Chapter 528: Avatar (3/3)
Now that the final ritual was needed to be done, Lith gave a look to Lilith indicating he needed her assistance.
The last ritual was the stage where Lith would share his consciousness and split his soul.
Lilith walked closer to Lith, who had begun engraving a new spell around the body on the ground.
A few minutes later, two magic circles were formed and in the middle of one was the body and the other was Lith.
Lith sat in a cross-legged position and started circulating his spiritual power into the engravings below.
The engravings lit up, indicating the ritual had started and Lith focused fully onto his mind sea to link it with the body.
While ensuring that, Lith also tried to split some part of his soul as without having a soul, the avatar cannot have a consciousness.
[Ding!]
The system's voice rang in Lith's head as he focused on his soul splitting.
[Host must choose the amount of soul to be split.]
Lith had an idea that such a thing might happen when splitting his soul.
Generally, as the person aged, their soul would increase in strength as well. The strength also depended on their cultivation.
Lith had got a good lecture from Lilith and Lucy about soul.
When born, the people of this world would have a soul equivalent to a mortal's soul which was the refrence point and considered as one.
The value of soul stayed as one until a person awakened their Magic Core.
After the awakening, the soul's value would be equivalent to two, which meant, a person's soul is equivalent to twice the strength of a mortal soul.
In such a manner, the strength of the soul increased naturally without a person having to do anything and only some people with the occupation of summoners, enchanters, and so on, would ever bother to do something else to increase their soul strength.
There were soul arts to improve soul strength due to these people but generally it was not needed.
Lith being a reincarnated being, and also an immortal, had a stronger soul than others of similar age. Though one might think it was a good thing, at the end of the day, it would cause some problems to Lith.
The body was a vessel for the soul. If the strength of the soul increases a lot, the body cannot contain it and one might end up in a precarious situation; in very extreme cases, even dead.
This ritual was beneficial for Lith since he could shave off some excess strength of his soul.
He became an immortal at a very young age and it was taking a toll on his body.
Lilith and the system both had asked Lith to rest and it was to stop accumulating any more experiences and put more stress on himself.
Thankfully, the ritual came on time and now Lith would have some stress taken away from him.
Lith, being in his meditative state, first decided to check what the strength of his soul was. Though he knew it was really strong, he still wanted to see the numbers.
He asked the system in his mind to show him the said numbers and in the next moment, the system stated:
[Soul strength: 89]
Lith, who was calmly sitting in a lotus position, became alarmed as he saw those numbers.
It was too powerful!
It would've been understandable if his soul was probably twice as stronger than he thought but this was too much!
It was almost 4 times the normal levels!
At the age of twenty-one, the normal strength of a soul was around ten to fifteen for normal people.
Lith assumed that his might probably go a little over twenty, maybe even thirty. But this was too much of a shocker to him.
89, that number meant Lith's soul was 89 times stronger than a mortal's.
No wonder his body was at so much stress.
Lith then asked in his mind, 'How much soul strength can my body handle?'
[Answering Host: 25-30]
Lith nodded internally. It was within his expectations.
His body was young and it could only handle as much strength of the soul.
Lith then asked, 'How much soul strength can the avatar handle?'
[Answering Host: 15-20]
'Can it go till 29?'
[Answering Host: It can be stretched till 21 or 22, but anything over can cause the ritual to fail and the host to get serious injuries.]
'How much are the chances to succeed in the ritual?'
[Less than 3%]
Lith clicked his tongue as he saw that number. Wasn't it too low?
He pondered over the situation and thought of what step he must take next.
He then ended up deciding to not take stupid risks and asked the system,
'What are the chances of success if we go with 19 soul strength?'
[100%]
'What about 21?'
[66%]
'What about 22?'
[33%]
'23?'
[17%]
'24?'
[12%]
'...' Lith didn't understand these numbers at all. They made no sense with the way they were decreasing.
In any case, the more soul strength he tried to put into the avatar, the more were the risks of failing.
Since Lith didn't want to take any risks, he decided to simply cut off 19 soul strength from his original one.
'Split 19 soul strength and begin with the final step.' He commanded.
[Initiating soul splitting...]
Lith's focused fully onto his soul now as this happened.
Lilith on the outside wondered why the ritual had stopped but then she could feel the fluctuations in Lith's soul and understood that the ritual might've started.
She took her position, ready to help Lith at any moment's notice.
Luna was in the hall as well, on standby at a corner. Lith hadn't asked her to leave and so she didn't go.
Soon, Lith's body started trembling as the soul splitting process had started. It was mild but could be seen by Lilith and Luna.
But from the inside, Lith felt great pain as his soul was being cut off.
He couldn't describe this pain as it wasn't a physical injury, but something damaging his soul.
Shaving off some part was no joke and the pain was so much that Lith wanted to scream.
Thankfully, his tolerance was really high and he didn't end up screaming and worrying his mother and maid.
A few minutes passed and the pain was only intensifying further.
Lith's mind sea was in chaos, his elemental cores around the Magic Core were also fluctuating with elemental energy. Things had begun getting heated.
Lith bore the pain and endured. While doing so he asked in his mind, trying to understand how much time he had to endure more,
'Progress?'
[43%]
'Damnnit!' Lith cursed.
It felt so long yet only 43% of it had progressed. It was so shitty!
But Lith still endured and bore with the pain. He had to preserve!
Why wasn't he screaming and shouting in pain one would ask?
It was because Lith was embarrassed to repeat the past things.
He still remembered that when it was his wings awakening ceremony, Lith screamed like a little bitch and ended up worrying both his mother and sister. Not just worrying them, they even ended up shedding a tear for Lith as they couldn't watch him in pain.
Lith still felt cringed knowing he shouldn't have screamed like that at that time. But then he could only sigh as it wasn't in his control. He was pretty new to this world and also very new to such pain. He had no idea at that time that it would pain so much.
In any case, he didn't want to repeat such a situation again and he tried to toughen up.
Soon, his pain automatically eased as he heard in his mind,
[...99% ...100% ...Soul splitting complete.]
[Sharing consciousness...]