The Roamer

Chapter 8: The awakening

As soon as Aeollus got back to his ordinary cell, everything outside once again brimmed to life, and he could see outside his cell again. He stood up, and tempered within his soul, to see more precisely the changes that had taken place deep inside.

‘Ah, my spirit feels much easier to control, and the soul infusion technique seems to have strengthened, as the scars from my body are also beginning to heal now too. Even the beatings from the announcer that usually leave obvious red skin with me forever are beginning to heal!’ thought Aeollus, who was clearly pleased with his current situation.

At that moment, he remembered how he infused mantra into his soul some months ago, and thought about doing it again. Back then, just trying to create a mantra to infuse within his body was depressing enough, and when he actually had to infuse it, it was painful enough to probably kill a goblin.

Yet, at this point, he felt that not only could he infuse mantra into his soul multiple times, he could probably do it while sustaining minimal injuries to his soul, and his physical body! Just from that feeling alone, he had already gained a major benefit from creating his first layer.

Aeollus took out the cultivation mat from below his straw bed, and sat in a cross-legged position. He than closed his eyes, and began to focus on his soul. He began to infuse mantra into his flowing water technique, just to test the waters before he applied mantra throughout his whole body.

He began to infuse the symbol, and prepared for the lashback that was to come. As expected, the lashback immediately struck back, and he felt a stinging pain, but it wasn’t nearly as painful as before!

‘Either the attack has become weaker, or I’ve just become that strong!’ he thought to himself, as he continued to infuse the mantra into the bone. A couple of minutes later, he had finished, and moved onto the next one.

‘I’ll test them all out once I finish with it all’ Aeollus thought to himself, while continuing to infuse mantra into every attack and technique he had, and also infused some onto the spirit in general.

After about half an hour, he had finished infusing everything with mantra. Even though it didn’t hurt as much before, after doing it for that much, his muscles were extremely sore, and he had even spit blood out a couple of times.

“Alright, I need a battle to test this out in. I’ll keep it hidden until I’m scheduled to fight someone within the top five hundred, so I can thoroughly surprise them and beat them down!” roared Aeollus, clearly proud and confident of how the whole process turned out.

“SHUT UP!” hollered the man opposing Aeollus and his cell, while throwing something at the bars of his cell to indicate that he was displeased.

‘Oh right, it’s night time right now…’ thought Aeollus, as he slumped into his little straw bed. ‘By tomorrow, I’ll see who I’m scheduled to fight, and hopefully it’ll be someone who is worth using all my powers on!’ Aeollus thought excitedly, and couldn’t wait to test out his new powers.

Just like that, Aeollus fell asleep and prepared for the next day.

--- Sequence 2 ---

Aeollus woke up in bed, and was clearly drowsy from infusing techniques. He looked around, and saw that nothing exciting was happening, as usual.

“Nothing exciting happens in this prison except for the arena matches, and we slaves don’t even get to watch it if we don’t sneak in!” complained Aeollus, who was clearly disappointed with the entertainment here. In the end though, he was just a slave that had no rights or opinions.

‘I’ll just use this opportunity to look over the battle from yesterday’

he thought to himself while sitting back down onto his straw bed.

He began to imagine the fight from yesterday, and recalled his experiences within it. Suddenly, he remembered something that he had tried within the fight that he never tried before.

“Yesterday, I had covered my fist in a layer of spirit and threw it towards the geezers soul attack, but now that I think about it, is that necessary?” Aeollus thought to himself, while remembering every single thing he had learned in the books relating to the physical body in cultivation.

He then got the cultivation mat from below his straw bed, and laid it on the ground while crossing his legs and sitting down on it. He once again began to infuse his mantra, but he directly applied it onto his physical body.

“If the situation is like I think, then there is a reason that it’s called the cultivation of the spirit and vitality. So far, I’ve only been focusing on the spirit and learning new attacks, along with some other stuff. Now, what if I focus on the vitality part of the cultivation? That couldn’t have just been added in to sound cool, so there should be something relating to the physical body directly when it comes to cultivation!” yelled Aeollus, who had clearly reached a conclusion concerning his thoughts.

Just as he thought, the mantra covered his whole body, and emitted a faint glow, as if he was a firefly in the middle of the night. The glow strengthened by every passing minute, and did not seem like it was going to stop growing at all.

He continuously chanted mantra with his lips and within his brain, and applied them onto his physical body. The skin kept absorbing it, and at times, some mantra that was applied to his skin would not be sucked in, but instead left on the outside of his skin, leaving a tattoo of a mantra symbol.

‘This is gonna be an issue, opponent’s in the arena who are experienced enough will immediately know what these mantra tattoos symbolize, and will put their guard up the moment they see them…’ muttered Aeollus in his head, while thinking of a way to cover up the tattoos.

After an hour or two, the mantra infusing into the skin had completed the process, and there was nothing else left. He had powered up his soul and skin as much as he could at the first layer, and would probably have to wait until he reached the second layer to achieve a phenomenal break through once again.

“Still, even if this is the end of what I can achieve right now, it was still amazing enough to consider my past self a mere ant!” roared Aeollus with vigor, as he sent his whole spirit flowing through his body, unconsciously activating the spirit infusion technique.

“Hurry up and prepare for battle you damn slave, don’t expect anything good from the next match though.”

After a few minutes of lying around in his room, the usual guard came and told him to prepare for battle.

“Your opponent is number 453, a monster who has been rising through the ranks recently, though not as fast as you. You know, for a slave, you sure do seem to be cultivating successfully well!” said the guard in a surprised tone as soon as he saw the tattoos along Aeollus.

‘I knew it, even this fool of a guard was able to notice such a change! My opponent is number 453, so he’ll definitely be able to realize all the tattoos running through my body!’ Aeollus thought to himself while thinking of a solution to this predicament.

After a few minutes of thinking, he just wrapped himself in spirit, and forcefully concealed the mantra that had been left on the outside as tattoos. When he did that, Aeollus suddenly thought up an idea and began to work on it.

Using the soul infusion technique would require a person to have spirit circulating throughout his whole body on the inside, which was understandable, as the spirit had to be able to reach the injury to heal it.

Now, what about if he used his spirit and covered himself with it on the outside? Not only would it be able to conceal the mantra, he could strengthen his whole physical body, and if it could reach the point where doing such a thing was merely second nature, then the gains could amount to being more amazing than the gains from even the first layer!

After a few more minutes of fantasizing, everything outside the cell turned black, which indicated that Aeollus was being sent to the arena. Just as expected, after a minute or two he appeared within an arena.

He stepped out of the cell, and looked straight at his opponent. He seemed to be a burly man, and had a #beard that resembled a beard of some magical school instructor, though he couldn’t remember who…

As always, the announcer did his introductions to the audience, and got out of the way to let the two fight.

Aeollus immediately began to sense the soul of his opponent, and didn’t find anything special at all. In fact, his opponent seemed to be many levels below him.

‘Oh, he hasn’t even stepped into the first layer…’ thought Aeollus, clearly disappointed with the current situation. Of course, on such an opponent, he wouldn’t dare to reveal his true powers, as the actual strong slaves within the prison would be alerted.

Considering that, he merely used a foundation base attack of wind, hoping to not try and get too carried away toying with his opponent. Fortunately, as if the gods had smiled down on him, his opponent’s head immediately popped from the pressure, and dropped to the ground, stopping him from toying with him.

“This… I might have gotten too strong for the people above the top three hundred, no, maybe even two hundred to compete with…” muttered Aeollus in a disappointed, yet excited tone.

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EXPLANATION

#1 To anyone who can realize what I’m referencing with this, you are a god.

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ABOUT ME

Name: Abdul Kareem

Age: 13 (Almost 14)

Occupation: Middle school

Goal: Idk, I’m just making a novel for now

Location: Why would I say that?

Relations: I’m not married (duh)

Favorite food: da asian stuf!

Anyway, on a more serious tone, this is my first novel I’ve ever tried writing. Thanks for being with me on this first experience!