Rihanna returned back from her spirit space feeling an oncoming headache. She , a 27 year old woman, was downgraded to having to argue and haggle with a abnormal talking seed with all the crankiness and wisdom of a toddler! After much debate, she had to finally resort to threatening, saying she would stop with all her cultivation progress and live the rest of her life like a normal commoner, directly cutting off its supply of energy absorption! And then she got the grudging allowance of fire energy to cut out three Frozen Magma Flowers from the Ice stones.
She spent another five days at the pool, trying to absorb enough fire energy to gain her quota of commission from the spirit space. She let out her senses, bypassing the ice energy clouds, and went deeper inside the pool, hitting the walls of the pool randomly with her energy, absorbing some energy here and there. All this was done to lure the fire energy towards her. But this time the fire energy seemed to be scoffing at her efforts, and she spent more than a day just to catch its attention. In the end, growing frustrated with all her efforts, she directly challenged the fire energy by absorbing a whole chunk of lava resting at the edge on a ice stone.
Needless to say, her senses were chased back to her body by a large stream of fire energy, twisting and turning and trying to devour all the ice energy in its path to attack Rihanna. The surrounding was growing tumultuous, even as Rihanna stayed within the new block of ice, and once again felt the burning heat of fire melting away her temporary residence layer by layer!
'Get ready and open your mouth as wide as you can! I am about to pull in all the fire energy in my vicinity, and once I begin I will not be able to stop. If you dare let me get burned.....just wait and watch!'
The tiny seed felt a huge shiver down its backside, and it struggled to open the mouth of the vortex as far it could stretch. This woman was an evil demon! She would definitely cut off all its supply. Might as well absorb all it could and grow a little faster so it would at least be able to defend itself from this ruthless woman in the future!
Oh, what a beautiful spectacle it was for anyone outside. Only Rihanna had her eyes closed and was oblivious to the beauty of the visual. A fire dragon, almost the size of the cave, roared out of the pool, circling around the bound cage, trying to sense out its target. The ice clouds changed from its subtle rolling about, and started expanding at an alarming rate, trying to shackle the dragon and push it back through the pool pit. The dragon roared, trying to thwart the attacks, its burning body convulsing, expanding and contracting rapidly, trying to tear through the bindings of ice.
In no time, the body of fire was covered in a zillion shards of sparkling ice. Having found its target, and unable to set itself free from the pierced ice, the dragon went berserk, and burning fire with ice shards and all, the dragon plunged into the block of ice, adamant at wanting to completely annihilate these teasing phantom which now sat silently, watching the show!
And thus a ferocious stream of dual energy, coiled around each other like fighting serpents, tore through her veins, completely rejecting all her attempts to control and guide it through to her dantian, and spread out like a wildfire, burning and freezing her body in rapid succession.
Rihanna choked, and finally coughed out a lump of blood. Her body was heating up and cooling down at lightning speed, internal organs being frozen and burned at an alarming rate. From the tip of her skin to the marrow of her bones, she could feel the melting and burning and freezing and melting....till she became completely numb. Unable to maintain her focus any longer, she felt the darkness descend, making her body sway.
'Stay awake! Why do you keep trying such atrocious tasks when you know it beyond your capability! If you faint now, this energy will no longer have any boundations, and will completely eat you up and destroy your soul! So wake up and bring this whole thing under your control! Or are you okay with dying like this? Remember there are others attached to your soul now...if you die, then so will we all!!'
Rihanna's mind jerked back to its senses.....What?! Did that mean Fluffy, Little Purple....and even that stupid seed.....she was now carrying the life of so many people in her hands?!
Instantly her mind calmed down, all her senses turning serious and focused. She could take the risk with her own life.....but she could never play around with the lives of so many others who had willingly attached themselves to herself.
Letting go of wanting to control the dueling energy within her, she sat back to simply observe the two forces chasing, attacking and trying to tear each other apart within her own body. These fellows seemed to think that her body was a battleground, and they didn't mind hurtling around it in wild abandon, hitting wherever they pleased, burning and freezing whatever they saw! Her forehead creased into deep lines of annoyance, and the irritation bubbled through her veins and mind.
'Silence! How dare you both go on a rampage while you are within my body! How dare you treat my body as your battle field! Both of you, will cease all your actions immediately, and willingly and like good children follow me and obediently enter the place I tell you to enter. In my body there can only be one law...MY LAW! And if you can't follow it.....then GET OUT!! Or do you think I don't dare to swallow you down whole and completely destroy the both of you!'
She could feel the blood boiling in her veins, heightening her anger. Even the hair on her body was standing up straight from the shivers of irritation coursing through her skin. The two wrapped up energy streams came to a sudden halt, hesitantly looking around. Even through their ferocious power, they felt the chills coming from a rapidly growing third power....somehow they were certain this third power would truly devour them both if they so much as sneezed!
And much to Rihanna's amusement and wonder, the two energy streams really did separate and turn into two extremely obedient kids, swiftly following the stream of energy Rihanna sent their way, and quickly entered the large mouth waiting for them at the end of their path.
Rihanna opened her eyes and stared back at the significantly less amount of ice clouds in her surrounding, not knowing whether to laugh or cry at this new development.
'Ummm....Little Purple....What was that?!'
'That....I think....is something similar to what happened on the day you were being chased.'
'Hmm?!....Hey, you have not yet told me what exactly happened that day? I don't seem to remember anything after I fell down the pit and hit my head.'
''I've told you before that your energy is guided by your emotions. After observing the happenings of that day, I do have deductions. But they still need to go through more trials and checking.'
'What deductions? You sound like a scientist from my world!'
'Well.....I have to be.....since you are hell bent on treating yourself as a lab rat! Anyway...unlike other cultivators, who can absorb and store the elemental energy they have an affinity for, and then use it for attacking defense, or other purposes. Your energy does not really directly attack or defend you, though maybe you can use it for medicine, alchemy, array and other purposes.....we need more research in that area.'
'Then....what is the point of being able to absorb and store energy if I can't use it? Like this it can only be useful for other people if they use me for dual cultivation or use my body for making pills and elixirs!'
'Don't get so hot and bothered without letting me finish! Your way of cultivation is indeed very different.....and very difficult as well. You can absorb all and every energy in your surroundings, and when you let out your stored energy, that in turn pulls all energy towards you. Which means, you can actually control and guide all the energies in your vicinity, making them move and act as you will them too.'
'.....Isn't that a bit too powerful?!'
'Hmph! Don't run to the results first! It also means that you need an enormous amount of mental strength, will power and spirit strength to be able to manage controlling a small amount of power for even a short while. I have noticed that whenever you are distressed or angry, your will power and spirit power increases. And it is probably due to this that you are able to connect to all the energy at such instances. Problem is.....you have no control over emotions, and they come and go as and when they please. So technically you have no control over your powers either, because you can't control the energies around you in the same way when you are not angry.'
Rihanna went silent for a while, blinking in quick succession, only her mind running through all this new information, trying to understand the process and details so she could create the path needed.
'Then....how is my mental power right now?'
'Strangely you have good mental power. Might be the reason that you opened up so many mental power related passive powers - sensory perception, reading minds, spiritual consciousness....all of them require a large amount of mental power. And continuously practicing them also increases your mental powers. But the crux of your problem is still emotional control. Do you remember what all you did to control your emotions in your past life?'
'Hmmmm.....there is of course meditation...and also chanting.....I also loved singing and dancing....I have also heard of painting as being a great de-stressor, though I never tried myself. Perhaps I should start with singing....I generally used to sing to express my moods.'
'Let's start with meditation and singing then. I'll make a.....what do you earthlings call it?....Ah! A schedule!.....we need to follow a schedule meticulously. We also need to get some books on mental and spiritual power building. But that will have to wait till we get out of here I guess!'
'Well. Then let's get going. Since we already have the fire energy, we can get our promised three Frozen Magma Flowers, and then we'll start with our onward journey! Let's go!'