Elder Cultivator

Different combinations of opponents kept Timothy on his toes. He was limited in his choices mainly by those who wouldn’t have destructive interference with each other, attacking a single human sized target. Powerful cultivators were sometimes capable of great precision, but unleashing their powers wasn’t always that neat and tidy. Anyone who specialized in wide area attacks wouldn’t be that relevant for Timothy to battle alone, though he often used his abilities to protect others, and group battles would be relevant later.

Once he figured out what he was missing. He felt like he was getting closer to something, but he might have been fooling himself.

Tauno’s spear struck Timothy’s shield- which he had accomplished by twisting his arm behind himself. If he turned his whole body, the other cultivator inevitably managed to redirect his attacks. As for why striking the shield mattered, Timothy was much more experienced with creating the rebound force there. The wild man went flying off into the distance as his own attack forced him back.

Relying on a shield to create a counterforce might be a limitation that Timothy should deal with. If he could get one of sufficient quality it might still be relevant against Domination cultivators, but against weaker cultivators he could likely manage without. Timothy didn’t think that was the insight he was looking for, however.

A dozen sharp rings struck him from every direction, rolling around his body. Zazil’s attacks didn’t rely on impact force, and thus it was difficult to push them away. Quick flickers of his weapon dealt with them for a moment, but they’d strike again when he left another opening.

Then his sword stabbed towards his third opponent. He struck a flat barrier that could have rivaled his previous defenses. Vari angled it such that his attack didn’t completely break through, then counterattacked, kicking him in the hip. Her own attacks were decent, but nothing that could faze his current state.

“That doesn’t really mean anything,” Timothy said. “You’d be dead before that attack hit.”

Vari shrugged. “Maybe you should actually break my barrier then.”

“You’d collapse shortly into the spar, then.”

“If you hold back against others, you’re only going to give opportunities to actually defeat you,” Vari grumbled.

“I understand that,” Timothy agreed. “But this is training.”

Tauno’s presence had disappeared a few moments prior, which meant he was doubtless about to attack. Timothy evened out his defensive energy, preparing to reflow it towards wherever he was targeted.

Vari lunged forward, but instead of attacking formed the corner of a cube with three flat barriers. That was at the same time Zazil’s rings reached Timothy, leaving him nowhere to dodge. His energy easily absorbed the cutting surfaces, but a spear stabbed towards him from his rear, aiming through Vari’s barrier which faded as his attack came.

Timothy had underestimated their speed. Tauno’s spear struck and… that was it. The bone weapon lost its momentum immediately upon touching him. The man pulled back, sighing. “Come on, you could at least try. It’s disheartening to launch a full powered sneak attack and get no response.”

“That’s…” Timothy frowned. “I was serious. And that attack should have at least punctured my diluted defenses.” Timothy folded his arms, recalling the moment. He’d been thinking about resisting all of Zazil’s blades, focusing on defense. He hadn’t reacted to Tauno, certainly, but that was because he had been thrown off guard… and already felt adequately defended.

Spread evenly around his body, the small fraction of his energy that should have met Tauno’s attack should have been overcome, as the difference between Domination and Augmentation wasn’t endless. It just felt like it, and Timothy had one reason why. Or at least why it would be true for him.

He recalled back to his advancement. The core of the Scarlet Alliance had been- at the behest of himself and Catarina- bombarding the solar platform that they were forming into an anchor. The process had amplified the barrier to nearly impossible levels, but even after he had completed his advancement and gained conscious control he still blocked everything, from all angles.

Timothy himself wasn’t a formation master, but he’d picked up more than a few things from his wife. Formations were meant to be efficient about distributing their energy, but one way barrier formations could be overcome was by attacking many points at once, either overwhelming their output or overloading their capacity to redistribute defensive energy. With sufficient power that hardly mattered, but it had to far outscale everything coming at it.

That fit what was happening during his advancement, but afterwards? Even if the attacks came with the intent that it would be absorbed, they were still serious. Something should have slipped through even the energy of a Domination cultivator, wherever it was weakest. Even if it the energy was perfectly distributed, a series of powerful attack on one location should have had some effect.

He knew he would have been overwhelmed eventually, but he hadn’t felt any particular weaknesses. Rather than having his energy distributed throughout, it had been more like all of his output was at every point.

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That didn’t necessarily line up with Zaur’s abilities, but it rang true to Timothy. And just because his abilities manifested in a particular way didn’t mean others would function the same.

But he had to test it to be certain of his theory.

“I don’t want you to take offense,” Timothy said. “But I want you to try to strike me at maximum power. I don’t intend to respond.”

Tauno looked at him. “Fine. But don’t blame me if you lose an arm.”

“The two of you as well,” Timothy said. “Just so I can be certain of something.”

Zazil nodded. Her rings pulled back, forming a sphere around him with room for Vari and Tauno. The latter pulled back to a great distance, then charged forward with his spear, picking up speed. Vari’s own attack wasn’t going to be much on its own, but Timothy knew she could provide counterforce to Tauno’s attack, forcing him to take the full brunt of the attack without letting the energy dissipate.

He stood firm, unmoving. But he called upon his power with all seriousness. He needed his defensive energy not to be evenly distributed around him, but to be everywhere all at once. An omnidirectional defense… if he wasn’t mistaken about how it could work.

Timothy was at not risk of losing an arm, mainly because Taunto was aiming for his center of mass. He might have his sternum split open and his stomach pierced through, but the attack was low enough that it shouldn’t destroy his heart.

True to his word, he didn’t do anything to redistribute his energy, simply calling upon that feeling of the first time… and this most recent moment where he’d not been thinking about it. He felt the impact force, but three Augmentation cultivators together had less power output than he did. Their attacks were negated just as much as if they had all chosen to attack Timothy’s shield with his full might concentrated on it.

Excellent. Now he needed to see how far he could spread that. It might be a bit ambitious to defend a whole planet or fleet at once just yet, but if he could take over the defenses for a few key people, it could greatly influence their strategy.

He also needed to make certain he could maintain a perfect defense while separating a portion of his energy for counterattacks. It should be possible, since it didn’t feel much more difficult to maintain that state than to constantly shift his energy around. In fact, it was even more natural- though it did require a constant output of energy.

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The system Anton was currently headed towards had dangers of some sort, though little was known about them as the scout had been almost immediately destroyed upon entering the system. All they had was a report while they were approaching the system about high natural energy and active usage.

It could easily be a cultivator inhabited system, and Anton wouldn’t blame them for taking out a foreign entity. A bit rude, maybe, but the lower realms had more than a few reasons to be paranoid about visitors.

Either way, it was deemed unsafe for exploration, but that also made it unsafe to leave alone. Anton thought he would most likely be safe, but more importantly he could get a decent picture of what was going on without getting close. His long distance senses were the best anyone had. Anton would bet on that, even counting the upper realms. Though of course, if someone in the upper realms took exception to his claims there wasn’t much they could do about it.

He had recently finished his stay with Maheg and was looking forward to further exploration. If there were people, he wanted to ensure there would be peace. And if it was something else, it was certainly worth studying.

From two systems away, he could feel it. The star itself was a blue giant, so he had a vague sense of it from significantly further away- but the system itself was visibly more full of natural energy than others from such a distance. That usually indicated planets with life, to retain the natural energy.

It took several more days before Anton was actually on approach to the system itself- space was big after all- but he was beginning to sense more details.

Most notable was that he didn’t sense any sort of formations around the system. That meant that whatever had destroyed the scout had merely stumbled across it. That implied a significant population.

Anton was able to confirm the early details of the report that it was occupied and quite active. In fact, rather than simply congregating around the planets Anton felt energy moving throughout the whole system. Were there interplanetary structures? That didn’t feel quite right, but he couldn’t place it until he got closer.

Massive beasts populated the system. Not distortion beasts, but instead the normal sort that seemed to dwell among standard dimensionality… if more accustomed to vacuum than Anton would have expected. Regardless of their origin, some were as large as Ascension-class battleships, and if Anton wasn’t reading them wrong they might be similarly powerful. Some of them might even be able to match Paradise.

There were smaller beasts, too- he merely noticed the most significant figures first. They too filled the area between planets, while many more seemed to dwell on the surface of any planet or moon in the system.

Before he was even inside the system, Anton witnessed numerous battles among the beasts. It would be impossible to sustain beasts of such size and quantity without great power in the system, but Anton suspected that there were even more specimens smaller in quantity.

He wondered if this was what those who life-seeded Akrys had wanted. Unlike Akrys, however, the beasts here were nor direct corollaries to common animals. Still, keeping that in mind Anton had to consider that they had their own thoughts. If he accepted sapience in cute animals, he had to accept it in more foul looking ones- and he didn’t just mean the deep sea residents of Akrys.

So far, he had no evidence either way for sapience or lack of it. He expected intelligence, as that was a key to survival, but whether it extended beyond that couldn’t be known. He approached cautiously.

The first thing that happened as he was beginning to enter the system proper was an ambush by hundreds of dart-like creatures that appeared from seemingly nowhere. The closest Anton could compare them to would be small swordfish, if said fish could swim in space. Either way, their stealth skills were exceptional considering they had nothing to hide behind.

Star Steps instantly accelerated Anton out of their central ambush zone, but they quickly turned to follow him. Anton prepared to defend himself, projecting an aura of danger. He hoped they would respond with something beyond aggression, but their response bordered more on hunger.

It would be a fight, then. Avoiding killing them would be difficult, but until he knew more he was going to err on the side of safety.