?Chapter 6494 Kirian''s Future Cultivation


    As leaders and role models, both Ketis and her husband led busy lives.


    It was difficult for them to spend enough personal time with each other, especially when the Red Tide Collective loomed over everyone''s heads.


    Nheless, neither wife nor husband refused to sacrifice their family time.


    They were not always able to return to the grand stateroom and enjoy a family dinner together, but they tried to be present often enough to keep their children fulfilled.


    It was only after Ketis returned home that she led down her guard. Her tough persona faded away as a matronly vibe took its ce.


    As a collection of bots began to deliver numerous dishes on the dining table, everyone began to take their seats and partake in their meals.


    As the Larkinsons filled their stomachs, they began to chat about what they had done for the day.


    One topic immediately stood out to the children.


    "Everyone in school is talking about cultivation." Kirian Larkinson spoke while chewing on a piece of garlic bread. "Their moms and dads have started to grow noticeably stronger or smarter after they began to practice. We all want to cultivate as well, but the stupid Repository doesn''t give us ess to them. Why do we have to wait until we are 12 years old before we begin to cultivate?"N?v(el)B\\jnn


    Ketis smiled in a good-natured manner. "Systematic cultivation is dangerous. Even the free methods that are deliberately designed to be easy to learn and master can lead you in the wrong direction if you make mistakes or worse, think you are better and try to make careless changes. Children as young as you and your sister are too imaginative and not calm enough to stick to instructions. It is irresponsible to let you cultivate when you are so young"


    Her son couldn''t ept this answer. "Eh, but when I talked to Andraste, she bragged to me that she had already been practicing a rudimentary cultivation method before the Red Collective was founded! Her father developed a method just for herself! She told me that children who obtainedpanion spirits don''t have to wait until they are 12 before they can begin to cultivate. They can start early!"


    As the children of one of the most prominent couples of the Larkinson n, it went without saying that both Kirian and Mayra already received theirpanion spirits. It was trivial for Ketis and Joshua to secure a pair ofpanion spirit fruits for their lovely son and daughter.


    That meant that Kirian made a valid demand. The 12 year age limit set by the Red Collective had little meaning for children who developed their spiritualities in advance with the help of theirpanion spirits.


    Everypanion spirit was inherently intangible and made out of E energy. That meant that even the weakest of them possessed an inherent talent in E energy maniption and absorption.


    In other words, if a child obtained apanion spirit, they essentially possessed enough spirituality of an ordinary adult, if not more!


    Venerable Joshuaughed when he heard how impatient his son had be.


    "What did I tell you about trying to grow up too quickly? You are not even 10 years old yet. Slow down. Wait until you are older before deciding what you want to be. If youmit to a cultivation method too early, you will lock yourself to specific jobs. It will be toote for you to change your mind."


    "I already know what I want to be!" Kirian stubbornly pushed back at his father. "I want to be a mech pilot just like you, dad! If my gic aptitude isn''t good, then I want to be a swordmaster like mom, but also be a Carmine mech pilot at the same time!"


    One of the greatest gifts that Ves had given to a huge amount of children living in the Red Ocean was that he single-handidly broke the nightmare that was looming over their heads for years.


    Each of them dreaded the day they turned 10 years old and went thorugh the infamous gic aptitude test.


    Once the examiners put a strangely-shaped helmet onto their heads, little boys and girls would soon learn whether they were a part of the lucky 3.5 percent or the deeply unfortunate 96.5 percent of the poption.


    Even if they were still young, every child was clearly aware that it was much likelier for them to fall into thetter category!


    That was why children were so afraid of it, to the point where they actually wished they would never grow older than 9 years old just so that they could maintain their blissful ignorance for a longer period of time!


    This was why children around the age of 10 or younger cheered the loudest when Ves finally announced his historic Yellow Jacket models!


    The existence of Carmine mechs and the revolutionary Carmine System permanently liberated all of these young and sensitive children from the fear of discovering that mech piloting was forever beyond their reach!


    Ketis and Joshua exchanged nces with each other.


    Many of these children were not quite aware that bing a Carmine mech pilot would be tough because human society could never allow all children to pursue this career


    option.


    The gic aptitude tyranny may have been cruel to the people who grew up under its reign, but it also yed an important moderating function.


    The development of gic aptitude was not entirely random, but it was so uncontroble that it may very well be the case. Neither rich or poor could influence the development of a child''s gic aptitude in any meaningful way.


    This meant that there was a sense of fairness in the mechmunity. The rich and powerful could not monopolize the mech piloting profession. The poor had a chance to be heroes on the battlefield as long as their gic aptitude was high enough.


    All of that threatened to change once Carmine mechs became avable. The limiting factor that prevented people from bing mech pilots was not gic aptitude, but other factors such as background and capital.


    Of course, Ketis and Joshua were both powerful and wealthy enough to allow for both of their children to dedicate their lives to bing Carmine mech pilots. They were not the ones who stood to lose in this new contest.


    They were much more concerned for other parents and children. The Larkinson n had a need for talented and loyal mech pilots, but their demand was not high enough to amodate every single child with a dream.


    Sooner orter, the n needed to formte a policy that raised a lot of barriers to


    prevent too many of its descendents from bing Carmine mech pilots as opposed to


    mech designers or starship personnel.


    The amount of manpower required to fulfill those other responsibilities were much


    greater!


    It was impossible for any organization to sustain itself with mech pilots alone!


    Thebat power of a mech force was not decided by the amount and quality of mech pilots alone. The support structure around mech pilots was just as important. The n needed to think carefully on which children were allowed to be Carmine mech


    pilots.


    "Let us wait until you are 10 years old before we decide further whether piloting mechs should be your future, Kirian." The mother said. "As for practicing a cultivation method, I will see what I can arrange for you. As far as I know, there is another reason why children under the age of 12 cannot responsibly practice cultivation. Theirprehension is usually too poor to make great achievements. You can only practice the simplest methods, and only the first chapters at that. Don''t expect to make much progress unless


    you are a genius."


    "Aw..."


    Kirian was a designer baby and had been raised under good conditions. He was not stupid, yet there was still gap between himself and a genuine monster like Andraste


    Larkinson.


    Both children dedicated a lot of time on practicing their swordsmanship, but Andraste''s study load was much higher due to her superior capabilities.


    While Ketis could afford to grant her son powerful augmentations and help him enroll in


    a first-ss school, she was reluctant to subject Kirian to so much pressure when he was


    still so young.


    Besides, if her son wanted to be a swordmaster or expert pilot so badly, developing his heart could make a much more positive difference than stuffing lots of theoretical knowledge in his head.


    "The simpler auxiliary qi cultivation methods are sufficient for you." Ketis told her son. "Don''t obsess too much over them. Just use them to increase yourprehension and speed up your studies. If you truly want to be a strong warrior like your father and I, then you need to be more active rather than sitting around while engaging in mental gymnastics several hours a day. There is an inherent contradiction between qi cultivation and willpower cultivation that cannot be reconciled. You can either choose to ovee wall by chipping away at its weak points, or bashing it apart by relying on brute force. The former approach is clever and efficient. Thetter approach is powerful but much more difficult to attain. It is up to you to decide which one you prefer the


    most."


    "I don''t want to outthink my problems! I want to outfight them!" Kirian decisively spoke! "Since dad has be an expert pilot and you have be a swordmaster, there is no reason for me to be any worse. I willpletely work to be a swordmaster or expert pilot myself! Hey, I just thought of something. Since I have apanion spirit, is it possible to be an expert pilot and swordmaster at the same time?!" Venerable Joshua made a noise of concern. "That sounds crazy. I don''t know what will happen. As promising as it sounds, I don''t think it will be easy to amodate two different kinds of willpower in the same body. You could either be the most powerful warrior of red humanity, or you might literally split yourself apart if you can''t reconcile two different but equally powerful wills. Don''t mess around with things like this. Your mother is right. Cultivation bes most dangerous when clever little munchkins like you think you can game the system."


    "What if it works?! If I can really be an expert pilot and swordmaster at the same time, then I can be twice as strong as you at the same rank!" Though Ketis liked to believe her son was clever and educated enough to know that his proposal had a high chance of producing a deadly ident, she still worried whether he


    would try to pull it off anyway.


    Fortunately, it was anything but easy to surpass the extraordinary threshold through willpower.


    Trying to do it twice in a reasonable timeframe was even less likely!


    So far, Kirian was too young to possess the qualities that could trigger a breakthrough.


    Ketis would rather have her son muddle around for a few decades before finally deciding on his future course as a soldier or anything else.


    If he insisted on following the footsteps of his mother or father, then Ketis at least wanted him to develop only one form of extraordinary willpower.


    He or hispanion spirit that had not broken through in this manner could easily


    increase his versatility and fault tolerance by practicing aplementary qi cultivation


    method.


    This was the ideal cultivation n that a worried mother had devised for her


    rambunctious son.


    However, Ketis was afraid that if she tried to impose it on him, Kirian would just rebel


    and try to pull off an extreme stunt out of her sight.


    "Oh Kirian..."


    Raising children was never easy.


    Despite the fact that Kirian had turned into a growing source of concerns, Ketis never


    ceased to love her son. It was precisely because she worried so much about him that she wanted to shower him with love.