Unsealing Emptiness

Chapter 382: Not Normal?

Ozul was content; he felt much alleviated now that he had absorbed all the Spiritual Cores.

Unlike what he expected, only the effects of the last Core felt a little damped.

Still, the overall result was out of his expectations. The initial Cores had already elevated his strength to new realms.

His senses alone were more than doubled!

Although he was suppressing most of it since it would take some time before he adapted to these improvements.

Such a considerable improvement felt not much different than a blind man who was suddenly given sight.

As he reached the hotel, Ozul hurriedly entered their room to test his new capabilities and check where his limits lay now.

.....

Unknown to him, right after he had left the forest, a couple of parties appeared in the vicinity. Though, all of them seemed hesitant to declare their curiosity openly.

The outburst of Spiritual Essence that they all sensed definitely belonged to a man ranked higher than them, so they didn’t want to risk their lives merely to satisfy their curiosity.

At first, it felt as if some experts were fighting and someone was killed and their Spiritual Core shattered, creating a disturbance in the Spiritual Essence. However, upon arriving here, all of them noticed that there were no signs of a fight taking place. Hence, it was concluded that it could be caused by a single person.

None of them thought that someone would have simply come to the forest, shattered, in a way, five Spiritual Cores of Origin Realm, and then disappeared.

There were too many unusual events happening around this forest these past few days.

People started getting worried that something chaotic was brewing up in the shadows and no one knew who, why, or when.

. . .

Back in his room, uncaring of all the commotion his ‘little’ actions caused, Ozul excitedly summoned just a fraction of the Purity. Though he didn’t let much of his emotions show up on his face, Raven still occasionally caught a few glints in his eyes.

She could make a rough guess on why he was in such a great mood.

Seeing him improving, she was only more determined with her training. In fact, for the past few days, all she had done was cultivate.

If Ozul knew that Raven somehow had the capacity to become even more motivated than she was previously, he would surely let shock appear on his face for the first time.

Even he was sometimes surprised by how tenacious Raven could sometimes be.

For now, though, he was more focused on himself.

The small slate of The Purity continuously changed shapes and moved in various directions according to his will.

While doing that, he created a few more copies of the slate and moved them in different directions, and changed their shapes accordingly.

All of that, which required him tremendous focus before was done by him without exerting any effort now.

Not only his control, but even the quantity of The Purity had increased. An extra layer of protection never hurts.

Overall, everything about his abilities had multiplied.

What took a mental strain on his entire body before wouldn’t be as hard now. Such as the times when he spread The Purity so thin that it almost looked like haze. Controlling that giant bubble of gas always proved to be taxing on his body.

‘If I were to fight that owl again, I’m not sure who would win...’ Ozul thought back on the man who had come dangerously close to killing him.

At that time, he couldn’t even put enough force behind The Purity to seriously injure him. But now things were different. He hadn’t experienced the full extent of his abilities, so there was no way to be sure who would win among them now.

‘What about Ember? Hmm...’ As he thought about it, Ozul quickly shook his head.

There was no way he could defeat that woman. Even while she is only half a step into the Origin Realm, she killed an expert of that Realm with such ease.

She was an old beast, but a beast nonetheless.

Still, he felt a lot better now that his strength had taken a leap again.

‘But is plundering from others the only way I can get stronger?’ he thought bitterly.

He didn’t feel bad about absorbing others’ Spiritual Cores, but it could be very troublesome if word got out that he ‘ate’ Spiritual Cores. Just like in the previous Realm, the idea of a person eating another’s Mana Core felt disgusting to humans.

If his secrets were to be exposed, it would cause many people to come looking for him, for one reason or another.

After getting a rough estimate of his strength, Ozul released a sigh of relief and plopped on the bed on his back.

In the eyes of the strongest people in this Realm, he was still nothing more than an ant that they could crush anytime they wanted, but he wasn’t going out of his way to mess with those people.

At least not yet.

“Since that’s out of the way now...”

He shot a glance toward Raven and the other two, who were both cultivating as well.

It was time that they also obtained the bare minimum strength to survive for now.

There were various tools that the richest people in the Realm used to raise the strengths of their descendants. But as mentioned, only the rich had this luxury.

Those artifacts that helped ease the cultivation process were rare. And the ones which could really make a noticeable difference were often hoarded by powerful families or sects.

It was no wonder that the so-called young masters of these families breezed through the initial realms as if they were simply growing up with age.

Taking a deep breath, Ozul stood up.

He didn’t need such tools to aid them.

He was more than enough.

. . .

Experts in higher Realms couldn’t use their Spiritual Essence to direct the Spiritual Essence of their descendants.

The human body instinctively retaliated against every foreign entity. This was especially true for Spiritual Essence.

Once a foreign Spiritual Essence entered one’s body, the body’s own Spiritual Essence, if there was any, would fight against it with all its being.

However, cultivation required prudent focus; if the Spiritual Essence was causing chaos everywhere, the person would never be able to use it to advance. Instead, it would cause injury to them, leaving the majority of them in a crippled state.

But that didn’t apply to Ozul.

He had already tested it several times before. Him using the Purity inside someone’s body never seemed to harm them.

Instead, the human bodies even retained small specks of it, what he liked to call the ‘Scent’.

It took so much time to advance the Realms because the cultivators needed to multitask inside their own bodies without losing their focus even for a second.

‘Not if The Purity guided the Spiritual Essence and at the same time, protected all the organs from getting damaged...’

Leaning towards Raven, he asked, “You are in the 2nd stage of the Core Formation, right?”

Startled, Raven opened her eyes and nodded absentmindedly.

“Very well. Let’s get you to the Nascent Soul.”

Open her eyes wide open, Raven looked at him, speechless. “Nascent Soul Realm?” she muttered, knowing full well that he never joked.

Ignoring her exaggerated, but valid reaction, Ozul sat behind her and placed his hand on her back. Small traces of the Purity entered her body as she closed her eyes, realizing that he was going to speed up the process.

It even made her a bit excited.

As for worrying that it might harm her? She trusted Ozul too much to even think about that.

“You are strengthening your Core?” Ozul asked. He only had a rough idea of what each stage of the Core Formation represented through their names.

Raven hummed in response.

“I will protect your body. Go wild,” Ozul spoke confidently.

He guided a layer of Purity to adhere to all of her internal organs in a way that didn’t hinder the blood flow or any of their function.

To Raven’s surprise, there was even a layer surrounding her Spiritual Core. In case it cracked due to the speed at which she would start feeding it the Spiritual Essence, it still wouldn’t harm her in the slightest!

Raven merely created a hair-thin line of Spiritual Essence at first, which she quickly advanced toward her Core. This hair-thin line of Spiritual Essence was not only far more than what she would typically produce but it was also moved with an incredible speed.

As the Core shined brightly with its surface getting a noticeable change in its luster, Raven beamed with happiness.

“This would have taken half a day!!”

“Focus.”

Raven’s shout disturbed Blaze and Zier as they opened their eyes to glance her way.

Blaze, seeing Ozul behind Raven, understood that he was helping her cultivate. Zier, on the other hand, seemed confused.

The jealousy in Blaze’s voice dripped like honey as he muttered while glaring at Zier, “I will be next!”

“Uh... Okay? But can you tell me what’s happening?”

His question was left stranded in the air as Blaze observed Raven’s Spiritual Essence spiking a little.

The difference was only subtle, but as they were always competing with each other, he remembered exactly how far she stood from him.

.....

Just as he was about to go back to cultivating, he felt something.

“No way... again!?”

The spike in Raven’s Spiritual Essence even became apparent to Zier this time who had also reached the first stage of the Core Formation Realm.

Having realized what was happening, Zier understood what Blaze meant by “I am next” just now.

Smiling awkwardly, Zier could only question in his heart, ‘If he could do it, why didn’t he do it sooner so we could help him!? And... This is not normal!’