With the aid of Phenax, Zeo can collect many types of the essence. Any alchemy who saw this will commit suicide. The struggle they must go through for the essence extraction requires a lot of experience, time, concentration, and wealth. But for Zeo, what is the meaning of struggle?
In the middle of the gathering, Phenax detected a richer aura leading them to a lake. In the center of the lake, there is a lotus that emitted coldness, its surrounding water surface are frozen.
Surrounding the lake, many spirit beasts can be found watching the lotus greedily, but none of them are taking action. Zeo noticed they were pretty far from the edge of the lake.
"I cannot believe there will be a Glacier Lotus here; looking at its aura, this is possibly a rare spiritual herb. " Zeo was stopped by Phenax when he tried approaching the lake nearer to get a better view.
"There must be a reason why all the spirit beasts do not dare to take action," suddenly a young white monkey roared, it seemed like it had lost its patience and run towards the Glacier Lotus. The resolve it shows, kindled the spark, making some spirit beast follow.
Spirit beasts that can fly are the frontmost. Still, when they are getting nearer to the lotus, a whirlpool stretch towards the sky suddenly comes out, protecting the lotus.
The whirlpool swallowed up everything nearing the lotus; inside the vortex , Zeo saw some long black silhouette with yellow eyes staring at the spirit beast trapped inside the whirlpool. But it remains unaffected by the whirlpool. It swims inside the whirlpool and then swallows up the spirit beast trapped in it with its large mouth. This is the first gigantic serpent Zeo has ever seen in his life, recorded in the book as Nightmare Serpent, to immediately run when spotted.
Zeo thanked Phenax for stopping him; he noticed his mind becoming clearer and focused since he became spiritualist. He is wondering why he never met any spiritual beast on his journey, should be Phenax doing. He's the one that decides which path to take and sometimes suddenly orders him to change pathing. He thought Phenax could only sense the aura of spiritual herbs, but now he cannot even imagine how great Phenax spiritual sense. Really befitted to be one of the Primordial Spirit.
"That Glacier Lotus is not your fortune fated for you, but for your level, I think the spiritual beast around you will help you more. See that surrounding carcass spiritual beast; fast while the other spiritual beast still distracted by that whirlpool, go use Devour on them". Zeo tilted his head in confusion; he thought Devour could only be used as spiritual herbs.
He reached towards the Red Eye Boar , one of the low-tier spirit beast. The body disintegrate living only a lump of meat. The presence of the lump of meat draw the attention of the other spirit beast except the Nightmare Serpent. The face they made if they cannot obtain the lotus , then the meat will do.
"Phenax, what happen ? Why are they approaching me. This lump of meat is like normal daily meat that I have every day". But when Zeo observes the meat carefully, the marbled meat emits a pure spirituality aura. "Omg, this is spiritual meat; what kind of ability that I receive from you, Phenax". He remembers that Phenax always emphasize to him all creation started from the void, but he cannot grasp the true meaning of it.
"Young one, you better throw that meat into the lake now, I'm also surprised with the outcome of the ability. Pick up other carcasses that you can while you retreat ". Zeo follows Phenax advice and retreats back into Elder Kinta's mansion.
Zeo takes out all the spoils that he gets in his adventure. But he doesn't know what to do with the essence and the spiritual meat. He still needs to learn how to concoct a pill and doesn't know how to cook. Aunty Elaine, his house servant in charge of cooking, told him before spiritual ingredients must be cooked with techniques or it will lose all of its spirituality. Only a spiritual chef can handle such ingredients
"Hahaha, you are neither alchemist nor a spiritual chef; just because you gain something, does not make you special if you cannot utilize it. I forbid you to give others the essence you collected; it can attract much unnecessary trouble, that meat you can ask Aunty Elaine cook it , just said your Uncle Kinta gave you , lets bring your essence into your spiritual world". The silhouette of a blackbird vanishes into the head of the young boy. Zeo thinks he really is useless and wonders how in the world his ancestor can be at the top without being a spiritualist relying on the black dagger.
"Thank you, Phenax for giving me a chance", not knowing the future that he will hold , Phenax feels guilty getting compliments from the 3rd young master of The Shadow Clan.
"Young one, try to throw 2 of the essence into your mana pool,
let us experiment more regarding your mana pool , i am sure this mana is special because it has element of the void", now only Zeo understood why his mana differs from other mana recorded in the book. His Elder Kinta emits a red aura when using his skill, making its surroundings heat up because he contracted with the Ancient Spirits of Fire. How proud of him for saying that he nurtures the spirit since it from Elite Class, never tempted to contract with another spirit.
Spirits can grow with the aid of the host by sacrificing a percentage of the mana pool size. Growing a mana pool requires many resources such as pills, spiritual food and spiritual treasure . Some spiritualists who become more substantial than the spirit it contracted, not wanting to sacrifice their mana pool, can exile the spirit by overpowering them from their own spirit world. Afterward, by natural phenomenon, certain parts of the spirit will be branded; this brand making them are called Exiled Spirit. There is a case the spirit is strong, absorbing all the mana pool of the host, which may lead to the host's death; if not , the fortunate will be wasted for whole life. Never able to be contracted to spirit his whole life. So two sides need to know each other before contracting. Without the consent of a spiritualist, a spirit can never enter the spirit world.
Remembering the feeling of his mana when he touches, which is never recorded in any book he read, he put 2 of the essences he collected. The essences vanished after a few seconds, nothing came out, but some of the mana was gone inside the pool. Not satisfied with the result, he poured out all of the essences in the collection, and a few seconds later, the essence vanished as well. But once it vanished, the mana pool swirled then turned into a small spherical ball which later solidified into a pill. The pill was purple in color but emitted a kind of fragrance and shine on its own. "This is !!! This is the highest quality of pill ever recorded in the history of Alchemy , LEGENDARY TIER."
A pill can be classified into different tiers; common, uncommon, rare, mythical, and legendary. Tier 4 alchemy, if lucky, can concoct at least 10 mythical tier pills in his life , but legendary-tier, it's only recorded , no one ever successfull on forging it , but sometimes history cannot be trusted as it may be altered for the benefit or to protect someone. For every tier , the purity percentage is by an additional 20 percent, but mythical and legendary tier they have their own unique property. For mythical, the pill will emit a unique fragrance that can never be forged. The essential requirement to become tier 3 or tier 4 alchemy is to distinguish the fragrance, so the Alchemy association kept mythical pills for exam purposes. For Legendary tier- the pill has the fragrance and will shine on its own which has never been seen , only been theorised.
Zeo sat backward in disbelieve; he doesn't even need to learn alchemy to forge pill, he had his own portable cauldron inside his spirit world. Who needs alchemy for pill , alchemy needs me. The mana inside the mana pool used up , requiring time to fill it up back.
"Hmm, looking at your disappointing mana recovery, it will take 2-3 days to recover just to fill up this small puddle of mana pool. Haishhhh..... the great me suffering within. Sob sob" Zeo feels embarassed, if there is a stone nearby, he will hide behind it away from Phenax. "So can you identify this pill, and what effect it can give you? I hope it is not poisonous".
Zeo only learned to identify most spiritual herbs; identifying pills is always the alchemy job for it. Phenax becomes more disappointed with Zeo , what is the point you have cheat-like abillity but no knowledge about it. What makes people always fail in his life , ignorance. Phenax have seen through mankind since the beginning of man due to ignorance, regret is born, which will eventually turn the world upside down.
Not to let his spirit become more disappointed, Zeo ingests the pill showing his resolve. Phenax just thought about the danger of ignorance, and suddenly this happened. He wanted to strangle the 5years old boy but kept checking on his body if things went wrong. Zeo felt a warm feeling in his stomach; he went out from his spiritual world and tried to guide the warm feeling throughout his body. After a few hours, thick black mucus came out from his body, and his skin looks became more elastic and more bright, which was always dreamt by a woman. His bone becoming sturdier than before, and he feels more energetic.
Overjoy with the result, he ran outside of his room, to shout as loud as possible; suddenly he saw a maidservant who was on standby in front of his room, vomited." Young miss are you okay? Are you pregnant ? If you are , you should go home and take a rest. I will tell your leader about it later".
"Your mother is the one pregnant, "the maidservant cursed within. "3rd young master of The Shadow Clan, I think you need a bath ". Zeo checked upon his body and realized what was happening chuckled. The black mucus is sooo smelly that he missed out due to his happiness. Realizing the smell, he as well vomited.
"Errr, young miss, can you clean up my room, I will go wash first", the maidservant just smiles at him, but no one knows within she was cursing and crying, asking herself what sin she has committed in this life.