Invincible Earth! : Volume 1
Chapter 10: Star Protection Treasure

Chuckling at Lance’s enthusiasm, Attok reached into his jacket pocket to take out the first cultivation treasure Lance would see in his life.

A walnut sized transparent glass globe came into Lance’s view. When it moved, Lance could see stars swirling inside it. It was connected to a silver chain designed to be worn around the neck.

“This is a Star Protection Treasure. Using the principles of a star’s production of energy, the scientists at IE made a peculiar material which releases the stored energy inside the treasure protecting the wearer from all harm under a certain level. The item you received in your on boarding kit was also a Star Protection Treasure, but of the lowest level. The cost increases exponentially as the levels move up, due to the increase in cost to make the treasure stable.

The rock you received can protect you from a full power strike of an Apprentice level cultivator, which is the next level after Initiates. Almost all threats in missions are limited to one level above you, but the faction leaders decided to reward you with this anyway because of the performance you have shown. This treasure can protect you from the full power strike of a Master. So if that Xuan Long or anyone attacks you, you will be protected and I will be alerted so that I or someone on our side can rush to your aid. Although they mostly won’t be so brazen, its best to be safe than sorry. It will automatically activate when it detects a threat that can kill you, or you can crush it to generate a barrier for 5 minutes. Use it well.”

Lance excitedly took the globe and wore it around his neck under his standard IE shirt. All initiates came without any luggage, so they were provided some sets of clothes for training and casual use by the station.

The globe felt cool on his skin, and gave him a measure of safety. Xuan Long’s expression when he was fainting had placed a slight fear in him.

Attok left soon after.However much Attok asked him, Lance really had no idea about how he had managed to output that much power.

That night, when Lance sat down to meditate, he found something peculiar in his dantian. The slab of energy was still there, but above it hovered a ball of golden light. Lance didn’t have the ability yet to make an energy form of himself in his dantian to interact with or train using his energy construct, as hinted by the manual in later stages. He could only resolve to ask Darius next morning.

After establishing the construct, the goal was to absorb energy steadily to completely solidify it. Right now, only the top layer was solid, and it only gave out a weak field. With subsequent strengthening, a stronger field would form which would upgrade each cell of the body more effectively, thus enabling higher output of power.

Today was the last day of training. According to the schedule, tomorrow would be a final test to qualify or disqualify initiates from taking the first mission. In the instructors words, “Its better to drop out if you are too weak instead of being foolish and taking the mission even if you aren’t ready. Even when one is qualified, the probability of passing is only 10-40%, depending on the difficulty of the mission. The probability of dying though is 40-70%. So swallow down any humiliation you might feel if you don’t pass. Being alive and mocked is much better than being dead and forgotten.”

These words had drilled themselves into each initiate’s mind. So far, not many had dropped out as the training hadn’t been as excruciating as it had been for Lance so far. The feeling of growing stronger had motivated everyone till now to push through the training.

But when it came to the matter of life and death, would they rather pass the test and risk dying or intentionally fail and keep growing stronger? Tomorrow would give the answer.

…

The next morning, as each Initiate made their way to the training ground after breakfast, they found a huge holographic image waiting for them. On it was rotating the iconic dragon around the earth which symbolized IE.

The holographic image dwarfed all the initiates, standing at around 50 feet height and width. It was in the center of the ground, so all the initiates gathered around it in concentric circles. As the image was hovering in the air, it was visible to everyone.

At the exact second the clock struck 8, a tall man with a shaven head wearing army camouflage clothes walked towards the image. As soon as he got under it, it was as if he had grown into a giant as the image had changed from the symbol to a 50 feet tall replica of the man.

The constant buzzing that had been there immediately quieted down seeing the stoic expression of the man.

As pin drop silence ensued, the man started talking.

“I am Donovan, the person in charge of the IE Initiate Training Program. Today is one of the most important days of your life. Today is when it will be decided whether you are a rising newcomer who can be groomed and nurtured with the highest amount of resources, or if you will go into the army to be a soldier of IE. The Earth is our mother and our home. As human beings born on earth, it is our duty to protect her from all threats foreign or domestic. Now is the time to decide whether you will do it as a soldier or as a commander.

The METs(Mission Eligibility Training Tests) will test each and every aspect of your improvement over the past month.

Some of you may think that you can fail the METs on purpose to train further and decrease the risk of you dying. You might think you will be fed such amounts of enidra every day allowing you to grow stronger and stronger.

Let me tell you, you will be sorely disappointed. The enidra supply of each failed initiate will be cut by half for each failed test or mission. On the other hand, if you pass the test and the mission, your diet will be upgraded to a more effective and precious form of enidra and you will also be awarded with various cultivation resources and weapons.

Fail, and your resources will be halved, along with our expectations.

Fail enough times, and you will be sent back to earth with your memories erased and your cultivation voided.

Pass the test and the mission, IE will spare no expense in grooming you to be the most powerful you can be.

Pass, and make your ancestors proud.

Pass, and earn the right to be part of Invincible Earth!”

Donovan shouted out the last words, with his fist in the air and eyes burning with passion.

He didn’t need to use his prowess as a Legend to influence the ones around him. After replaceing out that failing meant possibly fading away in mediocrity, even the meekest of them all looked up with their chest puffed out, ready for the challenge.

“Are you ready to honor your duty?“, asked Donovan in a thunderous voice.

“YES!“, screamed the initiates, faces red and eyes bloodshot.

The ground shook and the wind roared, as if in anticipation of the new legends these seeds would write.

…

When the roaring died down, there was pin drop silence yet again.

“Proceed to the testing area. There will be 3 tests: PP, reflexes and comprehension. You must meet the minimum criteria to proceed. Let the testing commence. I shall see you all in the mission briefing area, given that you pass.”

There was a great rush as everyone started to move toward the testing area at once. Lance was separated from Darius and Entsy as he tried hard not to fall.

“Watch out, newbie”. A sinister voice floated into his ears as a shoulder bumped into his back causing him to fall on his stomach. When he tried to immediately get back up, a foot pressed down on his back preventing him from doing so.

“I saw your fluke result. The faction leaders told me to cripple you if I can, but I told them you are nothing but a fly to me. Just a fly which I can squash at my mercy. You better hope you fail the test, because if by luck I get the same mission as you, I will personally make sure you fail. Remember that, weakling. Don’t go strutting around just because you could pull out a big PP from your ass.”

The foot moved away as the owner mixed into the crowd and faded away from sight.

Lance could never forget that voice though. Apollo.

The damn kid dared to call him a fly!

Well, flies can kill, thought Lance. He gritted his teeth, dusting off his clothes and walking towards the testing area.

A huge open area was cleared of greenery as numerous machines and rings were set up. The batch size was in the thousands, so the testing area was also as large as a football stadium.

The machines were standard PP testing machines. The rings though, were filled with humanoid robots wrapped in leather. They looked sort of creepy as the head was the same large eye that Lance had seen and interacted with before.

As Lance had already broken through, he passed the PP test smoothly even though his IN still hadn’t been discovered. If he hadn’t broken through, he would definitely have failed. In the bottom groups i.e the groups who had trained only for a month, the standards were lower for passing the test but the number of people who passed was only 70%. The rest hadn’t managed to breakthrough and their IN hadn’t been enough to bridge the gap. Of the 70%, 30% were people who hadn’t broken through but had impressive INs which gave them enough of a power boost to pass all the tests, some even with flying colors.

It must be noted that there were many types of cultivation methods. Lance, for instance, was following the standard IE manual. There were many initiates who had come from ancient clans on earth from various countries which still carried forward their tradition. Bloodlines were just a form of INs. These initiates with specific bloodlines or specific INs used their own customized manuals which in some cases took longer to breakthrough but gave a lot of improvement in power and speed even before breaking through. Other INs directly raised the body statistics to enable the initiate to pass the test.

The reflexes test was simply the humanoid figure rushing forward and using a martial art to attack the initiate. The initiate had to dodge as many strikes as possible. There was a minimum number of strikes that had to be dodged in at least one of the three tries that they had been given.

Regardless of the martial arts used, the overall speed of the strikes were the same. Due to breaking through, Lance’s mind functioned faster than it had before, allowing him to see the strikes more clearly and move his body more agilely, as it had also become smoother.

The problem was, he hadn’t had a chance yet to get comfortable with it.