One more chapter before I sleep. Enjoy.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As Akiza mde her way through the forest, she noticed there was a lot of changes. There was an incredible difference that she was able to notice. The flow of Internal Energy in her body had strengthened her considerably. She was a lot faster. She could make her way to the river within 5 minutes now whereas it took her ours before. She took some time to look at herself in the water before she got to work. "Is this what beauty is supposed to be?" she thought to herself. She realized that she looked a lot more like her father overall with the blond hair, lack of developed muscles, and whiter skin. But, she lacked the pointed ears that her father had and still saw traces of her mother in her hair style and eyes.
After about a minute of admiring herself, she got to work and filled the buckets with water. The buckets of water now barely felt like anything. She should travel between the river and the tree within 15 minutes. This was all thanks to the breakthrough into the Life Stage. With this newfound strength, Akiza was finally able to finish filling her bath with water. Prior to this, she was not fast enough and the water would seep through the ground every time she tried to fill it with water because she could not keep the dirt wet enough for water to fill it. However, the breakthrough gave her the speed and strength necessary to accomplish this.
"Take out the River Spirit Grass, Bark of a Thousand Year Old Tree, and the Purple Amaryllis," Akira instructed. Akiza took them out as instructed in as Akira continued his explanation. "Take your bowl, grind the three ingredients as close to a paste as you can in a 5:1:2 ratio, that means for every 5 River Spirit Grass, you place in 1 piece of bark, and 2 Purple Amaryllis flowers."
"What is this for Master?" Akiza asked.
"This is the base for a Nature Medicinal Bath," Akira explained. "You have a strong affinity for Nature energy and this bath is meant to reinforce that part. It should be able to greatly increase your flow of Internal Energy and push you into the Limit Stage."
"Is it that easy?" Akiza wondered as she counted out as much of the plants as she could. It was enough to mix the combination about 6 times mainly due to the limited amounts of Purple Amaryllis flowers. She then crushed the plants in her bowl. Although she only had her hands to work with, by using her Internal Energy, she was able to break most of the plants into almost like a powder.
"That's close enough," Akira interrupted. "Without a mortar and pestle, this is probably the best you can do. Take that and throw it into your bath and wait."
Akiza did as instructed and put all of the plants into the water. She sat there and entered her Dantian while waitng for the plants.
"Looking for something?" Akira asked.
"Book Two of Nine Yins and Nine Yangs Manual," Akiza replied.
Akira took out the book since he had been keeping it on him since Akiza tried to take it. He handed her the book and said, "Study well."
As Akiza began to look through the book, it contained a lot of medical information. There were detailed drawings of the human body, pressure points, and how to use them to treat a body. One of the techniques in the book was the one that her Master had used on her to open her Dantian and pressure points when they first met. It even included medicinal usages of some of the plants that she had collected including how they could be used for treating internal and external injuries. Some of the medicinal recipes were also elixirs that were meant to improve one's training. It was a book filled with a treasure trove of knowledge and Akiza wanted to know it all. However, there was one major problem. There weren't drawings or any sort of picture reference for some of the plants described. One of them described a rare flower that had both properties of Fire and Ice capable of improving one's Internal Energy by leaps and bounds, but had no picture.
Akira closely watched Akiza as she flipped through the book. "There's no way she can understand that right?"
"I have memorized every word in this book," Akiza said.
"This girl is a cheater," Akira said to himself. She is not only gifted with a talent for Fire, a deep understanding of the World Spiritualist Technique, the ability to greatly absorb Nature energy, but she also has eidetic memory. A mere child who is barely approaching six years old is nearing the knowledge of someone who cannot hope to achieve in a lifetime of study.
"I know how to use the gifts that you have given me to get stronger even faster Master," Akiza said.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
"What do you mean?" Akira asked.
"By using my opened pressure points and the Foodies method, I can absorb the full essence of all the plants through the bath," Akiza replied.
"Yes, that is the purpose of the bath," Akira responded. "But to think you have such a deep understanding of this is unprecedented. Even my Master took about a year to fully understand the Nine Yins and Nine Yangs Manual and he had an insane talent for reading."
"Maybe that's because you're a better teacher than your Master, Master," Akiza said.
Akira thought to himself, "Or maybe you're just that ridiculous of a monster."
"Is there anything else for me here?" asked Akiza.
"No not yet," Akira responded. "You will be training in fighting techniques after your next breakthrough. Most people begin learning to fight much earlier, butwith your gifts, you could probably push yourself to the Spirit Stage without much difficulty."
"What is so important about the Spirit Stage?" Akiza wondered.
"It is when you obtain your first Spirit," answered Akira. "The eggs here are all your future Spirits. They will grant you immense power and unique abilities once you learn how to use them."
Akiza looked closely at the sealed eggs from left to right. On the left was a red egg that was warm and had a pattern of fire around it. To the right of it was a green egg with rocks still stuck on it. The one after that was a blue egg with scales on it. The last egg was a striped black and white egg. Each of them were set to hatch at different points and Akiza could not wait to see them. "When do they hatch?" Akiza asked.
"The only certain one is the first one, which will hatch for a Hero the moment they breakthrough into the Spirit Stage," Akira answered. "The rest will come as you grow stronger, but when that will happen is uncertain."
Akiza nodded to signal that she understood. She looked around the library in her Dantian some more, looking for fighting techniques.
"Are you looking for something?" Akira asked.
"Fighting techniques," Akiza responded.
"I told you not to worry about that yet," Akira replied. "I will show you to the Fire styles once you finish your breakthrough, now hurry up and go take your bath."
Akiza exited her Dantian and took a look at her bath. The water that used to be clear enough to see through to the bottom had changed. It was now a pool of water pink in color. The powders that she had made earlier had been absorbed into water. She used her senses to inspect it and found that it was an extremely rich source of Nature energy, greater than anything that she had sensed since arriving in the forest. This was the effects of a proper combination of medicinal herbs used to improve training. She could not believe how such a thing was possible and wondered how potent a powerful elixir would be if simple plants could already be used to this effect.
"Get undressed," Akira said. "You need to absorb it through your skin in order to get its full effects.
Akiza got undressed and entered the water. "Cold," she said. She swam around in the water for a bit because it was something that she was not able to do in a long time. She was too short for the water and could not even properly stand up in the pool, so she leaned her back against the edge and began to meditate in the pool. She used the technique her master had taught her in order to absorb all the Internal Energy in the water. She sensed numerous types of energy. The River Spirit Grass had released Nature, Yin, and Yang. The Bark of a Thousand Year Old Tree contained Aura, Mana, Nature, and Elemental energy. The Purple Amaryllis contained Yin, Yang, Ki, Aura, Mana, Elemental, and Nature. She was absorbing eight types of energy into her body at once.
The immense power of the pool was overwhelming, but the Book of Foodies made it possible to absorb every last bit of energy. None of it went to waste like the food that she had eaten before. As she finished absorbing the last of the Internal Energy in the pool, she began to feel a very familiar pain. Akiza braced herself for the sharp yet familiar pain that came with a breakthrough. "AHHHHH," she screamed. This was much stronger, much sharper, and lasted much longer. Her entire body felt as if it was on fire.
Meanwhile, Akira looked at the Hero's Flower inside of Akiza. "Something isn't right," he said. He watched the Hero's Flower was it turned from what was a bright red color to a bright pink color. "Wasn't it supposed to turn blue?"