The Master Seal completely altered Sage’s former methodology. He had altered his body many times in the past, trying to create the powerful end result without losing any of its versatility. There were so many special abilities and qualities that he’d run into over the years that he felt were important and so he’d have to keep trying to make room to incorporate them all. It was such a delicate juggling act and despite knowing that a body built to support just a few powers was many times stronger he was always running into new abilities that made him want to rethink it all over again.

With the Master Seal these concerns almost completely disappeared. No longer did he have to worry about how he could best balance and maximize his body because he could change it on the fly. Instead of having to waste years undergoing metamorphosis to test out something new he only had to spend a few days removing his Master Seal and applying a new one. This few days of time was not how long it took to switch between forms, but to add new ones to the Master Seal. The Master Seal is created as a single whole, and while it can include multiple forms to switch between they have to all be a part of it when it is created and applied. If he wants to change what forms are in the Master Seal he has to create a whole new one and this process takes a few days of effort. What used to take years had now become days.

Better yet, he didn’t have just two forms, Beast and Human, he could have five at a time. While it was possible to have more or less, there seemed to be a sort of exponential increase in the time and difficulty of application. For some reason having five total forms and balancing the main Essence Seals into the shape of a pentagram was the most optimal solution. For some reason six forms became extremely difficult and time consuming while four was only slightly easier. This new variation of Release the Masterpiece thus became settled around five specific forms, the first being the original body of its target whatever that might be, the next one being Human with a powerful mind and balanced body, which left three others as useful transformations. The human form was also not necessary if they ever applied a Master Seal to a normal human but everyone in the Lang Clan was already a beast of some sort so this form was the substitute for the Human Seal.

The Human Seal was already a sort of lesser version of this technique as it was usually sealing up a beast’s tyrannical physical stats and using that power to increase their intelligence and adaptability. This was also why the Hoplites and Dragoons were so dull witted even as Humans. They were simply not that powerful so when their attributes were sealed up there just wasn’t that much to be used as fuel to make them smarter.

Sage already had some rough plans on what these forms would be, but there was some more testing to do. They had of course done many on the Inner World, but he had to make sure it all worked the same on the outside world as well. He removed his own Human Seal and spent a few days putting a Master Seal upon his chest. Considering he was still in the Depths, the choices of form were all useful for him in this environment. He hadn’t chosen the options with the maximum of efficiency, but he also wasn’t building these forms for aesthetics so he designed three very powerful but focused bodies.

He also planned to change his true body now that he had the support of the Master Seal. There was no longer a need to stuff as many options into his body as he could. All of those natural abilities that were present in his bloodline and ancestry would have high compatibility with him now. It was instead his goal to create a true body with the highest quality and bloodline purity that he could. Essentially, he wanted to make it so he had the most ‘total points’ available for him to use in creating three other forms. Instead of a multi-purpose body he would go for the most powerful overall. Of course, he also wouldn’t make his true body useless and it would likely be very good at least one role, then he would fill in for its weaknesses with three other forms.

Sage rushed out of the Great Pod, swimming into the water with powerful strokes of his human body. It was even more powerful than before as the Master Seal wasn’t wasting power trying to boost his already human mind. There was some loss in the conversion from huge beast limbs to small human limbs, but his physical strength was now far closer to his beast form than it had been in the past. His body was also enhanced by his Body Cultivation, laying a second form of cultivation onto the first. Sage’s Liquid Metal body, the combination of the natural ability of the Spirit Jade Beetle and his own Heavenly Material, made it far easier for him to advance in the Violent Sun Body Instruction. There was even the Jade Mantle surrounding his body and powered by his extremely concentrated Poison Qi to empower his body even more.

With three different types of physical enhancements, Sage’s reliance on Qi methods had shrunk considerably. It also didn’t help that he’d always mainly focused around Wood natured techniques, using them to hinder his enemies so he could defeat them with other tricks and surprises. Now, he took full advantage of his powerful body, using the poisoned blades of his Jade Mantle along with his physical strength and speed to come out on top.

Over the years of combat in the Depths he’d further refined his methods and altered his innate Poison Qi. The Searing Greenrose Miasma carried an additional effect over what it had in the past. When the dark vines spread through the body and bloomed into green roses to spread the poisonous miasma into the body it now had an additional burning pain. Instead of acting insidiously without any noticeable feeling of damage, it was now very obvious as it seared the spirit wherever the vines moved. It was still an intangible miasma, but now it burned. The reason for this change was even more simple: it made him stronger.

As a poison, Sage could already incorporate his Law of Corruption, but he had a second Major Law that was almost as powerful, a Thermodynamic Law. By adding heat to the poison he was also able to empower the Poison Qi with a second Law. This made him even more deadly in combat and the tier six beasts of the Depths became something he could hunt in groups without any assistance.

Keeping all these changes in mind he shot through the water towards his first testing ground. He had left the Great Pod moving directly away from the Gelid Blue, moving out further and further from the dense ice pack. He got out towards the deep open water and started to enter a zone with a far lower sea life density. That’s when he activated the first of his three alternate forms and released a loud squealing whistle.