Genius Empress Cross

Sad Beautiful Tragic

She woke up with a start and looked around her. Slowly, she tried to focus her hazy vision.

Before she could make herself process the status of her surroundings, a series of images and memories thundered in her mind making her close her eyes and groan in pain.

When she opened her eyes again, the haziness was now replaced with crystal clear clarity. It would seem that she had reincarnated and now resided in the body of Rin Kurusuh.

The original Rin's memory merged with her own and because of that, it gave her an overview about this world and the former owner's situation.

The world that she just reincarnated into was quite ancient if she would have to compare it to the modernized Earth.

Here, it looked like she was living in Ancient China but the historical timeline on Earth did not match with this place. So, she concluded that she must've been reincarnated to a parallel universe or to an entirely different realm.

She was not sure about that as well, and though the language in this world was different from any language that existed on Earth, it was also a good thing she inherited the knowledge of this world's language from the former owner of this body.

In this realm, they have what was called cultivation. It was like magic but not quite. It was more on manipulating the energy that they called Spirit Essence.

As early as six years old, a child must be tested for his spirit strength, cultivation base, and elemental affinity.

Spirit strength is the soul strength and it is graded by nine levels:

white, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, gold, and rainbow (wherein it contains all the colors).

The white color was the lowest level. It meant a cultivator has a very low to no chance of establishing a cultivation base.

The last three colors (purple, gold, and rainbow) were something of a legend because on this continent, the highest soul strength ever recorded was blue and it was already fairly strong.

Soul strength plays an important foundation for the cultivation base. Cultivation base is equivalent to one's physical strength. It is gained by absorbing Spirit Essence from the surroundings by means of meditation, tempering the body through means of divine treasures, and taking in cultivation herbs or pills.

It is also separated into different levels with different grades. The levels are, from lowest to highest: Martial Novice, Martial Disciple, Martial Practitioner, Martial Expert, Martial Master, Martial Grandmaster, Martial Emperor, Martial Saint and Martial God.

Each level is then divided into nine grades. One to three is Low grade, four to six is Medium grade and seven to nine is High grade.

Each person also has specific affinity for elements such as earth, fire, water, air, and etc.

The maximum amount a person can possess is four. Majority of the people in this continent had affinities for only one to two elements. And those people with two or more were already considered crème of the crop.

When Erhinai focused her thoughts on Rin's memory and her cause of death, she could not help but be amazed. Rin died because her meridians were sealed by her father.

Rin was the daughter of the retired War General Shin Kurusuh. Unfortunately, his wife died after giving birth to Rin. Because of the pain of extreme loss and loneliness, he chose to retire earlier from his post as the Dracomica Kingdom War General and instead focused on raising his only daughter.

He chose to leave their luxurious life in the city, exchanging it with a simple life in the mountains. For some unknown reason, he also raised his daughter as a boy and discouraged her from cultivating. He drilled it to his daughter's mind that the path of cultivation was a scary and difficult road. He even forbade her from absorbing Spirit Essence, thereby sealing her meridians and making his daughter a cripple on cultivation. He said it was for her safety, but he never really told her the reason why, though he seemed paranoid every time she asked. It was like he was afraid and angry at the same time. So the original Rin stopped asking any further.

Aside from the problem of avoiding anything related to cultivation, her father was, all in all, a good man.

The only problem was that his daughter died because she couldn't protect herself.

Seven years ago

Rin, together with her father Shin, were gathering some herbs in the mountain peak. As they focused on their chore, they accidentally encountered cultivators who were chasing a man and a child.

The man was badly wounded but still pleaded her father to save the boy that was in his arms.

At first, her father strongly refused because he was afraid it would put his daughter's life in danger if he helped the two strangers. But when the man showed a token to her father, he changed his mind right away and took the wounded boy into his arms.

The man did not go with them when Shin told her that they should leave quickly and hide. Knowing that he didn't have long to live, the man decided to be left behind to shake the enemies off their track.

They arrived at the hidden cave that Rin and her father called home. Her father then started to treat the wounded boy.

Shin was quite knowledgeable about medicine and, with the boy's superficial injuries, he was able to help the boy heal in no time.

The boy needed to rest and so, Rin took care of him. When the boy woke up, he was surprised when he saw the eight year old Rin staring directly at him.

"Dad!" she called her father. "He's awake!" Rin smiled and held her hand in front of the boy.

"What's your name? My name is Rin and my father's name is Shin. We saved you."

The boy only stared at her, confused as he said, "I-I don't know." He thought hard but his mind was assaulted by pain instead. He couldn't help but hold his head while grinding his teeth saying, "I can't remember."

"Rin, stop bothering the boy." Her father tapped her shoulder, telling her to stop and move to the side. She stuck her tongue out but still followed her father's silent order.

"I'm sorry if my son startled you." Shin started talking to the boy.

"I understand that you're confused right now. But one thing I can assure you is that your memory loss is only temporary, so don't force yourself to remember. It's important that you gain back your strength, and after a couple days, I will accompany you back to your home".

The boy tried to calm himself down and nodded to her father.

After a day or two, Rin and the boy grew closer. It was due to Rin's bubbly and childish nature that attracted the boy.

"Kai, are you really a boy?" Rin asked curiously. Kai was the name her father called the boy when she asked him about it. It wasn't that Kai remembered, but since he still didn't know his name, he just accepted it.

"Why do you ask?" Kai said while carving the figure of a phoenix on a small piece of wood. He didn't know why but carving comes naturally to him as a past time. He carved a couple of beasts onto the pieces of wood so that they could play with them.

Momentarily distracted on the phoenix that Kai was carving, Rin couldn't help but to exclaim, "Wow! It's a phoenix this time!" Her eyes were twinkling.

Kai just looked at her smiling. He was really fond of Rin; he found him cute and refreshing. Even though he couldn't remember his age yet somehow, he had a feeling that he was older than the petite eight year old Rin.

"Hmph! I told you to call me Big Brother Kai. I'm taller than you, you know!" He pretended to be angry.

"Yes...yes, Big Brother Kai," Rin respond eagerly. "But remember, you said that if I guessed it correctly, you would give it to me."

Kai snorted. "Tch, cheeky brat. Yeah, yeah...as you wish." He gave Rin a playful pat on the head.

Rin's smile grew wider, already forgetting her initial question of Kai's gender. She couldn't be blamed for asking, after all, the child in front of her was really pretty for a boy.

On the fourth day, Rin's father went out of the cave. He said that he needed to purchase some things in the village in preparation for Kai's departure tomorrow.

Kai's injuries were already fully healed and he already remembered some of his lost memories since yesterday.

He didn't tell Rin about it because the situation was quite complicated. He thought it was better if Rin didn't know. He only spoke to Shin, informing him that he already remembered and was ready to go back home.

Even though he didn't want to leave, but he had a lot of things that he must address first.

Maybe some other time, if given a chance, he will send someone to fetch both father and son so they could bring them to him.

When the day of his departure came, Rin's father came back and asked him to put on the ordinary clothes he had purchased in the village.

He also said that he already sent notification to his people and they will send a team to fetch him at their secret meeting place.

Kai bade his farewell to the silently crying Rin. It broke his heart that he had to be separated from his only friend, but he didn't have a choice himself.

After bidding his farewell, the three of them went out of the cave, only to be ambushed by the enemy who was lying in wait for them.

Everything happened so fast. An arrow was shot aiming for Kai but for some reason, Rin, who was beside him, without hesitation acted and used her body as a shield to protect him.

Shin, on the other side, reacted on his instincts and disappeared from where he stood, coming back within seconds with the culprit's head. When he saw that his daughter was shot in the back, he picked her up from Kai's frantic embrace and cradled her like a baby.

"Rin, my son." Shin tried to wake up his daughter by lightly slapping her face.

He knew that his daughter didn't have any cultivation to protect herself and the arrow that pierced her was lethal because of the poison applied on the arrow's tip.

He used his cultivation energy to stop the poison from consuming her heart directly.

At that moment, he regretted sealing his daughter's meridians. But then, if he had not done so, she would have died earlier as well. He was conflicted.

Anyway, he didn't have a choice. It was like death already latched onto Rin the moment she was born.

His daughter's body was starting to get cold and he, of all people, knew that he didn't stop the poison in time. The person who was trying to assassinate Kai was very ruthless for using a fast-acting poison such as this. Shin looked up at the young boy that was crying helplessly for his daughter's safety.

And that was Rin's last memory before darkness swallowed her consciousness.