings of water, desperately trying to fight them off as it… he… made his way over to Quanhao. But how could he do so, when he was so small and weak, completely out of his element here in the bog?

Pebbles was being dragged down as well, their enemies shifting and coiling with serpentine limbs of relentless water as they grappled at him. Any attempt at resistance was fluidly deflected, Pebbles’ tiny fists of stone of no effectiveness as they went through their bodies of water.

They dragged Pebbles to the very bottom of the bog. He resisted valiantly, but it was no use.

Sorry, Quanhao thought, barely able to remain conscious himself. I… I promised… to protect…

There was nothing he could do. Earth was resilient and durable, but even dripping water could punch through the sturdiest of rocks. A mountain could move, but where could it go, if it remained submerged beneath the tide? Even if he continued to endure, sooner or later, he would fall.

It was better to accept it now, and just… let go.

Suddenly, Pebbles stilled himself. He released his hold on the special green stone that he treasured so dearly.

And then, he merged into the ground beneath the bog and pried himself free from the clutches of his enemies.

Stunned and surprised, it was enough to kickstart Quanhao back to conscious thought; to remember his purpose here.

The Tribulation. The Revelation that awaited him.

He had been training for this. For over two years now, Shurui had been his partner in cultivation and in training. She drew strength from the element of Water, tempered it with the natural calmness of yin energy, and preserved a cool head to react to any situation possible. He had been learning from her, trying to achieve some insight into the qi that was based on cultivation of water.

Abruptly, Pebbles emerged from the ground just beside him. He stared at Quanhao with his gemstone eyes that shined even in the murky bog. The watery creatures returned with a fury, making sure not to repeat their previous mistake as they wrapped firmly around Pebbles. He was desperate, flailing his hands wildly, a low rumble of words becoming lost within the water.

But Quanhao understood. Somehow, he knew just what Pebbles was trying to convey.

Song Quanhao closed his eyes. He focused hard, feeling for just the slightest trace of the earth elemental energy lurking beneath the shadow of the tide of water.

One last hurrah.

This time, however, rather than doing as he did before in aligning himself with the Earth to grant him the power to resist the water dragging him down, he willingly let himself sink. The mountain could crumble beneath the tides. He let his knees buckle. He allowed his arms to grow limp.

And then, while maintaining this mindset of acceptance, rather than of fruitless persistence – of reactivity, rather than proactivity – he flared his qi to its very extremes.

It was a paradox of body and mind. One sought to go with the flow, while the other was screaming defiance to the Celestial Heavens.

And in that single instant – with these watery Spirit Creatures swirling all around him, solid Earth so far away – he saw it.

The glimmer of a Revelation.

Earth was not just merely the mountains. It was not just the most solid of stones or the hardest of metals. It was not just unbreakable and unchanging. It did not have to be grand and majestic; did not have to be as the mythical Mount Tai that was said to dwarf the lands in the days of the First Immortals, whose peaks lay so high in the Heavens that one could gaze at it and still not truly see it.

All this time, he thought he had to become a mountain that moved, that this was surely the nature of his Second Revelation. The earth element cultivators that he knew of who had achieved the Second Revelation were all unbending pillars of strength, staunch unmoving guardians who would shield all that they held dear from harm.

But that was their path, and this was his own. He did not have to have an unyielding heart that stood firmly in place against all odds. Earth did not have to be monumental in size, stature, or property. It did not have to be static and enduring.

Earth was in mud – fluid and accommodating, but it could be dried and hardened into sturdy mudbricks.

Earth was in sand – grains so fine that they could pass through the thinnest of apertures, and yet could be fired into glass to form a container that would sooner shatter than be deformed to strain.

Earth was in clay – in one moment, it could be malleable, and in the next, it could become hard and brittle.

Earth was… Earth was Adaptation, manifesting in an altogether different form from that of Water.

With that mindset, that single Truth, the earth elemental energy lurking beneath the bog answered his call readily. It rushed into him, and even as he accepted its strength, he did not call upon the unshifting nature of the Earth as he always had done. He called for a different aspect, this new perspective of the element he thought he knew before.

And somehow, he knew what he needed to do. He circulated his qi differently, passed it in a different pattern through his meridians. Accordingly, the elemental energy that rose to meet him swirled with the movements of his qi. There was a hint of something else – a different energy, one unlike the earth, and yet complementary to it all the same. All of a sudden, he was in a different state of mind than he’d ever been before, far more fluid than even when he had mimicked the movements that he’d seen Shurui perform while fighting the Demonic Beasts alongside Sylar.

It was funny. All around him, the living waters that sought to drag him down could pose no resistance, and with ease, he swam through the muck and resurfaced to glorious breath.

Then, he dove back in – ignoring the creatures that sought to entangle him – and reached for Pebbles, securing him tightly in his arms. He pivoted, diving toward the stone that Pebbles had dropped when he had tried to valiantly fight off the living creatures of water to save Quanhao, and seized it tightly in his hand. Then, he bent his knees and kicked off the ground, shooting upward through the water that posed strangely little resistance to his movements.

Without pause, he made it to the edge of the bog and placed Pebbles down. He held the stone out, lowering himself slightly, and pressed it firmly into Pebbles’ hand. Pebbles looked at him with awe and gratitude, but then trembled as he pointed at the approaching beings of water.

“Don’t worry,” Quanhao said, narrowing his eyes. “I will win.”

They came at him, but he was prepared. There was so much earthen energy all around him, and they readily answered his call, but it was also joined by a trace of… of Water?

He didn’t have the time to think about that right now. Using the Second Revelation was more taxing than the first. It would become easier over time, he knew, but for now, he could bear this pain if it meant triumphing over these creatures who had nearly killed both Pebbles and himself.

Though he roared a challenge, he didn’t abandon his latest insights to fall back to old habits. They tried to strike him – but rather than meeting their blow head on, he shifted, becoming malleable, moving in time with their attacks.

If he were Shurui, he knew that her style would be to then launch a counterattack that utilised her enemy’s momentum against themselves. She would whittle them down slowly, negating their attacks, and deliver strategic blows of her own. They’d sparred more than enough times over the past ten years for him to realise that.

He had no such need for slow and steady methods. He was of the Earth – and in that instant, the earth energy he was drawing in answered his call. The flow to it changed, and what was malleable became hard and unyielding, and a heavy fist smashed right into the body of living water. The force of the attack blew a hole through its body, and though it attempted to reform itself, a second strike was enough to destroy whatever was left of it.

Slowly, the being of water faded away, leaving nothing behind, dissipating much like Spirit Beasts.

“Who’s next?” he challenged. “You face Song Quanhao, Senior Disciple of the Righteous Heart Sect!”

With his newly awakened powers, they were no match for him. Each time they attempted to grapple him and drag him back into their domain, he shifted his form, changed the way that the power flowed, and they could find no grip upon him.

Soon, only he and Pebbles remained. The Tribulation was over now. Somehow, he just knew it. There was something changing in the world, and he could feel a force tugging at him, wanting to pull him back to his body in the living world. This dream-like world of Tribulation was beginning to break apart, warping strangely at the edges, and soon it would be no more.

He looked at his awestruck friend.

…no, not just a friend. A mentor. It was he who had showed Quanhao the truths of the earth, when he had been so close to giving up and failing the Tribulation.

He bowed, his head lowered with respect.

Pebbles tilted his head, curious at the gesture. Then, he stood himself upon the stack of stones that served at its feet, and bowed back. When their heads rose, Pebbles pointed toward the edge of the mountain, which was now beginning to break apart and crumble.

Home, Pebbles said, pointing. Family.

Quanhao blinked. Was it just his imagination? It had all been nothing but the sound of stones grinding against one another, but somehow, he thought that he understood Pebbles…

Well, Tribulations were weird, anyway. Even cultivators wiser and more powerful than he didn’t know if Tribulations were grounded in reality, or were simply long and drawn-out dreams.

Pebbles stepped toward Quanhao. In his hand, he held that tiny, green-coloured rock that he so prized.

Gratitude, spoke Pebbles.

“I can’t take it with me, Pebs,” Quanhao said, amused. He reached down and patted the top of Pebbles’ head. “It’s a Tribulation, y’know. It won’t come with me when I return to my real body. Besides, you’ve taught me plenty yourself. Why don’t you hurry back too?”

But Pebbles was insistent. He pressed it firmly against Quanhao, but could reach no further than his thighs.

Bemused, Quanhao decided not to question the bizarre logic of Tribulation and accepted the gift.

“Well, thanks? I guess?” he said, inspecting the stone. It was dirty-green and no larger than the size of his hand. Experimentally, he bounced it in the palm of his hand, and was somewhat surprised by its weight. “Huh. Cool stone, huh?” He knelt down, and rubbed Pebbles’ head affectionately. “Thanks, buddy.”

Buddy? Pebbles questioned back.

Yeah, this was nuts. Best just to go with the flow. After all, wasn’t that what this Tribulation was about? Didn’t Pebbles just teach him of the Revelation he now possessed, of how the earth adapted? Perhaps this was one last final test?

“Yeah. That means we’re friends now, Pebs.” He laughed and gave him a final firm pat on the shoulder. “Maybe I’ll come visit you in your home someday, yeah?”

Friends…

The word echoed strangely in his mind. He watched as the mountain began to collapse inward, Pebbles fading away shortly thereafter. The tug he felt was going stronger now. He let go of any resistance that he had, and began to feel himself drifting away, drifting, drifting…

-x-x-x-

Quanhao opened his eyes. He seemed far calmer than Sylar had expected, considering how he had been.

Just minutes ago, the Tribulation Storm had calmed abruptly, and the trickle of Essence had likewise slowed. Something had changed, Sylar knew, and in more ways than one. In those last few moments prior to Quanhao’s return, though Essence still continued to leak through Quanhao at a significantly slower rate, they fully registered to his mage senses, and he could easily draw them in to be fashioned as spells or burnt to generate qi.

Now that he was awake, that flow of Essence from out of his body was completely halted.

But now was not the time to ask the fine details. Before Quanhao even spoke a word, he was tackled into a fierce hug by Shurui, joined moments later by Yao. Guanzhong was a little more reserved, but he stood beside his friend all the same, and had a firm hand placed on his shoulder while commending him heartily. Xingling was there as well, offering her sincere congratulations to her former junior.

This was a pleasant sight. Elder Yang was standing by the side, beaming proudly at Quanhao. Several other Seniors were also present, having been drawn by the commotion that came with the cultivator hurriedly calling for Elder Yang. Even Qiyu had made her way over here.

There was a sense of something different about Quanhao now, though Sylar couldn’t quite tell what. It would be apparent soon enough, he supposed, considering that he must have achieved the Second Revelation.

It was then that Quanhao noticed Sylar. His eyes widened in surprise, and he held one hand up to wave in Sylar’s direction. “Sylar! You’re here too? You won’t believe what –“

And suddenly, he gasped loudly, and a hushed silence set in.

…uh?

“You brought back a Divine Treasure from your Tribulation?”

Sylar didn’t recognise who it was who first said it. Soon, however, the meditation chamber was filled with noise, as cheers broke out amidst the hurried whispers and cries of shock. Even Elder Yang looked surprised.

Quanhao held a strange-looking rock in his raised hand, that definitely hadn’t been there the entire time that he had been undergoing his Tribulation. Sylar frowned and took a step closer. There was just a sense of something vaguely familiar about it. He squinted, trying to think about just what exactly was so striking about it, and stretched his senses as a Diviner.

It contained no Essence, but somewhere in it, there was something that felt like a trace of magic. Yet, it was not exactly one of Enchantment…

It felt like… like the Elemental Plane of Earth?

He stared at it.

Surely it couldn’t be. It was just a small stone, and certainly couldn’t be fashioned into weapons or armour that the most powerful of fighters used to create their equipment, but that unique shade of green as it caught the candlelight…

Sylar forced his way past the crowd now converging on Quanhao as he continued to stare at the stone in his hands, as though he didn’t believe that it really existed.

A single Fire-Spirit pair fell into place. From out of Sylar’s outstretched palm, he released a Light cantrip. Some of the cultivators cried out at that, looking at him with confusion or startlement as a burst of radiant light flashed for a brief instant, but he continued to keep his eyes on the stone.

As soon as it was touched by magical light, it shone with a characteristic purple-white sheen.

No. Way.

“… adamantine?”

Some cultivators stared at the rock with wonder as the glow slowly faded away. Others – Quanhao and Elder Yang included among them – were looking right at Sylar, confused and befuddled, but with some sense of awe. Even Qiyu was staring at him weirdly.

None of that registered to Sylar at the moment. Right now, all he could think about was one thing.

Just what in all the twice-damned Planes Beyond happened out there?