Heaven Chosens Generation (Xianxia) ch. 1-3 (Patreon)

Heaven Chosens Generation (Xianxia)

Chapter 1: The Average Boy

Van Sekt was excited and nervous. He had been chosen to join a sect after all. He had been surprised when a Cultivator came to the village to test if anyone had the potential to cultivate. 

Apparently, every twenty years, sects sent envoys through every village in the boonies to see if the current batch of young people had the right meridians to absorb Heavenly Energy. For Cultivators, who could lengthen their lifespans into centuries or even millenia, they considered that starting before being twenty years old was considered young. For bigger cities and places where clans of Cultivators called home, it was more frequent.

The last time it happened in Van’s village was five years before he was born. So, at fifteen, he was now standing among other youths, some his age, some a bit older, very few younger.

They had been guided to the Foundation Valley Sect, one of the sects of the Azure Archipelago. It had been Van’s first boat trip.

The Foundation Valley Sect was set on an island which had a coast surrounded by high cliffs. The eponymous valley made up  the center of the islands as the cliffs receded.

After the trip, the sect had gathered all the new prospective members  and assembled them in an arena wide enough to contain them all.

Upon the stands, there were older people in finely made robes watching down from above, each level of the stands denoting their standing in the sects.

Closer to the initiates, there were the Outer Sect Elders. The Outer Sect was composed of beginners and those with low talents who couldn’t raise their Cultivation high enough. They were the ones assigned with low priority tasks and conscripted as infantrymen when the Empire was at war. The Outer Sect Elders were old Inner Sect students who had stalled and had low chances to breakthrough once more, so they were sent to teach and manage the younger generation.

Above them, there were the Inner Sect Sect Elders. Stronger and more experienced, the inner disciples rose above the Foundation Establishment stage and got better education in exchange for tougher missions

Then, there were the Core Elders. Each one was in charge of a portion of the sect. Their spots were divided between Alchemy, Arrays, Craft, Weapons, Element, Beast and Body. Each Elder could take a limited number of disciples, making them reserved for the best of the best.

And finally, there was the one addressing them all and telling them all this stuff Van hadn’t known before this instant. The Sect Master himself.

The sect was built on strength and merit. Raising your Cultivation and taking missions was the only way to earn your place here. Slackers would be kicked out and have their tongue seared with a seal, rendering them unable to give away the sect’s secrets or teach Cultivation to anyone.

Van had gulped at this part, not that he was intending to be lazy, but the image was striking. If the fidgeting of the other students was anything to judge by, most of them were intimidated by the Sect Master’s words.

But it wasn’t all threats and intimidation. He also spoke of  rewards for the hard-working, and how they would learn to cultivate.

There were too many new students for one-on-one teachings from the Outer Elders. General classes teaching the basics of a Cultivator’s many disciplines would be taught for the first few months. Afterwards, it was the disciple’s turn to train and gain merits to earn further tutelage, be it a technique to learn from the library, or to borrow the time of a more experienced Cultivator for their insights.

This seemed simple to Van’s mind.

[hr]

The following weeks taught Van that nothing was simple.

The first class had been a forceful awakening of their spiritual senses. They couldn’t cultivate if they couldn’t sense Heavenly Energy and turn into Chi after all. So, Elders had sent a surge of Chi into the young students, making them aware of the energy coursing through their meridians. There were softer methods, but this was the fastest and most direct, with the additional bonus of costing nothing but time to the sect.

Scions from Cultivator families didn’t have to go through the same experience since they had the time to meditate and learn to sense Heavenly Energy on their own when they were younger, or they ingested Chi-rich pills to do the same.

Afterwards was learning the Forward Path technique that allowed one to cultivate Heavenly Energy into neutral Chi, which would be used until a Cultivator found a more fitting technique.

Then, there were the classes. Unarmed and weapon-based combat, elemental affinity discovery, alchemy, crafting and arts, beast-taming and array formation.

Some, Beast-taming, array and alchemy, were more about giving knowledge of the profession for the uninformed.

Arts and Craft was surprising for many who only saw Cultivators as warriors, but the Elder teaching the class said that “the Dao was found in all things.” Van just enjoyed painting.

Elemental affinity discovery was, as it implied, a class where the disciples were examined to find toward which element they leaned. Van had an average affinity for the five elements, which was neither good nor bad.

Then, there were the martial-focused classes. All Cultivators were expected to know how to fight after all. And one of the first stages was all about building up a body able to handle more Chi anyways.

Van had felt pretty good during the basic unarmed combat class. He was used to some roughhousing. 

When it came to the weapon class, the blond disciple had thought to choose a sword or a spear like most heroes in the stories, however he was attracted to two other weapons. One was a pair of cestus, which were good for budding martial artists. The second was a metal ring with a sharpened outer edge almost as tall as he was, a giant chakram.

Then came the training.

A lot of training.

Back-breaking amount of training.

Foundation Establishment, the first great Realm of Cultivation, was divided into multiple smaller stages. Each was a check mark, a step in the ladder to ascension into a true Culitvator.

Spiritual Awareness was the first. It consisted of the ability to be aware of Heavenly Energy and draw upon it. Across time, it had become the easiest step since one just had to reach the state the first class had forcefully induced at will. Nightly meditations after the first class was enough for that.

The second stage was Body Forging. Once the budding Cultivator was able to draw Heavenly Energy in their meridians and turn it into Chi, he had to infuse that Chi into every organ, muscle fiber and bone of the body.

But first, the body had to be able to handle the energy flowing through it. It could only be done through breaking the physical shell and allowing Chi to rebuild it tougher.

Train until muscles tore and bones break. Meditate the Forward Path Technique until the soreness is gone as Chi fills in the gaps. Rinse and repeat.

The sect gave new disciples an amount of merit points that would let them buy enough food for a month, less if they bought training aids or teaching from their seniors, but once that amount was gone, it was time to earn their place here through tasks.

So, Van just threw himself into his training as much as he could. He even bought training weights to make his training more efficient, at the cost of less food.

But in his mind, the more advanced he was when his initial merit points were gone, the more tasks he would be able to do.

He also went to the sparring grounds. He got decimated by his fellow outer disciples, those who had already learned martial arts because they were from Cultivator families. Still, Van smiled through it all. It was a learning experience and he felt his movements were getting better. Pain was a good teacher for what not to do.

This led Van to now, his body and spirit aching, the moon having already dropped. Still, he kept switching from katas with his fists and feet, to twirling the Chakram around his body and limbs, trying to mix the two ways of fighting together.

But enthusiasm wasn’t a complete replacement for stamina. At the end of his training session, he laid there on the empty training ground, gazing at the night sky and too tired to go back to his room.

He closed his eyes.

“Wake up.” A sandal nudging his ribs woke him up.

He opened his blue eyes only to be met by blazing red ones.

Chapter 2: The Sword Saintess

Van looked up at the tanned girl standing above him. He was surprised he had never seen her before. He would have remembered someone that striking.

She had long blodd-red hair and equally red eyes with ringed pupils. Golden markings were etched across her ebony skin. She also had two, pitch black horns extending from her forehead upward.

Outside of her inhuman features, she looked like a pretty girl from the Eastern Haolong Empire, unlike Van who had the clear looks of someone from the Western Andros Empire.

Not that it meant much in the Azure Archipelago Empire where refugees from both empires had mixed together long ago.

“Hello.” Van greeted her as he rose up. She was as tall as he was if you didn’t count the horns.

He tried not to stare at her horns, but when he looked down, he noticed that she was quite top heavy and strained her white robes, so his gaze went back to her eyes.

She also had a long, single-edged, curved blade that she was holding by the scabbard. An odachi if Van remembered right.

“Do you often sleep here?” the girl asked.

“Oh no! I was just too exhausted from training yesterday!” His stomach grumbled. “So, I’m quite hungry!”

The girl looked at the smile on Van Sekt’s face and seemed to reach a conclusion.

“Suien Shizu. I often use this training ground in the morning.”

Van looked around. The sun was barely peeking out from the horizon. It was quite early.

“Oh, well, I won’t bother you, then. My name’s Van Sekt, by the way.”

He was going to leave when the horned girl put a hand on his shoulder.

“This place doesn’t belong to me. It won’t bother me if you stay.”

Ringed red pupils met blue eyes.

“Sure! I’ll eat a bite and come right back. Actually, I can go pick up something for you and we can eat here.”

Shizu reached inside her sleeve and pulled out a merit slip.

“I’ll take some of the meat buns and blue cherry tea.”

“Ok.”

Shizu watched as Van walked away, a hum on his lips.

[hr]

Van munched on his own meat buns, Shizu sitting in front of him and taking bites out of her own.

He noticed that she had pretty sharp teeth.

“If you hadn’t gone back with the food, I would have hunted you down.” She said out of the blue.

Van blinked and tilted his head like a puppy.

“Why would I have done that? I don’t want to make enemies.”

Shizu looked at the blonde. There was no guile on that face.

“That makes you a better person than most Cultivators. Don’t let people take advantage of that.”

“Sure!”

That cheerful answer only made her worry more.

They did proceed to train together.

Van had thought the other disciples were good. Shizu was throwing him round like he was a leaf in a storm.

She did not even draw her sword. She swung the sheath around, parrying his every move and whacking every opening she saw. Feints didn’t work either.

“Ow.” Van groaned on the ground.

“Don’t worry about it. I have been training since I could walk. You’ll catch up.”

Van didn’t really believe that he could catch up to Shizu, at least not in swordsmanship.

Van started cultivating the Forward path to heal the bruises Shizu had inflicted on him while the horned girl kept training on her own.

He was mesmerized by how she handled her blade. The world was a canvas and her sword was the brush in her hands.

Van wished he could find something to be that good at.

[hr]

Over the following days, Van met Shizu multiple times, though it was always doing physical exercises or sparring.

However, the blonde had almost reached the bottom of his merit points, so he had to accomplish some tasks for the sect in order to gain more.

He reported to the sect’s gates. An Outer Elder needed some men to carry crates of materials shipped in from other islands. Some had been bought, but a lot were from Inner Sect Disciples who had been on gathering or hunting missions of their own to bring back spiritual herbs, ores and the remains of Spirit Beasts.

Carrying it all to the Alchemy Hall was a bothersome, but needed, task that not a lot of people wanted to do.

Van was surprised to see Shizu there.

“Don’t your family send you money?” he had asked once they greeted each other. She did say she had training from before coming to the sect.

The dark-skinned girl sighed.

“I had a falling out with them before coming here. They wouldn’t send me anything even if I begged.”

“Sorry for asking.” Van bowed his head in apologies.

“Bah, lift your head. You didn’t know.”

Shizu was stronger and had a better balance than him, as evident by the number of crates she was carrying on her shoulders.

Though, Van did feel a bit of pride over the fact that he was carrying the second biggest stack of all of the other disciples.

His personal and joint training with Shizu was paying dividends. He was even starting to win some spars!

Things were looking up.

[hr]

“You dare dirty this Hong Yuan’s robes?! You court death!”

Van duked under a sword swing. He had gone to the sparring grounds, hoping for a friendly match.

Things had gone alright at first with Hong Yuan accepting his offer to exchange pointers.

The other boy had taken his stance with a swagger and a smug sneer.

A few exchanges later, Van had blocked a strike with his Chakram, which he then answered with a pushing front kick.

Which led to now with the sword user freaking out.

“Maybe you should calm down.” Van suggested while clashing chakram with the other disciple’s jian.

“Silence, you filthy peasant!”

“Rude.”

Van spun with his chakram around his torso, deflecting Hong yuan’s sword, and landing a backhand in the same movement.

Shizu prefered the sword, but she was also good at every weapon, so she had helped Van figure out how to mix his hand to hand with his Chakram.

“That’s it! Die!” Hong Yuan roared as his body was encased in a blue glow.

Chi channeling!

The angry disciple suddenly sped up, burning Chi to increase his performance.

Van was on the back foot, gaining cuts on his body as he mitigated the worst of the now heavier and faster blows.

A particularly vicious upward cut disarmed Van of his Chakram, and Hong Yuan swiftly followed with a stab.

Van twisted to the side at the last second, the sword penetrating his right shoulder instead of his chest. He screamed in pain.

Hong Yuan’s vicious sneer was interrupted by Van’s left hand striking at his throat.

The Young Master backed away, choking on his breath. He raised his sword to finish Van off, when blood started spraying out of his arm. The limb then fell limp.

That was why you needed to complete Body Forging before trying Chi techniques. A normal human body couldn’t handle the active surge of energy.

Van’s roundhouse kick knocked him out before he could realize the pain.

“Van!”

Oh. Shizu had arrived. Van realized with a bleary mind. His hand wandered to his shoulder and came back red.

“That’s a lot of blood.” He said, feeling woozy.

He started to collapse just in time for Shizu to grab him.

He woke up later with a pair of yellow, slitted eyes looking down on him.

Chapter 3: Snake of Samsara

Van rose from what felt like a comfy bed, and looked back at the source of the snake-like gaze.

She was a girl around his age, short  with soft features, pale skin and a straight posture. She wore an all-white robe with another, bigger one worn around her shoulders like a cape. She had green hair falling down to her butt, which attracted Van’s gaze to her ample hips.

When his eyes went back up, she was still looking at him.

“Good, you’re awake. Are you feeling any dizzyness?” She asked, ignoring the way he had looked at her.

“No, I feel alright.” He answered while looking around to find out where he was.

From the soft bed and the shelves full of pills and elixirs bottles, he would guess he was in the Medecine Hall.

“Good.” She said once more. “Your injuries have recovered nicely.”

“Are you the one who healed me?”

The gold-eyed girl nodded.

“Thank you very much! Can I have the name of my benefactor?” Van was surprised that someone as young as he was was skilled in the healing arts, but he still bowed in gratitude.

“Tang Mao. It is nice to meet you, Sect Brother Van Sekt.”

“How do you know my name? And please, call me Van.” The blond fired in quick succession as he rose from his bow.

“Sect Sister Suien Shizu was quite vocal when she brought you here to be healed.”

Van was feeling touched by Shizu’s actions. He smiled.

“I guess I’ll have to thank her too.”

Tang Mao looked at Van, the way he smiled and how fond he sounded. Her own gaze softened.

“It sounds nice. To have someone who cares enough to be worried about you,I mean.”

Van’s hands clapped around hers.

“That is a very sad sentence. I don’t want my saviour to be sad. I want to make you happy.”

Van’s words echoed through Tang Mao’s mind. Slowly, her doll-like composure gave way to a bright red flush on her face, and quivering lips.

Her hands lashed out with unexpected swiftness, striking Van’s body softly with the tips of her fingers, but before he knew it, he was laying back on the bed, his limbs refusing to move.

“If you have the energy to say nice-sounding things like that, that means you can leave in two hours!”

She then turned away and fled.

Van caught the tip of a green-scaled snake tail poking out of her outer robes and brushing the floor at high speed just before the girl left the room.

“Didn’t take you for a flirt. Where was the praise for me?” Shizu, who had been waiting outside the door, made herself known.

Van was confused. He wasn’t flirting. But, if his friend wanted some compliments, he would comply.

“You’re gorgeous. The way you swing a sword is so graceful as to make a swan jealous. You are strong and you are kind enough to use that strength to help someone like me. I’m ever so grateful you’re my friend.” He said with full honesty.

Shizu’s features didn’t twitch, but her dusky skin deepened a shade. 

“Guess, I asked for that.” She approached the bed Van laid on. “So, what happened? I only arrived to see you lay down the guy who did this to you.”

Van proceeded to tell Shizu how the spar with Hong Yuan went.

“Urgh.” Shizu made a sound of disgust. “Overprivileged noble scions who think too much of themselves. You can’t escape them no matter where you go.”

“Personal experience?”

“A whole family. Like I already told you, not people I want to talk about.”

She twirled a hand, as if trying to push the topic away.

“Anyway. Watch out for that guy when you’re alone. They generally don’t give up if they feel slighted.”

“Got it. So I just need to be stronger than him.” Van said with a serious nod and fully intending to go back to training the moment he was out.

“You do that. See you later.”

The horned girl walked out and Van decided that since he couldn’t move after Tang Mao struck his pressure points so expertly, he should just meditate.

[hr]

Over the next few days, Van trained even harder than before. He still couldn’t hold a candle to Shizu, but he did notice that the spars with other newly-minted disciples were becoming easier, his win tally growing as he improved.

He also caught sight of Tang Mao and he waved at her every time, yet she only turned around and fled whenever he did so.

The trend continued until Shizu grew tired of it and dragged the snake girl back with her.

“I had a talk with Sect Sister Suien-”

“Just call me Shizu.”

“With Shizu,” Tang Mao continued, giving Shizu a side glance. “Your words did surprise me and I misunderstood your intent.”

“Ah, I guess I should be clearer. My bad.” Van smiled. “Hi, Tang Mao, I want to be your friend, not only because you healed me, but because you sound nice and I want to make more friends.”

Mao looked at Shizu again, the horned girl giving the snake girl a smug smirk that said “I told you so.” Tang Mao sighed before turning back to Van with a smile.

“Very well. I hope our friendship will be long-lasting.” She said with a small bow of her head.

[hr]

Tang Mao proved a great addition to their little group.

Her talents laid in Alchemy, to the point she had been given a minor role in the Medecine Hall as a junior healer under the supervision of more experienced members.

However, that didn’t mean she was defenseless. Not only was she skilled in hand to hand combat, to the point she could give Shizu a run for her money as long as weapons weren’t involved, but she was just as good with poisons as she was at healing.

“So, you’re one of those Tangs, uh?” Shizu asked one day.

“Indeed.” Mao replied after a jolt of surprise.

“Is her family famous?” Van asked, curious about his new friend.

“Infamous.” Tang Mao corrected, the corner of her mouth turning down and her eyes narrowing. “I come from a clan of Demonic Culitvators known for their poisons.”

“Oh. Ok.”

Both girls stared at Van strangely.

“I mean, it’s like with Shizu. She said her family is made up of assholes, but she is nice. Your family is your family and you’re you. It’s really simple. I can’t believe I have to explain that to smart people like you two.”

Shizu snorted.

“I guess it’s that simple when said like that.”

“Indeed.” Mao hid her own smile behind her sleeve.