Lily Ward was determined to become a cultivator.

  She got a lot of flak for it, but no matter what, she remained dauntless. She’d even grown used to it, inured to it— hardly a week went by when she didn’t hear someone tell her something about how she’d never make it. So what if the Matron told her that she should set realistic expectations? There was no point in setting her goal at anything less than becoming a disciple of the Bloody Saffron Sect, so she wouldn’t even bother. Who cared that her teachers told her the competition became fiercer towards her final year at the academy, or that she was inherently disadvantaged in the physical classes due to her size? She’d just try harder. Or that even if she graduated at the very top of her class, she’d still have to surpass everyone in the entire city in the University in order to be accepted as a disciple of the Sect— she’d just study ahead. Far ahead.

  She had to. She had to.

  She’d gotten used to it, and, as she furiously scratched out topology equations on her paper, she was sure that this was just another step on her path, another obstacle to be over—

  Someone was sitting beside her. She yelped in surprise, leaping out of her chair a little before crashing back painfully down, glaring at the interloper. “Immortals!” Bastard— “you scared me—” then, she paused. That was the librarian she was yelling at, and she absolutely couldn’t afford to get banned from the library. So, no matter how much it rankled, she bit down her scathing response. “Librarian. Sorry. Am I in trouble?”

  The librarian shook his head. “Not as such.” It was the first time she’d really interacted with him, she realized. Some of the other, less diligent kids liked to gossip about how the new librarian had eyes in the back of his head, and gripe about how much more difficult it was to snack in the library now, but she’d never done that anyways so she’d not really run into him. “I just noticed you were having problems with…” he trailed off for a second— “and, I thought that I should come see what was ailing you.”

  She grimaced. “You make it sound like I’ve come down sick or something. I’m fine— this isn’t the first time I’ve struggled with a topic, and it’s not going to be the last. If I plan on making it to East Saffron University, then I can’t let something like this stop me.” She wouldn’t. She refused. Even if she had to spend the rest of summer break bashing her head against it, then she’d do it. She was only a little ahead of a first year university student at this point, and that wasn’t good enough.

  “You can also ask for help. Trust me, even immortals sometimes do that.”

  “Ugh.” And here she’d thought he was different. She should have anticipated that he’d be just like the others. “Just… don’t. I will be a cultivator, no matter how much you, or anyone else tells me I should be ‘more reasonable’ or whatever.” The man blinked, nonplussed— “And I’m not going to give up just because I have to learn stupid idiot useless maths.”

  Then— the librarian laughed. Actually laughed. She scowled— those were the worst sort, always, the ones who heard her dream and discarded it just as— “I believe you.” Her emotions tripped over themselves and faceplanted into shock, bewildered as the new librarian said something different. “Honestly. If you want to be a cultivator, then strive for it. Tear down the skies for it, and salt the earth for it— and never let anyone else tell you otherwise.” There was a dangerous presence in those words— a furious, terrible certainty that she recognized very, very well.

  After all, it was hers. “Actually?” She whispered, wondering if this was just some cruel platitude or if he really— “you think I could do it?”

  “I don’t see why you couldn’t.” And so simply said, she could tell that he actually believed that. It was a liberating feeling indeed.

  But still. A few words of encouragement didn’t change the fact that she had no idea what she was doing with her maths. “Alright, fine, I’ll bite.” It almost hurt to say it, but if he wasn’t going to stomp on her dreams then she could at least try and be polite, much as that was outside her usual modus operandi. “What am I doing wrong? I don’t get what the point of this is…”

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  Then, almost like magic, the librarian pulled out a few sheets of paper and the fanciest brush— not even a pen, an honest to heavens brush— effortlessly, fancily swiping out a character that kinda looked recognizable yet, on closer inspection, didn’t make any sense at all. “You’re kind of half right. This is stupid. But not because the maths are stupid— rather, the examples they’re using are just… pointless. Watch. What would you call this?”

  She leaned forward, squinting at it and trying to figure out—

  Her breath touched the ink, and it glowed.

  What. The. Hells. She recoiled in surprise, staring down at the character as though it was an Immortal Ascension-rank artefact. The closest she’d ever been to a formation before was the ancient, half-broken wardstone in the Matron’s office, and this… this was so much more real than that. “Is that a rune? Wait—” if he could scribe runes, then didn’t that mean… she’d known that Chief Librarian Lexi had been advanced to Shedding as part and parcel of her position, but— “are you a cultivator?”

  The librarian laughed. “Not at all.” Oh, right, of course… she tried not to feel dissapointed. Obviously, if he were a cultivator, he’d be off in a sect or something making heaven defying formations or fighting against the empire or something awesome like that. “I merely have some small expertise in formations studies. Now, that wasn’t what I wanted to show you… this is a simple, weak rune, no?” She didn’t bother responding, just studying the rune as intently as she could. “well, what if I were to give you a three-dimensional structure, and ask you to scribe it onto a two-dimensional space? What would you do?”

  “Um.” Was that a trick question? “Math?”

  “Have at it then.” A minute later, he handed over a paper to her with some sort of… depiction of the rune in front of her, expanded out to three dimensions. “Try.” She needed… she reached out to that beautiful brush, then paused— then tried not to flinch as the librarian handed it over to her. It felt… cool in her hand, solid. Like an awesome treasure straight out of one of her stories. Then, at the second piece of paper…

  It was a chance. An opportunity, to grasp onto something beyond her ken, beyond the ken of any but cultivators, and adamantly refused to let it escape her. Sinking into the description before her, she took in the whole of it—

  And got to work.

  It was hard.

  Just as hard as any of the problems before, but also more natural. There was something about having the problem in front of her that made it far less contrived, so much more actually important— and so she pushed forward, scribbling equation after equation, transformation after transformation and occasionally searching up clarification on her dataslate until—

  She put the finishing touch on her rune, and blew on it— and it didn’t work. She tried not to feel disappointed. Of course it didn’t work. It was a cultivator’s rune, a cultivator’s work, and she’d… she’d probably gotten it wrong somewhere. She’d been trying to solve the thing all evening, and… “I was certainI got everything right. What went wrong? I thought…” she was! And she could hear the plaintive note in her own voice, no matter how hard she tried to press it down.

  The librarian gently pulled the brush from her hand. “You did well actually. At least mathematically, you got everything right. All that you missed was a matter of technique— each stroke, a stroke, each curving form part of a single, greater whole.” He wrote as he spoke, and it was beautiful— the surety which he painted out a real, actual rune. “Close your eyes before you try it.”

  She scowled as she gently took the paper from his hands, but obeyed, placing it on the table and blowing—

  Light.

  So much light. Visible starkly even through her eyelids, starkly illuminating every single vein and rivulet of blood, and flesh, and— burning for a single moment before with a puff of smoke it burnt itself to nothing. Magic. That had been actual, real magic.

  The works of a cultivator, given unto the hands of a mortal. She didn’t know what to feel about it. Awed… she stared down at the scorch mark, then back at the textbook, then at the scorch mark again…

  Determined.

  Then she realized it was way too late, and that she had to get back home before the Matron yelled at her too much, but— still.

  She had for once tasted the power of a cultivator and, even if only tangentially, and… it had been everything she’d ever thought it’d be.