29 Heaven´s Hell

The first level of the Heaven's Hell technique was simple compared to the subsequent levels and it only used a marginal amount of soul energy, even Jason could barely afford.

While the first level indicated that one required around 0.1-9 soul energy units in numbers, the second level would need at least 10-49 units of soul energy to work properly, with a few additional requirements.

Jason's soul energy was close to non-existent and he was fortunate that he could form a contract with a one-star wild beast owlet.

Now with his increased soul energy due to Artemis's growth, his breakthrough, and the big overall share he received through his unique soul, Jason's soul energy finally reached one unit, which was enough to control Artemis as his soulbond properly.

Having the lowest required soul energy, Jason could only perform the Heaven's Hell technique once, before his soul had to replenish the soul energy over time.

As such he had to be careful.

Even if the first level was simple it could be extremely dangerous.

Thus, he entered the soul world carefully where Jason came across the sleeping Artemis.

He found it amusing to walk around his own soul world. He hadn't done it before because there were too many things he had to do on priority earlier.

It was the first time for Jason to experience his soul world and he looked around with curiosity shining in his eyes.

All kinds of color could be seen floating around his soul world while a dense golden hue accompanied everything inside his soul.

His eyes fell to the ground and he could also see the golden hue enveloping him, causing Jason to feel refreshed and calm.

There was not the slightest anxiety seen in his eyes as the tranquility filled him with newfound energy.

Looking around Jason got the feeling of being at home and at peace.

In this place, he was welcomed, which made him happy as he continued to walk through his soul world until he reached its center.

There was a golden unstable liquid in the form of a ball that was floating slightly above Jason´s head.

Everyone who underwent the soul-awakening had the same thing inside their soul, which was a mysterious liquid ball in various sizes.

Meanwhile, the soul and the size of the liquid, surrounding the weird-looking ball, varied for each individual.

The existence of the liquid ball was the same for everyone and it was the soul energy surrounding the so-called soul world core.

Many also called it one's soul but the commonly used name was soul world core.

Around the soul world core was the soul energy swirling around in the form of unstable liquid.

The amount of soul energy within indicated the size of the core because it was normally stored inside the core.

While most cores had at least the size of a ping-pong ball, Jason was glad that he had found his grain-sized soul world core within a rather short amount of time.

His core didn´t have a particular form right now and there was only the mysterious liquid revolving around the soul world core as the center.

The soul world core was the starting point of each soul world and its life.

Looking at the grain-sized soul world core, Jason was slightly embarrassed about his unique and fabulous soul world but useless soul energy.

The golden hue around him began to shine faintly as he calmed down almost immediately, oblivious to the shimmer surrounding him. which Jason didn't really notice.

Remembering his main purpose to enter the soul world, Jason concentrated on the grain-sized soul world core.

He tried opening the soul world core slightly, as he wanted to move the soul energy around.

From the formless liquid, he created a wafer-thin thread which most humans couldn't even see except someone blessed with exceptional eyesight like him.

The more soul energy Jason extracted, the smaller the amount of liquid around the soul world core became.

After his whole soul energy was taken from the liquid that enveloped his soul world core, Jason saw a golden-colored marble with an indescribable size as it was almost not visible, even to him.

This almost invisible marble was his real soul world core and it was almost embarrassing for him to even look at it due to its microscopic size.

This golden marble i.e, his core had mysterious inscriptions on it and while the liquid floating around it was the unstable soul energy. This energy was ejected by the core produced by his first soulbond.

The first step of the Heaven's Hell technique was to draw out the unstable energy around the real soul world core with his mind to form a thread with the energy.

This step wasn't dangerous, instead, one needed to have sensible and accurate control over soul energy.

His soul energy thread was less than half a meter long and wafer-thin due to the very good innate control he had over mana.

The first step was done in a relatively short time once Jason got the hang of how to handle soul energy.

After that, one could see Jason sweating buckets inside his tent while gasping for air.

He only sat down and nobody could imagine that he entered his soul world except the small golden hue shining around his head as an indicator.

Inside his soul world, Jason readied himself for the painful part as the unstable soul energy was now formed into a complete thread.

He would have to pierce through the golden marble with his thread to inject the soul energy inside it to force a certain growth.

Without a little nudge, Jason's soul energy wouldn't increase and it was necessary for him to force himself in order to do that.

He had to aim at a certain spot to maximize the effect of the technique and it took him quite a long time to find the right spot as it was already difficult for him to even see the soul world core.

As he forced the thread to pierce into the marble, a searing pain spread through his whole body as it felt like hellfire itself had ignited within him.

The pain rapidly spread through his brain, flowing through his veins like molten lava making him feel as if he was burning on the inside.

While he cried out in pain inside the soul world, one could see the liquid thread invading the golden marble blending into it after a certain amount of time.

Jason had never felt such pain before and he continued to shriek in agony, but he couldn't leave the soul world as it could harm or even destroy his soul if he made the slightest error.

Until the whole wafer-thin thread completely blended into the golden marble, Jason had to endure the torture. And so he gritted his teeth and did just that.

An hour later the whole process was over and Jason left the soul world with the floating golden marble in the center. He was drenched in sweat that made his clothes stick to his body and it flowed in rivulets down his face. But, he didn't have the energy to wipe it off as he was utterly exhausted. Slumping to the ground, he fell into a deep slumber as sleep overtook him.

**

Waking up due to suffocation early in the morning was as unpleasant as before and Jason pushed the furball, also called Artemis away, gently.

Opening his eyes, he could see Artemis who looked at him as if he had betrayed her and Jason felt her range of emotions that were filled with sadness.

To make up for his rude behavior, he pulled her into his embrace, and her mood changed instantly.

He activated his mana eye's special ability to look at her plumage and saw that she had slightly more mana in her blood than a day before.

If this continued, Artemis´ ability could reach the strength of a two-star wild beast while being a one-star wild beast in the future.

Continuing this mind game Jason was eager about her future growth and her evolution.

When he entered his soul world to look at the golden soul world core Jason noticed something unexpected.

Injecting the unstable foreign soul energy into his soul world core should only be done once a day because the replenishing effect would take a long time for the soul world core to push out the unstable energy.

However, looking at the still unstable, formless liquid surrounding the marginal small golden marble, Jason noticed that his whole soul energy was already replenished and expelled.

A soul world core was like a generator and dialysis at the same time, producing a fixed amount of soul energy until its energy was used up.

Refilling it with the expelled soul energy would activate the generator, causing it to once again expel the injected soul energy after cleansing and purifying it in order to make it more stable.

Once the soul energy would reach a certain size, purity, and degree of stability, the real process of the Heaven's Hell technique would begin with the subsequent levels.

Jason wasn't even remotely close to meeting a single criterion that was previously named but he was still astonished to see that his soul energy was replenished this fast.

With this, he could already practice the Heaven's Hell technique again.

Normally it would take a whole day to have one's soul energy replenished but Jason had slept for less than 6 hours and his soul energy was already completely replenished.

Thus Jason set down and repeated the same procedure as the day before.

This time, it took him 90 minutes and he writhed in agony through the entire duration that was much more painful than the day before. However, this time, he didn't fall asleep or faint.

Enduring the pain quietly, Jason finished his practice, before he stood up.

Washing up, he walked out of the tent into the open plains where he could see hundreds of youth gathering next to some strong-looking middle-aged men and women.