"Good morning, son. Time to wake up."
At dawn, a gentle voice with an indescribable sweetness stirred Mikolas from sleep. He had drifted off late, lost in thought while cultivating, and when he awoke, he saw a face that was joyful and beautiful with a hint of charm.
She was the kind of woman whose age defied guessing: her features suggested someone in her twenties, yet the composed, mature grace she carried was far from something a girl in her twenties could have.
Due to the hotter weather in the city lately, she was dressed more lightly. Her moon-white top clung to her curves, her ample breasts nearly spilling out as the fabric drew a deep line of cleavage between them, squeezing tightly.
Though her waist no longer had a maiden's slimness, she showed no trace of age. She wore a long peach flared ribbon skirt, and though it concealed the generous curve of her plump hips, beneath its hem her long, straight legs shimmered with allure. White high-heeled sandals completed the look.
Her dress was simple yet irresistible. Her beauty and sensual grace stirred something in Mikolas as he woke. Staring at her, memories welled like a tide. Still lying in bed, he offered the stunning woman a faint smile as he spoke: "Auntie."
"Calling me 'aunt' makes me sound old." The woman was slightly annoyed, though her voice remained sweet and lovely.
"I've told you already: when your mother's not here, call me 'mum.' The rest of the time, 'Snow' is fine. All right?"
"Got it, Ma," Mikolas replied with a soft smile.
That's right, this beautiful, alluring woman isn't Mikolas's real mother, but his father's other wife: Sinilow. From his memories, she was a pitiable figure to Mikolas, for she had once been a wildly popular singer in her heyday.
From her debut, she won countless fans with her stunning looks and voice, bewitching many young men. Yet when the time came, she cared only for Mikolas's father, Walker Vilem, and the two eventually pledged themselves to each other for life.
However, in the eyes of a Noble house like the Walker House, an entertainer's background was not a good reputation. Moreover, Vilem at that time also had an engagement with the Sutton family, another Noble house in Goldridge, so even though the two of them had given birth to two daughters, Sinilow had never been able to enter the Walker Nobility.
Later, the Walker and Sutton families united through marriage. Sutton Adēra, the proud daughter of the Sutton family and Mikolas's mother, wed into the Walker household. With her kind heart, she agreed to the arrangement, and Sinilow was finally accepted. Yet she still held no formal standing. Even after bearing another child—another daughter—Sinilow could not claim the status of being "honoured by a son."
Fortunately, Adēra was generous and always treated Sinilow as a true sister, so she suffered little under the elders' scrutiny. For this, Sinilow was deeply grateful; she cherished Adēra's children as her own and stayed close to all three of her daughters.
With these long-standing memories spinning in his mind, Mikolas unconsciously turned over and lifted the thin quilt covering his body, but forgot that, after practising last night, he felt uncomfortable and casually took off all the underwear on his body.
"Ah!" The moment the quilt was lifted, Sinilow gasped. Her beautiful eyes were fixed on Mikolas's crotch. She didn't know whether she was surprised or simply forgot to look away. She saw his member pointing upward, its length at least seventeen or eighteen centimetres, as thick as a baby's arm, flushed and veined, pulsing with the beating of his blood, imposing.
Startled, he reacted on instinct, one hand tugging the quilt back up, the other hastily covering himself and his member.
"Ma, I... I'm sorry, I... I didn't mean to." Mikolas's face flushed, and he stammered in explanation. Sinilow finally came back to her senses, raised her hand to cover her little mouth, giggled and said: "What's there to be ashamed of? You haven't seen your mother before? Brat, get up quickly, everyone is waiting for you to have breakfast."
After saying this, Sinilow immediately turned around and walked out of Mikolas's room. As soon as she went out, Sinilow's barely maintained composure could no longer hold. Her pretty face instantly turned red with shame, and her heart beat violently.
Although it was just a glimpse, the scene just now was deeply imprinted in her mind. At this moment, Sinilow had only one sentence going back and forth in her head.
'My half son's dick is so big!'
Sinilow wasn't lustful by nature; it was simply that Mikolas's member had shocked her. Her husband had been missing for three years, and she was at an age of intense need, struggling to cope. Suddenly confronted with such an impressive specimen, it would have been strange if her heart hadn't been stirred.
After Sinilow left, Mikolas immediately rushed into the bathroom and took a cold shower, and then barely managed to let his lower body soften.
'This won't do either!'
With a slightly helpless look, Mikolas returned to the bedroom and was about to put on the clothes he had placed on the bedside table. But after thinking about it, he took a pair of very baggy black trousers from the wardrobe and put them on.
When Mikolas went out, Sinilow had regained her composure, but she was still a little afraid to face him. When she saw him coming out, she just said, "Hurry up." Then she left.
Mikolas followed, watching Sinilow's waist and large, plump and round ass sway gently as she walked, and couldn't help as his member below that had just become docile suddenly stood up again.
Mikolas hurriedly inserted his left hand into his trouser pocket, grabbed the thing, and pressed it aside, not revealing anything because the trousers were baggy enough.
This made Mikolas secretly relieved: Fortunately, he thought more carefully, otherwise he would have been embarrassed this time.
But after the relief, he couldn't help but feel ashamed—although Sinilow is not his biological mother, she has always watched him grow up, and he keeps calling her "Mother". How can he react to her like this?
…
The Walkers were a noble family of Goldridge and one of the pioneers in the second sector of the federation. They were wealthy, their estate sprawling several thousand acres in all directions. Anyone of standing kept a private residence, so training went undisturbed. Today, Snow led Mikolas towards the main house, where his grandmother, Walker Lewis—the family's current pillar—resided.
With so many relatives, shared meals were rare. A summons from the old matriarch meant something important, and through the sparse recollections he had, Mikolas dimly recalled a similar summons in his previous life, also delivered by Snow—only without today's embarrassment.
He guessed the summons was to arrange further study in Skysea next year for him and his twin sister, Xine. They entered the main house one after the other; three people were already seated in the hall.
At the centre sat a stunning beauty who looked to be in her thirties, with a serious look on her face and an indescribable majesty all over her body; she was Walker Lewis, the family matriarch and Mikolas's grandmother, appearing no older to be in her thirties, her expression severe and her presence effortlessly commanding.
To her left sat a woman in a long, pale‑blue dress. She was Mikolas's birth mother, Sutton Adēra, celebrated for her looks across Goldridge and its surrounding cities since her teenage years.
Beside Adēra sat a sixteen-year-old girl sticking out her tongue and pulling faces at him. Her features were seventy to eighty per cent similar to Adēra's. Though not fully matured, she already showed signs of becoming a beauty. This was none other than Mikolas's twin sister, Xine.
Behind the three women stood several young ladies dressed as maids. Though their appearance paled beside the Walker family's beauty, they were still striking goddesses by any outside standard.
After the Leyris, humanity's social structure underwent enormous changes. The increase in danger made survival increasingly brutal with each passing year.
Following the collapse, warrior families, houses, and clans began sprouting from the consolidation, and they naturally held superiority. Ordinary individuals' lives became worth little more than grass. To survive, many sold themselves into servitude as slaves or maids—a common practice that, though unpleasant, ensured survival.
Yes, many could practise and cultivate, but the idea that everyone practises a Forte or explores rifts only existed in fantasy. In reality, every force—be it a clan, house, or even a Holyland—strictly guards its own practice methods, and the law protects them.
Unless beasts or lord grow so powerful that humanity faces extinction, no one will spread their Forte for all to practise. Seeing the two walk in, Lewis nodded to Snow first. Then her brow creased at Mikolas's odd trousers and the hand buried in his pocket. "Look at you, what state are you in?"
Mikolas laughed awkwardly and hurriedly walked to his sister's side and sat down, but he never took his hand out of his trouser pocket, although he had walked all the way thinking about many other things to calm down; the thing below showed no signs of softening. On the contrary, it became firmer.
If he let go now, even the baggiest trousers wouldn't hide it. Lewis didn't linger on the matter. "Eat first. We'll talk after," she said.
The Walkers lived as Forte practitioners, and their diets ran far richer than ordinary folk's, one small consolation being that none of it seemed to add much weight. Breakfast vanished quickly, and the matriarch finally got down to business.
"Let's get to it. You and Xine will be heading to Skysea College next year. I've already put in your applications. Train hard. If you hit Ninth Rotation, Second Ring by the selection, you'll have a strong shot. No slacking. Clear?"
"Understood," Mikolas and Xine answered in unison. Their aptitude was far from ordinary. At only sixteen, both were already at the Fifth Rotation of the Second Ring (Mikolas had an incident last night). With steady effort, reaching the Ninth Rotation by the selection in Septumbre was well within reach. Thus, Lewis and Adēra were at ease; if the two entered Skysea Academy, they could study more advanced Forte.
Only Mikolas knew that he and his sister would not be chosen for Skysea Academy next year, even though, by then, both would have reached the Ninth Rotation of the Second Ring, edging on its peak and a single step from the Third Ring. He felt no regret.
The so-called "Skysea Academy" was founded by several of Skysea's top houses and admits only the children of families from the surrounding regions. Admission brings access to higher Forte Practition, yes, but it also acts as a form of branding. Students wear this branding as their patrons' crest, and they, along with their entire clans, become little more than enforcers for greater powers: one of the Skysea houses.
And no matter how talented they were, it was almost impossible to learn the core Forte of any of these families, meaning the Admittant would always remain one tier below the true members.
"Grandma, aren't Goldridge's three great families tied to a holy land? Couldn't we find a way to study there?" Mikolas asked. The matriarch and Adēra exchanged a look; their expressions tightened. "How do you know about that?"
Snow and Xine, on the other hand, looked confused. Only then did Mikolas remember that in his previous life, it was only after the Goldridge Crisis that his grandmother and mother told him about it, which, under normal circumstances, he should not know now.
"When I was a child, I seemed to have heard my father mention it, but I can't remember clearly." Mikolas said hurriedly.
"All right, don't mention this. I will tell you when I have the chance in the future." The Matriarch waved her hand: "All of you go."
Several people rose in response, but Mikolas still maintained his left hand in his pocket and followed the two mothers and his sister away from his grandmother's house with slight awkwardness.
"Mikolas, Xine, remember Grandma's words and work hard." Adēra said a few words to her children and then left.
She had a tranquil personality, gentle and kind, yet she rarely engaged in conversation. If Mikolas hadn't known how deeply she loved him and his sister, he might have wondered whether his mother was truly their mother.
"Work hard, all right? I'm rooting for you," Snow said, encouraging the twins before heading off to catch up with Adēra, who was already fargone.
As soon as the two mothers left, Xine immediately shed her restraint and jumped from behind onto Mikolas's back. She put her hands tightly around his neck and asked him to carry her on his back. She said: "Brother, let's go practise!"
Mikolas tensed. The member he'd been holding down with his left hand, pressed against the base of his leg, strained against his grip, threatening to push his hand away and spring free.
Mikolas was startled and hurriedly said, "Go on your own, I'm a little uncomfortable today."
Xine hurriedly jumped off Mikolas, looked at him with a worried expression on her face, and asked: "Brother, are you all right?"
"Nothing, nothing, just need to rest a bit." Mikolas prevaricated and then left as if fleeing.
Watching her brother's awkward gait, Xine felt something was wrong through the sense born of the special telepathy she shared with her twin.
"Could it be that he injured his thigh whilst practising, and that's why he kept pressing it with his left hand?" Xine wondered to herself, her curiosity nearly unbearable.
Mikolas rushed back to his residence and locked himself in the bedroom. Today's events were so embarrassing; one misstep and he'd lose face completely. But if this hidden danger wasn't resolved, it would plague him every day.
The solution was simple: reconcile Southern and Northern Essence, basically dual cultivation. Given Mikolas's prior‑life grasp of the Forte, devising a potent dual‑cultivation method would be straightforward.
Before his regression, Mikolas had gained insight into the Axis Aspect. This Axis were the hidden structure within the Primordial Flow. According to the Institute of Ley Studies in the Septimont Federation, the Primordial Flow consisted of eight root instances or sixteen Resonances—that formed the foundation of all existence.
When charted on the cosmic compass, these forces aligned into four polar directions: North, South, East, and West, each opposed by its counterpart. North and South represented masculine and feminine, fertility and form, cold and heat.
East and West embodied expansion and contraction, energy and element, gravity and space—the will of nature itself. Most Practitioners trained within the Central Curve, balancing these currents in neutrality. Mikolas followed a rarer path: Polarisation Forte. He cultivated solely the Northern Essence, the masculine aspect of the Flow.
To progress, he needed a counterpart attuned to the Southern Essence, someone who could complete his circuit, a vessel of the feminine current.
In short, he needed a woman.