Breathe in, breath out—wasn't that how most guides on meditation started? Malwine had tried countless methods by now, all formed from bits and pieces of the widow's remaining memories. Counting seconds between each inhale and exhale, pursed-lip breathing, and whatever passed for void meditation nowadays… she thought she'd tried them all.

It didn't help that technique wouldn't be anywhere near enough to address the core of her issue—she needed [Meditation] to change, but she also had next to nothing against the Skill as it was, even if one of its features bordered on useless.

She needed the visualization it provided for the sake of working on her core—even if all that had ground to a halt thanks to her own actions—so the Skill had to evolve without losing that…

…not that Malwine had any clue as to how to make sure that remain a part of it. She could only hope the [Depicture] Aspect worked to keep the Skill on track.

As she finally accepted her best impression of a headless chicken wasn't going to get her results, Malwine felt back to consulting her frenemy—Beuzaheim's library.

That thing was still as disorganized as ever, enough that she'd started to doubt anyone without something like [Remote Reading] could navigate it at all. She'd half a mind to take her time checking it out in person—well, in person with a double—sometime. Perhaps librarians had Skills to make sense of the chaos?

But no matter. Books about Skills were practically a dime a dozen in the library, so long as she didn't look for actual Skill books. This served her purposes, still.

Unlike in the early days, where she'd been practically starved for reading material, she no longer wasted her time looking through absolutely everything on the off-chance it might contain one or two interesting throwaway lines.

Malwine must have skimmed dozens of books—and ignored countless more with clearly unrelated titles—by the time she found something of note. The book's cover was a rustic thing, with On the decline of self-made Skills hastily written upon it. The ink within was just as oddly runny, but the contents were legible enough.

People so often forget that before Normal or even Forged Skills were commonplace, so-called standardized Skills were barely more than techniques passed on from person to person. Passed from father to son, a well-built Skill could be the backbone of a lineage, superior to any Bloodline. And trust me, I could go on about how overstated Bloodlines are for days on end. Just don't get me started on the patriarchal structures of yore, and we won't have a problem.

But the key there was the amount of understanding involved, something no one really has now. If you're already working yourself up to mentally argue with me, you're probably part of the problem.

Back in the day, you'd know just what you were telling your children like the back of your hand. You could teach because you knew what you were talking about, and pass Skills on for the same reason. Even if you weren't the first to have the Skill, your own parents would have explained it well to you. You'd get the Skill because you understood everything behind it, not just because you had access to the right tools.

That's why people were built better before. Stronger. They understood their Skills at a level that simply isn't possible when you have them handed to you, and nowadays, none save perhaps otherworlders with their tailored Skills get to have that kind of connection to them.

Further criticism went on for pages on end, repetitive at times.

Malwine wouldn't deny this made her curious. Strictly speaking, she'd inherited [Write Anywhere] from OBeryl, but she had a feeling the author of this would still consider that an improper way of obtaining a Skill. And they probably wouldn't be wrong, at least within the confines of their own argument.

While she would have preferred to insist that her ability to salvage Skills from dead ancestors had to count for something, she wouldn't deny she would have been far better off if she'd actually gotten to learn from said ancestors directly. I hate that [Once and Forever] can't evolve.

Malwine scoffed at her own thoughts. She hadn't even managed to evolve one Skill yet, and she was already getting annoyed about what the inability to evolve meant for her starter Skills.

All in all, the book was a surprisingly enlightening read. It might not have helped her learn anything about what other types of meditation Skills might be out there, but it did bring some facts to her attention—things she honestly doubted she would have thought of on her own.

By no means am I suggesting you need to be an expert on everything you want to take a Skill for. No, the benefits of having a Skill would have you outpacing decades of studies, and if you've looked into what otherworlders tell us of their systemless worlds, you must understand just how much of a difference it makes.

But the fact is, Skills work in tandem with you. With your perspective, your knowledge, with what you can do. Even Skills that enable you to do things no human could do without them benefit from your compatibility with them, and the process is highly individualized.

People so often pretend trying to progress without aids is behind us, as if humanity as a whole were beyond such things as we've grown more civilized and educated. As my neighbor the {Horse} Champion would say: NEWSFLASH! All that progress came from somewhere, and it certainly wasn't from picking up a half-dozen Skills that will help you lay bricks in the exact same way every person in town does it.

Sadly, the matter of the nameless author's neighbor wasn't ever address again, despite how it very much should have been. Malwine had to squash her overwhelming curiosity with a wince.

Though perhaps it might have been for the best—near the end, it seemed the author could no longer help themselves and just started rambling about Skills in various contexts, not all of which felt really relevant to the book's topic.

Call it blasphemy, for all I care, if you're the idiotic type to insist on that 'some things aren't meant for us to know' nonsense. I'll be neither the first nor the last to point this out. The system likes to err on the side of caution. It'd rather overdeliver that underdeliver. Do you HONESTLY think otherworlders barely old enough to head outside on their own would have earned themselves four maxed Skills? No, whatever rules govern the system treat the risk of not properly rewarding otherworlders for their systemless deeds as a greater potential sin than simply handing out power they would never have earned on their own.

It also seemed Veit was not the only one out there with a bone to pick with Forgers… if for a somewhat frivolous reason.

Then we have things like Normal-rarity [Converse], the stupidest Skill ever created. If you've ever tried to talk to someone who's followed the dreaded <Word> Class that Prince Heinrich and his personal Forger tried to popularize, you'll know what I mean. That abomination is still popular with so many tutors, despite how egregious it is.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

I've sworn off talking to anyone following it on principle, and if you ever put me in the same room as a Forger, I won't care that the man who worked for the late Prince died before I was born. You'll have to hold me in place if you wish to keep my fists away from their face.

Yeah, you'd definitely get along with Veit, whoever you are. Or were… Dammit, Veit.

There was something precious about getting to read again. It wasn't as if anything had been stopping her, but she'd certainly slacked off on this department since she started spending more time with Adelheid. Her priorities had changed.

Though [Remote Reading] was an ability that felt impossible to burn out, Malwine felt her growing fatigue. As much as she'd started to enjoy this search—despite it technically being fruitless so far—browsing the contents of so many books still drained her mental energy.

Superhuman toddler in the Mortal Esse or not, it seemed breaks were still necessary if she didn't want to end up groaning at the mere sight of the written word.

It took longer than she would have cared to admit for something worthwhile to pop up again. Certainly, many of the books she skimmed had seemed interesting enough. But for someone looking to evolve [Meditation], they simply hadn't been relevant.

While Malwine never did find something directly addressing cultivation techniques, books seemed fine discussing cultivation as a concept. Had she not heard of the stages leading to Immortality already, she certainly would have now, and while she hated to admit it, one such source agreed with what Veit had told her. It was also engrossing enough that she kept reading, despite it having nothing to do with her <Soul> Skill.

The Early Esse is a precursor to the true start of our Existence, the period through which we go from being sentient creatures to being something that can grasp its place in the cycle. True consciousness requires awareness of itself, and during this stage, that is not guaranteed.

Once that threshold is passed, we reach the Mortal Esse. This stage is characterized by not only awareness of our Existence, but of its fragility. Recognizing ourselves as fleeting presences in the world signifies a turning point, for only then can we truly live.

I still disagree, Malwine grumbled.

Now, what sets true mortals apart from those who may yet escape the looming specter of death is potential. Most often conflate this with Affinities themselves, but that view does not encompass the intricacies of it. The truth is, only a planted Root can enable the unaided forging of a Class, and only through an Affinity can the option to plant a Root be unlocked. This is also why Skills that can use someone's Roots to forge Classes in others exist, despite the conflicting nature of such a concept.

The Core Integration stage is therefore the point at which, through the possession of at least one Class, our potential gains shape. It's far from unheard of for mortals still in the Mortal Esse to develop a core or even channels if [Toll] is accrued frequently enough, but it remains a separate part from them, an almost esoteric addition to the self.

For those with potential, this is the stage dedicated towards making that core truly central to their Existence. For us to make the most of it and further advance, our core must become as instinctual to use as the lungs we use to breathe. Mortals who attained Classes through the intervention of Roots that weren't their own will never achieve this, leading to them being dubbed hollow cores instead of true Core Integration individuals. What they have is merely a facsimile of what true potential yields.

She nodded along—though, much to her chagrin, she found she wished she were on better terms with the one person she could have asked follow-up questions to. Was that implying core visualization was a crutch? Or that visualizing her core was supposed to become second nature at some point? The ambiguity was troubling, and it very much did affect her right now.

And, hmm. So that's what hollow core is about. Malwine had known that was what Kristian's stage was called, for quite the while now, and she recalled reading about how the growth of hollow cores was stunted, but this clarified much.

Once that stage is surpassed, what follows is the easiest and hardest leap to make. The Formation of Tree Veins stage is deceptively simple. Not much is asked of us beyond reasonable mastery of our Roots, yet someone with a single one is just as likely to advance as someone with four is likely to stagnate. However, it is generally accepted that at least two Roots are necessary to properly weave the all-encompassing channels through our bodies, and all differing examples are oddities. You'll find just as many people who believe this is the stage most end their journey at as there are those who believe Core Integration matches that description better. The truth is that we know not.

Malwine squinted—she knew for a fact that Abelard only had one Affinity. Limited as their true interactions had been, [Nosy Old Lady] was good at making those details out, even if actual specifics about people's Affinities required personal knowledge on her end.

And of course, at the peak of Existence stands Immortality. If our journey starts with admitting our mortality, the final stage requires shedding it. Yet one could not exist without the other, could it? While the Mortal Esse and Immortality stand for concepts that are diametrically opposed, they represent a growth curve in our understanding of our Existence.

That was the first and last section the book had on Immortality. Malwine exhaled slowly. What a cop-out. Then again, the mere concept was something she wouldn't get close to anytime soon. Her annoyance stemmed from a place of curiosity, not actual need—which admittedly wasn't particularly unusual for her.

It didn't help that she'd spent so long skimming books by the time she'd even stopped to read that one, that she was just about tired enough to allow herself another break.

And so another day passed without the [Meditation] problem being solved.

Malwine fell into an uneasy pattern. With Adelheid back to her disappearing act habits, even Anna Franziska rarely came by. One of the estate's older scullery maids, Anna Wilhelmina, had taken over the task of bringing meals to her in lieu of those being organized around their lessons.

For days on end, the search through Beuzaheim's library became a matter of finding vaguely interesting things to spend her time on, even if they weren't related to meditation in any way. Her actual goal became something to be accomplished incidentally—it was more than clear to her that focusing solely on it would lead only to disappointment.

When The Forgetting came, Malwine found she was only slightly embarrassed by her lack of answers and progress alike.

"Happy birthmonth," she told Adelheid when she caught the girl waking up one day.

Her sister's expression shifted from her now-perpetual pouting to confusion. "What do you mean?"

"It's The Forgetting," Malwine explained. "That means you're five years old now, since you were born on The Forgetting of 5798."

Adelheid tipped her head. "The Forgetting of 5803," she spoke slowly. "That number's… big. But taking 5 from 103 would leave it at 98. Is that how years work?"

"Close enough. But it keeps going up. One hundred, two hundred, three hundred… eventually you get to eight-hundred. 803 minus 5 is 798."

"I get that," the girl shook her head. "Is it supposed to be special? Like Level 20 was?"

That had Malwine taking a step back—she hadn't been paying as much attention as she should have, maybe. She reached out and identified her little sister.

Adelheid fon Hūdijanin - Human - Level 23

She started at Adelheid, bewildered. "You've reached the Mortal Esse."

Malwine found she wasn't bothered, or even concerned—with how the girl operated, she'd expected this to be an eventuality. She was simply… surprised.

"Yes," her little sister nodded. "But it wasn't anything special. It should have been something special."

With that, the girl was gone.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.