The boys sighed, knowing that in the weeks to come, there is another kind of hell to go through. They obediently set aside an hour each day to train in the newly named, Death Furnace.

Such inhuman training method had never been seen or heard before, but for Kairos, this is only one of the many cultivation ways he created.

Kairos doesn’t have a choice, as an itinerant cultivator, he does not have a library filled with the accumulated wisdom of his predecessors. Everything must be created anew.

Unfortunately for his brothers, he sought after the ultimate results, and anything he comes up with is expected to be extremely harsh.

To do what others dare not is the only way to become what others could not.

It is evident in the way he took advantage of the Life Taker into his training methods. The Death Furnace is something that even though they only need to stay for an hour a day, only a superior physique with superhuman healing could survive.

However, they could not risk consuming the ranked seven poison the same way the two chumps had done, especially if Kairos was also to become incapacitated, there is no one else who could accurately administer the perfect dosage of swamp toxic as counteragent.

But there was an easier method available for them.

Kairos took the three-person portion of the Life Taker that Alan had saved up, and he formulated how to use his Heart’s Echo. It is a cheat ability that other Pill Masters will murder for, but he only needed to ask the spirit herb how to neutralise its poisons safely and bringing out the benefits.

Thinking of it, he went into action immediately, “Life Taker… Can you hear me?”

“Yes Young Lord, do you need me to poison someone? I’m a great bringer of death after all. Just say the word and I’ll…”

“Ahem, your enthusiasm is well-noted.”

“Of course! Heh! I am indeed a spirit herb with a vitality of a different class than the rest of my mates.”

Kairos instantly felt his head swell. The ranked poison is far more lively and talkative than he expected. Nothing like a gloomy, dangerous, poisonous character like he presumed.

He imagined the chilling voice of an assassin, but it was a child-like one that answered. And, once it spoke, it doesn’t want to stop.

The topic floated further and further away from his original intention. Kairos coughed politely in an attempt to stop the Life Taker’s chatter, but the latter mistook him, “Oh no, young lord, are you sick? Is it my pollen? Be careful, I am the great death bringer, even my pollen is dangerous!”

His head spun.

“No… I’m alright… really. Wait, you don’t need to disperse more pollen to prove your words because I didn’t get poisoned. Stop.”

His friends stared at him with both fright and shock, and quite a few of them stopped breathing immediately.

The Life Taker finally ceased after a while with an obvious air of disappointment. Being merely a few months old, it is like a playful child that do not know the gravity of things but will obediently listen to an adult.

Kairos, suddenly its surrogate mother, quickly let it know his intentions before it comes up with new ideas.

“Life Taker, you’re indeed amazing as a poison,” he praised, causing the plant to swell with a leafy pride.

But then, Kairos added with a wistful tone, “I had to move quickly, otherwise my friends would’ve died.”

The Life Taker seemed to shrink in his hands.

The poison attacked Alan and Jim before, but at that time it never realised the two are the young lord’s friends. In the spirit herb and spirit ore community, there is none that does not know that Kairos is the beloved one of the Earth Mother. It would be a terrible thing if it had killed the beloved one’s friends.

“I’m… I’m… sor… sorry…,” it said, almost tearing up.

“You know, there is a way you can make up for almost killing them…”

“Really!?” the plant brightened immediately.

Kairos nodded seriously, then said, “Can you tell me the way to extract your life essences? It can really help us out.”

The Life Taker thought for a while, then agreed, “I can tell you, but you mustn’t kill me. I will gather my strength in a hundred pollen. If you spread them on a fertile, fresh, corpse, I will let you have the rest.”

Other spirit herbs had similar requests before, so Kairos quickly struck an agreement and learned of its secrets. It is simpler for spirit ores or materials from different beasts. In the first place, they are not living things and turning from one state to another made no difference. What they want a simple desire to be useful and would help without reserve.

He went to work immediately, unleashing his Alchemic Flames, the Unknown Flame Sovereign. After a while, the three-person portion turned into a dozen pills. Each as potent as what Jim and Alan ate; a good fifty percent increase in their current Origin Energy when taken.

In the hands of a Master Pill Maker with a normal Alchemic Flame, to make two to three with a fifth's potency using his recipe would be a considerable achievement.

The difference isn’t because of one’s skill, after all, Kairos lacked experience and actual talent. It is because of the secrets he gained, but more importantly, his purple flame could forge pills without any wastage. It is why even the grandmaster Pill Makers were filled with hankering to make it their Alchemic Flame.

Kairos named his new creation the Life Giver Spirit Pill, a name that the spirit herb itself had suggested. It is an irony, considering its original traits as a potent, near-incurable, poison.

The pill increased life energy, and that alone would cause an uproar on Gaia even if other pill makers are not able to create as many in each pot, even if the Life Taker is a rare ingredient. The price for his recipe will be unimaginable.

For them, the effect is even better when they could directly use the energy of their life force. They quickly took the pills. Alan and Jim who already had the boost could only take a pill, while the rest of them took two. The medical properties are so strong that any more would be overdose even if they use their inner energies to disperse and absorb it.

All of a sudden, their skin flushed red as they noticed a heat that raised from their Dantian. It spread throughout their body, down to their fingertips. A sigh of satisfaction escaped the lips of some of them. They could feel a significant improvement from before, even for Alan and Jim.

At the same time, Kairos did not have the relaxed enjoyment as the rest. He felt as though his heart is bursting as life force was drawn in by the crystal hidden in his heart. His Soul Core.

The swirl of energy disappeared into the gem filling not even a-hundredth, but somehow he still felt his life energy strengthened. His Soul Core that was the size of a grain of sand before had doubled in size.

Excitedly, Kairos told this to his friends, but the others were astonished and stared at him without understanding.

“What’s a crystal doing in your heart?”

“I… You guys don’t have something like this?”

The boys shook their heads.

Kairos was flabbergasted, but he did not know what to say.

“Won’t you die to have something like that?”

“It might be better to take it out.”

“It’s doesn’t really feel solid to me. More akin an image of a crystal, so it doesn’t seem dangerous. I call it my Soul Core,” then Kairos gave them another, equally frightening news, “Besides that, I have something similar in my head. A blue crystal that appeared when I learned to control mana, so I named it the Mana Core.”

The others, Origin Cultivators like him, looked at each other without knowing what to make of the situation. Two crystals? And, if they include the Ki Core that Cultivators will form when they reach SSS Rank, there will be a trio of spirit gems.

The Ki Core is something to help a cultivator transcend their mortality, and will naturally occur when one reaches the start of a certain stage. Likewise, the Soul Core and Mana Core that Kairos developed announced the beginning of something.

Kairos’ thoughts crashed against Aisa’s conscious like a wave and woke the dragon up. She escaped from his robes with a grumpy look and tilted her head to look at him.

“Aisa, isn’t there a Soul Core and Mana Core for everyone?”

He had never questioned it before, assuming it was the norm.

Aisa who was grouchy from being woken up yawned then immediately reverted to her original, lively self. She ran one round around Kairos then said told him…

Nope~ Most would feel their whole body become soaked with life, but they won’t have a life essence like Kairos.

“What about mana? Do the mages of the south have Mana Core like me?”

Nope~

They would cultivate mana within their Dantian like you, thoughhhhh… it will start to crystallise with magic and look really …

“Pretty?”

Yummy~!

“…”

There are secrets to be uncovered and too many things connected to him that he had to put aside. Still, it seemed beneficial to find more items like the Life Taker that could strengthen his cores.

With life energy now permeating their every cell, the five of them quickly became ready for the hellish training.

Alan and Jim’s suffering from eating the Life Taker were not for nought. All pills will become less effective the more one takes it, especially for those with stronger medicinal effects.

However, for the two that took the poison directly, they did not have such a side-effect.

While Edward, Tommy, and Kairos, doubled their life force from taking two pills, Jim and Alan had another twenty-five percent advantage. The two gleefully announced it, as they made a secret pledge to test out more spirit herbs in the future; a thought that did not escape Kairos and quickly dismissed with a smack.

“You haven’t learnt your lesson? Sigh… Next time, before you guys eat anything weird, at least let me know first.”

“YEAH! Join us Kairos. Be one with the force of nature!”

“After one time of almost dying, seems like you two had become fearless? Maybe I should increase your training duration.”

“No please!”

“There is one thing we still need for our training though. The normal Recovery Pills are inadequate for the wounds we would be having.”

The simple explanation he gave caused everyone to pale and their lips to tremble.

What kind of training would cause them such horrible wounds?! Are they going on a life-and-death battle with Syriong?

“However, do not fear,” Kairos said with a smile.

“Boss! We are really afraid!”

He dismissed their frightened looks and took out a familiar item. The Yggdrasil Fruit. The treasured fruit is a staple in the divine realm, but over here it is a treasure that could reform one’s body for better training talent. Of course, it only works for mortal bodies and only once, but it is enough to cause top practitioners to drool. Even if they would not benefit much from eating it – after all their latent talent must’ve been top-class and hard to improve further – they could use it to patch any inherent weakness or give the fruit to their young.

If not because Aisa could get more and the fruit’s existence must be kept secret, Kairos wouldn’t dare to use it lightly.

“I couldn’t make this into a pill with the furnaces on Gaia, but even pounding it into a pulp and diluting the solution would create a better healing salve than almost anything we have.

I’ve prepared a bottle for each of you. Okay, enjoy your night.”

The angelic smile plastered on his face, causing everyone to grimace.

The four of them returned to their rooms and started on their self-torture, though, in their hearts, none of them doubted the rewards at the end.

Kairos, however, wistfully sighed. If he had thought about using the Yggdrasil fruit this way in the past, he might have prevented Tommy’s injuries from healing badly. Of course, at that time he had not yet uncovered all the fruit’s usage and couldn’t determine how much to keep for the rest of the Snowdrifts.

Even if Aisa could help get more, it wouldn’t be unlimited.

“Once completed, the Dharma Constitution is superior even compared with the Asura Constitution. I wonder if it is equal to Jones’ Divine Asura body.”

The dragon giggled without answering, as if saying he will know when the time comes, and then promptly went back to sleep.

When Kairos thought about how Aisa was always napping, he realised with a mystified smile that as a Primordial One did not need any rest so it must have been a hobby of hers.

Kairos checked his Time-Space ring which held the fruits, and realise the number had dropped to thirty. Still, plenty to share.

Left alone in his room, Kairos began his own training. As the one who suggested created this external cultivation method, he knows that he cannot work at the same pace as his brothers.

His physique has already reached the entry-level of immortals, and most ways would be insufficient to bring any improvements to him.

Previously, when the five of them were absorbing the eight elements to build up resistance and improve on their physical rank, he only gained the much needed elemental protection.

To see any significant improvements to his Huang Titan physical rank, he needs to put in more effort than anyone.

Unlike an hour in the furnace, he planned to stay throughout the night; any lesser would show insignificant results. Though he expects to be severely wounded, with enough healing resources it would be possible, and he had a great stock of them.

Without hesitation, he entered the Death Furnace.

Powered by spirit stones, the array he made caused the environment to change into a highly energised atmosphere of eight different elements. It was so highly concentrated that he felt as though he is wading in a thick liquid.

Kairos quickly realised another thing; even though Spirit Stones are crystallised Heavenly Energy, he was unable to cultivate his Ki when the energy had been turned into such a state, but now his flesh could feed on it.

The only problem is his inability to shut off his pain receptors while training, because without it, he cannot properly control the body refinement process. Once the experiments gathered enough data, he will be able to automate the process, and at that time he could temper his body in the furnace while sleeping. At the same time, his tests will allow him to formulate a method to suit the girls and the rest of their team.

For the next few days, the five of them lived closed to the edge of death until Vouno suddenly appeared in the Academy that they stopped.

Kairos’ father allowed his strength to roll without restraint, causing the air to crackle, alarming everyone.

It was only because there was no sense of hostility from him that the staffs did not take action.

The old teachers had forgotten about him, even though he was their student in the past. However, after Kairos became famous throughout the lands, and he himself becoming a Viscount, their background had been dug out and turned into public knowledge.

Now, it will be hard for someone not to recognise the father of the Gold Earl.

As a student they expelled years ago for failing the first year’s examinations, many of the instructors were nervous. They had not treated failures with respect. Many students with poorer foundation were sent out of their class with the littlest of excuses, all because they could.

Many people behave this way. When they hold power over another, they tend to lose themselves in the feeling of superiority. They could act unreasonably just because it makes them feel better. But, when the target of their bullying one day become strong enough to root them out, they become nervous and weak – not unlike how their victims behaved in the past.

If they could look from the outside, they will realise that those that they once despised were no different from themselves.

Vouno walked in without hindrance after flashing the Astroire Emblem, then made his way directly to the dorm. The instructors followed him with their eyes on a monitoring crystal ball.

With a few words with the Dorm Matron, he quickly found Kairos’ room and knocked on the door.

“Hi, son!”

Despite already knowing Vouno’s arrival, his father was the last person he expected to see, and he replied in shock, “Dad, why are you here? Did something bad happened?”

“Well, our manor’s construction was finished. Thought you would like to know.”

“You came all the way here just for that?”

“Heh heh. You didn’t see the way those old bastards were looking at me when I strolled through the academy. They must all be wondering how I could cultivate with my talent. What more, I am already at C rank. Man… that felt great!”

Vouno had only cultivated for a year’s time since he received the Origin Cultivation Method. To transverse from rank E to C in this time was an achievement not lesser than many geniuses.

Kairos sighed. There was disorder the moment his father arrive, but at least Vouno had gotten something out of his system, and it would be helpful for his cultivation in the future.

Just like Jones who had a conflict in his Dao Heart in the past because of his past, his father was also the same from years of being incapable of cultivating.

“Now that’s done, do you want to go home and check out the building? You can still make some changes at this point before we move the furniture.”

“Hmm, I guess so dad, let’s go.”

“Do you need to pack anything? Do the others want to come too?”

“I’ve everything needed in my rings, and they are busy training as well. It’d just be a short trip, but let’s drop by the shop first.”

Since they will be going out of the academy, he thought it would be a good idea to drop by to see Ling’er and Relestia.

And, when his father asked him home, an idea formed in his mind, “What if I pass on the secrets of the spirit herbs and ores I’ve learned to the old masters?”