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I was guided up a few marble steps and into the building. Inside, I found a rather small front room.

The middle-aged man from the previous ceremony, Su YuanFei, sat at the back of the room, overseeing the proceedings. In the middle of the room was a clear orb resting on a pedestal. To the right, a scribe sat at a table taking notes. Finally, behind the orb was an elderly man I had not seen before.

I wasn’t sure about the proper etiquette for this situation, so I gave the elderly man a slight bow and approached. I decided not to speak since that was usually the best course in an unknown environment. If they decided I acted rudely, I would just have to die and try again.

Fortunately, it didn’t come to that. When I neared, the elderly man spoke.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“Su Fang.”

I heard the scribe writing this down.

“Place your hand on the orb and channel your qi into it.”

Not sure exactly what that meant, I did my best. I placed my hand on the orb and tried to will something into it. Nothing happened. After a few moments, the man spoke again.

“Concentrate on your dantian, in the core of your body. Pull from there and push into the orb.”

I did as he said. I didn’t feel much, but I could feel something. A faint trickle of energy flowed out of me and into the orb. As it did, the orb began to sputter weakly with a faint glow of a mix of colors.

“Zero elemental affinity,” the elderly man said. The scribe wrote this down.

“What can you tell us about the blessing you have received?”

Having thought about this question, I decided to say something where hopefully they would think there would be more to come. I couldn’t help but think something would be better than telling them I learned nothing.

“My entire life my body has been weak and frail. After the blessing, I can feel that there is new strength in my body. Old pain has ceased, and I feel I am regaining the strength I should have. I believe there may be more to this blessing, but that is all I know right now.”

The old man gave me a look, and I could feel energy from him lightly probe my body. After that, he nodded to the scribe.

“He will be given the Earth Heart Mantra and returned to his original quarters.”

Then, he looked back at me and spoke in a disinterested voice.

“The new disciple tournament will be held in three months. If you do not place in the top sixteen, you will be expelled from the clan. Leave.”

I wanted to speak up and ask a question, but the guard who had led me in began pulling me away. After a second of surprise, I followed behind. We entered a side room where another scribe was sitting in front of several piles of bamboo scrolls.

“Earth Heart,” the guard said with a touch of disdain.

The scribe handed over a scroll from the largest pile.

“We will send someone to retrieve this in two weeks. You have that long to learn it. Do not lose or damage this scroll.”

I nodded and was pulled away by the guard. He took me back to the residential area but didn’t follow me back to my house. He probably went to grab the next person in line.

Sitting back down in my house, I needed to decide how to proceed.

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Being expelled from the clan for not placing in the top sixteen sounded harsh, but it did make some sense. The Su Clan was huge, and I was an orphan from a twig of a branch family. At some point, they would have to start pruning who was considered actual family members. It might not feel fair, but it did make some sense.

The new encounters had shown me new areas where my knowledge was lacking, and as long as I knew about a problem, I could solve it, and the fact that I had zero affinities seemed like it was going to be one. I didn’t know what affinities were, or how they would help me, but that testing showed they were considered important. I only had 1 credit, so there wasn’t much I could do. At most, I could use it to fill in a bit of missing knowledge.

“System, I want knowledge of affinities.”

You can only afford common knowledge of what people believe about affinities. The cost is 1 credit.

“Purchase.”

Purchase confirmed. 0 credits remaining.

In this world, there are many forms of energy. The most common form of energy is qi. It exists everywhere in the air around you. Similar to light or electricity, qi is a form of pure energy.

There are many different forms of qi. Using light as an analogy, there are many different ‘wavelengths’ of qi that give it different ‘colors.’ Examples of this are the five basic elements: fire, water, earth, metal, and wood qi. Other forms of qi include lightning, demonic, and spirit qi.

Affinity allows a cultivator to control the type of qi that matches their affinity. They can then pull that energy into themselves, empowering and strengthening their body. While rarer affinities may offer some benefits, they are generally seen as less useful, as their matching qi type may be lacking or insufficient in the environment.

Credits expended. Transaction complete.

I considered the Earth Heart Mantra I was given. It was used to cultivate earth qi. Would cultivating earth qi affect me differently than, say, fire qi? I wanted to ask, but I didn’t have any more credits.

Every time I died, I was told I was getting points because I reached Martial Disciple 1. When I asked about gaining more points, I was told that I would get points based on my cultivation level. It sounded like my cultivation level could be improved by using this Earth Heart Mantra to pull in earth qi. If I were to pull in qi and strengthen myself, I would eventually become Martial Disciple 2. That would earn me more credits when I died without running afoul of the System’s ‘no intentional death’ edict. I didn’t plan on dying, but I knew it would happen sooner or later, so I needed to make the most of it.

Affinity was a body’s ability to control different kinds of qi, and by having zero affinity with everything, I was basically at the bottom of the bottom. My control of qi barely existed, and I would have a very hard time advancing in rank at all.

For most people, this would mean the end of the road. However, as the Su Clan was no doubt aware, everything could change when blessings were considered. A powerful blessing could easily make up for lacking affinities.

For me? It meant I needed to make a plan. I was given an earth qi technique, so I might as well start there since I didn’t know enough to pick between the five basic affinities the System had listed. Rarer affinities sounded interesting, but if they were less useful without a proper environment, I would hold off on them until later.

“System, I want to improve my earth qi affinity.”

Temporary Low 9-star Earth Affinity. Cost 10 credits.

“Fair enough. System, I would like to improve my earth qi affinity by two steps.”

Temporary Mid 9-star Earth Affinity. Cost 35 credits.

From a little more prodding, I found affinities started at low nine-star and increased through low, mid, high, and peak. Then, they advanced to low eight-star. Presumably, they would continue to at least peak one-star, which may or may not be the highest. I couldn’t check that far. Importantly, each increase in affinity became more expensive the higher you went. Going up to just low eight-star would cost 260 credits, a 100-credit increase over the 160 needed for peak nine-star.

I considered this. Did I need to commit suicide dozens of times to get a usable affinity? I didn’t want to do that. Memories of my last death lingered in my mind. Also, I was sure committing suicide twenty-odd times in a row was exactly what the System had meant when it warned me against “quick, repeated, intentional deaths.”

So, I needed to find ways to quickly improve my cultivation, thus improving my credit gain. The key would be affinity, so I would start there. Improving to low nine-star was cheap, and I could certainly afford that after a single death at any time.

Wait…

“System, I want to improve my earth qi affinity such that it stays improved after every restart.”

Permanent Low 9-star Earth Affinity. Cost 100 credits.

There it was. Ten deaths to afford even the worst affinity if I didn’t want to have to rebuy it every time I died.

Processing… An external entity has discounted the price of increasing your affinity. Cost 10 credits.

Note: This discount will only be applied to the first affinity you permanently upgrade. However, future upgrades to this affinity will also be discounted to 10% of their regular price.

Only the first affinity… Did I want to focus on earth qi?

This wasn’t a decision I could rush. I was sure I could spend even more credits to change the affinity set to permanent in the future, but better to try to walk the right path from the beginning.

I didn’t even have the credits for this now anyway, so it would have to wait for the future in any event.

My goal moving forward would be simple. Push as far as I could. Learn as much as I could. If there was a risk, take it. Better to learn and die so I was prepared for the future. I didn’t want to die. Even with the resets. But I would.

That said, for the near future I wouldn’t exactly be doing anything death-defying. I would be sitting on my rear trying to pull in energy while having little to no ability to do so.