For a Foundation Realm Building manual, the name Ancient Dragon Physiology is quite a grand name. If not specified, one might think that this manual, with an overbearing title, might be an inheritance of some sort from a Legend or maybe from a martial immortal.
Morbius might be an immortal himself, but he is a useless one. Even though he can live long, with a weak body, he might be killed by an entity stronger than him.
He had yet to test if he is killable. Experimenting with it is quite dumb though since there are only two outcomes, which is life or death. With equal probabilities, it is very risky.
The Ancient Dragon Physiology is a very hard technique to grasp. This technique is only useable for the realm below Energy Absorption. After the breakthrough, this technique would be useless since the body already established an energy source. Also, the energy veins are expected to be strengthened during this phase making it harder to erupt and unlock the dormant veins.
For successful cases of vein eruption during the Energy Absorption Realm, the outcome is worse, for it could harm the cultivation, implode the internal energy source, and lastly the body has no way to automatically
heal since no breakthrough will occur.
If one asks if it is feasible to do this method at the peak of each cultivation realm, then the answer is, aside from Foundation Building, it is not feasible and also impractical and has no actual benefit.
"The first step is to do a finger stand. Start with the ten fingers and gradually decrease the number of fingers..."
Morbius is reading the manual in an ancient language. He finds the manual weird.
He needed to perform peculiar poses such as finger stance, super low horse stance, lotus pose with fingers supporting his body against the floor.
After reading the manual, he tried the poses as instructed. The practice is quite tedious which is evident from the amount of sweat dripping from his burly body.
"There are many different combinations of these poses. It's like dancing to the rhythm of my breathing. First set... Finger stand, lotus pose, and leg spread? This method is used for opening the pores to absorb energy." Morbius did as the manual said. He repeated this practice as well as the other combinations.
He needed to perform this until he could detect the energy in the surroundings.
In the past week, Morbius practiced the poses. Aside from his cultivation routine, he read some of the books he brought with him.
Most of his books written in the ancient text are about magic which is quite hard to swallow. Magic books are profound and even the basic ones are not easy to comprehend. Before one could study magic, one must first detect mana and absorb it and use it. For a Foundation Building realm, these books are not yet useful.
Aside from the ancient books, Morbius also delved into other books such as the Bestiary book series. He took a week to familiarize all the monsters in the first book.
To practice his cooking he might need to gather ingredients and hunt for monster meat. He could also sell the carcasses to the guild or the butcher house for money.
This week is quite fruitful for him. Even though he postponed his trip to the Merchant Hall, his training is worth it and saved his effort to find breakthrough resources.
While reflecting on his progress for the week and at the same time training, Morbius suddenly felt something.
'What is this sensation? It feels the same as the assessment chamber, but different at the same time.' There is a tingling sensation surrounding Morbius's body. He could feel subtle fluctuations in the surroundings which are quite unusual if not weird. He opened his eyes trying to see what is happening.
"T-this..." Morbius stuttered. For a beginner, this reaction is normal. If one does not react when such a thing happens for the first time, then there might be something wrong with that person.
Particles of light could be seen all over the place swaying around as the wind flutters. Even though these particles are not alive, like fireflies, they scattered and move everywhere the wind blows.
'Wow! It is so beautiful.' For an old man like him, it is funny to be mesmerized by many things in life like a naive child. With his age, it should be expected that he had unfathomable experiences in life, but now, his actions are akin to a child perceiving colors for the first time.
He breathed in and suddenly the energy entered his pores forcefully. For breakthroughs, he is supposed to breathe the air with his nose or mouth and circulate it in his energy veins, but with the Ancient Dragon Physiology, all orifices of his body were permeated with energy.
Instead of circulating the energy by breathing, the energy filled the energy veins abruptly until it got saturated. No energy source is being formed at the moment, for there is a crucial step before the breakthrough.
'I am now brimming with energy. It feels like I might explode at any given time, but at the same time, it feels like I can destroy the world.' Morbius exaggerated. He waited for a bit and finally...
"Erupt!"
The huge clump of energy inside his body suddenly became unstable as if each particle are repelling each other on a molecular level.
His veins tempered for 4000 years with rigorous training of basic Foundation cultivation proved its worth. The veins did not erupt yet as if they are resisting the massive amount of energy trying to decimate it. 'Fuck! The energy is not enough. I need more!'
During the crucial stage, Morbius, while performing his poses, absorbed energy in his body. Like before, he did not circulate it. The energy veins inflated drastically like a balloon due to the accumulation of energy. While inflation occurs, pain and pressure increase inside the body. Also, the walls of his veins are thinning due to expansion.
"Argh!"
He kept repeating the painful action until...
BOOM!
A thick mouthful of blood came out of Morbius's mouth. His pores and all the holes in his body bleed. His body is on the brink of disintegration with all the energy ravaging his insides. The massive amount of power surged to every region of his body agitating every cell, marrow, organ, skin, hair, nerves, and every nook and cranny of his body. In this world, such an occurrence is not ordinary.
Did it make him powerful? The answer is nope. At least... Not yet.
For a normal person, one could not withstand what Morbius withstood. He continued the set of poses without a halt. He needs to break through to recover. What happened before is vein eruption and to heal, he needs to perform the final phase - a breakthrough.
He started circulating the remaining energy in his broken veins. Due to the eruption of his veins, he successfully unlocked his dormant energy veins (dormant before Ancient Dragon Physiology training) allowing him to have extra pathways for circulation. For the potential of this physiology? Morbius is ignorant of the effects.
The energy continuously circulated to the new veins. As he was circulating, a pinball-sized energy clump appeared somewhere in his body. For every circulation, the clump of energy expanded slowly. The circulation method is not an Energy Absorption realm method. The circulation is based on the final phase of the Ancient Dragon Physiology. The final phase slowly heals the broken veins for every circulation as well as making the veins more durable and flexible at the same time.
While the veins regenerate, the circulation became easier and the energy clump (which is the formation of the Internal Energy Source) expanded faster.
Energy particles in the air are rapidly sucked by Morbius through his pores. Whether it is mana, Qi, or other forms of energy, he absorbs it inside, circulates it, and leads them to the Internal Energy Source he is forming. BOOM!
With his veins fully healed and energy source formed, he is now a full-fledged Energy Absorption Realm cultivator.