Awakening

[Host, you are a helpless bastard...]

Ace felt as if he was awakening from a long deep dream, he looked around but could only see endless white.

"Where am I?"

[Does it matter?]

"...You damned machine, just answer my question," Ace felt like he wanted to go back to dreaming.

[This is a space deep in your soul, it was made by my creator. Don't ask more, I won't tell you.]

"...What happened?"

[You went crazy and lost all your wits, that's what happened.]

Ace felt like he wanted to beat the shit out of the system, but he knew it was impossible.

[Anyway, you are lucky to have me. In the last moment, I preserved your soul from being damaged, but your brain turned into a mess.]

"But then, why did I go crazy?"

[Because your soul is linked to your brain? Think, bastard! If one is bad, the other will eventually be affected.

[Because your brain was damaged, your soul fell into deep sleep.]

Ace sighed and muttered, "Why do I feel that your mood is worse than mine?"

[Because I had to pay a price? I spent some original energy left by my creator to save you.]

"...Thank you, then," Ace said.

There was a short awkward silence.

"Now, what should I do?" Ace asked.

[I think I discovered the key for you to advance to the next realm]

Ace twitched the corners of his mouth and said, "How useful can it be right now? I can't even sense my body."

[You are too stupid to understand immediately, so let me explain.

[The Martial Enlightenment Realm is much more dangerous and profound than we thought. While it is true that one should focus on improving the state of mind rather than doing some slow grind, it can lead to deadly obsession.

[You fell into a deep obsession and eventually lost control of your own power, damaging yourself.]

"I see... only now I notice that I wasn't normal back then," Ace nodded, "But what is the key?"

[Haste makes waste, you only got the past enlightenments when you were calm and without hurry. This realm tests one's focus, willpower, patience, and talent.

[If you lose your cool and get hurried, you will fall into obsession without even noticing, and might eventually kill yourself by accident.]

"...So simple?" Ace was dumbfounded.

[Not exactly, I also noticed that this realm brings about some restlessness to one's mind, and this might worsen things.

[This restlessness is also strange because it brings with itself bigger opportunities for one to improve the state of mind.]

"I remember something like this from my original world," Ace suddenly said, "Something like heart demons and heart tribulations, and only after surpassing those can one achieve a higher level."

[You are always remembering strange things.]

"Those strange things helped me a lot!" Ace frowned with obvious dissatisfaction.

[Anyway, I made some comparisons and simulations with the original data given by my creator and made a hypothesis about the next breakthrough.

[Probably, this realm is about preparing one's soul and state of mind to come in contact with a higher level kind of... knowledge.]

"What do you mean?"

[Some creatures in the original space-time first improved their souls to then come in contact with the world's laws. Do you understand my train of thought now?]

"Oh, I get it! Just like the Foundation Establishment Realm of the novels was the preparing ground for the cultivators to reach the Golden Core Realm and come in contact with the World's Rhyme."

[...]

"So, what do I do? I am not in a good spot right now."

[Have you forgotten what kind of existence I am? As long as you have enough power to back me up, I can sense anything, including the rules and laws of the world.

[But since you are in such a sorry state, I can only sacrifice some of my original energy left by my creator to help you out.

[I will make you directly sense the laws of the world you are, at least their surface. As long as you break through to the next realm, your body will hopefully be healed.]

"What is the price?"

[I will lose my ability to control your soul power in the future, and the ability to sense things outside your body without your help.]

"So much?" Ace frowned.

[Don't ponder as if you have a choice, you know you don't.]

"But am I good enough to come in contact with such high-level knowledge?"

[Depend, there's a way out to quickly complete your transformation of the state of mind and soul and reach the peak of your current realm.

[I will make you come in contact with one of the most dangerous and obscure laws, the law of cause and effect. Of course, it will be just the most exterior mysteries of the law, but it will make your soul sink into your own memories so deeply you will feel like you lived the same lifetime many times over.

[The process will be arduous and you will feel like dying, but unable to! Are you ready?]

"Do I have a choice?" Ace asked with a sigh, "Let's do it."

When the words just left his mouth, Ace felt a deep sense of helplessness filling his soul as he was thrown into a strange state of being.

It was as if he could perceive invisible threads linking many of his memories together, creating a large complex web of his past.

It was beautiful, but his mind felt overwhelmed and he was constantly being washed by his own memories over and over again while many mysteries began to become clear to him.

In just a few seconds, Ace in truth relived his life through his memories numerous times. Every time he completed a cycle, he understood something new.

But because everything was occurring so violently, he had no time to sort everything he understood.

Over time, he slowly began to forget what was his original goal. As the web of memories expanded, because he was living the same memories again and again, Ace began to lose himself in an abyss of his past.

[Enough...]

When the system just spoke, Ace left that strange state of existence and stared blankly into the white space.

[Incompetent bastard... What can you do without me?]

A white hand condensed above Ace's head and patted him.

[Come back!]

Ace suddenly regained light in his eyes and began to open and close his mouth, without knowing what to say.

[If not for me sealing a great deal of your repetitive memories, you would be in a very sorry state...]

"Why was it like that?" Ace asked after a long silence.

[Because you are still unable to sense the outside world, the only way your soul could handle the sudden mysteries shown to it was to dive deep into your own memories.

[It wouldn't be like this if you could control your body. I mean, you wouldn't sink into your memories.]

Ace was silent for a long time, he was still having trouble calming the turbulent waves in his heart.

[By the way, your body began to break through.]

"What!?"

[Your soul and state of mind just experienced sublimation, what did you expect?

[Just hope that your body manages to use this as an opportunity to heal itself.]

Meanwhile, Lin and Cin were worriedly looking at Ace's body as an enormous vortex of spiritual energy formed around him.

When they noticed the anomaly, they brought him to a place far away from the village, afraid it would be destroyed.

Over time, the vortex of spiritual energy grew so strong that the clouds in the sky were affected and began to gather and form dark clouds.

"I sense danger..." Lin muttered while looking at the dark clouds in the sky, "Is this really a breakthrough?"

The dense and strong spiritual energy was swallowed by Ace's body non-stop, and his energies constantly absorbed it to strengthen themselves. His reserves and density of aura began to increase exponentially as well.

As he grew stronger, more spiritual energy was attracted, and the greater the impact on his surroundings.

His strong and overflowing vital energy began to wash his body so strongly that many hidden wounds began to heal, including the ones in his brain.

His eyelids began to tremble and after a few minutes he opened his eyes, "I'm finally back..."

He felt the great changes occurring in his body and soul and was dumbfounded. His aura was so dense that in the center of his energy core, there was a solid spherical condensation of it, and it was slowly growing.

His soul began to transform as well, and it was the first time it welcomed such a violent transformation. The spiritual energy was directly swallowed by it, instead of being first refined by his soul power.

Over time, Ace began to feel greatly bloated by the huge amount of power gathered in his body, he felt like his flesh was about to burst because it was unable to keep the pace of his energies.

At the same time, thunder and lightning formed in the sky, and the loud sounds echoed through many kilometers.

Perhaps because he was the center of everything, the lightning was also gathered at the top of his head.

He felt a mortal danger coming from above and only had the time to cover himself with his aura before he was swallowed by violent lightning bolts.

His clothes were instantly pulverized and his whole skin and hair were burnt, he felt like how whole body was almost melting.

He had no time to think complex things and could only do his best to mobilize his aura, and even his soul power and vital energy, to resist the onslaught of the lightning bolts.

Not only severe burns, but the bolts also cut through his flesh, opening deep wounds and breaking many bones.

Without him being able to notice, the amount of spiritual energy he absorbed began to 8ncrease tremendously as his energies began to rapidly empower themselves and even his body began to directly absorb the spiritual energy, not waiting for his viral energy to nourish it.

His body began to finally transform and strengthen itself as fast as his energies, it began to resist the lightning better and better, while more and more bolts descended from the sky because of the spiritual energy vortex becoming larger and stronger as he absorbed more of it.

At some point, Ace felt as if his body transcended a certain barrier and began to no longer be as beaten by the lightning as before, and even used the energy from it to heal itself.

His vital energy began to quickly transform into something new while merging with some of his blood essence... similar but much more powerful than vital energy.

It began to flow along his blood to all the corners of his body, nourishing and transforming everything violently.

His soul also transformed after his soul power was bathed into lightning, it was much more condensed and formed a much stronger soul power and soul sense.

In the center of his energy core, a solid sphere of aura formed, it was the condensation of all his aura, and nothing was left out.

The sphere of aura began to sping after there was no more aura left in his body, and with each spin, it absorbed large amounts of spiritual energy and refined it into a purer and stronger aura.

The new aura that was formed by that core was somewhat different from before, but Ace had no time to ponder over those things as he was still fighting for his life.

But as if sensing it couldn't damage and transform Ace further, the spiritual vortex around him began to disperse, along the dark clouds and lightning.

A great pit formed in the middle of the forest and smoke from pulverized wood filled the air. The pit was full of fulgurites, pieces of glass formed by the lightning hitting the ground successive times.

In the middle of the pit, Ace was on the ground as if he was a bag of trash. Large chunks of dead skin were hanging on the newly formed skin, giving him a horrendous appearance.

When the siblings saw his state, they panicked and approached to see if he was still alive.

But before they could come too close, they trembled in instinctive fear. It was as if an invisible pressure formed around Ace, and the world there was blocked.