The glow of the outer plates started to intensify, and then, a few seconds later, the central plate also began to shine. The air inside the circle crackled, and from thin air a dark mist ring formed along its perimeter. This small cloud of mist seemed to be charged with electricity, and a strong wind blew the surroundings away, overshadowing even the storm falling from above.

Red, who was at the center of the formation, did not feel any of this, though. In fact, it seemed as if he was the only thing unaffected by the powers manifested by this spinning ring of dark mist.

“You did it!” Aurelia’s voice reached him from outside the formation. “You really did it! Now sit down and focus, quickly!”

Her voice snapped the youth out of his daze. Yet, before he sat down, there was one last thing he needed to do.

He grabbed the wires hooked to his arm, and without hesitation, pulled them out of his flesh. Blood spilled down his arms, but the wound was quick to close even without the youth’s prompting. The absorption from the formation stopped, and now Red could circulate the energy in his veins freely.

He looked down at the longsword in his hand with some hesitation. The spirit roared in satisfaction in his mind, as if it wanted to continue fighting against the storm itself and kept providing a boon of energy onto Red’s body. Strength filled every part of his being, an intoxicating feeling, and the youth felt the sweet taste of bloodlust filling his mouth.

Yet, he knew this couldn’t continue. What he needed to breakthrough was peace and calm, not the rage the spirit provided.

In a single motion, Red sheathed the sword again. A roar of unwillingness and surprise echoed in his mind, but the being could do nothing to fight back against it. At the exact same moment, the youth felt his body deflate from the energy that filled it seconds ago.

Strength and power left him, to be replaced against with weakness and exhaustion. His muscles pulled him down on their own, and Red collapsed into a sitting position on top of the formation plate.

“You- What are you doing?!”

Aurelia’s urgent voice reached him from outside.

“I won’t be able to… breakthrough like that.” Red struggled to get the words out.

“You won’t be able to breakthrough like this either!”

The youth shook his head. “My chances are still… better like this.”

The woman offered no retorts to this.

Finally in silence, Red focused on the changes around him. The formation continued to gather force, the cloud ring spinning and growing by the second. The youth was unsure about what he was supposed to do next, but soon enough, the answer arrived on its own.

The storm ring started to close in on him all of a sudden. Red almost panicked by instinct, but even if he intended to, he wouldn’t be able to react in time.

Soon enough, the storm swallowed him.

The youth found himself inside a maelstrom of wind, rain, and lightning. The three forces buffeted against his body ceaselessly, and his entire world was consumed by the storm. He couldn’t see anything but the sparks of lightning and he couldn’t hear anything but the thunderous noises of wind and thunder in his ear.

At first, Red felt overwhelmed. Yet, a few seconds later, he felt something strange.

These forces, so destructive on their own, didn’t seem to be damaging his body. Instead, the youth felt a sense of calm and comfort as he was embraced by them, something that helped him ignore the fatigue he felt at the moment.

Then he felt something in his body resonate with his storm. At first, it was just a single point in his forehead, but then this sensation spread to the rest of his frame. It took him a second to recognize these were his acupoints reacting to the storm outside.

Something was knocking against them, attempting to enter his veins from every direction. It was a deluge of energy, stronger than anything Red felt before, and this made him hesitate.

However, he decided to trust the process at the end of the day.

Like taking a deep breath, Red tried to draw in this energy. It took little effort.

An endless stream of bubbling energy entered his body from all directions. The youth felt conflicting sensations spread throughout his body - a numbing, refreshing, and sharp feeling all combined in one. At the same time, these threads of storm energy started to travel through his veins, gathering into bigger streams as they met each other until almost every part of his body was full of them.

They didn’t damage his veins, to Red’s surprise. Yet, at the same time, these streams seemed aimless, as if they had no idea what to do inside his body.

This was, of course, the most important difference between this Parting Storm Formation and a Parting Sea Pill. The formation only provided the proper energy to open a Spiritual Sea, while the pill did that and also assisted with the entire process.

It was an added difficulty that Red took on willingly, and that was because the rewards for opening the Spiritual Sea on one’s own were far too enticing - the possibility of an epiphany. For that alone, he was willing to take a risk.

Red focused on his veins, trying to draw in these streams of energy together. The spiritual organ ached in pain, also affected by his efforts from earlier, yet it still offered him a sluggish response. One by one, the youth gathered these streams into one big current circling through his veins, as even more energy entered his body from outside.

Once the youth felt he was at the limits of his control, he stopped gathering energy and tried to move it in a certain direction.

The Spiritual Sea, a half-illusory organ, was located at the center of the human torso, just above the stomach and below the ribcage. Its main and only connection to the rest of the body was through an acupoint in the Spinal Vein - the very first acupoint cultivators were supposed to open.

Red himself tried to sense this organ many times in the past, to no avail. Yet, if the formation was working as intended, then this energy would help him reveal its form and, in turn, break apart the walls that blocked it from fully manifesting in his body.

As the youth direct this large stream of energy towards the end of his vein, he felt the energy hitting a wall. However, like a blade cutting apart its enemy, a path seemed to open to this current, which traveled further into the core of his body.

Then, for the first time, Red felt it. The energy seemed to hit something, circling around a small sphere that wasn’t there moments before. This sphere was smaller than a fist, and if the youth wasn’t focusing on it, he would have missed it.

This was his Spiritual Sea.

Red didn’t let his elation at the formation’s success get to his head, however. Instead, he examined the orb, inspecting it with this energy in preparation for breaking its wall. He couldn’t see the organ as much as feel it, however, and what he felt wasn’t promising.

The difficulty in opening a Spiritual Sea was determined by how complete was the barrier surrounding it. Some people were born with many cracks and openings along this illusory barrier, meaning their difficulty in breaking through these obstacles would be severely diminished. Others were born with almost a full barrier, however, and this would make the task a very daunting one.

Red happened to fall into this last group. The barrier blocking his Spiritual Sea was almost intact, and this meant that the level of difficulty in breaking through would be about as high as it got.

Yet, he was already expecting such a result.

No longer hesitating, Red directed this energy against the organ. He attacked the barrier, starting from the few cracks that were already there, as most cultivator manuals instructed one to do.

To his surprise, the barrier in that area crumbled with almost no resistance as his energy slipped through. The youth was surprised by this, but he continued his assault in another area nearby, shifting his focus. This next area also crumbled through without resistance, and Red continued to destroy this barrier bit by bit.

The task seemed too easy as to make Red suspicious. Was opening the Spiritual Sea really this easy?

Seconds later, he realized that was all wishful thinking.

As he twisted and turned his energy, he came back to examine an area of the barrier he had already broken before. To his surprise, though, the barrier seemed to have reappeared in that place without him noticing it.

Red examined the rest of the areas he broke before, only to realize they had also regenerated.

To confirm his suspicions, the youth tried to break the same section of the barrier again, except this time, he kept the energy in the same place to examine it. Sure enough, in a matter of a second, the barrier regenerated like it had never been broken before.

It was only then Red realized the true difficulty of the task. He needed to break through all the barriers quickly enough before any part of it could regenerate.

This meant that not only did his full Spiritual Sea barrier make the task harder, it meant that his talent in controlling Spiritual Energy would also play a large factor on if he would succeed. In this case, he would need to move these currents of energy much quicker than he was doing currently, maybe even manipulating multiple of them at a time.

‘This seems... unreasonable.’

It was no wonder why this was such a bottleneck for cultivators. Without the talent and the means, how many people would succeed? For this reason, a Parting Sea pill was almost invaluable to these people.

At that moment, Red felt a bit of the hopelessness Narcha must have felt in the past.

The youth, however, still wasn’t out of aces up his sleeve.

With his eyes closed, Red entered a meditative state. His expanded awareness reached to the center of his torso, where he could see and feel what was happening. There was a slightly glowing orb pulsating with energy, a few shafts of light poking through the cracks, and a large stream of dark blue energy swimming around it.

With his expanded awareness, Red eliminated one enormous obstacle in his way - perception. Most cultivators would need to fumble around blindly while breaking through, using their limited senses into their inner body to control and judge the situation of the barrier. The youth, however, had his meditation technique, which allowed him to observe his inner body and even somewhat control its condition.

If he was going to break through here, it would be by relying on this single advantage of his.

Red continued to gather the energy in his veins towards his Spiritual Sea. At the moment, the supply didn’t seem to be diminishing, a requirement that his master must have certainly considered in building this formation.

Once the youth felt he had gathered enough energy, he started his assault. This time, however, he used a different strategy.

He amassed the energy into a large clump surrounding the Spiritual Sea, and instead of making it move as one, he detached smaller streams from this clump and shot them against the barrier. This way, he would still have enough energy to assault other areas if the need arose, avoiding wastage and being far more efficient.

Of course, such a task was easier said than done. Through a lot of trial and error, Red figured out the minimum amount necessary of the energy to break through the barrier, and as such, his plan began in full.

Like an artillery, his energy bombarded the Spiritual Sea from every direction as fast as the youth could muster. Red couldn’t command all these streams all at once, however, and timing became vital in his success as he needed to keep breaking the same area again and again.

He met failure after failure. Yet, he made progress in every attempt, so he kept trying.

Soon enough, he forgot himself in the process. He became a machine, repeating the same movements without end. Gather energy, spread energy, assault the barrier.

His veins ached. His thoughts were muddled in a mire. Yet, beneath it all, his will persevered. This was his chance, and he wouldn’t waste it.

This mentality alone was what kept him going.

The cracks continued to spread in the Spiritual Sea after every attempt. The glow shining beneath the barrier intensified in his awareness.

Eventually, only a few small blockades remained, and Red put his all into pushing through.

The last piece of the barrier fell, and the Spiritual Sea shined in all its glory.

Then, the youth found himself being pulled into a world he never felt before.