An Exclusive Contract
Caught.
Something's off here.
She tilted her head again. Ryu Yeonhwa was not the sort of person who could leave a nagging doubt alone.
Spiritual power rose within her, and her eyes shone blue. The power of the True Eye Art—a technique for scrutinizing objects—swept over the talisman in exhaustive detail.
It was an utterly common Might Talisman, and talismans of that kind were easy enough to grade by color. She had thought nothing of it at first.
What… is this?
The moment she finished examining it, Ryu Yeonhwa's eyes flew wide with shock. The blue light in them deepened until her pupils vanished altogether.
Is this structure even possible?
The government's Appraisal Division. Their work was to observe an object and assign it a price. Cultivators who served there inevitably walked the Path of Myriad Phenomena.
Ryu Yeonhwa had studied the foundations of every cultivator's craft at university—Basic Talisman Studies, Basic Qi Refinement Studies, Basic Pill Dao Studies, Basic Formation Dao Studies, and a host of other miscellaneous disciplines.
She could draw low-grade talismans herself without difficulty. That was precisely why she understood how absurd this one was, and how special the person who had drawn it had to be.
It was not a matter of elegant lines or antique-looking script characters. The structure was unmistakably the lowest grade—and yet the power it displayed was low-grade. A complete contradiction. As her eyes followed the talisman pathways that formed the thing, Ryu Yeonhwa squeezed them shut.
I can't make sense of it.
She could grasp the interactions among the basic components. What she could not grasp was why those interactions produced a result like this. It was like watching someone build a one-kilometer skyscraper out of children's toy blocks.
She could see why it worked.
She just had no idea why it worked.
But of one thing she was certain.
A genius…!
Ryu Yeonhwa's emotions soared. Her eyes sparkled.
The cultivation world was crawling with talents like Ryu Yeonhwa.
They broke through into the Qi Refinement Stage before the age of ten, enrolled in elite cultivation academies with acceptance rates of a thousand to one, entered first-rate universities staffed by Foundation Establishment professors, and earned doctorates by the dozens.
Even so, they were only the top 0.5 percent—two hundred fifty thousand out of fifty million. And even that number was crushed each year beneath the next fifty million born.
But a true genius was vanishingly rare. Fireflies never envy the sun. Before a sky beyond the sky, they can only feel a helpless awe.
Tap-tap-tap.
Ryu Yeonhwa's fingers flew. She erased the 6,200 credits written in the field and entered 10,000 instead.
[Uh…?]
Bewildered characters bloomed across the scroll as Nain registered his confusion. Watching him, Ryu Yeonhwa's eyes curved into crescent moons.
"Nain, have you by any chance heard of an exclusive contract?"
An exclusive contract.
It was an agreement struck between a government official and an independent cultivator—someone who belonged to no clan and no sect.
Clan cultivators worked for their families; sect cultivators carried out their sects' missions. In either case, they never had to fuss over the mundane details of buying and selling. Great powers—clans, sects, corporations—all maintained their own internal markets for that purpose.
Independent cultivators had no such luxury. They sold their wares only to the government or on the private market. In exchange for convenience and time, government personnel took a modest commission and a boost to their performance record.
An exclusive contract with a government agent simply made the whole arrangement smoother.
"…Do you understand?"
From across the desk, Ryu Yeonhwa—neat suit, stylish monocle—waited for an answer. Nain nodded.
He knew the rough outline. An exclusive contract was practically a badge of success for an independent cultivator. Ryu Yeonhwa had not spelled it out, but she would never offer such a thing to just anyone.
Of course Nain was thrilled.
If I sign an exclusive contract, I won't even have to visit the Two-Sided Cultivation World anymore. I can just send everything to this person and be done with it.
Convenience and less hassle—those were fine on their own. What truly delighted him, though, was the simple fact that he would no longer need to go outside.
This is so much harder than I expected…
He had badly underestimated this body. He had thought he could at least manage in a virtual world—and yet two hours of moving around had left him like this.
If he could, he would burrow under the blankets this instant and hide for a week. No sunlight. Just rolling around all day.
There was the small problem of how a cultivator was supposed to train like that, but was that really a problem?
I'll just put the bed in the training room!
A stroke of pure genius. Admiring his own brilliance, Nain nodded along to everything Ryu Yeonhwa said. He lifted his eyes just enough to glance at her.
She's pretty, too… and she looks incredibly diligent…
"…Then."
[I'll take the contract.]
Nain scrawled his signature across the document she held out. Naturally he had read every clause with care. Exhausted or not, you did not get careless about things like that.
Nothing wrong with it.
An exclusive contract was not a heavy commitment to begin with. Either party could dissolve it at any time. Most simply never bothered, because both sides found the arrangement so convenient.
…And on a personal level, Nain already liked Ryu Yeonhwa a great deal.
She did throw in an extra 3,800 credits, after all.
He knew a goodwill gesture when he saw one. As expected of someone who looked so sharp—even the way she showed her sincerity was elegant.
Softly—
The contract bearing both their names sparked and vanished into the air. Ryu Yeonhwa bowed her head.
"The contract is complete. May you achieve great things upon the path of cultivation."
Nain tugged at Powo.
Flutter~
Understanding, Powo wrote across its own body with a soft rustling sound, looking thoroughly put-upon.
[Thank you!]
Nain stared at it, fascinated.
Where did this little thing even come from?
He had only been digging through his pocket for a talisman when his fingers brushed something oddly soft and familiar. He pulled—and out came Powo, lazily flapping along for the ride.
Did it get dragged into the virtual world with me because I'm its user?
No idea. Nain shrugged and tugged Powo toward Ryu Yeonhwa again in farewell. He did not meet her eyes, of course. Too terrifying.
[Well then, I'll be going.]
He stood. He wanted nothing more than to get back to his room and lock himself away for a month.
Seeing this, Ryu Yeonhwa rose in a hurry.
"Please feel free to contact me anytime, Nain! I'll appraise anything for you—even odds and ends!"
[Yes.]
As he answered, Nain flicked his thumb lightly.
This was Depth 1 of the Two-Sided Cultivation World. The deeper layers were nearly indistinguishable from reality—but in a place this shallow, a simple trigger was enough to leave.
Snap!
His consciousness surged upward with the click of his fingers.
And then—
"Wh-what?"
Nain found himself staring up into a pair of inorganic yellow eyes.
Jet-black hair, and pupils of bright yellow in stark contrast. A girl with a sharp, striking gaze was wearing an uncharacteristically flustered expression. Her raised eyes narrowed as they settled on him.
"…Oppa?"
"Eeeek!"
He should have said something—anything. Instead, only a stupid noise spilled from Nain's mouth. The inevitable fate of a shut-in who had come face-to-face with another human in the real world with zero preparation.
"Uh… uhh…"
Nineteen years old. Current realm: Peak of the Qi Refinement Stage. Affiliation: the Golden Elixir sect known as the Nine Heavens Thunder Sword Sect.
A dual spiritual root cultivator born with a Thunder Spiritual Root mutated from Metal and Wood roots. A genius who had completed five of the Seven Tribulations of Foundation Establishment and was preparing for the sixth. Decia rode an aerial taxi toward the outskirts of Future Special City.
"It'd be faster to just walk."
She muttered the complaint, but she knew better. If every cultivator tore across the sky whenever they pleased, traffic would collapse in no time. Unrestricted flight was a privilege reserved for Foundation Establishment and above.
Tap.
Decia stepped down from the aerial taxi and looked around.
"It's been a while since I was last here."
She walked the alley with familiar steps.
Compared to the central district where she currently lived, this zone was hopelessly run-down. The spiritual energy density was abysmal, and murky qi drifted through the air. None of the surrounding buildings rose higher than fifteen floors.
Even so, Decia strolled as though savoring the scenery, and before long she stopped in front of one particular building.
[Naeil Building 1]
A multi-purpose apartment, fourteen stories high, one household per floor. Decia punched in the front-door code with practiced ease and stepped inside.
[Floor 14]
The top floor of the apartment.
Arms folded in the elevator, Decia sank into memory with a complicated look on her face.
"…Is he still stuck here? My poor oppa."
Every child in the nurturing period underwent a first selection at the age of five. Spiritual root holders who passed spent a year being educated in the "Facility," then returned to live with their guardians for another two years.
Then came age eight. Once they were old enough for basic schooling, every child of the nurturing period left their guardian's home for good. This place was the house Nain and Decia had bought together with Eun Seolhwa's support.
Back then, Decia had adored Nain more than anything.
"…We didn't even live here two full years, did we?"
Ding.
The elevator chimed, and Decia stepped out to stand before the front door.
She hesitated a moment, then steeled herself and pressed the numbers into the door lock.
[0910]
Simply the ninth—Nine—and the tenth—Decem—strung together.
Beep-beep.
The lock released, and the door swung open. Decia stepped hesitantly into the entryway, slipped off her shoes, and walked into the living room.
"Haaa…"
Familiar air. Familiar sights. Drawing in a breath of warm memory, Decia turned her gaze to the capsule humming against the living room wall.
And then—
"Wh-what?"
"…Oppa?"
She found her old older brother, transformed into a state she could never have imagined. Decia's expression crumbled.
