Before I departed for secluded training, I first took care of the formalities.
With a stroke of the pen and the press of my official seal, I signed over full sovereign authority to Mirabel, granting her absolute control over the kingdom in my absence.
She hesitated to accept this responsibility.
Leaving in the middle of a war would inevitably cause complications, but I knew all would be resolved in due time.
I also made sure to notify the necessary generals, ministers, and court officials that I would be unreachable for an indefinite period.
Mirabel needed to focus entirely on leading the kingdom. I barely managed to convince her not to see me off.
Once all was in order, I prepared for my training.
I made my way through the garden, walking until the scent of roses grew wild and untamed.
At the far end, hidden beyond view, lay a hedge maze of blooming crimson, its thorns glistening with dew and mana.
I followed the twisting path, petals falling silently behind me with each step.
At the end of the path stood a solitary door, almost hidden beneath a wall of thick vines and curling thorns.
The roses here were darker, deeper in hue, as if soaked in blood and shadow.
A lone knight stood vigil before the sealed entrance. His posture was straight, unshaken, like the blade of a drawn sword.
Short, spiked brown hair. Bronze eyes that reflected neither warmth nor cold.
Olive skin and light armor designed for speed rather than bulk. Every inch of him looked born for swift violence.
He looked young, perhaps five years older than me, but he carried the weight of someone much older.
This was Sansir, one of the last knights trained personally by my father, and perhaps the only one whose loyalty had never wavered.
After my father's death, he had personally requested the duty of guarding this threshold.
His gaze sharpened when he saw me approach. Yet his expression never changed.
He gave a shallow bow. "Your Majesty."
"Sansir," I said, stepping closer. "I intend to begin cultivation here. Will you guard my body until I return?"
His bronze eyes lit faintly, just a flicker, but it was there.
"It would be my greatest honor. However, I must warn you. Leisure is not welcome in the realm beyond this door."
I smiled, glancing over my shoulder as if saying goodbye to the world behind me. "I didn't pack for comfort."
I wore only a loose white shirt and simple brown pants.
On my back was a light travel bag filled with dried meat, a flask of water, and one other item: a wooden training sword, carved from sacred ash.
No books. No scrolls. No luxuries.
Only resolve.
Sansir gave a respectful nod, then turned toward the vine-choked door. With a firm grip, he grasped the handle and slowly pulled it open.
A surge of white light erupted from the gap, cold, blinding, and dense with pressure.
My lungs tensed. Even standing at the threshold, I could feel the gravity of the realm beyond.
It pressed against my skin, crushing, suffocating, then pushed deeper into my thoughts, into the marrow of my soul.
The world shifted in an instant.
The void gave way to something vast and unreal: an endless azure sky stretched high above, its sunlight sharp and unnatural.
Below me sprawled a surreal landscape of vivid green plains, cascading waterfalls, and glistening rivers that shimmered with mana too dense to be natural.
Power surged through the air in reckless, chaotic waves. Time fractured, no longer something I could measure in heartbeats or breaths.
Seconds stretched and compressed unpredictably, disorienting my senses.
I couldn't even stand without reinforcing myself with mana.
The gravity here was no ordinary force. It pressed not only on the body but on the mind and spirit, as if trying to collapse me inward.
My every thought felt heavier. My every step trembled under invisible weight.
Breathing required mana. Standing required mana. Existing demanded mana.
Most oppressive of all was the realm itself. It actively rejected passivity, forcing out any being who refused to fight against it.
Every moment was a war of attrition. If I faltered, if I allowed my output to dip, I would be crushed outright.
It was perfect.
Perfect for cultivation.
[Everything up until now had seemingly led me to this moment. Here, I planned to accomplish the impossible.]
This place offered no distractions. No connection to the outside world.
I was alone in every sense, isolated in body, mind, and soul. And I planned to make full use of that.
Though I couldn't access my inner world freely here, I could feel the infons and spiritrons all around me.
They pulsed beneath the terrain, wove into the air, sang in the pressure.
Their purity made them clearer than ever before.
I made my way to the largest waterfall in sight, struggling against the crushing mana as I forced my way through the veil of cascading water.
Behind it, nestled in the rock, was a small cave, bare, quiet, dim.
I dropped my bag there, taking only the wooden sword with me as I stepped back into the open.
This place was the real trial. A patch of open grass beneath the burning sun. The wind here carried weight. Even lifting my arm was a strain.
I bent my knees and leapt.
Pain exploded through my spine as gravity yanked me back down, slamming me into the earth. My body convulsed.
And yet, I smiled. I had found it.
An environment so harsh, so unrelenting, that even the simplest actions were trials. This was exactly what I needed.
I rose slowly, trembling, and lifted the sword.
Then I brought it down.
[Just one swing used nearly all of my energy. Just one swing, and already my breathing turned ragged, my heart burning like coal in my chest.]
Blood seeped from the corners of my mouth.
I lifted the sword again, arms shaking uncontrollably, and swung.
This time, blood burst past my teeth.
I didn't stop.
A third time, I lifted it, coughing now with each breath, and for the final time, I swung.
The wooden blade cut the air like thunder.
Then I collapsed.
My body hit the ground with a dull thud.
Breath ragged. Lungs scraping. Heart flaring.
My vision danced with black stars.
Around me, particles containing all possible colors lingered, flowing in and out with each breath.
Among them were black particles, heavy with pressure, and lingering behind those were white ones, vast and infinite.
These were the three primal energies.
Infons, the white ones, held the data of existence. Spiritrons, those of shifting color. Mana reflected the color of one's being.
Mine was black.
Mirabel's was red.
A rare and beautiful color, hers, but mine was something else entirely.
I reached out, desperate to grasp them, to take hold of even a fragment of light.
But the moment my fingers grazed their presence, my hand dropped with a heavy thump.
[Nicholas was determined to surpass his pitiful limits, even while burdened by a plague unlike any the world had seen.]
Slowly, I wiped the blood from my mouth, then sat cross-legged with my sword laid before me.
Closing my eyes, I began to calmly absorb the surrounding energies, seeking to restore my strength by a different path.
[Title Obtained: King of Sloth Belphegor.]
King of Sloth?
This damned voice. I was trying to overcome my laziness, not embrace it.
[Unique Trait Acquired: Any attempt to accomplish a goal will result in a pathway forming before you, where all burdens are slightly lessened, even if only by a margin.]
I chuckled and smiled, blood still on my teeth.
Maybe I had misjudged this voice after all. Perhaps it cherished me more than I realized.
Even in my laziness, in my absurdist acceptance of life's weight and the futility of endless struggle, I held this resolve.
I would move forward not because I believed in some grand design or ultimate meaning, but because stagnation was a kind of death in itself.
The world might be indifferent, even cruel, but I refused to be crushed by it.