After digging up some dirt and a few stones Augus re-entered his Inner World with them and he started comparing. First he pulled the dirt he used for “Siphon raid” and after comparing it with real dirt he found what Maple was talking about.

  His dirt was… incomplete in some way, instead of the dirt forming clumps because of moisture or becoming loose because it lacks moisture it was forcibly held together by spiritual energy.

  A handful of dirt was negligible, barely noticeable, kilometers of it? Quite substantial. Augus couldn’t simply copy existing dirt, because if he wasn’t directly looking at it and comparing during the creation process he would forget something, it was the unavoidable consequence of not knowing how the material, any material, actually existed.

  He could keep a handful of dirt just laying around to use for reference, but it would neuter his speed as he couldn’t reference his created dirt as it wouldn’t be complete. Which after a few hours of analyzing Augus found why, why he could never make full 100% real dirt.

  He couldn’t make life inside his world, even microscopic one, so his spiritual energy would always need to fill that role, unless he created something that didn’t need either. Though that was above his current level and probably future level as that would be stepping into the realm of gods, creators. Or maybe not, just incredibly difficult, so difficult that for the current him there wouldn’t be much of a difference.

  Anyway, Augus had to understand how and why dirt is, instead of copying it if he was planning to create more than one handful of dirt at a time.

  While Augus was studying dirt Maple started talking, she was bored by this point. “Are you not gonna take notes?”

  “What for? With my current cultivation I won’t forget it down the line.”

  “So you don’t plan on sharing? You could get your insights into a spent spiritual crystal and it should retain them, be accessible for anyone who uses them.”

  “Yes I know how memory crystals work, my question is why would I simply give them away.”

  “I’m not telling you to give them away, you could sell them or exchange them.”

  “Sell them? Do you want to buy something?”

  “Maybe…” Her eyes couldn’t keep firm look, she kept dodging interrogation.

  “Let’s consider profiting of it later. I will buy you what you want, consider it payment for the lesson.”

  “A video game console!” Her eyes appeared to glow with excitement.

  “How do you know what a video game console even is?”

  “I have your knowledge, mostly. But not your memories so stop making that face.” His feelings of concern showed on Augus face, as having his memory “shared” with someone would be unsettling at minimum.

  Despite this tangent Augus kept practicing and studying how to better create matter, as in reality that was the gist of it, he had to figure how to create something that according to the laws of the outside world would be possible, not necessarily real.

  In the end, instead of resting Augus took a nap and got to training, by the time he went out of his Inner World it was the middle of the night.

  Despite not having spent much of his spiritual energy, Augus felt exhausted so he changed his position a bit and got into deep meditation.

  The way meditation waved sleep was because the spiritual energy the cultivator’s absorbed circulated their body, from head to toe. Furthermore, Augus had learned that if the concentrated solely on this task even his mind would rest as he entered a trance like state.

  It was around 7 am when Augus awoke from his meditation, ate something and departed for Dominic’s office.

  * * *

  After some pleasantries Augus and Dominic got into business.

  Augus was itching to start so he hurriedly asked, “Is all the paperwork finished? Can we start?”

  “For now yes, while you work I will get the rest done, it’s mostly the permits to install the completed World close to here and to have the Officers stress test it.”

  Before Augus could ask anything else, Dominic continued. “What are you going to do first?”

  Augus turned to the road map he had made on the way here. “First, I will need to analyze the terrain to implement it in my Inner World, it may take-”, Augus was forced to stop as Dominic asked surprised.

  “You can Recreate inside your Inner World already?!”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  “Is that the official name, Recreate? I’m just getting the hang of it, for now I have only managed to make a convincing imitation of dirt from my house’s backyard.”

  “It’s surprising that you can try at all, from what I know it’s a method only Body Reformation cultivators can do, only they have the level of control necessary to do so.”

  Even though this was surprising to Augus it wasn’t unexpected, from what he had learned each new realm came with increased control inside one’s Inner World. Augus was able to do like Body reformation cultivators because he already appeared to have the maximum level of control inside his Inner World.

  What surprised Augus was that someone at Body reformation realm was actually capable of doing so.

  According to Augus’s inference about how much stronger a World Maker’s control got with each breakthrough, a Body reformation cultivator was nowhere near close to Augus’s level of omnipotent control.

  So maybe such a level of control was unnecessary to Recreate real objects, it was thanks to the quirks from such a high realm or they couldn’t reach Augus’s level of imitation. Either way something must be different between Augus’s situation and a Body reformation cultivator.

  “In broad strokes, after learning to Recreate the materials of the base I will need the veteran’s and Officers help to design a realistic invasion. Only then would we start with the stress tests.”

  “Can you give me a timeline that I can present?”

  “About two weeks, maybe less, to Recreate the materials. I don’t know how long we will take with the veterans and Officers, but I would estimate from two to three weeks.”

  “So about a month at the earliest plus the stress test, that’s good. We expect an invasion in about 8 weeks so the recruits should have a month to train.”

  Augus got an idea hearing about the incoming invasion, “Sir, could I stay for the invasion, as an spectator if possible? That way I can tweak the World according to what I see.”

  “You would need to be inside the city to do so, on top of one of the buildings, we can’t allow a World Maker to unnecessarily risk their life in an invasion. The recruits have at least prepared for this.”

  “Understood, as long as I can see how the invasion develops I will get ways to improve the training.”

  “There’s only one thing remaining, we should name this World for the records, what’s it going to be?”

  * * *

  After Augus’s discussion with the instructor Augus went to present himself to his new associates, meanwhile the instructor went to inform about the new information.

  They would reunite for a class in the afternoon.

  The first ones Augus met were the Officers, they were closest and it would be the shortest one as there weren’t many Officers in the barracks.

  If Augus was honest the only one who stand out from the group was a middle aged looking Officer. Mostly because looking middle aged as a cultivator was rare.

  When a cultivator broke into new realms they gained minor buffs to their lifespan before Body reformation, but they also didn’t age much before they reached an advanced age. As such most cultivators jumped from adult to old in appearance.

  The only way for a cultivator to look middle aged was for them to reach Foundation establishment later in life, instead of the usual 18. Because further breakthroughs didn’t rejuvenate their appearance by the time they reached a stage of non-aging they already were past their youth.

  Despite Augus’s breakneck speed most cultivators could take years reaching the next realm, though in the current times was rarer as resources were readily available.

  The meeting with the veteran’s was more interesting, not only they were more, they also had a variety of stories and combat experience that Augus knew would be useful when the time came.

  Between the whole group there was one veteran who Augus found weird, they kept mostly to themselves and presented as a historian instead of a soldier. So, when the introduction died down and the soldiers dispersed, Augus approached him.

  “Could I know why did you present as a historian?”

  Though caught off guard by the sudden question the veteran gave a practiced answer. “Because before being a soldier I was a history nerd.”

  “You were interested in more than the broad strokes I assume.”

  “I was specially interested in the times before the Siphon appeared, see what I could learn from that time.”

  “Did you learn anything?”

  “That despite all the Siphon brought, not everything was bad” When he saw Augus confused and angry expression he spoke clearly, “Before they came cultivators were closed off from the rest of the world, fighting for the scarce resources. Not everyone could become a cultivator and those that did tended to die in wars between sects.”

  Augus nodded to signal he was following so the soldier continued, “though the spiritual energy was denser in those times there were less cultivators than now, as not everyone was born with the aptitude for cultivating. Nowadays all the non apt died, so everyone can cultivate.”

  “But the spiritual energy is less dense, according to you, why isn’t that we are fighting against the scarcity?”

  “Because humanity was so heavily culled that even this thin of an ambient is enough for us.”

  That managed to chill Augus down to his marrow, the war against the Siphon had killed so many that even the current thin ambient energy could easily meet their spiritual energy demands.

  With a slightly dry mouth Augus asked, “how big has the difference become?”

  “Our last census numbered us at around 50 million people, with 10 million distributed among the five cities,” this was common knowledge so Augus didn’t add anything, just dreaded.

  “According to the estimates from a few years before the Siphon first appeared, the population is estimated at around 5 billion just among mortals and around 500 million cultivators according to that time’s ratio of 1:10 cultivators.”

  Augus felt how a weight settled in his chest, the golden era of that time, with ten times the amount of cultivators among all the realms, hadn’t managed to win against the Siphon, it didn’t foretell well for their chances.

  “That’s why I became a soldier actually,” the historian, Rufus, concluded, “I knew the chances so I wanted to add how little I could to the fight.”

  The words resonated with Augus, for an instant he even wanted to enlist to add what he could to the fight, though a quick glance at their quarters squashed the thought before it could grow.

  The information may have bummed down Augus’s feelings but it had also inspired him.

  Since the beginning of his World Maker career his main focus was his personal growth, now that was being challenged by Rufus’s words. Though Augus wanted to help it wasn’t his main concern until now, helping others was like a side effect from his personal growth rater than his focus.

  Now Augus hoped this project would help in reorienting his focus, even if he wouldn’t become a soldier he would reach out to anyone who needed his assistance.