Theron walked into a room with somber lighting, Peak Elder Lotus by his side. Up ahead, the slumped back of an old woman stood.

Grand Elder Macie—or rather, now, Matriarch Macie—stood in silence, seemingly not noticing their presence.

Theron's pupils constricted.

BANG.

It was too late to react, a withered hand taking his throat a moment later, causing his feet to dangle in the air, unable to gain any purchase.

There was a convoluted, contradictory, dull sharpness in the Matriarch's eyes. It was like she had both lost her mind and yet was entirely focused on a singular task at the same time.

Her gaze landed on the spatial ring on Theron's finger and she grasped it with her free hand, ripping it off. In a flashing instant, her mind had already run through it all, her Third Eye brazenly flooding over Theron's body at the same time. But…

She found nothing at all.

There were a few golden coins. The wealth was more than a Silver Mancer should have, but not substantial enough to raise greed in even mid-tier Gold Mancers. The weapons were bland and uninteresting, though surprisingly of the Gold Resonance. And even the cultivation techniques in a corner were almost bold in their level of mundane.

Theron's body itself didn't seem to have anything else of interest on it.

Matriarch Macie's sharpness dimmed along with the rest of her momentum. She let Theron go, and he barely caught himself before he fell to a knee.

She turned away, walking back to her position staring out into the darkness.

"You can give him a Core Disciple position. If he can fight for it, he can stay."

She didn't say another word after this.

Peak Elder Lotus looked toward Theron, feeling one part embarrassed and one part resigned. This was the world of cultivation—the strong could do as they pleased. He could only hope that Theron understood not to overstep his bounds.

To his surprise, though, he didn't need to shush Theron. Theron only looked at his spatial ring that now lay on the ground, nodded, and then turned to leave.

Peak Elder Lotus frowned. Why was Theron leaving his spatial ring there?

"Hey, you forgot—."

"One day I'll make her pick it up and hand it to me," Theron said with a chill in his voice.

Peak Elder Lotus' eyes opened wide, his head snapping toward Matriarch Macie, planning to plead for some sort of leniency. But Matriarch Macie reacted as though she hadn't heard anything.

Ever since Sadie's death, she simply didn't care about anything else.

By the time he looked back toward Theron, the latter was already gone.

He looked at the ring, conflicted. But soon he made a decision and quickly bent forward to pick it up. Unfortunately, he didn't get a chance to do so, a force strong enough to send him stumbling back forcing him to stand.

"Leave it." Matriarch Macie said with a hollowness in her voice.

Shaken, Peak Elder Lotus could only hurry away to catch up with Theron, feeling as though his hair was on fire.

What the hell had he gotten himself into today?

Even after they were gone, Macie continued to stare into space, her thoughts having already forgotten the interaction. There were much crueler things in the world than what she had done… at the very least, Theron was still alive.

**

Theron walked through the Core Disciple sanctuary with a smile on his face as though nothing at all had happened earlier. As for the items he had stolen, he wasn't foolish enough to bring them into the Sect, nor did he actually care very much about Matriarch Macie's actions.

If one were to measure the things he had taken from her, she was suffering a great deal more because of him than he was because of her.

He had stored much of his things in the unnamed cultivator's cabin. He figured it was especially safe down there. He also had a feeling that there was one more secret of that cabin he had yet to unearth.

Now that he had a better understanding of the strengths of cultivators beyond the Gold Realm, he knew that the setup of the unnamed cultivator was too impressive to have been done by a Treading Cloud Realm expert.

If Theron was correct, only a Dome of Heaven expert could manipulate the environment to such an extent, forcing Water and Dark Mana together and completely altering an entire ecosystem.

However, the unnamed cultivator was very obviously someone at the pinnacle of the Treading Cloud Realm, likely a Quasi Dome of Heaven expert at the very best.

This wasn't enough.

There was another secret, one that would probably need Theron to be far more powerful to unearth.

In that case, what Theron should be doing now was preparing for his Gold Mancy Tribulation. He had been in the Silver Mancy Realm for too long.

There were still several months until the gathering, and time was tight, especially since Elder Zyrah's coming breakthrough was also hanging over his head.

Right now… he had to learn as much as he could about Dark Mana, and then consider how to suppress or at least make those effects synergistic with his Water Mana.

He had no desire to be a Dark Mancer, and it was nothing but a hindrance to his abilities.

However, if this could instead enhance his Water Mana… that was a different matter entirely.

"Elder Lotus?" a young woman coming down the Core Disciple sanctuary paused in her steps, her bare feet riding on a cloud of darkness as an anklet danced in the wind. Interestingly enough, she also seemed to outfit her toes with rings as well.

She seemed fond of adorning her feet with jewelry.

The Third Core Disciple, Lyra.

She had a familiar, adorable appearance and was incredibly short in stature. But judging by the chiming earrings that hung from her lobes, it was clear her feet weren't the only things she liked adorning with jewelry.

"Who's this? Why are you here?" Lyra asked two questions back to back.

"This is your newest junior brother. He was admitted as a Core Disciple today."

Lyra frowned. "A Silver Mancer?"

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