328 Idiotic 2

'Fucking hell. No more thoughts of death. Focus.'

Dyon immediately continued his train of thought, refocusing on his aurora.

The aurora flame within his mind's eye had its power dictated by his soul. At the same time, the power that the flame gained from the soul was used to power the eye and decide things like his 6th sense and the like.

But what exactly was that flame? Was it converting the energy to something else? Or was it maintaining the same energy?

In fact, what exactly was the soul made of? What did 'reaching a new soul stage' really mean?

In energy cultivation, it was simple. You reached a certain accumulation of energy, and as a result, you would reach a new stage. Each meridian could hold a finite amount of energy, however, that amount changed depending on a person's body composition. For example, one of the main defining characteristics of what divided, normal, earth, heaven, God and Faith seed level bodies, was the size of their meridians.

However, what exactly was improved during soul cultivation?

Dyon knew that each time he cultivated his soul, he had to tear it apart before building it up. In the end, this was a lot like normal muscle training from the human world. That said, when muscles built themselves back up in thicker and larger sections, they didn't do so with nothing. There was a reason why proper diet and rest was needed for muscles to grow. Why? Because they needed energy.

'That means that when my soul is reforming, it's using energy too. And this time, it needs a higher quality level of energy, which is why its absorbing saint energy. Great… Now I know why it's killing me. I just need to know how to stop it.' Dyon could help but roll his eyes and berate his own self with his personal brand of sarcasm.

That said, this was still an important thing to understand. Dyon's soul was undergoing a new transformation and thus needed this energy. This meant that some possible solutions had to be ignored.

For one, Dyon immediately crossed off the Florence Family technique from his list of solutions. At first, he had thought that maybe if wills were technically forms of energy too, then the Florence family technique would be able to absorb saint energy.

However, therein lied a problem with that solution. If he took away the energy his soul needed to properly mend itself, then he'd be left with a broken soul. His array alchemy would suffer, and he might die anyway. He couldn't afford that.

Suddenly a thought flashed in Dyon's mind.

'I'm such an idiot!'

If anyone heard Dyon, there would be a line going across universes to strangle him.

The truth was that every single thing Dyon had thought of had brought him to this solution. This solution was unorthodox and convoluted. The fact he had even thought up to this point with the pain he was in currently was a miracle unto itself.

The first thing Dyon had crossed of his list was the use of a saint expert to take the energy away from him. The truth was that there were a thousand demon generals with lower saint level cultivation in this very world. Although Dyon couldn't move right now, if he sent a signal large enough, they would converge on his location. In fact, considering the commotion being caused by his break through and the vibrating of the world, it was likely that they were already headed here.

However, not even five seconds had passed since Dyon began thinking. If it had been any more time than that, he would have likely already died despite the low density of saint energy.

That aside, the main problem with that first solution was that this wasn't cultivation deviation. His soul needed this saint energy to mend itself properly to the next level. Which mean no matter how much saint energy his demon generals diverted from him, only more saint energy would flood in to replace it.

The second solution that Dyon had shot down was using his Florence family technique to create a saint energy humanoid. And the reason was for the same reason. No matter how much he absorbed, his soul would only need more.

And that wasn't even mentioning the fact that the technique wasn't meant to absorb that kind of energy, although it would theoretically be possible.

So, after all of this, Dyon knew that the only solutions were to either somehow break his soul into a state where it was no longer on the verge of a break through. Or, to find a way for his body to be able to withstand saint energy.

Knowing those were his only two options, Dyon immediately chose to ignore the first. He refused to ruin his soul in such a way, especially since it would likely result in either death or a death-like state. If he was going to die, it would be while trying to reach perfection.

And that was when Dyon had thought of a solution.

In energy cultivation, in order to reach the essence gathering level, you had to first reach the level of a 7th grade expert – or a lower 6th stage. But, to reach the saint level, you had to be at least a 6th grade expert – or a lower 7th stage expert.

That gave Dyon a ray of hope to grasp on. He didn't have to reach the peak level of essence gathering to withstand saint energy. He just needed to be the equivalent of whatever a lower 6th grade peak essence gathering expert was.

Dyon was already a peak first grade peak meridian formation expert, the distance he had to travel was shorter. Now, the question was how to travel that distance.

Just as Dyon was thinking this, flashes of figures began appearing before him. He couldn't move his head, but those he could see were his demon generals.

"Dyon?"

Hearing the familiar voice, Dyon immediately knew it was Ri.

"Dyon, what's wrong? How can we help?"

'Eli? He's awake?'

Dyon chuckled bitterly, "Sorry buddy, I can't greet you right now."

"Successor, why do I sense saint energy around you? You should be able to …" Faenor asked nervously. She would normally be teasing Dyon about being naked right now, but this situation seemed far too serious for that.

The inner world of the ring seemed to be crumbling under the strain. Something wanted to come in, but it wasn't being allowed. It suddenly dawned on Dyon that maybe coming into the ring was a bad idea, it was too important for him to allow it to break.

'Dammit.'