Welcome, Legionnaire Polya.
This is a private terminal of the Legion Contribution Board registered to the 302nd Legion. You currently have access to all standard menus: Notices, Missions, Trade, Reports, Legion Status.
Please input your command.
Will Accepted.
Printing Legion Application Form for Qi Condensation.
One Contribution Point deducted, enjoy your discount!
Humming happily, Cerina sat atop the corpse of a massive Shield-Faced Bull, pen and form in hand.
Standardised Legion Application Form
Property of 302nd Silverine Bracers
Applicant Name: Cerina Polya of no House.
Applicant Age: Forty Years Old.
Applicant Heavenstage: 9th Heavenstage.
Enumerate your accolades and capabilities.
I am a capable practitioner of the Fist Art known as the 36 Purifying Winds Style which greatly enhances my speed, balance and unorthodox mobility. My strength is also significant for my level and I intend to hone it further. My inborn bloodline gift, the Eye of Anastasi is a single eye which provides me with extremely acute senses for a cultivator of my rank, particularly vision. I can count the number of feathers on a diving hawk and tell you their individual hues to the hundredth degree, as an example. I also have significant talents in both the Clan's Spirit Stone cultivation techniques, and my own Beast based cultivation techniques. I have some talent in Plains Breathing methods, but they exist as my weakest area.
As a First Heavenstage I successfully laid my charges of Spirit Stones without being discovered, and know of no failures with regard to my section of the evacuation routes. During this task I encountered and befriended a Strength Purity Sect member by the name of Lin Po, scion of the Lin Family.
Shortly after this I encountered an enemy Expert known as Swiftblood Hawk, a Fourth Pillar stage spear-wielder of fantastic mobility for his stage, who was being hunted by a Strength Purity Expert named Lin Shang. I avoided the enemy's notice successfully, with difficulty, and then fled into the forest. There I found a power that was very compatible with my own gifts and successfully absorbed it over the course of a week.
This Withering Eye allows me to wither and curse any creature, plant, or other entity which I stare at. I estimate it provides an eight small realm reduction in power and speed for exposed Qi Condensation Cultivators and a two and a half small realm reduction for those in the Foundation Establishment Realm.
As a First Heavenstage the primary accolade that I would claim is the successful alliance with Lin Shang, elder brother of Lin Po, and assisting him in killing Swiftblood Hawk with my Withering Eye. Most significantly, exposing the Blood Path expert to my gaze seems to have near crippled his extreme speed, reducing him to the level of a standard Second Pillar Expert. With this weakness, Lin Shang was able to deal the final killing blow and see me on my way out with my mission complete.
With my rewards, I cultivated to the 9th step in twenty years and have been exploring my homeland of the Beast-Raising Forest for use in the Trials since.
Please explain why you wish to join this Legion.
The ethos and focus of the 302nd appeals to my adventurous soul, and desires to assist the Clan and my community. My blood and natural talents call for and strongly aid efforts in deep recon, small unit movement to counter deep raiders, and opposing the Blood Path wherever it may be found. My practice of the 36 Purifying Winds means I am perhaps slightly faster than others of my cultivation rank, and my stamina greater and I would enjoy work as a scout, relay runner, or a position in a small unit's midline fighters.
In peace time I also find a call to order and police my community and to keep the peace in places like the Seven Heavens Trade City appeals to me. I would find satisfactory service in those duties.
Lastly, while I find some of their acts and behaviours towards me distasteful, I understand the Righteous Path's reactions and strongly believe I can work with them for long periods without issue. To crush the Blood Path in the Great Battlefield is a goal I believe we can all work towards and my experiences bear that out.
Additional Comments:
p.s if you don't accept me I am going to keep dropping dead and valuable Spirit Beasts in front of your apartment until I get in, so you might as well. Unless you want progressively larger and more valuable Spirit Beasts?
With a happy nod, Cerina dotted the last character and rolled up her application.
The logistics of a trip to a Secret Realm while
also serving as Legate of a Legion were a thing to behold. With so much of the intellectual brainpower of a mass of hundreds—or more frequently–thousands of cultivators all concentrated in a single individual at the top of the hill, it becomes clear that contingencies must be set up, long-term missions arranged, and all the paperwork be nice and tucked away so the organisation can endure on concentrated, aggressive momentum while their parent is away.
Admittedly, Rina Callista had an unfair advantage in that regard, what with how she lacked the accelerated processing talents and attention of a
true Legate, and thus had arranged her Legion in such a way as to limit the need for direct oversight and confirmation. But it was still the principle of the thing, and she had zero intentions of being an irresponsible cultivator and just meandering off with–at best—a letter buried in some deep corner of the bureaucracy explaining her business, maybe with a cheeky doodle or two on it.
She was almost positive someone did that at some point, so she needed to avoid following their example.
Most of the work at least was relatively straightforward. Signing off on promotions, sending condolences and registering the deaths of cultivators who had fallen in the line of duty, and ensuring that merits and discipline were meted out fairly based on the reports of the action in repelling the Insidious Poison Maze's advance. Which was successful even!
The… Only successful front of the fourteen that were attacked.
Oh Righteous Path, why must you be this way?
Regardless, along with the litany of busywork came the
better busywork of transfers. Rina rarely had time to really go recruiting directly, so she often ended up beaten to the punch for the best and brightest by Aretaphila, who used some kind of forbidden witchcraft to be everywhere at once as required to assert dominance. An actual assertive request for transfer though? That was new, and a little bit flattering! There were more established, better backed Legions to be applied for, and Rina's own CCCII were honestly less glamorous than some–her own reputation notwithstanding. She had, like, one real expert in her ranks after all!
But she couldn't let herself look too excited, no matter her personal feelings. She couldn't
afford enough benefits to outcompete the other Legates! Not with how expensive her cultivation had become at the Late Stage of the Single-Pillar Path!
So it was that she kept a tight control of her emotions and expressions as she looked up from the dossier she had been provided, hair properly tied up and in her official uniform, here in her office. Decorated with the intimidating weight of battle honors and trophies from her many clashes since being inducted into the
Optimatoi proper. The subject of her gaze is a giant of a woman with a single large and closed eye taking up much of her face, strangely adorable despite towering over Rina by the better part of a foot. It was just unfair, how some people got all the luck.
Joke was on her though, Rina's chair was elegantly crafted to make her look bigger, so she didn't lose out by much!
Her gaze was steady–Millet had joked about it being a 'Resting Bitch Face' or something along those lines, but it was good enough to help prevent her maidenly persona from being run over much by her peers. She lowered the papers to her desk, and steepled her hands together on the top of the sheets.
Now, how was she to handle this?
"So." She asks. "Just over twenty years of active duty, respectable performance in what was a shambles of an operation, and already in the Ninth Heavenstage." She lists out, one by one. "By our old standards, this was the sort of performance that would make you the envy of your generation–a Talent that the Legions would fight over to recruit." She leans forward, allowing just a slight trace of the
[Weight of the World] to fill the air, just enough to add pressure.
"These days are not the same. Essence is plentiful, and what used to be spectacular performance has now become the norm. For now, it's merely that the next generation is growing at a tremendous speed, but nothing happens in a vacuum. The unlucky will find themselves fodder, which will grow a new generation of bandits, cultists, and beasts to feed upon others. For now, police actions and holding ground are a simple, relatively safe task. But it will not be long until it becomes a terrible, thankless duty, as we serve as mankind's shields in a world gone mad."
She pauses for a moment to let that sink in, absently reaching for a cup of tea steaming at the side and taking a sip, enjoying the taste and allowing the tension to build.
"I will not turn you away if you are resolved, but know that this is not an avenue for rapid growth. I will not shower you with treasures and resources merely because you are a cut above the mass of your peers, you will receive the pay of a standard Legionnaire, and likely find yourself in greater danger, for it will be your flesh and blood as the first line of defence, and your fellows will require time to reach you. The task rarely receives accolades, and while there are tales of those who find a lucky chance, or are in precisely the right place at the right time. They are very much the exception to the rule. Are you
certain this is the path you wish to walk?"
There, that should be a sufficient level of intimidation!
Cerina looks down at her future Legate and she smiles a little. "You're kind to warn me, Legate," the young woman sets her shoulders and her own, much smaller aura rises in answer. Her smile becomes much sharper, showing her sharp edged front teeth. "I will not shirk. I will not cease. I intend to grasp the Fourth Keystone, and the Emperor's Pillar, and I am certain this is the Legion for me. I love the Clan, I can't do anything else."
The tall girl shrugs. "The pay is little issue. I have ideas for how to get around its limits anyway," Cerina says calmly, her former intensity gone under a cute and bouncy smile.
"Ambitious" Rina nods, her expression remaining steady even as she internally was cheering at the grand victory here. "Four Keystones and the Emperor's Pillar." She let that linger for a moment, and withdrew her Emanation. "Most would seek the Single-Pillar Path instead of remaining on the Orthodox Path, the power it awards can be critical after all, based on the exploits of those who have grasped that power."
It actually was a little curious, while cultivating this alternate path continually proved to be the bane of Rina's ability to socialise like many others, it did award considerable power to the ambitious. This might be a good way to feel out this new candidate and determine if there were any warning signs there.
Cerina considers that question for a long moment. Then she nods, seemingly to herself. "Katha Theodoros, Minervina Barda. Their successes have shown me something. The Dao, in a way. Here at my current station I know enough of my own path to believe that it would be incompatible with the," the girl rolls a hand, thinking of the right word. "With the direct principality, the overbearing singularity of the Single Pillar."
Cerina meets Rina's gaze confidently. "The Mountain Bell disasters showed me that the Clan needs a long term power that can assist them all. Qi Condensation to Core, and beyond. In the far future, perhaps I could be a tool, the lever, that blinds the Heavens at the right moment. That is where my Dao leads me I believe."
Rina nodded there. "You're not wrong I feel." She begins, one finger absently tracing the rim of her teacup as she withdraws slightly into her thoughts. "The Single-Pillar Path provides great power, but the further I walk along it, the more I grow… Concerned about where it will progress, taken to the utmost extreme. The Demonic Altar Sect seems to consider it to be a holy thing, for all that their followers are incapable of achieving it, and having explored it further than most in the Clan, I think I'm beginning to perceive the meanest edge of its promise."
Her hand twists, a snap of her fingers producing a mote of liquid flame above her hands, carefully held into a sphere, power projected into reality. "To concentrate the entirety of one's Cultivation Base into a single construct, one that has grown more connected to one's Truth than any ordinary cultivator has a right to touch. To then ensure that Foundation can process a tremendous flow of Essence at all times, power dyed in the wielder's Truth. What better practice can there be to forcefully bring one's Truth into reality than to constantly grapple with it at every moment of your life? And yet…"
She closes her hand, and the flame snuffs out. "I feel that is only a prerequisite for the true purpose of the Single-Pillar Path. That only one who has mastered Essence and Truth alike has any right to grasp its secrets. I don't think introducing more Kings into the world is a wholly good thing in light of that. The Truth, Dao, Dharma, whatever it is that you want to call it, allows for no compromise but to follow it, and it is oh so easy for that to turn to a conflagration that would leave few intact in its wake."
Cerina's expression shifts as Rina speaks, cautious, thoughtful and then very interested. "I agree… and there is something more I could perhaps add? A metaphor for context. The Righteous Path are our allies of today and tomorrow. But both know that we cannot be allies of the day after. Common enemies bring common alignments and I wish to assist the Clan's diplomatic efforts with the Righteous Path.
"That is why I acted as I did with the scions of the Lin Family. I think the Righteous grasp the issue you have described and I have the concern that if I became a King, that they would see me more poorly than if I was 'orthodox'. Kings provide destabilising poles of power," she finishes, sounding a little uncertain in that way of a subordinate stating something they think might be obvious to a superior.
It is perhaps an odd challenge to read an expression on someone who never opens their eye, but Cerina adroitly makes up for it with the rest of her face using her expressive smiles and tone.
"Mmm" Rina hums, satisfied at the answer. "In the end, you're correct on this matter. We have common cause with the Righteous Path in regards to opposing those who would devour the world, but so long as the Heavens desire our destruction, any true peace is fleeting, and would be shattered when the new generation, glutted on its gifts, are encouraged to turn their blades towards our people." She tapped her fingers on the wood of her desk, and gave the impression of thinking.
But the response had already been made long ago, Rina just needed to make it look like she wasn't excited about it.
"Very well, I am satisfied." She nods. "I will approve your transfer to the CCCII Legion. We will be conducting security and exploratory duties within the new colonies in former Blood Cannibal lands in the years ahead until we've heard from the Protostrator, to shake down any new recruits in anticipation of the upcoming set of Trials. I myself will be taking a brief sabbatical in the next few years to train, but I do not foresee any great dangers in the days to come."
"Yay! Thank you Legate… oh," Cerina stops with a sudden cough, and then a formal salute. "Thank you Legate," she says, blushing slightly but much calmer. Then she takes a steadying breath and continues. "If I may make a request, before you go on sabbatical, would you like to spar with me in order to get a personal sense of what my abilities can do? I am not aware of any curse users in the 302nd, except for potentially one of your personal Auxilla, and my Withering Eye is probably best classified as a curse."
Rina paused at that, her stride seeming to break at the request. "You… Want a spar, with me?" She asks, clearly showing signs of confusion at this.
"Yep!" Cerina said brightly.
"You're…" She blinks, and pinches the bridge of her nose. "I… Okay, sure, I have a little time now?" She says, shaking her head and rising to her feet. "The courtyard should be fine, I think…"
This was ridiculous though! I mean, it was probably a good curse art from the reports–anything that could let a Qi Condensation Legionnaire significantly impair a cultivator almost a full Great Realm above them was serious business.
But there was a great difference between a fourth pillar Blood Path Cultist and a Single Pillar King! Was this arrogance or just being excited?
How was she even supposed to impose a meaningful handicap from this? Ahhh!
Still, she did her best to keep her expression as controlled as she could as she led Cerina out to the courtyard–an expansive enough location, good for occasional demonstrations and meetings with the Centurions.
What was she going to
do here! She didn't want to hurt the rookie's feelings, but there was only one way this kind of contest could go!
"Legate?" Cerina opens as they enter the courtyard. "I know I'll lose, that isn't… winning isn't quite the point of this?" She says, trying to be comforting.
Rina paused in her stride, and coughed once. "Apologies, it's fine, it just feels a little like bullying, you know?" She sighed, and stepped out into the courtyard which was…
Honestly rather pedestrian, but the luxury of
having stone structures for a newly settled base camp was a luxury that only the CCCII could sport. It did have a wide courtyard though, with a smooth, flattened stone stage in the center.
Rina stepped to one side of it, and exhaled, calming herself. "Very well, I will limit my physical strength and speed to that of an average Foundation Establishment cultivator, and I will not make use of my Emanations or my Magic beyond what I can't actually neutralise. It will be your victory if you can still fight after five minutes."
That was a good handicap! Definitely! Probably!
"I'll do my best, Legate!" Cerina said as she stepped to the other side of the stage. She stood before her Legate loose limbed and with her hands in her sleeves. She took a breath and then grinned, spreading her hands.
Her eye slid open, a sphere of bronze with an iris of blue revealed before light blasted forth. Unmerciful cobalt, the light of radiative, sickened Qi through water snapped across the field to attempt to invade Rina's spiritual and physical bodies. In that brief flash, a series of pops like firecrackers went off, and a cracking of stone heralded most of the stage flying at the Golden King as Rina's footing became unsteady.
Rina stood on the opposite end of the stage, arms crossed as she awaited Cerina's first strike, reasoning that such a handicap was the least she could do to given everything else involved, since otherwise there wouldn't be much of a sporting chance.
She was not disappointed, as Cerina's eye opened, and…
from the stars came a fell light, sickening and poisoning all it wandered through, Void rose to meet it…
Cobalt light splashed against an unseen sphere, shattering into firefly light as it scattered, the backwash rendering what was ordinarily nigh invisible blows into a dramatic clash of Qi and wills.
Rina's mouth pursed slightly, and she resisted the urge to let that evolve into a true grimace. The
[Astral Voidguard] was adept at deflecting all forms of incoming attack, whether physical or esoteric–but she wasn't used to this sort of immaterial, persistent stream.
It felt vaguely dirty, like proximity to something foul even if it couldn't touch you.
Then the stage was thrown at her, and Rina Callista uncrossed her arms.
A
shriek of metal-on-stone filled the air, and a radiant glass
gladius tore through the approaching stage, Rina meeting the gaze of her junior as she closed with terrifying speed!
Cerina was
close, as she had sped across the battlefield beneath the tossed stone, skimming across the ground in a strange flat spin. Propelled by bursts of Wind Qi, one arm was already striking out for her Legate's legs, sheathed in more yet more Qi tuned to cutting. The younger girl yelped in brief shock and corrected, one hand slamming down and spinning her to kick up a huge cloud of dust as she was propelled away by a Wind burst, cobalt glare still visible through the dirt and stone tossed up in her frantic dodge.
She would really rather not get stabbed, retreating as best she could as she spun like a figure skater.
It was a good plan, it would work against most peers, the low stance and the fluid movements enough to foil the strategies employed by most cultivators, who train to fight foes who are greater in size or equal. It emulated the stature of the small while retaining the leverage and mass of the large.
There was only one problem.
"The first lesson if you hope to fight against Realms," Rina lectured, slipping into Cerina's back as she aggressively sought to compensate for her initial headlong rush. "You are always at a disadvantage in processing speed. If you can take one action, they can take two or three."
Her foot snapped upward, guided by the light emitted by Cerina's eye. "Clever movements can aid you against peers, but against Experts, you must seek maximum impact in the least possible moves!"
Cerina laughed, laughed like a child as one arm was thrown out, the rest of her spinning away as she jumped. Rina's foot struck her arm, shattering the bones in the forearm in seven places, before proceeding to strike her ribs and break several of them. With a burst of Wind Qi Cerina followed the momentum up, through the air as she expended the sheath of Wind around her to soften the blow slightly.
Cerina landed on the wall of the courtyard, kicked much like a rubber ball, where she struck heavily. Coughing, she frantically shot over it and flipped down to the other side. As she fell, uncaring for her injured arm, struck at the walls to send torso sized projectiles at Rina. Shape a specific series of paths.
Let go of thought and just experience. Cerina crouched like a beast in the new gap she'd torn open.
The Junior's response was a good one, accepting what could have been a crippling blow with a merely damaging one, and borrowing the force of the attack to create distance. In an ordinary battle, with the force of her Withering Eye, this would help narrow the gap in power between the two combattants, and should she endure long enough, it would allow her to turn the tables when the foe's strength has been reduced to nothing.
But the point of training wasn't to simulate optimal conditions, it was to simulate real combat. Who knew if her foe had a treasure or technique that could absorb the force of her curse? How did she react in that case?
Rina wasn't actively setting out to deny her the greatest trump card at her disposal, but since the
[Astral Voidguard] could deflect it, she would take advantage of the opportunity to teach a good lesson.
So she gave the Legionnaire a chance to open the distance, instead of chasing after like she should have. This kindness was rewarded with the destruction of the walls Rina had put such effort into raising.
She pouted, how rude.
Rina Callista exploded into motion, a shield expressing itself from her storage ring, battered and worn from many battles early in her career, and she charged
through the storm of projectiles, gladius and shield moving as one as she carved a path through the barrage and once more into Cerina's reach, pivoting on one heel and delivering a casual roundhouse kick to the side of the taller woman.
"Second Lesson." She added, pivoting back to her ready posture. "Using the environment helps, but only as a measure of escape against a superior foe. If the obstruction poses no obstacle to the target, creating it only wastes your time."
Cerina couldn't dodge, even relying on instinct. So she didn't. The kick slammed into her other side, breaking yet more ribs as Cerina propelled herself with Qi in a spin around Rina's leg. Blood bubbled on her side and from her mouth as her Qi plus Rina's superlative force span her around into a kick at the Golden King's face.
The kick was well executed, borrowing the force of Rina's own attack to multiply its force considerably. She allowed herself to reward the cleverness with a smile as the kick reached the pinnacle of its speed.
And then began to
slow, the force of the attack devoured bit by bit, until Cerina found herself just sliding off of the Legate's aura, the same nigh-invisible force that repelled the Withering Eye.
"Finally, the Third Lesson." She caught Cerina's leg, and gave an apologetic shrug. "Victory isn't always a matter of defeating the opponent, if they're too strong, the best move is to avoid a direct clash and achieve victory in another fashion."
She clenched her fingers, and Cerina felt a lash of pain go through her body.
"You might want to take care, you don't bite your tongue." Rina smiled beatifically, and began to
pull
In a frantic moment of effort like a beast biting her own leg Cerina wrenched against the grip and struck at her shin, above where Rina had grabbed her. Her flesh split and her bone cracked in a hideous spray of blood aimed at Rina as a distraction as she tried to slip away and fall to the sand below where she might hide for a few seconds.
At this point, it was a good strategy, but nowhere near enough to change the final outcome of where this was going. Rina's grip merely adjusted to the new, more jagged structure of the shattered leg, and she finally
heaved, slamming Cerina again and again against the sands around.
Though relatively gently compared to the prior blows, which shattered bone and shook organs on contact. Rina only wanted to teach a few lessons, not kill or cripple the poor girl!
When the deed was done, and Cerina reduced to little more than a puddle of pain on the ground before her, Rina let go, and smiled, looking down towards her.
"The final and most important lesson with regards to Fighting Against Realms?
Don't, for every tale of a Jin Muyi or an Indomitable Thirteen, you have countless dead cultivators who tried it and were crushed for it. You have a rare gift in that eye of yours, but it
alone does not make you an Expert. Only training, tempering, and experience can let you cross that gap reliably, and
that only against the weakest and most inexperienced examples of their kind. If you have to face an Expert, your objective should be to either retreat, or support an Expert of your own. Facing them directly should be a last resort, because even if you can claim victory, you're unlikely to be in any position to defend yourself afterwards."
"Lou, *ffffft* Pleh," Cerina began, face down in the sands. Then her neck and head turned like an owl to look at her Legate through her closed eyelid, her Eye shuttered now. "Loud and clear, Legate!" She said, sounding exhausted. Neck strangely twisted, she rolled her shoulders as she looked up at Rina.
"A thought occurs, Legate, while I am beneath your foot. Even if I am unable to move, my Withering Eye takes so little Qi that I could still potentially aid my allies even while I am incapacitated or potentially crippled. What do you think?" Rina's junior asked, the pain lacing her tone overrun by genuine curiosity.
Already pops and crackles heralded the beginning regeneration of her arm and ribs. Her leg would probably follow along shortly.
Rina smiles, and kneels down to get a bit closer. "That's the way to think of it! Take a dive if you have to, wear them down when they think you can't handle them. But do keep in mind that you can never be
certain your foe lacks the ability to deal with it. There's no shame in using tactics and tricks to help even the odds when your foe is stronger than you after all, as long as you're not resorting to anything that harms our charges to get it."
Cerina gurgled what would have been a laugh. "Quite, quite, that
was the idea…," she said, becoming slightly muffled as her head span back around and she carefully levered herself to a mostly standing position. Her messed up leg was held off the ground gingerly. "You think hiding in the sand after I went over the wall would have helped at all, Legate?" She asked as she stood there, holding her injured arm close to her side.
She wobbled and nearly tipped over. "Also, I need help getting to the medical wing," she said drolly before wincing. "Ahhhhg, goat-fffffffuu,
owwwwwie…"
"It wouldn't have hurt, definitely." Rina smiles, patting Cerina on the shoulder as she helped her back up. "Have to say though, that curse of yours is
really uncomfortable to be under, almost anxiety inducing, have you ever thought…"
And so it was that Rina Callista finally managed to beat Aretaphila Myia to one of the elite juniors of the next generation, a time worthy of song and celebration.
If perhaps a little less blood on the sands next time.
… She would need to spend more time and energy fixing the damage, wouldn't she?
