The process to absorb and annex soul force was different than what Kyle had expected.
As his Spirit Soul was sentient and could transform the surrounding energy into soul force at will, Kyle didn't have to worry about absorbing it.
Thus the absorption process was rather simple, annexing the expelled raw soul force was much more difficult.
It took Kyle quite some time before he was able to perceive the soul force within his body!
However, it took him even longer before he could control it to some extent.
His mastery of soul force could only be described as poor, and that was already a generous assessment.
As such, it took him some time before he finally understood what he had to do with the soul force.
But this didn't lessen his worries because after figuring out 'what' he struggled with, Kyle had a hard time annexing and digesting the soul force in order to nurture his body.
In the end, the annexing process was not that hard and the most difficult for Kyle was to move the expelled soul force provided by his Spirit Soul around his body!
To put it simply, in order to annex all kinds of energy, one had to circulate the energy through the entire body, building up a connection with the respective cultivated energy.
This connection would assist to annex soul force as the cultivation veins would slowly transform the foreign energy into something that belonged to the body.
Yet, it took Kyle several hours before he had been able to annex an infinitesimal amount of soul force owing to his poor control over soul force!
After that, it had begun to merge with Kyle's body, nurturing and strengthening it!
'Once my entire body is nurtured with soul force, I would enter the Fortification stage.
At that point, I would be on par with the weakest of the most commonly found beasts in strength!... That sounds reassuring yet ridiculous at the same time!!'
Accumulating more soul force was amongst the most important tasks he had to pay attention to right now.
It would increase his strength, reinforce his life force and allow him to exert the Nurture ability on his Spirit Soul!
Excitement spread through Kyle's body as he thought of the next steps while biting into the fist-sized fruit he had plucked from one of the tree's branches next to him.
Right now, absorbing soul force until he reaches the Initial phase of the Fortification stage would be the best course of action for Kyle.
However, what he had completely forgotten was the stench caused by the clotted blood and the dead veins which the Spirit Soul's birth had expelled!
This stench wafted through the air and only now did Kyle realize that there were many starving beasts at the Initial and low Fortification stage on the ground!
Those beasts would be a great target to test his newly acquired strength.
However, Kyle knew that he had yet to attain the average physique of an adult of the Yadras race, let alone enter the first cultivation stage!
His body was still in a poor state, despite eating lots of fruits and practicing climbing trees for three days straight.
While Kyle's overall state had improved considerably, and he wasn't getting as exhausted as his first day on Shima, there was a long way for him to go.
Nevertheless, the first thing he had to do was to leave his current position if he didn't want more beasts to be attracted to him because of the stench!
His possessions were already packed in the small backpack that was filled to the brim.
There was not much Kyle had, to begin with, but the fruits, vines, a few stones, and the weapons he had were more than enough for him to survive for now.
Thus, after he saw the first few starved beasts, Kyle jumped on another branch and quickly moved across several thick branches while ensuring that he didn't accidentally slip.
He continued jumping from one branch to another and taking a backward glance once in a while to increase the distance between the pile of dead cultivation veins and himself.
After he thought that the distance was enough, he descended to the ground and took out the boar tusk weapon before marching ahead hurriedly.
Keeping himself fully focused on his surroundings and vigilant of every noise he could hear, Kyle ran for almost ten minutes before his body couldn't go any further.
Gasping for air, Kyle took in lungfuls of oxygen as he clutched his chest.
Despite the exhaustion, a faint smile emerged on his face when he realized that he had been able to run for such a long time.
A ten minutes run wasn't extraordinary but given his weak physique, it was considerable progress in just a matter of days.
'Training my body for several hours by climbing trees during the last few days was definitely worth it! Or has my stamina increased because of the annexed soul force?'
Kyle was not sure about the exact reason but it was probably a combination of both the assumptions!
Either way, it was definitely advantageous for him.
After he was done catching his breath, Kyle decided that it would be best to walk through the forest at a slower pace.
He had already increased the distance from his earlier position and Kyle found that it was unlikely for a beast to pursue him.
'The starved beasts should have encountered each other right now. Rather than pursuing me, they're probably trying to kill each other!'
With that thought in mind, he was able to remain calm as he looked around to find a new hiding spot to stay for the next few days or even weeks.
Suddenly, his Spirit Soul appeared on his head and Kyle heard a faint yelp of the Emerald Fox as if it wanted something from Kyle.
This astonished him a little bit because he thought that Spirit Souls didn't require anything to sustain themselves!
However, after some time Kyle was able to faintly understand what his Spirit Soul had been trying to convey.
At the same time, he was able to sense that the connection between him and the Spirit Soul was slowly becoming firmer.
It was a normal process in Kyle's opinion, but what made him wonder was that the Emerald Fox was demanding something to eat!
Yet, instead of meat or fruits, his Spirit Soul wanted something else. It didn't take Kyle long to understand that it was craving for Souls!
In the end, his Spirit Soul was still in its Initial phase and had not even reached the adolescent phase, let alone adulthood.
The Emerald Fox had just been born after all!
Kyle was a little dejected as he had no way to provide any souls to his Spirit Soul right now.
But, he was determined to fulfill the Emerald Fox's demands.
Thus he began racking his brains to think of a way to provide it with nutrition.
Meanwhile, he tried to stay vigilant because he was not sure what kind of area he had entered some time ago!
Kyle had yet to encounter a beast at the Vitae stage but he was sure that there were lots of them within the Sadorla Forest.
There might be stronger beasts in the forest as well but Kyle hoped that he wouldn't encounter them before reaching the Fortification stage!
This was important to him because he wanted to reap as many benefits as possible by killing the weaker beasts in his surroundings.
As such, he had to avoid beasts at a higher rank because Kyle was not confident of escaping their clutches, let alone killing them!
'How can I feed my Spirit Soul with souls if I'm unable to fight and kill even a single beast? I can't always wait for the perfect opportunity to ambush other beasts! This worked out twice, but it's way too dangerous!!'
Suddenly, only minutes after he pondered about a solution, he recalled that he had the Nurture ability that was able to nurture anything he targeted!
He was not sure if it would work as he hoped for, but Kyle doubted that trying would hurt him.
At least, he would be able to test a few theories he had come up with in his mind before.
However, what he hadn't expected was receiving more than a dozen different paths he could nurture his Spirit soul in while targeting it with the Nurture ability!
Before using his ability, Kyle retracted the Emerald fox into his body, or to be more precise the center of his chest.
Once inside, it had laid down and Kyle noticed that the Spirit Soul was enveloped in multiple faint colored hues.
While exerting an ability that targeted individual beings one was able to perceive a faint hue.
The more hues one could see, the more parts within this being could be targeted by the ability.
Hence, Kyle's joy knew no bounds when he perceived multiple hues around the Emerald fox cub.
A vibrant smile appeared on his lips while his eyes were closed, allowing him to sense everything within him.
'One hue should represent the ability to nurture the Spirit Soul itself because that has already been proven...that's the white one! But what about the others?… They're also different in thickness...Which one do I have to nurture to quell my Spirit Soul's hunger?'
What was he supposed to do now?... Gamble???