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Chapter 333: Heavy Pagoda
🕑 Added 2023-12-22 17:36:00 +0000 UTCIf someone took an ancient Chinese pagoda and placed it in a weird alien setting, that would pretty closely resemble the Black Hole Church’s Heavy Pagoda.
It had seven floors. The roofs between them extended out of the building, like open umbrellas, while the walls were smooth and completely vertical. The entire pagoda was constructed in a dark material that Jack couldn’t identify, making it almost invisible against the dark sky. However, the ring of light around the pagoda’s base illuminated it just fine.
As they approached, Jack saw that this ring of light was actually thousands of tiny symbols, each completely incomprehensible. With a cursory glance, he did not find even two that were identical.
“Those are Dao glyphs,” the Sage explained. “The basis of magic formations. The language of the Dao. They aren’t letters; more like instructions, with each symbol representing an entire sentence. Kind of like the eastern ideograms, but significantly more complex.”
Jack whistled. “What do they say?”
“That this elevator goes down.”
“Excuse me?”
The Sage laughed. “I don’t know to read them. However, I know they are part of a gravity-enhancing formation. The Heavy Pagoda takes advantage of its environment and uses magic to amplify the already great gravity by a number of times.”
“A number of times?” Jack shivered. Just normal gravity here was a thousand times stronger than Earth’s. “You mean it gets even stronger?”
“Oh yeah. The first floor has gravity twice as powerful as the rest of the Cathedral. After that, every higher floor doubles it again. The seventh floor contains gravity that is one hundred and twenty-eight times stronger than the regular gravity around here. Just the body weight of a normal cultivator would number in the millions of pounds in there. For Dorman, think billions.”
“Hey!”
“What’s the use of such a thing?” Jack asked.
“You’ve experienced the Cathedral’s high concentration of Dao, right? Thanks to the thousandfold gravity, the Dao here is much more concentrated than elsewhere, making cultivation more efficient. That increase is further amplified in the Heavy Pagoda. Moreover, there are special meditation mats in there that read the cultivator’s Dao and help filter out the irrelevant particles, further increasing the speed of your cultivation. With those two advantages combined, even the first floor of the pagoda offers a roughly fifty percent increase in cultivation speed. There are also other advantages…”
Jack’s eyes widened. “What about the final floor?”
“The final floor?” The Sage laughed again. “With your current strength, even the first floor is a stretch. As for the final floor, nobody goes there. Even the current #1 outer disciple, Min Ling, can only cultivate at the sixth floor.”
Jack considered it. Makes sense. If my body weighed ten million pounds, I would just become paste.
“The Pagoda also helps with breakthroughs. Unfortunately, I cannot enter,” Dorman added in a sad voice. “Even if I successfully became a disciple and reached the 950 ranking, my weight has over-doubled due to my current form.”
A hint of pity entered Jack’s heart—Dorman was an extremely talented cultivator who’d bitten off more than he could chew. Now, he was trapped here, unable to either progress or leave, and he was forced to just watch as his potential dried out.
Oh, what the hell? We come from the same planet.
“Hey, Dorman,” he said. “If I manage to get more resources in the future, I will definitely save some Dao stones to help you break through as well.”
Dorman’s eyes shone. “You would do that for me?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thank you, Jack. Your words mean a lot to me. I will engrave this kindness into my heart.”
“You don’t have to go that far. Just don’t forget about your home planet.”
Hearing that, Dorman lowered his gaze in shame. He had heard about the war that occurred on Earth. In fact, he would have joined if he wasn’t trapped here.
But what could he say? Getting trapped was his own fault, and at the end of the day, he was not there when his planet needed him. All he could do was swallow the shame.
Jack did not wish to press the issue further. “I will go test out the pagoda,” he said.
“Then, I’ll walk back to my cabin,” the Sage replied. “No sense in watching the walls. Drop by later to drink some tea.”
“I’ll wait for you,” Dorman said, raising his head with bright eyes. “Cultivating here or elsewhere makes little difference. I’ll accompany you after you exit.”
Jack gave him a deep look. This Dorman…
Back on Earth, during the Integration Tournament, Dorman had been cold and arrogant. He refused to put anyone in his eyes, refused to consider others, and had only acknowledged Jack after the two of them tied in a spar. Even after they met again in Trial Planet, Dorman’s attitude hadn’t changed much.
Now, Jack could see that Dorman’s arrogance had been beaten out of him. He had arrived at the Cathedral, where every single person was an outstanding, otherworldly talent. Here, Dorman was only average, and he had faced failure repeatedly. He could neither progress nor leave. Moreover, he had been trapped in a form that severely constrained his battle prowess, driving him further down the bottom of the barrel.
It must have been a cold wake-up call…
That arrogant young man had been tempered, finally losing his cold heart and becoming earnest. He could now see past his pride. Jack had done him a favor by promising to help him in the future, so Dorman would wait outside the Heavy Pagoda for however long it took.
He had matured.
Jack nodded slowly, acknowledging Dorman in his heart. When he promised to give him some Dao stones before, it was only on account of them being from the same planet. Now, he genuinely wanted to help.
“Good,” he said. “I don’t know how long I’ll take. If you get bored or tired, feel free to leave.”
Dorman raised a brow. “You know you only get one hour, right?”
“I do?”
“You’re ranked 950. You can enter the pagoda, but only for one hour a month. The next increment is at ranking 900, where you get two hours a month.”
“Oh.”
Jack didn’t know that. One hour was very little time. It was clearly meant to let the low-ranked disciples get a taste of the pagoda’s benefits, making them strive harder for higher ranks.
“See you in an hour,” Jack said, then boldly strode towards the pagoda. Dorman plopped his ass down where he stood, closed his eyes, and immediately entered meditation.
His discipline was good.
The Sage had already left, so Jack approached the pagoda alone. The outside was empty; the only person present was an Envoy, who was apparently responsible for managing the pagoda.
“Hello,” Jack greeted him. “I am Jack Rust, ranked 950. I would like to enter the Heavy Pagoda please.”
The Envoy shot him a glance. She was an older-looking human, with gray hair caught in a tight bun and simple robes hanging from her shoulders. Despite her old age, her body seemed robust and powerful, and her gaze was naturally hard—like a gladiator granny.
“One hour,” she said, then closed her eyes again.
“Thank you.”
Jack approached the first floor.
Each floor had its own entrance, but there were no stairs. To enter the second floor, one had to jump there or fly. Of course, to a cultivator who could handle the second floor, reaching it was a trivial matter.
Jack only had one hour, but he could enter any floor he wished. Naturally, he chose the first. He approached the door—a massive, unadorned block of dark stone—and pushed it open. It was heavy. Far too heavy. He had to use part of his Dao to open it, and yet, as the block of stone swung open, it made no sound at all.
The inside of the pagoda was pitch-black and completely silent. It was like entering a nightmare. Jack took a step inside.
The moment he did, the sky crashed down on his shoulders. The already extreme gravity doubled. Jack gasped, suddenly finding it hard to stay on his feet. He rapidly rotated his Dao, finding that even standing here consumed a frightening amount of energy. He could spare it for some minutes, but after that, he would get tired. If he meditated for too long and passed his limits, he could become unable to walk out.
Perhaps the one hour limit was not to tease him, but to protect him.
Jack gritted his teeth and endured the exertion. He forced himself to walk, every step a hurdle. His perception spread out, but to his surprise, he found that it was limited to within three feet of his person. Anything beyond that vanished like a stone thrown to the sea.
This had to be an effect of the pagoda’s formation. It was probably meant to give privacy to the meditating cultivators. After all, nobody liked being watched, especially in such a demanding environment.
However, Jack also noticed a thin stream of Dao energy under his feet. It was flowing inwards, as if showing him the path. It made sense. If he had to spend ten minutes looking for an empty mat in the darkness while dodging cross-legged cultivators, the pagoda would be nothing more than a joke.
Jack followed the thin stream of Dao between his feet. Every step was hard, but he pushed through. The stream led him in a curved path, presumably avoiding other cultivators, before a meditation mat finally entered his perception range. He couldn’t see it, but he perceived it as made of gold. As he approached it and sat down, it was freezing to the touch, though that also helped calm his mind.
Now, I guess I meditate…
Jack was stranded in darkness, enduring extreme gravity and the natural coldness of space. His purple robes clung to his body, and his dark hair was plastered to the back of his neck, the roots of each hair pulling on his skin as if they wanted to jump out. Jack’s Dao was constantly active, neutralizing a large part of the gravity, but even the small portion that remained was hard for his body to endure.
He pulled up his status screen, specifically observing his stats.
Strength: 1760
Dexterity: 1760
Constitution: 1755
His titles also gave him a combined 100% increased efficacy for all his stats. All things considered, his Physical substats were at an effective 3500 points, roughly, which was seven hundred times greater than the average pre-System human.
With the current gravity at two thousand times that of Earth, and also the fact that his body was not optimized for such conditions…no wonder his waist hurt.
Still, Jack closed his eyes and attempted to cultivate. A small part of his mind remained vigilant—if an enemy approached him in the darkness, or if the drain on his energy became too much, he would immediately wake up and be ready to react.
Besides that small part of his mind, the rest of him closed out the world. Everything washed away. Even the immense weight was only a faint echo in the distance. His Dao Tree pulsed with power, and the surrounding Dao became his to wield.
At the same time, the meditation mat under him activated as well, drawing at the Fist-related Dao particles and pushing away everything else.
Jack fell into the familiar practice of meditation.
Though his progress in the D-Grade was mostly made through killing others, he had actually spent most of his time meditating. It had almost become second nature by now. His perception spread out gently like a thousand slender fingers, picking out the Fist-adjacent Dao particles and drawing them inside his pores. From there, they traveled to his chest, where his soul was located, and slipped in. Another part of Jack’s perception then pushed them inside his Dao Tree, where they filled it with vitality.
Normally, as Jack had already reached the limits of the D-Grade, cultivating like this would not bring any benefits. No matter how much power he crammed into his Dao Tree, its total capacity could increase no further until he broke through. He was only doing this now to increase his familiarity with the Dao of the Fist. Any excess energy would just disperse.
However, to his surprise, the energy actually accumulated!
Jack’s closed eyes flickered. He drew short breaths due to excitement. The increased density in here increased his rate of cultivation, which meant that he would progress faster if he wasn’t already at the limit. However, the pagoda’s formation actually had a secondary benefit; somehow, the Dao was artificially packed together, slightly decreasing its volume by increasing its density. That allowed Jack to accumulate more of it inside his Dao Tree, effectively supercharging it. This excess energy would eventually disperse, of course, but it was not instant. He could maintain this state for a few minutes.
Inside the Heavy Pagoda, the total energy he could accumulate had risen!
Jack’s heart was jumping in excitement. The reason he needed Dao stones, the main reason he couldn’t break through right now, was the limited amount of energy he could fit in his Dao Tree. If the Heavy Pagoda allowed him to temporarily increase that limit, even by a little…it could decrease the number of Dao stones he needed.
It could speed up his breakthrough!
Just by the little bit he’d experienced already, Jack estimated that if he filled up his Dao Tree here, he would only need fifteen Dao stones to break through, not twenty. That could already save him months of effort.
And this was just the first floor of the pagoda. Higher up, the Dao density would be even greater. A crazy thought entered Jack’s mind.
What if I entered a higher floor?
