Molting the Mortal Coil

Divine Breath. It was only a supplementary technique as an Alchemist, but it can also be used in battle. Given that it was taught only to those practicing the Instruction of Divine Paradise, outsiders considered it to be their signature technique. Divine Breath is an interesting technique as it’s a combination of Body Training and a Qi Technique that can be used in battle or to help with Professions. As Sage read more he learned that it was a form of body hardening and muscle training that used a unique Qi circulation path along with opening specific Qi Pores. The training was focused on toughening the lungs, throat, tongue and mouth, along with increasing the power of the lungs. The Qi Technique requires the opened Qi Pores in the lungs to let large amounts of Qi flow in. The description in the manual covered all these areas, but ‘Divine Breath’ was truly the name of the technique itself.

Divine Breath as a technique uses Qi to compress air as its drawn into the lungs. As the air was compressed more and more was drawn in. From the description and diagram, Sage had a guess it created a low pressure zone which acted like a vacuum. Otherwise there was no way so much air could be drawn in with a single breath, the volume of a person’s lungs didn’t increase after all. Once the air was drawn in and compressed, it could be used to assist an Alchemist, or Blacksmith, by acting as a bellows. Normally, the flames would be fed by large amounts of Qi, but with Divine Breath the heat was easier to control with a much lower expenditure of energy.

In combat the energy use was much higher as the air was released in high volume, releasing high pressure winds. At higher levels of mastery, Divine Breath users can even control the released air to form blades, walls, or other useful shapes. The most common use was to create flames and then imbue them into the Divine Breath. A Cultivator using a flame technique would be able to accomplish the same, but Divine Breath improved efficiency by many times, just like when used for Professions.

Whoa, fire breath! That is not what I was expecting when I read the name of it.

Sage found the Instruction of Divine Paradise was a far higher level of Alchemical techniques than what he’d learned in the past. It was a shame that Alchemy required a lot of time and large amounts of resources to train in. At the moment he was eager to learn Seals and return to that cave dwelling, he didn’t want to devote years to Alchemy right now. Unfortunately, the Instructions of Divine Paradise will have to wait for later. On the other hand, Divine Breath was useful as a combat technique so he put it into his planned training regimen.

The next techniques Sage planned to train were from the Ancestral Memories of the Twin Ringed Soul Serpent. In fact, he needed to train all the techniques from the Ancestral Memories. First was called ‘Avatar of Excess’, the technique that forms the Twin Soul. It had a strange name, but the Twin Soul was powerful and once created it would be a great distraction and weapon against others.

The second and third technique were related to the Twin Soul. ‘Anima Devour’ is the technique that the Twin Soul uses to consume souls and gain their strength. The souls are weakened through battle, with pieces crumbling and falling away from them. Anima Devour is a method that lets the Twin Soul absorb the pieces that have fallen away to recover its lost strength as well as the lost strength of the opposing soul.

‘Anima Cannibal’ is the opposite of ‘Avatar of Excess’. This technique actually reabsorbs the Twin Soul. Avatar of Excess essentially splits the soul in half and allows the new split to leave the body. The Twin Soul can then go out and use Anima Devour to strengthen itself rapidly. The Twin Ringed Serpent will then use Anima Cannibal to reabsorb the Twin Soul and gain that increased strength. With a new greater sum of soul strength, it can perform Avatar of Excess once again and evenly divide the energy. The new Twin Soul will be weaker than before, but as more energy is returned to the main body there is less risk if the Twin Soul is destroyed.

The fourth technique is one that Sage was most excited about, ‘Cerulean Cloud’. The neon blue gas that surrounded the Twin Ringed Serpent is a product of this technique. When Sage realized what it did he was ecstatic, the Cerulean Cloud was a method to hide from Spiritual Sense. Such techniques weren’t unheard of, but they were extremely rare and from what he was told they were the highest level secrets of Assassin organizations. It didn’t require a high level of energy or intense amounts of concentration. The drawback was a special physiology. Only those with scaled bodies could perform the technique and while in effect it always created a dimly glowing cloud of gas around the body. It seemed to be a sort of body training technique that focused on training the scales to transform Qi in a specific way to emit the blue neon cloud.

Sage wasn’t quite sure how it worked, but he had a few ideas. Spiritual Sense at the lowest form was sort of like a combination of touch and scent. As it expanded, it felt like growing larger and brushing everything against the skin of a giant body you didn’t know you had. Since it was such a large area it took focus and practice to feel things delicately, just like trying to read a plaque by running your fingers over it. The blind learned to read braille, but it’s a slow process. They also don’t read it using their elbows or shins. The sense of touch has different sensitivities on different areas of the body. The same goes for Spirit Sense, just expanding it outwards was very low sensitivity, the Cultivator has to focus their attention on a single small area in order to get good results. The main benefit was that it also acted like the sense of smell, in the area that the Spirit Sense was expanded over the Cultivator can pick up auras and energies as if they were smells. Stronger auras were more intense, while weaker ones would be faint. Different energy auras could be recognized like scents. Most could only pick out general groupings like recognizing the smell of an orange or a lilac, while those with highly practiced senses or special techniques could pick out specific people by their aura like a bloodhound following a trail.

From the description and methods for Cerulean Cloud, Sage’s guess was that it acted like an anaesthetic for Spirit Sense, numbing it when it entered the neon gas to create a blind spot. Just like when he was trying to find Twin Ringed Serpent’s Egg. He couldn’t sense the egg, only that there was a space missing from his senses.

The last Ancestral technique of the Twin Ringed Serpent was simultaneously the most and least interesting. It was called ‘Soul Spawn’, the technique which made the Twin Ringed Soul Serpent it’s most fearsome. The Serpent’s eggs are all born inert, that is to say they never hatch on their own. They aren’t unfertilized as they don’t require mating, instead the eggs are nearly a clone of the Serpent. When the Twin Ringed Serpent is facing death, it can choose to abandon its body. Just like when Sage was fighting it, the soul leaves and enters the egg. The egg then becomes active and will incubate and mature to match the characteristics of the Serpent’s soul. Once it hatches, the Serpent is born with a brand new body. It means a whole new lifespan, but it also means starting back over collecting energy and training muscles. The Serpent is reborn, but as a child once again.

True reproduction is performed by collecting an excess of soul energy with the Twin Soul. The Twin Ringed Soul Serpent splits off a permanent version of the Twin Soul, imparting its Ancestral Memories along with the traits and tendencies it hopes will make the next generation better. The new soul is no longer a twin, forming a unique identity as it enters one of the eggs. Unlike the normal Twin Soul this doesn’t just split the soul in half, instead leaving the original Serpent with barely a fifth of its original strength. The Twin Ringed Soul Serpent can save itself from death in most cases so it’s no wonder their reproduction is so slow and difficult.

Sage planned on learning all the techniques from the Twin Ringed Soul Serpent’s memories as it provide a stealthy attack and defense. If he could hide from Spirit Sense he just needed a normal level technique to hide his appearance and sound. Mmm, someday I might just be a ninja!

Next on the list of improvements: Formations!