In the preparation hall of Edith, Tilan was sitting on a seat in the corner, flipping through a book in her hand which introduced the more famous Transcendent Factions in the current Federation.
Unlike the 'Primary School - Senior Academy - University' teaching and imparting model, Transcendent schools are much freer, and the operation of each varies.
Many Transcendent schools establish branches across various Star Domains, housing resident personnel. As long as a sufficient fee is paid, instructors from the faction will teach you the relevant secret techniques and knowledge and grant you the license to use them.
If one uses the faction's secret techniques without obtaining the faction's licensing permission, it would be considered illegal and, if discovered, would result in a significant fine.
However, Transcendent schools are not purely profit-oriented organizations like companies. Their greater purpose lies in gathering transcendents who practice the same type or style of secret techniques to learn from each other, iterate research and development, and carry on a legacy, ensuring the system does not become outdated and continues to progress.
More than money, they value legacy. To enter an organization internally, one usually needs a recommendation and assessment from senior members and must abide by the rules and disciplines of that school.
Currently, the Federation has many large and small Transcendent Factions, but only over 300 can truly be called 'well-known'. The leaders of these factions are at least masters of Sequence 7, with a few even having legendary figures of Sequence 8 in charge.
The past Jielou City was also a somewhat famous Transcendent Faction within the Four-leaf Crystal Star Domain, but with a conservative style, it rarely recruited external members. Later, as the North Star Area declined, Jielou City gradually waned, and nowadays, its public 'Honored Master' Gu Qianlou is but Sequence 6.
Efnie had been learning from the 'Red Robe Death God Sect' from an early age. The headquarters of the sect is in the Deep River Star Domain and is known for its 'Flame'-related secret techniques; Four-leaf Crystal here only has a branch.
The 'Red Robe Death God Sect''s Mother Superior 'Zancafoni' had visited Jade Skirt three years ago and met Efnie. At that time, Mother Superior 'Zancafoni' thought highly of Efnie, promising that if she reached Sequence 5 after graduation, she would accept Efnie into the sect and directly make her a core member.
Compared to other loose schools, the 'Red Robe Death God Sect' is a much stricter and tighter-knit organization. Becoming a core member is not simple, so this promise is quite valuable.
Each Transcendent school has its own style; 'Golden Lands' only recruits members with elven bloodlines, and the spells and secret techniques they teach are mostly related to fairies.
'Dual Swords' used to be a very famous Transcendent school too, but later transformed their organization into a university.
In some respects, the past 'Yuanting Courtyard' could be considered a Transcendent school, but Breed Masters' 'Courtyard' model is closely integrated with production, having departed from the usual Transcendent school mode and bearing more resemblance to ancient Eastern sects. Members of the courtyard live together, support each other, and share different duties.
All in all, 'Transcendent School' is a very broad concept. How it operates depends entirely on which mode suits each school best.
Slowly turning the pages of the book, the girl's finger lingered on the page introducing 'Golden Lands'. The book boasted exquisite illustrations portraying petite fairies fluttering in the forest and the faction's goal to emulate the golden mythological fairies from the distant First Era.
In order to emulate those legendary figures, the faction had collected numerous fairy-related codices, materials, and knowledge, and had developed a series of fairy-related secret techniques. Because of their beautiful yet deadly nature, these secret techniques were highly favored by many female transcendents, the most famous of which was the 'Fairy Incarnation' technique, allowing one to briefly transform into a fairy, gaining high speed and reaction capabilities, as well as the use of some special abilities.
However, at the end of the introduction, someone commented that these secret techniques were merely poor imitations of the 'Seven-Headed Fairyland's Song' from legends, scoffed at by ancient Elf Families. If it were the Central Star Domain, Saint Ingo Academy, which represents many traditional elven powers, would probably disdain learning from 'Golden Lands', but the Four-leaf Crystal here is just a branch school, so they didn't care as much.
Mythological fairies, huh? The girl recalled the history she had learned before about these legendary creatures mentioned almost in passing in textbooks. However, they're often discussed by enthusiasts online. According to many scholars, the first generation of 'mythological fairies' perished in the great war of the Second Era, and although the fairy species continued, much changed from the first generation 'mythological fairies'.
Since there are none present, augmented by the filter of various legends and fairy tales, 'mythological fairies' gradually became a symbolic icon, appearing in many games and films – likely sharing the same pedestal of remote fantasy existence as witches.
Shaking her head and laying down the book in her hands, although she didn't know how much of a gap existed between 'Golden Lands'' mimicry of fairy incarnation and the original, based on the results of previous observations, Tilan felt she also wouldn't be able to avoid such a strike, as that speed had already surpassed the limits of normal transcendents' reaction capabilities.
However, she wasn't without countermeasures. If it really came down to it, she would simply have to reveal her true strength and transform into her crystal form, just like when she fought with Temisia: both in crystal form, what feared wounds and injuries to common folk were merely the separation and reunion of crystals for them.