"The Soul Shredding Poison does exactly what its name would suggest. It attacks the soul, thoroughly ripping it apart till nothing remains. Depending on the consumer, the experience is unique so it cannot be predicted. What can be predicted, is that the experience will be agonising.
"The effect hardly matters to us, what does, is how the poison achieves it. The first thing it does upon consumption is slowly rob the consumer of their senses and makes them lose control of their physical body. In actuality, the poison is simply separating the soul from the body so that it can erase the soul while leaving the body intact.
"This separation causes the soul to enter an intangible form where they still retain their sense of sight and hearing. The consumer would not be able to realise this due to the sheer anguish they would be experiencing in those moments.
"While in that intangible form, the consumer's death must be prevented. Such a thing is easier said than done. There is no infallible way of achieving this however, it is my speculation that feeding the poisoned individual a massive source of life force can somehow make the odds a bit more probable. Instead of a one in a million chance of surviving, they have a two in a million chance.
"After surviving the process, the individual will need to find a way to retake control of their physical self, a way that, I speculate, will be unique to them alone. In doing so, they will also learn of a way to separate their soul from their body whenever they please. Finally, after being able to do that, one will be ready to practice the Soul Splitting Art."
Yun Lei read the manual he had recreated in his head, both with amazement at how accurately it had described his own experiences but also disappointment. The reason he had been so interested in that manual in the first place was because he thought it could tell him more about the soul, however, that wasn't the case.
In fact, the author seemed just as clueless about the topic as him. The entire thing was written down like it was a documentation of someone's experiences rather than a manual for a technique. It didn't take him long to find out that the author didn't even know if the Soul Splitting Art could be practised in reality since it was more of a theoretical construct based on speculations.
The entire art seemed to be a 'what if' scenario that had never been tried before. The thought process behind it was simple enough. The physical body could be controlled with an incomplete soul which would mean that, theoretically, if someone were to split their soul into two halves, one half could safely separate from the body while the other half still retained control.
Since the soul retained its senses of sight and hearing even after being detached from the body, the separated half of the soul could be used as the practitioner's eyes and ears that could go where their physical body never could. It could be used for anything from spying on people to scouting out dangerous areas. The best part was that since the soul was completely intangible, not even high-level cultivators could sense its presence.
On paper, the Soul Splitting Art seemed like an amazing art with a lot of potential and utility however, Yun Lei could see many problems with it. The most basic one, which was also the hardest to overlook was the issue regarding soul strength.
Sure, the body could be controlled with a damaged, incomplete soul as he was doing even at that moment. However, to do so, soul energy had to be used as a crutch in order to compensate for the function of the missing part. The amount of soul strength that had to be used was directly proportional to the size of the part that was missing. The smaller the soul, the harder it would have to work to control the body.
To put it in simple words, losing a part of the soul was like losing a leg. If you compensated for that loss with the strength of your arms by using a crutch, you would still be able to walk. But what if you lost an arm on top of that? Wouldn't your remaining arm and leg have to expend even more strength to keep you walking?
Splitting his already damaged soul into two halves was like cutting off all of the remaining limbs from his body that had already lost a leg. At that point, his body simply wouldn't be able to generate enough energy to walk, no matter how hard he exerted what remained of it.
Even if one were to completely disregard simply how painful such a process of dividing the soul would be, there was another massive problem in the form of split consciousness. Drawing a circle with one hand while drawing a square with another was a difficult enough task already. Trying to process the visual and auditory senses of two different sources at the same time would be, without a doubt, a nightmare.
Yun Lei let out a deep sigh of frustration as he tried to clear his head of all the clutter it seemed to have filled up with. He needed a break, and some fresh air definitely wouldn't hurt.
He got up from his chair and stretched his body before leaving his room and walking out of the Yun Estate. He didn't have much of a goal that day but he just wanted to relax and think of nothing for a while. Of course, Situ Yue walked behind him and a few cultivators discreetly followed them.
Autumn was always a busy season in Ether Cloud. It was abuzz with even more activity than it always was. There were a lot more people walking around in the streets than normal with a lot of them being travellers from different parts of the kingdom.
Travelling between different cities was never an easy task, especially to relatively isolated cities like Ether Cloud. Unless you were a cultivator, travelling too far from the city walls was basically a death sentence.
Autumn was the season where many merchant caravans arrived in the city to buy and sell goods. Since these caravans were usually run by very rich merchants, they naturally had enough money to hire cultivators to protect themselves. Many other folks used this opportunity to travel around by tagging along with the caravans after paying a small fee.
Aside from being one of the most beautiful cities in the entire kingdom, for Ether Cloud, autumn was a season of festivities. It was undoubtedly the best time to visit the city.
"Are you serious? Those robes, for only 5 silver!?" A conversation caught Yun Lei's attention.
"Of course, I'm serious. You must be a traveller. Thunder Cloud Apparels is the best clothing shop in our town. The clothes they sell are extremely high quality and they are very affordable. You should take this opportunity to go there and buy something immediately."
A stall owner was talking loudly with one of her customers. Seeing someone advertise his company so vehemently made Yun Lei chuckle.
"I will, I will. Where should I go?"
"Oh, just head towards that direction and ask anyone, they'll show you the way."
"I was heading there anyway, how about I escort you?" Yun Lei interjected in their conversation with a smile.
Both of them turned towards the source of the voice, the customer seemed clueless but the store owner quickly let out a gasp before bowing her head.
"This servant greets Young Master Yun." The middle-aged store owner's tone was almost reverential as she spoke to the young noble. She had been one of the people who were present at the opening ceremony of Thunder Cloud Apparels and not only that but she had been standing quite close to the stage. It was only natural for her to recognise Yun Lei.
"It's fine, no need to be so formal with me." Yun Lei said, waving his hand. He didn't particularly care about etiquette anyways.
"I thank Young Master Yun for his kindness."
Yun lei nodded his head at the shop owner before turning towards the customer who seemed to have caught on to what was happening and had bowed her head.
"You seem rather young to be travelling alone." He remarked.
"This one came together with her family, Young Master Yun. I was feeling hungry so I came to buy something from the stall."
"I see, I see. They must be waiting for you to return then. Perhaps I can escort you some other time then." Yun Lei said with a small laugh.
"Thank you, Young Master Yun." The young traveller said, trying to calm her beating heart. Although she had only seen the young noble very briefly, she had almost been stunned silly because of how handsome he was. On top of that, his gentle and enchanting laugh was more than enough to steal her breath.
"Well then, I hope you enjoy your time in Ether Cloud." The Young Master said before walking away.
The young traveller kept looking at the retreating back of the noble for what seemed like an eternity.
Thunder Cloud Apparels seemed very busy that day. Although it was always somewhat busy, there seemed to be a lot of tourists who wanted to buy clothes. So much so that a long line had formed in front of the shop.
Yun Lei, of course, avoided the line entirely and walked straight to the shop entrance.
"Get in line pal!" One of the people standing in the queue shouted at him. Naturally, he completely ignored it.
A city guard, who seemed to have a permanent scowl on his face, was standing next to the entrance of the shop. Yun Lei didn't know what he was doing there but it probably had something to do with the massive queue.
"Do you have a hearing prob—" The person who had shouted at Yun Lei began speaking once more but choked on the rest of his words when he saw the mean-looking city guard give a ninety-degree bow at the young man's approach.
The Young Master simply nodded at the guard before entering the shop. The inside was just as packed as the outside and from the looks of it, two groups of people were having a rather intense conversation regarding the purchase of goods. They were shouting at each other and also at the shop staff.
"I came here first so I'm buying them."
"Who do you think you are, huh? Why can't I buy first, my money is already on the counter."
All of the people in the shop seemed to belong to one of the two factions who were going at each other. The two who were shouting the loudest were both overweight, middle-aged men wearing very fancy looking clothes and covered in jewellery.
The shop staff were trying to defuse the situation but their borderline desperate pleas fell on deaf ears.
"Why should we calm down, huh?"
"Stop shouting." Yun Lei's cold and deep voice pierced through the noise, causing both of the fat men to turn towards him.
"Who the hell is this brat? How dare you talk to me that way? You go throw that brat out." One of the fat men ordered a subordinate.
But before the subordinate could even take a step forward, a cold aura began spreading through the air, causing him to come to a halt, sweating profusely. And it wasn't just him, everyone in the shop was sweating a little, with the exception of Yun Lei and Situ Yue.
The person responsible for letting out the aura slowly walked forward toward Yun Lei before bending at the hip.
"Servant greets Young Master Yun."
Seeing the young-looking female staff member, whom they had been shouting at for the last half an hour, suddenly let out the aura of a cultivator made both of the fat men break out in cold sweat.