Chapter 82: Essence Fireseed, Equipment Mutation

Day after day, night after night...seven days passed in the blink of an eye!

Dawn. The appointed day. Bai Yunfei once more awoke from his stupor. After mentally adjusting himself, he glanced at the skies outside, then lowered his head. He raised his right hand, clenching it strongly, then shut his eyes again, carefully sensing things.

A moment later, Bai Yunfei once more opened his eyes, a hint of surprise in them. But then, he frowned once more, a look of worry appearing.

"I need just a bit more. I can sense that with just a bit more, I'll enter the Soul Sprite stage! But I'm caught at this critical juncture...will I have enough time?" Thoughts flashed through Bai Yunfei's eyes as he considered the current situation. "Most importantly of all...at the Soul Sprite stage, for my soul's elemental attribute, I've already decided to choose fire, but if something changes..."

"Still, the next stage is right before me. If I stop now and fight Zhang Zhenshan as a late-stage Soul Warrior..." Bai Yunfei's frown grew even deeper was he mentally struggled with what to do. Moments later, a vicious look on his face, he revealed a hint of determination and madness in his eyes. "If I'm going to do it, then I'm going to do it all the way! I made my decision seven days ago; how can I shirk back at the final instant! I have a few more hours before the afternoon...I can do this!"

Waving his wrist, he pulled out a long saber, swept it with his gaze, then murmured softly to himself, "Upgrade!"

In an incomparably practiced manner, he spent tens of minutes upgrading items before finally exhausting his soulforce and passing out on his bed.

The sun slowly rose. Hints of sunlight seeped through his thin window screen, shining into his room. One hour. Two hours...

Slowly, the little room seemed to begin to change slightly.

Bai Yunfei still seemed to be asleep on the bed. His breathing was regular, and there was nothing strange about it. Then...what was different?

As time flowed on, the difference in the room became more and more apparent...it was the light!

Under the bright light of the sun, the room should have been illuminated already. But at some point in time, a faint red light stealthily appeared, growing increasingly apparent. It slowly deepened into a crimson color, and then other colors slowly began to emerge as well. The colors appeared out of nowhere, increasing in number and richness. Towards the end, the entire room had transformed into a rainbow color...and then the light slowly began to flow about. Moments later, all of the light focused in one region; the region around Bai Yunfei!

After spending some time swirling around and 'inspecting' Bai Yunfei, finally a hint of crimson light slowly left the 'squad' of light and gracefully flew towards his chest, then slowly merged into his body.

Its actions seemed to serve as a signal, instantly causing all the other colors in the surrounding area to begin to move in unison as they flew towards Bai Yunfei. They approached every part of his body, then slowly moved in.

More and more light fused into his body, and more and more light appeared out of nowhere. Slowly, Bai Yunfei's body began to change. His forehead began to slowly furrow and tighten. Towards the end, his face was completely contorted and twisted, as though he were under immense pain. His fists were clenched, and his entire body was trembling slightly.

If Hong Yin were present, he would have been able to tell with a glance...that this was advancement into the Soul Sprite stage!

However, Bai Yunfei's current situation was tremendously different compared to most Soul Warriors advancing in power.

When Soul Warriors reached the limit of their power, after accumulating enough soulforce, the natural elemental energy of heaven and earth would be summoned, at which point they would decide to enter the Soul Sprite stage. First, they would choose their elemental essence affinity, and most would choose the type they were most suited towards. But of course, some would choose two types or even more. Those who made such decisions were either unearthly geniuses...or peerless fools. Because there was an element of choice, when the natural elemental energy of heaven and earth was summoned, when the flesh was being baptized for the first time, only the type of elemental energy that one had chosen would appear. It would merge into the body, then become the elemental essence energy for the wielder.

But there had never been, from ancient days until today, a situation where a Soul Warrior who was advancing to the Soul Sprite stage was in a state of unconsciousness...

Elemental energy entered his body, entered every inch of Bai Yunfei's body as it was being tempered. However, because Bai Yunfei was unconscious and unable to voluntarily 'choose' which sort of elemental energy he wanted, this current situation appeared, where a mishmash of energies was entering. His right arm was crimson; this was the fire element. His left leg was ashen white; this was the ice element. His left arm was golden yellow; this was the metal element...

Bai Yunfei's body began to shake harder and harder, and more and more agony appeared on his face. Beads of sweat constantly fell down from his forehead. If this were to continue...this random mishmash of elemental energy alone would be enough to tear his body completely apart.

"Aaaah!"

Finally, a miserable cry rang out from Bai Yunfei's throat. He suddenly opened his eyes. This time...he didn't 'voluntarily' wake up; he was tormented awake by a bone-deep pain that came from throughout his body!

His mind was completely blank for a moment. By the time he regained his senses, he saw all the types of light before him which were merging into his body...followed by a series of nearly coma-inducing pain that came from virtually every part of his body.

"This is...elemental energy of heaven and earth!" Bai Yunfei gritted his teeth, thinking frantically, "But why is there so much of it! What's going on...right! My choice! I need to choose!"

He knew that the most important thing right now was being calm. Bai Yunfei suppressed his agony, shut his eyes, and began to investigate the state of his body.

Chaos. It was utterly chaotic. The soulforce in his body was like an untamed stallion that had become unleashed. It was bounding everywhere without any pattern, with some of it seeming to pull in the power from the outside world into the body, and some of it strongly resisting and pushing back against that power.

"I can't control it. I can't control it! What should I do...what should I do?!" Bai Yunfei's sweat continued to grow, and the worry in his heart was incomparable. He swept his left arm with his sense...then let out a surprised, "Eeee? My right arm doesn't feel uncomfortable at all. This is...fire!"

"Fire! I can control it! This is what I want...I just want fire element. The rest of you can all beat it!" The situation in Bai Yunfei's right arm caused him to feel surprised and delighted. Without hesitating at all, he controlled the elemental fire in his right arm, pushing it out to spread throughout his entire body, seizing the 'territory' which the other types of elements had taken over.

The reason why all sorts of elemental energy had flooded into his body earlier was because he had been passed out. Now that he had regained his consciousness and was voluntarily choosing fire, his body began to reject the other types of elemental energy. A short while later, Bai Yunfei was finally able to drive out the other types of elemental energy, and the rainbow of colors surrounding his body seemed to have lost their guide. The colors slowly vanished, leaving behind just a crimson color that swirled around Bai Yunfei, slowly fusing into his body.

"Whew..." He could feel the agony racking his body gradually lessen and then vanish. What replaced it was a warm, comfortable feeling. Bai Yunfei finally let out a sigh of relief, and a look of delight appeared in his eyes. It was as though he had finally escaped danger.

Soulforce circulated throughout his body. One ball of elemental fire after another merged into it. Bai Yunfei could sense a series of blazing surges of energy constantly wash through every part of his body, and with each pass, he felt as though he could sense his body grow slightly more powerful.

Slowly, after the blazing energy within his body had made several loops within it, all the blazing energy gathered at one of the apertures within his heart. Soul cultivators termed this aperture as the 'essence aperture'; as the name suggested, it was the place used to store the elemental essence of a Soul Sprite. When advancing from the Soul Warrior level, gathering elemental essence was the final step; after the body was tempered for the first time, the body would be able to receive its first batch of elemental energy, and it would automatically gather the energy into the body, slowly circulate it, then finally form it into the 'elemental essence-seed' that would accompany the soul cultivator for his entire life.

Bai Yunfei could sense that all of the elemental fire within his body was slowly concentrating around his heart. A 'hot' feeling slowly grew stronger, as though...a seed of fire was beginning to form within his body. It constantly absorb all of the oncoming elemental fire, and it slowly grew larger, larger, larger...

More and more elemental energy appeared out of nowhere, and more and more of it flooded into his body, gathering at his heart. More and more...perhaps too more?

By the time the fireseed in his body had grown to the size of a thumb, Bai Yunfei had slowly come to the realization that something was wrong. He felt as though...he was growing 'too hot'?

The earlier warmth had grown increasingly great, transforming into a fiery heat that then transformed once more into a scorching blaze.

"This isn't right! It feels...as though I'm unable to control it! It's too much. Too much!" He discovered, to his terror, that he was actually becoming unable to control the elemental fire that was being absorbed into his body!

The result which Bai Yunfei feared the most was happening; because of how frantically he had increased his soulforce, the process by which he had advanced past the Soul Warrior stage and charged into the Soul Sprite stage caused this process of forming a fireseed, what should have been a simple and easy process, to mutate!

He was unable to control the complete essence fireseed!

He stared at the world, which now appeared completely crimson. He could feel the blazing, scorching heat within his body, and a look of panic appeared in his eyes. "I'm almost at my limit! If this continues, I'm going to be burned to death by the elemental fire! What should I do? What should I do?! I'm almost unable to endure this amount of elemental fire! Wait...right! Share it! The fire...Firetipped Spear!"

When this thought flashed through his mind, Bai Yunfei's eyes lit up. Not hesitating at all, he lifted up his right hand slightly, and with a thought he caused the Firetipped Spear to appear in his hand. Instantly, Bai Yunfei could notice the elemental fire within his body hesitate slightly...and in the next moment, Bai Yunfei seized back just a bit of control and forced a pulse of elemental fire into the Firetipped Spear.

It was as though a barrel that had been completely filled with water had suddenly sprung a leak. The continuously expanding fireseed within Bai Yunfei's heart actually did as he wanted, sending a pulse of elemental fire out through his arm and into the Firetipped Spear.

"It works!" Bai Yunfei was overjoyed. He could feel the pain in his body gradually begin to ebb. A thought flashed through his eyes, and he pressed his left hand against his ring on his right finger. That crimson bracer also appeared on his hand. Not hesitating at all, he pushed it onto his right arm.

The blazing pain within his body dropped once more, and Bai Yunfei let out a sigh of relief. Not daring to relax at all, he hurriedly controlled the constantly expanding fireseed in his heart to guide its energy out, restricting its size to roughly the size of an infant's fist.

Strands of elemental fire essence flowed out from the developing fireseed, carrying streams of elemental fire. Under Bai Yunfei's control, it flowed through his right arm, into the bracer and into the Firetipped Spear.

Both soul items were gleaming now, and were now beginning to throb as though they had their own heartbeat. Because the bracer came first in the sequence, it absorbed the most amount of elemental energy, and so the light of the Firetipped Spear was slightly dimmer. These two soul items, thanks to Bai Yunfei's actions to reduce the risk to himself, were quietly beginning to change...

After an unknown period of time that could've been anywhere from a few minutes to an extremely long period of time, the surrounding red light had finally been completely absorbed into Bai yunfei's body, causing the entire room to once more return to its usual situation. However, a lingering warmth remained within the air...

Bai Yunfei slowly opened his eyes. He wanted to sit up, but multiple notifications flashed through his mind that caused him to forget all of his actions due to surprise.

"Upgrade success."

"Upgrade success."

"Upgrade success."