As we cultivate I wonder if we'll get better at drawing out XP from sources, see more of the qi in objects, or if we'll be able to sense more advanced concept type qi that we didn't notice before. (Is this something engraving might unlock?)
After we build our foundation a bit it sounds like we'd want to engrave stuff to get access to qi skills.
That's assuming the same applies in this version of the quest, and we'll get to eat several times. That said, I am in favor of eating and assimilating as much as we can from this base.
Realized that the way the current system was set up there was no reason to do that last step that cost 4141 exp because there was no step after it. Adjusted the exp caps upwards and decided to highlight where you are in the Foundation grind in what i feel is a more visually coherent manner.
Please be aware you can ascend from path 1 to path 2 any time after you hit the flawed foundation stage, but i advise you do be wary of advancing with a low foundation.
Hoping to get update out sometime today.
_
Assimilation Results:
Your cultivation is currently at Second step of the first path 17/40 towards the third step (Flawed foundation)
12 Darkness, 6 Light, 7 Blood, 5 Life, 5 Death, and 12 Water Dao marks assimilated. The dao is dissolved and added to your cultivation base:
=>
60 cultivation exp (5 per Darkness dao consumed) + 30 cultivation exp (5 per Light dao consumed) + 14 cultivation exp (2 per blood dao consumed) + 50 cultivation exp (10 per Life dao consumed) + 50 cultivation exp (10 per Death dao consumed) + 24 cultivation exp (2 per Water dao consumed) X 1.6 (base 1.0. +.5 for incredible potential +.1 for being in harmony with your Compassion dao heart)
Hp= base(Determined by size of the creature. 2 for small creatures, 4 for medium creatures, 8 for large, 16 for colossal) + your cultivation dice size (so a D4 would add 4 hit points) + any hp adjusting traits or techniques
so a path 3 large creature with the dice 2D8 + 1D5 would have (without any modifications from techniques):
8 + (8 + 8 + 5) = 29 hp.
so Baiyu's current hp is 8 (2 + 6)
i may adjust this system later. however, for now i think it works.
at the moment it is just the difference between rolls, i'm probably going to adjust combat as the quest goes on though as that system was very swingy in the previous version of the quest.
We'd want to engrave marks as well in order to get some Qi manipulation going. Baiyu will need something to make up for his size when fighting other spirit beasts.
[X] Plan: Storm bunny
-[X] Assimilate dao marks
--[X] Assimilate 12 Darkness, 6 Light, 7 Blood, 5 Life, 5 Death, 12 Water
--[x] Eat something
--[x] From the Ai Lei's storm tree
---[x] Eat the fruit on the tree as well?
-[X] Explore down the tunnel
Chapter 9: Concerns of the heart part 2
Baiyu wondered around Ai Lei's domain. It was visually impressive, yet horribly crowded for the young rabbit. The storm tree laid at the peak of a massive mountain that sprung up above the great sea of clouds. At its peak laid the plateau with the storm tree in its center. Yet when Baiyu looked up all he could see was a massive storm that stretched on into the horizon. Rain fell gently all around the mountain, yet not a single drop fell upon the mountain itself. Baiyu could see off into the distance for miles and despite all of that space he was confined to the mountain top. For he could not fly, nor did he dare to try and scale his way down the mountain, so steep it was.
Ai Lei had left Baiyu alone on the mountain top hours ago with only the instructions to tell her when he wanted to leave. At first Baiyu had been tempted to try and leave immediately, but he had realized that this was the only place in which he felt safe. The only place where he wasn't hunted and in constant danger. It made him consider if he wanted to leave at all. He was a child and every thing he had seen of the world since leaving his parents cave had only spoke of danger and death.
He wanted safety and he wanted a home. Since the death of his parents Baiyu had been growing steadily smarter. A gift that allowed him to survive as he had till now and a curse that made him feel things he did not want. The loneliness, the pain and the hatred he felt towards humans at the thought of his parents death. The understanding that his siblings laid in the paw of those who had committed such a deep offense. Worry at what they must be doing to them.
Baiyu wondered atop the mountain worrying and thinking about his siblings. About the injustices that he had suffered and the situation he was in. Eventually he found himself sitting at the edge of the mountain, staring down at the sea of clouds before him. He felt helpless.
"What are you thinking about now?" Ai Lei said as she stepped up beside him. She had taken the form of a rabbit, but kept her antlers and striking blue eyes.
"You know what I am thinking." Baiyu said, keeping his eyes on the storm below.
"I know that I have told you to follow your heart and yet hours have passed and you have done nothing but bemoan your luck."
"Bemoan my luck? My parents are dead! I have almost died several times! My siblings are all either captured by my parents murderers or DEAD. Ever since I left my parents burrow things have gone wrong again and again! If I leave your 'heartland' or whatever you call it then I will die! The great beast will eat me or a human will grab me or some other monstrosity that I can't even do anything about! What am I supposed to do? Run into the tunnel and die?!"
"If that is how your path ends then such is the will of heaven."
Baiyu turned to her, "And how is that 'bending the world to my will'? How am I supposed to fight the humans, much less the great beast when I am so weak."
"You may bend the world to your will, but you cannot break it. The heavens decreed that you were born a rabbit. You cannot change this. It is what you are...," She turned to look out over the sea of clouds. " But it cannot dictate who you are or what you will become. If you wish to make the world bend to your will, then you must make who you are become more important than what you are. Succeed and you will grow. You will be more than an animal. More than prey. But you can only do that by following your heart, no matter what tries to stop you or get in your way."
Baiyu looked down at the ground, "You tell me all of these things as though it were easy. As though it made SENSE. I don't get it. I don't get how to do it. Just tell me what to do."
Ai Lei sighed, "No. For all of your insistence, it is vital to your growth that you craft your own path. I will not tell you what to do, but I can try to help you realize who you are."
"I know who I am. I'm just Baiyu, a rabbit."
"No." Ai lei spoke for the first time and her voice was as gentle as the rain, as unflinching as lightning." You are Baiyu, the son of valiant parents who gave their lives to protect their children. Brother to your siblings. Survivor of a situation that would have killed many others in your same position. And despite all of this you showed kindness to an enemy who tried to kill you. Yours is a compassionate heart."
Baiyu was too stunned to respond as she turn to look at him, "What do you want Baiyu?" She said, speaking into his mind once more.
"I want to live."
"You can do better than that." She encouraged him.
"I-I want to save my siblings from the humans, But How? I can't pos-"
"The how doesn't matter. If that is what you want to do then do it and damn the how. You will find a way."
"It's not possible." Baiyu objected.
"Would you have called it possible to escape the great beast and its spirit? Would you have called it possible to survive a mountain collapsing on you? Do not worry about the how. Just keep moving towards your goal and you will discover the how along the way."
Baiyu hesitated, another objection on his mind, but she had a point. For what had felt like the longest time he had thought himself doomed in that cave, but he had escaped. He had lived. He wasn't sure of the path forward, but he knew his next step, "I-I will try."
Ai Lei nodded and disappeared.
Which was just as well. Baiyu had work to do.
A/N: Splitting up the chapter into two parts as this scene ended up much longer than I was anticipating. Ended up feeling like an extension of the last chapter so I named it as such. Next update will be Baiyu putting his (your) plan into action.
[X] Plan: Storm bunny
-[X] Assimilate dao marks
--[X] Assimilate 12 Darkness, 6 Light, 7 Blood, 5 Life, 5 Death, 12 Water
--[x] Eat something
--[x] From the Ai Lei's storm tree
---[x] Eat the fruit on the tree as well?
-[X] Explore down the tunnel
Chapter 10: Small steps lead the way.
Baiyu was feeling motivated after Ai Lei's encouragement. He might have a long road ahead of him to rescue his siblings and he wasn't even sure how he was going to do it, but he did know what his next step was. He had energy in his body waiting to be used and he fully intended to use it. He could engrave the qi into his body, He wasn't sure exactly what it would do, but his instincts told him that there had to be something useful for him there. However, experimentation wasn't what Baiyu wanted to do right now, he wanted strength. He wanted power.
So instead he fed his energy to the clear core within him. It consumed Baiyu's energy ravenously and without hesitation. It grew and swelled until it was almost double its original size, the clear surface rippling like water during a storm. Then the damn burst and a wave of clear and colorless energy pushed out and settled into Baiyu's body. As it washed over his body, the alien feeling that had never completely faded ever since he had first gotten stronger in the cave disappeared. It had faded into the background of his mind, a minor detail in the course of events that had transpired, but its absence was felt keenly by Baiyu. Finally he felt truly at home in his body once again. It was different, yes. Stronger, faster and healthier than it had been before he had awakened, but it was finally truly his.
Satisfied by the change, Baiyu looked at the core within him and saw that it had shrunk in size once more. It was slightly larger than it had been before he had fed the energies to his core, but otherwise it seemed unchanged. Yet it had not taken Baiyu much energy to feed the core and grow stronger. He still had a lot left over. So he fed it again, and again it grew larger and larger until it "burst" once more.
This time, wherever the wave of energy passed Baiyu felt uncomfortable as the the qi changed Baiyu's body, refining it. Perfecting it. When the energy was spent, Baiyu was stronger than he had been. No, not only stronger, he also felt healthier and cleaner as the energy and blood in his body flowed better than before. He felt vigorous and energized, like he could hop for hours and not be tired in the least.
So he did it again and again and again until he had run out of qi in his body. With each cycle the core in his body grew slightly bigger and more and more flaws in his body were correct, more of him was improved. Each cycle fixed less flaws than the ones before it, but all of the energy that did not fix some flaw in his body, sunk into his flesh itself empowering it beyond what was normal or natural. With every cycle his body became more in all respects, yet the changes of the final cycle were the most pronounced. In this cycle the changed were more focused on Baiyu's muscles. The rest of his body was nearly ignored as the imperfections in Baiyu's muscles were rooted out with exacting efficiency. The result was that Baiyu felt as though he was able to exert his body far more than before as his muscles became hyper tuned.
When he went to try and feed his core again, he found that he had finally run out of qi to spend. Baiyu had a brief flash of disappointment at that realization, but it was quickly banished by what he had accomplished. Four times he had refined his body and by then end of the process the difference felt as though it were night and day to the young rabbit. When he tried to hop to test out his new strength, he launched his body almost halfway across the mountaintop plateau, tumbling to a stop near the center of the tree. He blinked in a daze as he saw the dozens upon dozens of feet that he had accidentally hurdled himself. He felt both impressed with himself, and excited for the future. If cycling his energy had made him grow this much stronger then how much stronger would he be in the future?
"Please do stop thinking of it as 'cycling your energy' It is called cultivation." Baiyu heard Ai Lei huff at him from... somewhere.
"Why does it matter what I call it?"
"Because if a spirit hears you call it that then they will think of you as uneducated."
"What does uneducated mean?"
". . . We will have to fix that. You cultivated so quickly I almost forgot you were but a child. You are talented, you know. Most would not be able to cultivate so far with such little qi." Baiyu Felt a little bit of pride as she said that, "When you need to rest please do return here. There are some things I would teach you to correct your lack of knowledge."
Baiyu was curious as to what she meant by that but it didn't sound so bad, "Ok. You said I could eat from your tree right?"
"Yes, you may. Though do be warned that if you eat the fruit then you will gain some of my dao. It is not a light decision to make."
"But you also said that the tree is a part of you, right?"
"Yes?"
"Then won't it hurt you if I eat from it?"
"Do not worry about that."
She fell silent as Baiyu continue to question her, concerned at the possibility of hurting his new teacher. He didn't want to her to be in pain. In the end though he trusted that she wouldn't tell him to eat from her tree if it was going to hurt her though. He decided that he would just have to pace himself and only eat things that seemed like they were growing from the tree. Not part of the tree itself. A decision that he made quietly to himself and that he quickly put to the test as he ate from the tree to fill his empty power with new energy.
He tried to bite the strange cloud leaves of the storm tree, only for his teeth to snap shut over nothing. Instead he, after some testing, found that he needed to breathe the dark stormy leaves in like he was sucking in his breath. He felt familiar water qi flow into his body alongside other, stranger qi's. Wind qi had a light feel to Baiyu and seemed to be prone to just spreading itself out over the rabbits body. Lightning qi, in contrast to what he had expected, like to lay still before quickly zipping to somewhere else in his body faster than he could tracks. The last type, storm qi, was much like the leaves themselves. Dark and rumbling with barely contained lightning that flashed with the dark clouds.
Baiyu didn't eat many of the storm leaves since he was unsure of how much he could take before it would start hurting her. He did however ponder eating one of the fruits. Even with his . . . Cultivation. He still could not truly understand what he was seeing. They remained blurry spots on his vision that his sight would slide off of no matter how he tried. Apparently he could eat it too and gain some of Ai Lei's "Dao". He wasn't sure what that meant, but he did know that it was apparently a significant choice to make.
Did he dare to do it?
[] Yes, he did. Baiyu eats the fruit and gains Ai Lei's dao, and all that entails.
[] No, he did not. Baiyu would find his own dao... whatever that was.
Gains from eating at the storm tree: 1d30 water, 1d30 wind, 1d20 lightning, 3d10 Storm.
Water: 10 water dao gained.
Wind: 23 wind dao gained.
Lightning: 16 Lightning Dao gained.
Storm: 13 storm dao gained.
Storm tree is available to eat at again in 1d3 turns: Roll: 2. 2 more turns until eating at the storm tree is available again.
Assimilation Results:
Your cultivation is currently at Second step of the first path 17/40 towards the third step (Flawed foundation)
12 Darkness, 6 Light, 7 Blood, 5 Life, 5 Death, and 12 Water Dao marks assimilated. The dao is dissolved and added to your cultivation base:
=>
60 cultivation exp (5 per Darkness dao consumed) + 30 cultivation exp (5 per Light dao consumed) + 14 cultivation exp (2 per blood dao consumed) + 50 cultivation exp (10 per Life dao consumed) + 50 cultivation exp (10 per Death dao consumed) + 24 cultivation exp (2 per Water dao consumed) X 1.6 (base 1.0. +.5 for incredible potential +.1 for being in harmony with your Compassion dao heart)
