Ailsa didn’t rush Ryu. This sort of decision was too important. In addition, she herself knew how tall the mountain Ryu had to climb would be regardless of his choice. Clans and Alliances didn’t just pop up out of thin air. It required countless epochs of effort for a Clan to rise up, and even then, the vast majority would never be as powerful as Ryu’s Tatsuya Clan. Because of this, Ailsa almost felt that Ryu was in the right wanting to go at it alone.
“How do you feel about puppeteering?” Ryu suddenly asked.
Ailsa blinked. ‘Puppeteering? Ah, I understand. You want to compensate for your lack of talent along the Mental Realm path with your Qi Realm talent.’
Puppet Masters. They were an incredibly ancient cult of individuals who used their deft control of qi to bolster their strength. Instead of controlling corpses with their Mental Realm like necromancers did, they used their qi like the strings of a puppeteer.
There were many pros to this path. Corpses responded faster and with more agility to commands. However, there were many cons as well. Typically, necromancers could control more corpses. In addition, puppets tended to be less durable, namely because stronger puppets required thicker qi strings. The tradeoff was too steep. And…
‘Though it’s possible, you shouldn’t believe that you’ll completely escape the limitations of your Mental Realm by taking the puppeteering path. Do you remember what is limiting your dual polearm wielding path?’
Hearing this, Ryu already knew what was coming and smiled bitterly.
‘Puppeteering requires controlling multiple variables at once. Strictly speaking, it’s far more complex and layered that simply controlling two weapons. Anything that places such a heavy burden on your mind requires your Mental Realm – it’s unavoidable.’
Ryu closed his eyes, nodding solemnly. But, his depressed state didn’t last for long. He couldn’t afford to be to depressed, he didn’t have the time for it. Not long later, his eyes opened with a keen resolution.
‘You’ve made a decision?’
“Yes.” Ryu nodded heavily. “All of these matters point toward one obvious choice. There’s no room to be accepting of my weakness. Instead of spending so much time trying to accommodate my inadequacies, I want to fix them.”
Ryu turned his gaze toward Ailsa. “How do I rid myself of this weakness?”
‘I see… So that’s your choice.’ Ailsa smiled. ‘I should have known. It’s quite typical of you. Good, Big Sis will help you then. But, you should know that fighting against one’s lack of talent isn’t something that ever ends, it’s a battle of a lifetime… I think this will be a good experience for you, not just for your strength, but for you mind.’
Ryu understood the hidden meaning of Ailsa’s words and said no more. He had too many advantages to lament his bad luck. If he couldn’t make use of the cards he was dealt, in spite of how good the truly were, then didn’t that mean no one could defeat Fate? At the very least, he wanted to understand just what truly battling against Fate meant. So, he waited silently as Ailsa fell into her thoughts, he knew that she was tossing away all of her previous plans for his sake and he couldn’t have been more thankful.
‘As you know,’ Ailsa finally spoke, ‘There are limiters to what one can do with their minds without Qi Realm cultivation. It is unadvisable to enter the Soul Birth Realm until after one completes their Immortal Ring, for example.
‘Currently, little brother is in the lowest Mental Realm – the Spiritual Entrance Realm. Much like your body, where you are currently accumulating as much Vital Qi as you can to prepare for the next realm, you are also meant to be accumulating as much Spiritual Qi as you can for your Mental Realm.
‘Unfortunately, this is where your limiter lies. Just like your Ancestral Bloodline can hold more Vital Qi than others who have lesser bloodlines, your Mental Realm is limited by your talent in that you can’t accumulate as much Spiritual Qi as a genius of the Zu Clan would be able to.
‘Still, little brother does have some advantages in the Mental Realm. Firstly, the Origin Flame. It allows little brother to have perfect recall. In fact, to call it perfect recall is almost doing this treasure a disservice. Simply put, even with your lack of Mental Realm talent, you won’t ever stumble in your Visualizations.
‘Second is little brother’s Heavenly Pupils. Not only do you have perfect recall, but you can grasp the essence of Visualizations far quicker than others. The issue is that these two advantages are useless. Do you know why?’
Ryu nodded. “Because neither increases my limits. If anything, all they do help me reach my low ceiling faster than anyone else could, but doesn’t fix the root of the problem.”
‘Exactly right. What little brother needs is a method to increase your limits. I have these methods, but they come in two forms. One is luck. The other is pain.’
Ailsa smiled an ambiguous smile. ‘The luck aspect is already accomplished. The Spirit Seeking Lilies are treasures one can only hope for and never ask for. Taking even one petal can instantly double your Mental Realm’s size. However… Little brother’s Mental Realm talent is at the point where that won’t be helpful. This is why little brother must combine this luck with pain.’
Ailsa took a deep breath. ‘Do you remember [Tribulation Nine Clouds]?’
Ryu flinched involuntarily. “So that really is the only choice…”
Ailsa giggled, giving Ryu a knowing look. It seemed Ryu had already thought of this possibility and had just been avoiding it.
[Tribulation Nine Clouds]. It was a technique that used tribulation lightning to forcibly increase one’s potential. Ryu had seen it while he was trying to pick his Qi Techniques. Though Ryu had found it in a section of Qi Techniques, the foundation of the technique was turning tribulation lightning into qi… There was no limitation on the kind of qi it could be. Meaning, Spiritual Qi was also a possibility, even Vital Qi.
‘Ryu, this is your only path. Some people aren’t even lucky enough to know such a technique exists – they don’t even have the choice of risking themselves to improve. I wasn’t joking when I said fighting against one’s lack of talent was a lifelong endeavor. Even after you break your limiters in your current cultivation realm, you’ll find out that after you break into the next realm, they have limiters of their own, and so will the next, and the next. This is why simply taking the Spirit Seeking Lily is useless … you need to be ready to fight against the cards you were dealt every step of the way.’
‘I understand.’ A flicker of resolution colored Ryu’s silver eyes.