“So, how do we split the rewards?” Carlos asked as the sun was about to set.

It had been a productive day. They had obtained nine pieces of earth quintessence. But it had mostly been Doro’s hard work. Everyone else just sat around and watched.

Zachary frowned. This was something he had not discussed with Heather beforehand. The excitement of reaching the quintessence spring and figuring out how to deal with the scorpion dragon made him forget this important detail.

Heather walked up to him with a cute smile, “I am sure you won’t be satisfied with equal shares. How about this? Since Doro did the hard part, we can count it as an additional member, meaning we divide by five and you get two shares.”

Zachary considered it briefly and asked within his soul, “Wander, what do you think?”

“Huh? Oh… two out of five sounds pretty good.” Wander replied lazily. “Somehow, I think you are still be getting ripped off but I too hungry to worry about it.”

Zachary silently chided the turtle before nodding to Heather, “Okay, that’s fine.”

She smiled and held out an open palm.

“What?” He asked.

“I need the rest of my soul orbs now.”

Zachary smiled wryly. It was another thing he had forgotten in the heat of the moment. He opened his supply bag and counted out twelve soul orbs. He handed them over, thus completing their initial deal.

As for the earth quintessences, Heather’s gang was quite efficient in dividing it up. They had probably done it many times before among themselves. They set up a rough weighing system with vine rope and a wooden plank chopped into shape by Heather’s mantis. Zachary was impressed and had no problem with it.

In the end, Zachary received three pieces of quintessence. The combined weight of the stones came to about two-fifths of the overall. It was only a rough measure but nobody raised a fuss. They all expected to gather more tomorrow.

Dinner was a simple affair. Each person took care of their summons and settled in for the night. Zachary fed Sugo's seaweed to Wander and spare novice rank anima crystals to the others. His lineup had grown large and it was a time-consuming process. It was completely dark by the time he got around to Doro.

“Doro, sorry I made you wait.”

“Guh… it’s alright.”

Zachary patted the mound of dirt that was its head, “How about we find out what’s so special about these rocks.”

“Okay!”

Doro lifted the first piece of quintessence, the smallest, off the ground. Zachary held out both palms and pressed them against the cool surface. He then closed his eyes and opened the earth path within his soul.

The first goal was to improve Doro’s soul cultivation. If Doro was stronger, it could move through the earth easier and faster. They would be able to collect more quintessences with less risk. The next goal was his own soul cultivation. When Doro broke through to the Three Paths Adept Rank, he would also have a chance of advancing. It was a feedback effect unique to humans and their summons. It wasn’t guaranteed but the higher the talent of the Ensouled, the greater the chance of a breakthrough for the summoner. If it didn’t work with Doro, he still had Wander who he had complete faith in.

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“Hahh…” Doro let out a contented sigh as the Eternum started to flow.

To Zachary, it was a new experience. He had never had the opportunity to cultivate with quintessence before, only anima crystals. They were far too expensive back in the Old World. Now, he understood why.

The energy was so pure. It was so pure that it was flawless. It was a magical feeling. It was as if he had been plunged into a fathomless pool of earth. Like water, it surrounded him from all sides and filled his body, all the way to his soul.

Anima crystals were never like this, even crystals from earth-attribute Ensouled. Crystals came from living souls which always had eight paths and eight attributes. Even if the Ensouled was a creature of earth like Doro, it had still absorbed other attributes of Eternum throughout its life. Such impurities would forever remain within its soul and its anima crystal.

Quintessences, on the other hand, were immaculate materializations of a single element. There was no other element. These treasures were born out of nature and the mysterious forces of the world. They were perfect.

The flow of Eternum was fast and strong. In the blink of an eye, the smallest piece was used up. The stone crumbled to dust in Doro’s hand and Zachary quickly replaced with the biggest piece and continued cultivating.

Earthly energy surged once again, into Doro as well as Zachary by proxy. They were both plunged into a sea of Eternum once again, a state where their souls were continuously consuming earth and being refined.

“Raaahhhh!!” Doro suddenly roared.

Rising out of the ground, it raised its burly arms towards the sky. Eternum surged out of its body, overflowing. It was happy, so happy it couldn’t help but shout out.

“Shh. Don’t be so loud.” Zachary warned but it was a little too late.

“What’s wrong?” Heather asked, rushing up to him from her side of the camp.

Her mantis and gray wolf were already summoned, ready for battle.

“Sorry, Doro got a little too excited. I’ll remind him to be quiet.”

But as he said that, it roared again.

“Raahh!”

This time, its body visibly grew in size even as Eternum continued to surge. Its soul sea was full of the purest earth energy. There was nowhere for it all to go. One soul path at the adept rank were far from enough. There was only one option, forcefully widen a second path and achieve a breakthrough!

“Rah!”

Doro let out one last roar as all of the energy surged out of the multi-colored rock. Its life path, which had been at the novice rank, was pushed wide open with indomitable force. Its entire body glowed with reddish-brown light as it broke through.

“Rah…” It let out a satisfied grunt.

In a flash, it was done. The light was gone. Doro was now a Two Paths Adept Rank summon.

“It broke through? Just like that?” Heather asked.

“Apparently.”

“Well, lucky you, I suppose. Quintessences aren’t so easy to work with. The energy within is too pure for our summons so it’s a much slower process.”

“Ah, that makes sense.” He said.

Doro was a creature of pure earth so naturally, it was compatible with earth quintessences. Other, normal Ensouled didn’t have such advantages. He wondered what would happen with Wander or Onkie.

“But I wouldn’t be too happy right now.” She said, “Your guy was very loud. At least, there is no movement from the cave but anything could come sniffing around during the night.”

“Should we move?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

The two of them came to a quick agreement and acted quickly. The gang packed their tents, removed any trace of their presence as best they could, and moved to a location beside the stream. It was far away enough that it would hopefully fool any wild Ensouled that came wandering by.

They set up camp again, along with some grumbling. Carlos went to sleep while Heather and Shuhua continued to work with their summons to absorb the quintessences.

Zachary climbed up a large tree for an early start on sentry duty. Doro needed some time to stabilize the changes within its soul sea. It was never a good idea to rush into another breakthrough before the soul was fully healed.

As he was settling into his spot on a large branch, he heard a familiar sound once again.

“Hoo… hoo!”