Chapter 188: Soul Spirits and Elemental Affinities Part 1

Damian was ready to attempt to permanently copy the Soul Spirit of the royal academy student and completely agreed with what Utsusu had said.

It was time for him to increase his power once again and his life and death battles have helped him experience an increase in the power that he could draw out from the copy book, which is great.

{Your body should be able to handle the shock and strain and suddenly copying another Soul Spirit and after that, you should begin practising and training with it}

{You are in the middle of a beast area that is filled with powerful beasts and it is a great opportunity to increase your power and combat experience, while also assisting the Monkey Beast in recovering by providing it more beast meat and beast cores}

Damian nodded his head determinedly, as he was ready to begin, but before he could, Utsusu stopped him.

{Before you do anything, there are quite a few things that I need to say and I will start with how I would advise you to move forwards from here on out. First of all, you will need more than a week outside of the academy in this dangerous environment to benefit as much as possible and although the academy may be worried about you, it isn't such a big deal}

{Also, although I have promised to be less passive when it came to assisting you in your progress and cultivation, I will only be giving you hints and guidance. The real progress needs to be made by you and now that you can draw out more of the copy book's power, it is time for you to start increasing your power rapidly}

Damian was listening to everything that Utsusu was saying and nodding his head, while eating some beast meat and watching the Monkey Beast wolf down as much of the remains of the beasts as it could.

{Your body has begun evolving and will continue improving, developing and upgrading with the more power that you are able to draw out from the copy book. The more you use it and the stronger your body becomes, the more power you should be able to draw from it, but your mental fortitude and your control over your energy and power need to also improve}

{Never be restricted and always strive to be the greatest like you have been doing, but now that you are becoming more known and more powerful, I am worried that you will draw too much attention and make too many enemies. You can overcome everything, but make sure to hide your powers and only use your Maxwell Fire Soul Spirit in public. The only time you should use your other abilities is in a life or death situation or when your identity is concealed}

Utsusu continued giving Damian all sorts of advice that was all very useful and important for him to remember as he had almost died twice already in the Beast Woods and would have if it wasn't for the Monkey Beast.

As they continued conversing with each other within his mind, the Monkey Beast found it unusual that Damian had zoned out and seemed to be focused on something, and yet wasn't doing anything.

But the beast was hungry and didn't worry about it too much as it continued eating, while Damian continued speaking and listening to what Utsusu had to say.

{Did you notice how the flame user differed from yourself?} asked Utsusu, wanting to test Damian's perceptivity and understanding about the use of energy.

[Yes, I think that the royal academy student that fought with fire didn't have a Soul Spirit and only had an elemental affinity with the Fire Element] answered Damian.

{So, what do you think is more powerful? Your Soul Spirit that allows you to wield a flame that is formed within your dantian or the royal academy student's elemental affinity that allows it to use the fire energy that it has absorbed and cultivated to unleash similar attacks?} asked Utsusu.

Damian didn't know how to answer that question and took a moment to think about it.

On the surface, it appeared as though both him and the royal academy student had the same capabilities when it came to wielding the fire element, but how they used the fire element was very different.

Damian's Maxwell Fire Soul Spirit was essentially a flame that was stored within his dantian, that would be stored within the copy book when it wasn't activated.

Using his control over that flame and supplying it with energy to increase its power and also sustain it continuously, he was able to unleash fire attacks using that flame and could train his flame to be hotter and stronger.

The Golden Flame Cultivation Method was only suited to cultivating a Fire Soul Spirit that would form a flame within the dantian and the royal academy student wouldn't be able to use it.

The royal academy student had a storage of fire energy within his dantian, but it wasn't in the form of a flame, and using his fire elemental affinity and his fire energy, was able to unleash flame attacks and his capabilities were very similar to that of Damian's.

A Soul Spirit was merely an innate ability that was formed out of one's elemental affinity or a mutation that gives a cultivator an ability that they can naturally unleash and is a part of them.

While one that didn't have a Soul Spirit but had an elemental affinity could unleash the same ability as the Soul Spirit user, they would struggle to do so as naturally and wouldn't be able to use as much power through that particular ability.

Both are linked and a Soul Spirit user also had the elemental affinity, so could use the same abilities as the cultivator that doesn't have a Soul Spirit, but would be more restricted and would find it harder to apply their elemental energy in different ways.

Because of that, most cultivators with Soul Spirits would only be able to use the innate ability that came with it and wouldn't be able to progress much further with it, while those with elemental affinities also would struggle to master multiple uses of that element and would stick to one way of using applying it.