Jest was an orphan, a slave, and a weakling.
Jest was the one you would feel pity for. His life was what one could describe as pitiful.
He was born in a slave mine. A few minutes after he was born, his mother was taken to carry out her duties. She was a slave miner, after all, so she ought to work.
No matter the situation you are in, you must work when your time has come. So she was taken away.
But she never returned.
That day, she was supposed to come back and hold her newborn in her arms, but she was buried alive by rubble, and her dream of caring for and someday scaling the Wall of Death with her son was lost in her final dream.
Her dream to make sure her son escaped the life of slavery was lost under the rubble.
Jest was then left to fend for himself as an infant.
Luckily, Auntie Ama was there, and she took care of him until he was 7 and could hold an axe. That was when he was branded and sent into the mine.
Welcome to the Mine of Alcatraz, the deepest and darkest mine to have ever existed in the world of Byrmrr.
Jest was just a boy who was born from an unjust union between a guard and a slave. He wasn’t meant to be born, but he was, and from the day he was born, he knew no happiness.
He was surrounded by horror, and so he had to adapt—and he did. He adapted and strived to live. He lived, and for 16 long years, Jest—or, as many slaves used to call him, the Daytime Dreamer—was a slave.
He was also a miner.
He was one of the hardworking slaves and one of the caring ones. His mother died, but she left him with a group of family members who loved him.
All slaves ought to stick together…
He was known as the daytime dreamer because he often dreamt of scaling the Wall of Death, the only way to escape the Mine. There, he would have to climb an 800-meter-tall wall.
If he fell, he would die.
Obviously, it was a lost cause, considering nobody had ever managed to scale it and escape the life they were living. Those who tried fell to their death.
Nobody had ever been able to do it.
But Jest was obsessed with the outside world. He was determined to learn, to grow, and one day live a peaceful life.
He doesn’t want to be a slave forever. No, he wants to change his destiny and become someone important.
Being a slave wasn’t something he asked for; it was what he was born into. So he wanted to escape that life.
And so it happened.
16 years later…exactly on the day he was born.
Jest went to the wall, looked up at the darkened skies filled with countless stars, and turned to his fellow slaves.
“Let it be known that today is when Jest scales the wall and escapes to claim his destiny.”
He took his first step, the second, and the third until he was a quarter of the way up. Everyone watched with calm expressions.
They had seen countless people reach a quarter of the wall before.
But then he kept climbing until he was halfway up. Still, no one cheered, as this wasn’t new either. They had seen this happen every single day.
He moved to three-quarters of the wall, and everyone started shouting his name.
Morale was high. They wanted him to succeed. This was only the third time someone had reached 600 meters, and it had happened within two hours.
Jest was tired, but his determination kept pushing him. He kept moving, and before anyone could fully grasp how he was doing it, Jest was halfway there.
Then Jest climbed to 799 meters and looked down. He saw the faces of all the slaves, all of them with tears of joy falling down their faces. Some gave him the morale to go and live his life.
Most of the faces were those genuinely happy with what he had accomplished. They all wanted this and seeing one of them succeed; they were all happy for him.
He took ten whole minutes watching their expressions. After 10 minutes, a tear fell from his eyes, and he said with conviction,
“I will be back.”
Jest climbed the last obstacle, and the dream he had was made a reality. He had escaped his life as a slave, and now, he could live a better life.
“Where to go… where to start…”
The question was a heavy one. He had no money…
Point of correction: he had a piece of stone, which he heard people call a spirit stone. Holding it filled his veins with energy. He also heard the elders call it money.
So he picked a direction and went.
He appeared in the city of orcs, where humans are treated as equals, for Byrmrr is a world of many races, and the humans and the orcs are allies.
He entered a store and bought clothes. He paid with the stone, and after 30 minutes, he was returned a sizable pouch of money as balance.
He left and, using his cleverness, managed to get to a human continent, which took him three months and half of his money.
He blended in.
Then, one day, he heard the phrase, “The Genesis Light Sect is recruiting mortals having the talent for cultivation.”
That was all they said. But he went for it.
The minimum requirement was to have a Copper-grade spirit root.
The Genesis Light Sect recorded their 13th Platinum-grade spirit root disciple that day.
Jest was fortunate. He was a genius with a clean slate.
He was chosen by an Elder who was a swordsman, and since then, Jest started walking the path of the sword under the guidance of his master.
His cultivation talent was the best. He managed to rise through the ranks much faster, and his comprehension speed was also so great that within a couple of years, he became a Sword Grandmaster.
It was one of the best moments one could ask for. Jest was the person; he was the most talented. Even his master paled in comparison.
His talent with the sword was impeccable.
But the Sword Saint stage was the furthest he could go after five years. That was the extent of the knowledge available. The primitive sword path his master gave him could only take him to the Saint stage.
Rumour had it that the strongest path available could only go as far as the Sword King stage. So he was stuck.
His talent was being wasted. He tried for four more years, but he could not gain any form of understanding of how to progress.
So, he was depressed and didn’t know how to move forward.
Until he said to himself, “I will create my own path, and just like how I scaled the wall of death, I will take this to the peak. I will name it the Genesis Sword Path, for this will be the first path to the pinnacle of the Sword Dao.”
Kent woke up inside the Tower feeling different…