Calm Wanderer
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(AKJ) Chapter 65 - Skyrocketing Cultivation Base and Seraphine's long ears
🕑 Added 2024-06-19 17:00:13 +0000 UTCDamovotsk, Molkovia, Earth.
Demian's P.O.V.
Through his senses, he noted the significant transformation happening to his body, or more precisely, to his spiritual channels. The three main channels he unlocked when he broke through to the Chi Gathering Rank, the same which bore the brunt of his inner energy rampage, were healing unexpectedly quickly. Of course, if it were limited to that, he would only feel mildly surprised.
No, the true reason for his marvel was what was happening to another of his Main Channels, the latter unlocking itself at relatively high speed with the help of that unknown surge of Energy. The unlocking itself was something he already expected from his Perk’s overpowered capabilities. However, he did not expect the ease and speed at which it was happening, instead anticipating numerous days of intense training before he could experience this massive improvement in his cultivation talent.
‘I thought my Perk was incredible, but I guess I’m being too conservative... From what I know, it should be extremely difficult to unlock Spiritual Channels, at least for normal cultivators. And even that needs super rare resources. But now...’ He thought before his attention moved toward Seraphine who still had her lips stuck on his. With a quick observation from his Soul Sense, he noticed that her Spiritual Channels, which were previously mostly dormant due to her low Cultivation Base, were in the process of awakening.
Now, he was not a cultivation expert, but he could easily guess that it was far from being a normal situation for someone at the Mid Body Strengthening Rank. Only once one reached the Peak of Body Strengthening could one try to activate their spiritual channels, then use them to absorb Spiritual Energy and break through to the next Rank. In her case, however, the opposite was happening, with her channels being activated ahead of time without following the normal process of strengthening her body to bear the strain without collapsing.
Thankfully, it seemed like something was bearing the burden for her, averting the potentially crippling damages she would have incurred otherwise. ‘It must be something from my Perk. After all, that entity was powerful enough to gift me those Perks, so he should’ve planned for that situation. That’s probably why I didn’t feel much pain from unlocking my Fourth Spiritual Channels.’ Those thoughts traversed his mind before his attention returned to the internal turmoil they were both experiencing.
The transformation lasted a relatively long time, longer than for both of his previous breakthroughs, probably due to its foundational aspect. Nonetheless, it did end after a while. At that moment, Demian swiftly tallied all his improvements. He noted that his mental acuity had improved, while his physical body had been refined to a much greater degree. His inner energy had also become much purer. All in all, he realized that his combat power had benefited from a massive increase, giving rise to great confidence for the unavoidable conflict they would be experiencing in the near future. That being said, he would still need to test the exact degree of strength he just gained if he wanted to plan his future fights better. He was very satisfied with his gains, though.
However, his mind, which was already on future events, was quickly brought back to the present when he felt a resonance happening between his new Channel, the previous unknown surge of Energy, and the ambient Spiritual Energy. The latter, as if in front of a black hole, started to rush inside his body, moving quickly through his four Spiritual Channels to his Dantian, where it began to accumulate swiftly. As if to mirror his situation, Seraphine’s body joined him in sucking up the Energy around them, pushing her Cultivation Base upward at lightning speed, while crushing all the bottlenecks on the way as if they were mere illusions.
Only until she reached the Peak of the Ninth Level, did the Spiritual Energy coursing through her body calm down slightly. It did not stop accumulating, however, and, as expected, once her body was refined to the limit, the previously ‘calm’ river turned into a wild torrent, smashing against the bottleneck separating her from the Chi Gathering Rank on its way and prompting the start of a new round of physical improvements. ‘Why does her cultivation speed seem even more ridiculous than mine? I think I can now understand Big Sis’ frustration...’ Demian briefly thought before his mind caught on to his own speedy upgrade. ‘Maybe I’m being hypocritical...’
Indeed, his cultivation base was also skyrocketing, pushing toward the Peak of the Second Level, then past it to the Third Level and upward again toward the Peak. At that point, his Inner Energy behaved similarly to Seraphine’s, accumulating calmly while refining his whole body to the limit of its Level. Thankfully, they were not in Damovotsk, since the thin Spiritual Energy there would have made the breakthrough not only harder but also much longer. Although, with the mysterious surge of Energy guiding his Cultivation base’s upgrade, it would have probably succeeded anyway.
It still took a while of accumulation and refinement before Demian reached the absolute limit of the Low Chi Gathering Rank, or at least, what he was capable of reaching. At that point, the Inner Energy regained its wild nature and rushed toward the ‘invisible’ barrier blocking the way to the Mid Chi Gathering Rank, something that would stop most cultivators and hinder the rest for a while, especially if they did not have any resources such as Spiritual Pills. What amazed the young man, though, was the frailty of the said barrier, which disintegrated almost instantly with the onslaught, almost making him doubt the information previously given to them by Sergei.
Whether it was true or not, his Spiritual Energy was currently being compressed through the use of his will and Spiritual Channels, making the gaseous substance denser and denser until it finally reached a ‘mystical’ limit. Compressing it further was impossible unless Demian increased the quantity of Energy available in his Dantian. In other words, he needed to improve his Cultivation Base. When his inner Energy stopped shifting, it immediately started flowing through his entire body and mind, refining and strengthening the two until they also reached the limit of his current Level.
This process took even more time, until every modification ended, leaving the young man with a dizzying feeling of invincibility, an illusory feeling that came from the huge and fast improvement in his strength. What was true, though, was that, if it was him now, he could probably easily pulverize that previous old tree’s trunk with a single punch, instead of needing several. And that may not even be his limit... ‘I should be as strong as Bryn when she’s in her buff state, right? And with my speed, she’d have no chance against me...’
A brief feeling of schadenfreude appeared in his heart before his attention returned to the situation on hand, or more accurately, to Seraphine’s body. Indeed, a sliver of his mind had always been focused on her throughout the ‘ordeal’, and he did notice that, before reaching the Fourth Level, everything went smoothly. However, as soon as he did reach that Level, something inside her seemed to have been triggered, activating some unimaginable changes inside her.
While observing her body shape-shifting progressively, a part of his attention was also focused on her cultivation base. The reason being that he worried that the transformation occurring to her body would disturb her breakthrough, leading to grave consequences on her foundation or even on her life. Thankfully, his worries seemed unwarranted, as the only ‘consequences’ she was experiencing was her Cultivation Base’s upgrade slowing down, probably due to the lacking quantity of Energy around, at least lacking for such a great transformation.
In any case, as soon as he established that the physical changes were not detrimental to her, Demian felt relieved. As for her new looks? He did not care that much since he never was too particular about what his Lover looked like. As long as she was happy with the changes, he would be satisfied. After all, their Soul Bonds would not change with her ‘new body’, and, knowing the enhancement effect that cultivation had on people, he was confident that she would be, at least, as beautiful as before. If not more. While waiting for the modifications to end, his mind started wandering, while old memories began resurfacing.
An unknown time later, Demian’s eyes caught some small movements coming from Seraphine’s body, signaling the end of the previous phenomenon. A few seconds later, Seraphine’s eyelids fluttered slightly before rising slowly. As soon as they opened, his gaze caught the image of what was behind. Unlike in the past, no empty eye socket met his eyes. Instead, a sort of grey film covered everything, akin to a mysterious grey veil.
Before he could ask anything about it, however, the young woman took a few steps back, leaving a meter or so of empty space between the two of them. Her subconscious movements made him briefly recall about their previously awkward position and helped him realize that those invisible shackles vanished. While feeling unprecedented freedom washing over his heart, he naturally started to stretch his limbs and crack his neck. “Much better!” He exclaimed with delight.
His gaze, however, was quickly attracted by the strange head movements of Seraphine, stroking his curiosity. The latter‘s head was moving in every direction as if she was trying to take in the sights all aro... ‘Oh! She’s...’ He briefly thought before he heard her trembling voice. “Ba-Babe? I-I think... I think I can see! I... Am I dreaming? Is this... Is this a dream, Demian? Please tell me I’m not dreaming...” As the words left her lips, her tone became lower and lower, showcasing the violent surge of emotions filling her heart.
Feeling slightly surprised at the speed she was seemingly able to master her Soul Sense, he nonetheless felt happy for her, evidenced by the smile he wore while answering in a firm tone. “You’re not dreaming, Love. You’ve broken through to the Chi Gathering Rank successfully, so you should be able to see through your Soul Sense.” Hesitating for a few seconds, he added. “Your body changed a lot, though, so I’m not sure what you’re capable of. You’ll probably have to investigate that yourself.”
His words brought her attention to her own body, her hands gingerly touching her face before asking hesitantly. “Is it truly me? I... I look... Different than what I remember.” Her doubts were clearly warranted if he took into account her new physical appearance. Nodding his head, he replied, amused. “Yep! Your reaction is completely normal. I mean, your current height is 1m90, which makes you pretty tall, especially compared to your previous 1m65.”
Of course, as a healthy male, her height was not the only thing he noticed. Indeed, his gaze also fell on her curves, the latter matching her massive strength increase and moving her body from the slender category to the curvy one, albeit both proportionally and literally smaller than her big sister. That being said, Bryn was a marvel of nature, so, comparing any woman to her was pretty unfair, especially someone like Seraphine who now had an objectively out-of-this-world physique.
“Why are my ears like that? Am I not human anymore?” The young woman’s voice brought him back from his lustful fantasy, prompting his gaze to switch to her small hands stroking her ears. The latter, partially hidden by her now deep purple hair falling all the way to the middle of her back, had grown into an elongated shape, akin to those legendary elves he read about in the past in fantasy books.
With a curious look, he answered doubtfully. “I’m not really sure but... I feel like it’s a similar phenomenon as what happened to Big Sis when she broke through.” Wearing a doubtful look on her face, she replied. “But she didn’t change as much as me...” Shaking his head, he explained. “She’s literally 2m50. Do you REALLY call that a small change? And that’s beside the fact that her skin changed color, just like you. Although yours is very different from her golden shade.”
Pausing for a second, he subconsciously admired her caramel skin before adding. “As for if you’re still human or not, I can’t say for sure. Whatever the case, you’re my woman. You can be an Elf, a Dragon, or an Orc, that won’t change the fact that you’re the woman I love.” His reassuring words made her giggle, relieving her from her unspoken worry. “Wouldn’t I look terrible as an Orc? I’d rather be an Elf.” Chuckling slightly, he retorted while cocking his brow. “Who knows what a true Orc looks like? I’ve seen some very interesting drawings of female Orcs in the past, and they were anything but ugly...”
Unexpectedly, she did not comment on his joke, instead saying. “Whatever the case, that’s not important. Babe, could you...?” She gestured toward him and her body, confusing him for a brief moment before understanding dawned on him. “Right! Sorry, I was too distracted, I kind of forgot you were still naked.” As he spoke, he swiftly removed his T-shirt and gave it to her before doing the same with his pants, leaving him in underwear.
‘Is it something normal for cultivators?’ He randomly thought that him ending up wearing only his underwear in random places was becoming too commonplace for his liking. ‘At least, I’m not completely naked like the time when I reached the Chi Gathering Rank.’ Just like him at that time, Seraphine just experienced a massive increase in size, and her clothes were not ready to handle that, leaving her in the nude with clothes scraps lying on the ground around her.
What surprised him, however, was the fact that, besides her clothes, nothing on them was damaged by their respective breakthrough. However, everything around where the two were standing held the mark of the shockwaves the two created each time they broke through. ‘Strange... Could it have something to do with the connection we shared through that Energy Surge... Interesting...’ He pondered for a moment before the sounds of footsteps brought his mind back to the present.
Turning his gaze toward Adeliya and Bryn who were walking steadily in their direction, he did not feel overly surprised. Indeed, as a cautious man, he always kept a sliver of his attention on the surroundings, even if he was incapable of moving previously, in case someone ill-intentioned tried to interrupt them. Fortunately, no one else came to bother them, making the two older women guarding them redundant. Nonetheless, he did feel grateful for the gesture, which brought a smile to his face before his expression turned embarrassed as Adeliya’s teasing words reached his ears.
“Why do you always end up almost completely naked, Demian? You weren’t like this in the past!” Feeling a bit sheepish, he retorted, playing along with the joke. “Hey! Only the first time was my fault!” His answer made the three women giggle for a moment before the two arriving women turned their gaze toward Seraphine, with Adeliya commenting. “You look amazing, sweetie!” Her gaze shifted a few times between her two daughters before she added wistfully. “The two of you... I guess hoping to blend in with normal people is a pipe dream, isn’t it?”
Unlike her tone when they left the penthouse earlier, she sounded more accepting of their situation, which brought a smile to Demian. “Since we’re done here, why don’t we leave? I’d like to put some clothes on to make a certain someone quit teasing me.” His remark brought an amused smile to the faces of the three women, especially his Aunt who let out a few chuckles. The four then started moving toward the two cars parked less than a kilometer away.
