A Thunderseed Pearl the size of a thumbnail. A prayer fan painted with cranes that smelled faintly of sandalwood and old rain.

Every hand presented gifts with more care after confirming themselves that Fang Chen possessed the legendary Void Emperor Bloodline.

The banquet thinned into quieter pockets of talk. Music softened. Lanterns burned down to amber cores. Victor drifted to the terrace to breathe cooler air, only to be hooked by the sleeve and tugged between two moonlit cypresses.

Xuan Qing had swapped formal brocade for an ink-dark jacket and a silk ribbon tying back her hair. Her eyes were star-bright, daring and soft all at once. "Close your eyes," she commanded.

"Why?" Victor questioned.

She pouted in response. He let out a sigh and decided to compromise.

After closing his eyes for a few seconds, she told him to open them again.

Victor did as he was told and and spotted what seemed like a ribbon in her hands.

Only, it wasn't a ribbon. It was a thin length of silk bound around a bead of milky jade carved with tiny arrow marks like the ones that appeared on his skin when he called his void blood.

"I made it," she voiced with a sudden shyness. "It's ugly but you're not allowed to say so."

"It's perfect," he voiced with a tone of gratitude.

She stepped closer, tied it at his wrist with slow, careful fingers, and then stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.

The touch was warm and bold. She lingered one heartbeat longer than bravery required, then hopped back with pink face and sparkling eyes. "One day," she blurted, "I hope I can try the other cheek. Or—well—"

He laughed softly. "You're incorrigible."

"I am," she voiced with a delighted tone and then fled, vanishing into the palace like a moonbeam chased by a cloud.

He touched the bead. "Did an NPC just fall for me?" he murmured, amused at himself for using the word as if it meant anything here, where the lines blurred in ways he never quite wanted to examine.

He spent the night in a guest pavilion that smelled faintly of clove and cedar.

In the morning, he collected his new trinkets and scrolls and all the other gifts before returning to Violet Spring with the sun high and the city bright beneath him.

The sect felt different. Curiosity had turned to welcome. NPC disciples bowed with open smiles, and even the players who were easy to spot by their in game names floating above their heads, sidled up with friendly audacity.

"You're Fang Chen, right? The grove guy? We're putting a team together for the Black Briar outskirts—need someone who won't die."

"Any chance you'd look at my footwork? I can't get the second beat to sit under the breath—"

"We've got a shard-hunt in the Moonbright Caves. You in?"

What Victor didn't know is that he had become quite the hot topic, not just in the sect but even outside. The name Fang Chan wasn't unfamiliar to gamers in Blue Flame city anymore.

If he walked around during the day more, he would have noticed this but because he had been copped up inside of his core disciple courtyard for the past few months, he never knew.

He didn't overpromise. He shook hands, traded a few tips, added a couple of player tags to his friends list. "Next time," he told them honestly. "I have something I need to do first."

Minutes later, he arrived at the Missions Hall... a quiet building of honeyed wood and transparent paper screens.

A steward recognized him and, with a flustered bow, guided him past the general boards to a small chamber with a single table and a lacquered drawer.

Inside lay a slate of core disciple missions. They were fewer than he expected and heavier than they looked.

He skimmed through them:

mediate a border dispute between minor clans

eradicate a blood-leech hive in the southern marsh

retrieve a lost heirloom from a haunted pagoda where the floors remember the last battle and replay it nightly.

Then one line caught his attention: "Supervise and safeguard a team of new Violet Spring disciples in the Glassstep Wilds. Purpose: experience, minor bottleneck breaking. Threats: mid-tier spirit beasts, opportunistic bandit companies, terrain anomalies."

The moment he saw it, he was instantly interested.

There were still areas he hadn't explored in the outskirts of Blueflame and he believed this particular mission could also be beneficial to him.

He signed the slate. The steward exhaled as if he'd been holding his breath since dawn and stamped the mission seal.

"When do they leave?" Victor asked.

"Two weeks," the steward stated. "They're green, but eager. They'll need a firm hand."

Victor nodded. "They'll get one."

...

...

Victor kept his head down for two days, doing nothing but cultivating.

He logged out after wards and returned his focus to the real world.

Today was Wednesday so morning routine was water based. He had weights on his waist as he cut through the academy's river pool while beam traps scribbled sizzling lines under the surface.

He slipped between them out of habit, already becoming quite skilled in swimming.

As usual, there was only one warrior lecture slotted in for today due to the ongoing Outland excursions.

It had been like this for weeks but Victor was just glad that his punishment was ending in two days which meant, he could finally do the one thing he'd waiting a month for...

...

...

Friday came by in the blink of an eye and as usual, Victor focused on morning routine and lectures.

Time flowed by very fast and another batch happened to return today so everywhere was pretty rowdy.

However, Victor didn't listen to their stories on the Outland excursions this time. His mind was only focused on one thing as he waited for the day to come to an end.

Half the auditorium buzzed about sectors and rumored routes; the other half compared loadouts like kids trading cards.

When the bell chimed and the instructor dismissed them early, Victor didn't drift toward his dorm or the feedhubs.

He veered towards the administrative tower.

"S-rank perks here I come!" He voiced excitedly as he made his way there.

Now that his punishment had ended... it also meant that he could finally get the perks of being number two in the entire awakened academy.

He nearly drooled while thinking about the S ranked perks that included private quarters, personal training chambers, med bay cubby, access to personal instructors, one million monthly credits and a bunch of other things.

He wanted the training chamber, and he really wanted the soundproofing.

The clerk at Housing glanced up, did a double take, and then recovered into professional neutral. "Congratulations on your… upgrade," she voiced while staring at him with a look of curiosity. "However, according to your student files, you're listed as B-ranked. It would seem that it hasn't been upsated yet... We'll need your student file to reflect S-tier before we release a private suite to you."

"Oh come on... why does everything always have to be the opposite of straightforward," Victor grumbled.

"Documentation and Processing can push the update... just head there and let them know."

"On it," Victor didn't let this kill his enthusiasm.

He proceeded to head to Documentation and Processing on the higher floors.

Documentation smelled faintly of ozone and mugwort from the mana scrubbers. Counters, screens, runic badges on lanyards, the whole ritual.

He queued and waited... apparently, a bunch of students were here for a variety of reasons.

He did his best to maintain a positive outlook, hoping that nothing would ruin today for him.

When it was his turn, a balding tech with a sharp nose waved him to a chair and swung a scanner over a dark card in Victor's possession.

"Name, cohort, camp."

"Victor Revenant, first-year, Camp 11."

The tech's brows rose. Everyone knew the name now, which was annoying.

He typed anyway, bringing up Victor's information. "S rank privileges, yet to he implemented... data to be updated..." he muttered. "Baseline scan, mana profile, system sync."

Victor reclined as sliding bands of light swept across his sternum, his temples, the inside of his wrists. Lines of data scrolled and then stopped.

"Awakened System level..."

Then the cursor blinked and the screen threw up a gray box.

DATA INCONCLUSIVE

The tech frowned. "Huh."

More humming rang out as the lines of light scanned once more.

A second wand tapped his forearm, drawing a globule of blood into a little crystal reservoir. The runes flared, seeking signatures that weren't there.

"Awakened System Level..."

DATA INCONCLUSIVE

"This… weren't you the same kid from the first day of registration?" The man suddenly recalled that there was a kid he asked to return for rescan over three months ago. "This isn't the first time this is happening, is it?"

"Something like that," Victor voiced with a blank face.

He was starting to realize that this might be a problem... there was no way this light thing would be able to find out his system level because he didn't have one...

"We can't finalize S-tier without a confirmed level," the man murmured while turning to face the screen.