Chapter 106: Embracing the Unknown

Seated in the lotus position, Darius examined the massive diamond in his hand, observing the swirling elements trapped within.

'I owe Neko a big reward after this.'

He placed the Gaia's Heart Diamond gently in his lap, focusing on his gauntlet, it slowly crawled down his arm to form the black orb, storing it along with his armor and tunic, he closed his eyes and began to center his mind. As he did, the ambient mana from the diamond surged, a dense wave spreading through his senses.

'More than enough…'

His mind zeroed in on each element—water, earth, fire, wind, and lightning—reaching out to embrace the depths of his current comprehension.

Slowly, a faint glow surfaced beneath his bare skin as his tattoos flared to life, lighting up in sequence: deep blue and earthy yellow on his left chest, fiery red across his abdomen, pale green joining the others on his right chest, and the purple of lightning blazing on his forehead.

Above him, the ley lines within Agarttha began to flow faster, gradually reacting to the mounting energy, their currents growing erratic.

'This bottleneck ends here,' he resolved, his expression hardening. His breath slowed, becoming deep and steady, while his blue aura swelled, thickening like an incoming tide. It wrapped around him, creating a dense shell of water mana.

'My body should hold out as long as my focus remains absolute. Gather, suppress, and break.'

'If I could brush upon my Path of Origin...' He clenched the Gaia's Heart Diamond tighter, the raw mana surging within it echoing his intent. He knew the odds were slim—he had no real control over when the Origin Path would reveal itself. It was elusive like a shadow, or an illusion, seemingly beyond his reach.

But this breakthrough was different.

'Without Daemen’s soul fused within me, there’s no interference, no chaotic thoughts blurring my comprehension. It’s clearer now.' He realized how much Daemen’s presence had influenced him—an ever-present storm of rage, guilt, and hunger for vengeance that wasn’t entirely his own. Now, separated from that, his will felt lighter, more refined, like a blade stripped of rust.

'If I can harness that clarity, even for a moment, I might glimpse it.'

Without further hesitation, he activated the Arcane Talisman Technique to its fullest.

The air trembled, the mana within the Gaia's Heart Diamond surged, his control absolute. He drew it in without restraint, his body demanding the full brunt of its energy. The diamond blazed in his palms, attempting to flood the cavern with an intense glow.

The barrier surrounding him rippled violently, responding to the sudden outpour of raw power. Light reflected off it like shards of glass, creating a dazzling, chaotic display around him as the sheer force of the mana clashed against the protective array. It held firm, but barely, hiding everything happening within.

His meridians screamed, tattoos pulsing beneath his skin, cycling the surge as his crystalline bones creaked under the pressure. Every breath was a struggle, every heartbeat felt like it would rip him apart. But his focus didn’t waver; he could feel the first ethereal barrier of the crystal skeleton beginning to fracture.

'Break.'

The mana roared through his meridians like wild beasts, each surge feeling like molten lava scorching its way through his veins. The searing heat spread rapidly, burning through his body.

Darius knew from the start that altering the original Taiji Talisman Technique wouldn't let him avoid this critical step. His only current means of storing mana was within his crystalline skeleton, allowing him to bypass typical limitations of the body foundation stage. This granted him the ability to use martial techniques before forming a qi sea or core, something this stage hadn't granted him with the original technique.

However, the strength of this approach was also its limitation. Originally, his bones could only store qi, waiting to used for the first stages breakthrough, now his bones stored, and channel mana externally, relying on his aura to exert power. While this worked because of Gaia’s spellcasting system, which used external auras, it posed a problem now: he needed to manipulate the mana internally with precision. To do this, he would have to disable his bones' ethereal barriers temporarily—barriers designed to direct mana outward. Breaking through these barriers was the first true bottleneck of his cultivation.

Suddenly, the arrays etched into his organs and muscles ignited, their glow fierce and angry, sizzling into themselves as if trying to brand his very being. His body wanted to convulse under the strain, yet he forced himself to remain still, pushing down the waves of torment.

But the worst of it came from his bones. The crystalline structure, once his strength, now felt like a cage ready to shatter. Every fiber of his control was stretched thin, every moment a test of his will. If his focus slipped, even for a heartbeat, his entire skeleton would explode from the pressure. The agony was almost blinding, yet he gritted his teeth, not daring to let the pain win.

Having drawn in mana from all five elements, the gathered energy seethed within his bones like multicolored boiling oil, each element roiling and shifting in a violent, chaotic dance. The pressure grew with every moment, his bones seeming barely able to contain the intense, elemental forces swirling within. Finally, as his body threatened to split, Darius began compressing the mana, drawing it together with ruthless focus.

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Bit by bit, the boiling mana shifted, draining from every corner of his skeleton, leaving his bones hollow and still as the mana gathered into a single, blinding point. The multicolored torrent collapsed inward, becoming an extreme, searing light that pulsed with the power of every element.

With unwavering precision, he drove this condensed essence—a needle of pure, concentrated energy—straight toward the center of his sternum.

'Break!'

The sound of shattering glass exploded, a deafening crack that tore through the cavern like a thunderclap. The force ripped apart the barrier hiding Darius instantly, shredding into nothingness as the noise echoed violently throughout Agarttha.

'Once more!'

Gritting his teeth, Darius forced the mana to gather again. The pressure this time doubled, agony ripping through him as each crystalline structure strained under the weight of the compressing mana. His body trembled violently, the pain now a raw, searing hot blade that sliced at his very core.

The agony was nearly unbearable, his thoughts fractured under the intensity, but he kept driving forward. The mana, now denser than before, swelled within the marrow of his bones, threatening to tear them apart at any second.

As soon as he sensed that the gathered mana had reached the limit, he slammed it into the final layer, unleashing everything.

"BREAK!"

Silence. The final layer shattered with a soundless force. But a devastating shockwave rippled outward, silently tearing through the cavern.

The surroundings held steady, but the massive rock beneath him disintegrated, reduced to fine dust. His body hovered in the air, aura flickering violently through the elements—flames, lightning, rushing wind, surging water, and trembling earth, each vying for dominance.

He succeeded, but the taste of it was fleeting. There was no time to celebrate.

The next step was critical—a fragile moment between advancement and annihilation. His body felt like a thin wineskin trying to contain a stormy sea. Gritting his teeth, Darius marshaled his will, forcing the wild mana into order.

Blood began to ooze from his seven orifices, his form twisted and rigid—a grotesque statue with a maturing, stoic face. The elements within him clashed furiously, battling for supremacy.

'Focus!'

The command echoed sharply in his mind, cutting through the haze of agony. Desperation fueled his next move: drawing one last surge from Gaia’s Heart Diamond, he channeled it through his Triple Burner Meridian.

The sudden influx cleared his thoughts, momentarily numbing the pain. With a burst of clarity, Darius seized control, breaking down each element with ruthless precision and speed. He infused his comprehension into them—tempering their raw power, turning chaos into unity, forcing them to bend to his will.

'Frost Breath of the Serpent.'

His memories surged, clear and sharp—the frigid mist curling around him, freezing into serpents in its wake. "Gather!" The chaotic water element surging throughout his dantian immediately shifted, reforming into a deep, raging sphere that churned steadily within him.

'Terra Pulse.'

He recalled controlling the earth during his first encounter with Neko, the sheer force of Gaia’s power surging through his veins. "Anchor!" Darius bellowed, feeling the tremors settle into a solid, dense mass, unwavering and deep.

'Solar Tyrant’s Fist.'

The memory of Ramman’s laughter burned vividly in his mind, the blinding heat of his own fists raining down upon the knight roaring through his being. "Contain!" Pushing the wild flames inward, he compressed them into a simmering, fiery orb, raging but controlled.

'Blessing of the Zephyr.'

The techniques fierce currents from that desperate escape flooded his senses—the frantic wind that had saved him from the Swamp-Roach horde. "Converge!" His voice rang out, and the turbulent element finally coiled together, forming a round, airy vortex.

'Echoing Thunder Palm.'

The surge of purple arcs, the electrifying clash, Trayton’s mocking gaze—all of it fueled Darius’s final push.

"Bind!" he shouted, the crackling arcs folding in, wrapping the element in a tight, sparking ring.

"With my Martial Techniques as the foundation... Balance!"

The five elements within Darius’s dantian whirled to life, his will forcing them into a controlled orbit. Outside his body, his aura, which had been wildly fluctuating, finally settled as one by one, all five elements fell into place, their distinct energies rotating around him. As they did this, his aura began leaking upward toward the ley-lines, merging seamlessly with their streams.

"Condense!"

Each orb halted abruptly, their forms solidifying into small, dense cores. Their surfaces, once turbulent, now smoothed over, emanating an intense, solidified energy.

Strain surged through him, every fiber of his being feeling the pressure, at risk of tearing if he didn't maintain delicate control—like forcing an enraged tiger into a silk sack. Yet, the process flowed smoothly, his will guiding it.

As the final forms of the cores solidified, a sudden tremor rippled through them. The cores twitched violently, their essence sputtering.

'Something’s not right.'

Instinctual panic clawed at him momentarily, but centuries of experience kept him steady. Splitting his focus, he tried to stabilize the cores while urgently searching for the cause. His consciousness immediately plunged into the water core.

It was instantly clear: the core's structure was trapped in a destructive loop, unable to complete its final phase of condensing. Mana leaked uncontrollably, spilling into the void of his dantian.

Peering deeper, he analyzed an individual microscopic rune within the swirling mass. A realization hit hard. 'The runes are unstable.' They were shifting erratically, unable to form properly their structures stretched and morphed. 'There’s no guidance because I didn't include a base rune to set the language. I should still have time.'

Withdrawing his focus, the backlash he was holding back from the looping cores finally broke free. His skin instantly darkened, splitting into jagged lines as blood sprayed from his body. Each breath grew heavier, his consciousness slowly slipping.

In desperation, Darius leeched into the lightning core, drawing some mana into his Triple Burner Meridian, sparking his thoughts to accelerate. 'If only I'd known, I would've waited to study the primordial languages. Right now I've only mastered the naturally occurring ones for each element; so I should use those.' Regret and indecision lingered for an instant, but he crushed it. Hesitation meant death.

'If this is truly my path, I must forge it myself, I'll use my own runic language.'

Gritting his teeth, he targeted the water core, visualizing the storm of shifting runes within it, along with the water element array across his meridians. 'My understanding is still shallow, but the core rune for each element was the first one I grasped.' Confidence rising, his will pressed forward, imprinting onto the core’s unstable mana. 'Nén...,' he repeated his languages word for water inwardly, channeling his intent into the runes.

The process did nothing to ease the damage; his skin continued to bleed and crack, every breath a sharp reminder of how close death currently was. But in his previous life, when he truly earned the title, The Glutton, death was a constant companion, and charging forward was second nature.

Blocking out the pain, Darius’s focus held steady. His mind remained a still sea as the first rune of his language began to materialize.

'Nén... Nén... Nén...' Each repetition further cemented it, its fluid yet deceptively simple structure slowly gaining color and form.

His erratic aura calmed, the colors shifting to a deep, tranquil blue as the rune imprinted fully. His aura flared skyward in a burst of serene energy as the water core settled and began to pulse with a soothing light. A sudden coolness steadily pushed through his body, healing some damage and bringing a moment of reprieve.

Wasting no time, he shifted to the cracked yellow orb. 'Dor... Dor... Dor...' With the same unwavering focus and the experience gained from the water core, he visualized his word for earth. The rune gradually solidified within the orb, its shifting form becoming dense and grounded.

When the rune locked into place, the core pulsed with a stabilizing light, its presence like a shield around his battered body as the pressure lightened.

Without hesitation, he moved to the smoldering coal of flames. 'Nár...' The rune flared and condensed rapidly, its burning energy folding into the core's fiery surface.

His proficiency was quickly improving, completing fire, wind came next. 'Vá...' The runes of air swirled, aligning and completing themselves easily. Finally, he focused on lightning. 'Liltë.' Spoken once, the core sparked violently, settling as the rune etched itself into place.

With the five elements now stabilized, the cores’ mana erupted, flooding through him and restoring his body. His skin finished mending and his form returned to its peak.

A brief wave of accomplishment washed over him as he gazed at the five cores, each now branded with a glowing rune. The symbols pulsed steadily, their energies synchronized, and the chaotic surge within him finally stilled.

His breath steadied, and a hint of a smile formed. He’d done it. The runes held, and the elements were balanced.

But the next challenge awaited.

'The final step,' he thought, his eyes blazing with renewed focus. 'Forging the Arcane Sanctum.'