Maxine carefully scanned everything within the range of her spiritual sense for the last few days. She had been trying to figure out a clear route to the essence core storage room. Whether it be through a direct route through the corridors of underground portion of this base or through it's ventilation shaft system. Getting into that room undetected was only the first part of her plan. She already had her planned route and was only waiting for the graveyard shift to be half over and the guards to be half-asleep to enact her plan.
After scanning both of her guards just outside of her room with her spiritual sense, Maxine slowly opened her eyes. Both of them were having difficulty staying awake. With a subtle use of her spiritual sense, she caused both of her guards to fall into a deep slumber. Maxine placed her bangle on her bed before using a small mass of her essence to mimic her essence signature and vitals. It wouldn't last more than a few hours, but by then she would already be at her goal.
Carefully, she got out of her bed and slowly opened the door. She scanned the corridors with her spiritual sense to make sure the area is clear of patrols before slowly making her way towards the storage room. She hadn't wanted to traverse the corridors, but each section of this underground base had it's own separate ventilation system. It made finding a route through the ventilation system to her goal impossible. Maxine avoided the odd patrol and any active surveillance cameras on her way to the storage room.
Maxine stopped next to a corner office just down the hallway from the storage room. She knew that the storage room would require a keycard to enter, but the room's ventilation system connected to the office infront of her. Unfortunately, the office was occupied by leiutenant that had fallen asleep at his desk. Maxine carefully opened the door while muffling the hinges with her essence. After entering the room and closing the door behind her, she tiptoed as silent as a cat towards a filing cabinet. The ventilation duct was just above it. When the sleeping lieutentant shifted in his sleep, Maxine froze in panic right . When it was clear the man wasn't going to wake up, she used her essence to quietly removed the vent from the duct and climbed in. It was a tight fit leaving her only inches to spare to either side. She was for once happy that she reincarnated as a girl. If she had been a man, she would never have fit inside this duct. She quickly crawled to the storage room.
Maxine found a contact sensor attached to the vent. She formed a blade of essence to cut the inside edge of the vent to avoid tripping the sensor and removed the portion she cut out. She dropped down almost soundlessly into the room. She was grateful no one had thought to install a surveillance camera inside the room as she looked around the room.
There were shelves full of labeled small boxes. She walked to the door and looked around the room to see if there was anything she could use to make sure it stayed closed. There was a filing cabinet that listed all of the items in the room with their sources. She couldn't move it without making alot of noise. She scanned the area with her spiritual sense and decided none of them were close enough to hear it. It only took her a few moments to move it infront of the door.
Maxine turned around and let out a sigh. Now for the second part part of my plan. I know this part is on the crazy stupid side, but it shouldn't kill me as long as I eat some Heart Protection Fruit and Regeneration Grass. Maxine walked one of the shelves and tore open two boxes containing those herbs and ate their contents before walking to the very center of the room. She began using her essence to control every shadow in there to create hundreds of tendrils. Each one of those tendrils punctured one of the many boxes and arranged them around herself to make a crystaline cocoon several layers thick with just enough room for her to breath. With a final touch, she manipulated those shadows to encase her with the essence cores leaving only a half inch thick layer of her manifested essence. She had left a few very small gaps on the top and around the base for air circulation. She was nearly completely drained from that expenditure, but these preparations would leave her completely undisturbed to absorb all of the essence within the cores.
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After hesitating for a moment, she began refining the cores and drawing all of that refined essence into herself. Sudden searing pain reached across every inch of her body causing her whole body to tremble. She knew this was only the beginning. If she faltered in the circulation of her cultivation method for even an instant, the essence she was absorbing would go out of control and would tear her apart from the inside out. The pain only got worse the longer time went on. It felt like every bone in her body was being broken over and over again. Her muscles and skin felt like they were being flayed from her body. Yet she still circulated her cultivation method as she took in more of the essence from the cores. She could no longer hold in her screams. However she couldn't stop. Not it she wanted to protect those important to her.
While enduring all of that monsterous pain, her essence had smashed through bronze stage some time ago and was rapidly approaching iron stage. The essence cores were dwindling swiftly and were about to be used up by the time her cultivation finally reached iron stage. Not wanting to waste the remaining cores, she absorbed the last bit of essence in them and finally relaxed her control when it was clear her cultivation was stable. In that instant, she was overwhelmed by dizziness and passed out.
In her dreams, she heard several people calling out to her followed by alot of grinding and hammering sounds. Emily, Amanda and her mother were all pleading with her to wake up and leave her cocoon. Maxine slowly started to stir and opened her eyes. Confusion filled her eyes very quickly. Her cocoon should have dissolved as soon as she lost consciousness. To try and understand this anomoly, she carefully examined it and discovered that it was draining a very small stream of essence from her without her conscious effort. The ammount drained wasn't exceeding what she was producing and could be maintained indefinitely until she decided to cut off it's supply of essence. Once she did that, the cocoon around her would collapse. Now that that mystery is solved I need to check on to other things.
She checked on her essence core with her spiritual sense. It's original copper hue had darkened to an almost black metallic grey. She followed up by scanning the rest her body and immediately noticed that her clothes had been shredded. She might as well be naked with how little was covered. I could barely keep my essence under control earlier. It's no wonder my clothes got shredded. However those thoughts were shoved away when she saw her hair. Her hair had been bleached of almost all of it's color and was now silver grey. I hope this isn't permnament. I was rather fond of my brown hair.
Maxine shook her head to force out all of those distracting thoughts. She had to figure out what the date was since there was no way to know how long she had been unconscious. Couldn't have been more than a few days. She extended out her spiritual sense while searching for any active terminals or computers to find today's date. While performing her search, worry and fear were gradually taking over as she noticed how few soldiers were at the base. None of the tanks or armored personel carriers were at base as well. She hastened her search and found an active terminal. The date listed was June 7th.