Two weeks passed by.
Rhys walked out of the Alchemy hall with a frown. Behind him, murmurs from the crowd could be heard.
They were whispers of awe and disbelief.
In just two short weeks, his mastery over the lifestyle skills of Alchemy, Enchantment, and Formations had reached a level that others could only dream of achieving in a lifetime.
Combined with his earlier feat in butchering, he had shaken the foundations of Greenleaf’s artisan community.
Now, he just had to obtain the respective profession cores if he wanted to formally establish himself as an Apprentice Alchemist, Enchanter, Formation Master, and Butcher.
That was the standard path. A path he had no intention of following conventionally.
As he contemplated his next move, a familiar blue screen flickered to life in his mind.
[By continuous learning and practical experience across multiple disciplines, you have unlocked an opportunity to comprehend the unique truth of the professions. Cost: 1000 years of lifespan. Y/N?]
Rhys didn’t hesitate. A thousand years was nothing, but knowledge of a fundamental truth was priceless.
’Yes.’
The world didn’t change, but his understanding of it did. A torrent of information, not on a specific skill but on the very nature of skills themselves, flooded his mind.
It was a profound, conceptual understanding that organised the chaotic mess of hundreds of different crafts into a clear, elegant structure.
He saw that all lifestyle skills and professions were interconnected. They were not separate paths but branches of five great trees.
The first was Alchemical & Mystical Arts. This was the path of manipulating the unseen energies of the world, covering everything from Alchemy and Formations to Enchantments and the creation of Talismans.
The second was Culinary & Biological Professions. This was the path of life itself, of understanding the flesh and essence of living things. It encompassed Butchering, Spiritual Cuisine, and even the taming of beasts.
The third was Crafting & Material Manipulation. This was the path of shaping the physical world, of turning raw ore into a sharp blade, rough hide into sturdy armour, and raw timber into a home.
Blacksmithing, Tailoring, and Leather working all belonged to this tree.
The fourth was Artistic & Knowledge-Based Skills. This was the path of the mind and spirit, of conveying intent and understanding through mediums like Calligraphy, Music, and Painting, or through the simple act of teaching.
The final tree was Utility & Survival Skills. These were the most fundamental skills, the ones that allowed a cultivator to exist in the world: Navigation to find their way, Foraging to find sustenance, and Mining to unearth the world’s hidden treasures.
Rhys stopped in the middle of the street, a look of sudden, deep understanding on his face.
He had been so focused on the individual skills that he hadn’t seen the bigger picture. He had mastered skills from the first two paths—the Alchemical and the Culinary.
But the other three remained completely untouched. He was like a warrior who had only learned to use his right arm and leg, leaving the rest of his body untrained and weak.
"I’m still unbalanced," he muttered to himself. To be truly self-sufficient, to be a true master of his own destiny, he needed a foundation in all five paths.
His plans for the next two weeks changed instantly.
He spent the next few days at "Ironhand’s Forge," the largest blacksmithing workshop in town. He didn’t ask for a job this time.
Instead, he paid a handsome fee to the owner to simply observe. He watched the smiths work, the roar of the forge, the rhythmic clang of hammer on steel.
He saw how they folded the metal, how they quenched the blades, how they drew out the Qi within the ore.
He bought a simple, unrefined ingot of iron and a basic blacksmith’s hammer.
That night, in the backyard of the inn, he created a makeshift forge. He didn’t have the proper tools, but he had something better: perfect control.
He used a targeted Spark Fist to heat the metal to the precise temperature, and his Void-Tempered body allowed him to swing the hammer with inhuman strength and precision.
[Host is performing the action of ’Blacksmithing’. Rudimentary practical knowledge is being acquired.]
[Analysing host’s movements... Comparing with theoretical ’Perfect Blacksmithing’ knowledge...]
With the System’s guidance, his clumsy initial attempts quickly transformed. He learned to feel the metal’s spirit, to hammer out impurities, to shape it not just with force, but with intent.
By the end of the week, he had forged a simple, yet perfectly balanced and incredibly sharp, short sword from the single ingot. He had gained a fundamental understanding of the third path.
For the fourth path, the Artistic, he chose Calligraphy. It seemed simple, but he knew that in a cultivation world, the act of writing could be a profound skill.
He visited a quiet shop that sold high-quality brushes, ink, and paper. He bought a basic manual, ’The Foundations of Spiritual Brushwork’.
He spent his evenings practicing in his room. At first, his characters were just ink on paper.
But as he practiced, the System began to offer its corrections. It taught him how to channel a sliver of his Qi through the soft bristles of the brush, how to imbue each stroke with intent.
[Skill ’Calligraphy’ has been comprehended to Perfection.]
He took a clean sheet of paper and wrote a single character: ’Sharp’. As he finished the final stroke, the paper hummed with energy.
He ran his finger along the edge of the sheet, and a small, painless cut appeared on his skin.
The paper itself had become a weapon. He had grasped the essence of the fourth path.
For the final path, Utility and Survival, he chose Navigation.
A hunter who couldn’t find his way was just a man lost in the woods. He bought every map of the Azure Province he could find, from crude local sketches to the more detailed, expensive charts sold by the merchant guilds.
He didn’t just look at them; he memorised them.
He then spent his nights on the roof of the inn, staring at the stars. He purchased a basic astrolabe and a book on celestial navigation.
[Skill ’Navigation’ has been comprehended to Perfection.]
The knowledge settled in his mind. He could now look at the position of the stars and know his exact location.
He could feel the subtle flows of Qi in the earth, the lay lines that crisscrossed the land, and use them as a natural compass. He would never be lost again.
And just like that, a month had passed.
The town of Greenleaf was buzzing with strange rumours. A mysterious butcher of impossible skill had appeared at the Dismantling Center.
A prodigy blacksmith had been seen forging a flawless blade in a single night.
The quiet calligraphy shop had sold its most expensive ink stone to an unknown expert whose brushwork carried spiritual power.
Whispers of a multi-talented genius, a hidden dragon, spread through the artisan community.
Many tried to find this mysterious figure, but the culprit of these disturbances was already gone.
Deep within the Whisperwood, in a cave hidden behind a waterfall, Rhys stretched his limbs, feeling a new sense of completeness.
The past month had been more valuable than a hundred years of secluded cultivation.
He had built his foundation not just in power, but in knowledge.
"It’s time to improve my strength," Rhys muttered, a determined glint in his pitch-black eyes.
His adventure as a Lifeskill artist was over. It was time for the hunter to return to work.