Book 3: Chapter 35: Upgrades
Chapter 35: Upgrades
The resulting influx of aether was immediate.
As soon as the elixir hit his stomach, Alex felt the condensed energy erupt through his body, shooting out into every extremity; limbs, toes and fingers, all filled like it was molten metal being dumped into a mold of his image.
He was already sitting on the floor, luckily, or he would have been knocked right on his ass. Instead, he grunted loudly, his chest bucking strongly as pain ripped through him in response to the fiery hot energy that bombarded his every cell.
Holy shit!
All the bullshit he had gone through with his Wyrm-heart constitution, the [Vita-Surge Cloak], forming his aether channels from his soulgate—and more—should have prepared him for whatever was going on his body now, it didn’t.
He slammed his jaw closed, teeth clenched tight as he forced himself not to scream like a god damn baby. Instead he grabbed on to his knees and turned his attention inward, to the energy rampaging through his body.
Obby pressed him on. “Keep it all contained in there, once a little bit escapes, it will become a cascade effect and it will come rushing out.”
I know. And he did, Alex could feel it, his body acting as an airlock on the energy inside him. One small misstep and the aether inside him would decompress, explosively.
He mentally wrestled with the energy from the elixir, taking control of it with his mind and trying to redirect its chaotic rampage into a more orderly affair. He began guiding the torrent, nudging it into a cycle inside his torso, down through his left leg, then back to the torso, into his right leg, before coming back again. He repeated the process with each arm, then started all over again, each time making sure to try siphoning a bit of the energy into his aether channels, through his next meridian, then back.
There were many methods he could try for this, but Alex didn’t have the patience, nor the focus to do something fancy. A simple cycle pattern was what he could manage. Torso, leg, torso, arm… in and out, bit, by bit, by bit. His body took it in like a rabbit nibbling at a vegetable far large than itself. It would take time, but the furry bastard would eat it all. Alex was that furry bastard.
“Weird flex, but okay flesh sack.”
Shut up, or at least try to help me.
Obby responded by snaking its sentience out of the bond in his soulspace and into his soul aperture before grabbing a small bite of the elixir’s aether for himself and retreating back again. It was barely a cup of water from a swimming pool, but Alex would take it.
He continued, each minute, another cycle, and another small bit of the energy being forced into the tissues of his existence. Of course his body refused to let this happen without a fight, as he could feel many small injuries begin to form internally, bones cracked, muscles tore, and veins burst. Alex’s body was basically being torn asunder, and yet he couldn’t help but smile.
It was working.
After an hour, Alex still sat against a wall in the cave, eyes closed tight, his teeth pressed together so hard he thought they would break. His posture remained deathly still except for the randomly occurring shudder that wracked his spine. Outside, he looked as though he was simply dealing with some serious stomach pain, or a monstrous fit of hiccups, but inside was a different story.
He was forced to down another healing potion, his third that hour, to keep up with the internal damage, but even that barely helped. Whenever he drank, the energy of the potion was quickly assaulted by the torrent of aether in his body before the potion could provide its hull healing effect. It made the potions even less effective than they already were from his cultivation level, and high energy demanding body.
“Looks like you’re a quarter of the way through. Still got it?”
He gave a bare mental nod, his focus remaining on the energy control, on the whirlpool of aether that was now swimming inside him. He had managed to get the massive amount of energy into a collective cycle, swirling in a directed manner at his center, around the second meridian of his aether channels, and then funneled through into his body again. As the energy returned, Alex specifically targeted where his tissue was most ready to absorb it.
It made the process slightly slower, but far safer. This way, there was perhaps only a ten percent change of sudden internal explosion.
By the second hour, he was half way through the energy and his processing speed went up from there. The third hour saw only a fifth of the energy remaining, and he could feel his [Aether Attuned Body] was already reaching the crest of the next threshold. It wouldn’t take all the remaining energy to finish, so he decided to refocus.
The next meridian, we should be able to handle, yes?
“Hmmm, I would say yes, most definitely. If you want to go for it, I’m with you. Meridian first, then the body attunement threshold?” Obby asked.
Yeah, let's do it.
Alex pulled the remains of the aether whirlpool from his center and funneled it all into his second meridian, the focus point of clustered aether channels near his T1 vertebrae, and began flooding it with everything he had left.
Like before, the meridian began to swell as it filled, slowly pushing back with increased force the more Alex sent into the channel-cluster. His mind formed aether braids at his gates as he worked, pulling in even more energy from the ambient aether around him, then he emptied the other two gems in his bracer, pulling even their contents into his body. All of it assaulted his second meridian in a focused tidal wave, overwhelming it until he felt the same small snap, as before. And then, the meridian bloomed open.
Finally… It felt like Alex had a kink in his neck for years, and had finally managed to pop his neck and gotten relief. The chaotic swirl of aether around the meridian was absorbed, and promptly used to harden and reinforce the channels around it.
“Everything is looking perfect, no aether strain on the channels, no residue blockage. Flawless, if I say so myself.”
Good, okay. Now... to finish the first task then.
Even though Alex could feel his body trembling slightly, he knew he couldn’t stop, not yet. Without even looking up from his work, Alex prepared some tea, the Seraph Dust sprinkled over the surface and shimmering slightly as it was absorbed. It was a needed step, as the next phase would force him into an Earthly Tribulation, and Alex didn’t want to lose a limb after so much hard work.
He drank the tea with shaky hands, set down his cup in its saucer, and got back to processing the aether still swirling about inside his torso.
He had a breakthrough to approach.
***
Abilities: Aether Attuned Body III (80.0%)
Ability Evolving…
Aether Attuned Body IV (80.1%)
Your body has further adapted to aetheric energies. You are further connected to the aether of the world around you; muscles, bones, and tissues of your very existence touch on the energy of the universe.
+6000 Experience to All Stats.
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