Chapter 123: THE ONE WHO LIGHTS THE WAY

[ Hidden Quest Triggered: THE ONE WHO LIGHTS THE WAY ]

[ There are those who walk the path. There are those who conquer it. And then there are those who light the way for others. The influence of a teacher cannot be measured by the number of lessons taught, nor by the number of students instructed. For every soul they guide may go on to guide another, and every life they change may become the cause of countless others being changed. Light the way. Guide those who follow. And leave behind a light that continues to shine. ]

Encrid stared at the message in surprise.

Then the rest appeared.

[ Quest Rank: ★★★★ ]

[ Quest Difficulty: ★★★★★ ]

[ Narrative Relevance: ★★★★★★★ ]

[ Objective 1: Help at least five people progress in their cultivation. ]

[ Reward: Temporary Realm Limit Breakthrough Token (Lv: Max) ]

[ Objective 2: Help five hundred people progress in their cultivation. ]

[ Reward: A Unique Title ]

[ Objective 3: Influence fifty thousand people directly or indirectly. ]

[ Reward: ▮▮▮▮▮▮▮ ]

Encrid read the first objective twice.

Then another line appeared.

[ Objective 1 Complete. ]

[ You have obtained <Temporary Realm Limit Breakthrough Token (Lv: Max)>. ]

Encrid stared at it.

A four-star quest with a five-star difficulty.

Neither number was particularly frightening by itself.

Compared to some of the monstrous quests the system had given him before, a four-star quest was almost ordinary, and even the five-star difficulty did not seem especially remarkable when he considered some of the things he had already been asked to accomplish.

The part that caught his attention was the other number.

Seven stars Narrative Relevance.

Encrid’s expression slowly became serious.

That was not a measurement of difficulty.

It was a measurement of importance.

He had seen enough of the system by now to understand that there was a difference between doing something difficult and doing something that mattered to the story.

The quest had not appeared because teaching forty-four people was particularly difficult. It had appeared because teaching them could change what happened afterward.

Encrid looked back at the objectives.

Five people.

He had already achieved it.

Five hundred.

That was a large number, but not an impossible one. If the school continued, if more classes were established, if the people who learned from him eventually taught others, then five hundred was something he could actually imagine reaching.

Fifty thousand, however, was another matter.

Encrid stared at the third objective for several seconds.

Fifty thousand people.

Directly or indirectly.

He had no idea how he was supposed to influence that many lives.

Even the Wall did not have fifty thousand people.

Perhaps the system meant that someone he taught would go on to teach another person, who would eventually influence another, and the chain would continue until the number became possible.

Or perhaps it meant something else entirely.

For now, Encrid decided he did not care.

He had learned that trying to solve an impossible objective before the system explained how it was meant to be solved was an excellent way to waste an evening.

So, his attention returned to the reward.

[ Temporary Realm Limit Breakthrough Token (Lv: Max) ]

Encrid focused on it.

The description appeared beneath it.

[ For one minute, you can break through a single Star into the highest realm possible. ]

That was all.

A remarkably short description for something that was, in Encrid’s opinion, completely ridiculous.

"One minute."

The words left his mouth quietly.

The implication was much larger than the description.

It was similar to the Temporary Skill Proficiency Token he had received before, except this time the system was not allowing him to borrow mastery over a skill.

It was allowing him to borrow an entire realms.

The highest realm for one minute.

Encrid slowly sat down.

"This is crazy."

He had thought the skill proficiency token was powerful when he received it, but at least that reward had required him to possess the skill in the first place. This was something else entirely.

Realm directly affected power.

A cultivator could possess several Stars and still be weaker than someone with fewer Stars if the difference in their realms was large enough. The realm represented how deeply a person had cultivated a Star, how much power they could draw from it, and how completely they could control that power.

And this token would temporarily take one of his Stars all the way to the top.

Encrid looked at his Azure Star.

He had spent months thinking of himself as weak.

He was a one-Star Initiate.

He had no remarkable cultivation talent.

He had never expected to become powerful through cultivation.

Yet, for one minute, this token could make all of that irrelevant.

For sixty seconds, he could take his Azure Star from the first realm to the seventh.

To the absolute limit.

Encrid did not even know what that would look like.

He had never seen an Absolute cultivator since he had arrived in this world and he knew he would probably never see one.

The highest realm was the sort of thing people spoke about in old histories, legends, and exaggerated stories told by drunk mercenaries who wanted their victories to sound more impressive than they had been.

And now he had a token that could let him stand there himself.

Even if only for a minute.

Encrid leaned back and looked at the quest window again.

There was something strange about it.

The reward was absurd.

Far more absurd than the work he had done to obtain it.

He had not defeated a powerful enemy.

He had not killed a Roamer.

He had not discovered some ancient artifact.

He had simply taught people.

Forty-four ordinary people had sat in a bathhouse every morning, and five of them had managed to open Stars.

That was all.

Or perhaps it was not.

Encrid’s eyes narrowed.

The system had never actually rewarded him according to difficulty alone.

That was something he had suspected for a long time, but this made it difficult to ignore.

The system seemed to care about consequences.

Not merely what Encrid could accomplish himself, but what his actions caused other people to accomplish.

The skill proficiency token had given him the ability to temporarily reach the highest level of a skill because it allowed him to do something he otherwise could not.

This token was different.

It had come from teaching.

From taking knowledge and passing it to other people.

From creating something that could continue without him.

Encrid looked toward the bathhouse.

The students were still inside.

Tomorrow morning, they would return.

Halla would continue cultivating her Celestial Star.

The stable boy would continue working on his newly awakened Star.

The others would continue searching.

Eventually, some of them would become stronger.

Perhaps one day they would teach their children.

Perhaps one of them would teach a soldier who would survive a battle he otherwise would have lost.

Perhaps another would become a healer, or a commander, or a teacher. ℯℯ𝑙.

Perhaps someone Encrid taught would eventually teach someone who had never even heard his name.

That was how influence worked.

It did not always travel in a straight line.

It spread.

Encrid looked at the seven-star narrative relevance attached to the quest.

The quest confirmed his theory that the school mattered.

Perhaps more than he had understood.

He had assumed that becoming Strategist of the Wall was the important part.

After all, that position gave him access to the Council, authority to propose changes, and enough influence to begin moving things in the direction he wanted.

But perhaps the title itself was not what mattered.

Perhaps the school was.

If the Wall had two hundred more cultivators instead of the seven hundred it possessed now, that would matter.

If it had five hundred more, it would matter more.

If those five hundred eventually taught another five hundred, and those people taught another five hundred after them, then the Wall would no longer be a place where cultivation was something only nobles and the exceptionally fortunate understood.

It would become part of ordinary life.

And once something became ordinary, it became very difficult to remove.

Encrid looked once more at the third objective.

Fifty thousand.

It was still absurd.

But he ignored it.

He would deal with fifty thousand when he had five hundred.

For now, he had a school and he had forty-four students.

Five had opened Stars.

And he had a token capable of giving him one minute at the absolute limit of cultivation.

Encrid closed the system window.

He had spent months wondering whether he was actually capable of stopping the Wall from falling.

There were too many variables.

Too many enemies.

Too many things he did not know.

The Roamers would come.

The forest would remain.

The Seven Sins still existed somewhere beyond the horizon of everything he currently understood.

And there would be things waiting for him that the original story had never mentioned.

But for the first time in a while, Encrid felt something he had almost forgotten to allow himself.

Confidence.

Not the confidence that he could personally defeat everything that stood against him.

That would have been foolish.

It was the confidence that he could change enough things, prepare enough people, and build enough strength that the future did not have to happen exactly as he remembered it.

He had wanted to stop the fall of the Wall.

Perhaps he had been thinking about it incorrectly.

He did not need to become strong enough to save everyone himself.

He needed to make the Wall stronger.

And if that was what the system wanted him to do, Encrid was more than willing to oblige.

He looked toward the dark outline of the Wall beyond the window.

"Let’s see how far this goes."

For the first time since arriving at the Wall, Encrid was certain of one thing.

The Wall would not fall.

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