1 year has passed since Aria started attending her aura school.
I was making some chocolate cookies when I heard someone knocking on the door loudly.
Knock!Knock!Knock!Knock!
"You Son of bitch! Are you trying to crash the door !?"
I ran to the door and opened it quickly. Before I could curse, I found Aria standing there with the brightest smile I had seen on her face since she made me her personal cook 4 months ago after seeing my "talent" again.
Before I could ask her anything, she immediately took me in a bear hug that almost crashed my bones.
She said with a cheering voice. "Ray! I did it !, I finally did it !"
I said with a shaking voice, barely able to breathe. "What…did you... do… exactly... I can't breathe !".
"Ops". She finally dropped me on the ground with a *thud*, allowing me to take a breath.
" Sorry, I'm just happy !"
' I'm going to die from this someday, how is she keeping all that power in this small body! '
I exhaled and asked "Why aren't you in the school? Wait, did you escape ? It's ok, I won't tell Mom ."
"No! I graduated; I formed my aura core! They sent me the awakening technique already."
"...."
For a moment, my mind stopped working, then the realization hit me.
"You fucking did what!"
"Ray, watch your languag—"
"—I'm going to tell Mom, we are celebrating today; it's not every day I find out that my sister is a cultivator! "
Aria crossed her arms and raised her head with pride.
"Heh, you are lucky to have a genius like me as your sister; you should have seen instructor Marcus' face when I formed my core; he looked like he would die from shock !"
'well, I can't blame him . '
The reason why Aria was considered a genius now is that most people form their cores at the age of 14 or 15, forming your core at the age of 12 means that you were either lucky or have high willpower . Additionally, you will have more time to cultivate before attending the Exalted Academy at the age of 18, which would give you a head start especially if you were able to reach Tier 3 before the ranking test.
Even the novel's protagonist, Arthur Sunblade—the humans' youngest prince, formed his core at 13 . Once the king heard that, he made a big celebration.
'Well, Aria isn't less than him. I should make something good for her .'
I opened my bracelet to tell my mom the good news, but then I shifted my gaze to Aria.
"Hey Aria, did anyone try to give you any strange offers ?"
She sighed. "Yes, I was surrounded by a lot of nobles that tried to know where I was living to convince my mother to make us sign an engagement contract , but don't worry, instructor Marcus kicked them all and helped me to go back home. I hated his training but it looks like he isn't that bad."
I sighed in relief. 'I owe that instructor one.'
They can't recruit a person under 18 but the engagement contracts were exceptions. The government was actually encouraging marriage and giving birth. Giving you some contribution points everytime you give birth .
I called my mom and told her the good news. She was so happy and told us that she and grandma will back in 5 hours
I decided to read some books with Aria until they arrive.
"Hey Aria, help me read some books. "
She grinned. "Sure, but I wonder if you can pay the price. "
"Half the cookies I made."
"Deal! "
We moved to the house library. I grapped a geography book and started listening to Aria.
*Squish!Squish!*
"Sho, Eldoia ig divided insho…"
I was already used to how she speaks while eating, so, my mind was correcting what she was saying automatically.
Eldoria was divided into 5 kingdoms; each kingdom was ruled by one of the current 5 main races, which were orcs, humans, elves, dwarfs and demons.
Due to our mother being an elf, we were living in the elven kingdom even though we were hybrids; the elven kingdom had around 500 million elves—both pure and hybrids—living here. Due to the high population , this kingdom was divided into 3 layers.
The outer layer: the slums where the commoners live.
The inner layer: where the nobles and rich people live.
The core layer: where only the royal family, the 3 great clans and some important individuals live.
There is a similar system in both dwarves and human kingdoms. The book didn't mention anything about the orcs and demons unfortunately.
Thanks to my dear father, we were able to live in the capital of the inner layer, where we had good food, high safety, some training facilities, teleportation gates for travelling and more; I couldn't imagine what the people in the core layer have.
* * * * *
After 5 hours, Mom and Grandma returned, and they bringed with them the biggest cake I have seen in my 2 lives.
One week later, Aria started using the awakening technique; she said it's about opening some paths in your body and connecting them to the aura core; it may look easy, but some people needed 2 years to do this; even the protagonist awakened his aura in 5 months.
1 month later some low nobles started sending envoys to recruit me and my sister using engagement offers, being a genius brother meant that I had a chance to be a genius too, so they wanted to invest in me, someone was even bold enough to try to marry my mother!
'Duskwood family, I will remember you !'
My grandma was responsible for speaking with each one of them; she refused every offer without muny troubles; I started thinking that she was a former politician from how she spoke.
2 months later, Aria awakened her core, a great achievement that no one expected; my mother and grandmother almost got a heart attack from the news.
Her body became much stronger, she could easily raise me with one hand—which she did—as if I was a toy.
I asked her with visible excitement. "You must know your affinities to make your own technique now, right ?, Can you feel them now? "
Aria closed her eyes for a moment. "Hmm, I'm not sure. I can definitely feel the wind for now, but I feel that I have more ."
Unlike the Exalted who could know their affinities instantly by feeling the mana and using technology, the cultivators must know their affinities themselves; it may take days, months or years, depending on the affinities you have and your luck.
For 10 months, she kept training and practising her aura control while trying to feel her affinities; as a cultivator, she can channel her aura into her body or any objects to enhance them. Which wasn't that easy according to her.
She also started feeling her second affinity, which was some sort of purple light . And she still felt that she had one other affinity.
' I wonder what was her role in the novel, it was already rare to have 2 affinities, talk less about 3 ! '
But Aria's talent didn't stop here.
* * * * *