Chapter 5: So-Called Ability Users (Part 2)

Tian Yi continued his explanation. “Strong-rank users naturally make up a smaller proportion than Paper- and Normal-rank users. Apart from a few exceptionally gifted individuals who can reach this realm with ease, most ability users need at least ten years or so of tireless study and practice before they have a chance of reaching the threshold of Strong rank. So if you want to get ahead and have lofty ambitions, start training early. Goku and Luffy both started grinding levels as children so they wouldn't need so many cheats when they grew up.”

“Where did these weird examples suddenly come from...?” The corner of Zuo Dao's mouth twitched.

Tian Yi ignored him and continued, “Only at Strong rank can you truly be called an ‘ability user.’ Abilities at Normal rank and below are innate, whereas reaching Strong rank is an expression of individual will.

“In fact, many people in this world don't consider having superpowers a blessing. They see it as an illness, a burden. Take Blood Owl's ability. If someone else had been born with it, that person almost certainly wouldn't have lived to start elementary school. That's why Blood Owl isn't an ordinary man. You couldn't find a second case like his on the entire planet. He's extraordinary.

“But most people in this world are ordinary.

“Everyone has their own idea of the person they'll become. But most of that thinking comes to nothing. Ordinary lives tend to follow just two paths. On the first, people get to exercise their inborn talents and gifts and become the people they're suited to being. Those who take that path are the lucky ones. People on the second path drift with the current, pushed by family circumstances, social pressure and so on, eventually becoming what other people want them to be. They make up the bulk of this world.

“I once read a Book of the Heart about a middle-aged man who'd dreamed in his youth of becoming a rock singer and changing the world. But for all sorts of external reasons, he couldn't stick it out and had to turn his attention back to his studies. He got into a second-rate university, then went to work. Twenty years later, his hairline was receding, his beer belly made him look six months pregnant, and his life was ordinary, tedious and exhausting. When his young son stood before him with a guitar in his arms, solemnly declaring that he was going to form a band and make the most of his youth, the man trotted out the same old arguments. He objected and tried to talk him out of it, citing countless failures and the possible consequences of failing, killing another person's dream. Because he'd compromised, his own experience told him that compromise was the right choice. He didn't understand what those who'd persevered had been through. All he could see was failure.

“People have always been like this. Establishing accepted rules and conventions is merely a way for the majority to make the minority compromise, because the hardest thing in this world is changing someone else's will.

“Actually, you don't have to take either of those paths. What sort of person you're suited to being, or what the world wants you to be, doesn't matter. What matters is what you want to be in your own heart. If you have no talent, you can work hard. If you lack the right conditions, you can create them. Even if you ultimately fail, just accept the price. Your life is your own game. The people who force you to compromise won't pay your bill with their lives.

“That's why I say Strong-rank ability users are the backbone. Whatever their motives, whether they're indulging their greed, upholding the justice in their hearts, or simply proving that their existence has value, they've entered the ranks of the experts through their own effort and intelligence. They've chosen... to become ability users.”

At this, Zuo Dao gave him a sidelong look. “If you're implying that I'm short on talent or have no ambition, at least get yourself to Strong rank first...”

Tian Yi avoided the subject of his own ability rank and merely replied, “You certainly have no ambition. As for talent, I think you've put yours to use elsewhere.” He lifted his coffee and took a sip. “Now for the remaining three ranks. Under the Empire's system, what we're about to discuss would already count as top secret.”

“And from the Inverted Cross's point of view...?” Zuo Dao asked.

Tian Yi shrugged. “I told you before we started. Just some obscure facts that ought to be common knowledge.”

“Fine.” Zuo Dao gave up.

Tian Yi said, “To use martial arts novels as an example, if Strong-rank ability users are fighters who've made a name for themselves in the martial world, then someone at Fierce rank is the head of a major sect, or has strength equivalent to that sect's best fighter.

“There's a bottleneck between Strong and Fierce rank, and diligence and hard work may not get you through it. The process is as difficult as the legendary attainment of enlightenment. You need the insight to understand it. Those who can't understand it simply can't.

“In terms of physical strength, a Fierce-rank ability user may not be much stronger than a Strong-rank one. What matters at this rank is that they clearly understand the principles of energy.

“However skillfully you use energy without understanding it, you can't achieve even a fraction of what's possible once you've grasped its essence. As I said, at the upper limit of Strong rank, the techniques for using an ability in conjunction with energy have generally been honed to perfection. Fierce-rank users, however, can make their abilities take countless forms, doing whatever they wish. Suppose someone can control metal. At Strong rank, he spends one unit of energy bending a spoon. When he reaches Fierce rank, he discovers that the same unit of energy can actually bend a lamppost.

“Most Strong-rank ability users still stand a high chance of dying in a natural disaster or a military extermination operation. If they put everything into escaping, their survival rate is roughly 30 percent. Fierce-rank users have over a 90 percent chance of escaping either situation. They can give energy a degree of tangible form to resist damage or convert it directly into destructive force. It consumes enormous amounts of stamina, but it's useful at a critical moment. That's how Tea Immortal survived the explosion a few days ago. If that blast had gone off under a Strong-rank user's feet, he'd have been reduced to ashes.

“Different users have different abilities, and their defensive effectiveness varies, but basically, conventional weapons fire, including close-range submachine-gun bursts, long-range sniper fire and even howitzer shells, can be blocked without too much effort. They're human weapons in every sense, impervious to blades and bullets. Unless you stick the barrel into their mouth or up their asshole before firing, a single Fierce-rank ability user on the battlefield is worth at least a regiment of regular troops.”

Zuo Dao grinned. “Judging by what happened in Venice, Blood Owl's worth a division, then?”

“It's possible, but it depends on the circumstances. In full-scale war, the weapons and troop types the Empire deploys are far more technologically advanced than the forces it uses in cities. Even if someone really could pick up a mountain and throw it at them, their armored vehicles might still burrow out from underneath and rejoin the fight,” Tian Yi replied. “Now, let's talk about ability users who can reliably hold off a division. Mad rank.

“Their physiology still falls within the bounds of humans or mutants. There's no question about that. But the physical toughness of Mad-rank ability users is rather extreme. You could say that they interact with the natural world on a different basis from ordinary people. In their eyes, the world is energy.

“It's like watching so much porn that your mind naturally has no...” Tian Yi abruptly stopped and took a sip of coffee. “That's not a very suitable example. Let's try another comparison. It's like those impossibly hardcore players who see video games purely as data. Memorizing every pattern, 100 percent, is just a basic skill to them. They know by heart how many enemies will spawn in an entire side-scrolling game, how many rewards they can pick up after clearing a stage, even how many times they've pressed a button. The most exquisite graphics mean nothing. The finest game music might as well not exist. Reading the story serves only to help them clear the game, and if there's no story, they can shrug it off with a smile. They yawn their way through horror puzzle games and play dating sims as memory games, ignoring all dialogue and remembering only the choices and branching paths. While playing, they can pull off extreme maneuvers you'd normally only see in tool-assisted speedruns. Their reactions are lightning-fast, their expressions blank, and they're extraordinarily calm in the face of any unexpected situation. In their eyes, the game is data. What they're doing is using the controls to make that set of data run precisely, perfectly and quickly, until they've beaten the game.

“Broadly speaking, lower-ranked ability users facing a Mad-rank user are like casual players who've only just reached the level cap, watching a world-first kill achievement pop up on their server.

“Those below can only imagine the true extent of that gap. Those above won't explain it to them, and even if they did, the others might not understand.”

“So... you're trying to explain it to me when you're Paper rank just like me, right...?” Zuo Dao said.

“You've got a lot of snide remarks today. Taking every opening to mock your boss, are you? You must have a lot of grievances you want to air.” Tian Yi took a cleaver from the drawer and laid it on the desk. “Tell you what. If you're unhappy, just hack me to death.”

Zuo Dao froze. “Bro... you... d-don't j-j... joke around.” His nerves suddenly made him stammer.

“That's what I'm trying to explain. Why I'm the boss, while you... hmm... you're just a head of Zuo Dao,” Tian Yi said.

Zuo Dao blinked. “Do you count humans by the ‘head’? And my name isn't an insult or a common noun!”

Tian Yi acted as though he hadn't heard and continued, “My point is that even if you hacked me to death, you still couldn't be the boss. That's the gap between us. Come to think of it, Gu Wen has the best chance of anyone in the Inverted Cross of killing me and taking my place. I'm working hard to train him toward that goal. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to have much ambition, which deprives me of the fun of fearing for my life. Ah... there's endless pleasure in pitting yourself against other people.

“All right, back to the subject. The gap between Mad rank and the other ranks is like what I just demonstrated. A Mad-rank user can hand someone a knife and say, ‘I'm so much stronger than you that the gap is hard to put into words. Attack however you like. I don't care.’

“You could count the world's Mad-rank ability users on your fingers. To continue the martial arts novel analogy, they're on the level of the Five Greats. You need both talent and hard work, and even then, reaching Mad rank depends on whether you get the right opportunity, or luck, if you prefer.

“Mad-rank ability users employ energy the way Strong-rank users employ their abilities. They have the strength to take on an army single-handed. In war, Strong- and Fierce-rank users have considerable tactical value, while Mad-rank users have strategic significance. Their intervention doesn't merely decide who wins a fight. It can fundamentally affect the outcome of an entire campaign.”

Zuo Dao said, “Then that last rank really does mean a ‘god’?” He asked because there were currently no known God-rank ability users in the world, and he'd never heard of anyone like that appearing in history either. God rank seemed to be there simply for people to gaze at, utterly beyond human reach.

Tian Yi answered in an utterly casual, matter-of-fact tone. “Yes. Very close to the literal meaning. At God rank, you're no longer human.

“For all I've just said about how invincible Mad-rank users are, they're still human. Humans have all sorts of weaknesses they can't escape. The limits of physical and mental stamina are the most fundamental restrictions. However powerful a martial artist is, if you subject him to an endless siege by small fry for days and nights, he'll die sooner or later. So as long as someone is human, they can be defeated.

“Take the Empire as it stands today. If it were forced into a position where it urgently needed to eliminate a particular Mad-rank user regardless of the consequences, it would have two options. First, send three ability users of Mad rank or above to hunt down and kill the target. The outcome would be difficult to predict, and the estimated destruction would range from a city to a continent. Second, deploy nuclear weapons or Genesis, deliberately destroying a commandery of its own territory, killing every snake, insect, rat and ant, leaving not a blade of grass alive.

“But neither option works on God-rank ability users. They're deities who have descended into this world in human bodies. How could any human act take their lives?

“Even if heaven and earth collapsed, the sun changed and the stars shifted, God-rank ability users wouldn't die from it. Energy brings about another qualitative transformation in their bodies. They shed all human limitations and weaknesses and become beings of a higher dimension. Monsters in the truest sense.

“Grasp the sun and moon, move mountains and rivers, destroy heaven and earth. The realm of immortals.”

Zuo Dao said, “There's something I find strange. This six-rank system for ability users has been handed down from who knows what era. If no one has ever reached God rank, why establish that rank at all?”

Tian Yi drained the remaining coffee from his cup and replied lazily, “How do you know no one has? I told you from the start that what I'm explaining is the most accurate and appropriate understanding of ability-user ranks. If God-rank users didn't exist, would I be describing them from my imagination?”

Zuo Dao looked at Tian Yi suspiciously. “You know a god?” After asking, he paused, then spoke again with greater emphasis. “You're a god?”

“Do I look like one?” Tian Yi asked.

Zuo Dao stood, circled Tian Yi twice, and adopted the tone of a street fortune-teller. “Your Excellency is versed in the collected writings, comprehends the hundred schools, ascends the heights and composes verse, beholds all things and knows their names. Your discourse is lofty, your breath restores the withered and revives the dead... Hmm... Judging by this humble Taoist's attainments, I suspect you're simply making it all up.”

Tian Yi said, “Though I suddenly feel that killing you would get me straight to the level cap, we're discussing serious business, so that can wait.” He picked up the cleaver on the desk and hurled it at Zuo Dao without warning.

Zuo Dao ducked his head out of the way. “Hey! What's gotten into you all of a sudden?”

“This is your first lesson in energy,” Tian Yi said. “Why did you dodge just now?”

“What do you think? If I hadn't, you'd be covered in blood,” Zuo Dao replied.

Tian Yi smiled. “You dodged because you thought that if a cleaver hit your head, you'd be injured.”

“Isn't that obvious?”

“Then what would you do if I threw a pillow at you?”

“I'd start questioning your sexual orientation...”

Tian Yi ignored that remark. “You have this idea in your head. Cleaver versus face, the cleaver wins. Pillow versus face, at least the face won't lose.” He got up and went to the coffeepot to pour himself another cup. “But in fact, they're the same thing.”

“Kinetic energy, thermal energy, chemical energy. Everything produces energy as it operates. Going back to that gaming concept, once you start seeing yourself as a set of data too, you'll understand a lot of things other people can't.

“Take ordinary people. With training, some can chop through several stacked bricks barehanded or kick through wooden boards and so on. They're still flesh and blood. Skin is still skin, flesh is still flesh, and bone is still bone. Chop them up and make dumplings out of them, and they'd taste no different from anyone else.

“But why would an ordinary person break their foot kicking a wooden board, while those who've trained can destroy objects that are theoretically harder than the human body?”

Zuo Dao replied, “Obviously, during practice, their fists and feet gradually adapt to hitting hard objects, and they overcome their fear. The speed of their punches and kicks, the coordination of their breathing and so on all take practice too.”

Tian Yi said, “That's correct, but you've missed the point. Everything they do is really just to make themselves believe that in fist versus brick, the fist can win.”

Zuo Dao said, “You mean if I hypnotize myself into believing my face is harder than a cleaver, I can just take the hit?”

“Of course not. Believing alone does nothing. Your head would still split open and bleed. I'm just telling you that a face can absolutely be harder than a cleaver. The key is how you make that happen in reality.”

Zuo Dao thought for a moment, then asked, “With this energy you're talking about?”

“This is a technique you must master before turning yourself in, and a required lesson for reaching Fierce rank. Once you've learned it, your ability will improve very quickly,” Tian Yi said. “But as I've already told you, it's like attaining enlightenment. However much I explain, it still depends on your insight. A great deal of it can only be grasped, not put into words.”

Tian Yi pointed at the cleaver on the floor. “Anyway, remember this. From today onward, that isn't a cleaver. It's a set of data flying toward you. It's made of iron and wood, and its kinetic energy comes from the work I do. You can draw up an equation and work out how to make proper use of the lump of data called ‘Zuo Dao’ to block the set of data I throw at you.”