Rocky had some time, so he decided to go check on Verdanim at the beast farm first. After all, he had not seen it in a while now. He looked at the wound on Verdanim's lower abdomen, carefully scrutinising the skin around it. It seemed to be healing very well and he was certain that the suture would come off soon. However, the limb was a different ball game altogether. Until they took the plates off, Rocky would never know how that injury was doing.
Everything looked okay at the beast farm and so Rocky lumbered down the dusty pathways and made his way to the old abandoned house. This was his happy place, and he felt at peace here. On reaching the threshold, Rocky began to practice and work on his capabilities. He was almost at the sixth grade of the Earthly Stage now and only a little more spiritual power would be needed, before he could reach the sixth grade. He couldn't help but think that had he absorbed more spiritual power while he was in the belly of the Demonic Devouring Boa, he would have easily reached the sixth grade by now.
As he sat there, with just his thoughts to ponder over and nowhere else to be, Rocky went into a state of deep thinking. He could not figure out how everything had occurred. Demonic Devouring Boa's belly was a dangerous place to be in. But even then, while he was in there, he knew that a part of the boa's spiritual power had been transferred to him. It was strange, that not all the power that the boa had possessed swarmed into him. It was, as if, the rest of the power simply disappeared into thin air.
But what Rocky did not know was that the spiritual power from the boa had not disappeared. It had instead, been absorbed by the power of the Holy Dragon Bead. Even though Marcia had succeeded in sealing the powers of the Holy Dragon Bead, the first layer of the seal would be loose as he grew stronger.
As Rocky had reached the fifth grade of the Earthly Stage back then, the first layer of the seal was not as solid as before. The power of the Holy Dragon Bead worked and absorbed the invading spiritual power.
In a way, the power that was absorbed had benefited Rocky because otherwise, his body would not have been able to survive the exposure to so much power. Rocky's body was still refining the powers and was not equipped to handle so much in one go.
There was no way that Rocky could have refined so much spiritual power, all by himself. Had it not been for the power of t
have to grade up and reach the eighth grade of the Earthly Stage.' Rocky's thoughts engulfed him completely. The spirit-manipulated beast could only advance, if the spirit manipulator also advanced - otherwise, it was all in vain.
So it all boiled down to this - the only way to upgrade Uriah's power was to upgrade himself.
And after all, for every spirit-manipulated beast, reaching the third grade of three stars was a highly coveted position. Even amongst the spirit manipulators who had the same power as Rocky's, being able to have a spirit-manipulated beast at the third grade of three stars was a rarity. In order to bring the spirit-manipulated beast to such a level, the spirit manipulator would have to undergo a lot of improvement. Not just that, it would require a certain kind of strength, resilience and treasure, to the quality of the spiritual crystal - which was the rarest amongst the rare.
Now, Rocky's mission was sorted. He had to collect the spiritual crystal, not just for his own upgrade, but also for the sake of Uriah. Rocky knew, that using the Dark Heaven Egg would also help in improving Uriah's grade. However, it would not be as effective as using the spiritual crystal. The crystal was specially designed for the spirit-manipulated beast.
In the past, Rocky had used the power of the Holy Dragon Bead to refine the spiritual crystal with Uriah and it had worked the other way around. The results were stupendous. Rocky figured, that when he would reach the Heavenly Stage, he would probably use another cultivation method. He would be able to cultivate himself in the most perfect manner.