Alex woke up early in the morning, fully rested after a lengthy session of Intent training over the course of the previous evening. He had improved a small but noticeable amount since the last time, which Alex guessed was the result of improving his own Physique.
His spiritual energy had likely improved by a similar amount, which in turn made his Intent become slightly stronger as well.
He came to realize that just by eating the Sunhearts alone, he might be able to improve his Intent by a significant amount. Nowhere near enough to break the seal, but certainly a decent bit of help nonetheless.
Alex brought out one of the Sunhearts in his storage bag and looked at it. There wasn’t much heat around it at the moment. Night lacked a lot of the Yang that created the sensation of heat, after all.
The Sunheart was certainly a great aid in helping improve his Physique, but Alex felt that it wasn’t the right thing for his Creation. He couldn’t explain it exactly, but the Sunheart wasn’t the same as the sun at all.
Something was missing from it, which he would have to meditate upon to find the answer. He tried to find some answers with the time he had at that moment, but he came up with nothing.
In the end, Alex could only sigh and give up. He would have to try some other time.
For now, he wanted to go check on the warriors.
The sky glowed a dark blue in the east as dawn approached. And even without the sun, the people in the city were already up and about. Most of those were warriors that were either coming back from their duties in the night when the beasts came out of hiding, or going to work for the day when beasts with Sunhearts showed themselves on the surface.
Alex headed north through the many roads of the city. Despite its 20 thousand population, Sunspear wasn’t that large a city at all, so it only took Alex about 10 minutes to reach the northern end of it, which was the end of the plateau that descended into a larger expanse of land with hard ground.
Young children of ages 8 and above had already gathered in this place, all of whom were currently running a lap around the large empty land with some instructors shouting at them from afar to run even faster.
Alex took a moment to look through all of the different locations that were within the warrior’s training ground.
There were a few running grounds, a few large training grounds with racks of weapons, 3 different platforms built for friendly battles, two obstacle courses, along with a few different buildings that Alex couldn’t see the inside of.
More children continued to appear as the sun rose above the horizon in the east.
Alex looked around, quickly understanding that this was nowhere near enough for these people to be body cultivating. This was just regular training, so the body cultivation did truly come from consuming the flesh of the other beasts.
Someone waved at that moment, catching Alex’s attention. Looking toward him, he realized it was Gorang. Since he gestured for him to go down there, Alex accepted the invitation and went down there.
Gorang quickly greeted him and introduced him to the other instructors that were around.
“This is Alex. He is a healer who’s staying in the city for some time to make us some pastes.”
The other instructors greeted him, all of them cordial and affable.
“Did you come down here to watch the kids?” one of them asked.
“Yes, I did,” Alex said. “I am not used to the desert culture, so I wished to learn more about it, starting with the warriors who seem to be in charge of a large duty.”
“That we are,” one of the instructors said. “We are what guard the thousands of people from annihilation from the beasts of the desert. We work hard so they may live a carefree life.”
Alex slowly nodded. “That is an honorable life for sure. If I may ask, does one choose to become a warrior or are they forced into this life?”
“No one is compelled to this life. It is the most honorable one, so many choose to do so anyway. Almost every child in the city tries to become one, and it is our job to both improve the ones that are worthy and weed out the ones that aren’t. This is a dangerous life, so anyone less than capable cannot be allowed to go through this.”
Alex nodded. He hadn’t exactly come across any group of people like this before, so it was interesting to see their side of the world. He looked around at the training of young boys and girls, quite surprised by how equal they were in number.
And yet, almost all of the warriors he had seen were male.
“May I ask why there are so few female warriors?” Alex asked. “Or is it just a coincidence that most of whom I’ve met are men?”
“It’s… not a coincidence,” Gorang answered. “There truly are very few female warriors, but that is because of the extremely difficult requirements that are placed on them.”
Alex narrowed his eyes. That sounded like discrimination, but he had an idea as to why that was.
“How often do warriors die?” Alex asked.
“Often enough that it is a problem,” Gorang said. “It’s difficult enough to kill all the beasts in the night, and they get even more difficult during the day. A warrior dies every few weeks in battle because of the danger.”
“Is that why you won’t let women join so easily? So that they focus on nurturing more children?”
“That is part of the truth,” Gorang said. “But women also tend to have a higher mortality rate in the desert compared to men, so we only allow a select few to become warriors because of that.”
Alex raised an eyebrow as he realized the other reason.
“There is too much Yang in the desert for their own good, huh?”
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