“Nicely done.” Shao Lin clapped from on top of the Snapper. The creature was still in the same spot, too afraid to move. “What are we going to do with this guy? He’s too big to take back to the Sect.”

I waved my hand dismissively. [Leave him. He’s too weak anyway.] It seemed that defense was all it had going for itself, and maybe a strong bite. But it was clearly much weaker than the raptors I just killed as it was running from them. Anything below Golden Core wasn’t really worth my time anymore.

I gathered the oversized birds’ bodies and turned them into coal- I mean Essence. The process took a few hours, and while my body channeled Qi, my mind was busy consuming their Souls. At some point, I gained the ability to multitask if the things I was doing weren’t too complicated. Wasn’t sure when it happened, but it was definitely useful in certain situations.

In any case, I purified their Souls and consumed their Soul Essence after extracting all useful memories and knowledge.

Having combed through life-long experiences of other living beings, despite us being so different, I managed to find bits and pieces of inspiration that might help me when crossing the border of the Golden Core Realm myself.

Any advantage I could get I would take, no matter how small it was.

When building a skyscraper, even grains of sand were useful if in large enough quantity. Every piece of information would eventually come in handy.

“Are you done? I’m bored.”

I looked and saw Shao Lin sitting on top of Snapper’s head while the creature slowly walked around in a circle. “You took so long I even had time to teach this guy some tricks. Look, I can direct him where to go.”

I indeed looked as he poked the creature on the left side of the head and it turned left. He then poked it on the right, and it also went left.

“...I’m still working on it. Halfway there.”

Did I mention I was not impressed? Well, now you know.

[Dude, let the poor bastard go. We have other things to do.]

“Sigh, alright.” He jumped off the Snapper and patted it on its side. “See ya later Stumpy. May we meet again someday, if fate allows it.”

The stubby-legged Snapper called Stumpy, went, as quickly as it could – which wasn’t that fast all things considered – away in search of more suitable hunting grounds. Probably a mud pond or a crack in the earth to hide in or something.

“Okay, where to?”

I looked around, but honestly, I wasn’t sure. The forest was becoming dark quickly, the short winter days being the ones to blame. I jumped from tree to tree until I saw the sky and the orange setting sun. According to my calculations, we needed to travel east for another half a day, and then turn north.

I told as much to Shao Lin and he became skeptical.

“I don’t know man… That sounds like we would end up in the Brilliant Sword Sect’s territory.”

Well, duh, that was kind of the point. Remember that saying that criminals often returned to the place of a crime? Well, I had some things there, hidden in another dimension, waiting for me. We had to do it.

[It’s going to be fine, don’t worry about it. If there is going to be trouble, we can just run away.]

“Well… Yeah, I guess we can. Alright, let’s do it! It’s been a while since I snooped around their land.”

I rose an eyebrow but didn’t ask for details.

We broke into a run and ignored the weaker creatures for the most part. I still took some time to kill anything close to the Golden Core Realm, only this time I didn’t delay too much. Playing around with beasts that posed no danger and seriously fighting with a scary monster were two entirely different things.

Especially when we were short on time. Shao Lin even helped every once in a while when it looked like the fight would drag out.

As night fell we decided to camp out. Some nocturnal creatures were very strong and tricky to deal with, especially when visibility was low.

Not that we had the luxury of time to bother with them. A mass of corpses was piled in one spot we chose for our camp. Between the thick roots of the Ironbark tree, we found shelter and lit a small campfire. I converted most of the creatures into Essence while Shao Lin made dinner.

Having absorbed the knowledge of the old ghost, I knew how to purify the Essence Cores and could consume them without worry. Well, mostly. Once again, having no access to my own Golden Qi lowered the effectiveness of the skill, but it was good enough. The impurities contained in the cores would only become a problem if I was stuffing my face full of them all the time.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

And although the flesh of Golden Core beasts couldn’t be compared to those of Spirit Beasts, it was good enough to keep us going, not to mention that we gathered a literal mountain of it.

We split the Essence evenly and consumed it on the spot. While the difference between Realms went by more than a factor of a thousand, the great quantity of it consumed had a quality all on its own.

We sat around the crackling fire with eyes closed, Cultivating in silence. Strands of Qi bound together, forming a long, thin thread with defined length but no thickness. The thread then coiled and twisted, like a chain of proteins, and folded all on its own. It formed a myriad of geometrical patterns, most of which I could not name, but in the end, it all became the same.

Having no thickness, the strand could form a structure with no volume as it compressed into a singular point of energy called Soul Essence.

The longer the thread of Qi, the stronger/better the Soul Essence. That’s why having more Qi was an advantage as the strands created could be made longer, easier. Though there was still a limit to the length.

Of course, even if a person had very little Qi, they could just wait for it to regenerate and then form longer strands, but that took a lot of time. One of the reasons having a place like the Sect with higher Qi density that was constantly getting replenished was such a necessity. Even better, Elders could straight up sit inside a miniature Formation that would concentrate Qi further to help them Cultivate.

Lastly, those in the Spirit Realm could use Spirit Stones to directly absorb the energy inside. It was already compressed to the desired density, the only thing left was to construct the Essence.

And this construction could have almost infinite variability and was the reason every Cultivator had a different signature, a different Aura.

It was not compatible with others and could not be absorbed directly, at least not before being purified, an action that wasted a lot of energy.

Nobody would Cultivate exactly the same as another, unless that person was retarded, or wanted to be used as a Cultivation resource. Having the energy perfectly compatible with another was just asking for trouble. Who would even do such a thing? That would be stupid.

Anyway, after the small incident of getting the body taken over, yours truly abandoned The Awakening Breath and instead Cultivated in a more primitive manner.

I did whatever felt right, letting Qi naturally curl and fold as it wished, basically letting my instincts take over. I didn’t know if that was right, but my Path was different from everyone else, and as such the methods to getting there were naturally unlike anything I have ever seen.

My Soul felt bloated as I absorbed the last crumbs of Soul Essence. Another Soul or two and I would be ready to evolve, to step higher. To become something more, a higher being, I felt it.

But alas, that was for later. I was still lacking some Soul Essence to advance optimally. I could break through to a level higher, but it wouldn’t be the best. I would be leaving future potential on the table.

Every time since learning to Cultivate I have let my Soul advance on its own by pushing it to the limit and beyond. It has never let me down before so there was no point in doing so now.

At a certain point, I fell asleep and only woke up the next day when the sun was already out. The campfire was extinguished and it was snowing lightly. I was covered in the icy stuff, but it didn’t bother me. However, Shao Lin was nowhere to be seen.

But that’s simply because he was sitting behind me, on top of the tree, looking out for danger.

[Hey.]

“Ah, you finally woke up.” He jumped down and landed gracefully on top of the snowy blanket. “Ready to continue?”

I looked around. [Do you know where we are?]

“Somewhere between the two Sects?” Shao Lin said and shrugged his shoulders. It was difficult to tell our exact position. Everything looked the same.

I took out a piece of paper and went through my memories to draw an approximate path we took.

[Which way is east?] I asked.

Shao Lin thought for a bit and then pointed the way. I scribbled on the piece of paper and then did a few quick mental calculations. It was crude, very crude, but I knew the approximate distance and direction we were from the Myriad Beasts Sect.

[Alright, let’s go… that way.] I pointed slightly north, but still mostly east. I suspected we would find the place I was looking for by the end of the day. I just hoped the place didn’t change too much since I last saw it, especially with all the snow that covered everything.

We once again broke into a sprint.

Not because we tried to hurry or were short on time. No, we ran because the ground suddenly shook, and a powerful roar reverberated through the land. The magnitude of which we have never experienced before.

Shortly thereafter, a loud screech came, followed by an explosion that nearly made me lose my footing. An earthquake shook the Ancient Ironbark Timberland and a bright light and a cloud of dust rose from the west.

“Run! If we get caught in that, we are dead!” Shao Lin shouted and accelerated like lightning in the opposite direction.

I was a few seconds behind him, but that was just because the sheer power of what I felt was unlike anything I have ever experienced. The closest thing was those two creatures in Spirit Realm fighting a few months ago.

We ran, Shao Lin using his barriers as footholds while I ran like an animal on all fours, jumping from tree to tree, and mostly avoiding the ground.

Seconds later, we heard harsh whistling, and boulders the size of cars and trucks began raining down all around us. It was as if we were in the middle of a warzone with explosions everywhere. Clearly, whatever that explosion was, it threw a literal mountain in the air and was then quickly coming back down, destroying the forest.

Distant booms that shook the ground still came every once in a while, and only the nearby explosions and massive stones falling from the sky drowned out the foreign threat.

A massive boulder smashed into an Ironbark just as I was about to land on one of its branches, and the shower of splinters and rock made me miss my jump. I plummeted to the ground fifty meters below and nearly landed on some small animals that were also running away in a panic.

The poor creatures nearly had a heart attack and quickly disappeared beneath the undergrowth.

Shao Lin was quickly disappearing from my sight, so despite promising myself to be careful and never use it publicly, I twisted the space around me and felt gravity shift as I began falling horizontally to the ground.