1 Prologue 1 (2/2)
”You are late again. . Three hundred push-ups”
”Yes...”
My Master, Devin Zaldivir, stopped me that day and somehow convinced he was not a robber, or a scammer, or a murderer. He showed me what he can teach me, this made me forget that I have an empty soul and I agreed. I still don't know how I could've got convinced by someone who looks so dumb.
When later I told him that I have an empty soul, he said that it didn't matter. So… I took a gamble. I told my parents that I need to take a break, somehow, I convinced my mother, but my father… I had to agree that if it doesn't work out in a year, I will start work in his office.
But in the time I was here all I did was train without a break. And other then the first time Master showed his power, whenever I brought the topic up, he avoided the question. Until today that is. When I finished my thousandth push up, he brought a small bag and started talking.
”Ok kid, your body should be strong enough to go through the awakening now.”
”REALLY?!”
”Yes. But let me first explain what is it that I will teach you. 50 years ago, my father created this art, and it was him that thought it to me. He called it the Soul Arts. You should know about the Martial and Arcane arts and that they use elemental soul essence as their source of power.”
”Well, yes. Everyone who wants to be an artist knows that.”
”To achieve that, they use an awakening stone to rip off a part of their soul which is the elemental essence. On the other hand, the soul arts that I will teach you do not use the soul essence at all, it uses the whole soul.”
”Wait. The whole soul? That can't be if you want to do that you would have to rip your whole soul from the fifth dimensions. That's impossible, they tried to do this during World War 2, hundreds of people died at that time.”
”Well, you sure are smart. But it is defiantly possible.”
Masters face was filled with confidence. Or at least I thought it was confidence, with his odd expression it was hard to determine.
”Listen, when you extract soul essence you need to tear your soul, which requires a large amount of awakening stone, but in turn, it is effortless to place it in your body. On the other hand, moving the soul is much easier, meaning that a lot less of it will be used making it almost impossible to move it into the body. Think of it that way, it's like balancing a stick and a toothpick. While you can balance the stick quite easily, doing the same with a toothpick is impossible.”
That makes sense. For hundreds of years, we knew that to have a higher chance for success it is better to use a more substantial amount of awakening stone, so it was fair to assume that for moving the whole soul it would be even more significant.
Let's start from the beginning. The required amount of awakening stone to move the soul from the fifth dimension is smaller than it is required then to split the soul. If a piece of metal is used as an analogy, it would be like trying to break it with your bare hands. Ordinary people wouldn't be able to do it, but they can pick it up and toss it away. This is understandable. And using his analogy with the toothpick, it would explain the reason why there was no success over so many years. But if you can't move it how can I still accomplish extracting the whole soul?
Since the soul needs to end up inside the body, then the awakening stone could be from the start placed inside of the body.
But this again poses different a problem. The awakening stone is toxic. After digestion it will slowly dissolve in the stomach and depending on the amount in the most severe case, even death is a possibility.
But it all depends on the amount if it is the amount that is required for a normal awakening it means certain death, but since the amount is smaller in when moving the soul… then as long as you don't use too large of an amount and it will be enough to move the soul and not die. It's possible.
Wait… there is still one more problem. How to focus on the stone. It is a necessity to focus on the stone to 'see' the soul. I had to do the same thing while I was searching my soul for elemental essence in the university. It was hard enough to find the soul with a massive piece of the awakening stone. With such small amount, spread around in the bloodstream and with the symptoms of the awakening stone poisoning.
As long as the amount of awakening stone is precise. It will be possible. Extremely hard… but possible.
To think that… someone so dumb looking will know a secret that troubled the humanity for centuries.
”I understand. Then you must know the exact amount of the awakening stone that needs to be used, right? Do you perhaps have a way to dull the symptoms of the awakening stone poisoning? Or a method to help find the soul?”
”…”
”…”
Silence. Masters face quickly changed as confidence that was there disappeared. He now looked dumber than usual.
”You sure are smart…”
”I'm.”
”Well. I do know the exact amount of the awakening stone needed. Since it's toxic… I'm guessing that you already know that.”
”Yes.”
”Great… then you should know why you had to train so much for the past two months?”
”To be able to withstand a higher dose of the awakening stone. I'm guessing that if I were to take the minimum amount two months ago, it wouldn't end well for me.”
”… is there even a need for me to explain anything now?”
”You could answer the questions that I asked you.”
”… Right.”
He passed the small bag to me. I looked inside of it hurriedly. It was full of small marbles, each one of them looked was pitch dark with what looked like little stars inside of it. Awakening stone. The most precious resource on the planet. Every year there is only a limited amount of it mined and refined. It is tough for universities to get it, and yet this master of mine just passed me so much of it.
”You only need to take one, then for the next 4 hours, you will have a chance to move your soul from the fifth dimension. And there is no special method or an antitoxin, you just have to do it as is.”
”That's unfortunate.”
”From now on, we will switch your schedule, in the morning you will still have to train as usual, in the afternoon I will start to teach you fighting. In the evening you will try and awaken. Today rest a bit, you can try to awaken as well. Good luck.”
”Yes, Master.”