Sambil mencari panduan dalam hal ini, dan mempertimbangkan prinsip-prinsipnya sendiri, karena tidak pernah secara khusus fokus pada satu hal, namun sangat unggul dalam banyak hal, Lex telah berkonsultasi dengan Qawan dan Anita. Tidak heran menemukan bahwa Qawain hanya memiliki satu tenet, yaitu 'Jalan Gua'. Frasa literal itu seluruhnya adalah tenetnya, sesuatu yang Qawain utung secara terbuka, meskipun Lex memahami bahwa biasanya bukan jenis informasi yang mudah dibagi.
Memandang Qawain hanya memiliki dua semangat utama dalam hidupnya, yaitu seni bela diri dengan gua dan Anita, tidak heran demikian.
Yang heran adalah tenet Anita. Ia memiliki tenet dari penyelamatan, pedoman, perlindungan, kepemimpinan, tekad, dan kebaikan. Jika Lex tidak mengetahui lebih baik, Ia seakan-akan menggoda dia.
Namun Anita memberi latar belakang mengapa ia memilih tenet-teenya itu. Di planet tempat Anita berasal—yang Lex pada akhirnya tidak benar-benar tahu dan tidak pernah mengunjunginya—Ia adalah orang yang memimpin manusia dari hari-hari mereka sebagai orang kembang basah. Ia membantu ras tersebut berdiri, dan ketika Ia melihat bahwa mereka akan tanpamu tanpa kehadiranmu, menemukan cara untuk mengubah ras manusia itu menjadi lich sehingga Ia dapat memimpin manusia lebih lama.
Namun semua hal yang baik harus berakhir, dan pada vaksina ketika waktunya tiba, Ia pergi dan menitih manusia untuk merawatnya sendiri. Ia memiliki kehidupan baru sekarang, dan lebih dari itu, Ia saat ini sangat senang dengan pilihannya. Bahkan cinta untuk menjadi sahaya sebesar itu hanya menegaskan keputusan tenet-teenya tersebut.
Mungkin ibu-hati dan insting maternitas mungkin lebih baik sebagai tenet, tetapi tidak ada gunanya membahas hal ini sekarang. Tenet tidak bisa diubah. Bahkan John, yang telah kehilangan kultivasinya secara total, akan memperoleh tenet yang sama yang ia kehilangan bila pernah kembali ke level Earth Immortal.
Satu, alasan akhir mengapa memilih tenet yang tepat sangat penting adalah bukan hanya karena secara literal memengaruhi kekuatan dan status dalam realm abadi, tetapi bahwa realm yang sedang tumbuh di realm abadi tidak lagi tentang menyerap energi.
Ya, masih ada elemen dari hal itu, tetapi ia mendapat aspek baru untuk dihadapi, yang adalah pemahaman terhadap hukum. Semakin sejarah dengan prinsip-prinsipnya sendiri, dan bisa memahami kompleksitas di balik berbagai hukum, atau mungkin hanya satu hukum tertentu, semakin tinggi pula kultivasinya.
Tanpa pemahaman, menyerap energi akan menjadi pekerjaan yang sia-sia, dan tanpa energi yang diserap, tidak ada cara untuk menerapkan konsep-konsep baru tersebut.
Dengan tekanan yang sangat menekan pada keputusan tunggal itu, Lex telah memikirkannya dengan panjang lebar. Wajar jika sebagai tendensi awalnya, Ia memikirkannya dengan comedic langkah-langkah yang berbeda, seperti memilih tenet kapitalisme.
Meskipun pemikiran itu tentatif sebagai lelucon, Ia mengarahkan ia untuk mempertimbangkannya selama minggu-minggu. Baik ia mau mengakui atau tidak, jika ia menjadi lebih kapitalistik, tanpa peduli pada pengaruhnya terhadap sisa alam semesta, Ia pasti dapat memperluas Midnight Inn dengan lebih cepat.
Ia telah memikirkannya dengan tenet lava, pertahanan, serangan, dan banyak lagi. Ia juga telah mempertimbangkan untuk menyiapkan diri pada jalan keuntungan. Tentu saja, tanpa kekuatan, Ia akan kehilangan segala yang telah diraihnya.
Ia tidak ingin membuat keputusan dengan ringan. Namun kini, lebih dari sebelumnya, Ia terlahir pada pemikiran menjulang ke arah kekuatan. Di balik sanadernya, Ia menyadari bahwa Ia sudah membuat keputusan. Ia hanya membiarkan diri menerima beberapa, pergerakan akhir refleksi sebelum menematkan beban itu pada diri sendiri.
Empat puluh enam jam yang direncanakan untuk perjalanan itu terbang lebih cepat daripada yang pernah Ia rasakan, dan ketika Lex membuka matanya, kapal sudah berada dalam Trial of Eternity.
Momen itu telah tiba, dan Ia menyadari bahwa Ia tidak dapat kembali. Ini akan menjadi momen penentu bagi Lex, bukan karena Ia menjadi abadi. Tidak, justru karena segala yang Ia lalui sebelum ini, baik mendapatkan Inn, memesan tamu pertamanya, mendapatkan hadiah yang luar biasa, menemukan sistem kultivasi yang menakjubkan, berkembang menjadi sangat kuat, menerima nasihat panduan, semuanya itu melalui pengaruh eksternal.
Itu bukan untuk mengatakan bahwa Lex tidak pernah membuat keputusan sendiri—Ia telah. Tetapi dalam kebanyakan hal, Ia hanya bereaksi terhadap sebuah masalah, berusaha memecahkannya. Ini akan menjadi pertama kalinya Ia membuat keputusan sendiri, bertindak untuk secara proaktif menangguhkan banyak masalah, dan mengambil alih arah dari hidupnya.
Ia berdiri, dan aura-nya secara alami menjadi lebih tajam dan mematikan daripada sebelumnya. Tanpa suara, seal keduanya mengalami pergulatan, dan Ia menyentuh seal ketiganya yang menyelimuti pakainya. Waktunya telah mendekati.
Satu per satu, para penumpang lain dalam kapal dikirim, hingga akhirnya tiba pada giliran Lex. Saat Ia muncul di lokasinya baru, Ia dikelilingi oleh kelam total, juis suitnya sangat cocok untuk menyamar. Ia bisa telah sepenuhnya tak terdeteksi jika memilih untuk bersembunyi, tetapi Ia tidak.
targeting him.
While seeking guidance in this regard, and considering his own tenets, since he hadn't really specialized in any one thing, but excelled in many, he had consulted Qawan and Anita. It was not at all a surprise to find that Qawain only had one tenet, which was 'The way of the Sword'. That literal, entire phrase was his tenet, something he shared openly, though Lex understood that usually it was not the kind of information one divulged easily.
Considering that Qawain only had two passions in life, swordsmanship and Anita, it was not surprising at all.
What was surprising were Anita's tenets. She had the tenets of nurturing, guidance, protection, leadership, perseverance and kindness. If Lex hadn't known any better, then he would have thought she was messing with him.
But Anita gave him the background of why she had chosen those as her tenets. On the planet she was from, which Lex to this day did not actually know nor had he visited, she was the one who led humans from their early days as cavemen. She brought that whole race out and helped them stand on their feet, and when she could see that they would be hopeless without her, found a way to change her race from human to lich so that she could lead humans for even longer.
But all good things must end, and there eventually came a time when she left the humans to fend for themselves. She had a new life now, and she was more than happy with it currently. In fact, she loved being a mother so much that it only reaffirmed her choices of the tenets she selected.
Perhaps motherhood and maternal instincts would have better served her as tenets, but there was no point in bringing it up now. Tenets could not be changed. Even John, who had lost his cultivation entirely, would regain the same tenets he lost if he were to ever return to the Earth Immortal level.
One, final reason why selecting the right tenets was exceptionally important was because not only did it literally affect one's strength and standing within the immortal realm, but that growing realms in the immortal realms was no longer about absorbing energy.
Sure, there was still an element of that, but it gained a new aspect to it, which was comprehension of laws. The more one was in sync with their tenets, and could comprehend the complexity behind various laws, or maybe even just one law, the higher their cultivation would rise.
Without comprehension, absorbing energy would be fruitless work, and without absorbed energy, there would be no way to put those new comprehensions into practice.
With so much pressure put onto a single decision, Lex had thought long and hard about it. Naturally, as was his tendency, he thought of various comedic tenets he could take, such as the tenet of capitalism.
Although that thought started out as a joke, it led him into contemplating it for weeks. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, if he became more capitalistic, without regard for his influence on the rest of the universe, he could definitely expand the Midnight Inn at an accelerated rate.
He'd thought about the tenet of lava, of defense, of attack, and many more. He had also thought about setting himself up on the path to supremacy. After all, without strength, he would lose everything he had gained.
It was not a decision he wanted to make lightly. Yet now, more than ever, he was attracted to the thought of it. He and his siblings would not have suffered if his parents had just been a little stronger.
He would not be scampering around, plotting conspiracies just to come face to face with the man who used his sister if he was much stronger. He was certain that he would face many more challenges, personal and for his Inn in the coming future, and without strength all of them would become meaningless.
All it would take was one strong enemy who took him by surprise, and everything would be over. The kind of tenet he would pick would naturally influence him as well. They would shape how he thought, how he acted, literally how he perceived the universe. It was a single decision, and its repercussions would follow him for the rest of his life.
Yet now, more than ever, Lex was leaning more and more towards the pursuit of power. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he knew that he had already made a decision. He was just allowing himself these few, final moments of thought and contemplation before he adorned that weight onto himself.
The ninety six hours that the journey was supposed to take flew by faster than ever before, and when Lex opened his eyes, the ship was already within the Trial of Eternity.
The moment was upon him, and he knew he could back out no more. This would be a defining moment for Lex, not because he was becoming an immortal. No, instead it was because everything he had been through before this, whether it was getting the Inn, bagging his first guest, getting an amazing reward, finding an overpowered cultivation system, growing ridiculously strong, receiving guiding advice, all of it, each to a certain degree was through external influences.
That was not to say that Lex had not made his own decisions - he had. But in most things, he was just reacting to a problem, trying to resolve it. This would be the first time he was making his own decision, acting to preemptively negate many problems, and take control over the direction of his life.
He stood up, and his aura naturally became even more honed and deadly than it was before. Silently, his second seal unraveled, and he touched his third seal from over his clothes. The time was nigh.
One by one, the various passengers on the ship were sent out until it was eventually Lex's turn. When he appeared in his new location, he was surrounded by complete darkness, his suit blending in perfectly. He could have been completely undetected if he chose to hide, but he did not.
targeting him.
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