The entrance behind him was immediately blocked up with ice by the adults waiting for them to enter.

Everything was completely the same as the day he went for his baptism, but this time there was no one bold enough to talk back to Kaoran, so they went the entire time in silence.

When they got to the place where the lake was, Stone felt a wave of nostalgia. He was confused for a moment before realizing this.

This was the first time he felt like that towards some space.

Furthermore, in this place, he had gone through an important event changing his life. Now there will be a second one.

Getting a name. How long did he wait for this? Originally, he would need to wait only a few months before he would be able to name himself in the village. But the monsters came and destroyed everything.

On the other hand, in this place, you need merit to get a name. Of course, the name will be more potent, but some people simply won’t get enough merits before passing away. It is also considered a crime to make some name for yourself without any ceremony with Spirit World.

That made many weaker tribesmen nameless and only used nicknames or warrior titles.

But Stone hoped for a normal name. Being called Stone wasn’t a thing he enjoyed that much. To travel and see the world, he needs a respectable name!

For that, he spent the merit that he was saving.

But it will be all worth it. He believed in that.

In just a little while, it was time for the first batch.

This time Stone thought it would be for the best if he could enter once everyone is done since it will probably take some time and that it could be dangerous.

He already said this to Kaoran, and he agreed with him.

Everyone started to undress preparing to dip their bodies and started to take turns.

Hours passed, and most of the children have gone through the changes.

Some were satisfied with their results, some disappointed. Not everyone could be the winner.

At this point, Stone decided to undress himself too so he can go once the last children get out.

The only thing he left on his body was the amulet created from blue feathers. They were from the time he hunted the Ohera tribe. Kaoran managed to turn it into a protection amulet, and now it was extremely useful as it could get dangerous.

Now that he was the oldest one here he felt a little weird between other children, but the excitement completely beat off the feeling. Instead, he went to Kaoran.

“Don’t forget to baptize the blade.”

“I have it stored here. Once you guys get out, we will use the rest of the Cold Energy, so don’t worry.”

“Alright.” Stone nodded at this.

“Oh Yeah. I almost forgot. Here.” Kaoran suddenly remembered something and took out a necklace with a small white pearl.

“This is a pearl that can hold a certain amount of Spiritual Energy. Now that you can control the energy to a certain extent, you can use it when you are underwater. After all, you can’t practice the ‘Nature Breath’ method to the fullest potential at the bottom of the water where you can’t do the breath exercise.”

“I know. Thanks. It will come in handy. I will be going.” Stone knew this very well. He already thought he would need to switch to basic meditation again if it was too inefficient.

With this, he will be able to skip the accumulation of energy from breathing, making it much easier.

He just quickly took out the pouch with the herbs and quickly devoured them. It didn’t matter in what order, so he just stuffed them into his mouth and swallowed them.

Many children were curious since he was doing something different from others but didn’t talk. They will ask someone later for sure.

After some time, at last, the last children got out with a happy smile.

Since he was ready, he didn’t waste his time and jumped into the water.

Not slowly like the last time since the cold wasn’t unbearable anymore and mainly because he was now a good swimmer.

Swimming was a good way to train your body, and so he was sometimes swimming with Degres in the northern rivers.

That made it much easier for him to get to the center where he took a very deep breath and submerged himself.

Once he did so, he dove downwards towards the place where he saw the golden lights.

As he swam, he felt the Cold Energy flowing around but not being able to enter his body.

The deeper he got, the darker the particles got, and he started to feel the cold.

He didn’t expect the lake to be so deep. He was in a meditative state the last time and so he didn’t realize how much he sank.

But as soon as he got deep enough, he stopped thinking about such distracting things.

All that remained in his mind was the golden lights he saw before. Looking around, he didn’t see them, but he already guessed that the reason was that he was half-unconscious last time.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

So in the end, he just took the most comfortable position he could under the water and closed his eyes.

He took the white pearl in his hand and started to circulate the method Kaoran was so proud of. While training in it for several months already, Stone still didn’t make that big progress.

That was mostly because his talent was still bad but also because Kaoran wanted him to accumulate the experience rather than make some big steps and later lament his choices.

The first step in this method was to connect yourself with surroundings through breathing exercises. These will allow you to have access to the Spiritual Energy around, and you will be able to breathe it into your body.

Since this method emphasizes nature, it is most potent when it is practiced in places untouched by civilizations. Big cities, dams, or any other man-made structures disrupt the flow of nature, making it harder to practice this.

The good thing is that Stone was at a place where the biggest structures are shabby cottages, so the nature is more potent here.

The more so in the place he was right now. The place is seen only by people once every few years, and there are no marks of them since they worship this place.

Unfortunately, he can’t absorb the energy really well. Stone’s talent made it extremely hard to accumulate the energy without leaking it out.

That was the usual threshold for magicians of the South to tread this path.

And Stone didn’t pass it.

Thankfully his teacher, Kaoran, didn’t care as he believed he would be able to reach great heights one day. It will be hard but not impossible.

This way Stone started to circulate the energy from the pearl into his body.

Despite there being a minimal amount of it, it was extremely hard for him.

He focused his all for it to get inside of his body.

Slowly, after hours of strenuous work, a strand finally split from the pearl and drilled inside the hand of his.

Because of his poor control, the energy loss was quite big, and the damage done was also considerable.

If anyone looked at his arm right now, they would think some kind of worm was drilling a hole inside of his arm and would be horrified by the disgusting sight.

But he didn't care about the pain. He already trained in this way and knew the flaws of his. He will fix them later. Now he had to focus on the important part.

As time passed, the strand of energy passed deeper and deeper inside of his body with slightly faster circulation. As it reached a certain part of his body, Stone felt a certain relief of releasing some kind of block.

Kaoran told him that this was the block he himself made to block the hallucinogens inside of his body. Now that it was released he will hallucinate for several hours straight.

Knowing this, he opened his eyes and focused on his Spirit. He wanted to leave the body behind. Wanting to move despite not using any muscle.

At this point, he felt as if the place was rippling and that the water currents full of the Cold Energy started dancing around him turning into all kinds of wild animals.

A herd of deer chased by the pack of wolves was doing circles around him while the birds were frolicking above them.

Bears were fighting together for dominance, and foxes were burying themselves in the snow to catch rodents.

All kinds of phenomena he saw in years of living in the wilderness were showing up.

But those were only a fraction of what he saw.

Things that do not exist or are simply too weird were seen by him as he started to feel dizzy.

Snakes with heads on both ends were eating each other while tightening themselves around him, birds with teeth were eating creatures made of gemstones and many other bizarre things were happening around him.

But what he didn’t expect to see was something completely different.

A monster. It was a gigantic creature with a visage of an eerie wolf. It had bony protrusions on its body and deer’s antlers on its head making it look even more creepy. It had a twisted smile as it slowly neared him while killing everything that came under its paws.

Stone froze at his sight. Seeing the creature hunting him for years was like a nightmare turning true. For a moment he couldn’t do anything and even forgot for a moment to practice the method.

The creature’s smile got even more twisted at his show of fear and opened its drooling maw to devour him once again.

But this time something was different.

“Stone. You must overcome this. It won’t be able to hurt you. You grew while it regressed. It is a pitiful creature worthy of regret. Ending its life won’t only give the release of yours but also its too.”

A whisper so silent that Stone couldn’t understand what it was saying at the beginning.

But as it continued, he noticed its feminine tone full of empathy and tranquility.

This made him calm down a bit.

However, once he realized whose voice it was, he was astounded.

‘Zephyr?’

“Don’t be so surprised, Stone. You are just in a state where you can see me once again.”

The voice said with a soothing yet also slightly teasing voice.

‘How?’

‘Now is not the time, is it? Overcome this, Stone.’

When she said this, it was obvious that she talked about the monster.

Looking at it, now that Stone got his senses back, he was visibly calmer. The monster still gave him goosebumps but it wasn’t so serious.

What he didn’t expect to see when looking closely was that it seemed to be much more pitiful than he remembered. It had wounds everywhere, and it seemed to have black rods embedded in its body hurting it. It wasn’t that noticeable in the dark since it had dark fur. But now he saw it and he was shocked,

But then he saw the wounds on its body rotting as the flesh was falling from it. Its jaw was already bare as he could easily see all of its teeth. The place where the eyes were supposed to be were only the red pits gazing deeply into his soul.

It definitely wasn’t like that before.

Or is it just another product of his imagination?

If it was then why?

He had so many questions but he knew he wouldn't get the answers to them. His instincts told him that. And so instead he swirled the water around him so that the creature disappeared. Then he turned his attention to a voice that he didn't know where it came from.

‘Does this mean you are real?’

‘That is not so.’

But the voice denied it.

‘Then what are you? Just another hallucination?’

‘Close. I am your imagination. The manifestation of your desire for freedom. Your dream of adventures.’

‘What? That doesn’t make any sense.’

‘And what does in your life, dear little Stone? Your life was already destined to be unlike anyone else.’

‘But why? Why would you appear so suddenly after that night!’

He was confused and couldn’t understand.

‘I didn’t, Stone. I was there since the time we were trapped. It was just that you were not in a state to hear even your own imaginations.’

‘That doesn’t explain why you appeared so suddenly years later.’

‘Hehe, I am here only when you suffer. When you are constricted and feel suffocated. Don’t you remember? The girl I have borrowed the appearance from. She was the source of your nightmares. Her screams of pain, her hate towards you that made her end her own life. This made it easier to manifest for me and help you.’

‘Why?’

Stone felt horrible. The knowledge that you have been crazy since childhood was something hard to stomach. Fortunately, Kaoran already prepared him for this outcome, so he didn’t freak out.

‘I am part of you, silly. I wanted to get you out of this place where you can’t lead a proper life. Living like a barbarian isn’t something that fits us. I would guide you for as long as possible but once you fought that bear and broke through your bottleneck in spiritual perception, you couldn’t perceive me anymore since I don’t exist. Pretty ironic, isn’t it?’

The soft giggle sounded out but Stone still couldn’t see her.

‘Don’t bother. I do not have any appearance. Like I said, I just borrowed the appearance of that poor girl to fit into society.’

‘You just said that I couldn’t perceive you anymore. Is it because of the hallucination that I can see you again?’

‘That’s right. Once it dissipates you won’t be able to see me anymore. And that’s why we should hurry.’

‘To enter the Spirit World, get the name and make the first step to get freedom, of course.’

And with those words, everything around him lit up.

Everything seemed to be the same, but Stone knew for sure.

That everything was different.

‘Welcome to Spirit World.’