Oberin was working away getting back into the flow of weaving new arrays, and stabilizing the energy output from the dimensional sphere.
'Without me as a power source stabilizing the space and feeding energy to grow it should be collapsing. However, since Jason's no longer inside absorbing energy and disbalancing the energy it seems rather stable, it just can't continue to expand. If he re-enters we might have a proble.....'
Oberin was again disturbed by the notifications that spatial disturbances were occurring in Sword Hilt Hall; not that he couldn't sense them, he just was focused on his work at hand purposely trying to ignore everything else going on.
'He's at it again!?'
Shifting his attention back to the hall, he watched in confusion for a breath then realizing what he was doing.
'He's produced two orbs, one of Fire Water and the other of Water Flames. Spacing them 200m on either side of him is making a yin yang principled vortex. Absorbing the access energy from each to cultivate. This technique isn't half bad.' He stayed to watch while each grew in parallel until they reached about four meters.
Working away, Jason noticed Oberin started to link minds but then stopped. He already knew why, he needed his focus right now, and Oberin didn't want to cause him to make a mistake.
The vortex of energy was moving clockwise, from the left side around his front to the edge of his right side he was surprised his skin wasn't burning off. From his right around his back to the edge of his left it was how he imagined walking naked on top of the Earth would feel.
Both sides were absolutely soaked for the opposite reasons, the front from the ocean of sweat, his back from the water vaper in the air losing energy and condensing onto his body. The sweat was boiling off and the condensation was starting to form frost lines.
Compared to what he was currently battling mentally and internally, he had no time to focus on an annoyance that didn't even hurt.
Shrinking the orbs for a moment, Jason connected with Oberin via their soul link.
-"Hey Oberin I can't talk but for more than a moment but, I was a little too right with my idea.... the ball of Fire Water and Water Flame having a balancing effect on each other's instability. The amount of arcane true water and fire aspect I have to feed them is drastically less compared to what I needed before, even without my direction the environmental effects of both complement them well.
If I left them both alone I'm sure they would just grow until the neutral world energy around them couldn't fuel them anymore. I don't want to find out what happens if they both collide before growing unstable. If I'm unable to siphon the energy away quick enough, while also processing it, and then emitting excess energy as fuel to keep room for more to pour into my Divine Spirit Core easier, I can only assume something like that would happen.
If I wasn't using my body as a buffer diluting it with my base essence, I'd push the limits of my eyes and pressure inside my spirit core too far. I don't want to find out what happens if I push past what they can adapt too.
The good news is the pressure on the shell of my divine spirit core is twice as hard as before right now, and I'm not sure of keeping focus past that. Overall though, this is twice as fast for processing more dense base essence to feed my body.
Though there's a little more benefit than just that in this. Notice I'm trying to keep the two streams of diluted energy's separate but they're attracted to each other, making 100% separation completely impossible. Though when they collide its similar to my blood, an explosive reaction occurs then growing neutral to one another. That process seems to temper my body faster and is also making it more accustomed to its effects.
I started barely able to withstand siphoning both when they were 20cm wide, now they're about two meters each; which is about when I assume you took notice. I don't know how long until my next breakthrough, my divine spirit core has only grown about half the total size it did last, but there's about five times more of the new base essence stocked up inside."-
That whole thought process and findings were conveyed to Oberin in only a few seconds, before the orbs grew back by a two meter diameter each.
'Well, he's fine. I suppose it's because his emotional maturity fits someone who's only been born 12 years ago, I forget analytically he's been an involuntary observer but passionate researcher for about eight billion years.
I need to remember he's new to the physical nature of his emotions and their affect on him, plus how to handle them along with his physical needs. Before he ever had to do anything to maintain himself, he felt driven by the fact that he was only able to observe, Oberin observed.
He observed both change and formation of the more recent two thirds of the universe, it was rhythmic, as the galaxy's formed and faded. It was a cycle driven endlessly over vast time periods, eventually it was always the same thing he grew used to it; however, that is until he found things that moved counter to that like himself.
They didn't seem to serve that greater of a cycle like all he had seen before. Their purpose in the cosmic soup didn't benefit, let alone aid that cycle at all. Stars formed from light elements gathering, igniting if they reached standardized conditions, eventually collapsing into a black hole or exploding providing the building blocks for more things, but energy was always dissipated.
The longer things went on he must have understood that it was slowing down, as it was growing cooler and cooler overall; even if he couldn't feel it, if anyone got to watch long enough they'd see how things were growing smaller in scale over time, while the void pockets of the black holes grew larger.
The life forms on earth were similar to him, in that they moved opposite to that flow inside their own little world. He tried to understand them but never could, no two ever did something exactly the same. They grew more complex, like him, seeing them changing started to make his own changes more rapid.
But he did that not through some unconscious cycle like them, the life forms never knew what they came from before they just were. Yet he knew where they started, he knew every second of it. They didn't know how to change, yet all he knew how to do was change himself.
Yet they could change the world, he couldn't. No matter how much he observed, he could never fundamentally understand the cycle at play except for the physical nature of their evolution which did nothing to help explain the actions of humans. Now it seems like his nature is to see what he can change, in literally the most broad sense imaginable.
He's perfect, absolutely perfect! He's more of a Guardian than any of us ever could be. Jason's driven by purely endless curiosity for his own limits, fascinated by the change he can produce but he lacks the drive to use his insight to provoke change.
He's becoming a god of knowledge, and that's what I want, power hungry gods are always a nuisance, absorbed solely with spreading their aspect. Without us Guardians I assume that's gotten worse before they were protected under our decrees preventing mortals from hunting them as living power sources like they tried to do to us too.
But his absolute acceptance of the world around him from his observatory nature as it is could also pose a problem. Fighting the heavens isn't about him really, he's not impeded by their effects it seems so that could grow from an acceptance to an indifference.
I should let him explore some of the local realms, their cultivation levels are low due to the low energy levels in this plain.'
Oberin's analysis of Jason's character wasn't far off except his placement of mortal emotions; Jason didn't use his brain to process emotions it worked like an auxiliary network for experiencing physical senses to his true body in the gate.
His emotional response was far more abstract, a mortal's soul was within their brain and couldn't be completely detached, only disrupted by trauma. His decisions were well described when Oberin said passion, he was driven by his own whims and stray thoughts he wanted to find an answer for; when he felt emotions like anger and grief at the loss of his parents it was more like he was experiencing it in the 2nd person making it easier for him to ignore until Oberin reminded him of it.
Essentially all emotions experienced physically by his Id, kept completely separate from his Ego or Superego, which were only affected by his own isolated conventions. Currently his ego originated from his observations and Superego wasn't the result of a moral compass but rather the True Infinity Aspect that actually made up his true body, it by nature was all encompassing, understanding, and adaptable.
Nonetheless, unknowingly for both of them, deeper evolutionary changes were taking place to his Ego and Superego. Being able to now fully explore who he was with Oberin as a bouncing board, he could actually share everything about himself, he was opening up for the first time to someone since his birth billions of years ago, he was starting to question things about himself.
For once he wasn't trying to learn how to be 'human' but trying to learn how he should be himself, how he wants to act, what he wants to do. Before everything was blending into humans, he knew he was different but all he ever wanted was to have a chance at what they had. Now he had it, so he had no idea what to do next other than continue to live with a mortal mask, knowing he might outlive all of them. Now he knows that he really would, so he was finally thinking about what he wants to do to make his indefinite future a pleasurable experience.
He didn't know that because of this he wasn't cultivating just his body anymore but his mind too.
Oblivious to Oberin's observations of his character, and the changes taking place subconsciously to his persona, Jason was finally on the cusp of another break through after about two days of effort.
Expanding the core finally stopped at four times its size. He'd compressed about almost 25 times the volume of his new base essence compared to the last, and the rest of his body was showing signs of maxing out as well.
'Looks like it's about to start again, I better rain in the orb's or if its like last time when the core compression stage starts I won't be able to focus on stabilizing them.'
Slowly, the now four meter wide twin orbs shrank, growing smaller as every moment. Jason anticipated the energy return on their consumption still being about 101% return on his energy, although that was a mistake.
The orbs have stabilized in each other's presence, they've grown fundamentally in strength, especially being in one another's presence for more than two days. A core of more condensed energy had formed in their center like a star.
Once they were peeled away to 40cm wide, the energy ratio ramped up to 120% or a 1.20x return.
'Fuck me, I didn't think anything more could change what is this, I literally can't store this energy and I'm not able to resist the current of energy right now. But if I let go of control they'll probably blow up and I don't want to find out if my new body can withstand that.
I guess it's time to find my limit, let's see how much I can absorb at once, I'll push the extra into the Divine Spirit Cores Infinity Rune there no where else I can put this energy.'
Of course his last second plan didn't work out how he liked it. Once they reached a full 25x compression of base essence, the contractions started. The core rune had a storage capacity but it worked more like a buffer than what he fed it, it converted to his whim he hadn't tried to hold anything inside without letting it out directly before.
It also naturally generated the current level base essence from nothing, one of the perks of being a god. Normally if he was running empty he'd feed that generated back into it, converting it to the requested aspect at a ratio depending on the desired aspect and purity, the purity could never surpass his current base essence at 1:1.
(Base essence : converted essence | ex. The True Fire Aspect was 1:10, and vice versa, converting one part of either fire water or water flames into base essence produced about 1/2 parts base essence or a ratio of 1.5:1)
It turned out holding something inside the rune was far harder than trying to pull out the new base essence from the contracting runic lotus petals that made up its shell, during a breakthrough. The Divine Spirit Core wanted to force through the energy as quickly as it entered by compressing it through the outlet on the side that faced the back of his skull but he could well feel there was no room.
'Come on, come on.... they're almost... go.....-ne.' The rune was now holding reserve at around 2 fold base density of his core, along with the 25 fold pressure outside the rune he thought his head was going to pop open if he lost control.
The whole time he could only extract so much of his reformed base essence it seemed controlled by the runes. When the orbs finally faded, the rune was holding an extra 4 fold reserve. The contractions had only shrunk it to 3x the normal size, the hardest part had yet to even come yet.
The pressure continued to get worse, and when the contractions pressed it down to 2x the normal size he thought he was going to pass out from the pain. He could barely focus on the extraction process, he was slowly forcing the extraction point open more directing all the pressure on the opening.
'I can't hold all this energy in the rune but there's still no room dammit!' His last bit of focus broke a moment later, and in bulk, the internal energy reserve exploded to 29x the base line. The shell expanded back to 3x the normal size and it started shaking and vibrating. But the compressed strands of the more pure essence extracted didn't change.
With each vibration pain paralyzed him, it radiated through every part of his being, from the tips of his physical body all the way to his true body, even the infinite archive felt like it hurt with what little connection he had to it in the physical world.
Just as he was losing hope and beginning to give up, 12 of the runic lotus petals elevated from their constant flow along the surface and formed two bands of six below the already floating band of six runes. They started glowing, rotating in opposite directions to one another, the core rune forming a whirlpool on either side following the lotus petals, sucking in the energy held inside the Divine Spirit Core.
The rune wasn't absorbing the energy inside but its actual structure. The channel between the runes on the gate, and usual band of the same runes around his eyes and Divine Spirit Core, formed just between the Soul Gateway and the Divine Spirit Cores Band.
A bright light emitted from the core rune, it blinded his internal vision. He couldn't see inside any longer, the pressure was decreasing with each moment, he didn't care what was taking place at this point he just wanted the pain gone.
When the pressure decreased back down to what he felt it should be, the light faded revealing a new rune that looked entirely different from before but still had the same feeling he knew it still was an infinity rune just a new one. The petals melded back into the ever changing and flowing shell.
The rest of his breakthrough transpired as it normally did, only the amount of purified base essence in one strand doubled. The current base essence flowed into the rune and core ejected it out at twice the speed. The last stage of the break through happened twice as fast.
Once empty of all the previous essence, the channel between the Soul Gateway, Divine Spirit Core, and then his eyes formed along with the beam of true essence from the infinity symbol. Again he was assaulted with a barrage of new senses, his senses in the world tripled this time reaching 600m.
All the visuals were far more detailed, making his head spin. Once it finally receded and the process was over he felt empty, but brimming with new strength. Every part of him felt he was exploding with power despite not having any fuel.
The rune in the Divine Spirit Core started filling the space with his new base essence and the cycle was complete.
-"Oberin, what the hell just happened?"-
-"Well you broke through a level in both your mortal and god cultivation levels. What I didn't mention before about gods is that since they only have a divine spark or core, they cultivate not through advancing the body or anything else. Being of pure energy they advance the rune at its core. Those runic lotus petals, didn't force it inside the pocket space inside the rune but rather upon pushing the internal space to the limits usually that process occurs inside out but using the petals it occurred outside in.
From my perspective you were refining the actual rune, I could be wrong at certain parts but congratulations on reaching the third stage and advancing your divine rune to the second stage. This is the second class world or universal rune for Infinity! Though by accident you managed to figure out how to cultivate another side of yourself on your own, congratulations little god!"-