Chapter 33 - Awakening
Leon wasn't going to show mercy to someone who pointed a gun at his head. Snake deserved death anyway. Being the ex-boss of the gang, his hands would surely be stained with the blood of many people.
Leon dragged the unconscious Snake by the collar back to the rear end and place him on a table.
Arlo and Gower returned at this moment. It shouldn't have taken them that long to kick the people out of the building, but he wasn't going to question them.
"Do you have any other instructions for us, boss?"
"I need you two to guard the stairs and not allow anyone to come down and disturb me."
"Right away, boss." They took a last glance at the miserable and unconscious Snake before leaving.
...
"The new boss seems to have strange aesthetics taste." Arlo suddenly said, while they were guarding the stairs.
"What do you mean?" Gower was puzzled by Arlo's comment.
"Didn't you see? The boss sent away the beauty without touching her before, yet he told us to keep others from disturbing him, while he's in there with the ex-boss." Arlo explained.
"T-This... surely not 'that'... right?" Gower felt chills crawling up on him.
"I hope not... who knows how kids are raised these days. It's fine as long as the boss don't call us for 'that'."
If Leon knew how the two was talking behind his back, he would have puked blood from anger. There was no problem with his sexual orientation!
...
When Leon finish his preparation, he sent his divine sense into Snake's unconscious body and inspected every part of his body, making sure not to miss anything important.
He wanted to study the difference in the body of a 2nd step awakener. The body was naturally stronger than ordinary person. Leon discovered that the strengthened body wasn't simple. It was tempered by earth element and would have a degree of resistance against earth-element attacks, albeit not much.
Leon speculated that other awakeners are also tempered by their respective elemental affinity. With the acquired resistance, the chances of awakeners being harmed by their own ability is lowered. for example; It would be bad if a fire user accidentally burnt himself to death.
Leon sent his divine sense into the glabella region after he was done with the other areas. The earth core was spotted in the center as he expected.
But seeing the core failed to answer some of his doubts. How do awakeners advance their powers without the help pills? From the awakeners he had encountered so far, none seem to be training under any sort of special technique to advance their powers.
Even without pills, they could still advance naturally. It was just a matter of time. There must be a bigger secret behind their source of strength.
Leon couldn't discover anything new in the glabella, so he decided to peer into the core directly. The core was not solid. It was just a body of energy clustered together. Leon's divine sense was immaterial and was able to pass through it easily.
The center of the core was empty. Just a bunch of earth elements revolving around it. Nothing particular stood out. Leon was disappointed and was about to give up when suddenly he felt the faintest connection of the earth core leading elsewhere. It led direction into the sea of consciousness, which could also be called the spiritual sea.
If it was someone else, he would think carefully before entering the spiritual sea of another as he could cause irreparable damage to that person, if he was not careful. He didn't have proficient understanding of the soul to be able to heal a soul injury.
However, since the person in question is an ex-gang leader, he had no misgivings and entered the spiritual sea without hesitation. Whether Snake suffered any soul injuries as a result didn't bother him.
In the depths of the spiritual sea was supposed to be the lone soul core, but Leon discovered that an earth seed was orbiting around it.
The earth seed was minuscule. He might have missed if it was stationary.
He could feel the Earth Laws radiating from it and was shocked.
'How are awakeners able to come in contact with the laws?'
The heavenly laws weren't something that could be comprehended unless one reaches a high enough cultivation level to come in contact with it. If one had a high enough perception then they can also perceive the Laws and their cultivation level would not matter. Leon was indeed an oddity to be able to faintly feel the Laws with his high perception due his strong soul.
Awakeners can establish a connection with the Laws upon awakening and able to draw power from it with their soul as the medium.
Such relationship between awakeners and the Laws was like making a contract. The power isn't truly theirs and they are just borrowing it. If the connection was cut, then they would be as good as being crippled from using the power of the Laws.
One would have to comprehend the Laws to truly make it a part of their own strength. It could be seen that although awakeners could manipulate the elements through their established connection with the Laws, the power is not great without comprehension. It's similar to owning a weapon, but not knowing how to use it.
Leon realized that if he establishes a connection with the Laws then it would be easier for him to comprehend it due it becoming clearer to him. To have a head start on comprehending the Laws would be great aid to his practice in mastering the 5 elements for his cultivation technique. There were two cons to awakening; He would have to find a way to comprehend the other 4 element Laws too if he wanted progress in his technique. So far, he is still stuck at the initial stage of mastering the 5 elements for the [Hegemony of Primal Chaos] technique.
The other con is; awakening would temper his body in one of the elements, creating imbalance and making it harder for him to advance his 5-element body. However, the 5-element body wasn't required for practicing his [Hegemony of Primal Chaos]. It was just a byproduct of possessing quasi-Grandmist energy. As long as he tempers his body in the other 4 elements too in the future then the problem would be resolved.
Seeing that there was no big problem to awakening, Leon retracted his divine sense and ended Snake's life since he had no further uses. If the girls had seen what Leon was like this night, they would have been surprised. But it wasn't something surprising for Leon. He understood the principle of having mercy on your enemies is to be cruel on yourself. Although he might be strong, the people close to him wasn't. He would feel regret if they were implicated as a result of his act of mercy.
Leon took out a True Awakening pill and swallowed it.
Leon have been pocketing extras whenever he successfully refines more than 6 pills in each batch. He had refined 9 pills at the Cromwells earlier, one more than last time. He was becoming increasingly proficient in using poor fire and pill cauldron to concoct pills. He wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing.
Leon wasn't sure which Elemental Law he would be building a connection with. However, He thought that the missing prince would have a metal element if the missing prince were to awaken.
With that thought in mind, Leon pop the pill in his mouth and swallowed it. He sat down in meditation position to absorb the pill's efficiency. He felt it rushing into his brain region after running a cycle around his body. He felt the effects of the pill lingering in his brain for awhile before he felt a part of his brain being stimulated and becoming active like it had awaken from a long slumber. it felt strange to Leon knowing it was a part of him, but he could not tell which part of his brain it was exactly.
But the moment it fully awakened, Leon felt one of the Laws become clearer. A connection has been established between the two just like that and a wave of fire element descended upon Leon's body to temper it.
Strangely, the tempering effect did nothing on Leon's body and the awakening ceremony ended just like that. Apart from his connection to the Fire Laws, there was no other benefits. When he thought about it deeper, he shook his head in understanding. His initial 5-element body was tempered by quasi-Grandmist energy. Even if it just quasi-Grandmist, it is still stronger than fire. As such, the fire tempering process brought no changes to Leon's body. He didn't even feel the heat.
But then again, he was already at the 5th layer tempered body. 1st step awakener was equivalent to 1st layer tempered body. Body tempering for 1st layer would naturally have no effect on a body tempered to the 5th layer. He speculated that only when his strength as an Awakener exceed his own level in Divine practice would it start to affect his 5-element body.
Opening his eyes, he started playing with a wisp of fire as he made it dance on the top of his fingers with his will, showing his exquisite control of fire. His high-level control of fire was a result of his years of practice in alchemy and fire along with his family's [Fiery God Manual] He was hoping for the metal element, but he ended up with fire.
'Being granted a second life was enough. My luck in my second life would have been too great if I was also bless with a high status as a prince.' Leon sighed.
What Leon didn't know was that with the karmic virtue he accumulated in his past life as a doctor, it wasn't out of the realm of possibility to be reborn as a prince. In the end it was all just chances and perhaps karmic virtue was used to bless his luck with the ladies instead.. But if it was then Leon wouldn't know whether to laugh or cry if he knew about the Karmic Laws.