I retired to my tent for the night which, in my opinion, was way bigger than it needed to be.
Even calling it a tent felt inadequate as there were rooms within the tent itself, albeit all of them being separated by a cloth curtain of sorts.
Still, there was a sitting room, the bedroom and even a bathroom. And the bathroom had an actual bathtub and toilet that flushes somehow.
I believe magic was involved in the creation of this tent which meant this thing must have been pretty expensive.
Honestly, I don't really feel at ease even staying inside here, but this was the only place I could go to ensure I had privacy.
As a result, I wasn't ready to sleep yet but now I was stuck inside here.
Outside, the mining operation was still ongoing as the night shift took over, the entire place being illuminated by floodlights.
The Vanguards would also be rotating out their guard duty right about now. We may have dealt with the majority of the Anomalies but that doesn't mean the entire rift was completely safe. There might still be some stragglers that show up that will attack us.
If it was an especially high danger level rift, a fortress might even be constructed as there would be wave after wave of Anomalies attacking almost constantly.
That's why it felt odd for me to be staying inside this tent instead of being out there taking a shift in keeping watch, since I was used to doing so as a Vanguard.
Seeing that I had nothing else to do right now, I dropped a message to my family telling them that the expedition was going well and I should be returning either tomorrow or the day after.
Normally, you wouldn't get any reception within the rift but modern technology mixed with magic allowed us to bring in a sort of transmitter that can connect outside of the rift, allowing us to even connect to the internet from here.
Seeing that I had some alone time as well, I decided I might as well try that meditation thing again.
This time though, instead of getting someone to take a picture of me, I simply set up my phone to point its camera at me while I sat down in a cross legged position.
I have to remember that I still had a bruise at my side so I was careful not to take too deep of a breath before I exhaled, relaxing my body.
I emptied my thoughts and just focused on breathing, making sure that I had no distractions in my mind.
The darkness stared back at me and my breathing slowed. Soon enough, I was taking very light breaths and it felt like I had melted into the darkness itself.
And that's when the speck of light appeared at the edge of my vision once more.
I made sure not to focus on it and just maintained what I was doing already, prompting even more balls of light to appear.
Once again, they slowly drifted to the centre as I maintained my concentration, all of them forming a spiral in the centre of my vision.
Everything was the same up to this point and that was when I realised that the light simply revolved around the centre point but never actually entering it.
I suddenly had a strong desire to move my hands and instead of fighting it, I allowed my body to move as it wanted.
Still closing my eyes, I lifted up my arms and moved them in a circle in a clockwise direction, as though I was trying to stir a pot of water to create a small whirlpool.
The balls of light reacted to my movements and started moving even faster, the ones that were still outside the spiral quickly spinning towards the centre point.
When all the specks of light had gathered in the centre, my hands revolved around it one more time before slowly moving to cup both of my palms in the centre in front of my chest, as though I was holding a ball.
I breathed in one more time before I slapped both palms together and all of the light balls were forced into the black hole in the centre.
Almost immediately, I felt as if I was floating for a moment and a feeling of warmth appeared in my chest.
My hands then separated before clapping together once more in a prayer pose and the warmth I was feeling spread all throughout the rest of my body.
A sense of weightlessness fell over me right before gravity took control over me again before I felt weight return and I was sitting on the ground once more.
I waited for a moment to see if anything happened and when nothing else was forthcoming, I slowly opened my eyes to see if anything changed.
There was still the feeling of warmth in my body but it felt especially hot on my side.
I lifted up my shirt to see what it was and the heat came from where my bruise was.
But even as I watched the bruise seemed to be fading away and rapidly right before my eyes until my skin was completely unmarked.
I even tried to prod my side with a finger and the pain was completely gone, as though it was never there to begin with.
Huh… Was that some kind of new skill that I gained? Like a self healing skill?
No wait… Looking around, it feels like everything looks a little… Brighter? Or rather… It looks clearer, like my vision has improved.
Just now the corners of the tent looked completely dark but now I could somewhat see the outline in the corner of the darkness.
Also, the patterns on the tent seemed to be highlighted a little to me where I could make out minute details on the tent now. I could even see parts of the fabric where it looked a little different than the rest in terms of colour variation.
Not only that, if I were to focus just a little bit more… I think I could hear the sounds of people speaking over the loud grinding sounds of the mining machinery in the background.
In other words… I think I got a little stronger?
Not in terms of physical strength but in terms of ability. Actually… It might actually have affected my physical abilities too…
Hmm… I think I might know what this could be, but before that, I want to check something else first.
I picked up my phone that I had left at the side and stopped the recording before playing back the video I had just recorded.
For the first minute or so, nothing happened and it was just me sitting cross legged with my hands placed on my knees and looking like I was asleep.
But right at the three minute mark, I finally noticed that there were balls of light that appeared around me and floating just out of reach of me.
As the video progressed, more balls of light joined in and they started circling around me, slowly getting closer and closer.
Eventually, the balls of light started revolving around me at an arm's length away and I'm guessing this was what I 'saw' when I had my eyes closed.
The centre of the black hole had been me and the balls of light had been revolving around me the entire time.
Also, there seemed to be a circle of light underneath me and it looked like there was some kind of pattern as well. But since I had my phone recording me from the ground level, I was not able to see what exactly the pattern was and I only knew that it was giving off light.
No matter, I could just try it again later and record from a higher elevation.
Then, I started to move my hands in a circle and the rest of the light balls were sucked into the sphere around me before I held my hands in front of my chest.
When I clasped my hands together, the light shot into my body and disappeared, causing my chest to glow noticeably.
When I moved my hands in a prayer position, the light then spread to the rest of my body though I did notice there was a more intense glow focusing around where my bruise had been.
The light then subsided and I held the pose for a few more seconds before I opened my eyes again.
I stopped the video there and this is where I think I figured out what kind of myth I had awakened.
I have read stories and also played games about it before where you have people cultivate and gather Qi energy or whatever the story decides to call it in order to grow stronger.
This would explain why I saw the Yin and Yang symbol when I had first awakened since cultivators usually have to find balance in their energies and stuff.
I guess… I am a cultivator now?