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I continued to hesitate, so YuLong announced his decision. “I’m going home too. I know my limits. I’ve tried to learn to make talismans, but I have no talent for it. I only know how to fight. The best I can do is join someone else’s retinue. I need to talk with my father about my future before making any decisions.”

LiTing was nervous as she spoke. “I am going to take the regular Grandmaster courses. I wasn’t given enough funds for anything else.”

I looked at Yan. He signaled for me to speak.

“We all need to stay in the Academy. I know you all have your own paths to follow, but we all need to remain in our classes.”

I reached into my storage space and pulled out all the letters they sent me last time. After sorting the pile into three stacks, I slid each stack to the person who wrote them.

“These were provided to me by a powerful cultivator. They are letters from a phantom future. I don’t know what they say, but they should contain hints about what will happen if you leave the Academy.”

This was the story Yan and I had created. If anyone was testing the truth of our words from hiding, it would all check out. I considered using another shield for this conversation, but neither of us liked the idea. It might draw too much attention, some things were better off not shared, and personally, I didn’t want to spend the credits it would take.

“Fang…” JiaQi looked at me with a worried expression.

“Please, trust me. Everyone needs to stay in the Academy, and we need to all stay in the same class. I can pay for everything. Don’t worry about that. My backer will make sure there are no issues.”

If Emperor Li was going to act as some cheap master in the shadows, I would use his shadow as best as I could to keep us as safe as possible.

Yan added his thoughts to back me up.

“I’ve read part of what Fang gave me. I agree that everyone needs to stay here. The information he provided has made me aware of dangers that our position in the Academy is protecting us from.” He looked at YuLong. “Remaining here is also protecting our families.”

No one was overly happy about the scant information Yan and I were willing to tell them, but they all agreed to read the letters.

When we met back up the next day, no one wanted to talk about what they had read, but they all agreed to stay in the Academy. JiaQi and LiTing weren’t exactly happy about the situation, but they accepted it well enough. YuLong, however, seemed especially torn up about being unable to return home.

It wasn’t something I was overly comfortable doing, but I knew I had to try and help him. After our meeting broke apart, I pulled YuLong off to the side for a private discussion.

“Hey, are you okay?”

His face twisted through a few emotions before he finally shook his head helplessly.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.” He put on a fake smile and snorted a small laugh. “Just means I get to practice some more, right?”

He turned to leave, but I put a hand on his shoulder. He froze at my touch.

“YuLong… I’m sorry… I just… I know this situation is hard, but we’ll get through it. We just have to keep walking forward.”

He didn’t turn around to face me. He just spoke into the empty air in front of him.

“I didn’t come here for myself. I didn’t come to the Academy to improve my own strength or cultivation. I came here to help my family, you know? We might be connected to an imperial clan, but we’re just an unimportant branch family. I thought… I thought that I could come here, do well, and improve the lives of my brothers and sisters.”

His voice started to choke up. “Now, because of who I was put in a class with, they are all destined to die, and the only way I might be able to save their lives is by never seeing them again. So, no. No, I am not okay.”

“YuLong… I…”

I didn’t know what to tell him to reassure him. I couldn’t tell him everything. It was too dangerous, but I had to tell him something.

“YuLong, we’ll get through this. If you trust what you’ve read, you can trust me when I tell you this. While you won’t be able to see your family again for a long time, decades, possibly longer, you will see them again. You will be able to improve their lives beyond anything you’ve ever dreamt possible. Your future… your family’s future… will be limitless.”

He didn’t speak. He only silently nodded his head and pulled away from me to return to his room. I could only hope I had said enough.

Return to classes was difficult for everyone, but it was something that needed to be done. We had to set our focus on doing our best at the Academy so that we would be able to excel in the sect and be able to avoid the schemes of powerful clans.

However, our first task in forging our way forward was to take several steps backward. Everyone had used suboptimal techniques when creating their meridians, so we needed to spend several weeks dispersing them and creating new ones.

Instructor Yuan passed along a technique to make the process of meridian dispersal much easier than what I had done in the past, and she ordered us to use it as we cultivated our true techniques through the Master realm. If we noticed even a hint of a problem with a meridian, we were to use the technique to disperse and reform it.

Aside from just making the process easier, it also allowed us to capture a portion of the dispersed qi and apply it to the new meridians we were forming. By using this technique, I was able to completely disperse my old meridians and form two new ones by the end of the term.

Now that I had returned to the school timeline, the \'real\' timeline, I returned to using the Writ of True Earth so that I would be able to cultivate essence again in the future.

On the last day of class, we all left together to register for another five years of classes. After paying another 14 spirit stones for everyone’s tuition, I was ushered into a private room to have my affinities examined.

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“Three mid five-stars… and that static has grown slightly.”

She looked at me, but I didn’t provide a response. Next time, I might need to purchase something to hide certain affinities.

“Your results are disappointing. With so many opportunities, it was hoped that you would advance more broadly.” She spoke in a clipped, harsh tone. “While there may be mitigating circumstances, they do not change your results.”

She retrieved a ledger from the storage bag and made a few notes.

“Your instructor will be informed of our decision about your future training.”

That was a solid dismissal, but I had to ask something before I left.

“Will we still be punished if we raise our affinities outside the Trials now that the term has ended?”

“No. If you have the means to do so, it is allowed as you will not be allowed to enter any Trials during this term. However, you should be aware that depending upon your results, if you wish to return as a Grandmaster, you may be allowed inside them as part of your coursework at that time. The number of opportunities you are granted, if you are granted any at all, will be determined by your performance during this term. Take that into consideration if you decide to improve your affinities in other ways.”

I thanked her for the advice and departed, ready to return to class.

Instructor Yuan stood before us to explain how we would spend our next five years.

“Your most important task during this term is taking Disciples under your tutelage. As you were taught as Disciples, so will you teach others. The Disciple course is four years. I will spend this first year teaching you how to teach. Then, you will spend the next four putting these lessons into practice.”

She looked at Yan. “You will be responsible for a class of five Disciples of your choosing.”

She looked at JiaQi, YuLong, and LiTing. “You three will each be assigned a Disciple and become their personal trainers.”

She turned to me. “You get a choice. You can either be a personal trainer, or you can be assigned to teach a class of my choosing.”

“Is there a reason I should pick one over the other?”

“You will find teaching a class of Disciples far more rewarding in both experience and credit with the Academy. However, it will be far more challenging. Especially for you.”

Was that a threat or a dig at my potential teaching skills? Both?

After only a slight pause, I knew what I wanted. There was no reason to take the easy path here.

“I’ll take the full class.”

Instructor Yuan smirked at my decision but didn’t comment further.

The next day, LiTing, JiaQi, and YuLong were sent to study under separate teachers while Yan and I were to be trained by Instructor Yuan personally. Once class started, it was clear she intended to maintain her approach of only explaining what we were supposed to do after first letting us fail.

“Your Disciples will all be from wealthy or powerful families. While they will have never cultivated before, they will be familiar with the basics. Think back to what you knew when you first entered the Academy. Your students will all know as much or more than you did.”

This prepared speech was… questionable. My own history was one thing, and it was fair that she didn’t know it, but the person beside me was Zhuge Yan…

“That’s one of the reasons we take the approach that we do. Your Disciples will be young and brash. Most will think they know everything you want to teach them already, so your first task is to show them how much they have left to learn.”

She motioned for me to stand and walk to the front of the room. As I did, she moved to take the seat I had vacated.

“This is the first day of class. Teach us.”

I blinked. What was I supposed to do?

During the classes, I had felt that both Instructors Sun and Yuan could have done a better job in explaining certain things, but I was willing to follow their examples. At least, I was willing to follow them until I had a firmer idea of how to try and improve upon them.

So, what should I do? She said to show the students how I could help them. How was I supposed to do that? I could try and demonstrate my prowess in some way, but if the students were from cultivation families with Lords and Kings, there wasn’t much I could do that would shock them.

I tried to think back to my first lessons under Master Sun. He had forced us to cultivate an awful technique under conditions that led to drawing in mountains of impurities. Was I supposed to do that? But… I came to class a month late. What happened before that?

The first lesson had to be about creating qi filters, right? So… The student would need a cultivation technique. I took a quick check around the front of the room and found a storage bag that had been placed out of sight. Inside were several manuals, including five Low-Yellow cultivation techniques.

I handed one of these low-level manuals to both Yan and Instructor Yuan.

“Cultivate this.”

Instructor Yuan showed Yan what he should do. She created a false qi filter and vortex above her palm to simulate a Disciple trying to cultivate the technique. These false filters were nonfunctional and only served as a prop for the lesson.

I looked at Instructor Yuan’s faulty creation and frowned. How should I correct her?

“You will pull in a significant amount of impurities with this. You need to fix it.”

Instructor Yuan fumbled around, making a poor show of fixing her mistakes. What was I supposed to do here? I didn’t know an easy way to explain what she was doing wrong. The only thing I could think to do was repeat the same tactic I’d used in the past. It might not be what Yuan wanted, but it was the only plan I could come up with.

After a bit of hesitation, I looked at Instructor Yuan.

“One moment, please. I need to make a slight change.”

She nodded graciously.

At this point, the spirit flame in my body was the wood-based one I had used to complete the Earth Trial. Using my spatial bag as cover, I pulled an empty jade box out of my storage space, forced the wood flame out of my body, and stowed it in the box.

Returning this box to my storage space, I then retrieved a fire-based flame and absorbed it.

With this complete, I returned to Instructor Yuan’s ‘lesson,’ and she resumed her fumbling with the filter.

Using the spirit fire, I created a ghostly apparition and overlaid the correct form on top of what she was doing.

“It should look like this.”

She adjusted her qi to align it with my example.

“Here and here still need adjustments.” I pointed to the problem areas.

She quickly fixed them and began ‘cultivating’ properly.

I backed off and waited for her judgment silently, but she just continued acting out her role for several more minutes.

When it was clear to her that I would say nothing else, she stood, gestured for me to retake my seat, and moved back in front of us.

“That was an interesting technique to clarify the problems with the qi filter. Lord Ning mentioned something like this previously and wished for you to attempt to use it in your classes. I believe it may work.”

She turned to Yan. “What can he improve?”

He looked at me. “Don’t talk about impurities at this point. There isn\'t any value in it. Just tell them what they are doing wrong without the why. Adding in talk of impurities can muddy the explanation of what they are doing wrong and how to fix it.”

Instructor Yuan nodded. “I agree partially. Such details may benefit some students, but if you want to bring it up, you need to make it meaningful. Don’t just say ‘impurities.’ If you want to talk about them, talk about them. If you don’t, then don’t mention them.”

She kept her focus on me. “What else could you improve?”

“I’m not sure… You corrected the filter quickly and would have been cultivating well. I don’t know what more could have been done.”

“What did I tell you? Show the students how much they have left to learn. You didn’t do this at all. You had me make a few minor alterations and were satisfied with the result.”

I didn’t understand. “Because it was correct. Wasn’t it?”

“Yes, it was. That is the problem. Cultivating correctly so easily doesn’t teach them the lessons they need. They need to cultivate poorly. The worse they do, the better. Don’t start them with Low-Yellow techniques. If they already have a Peak-Earth technique, make them use it. If not, provide the ones in that bag you found. Then you can use your little trick. Even with its help, they will still fail without sufficient practice. Being able to clearly see what they are doing wrong and not be able to fix it will be far more helpful at this stage.”

She looked at Yan. “What was his biggest mistake?”

He turned to me. “She said to teach ‘us.’ You didn’t teach me.”

My jaw dropped slightly at that. Yan hadn’t tried to do the false cultivation even after the instructor showed him how. Why would I…

Instructor Yuan gave Yan a look of approval and then looked at me to explain.

“Try to involve the whole class. I am focused on your actions right now, but I have been making an effort to include Zhuge Yan during the process. This will be difficult, especially when there are large differences in abilities between your students. However, as you will both be teaching a full class of Disciples, it is a skill you must work to improve.”