Reaper of the Martial World

Book 12: Chapter 99: Secret of Life (2)

“How will you study it?”

Lilith wasn’t actually interested in such things. Other than her sword and Dyon, she didn’t really care about much else other than her wish to be free. However, sensing that Dyon seemed completely focused on the time at hand, and wanting to spend more time with him, she couldn’t help but ask these questions.

“I spent decades grasping my Master’s self-created path of array alchemy. It taught me a lot of things about how the world of alchemy and the world of runic vein theory might be connected. There’s a lot of potential hidden in the idea of forging pills with flesh and blood.

“Just like I’ve analyzed heavenly herbs to now, I want to see what kind of secrets are hidden within void beasts.”

Lilith’s gaze flashed with a peculiar glint. If such a thing was possible, wouldn’t that mean that Dyon hoped to one day create beasts from his array alchemy much like he created heavenly herbs? Wouldn’t that be too much?

Dyon smiled, seemingly seeing through Lilith’s thoughts.

“I don’t think it would ever be possible for me to do that. Well… It would be possible, but… Watch this.”

Dyon’s soul qi surged. In the next moments, Lilith witnessed a scene that made her uncontrollably pale in horror.

Very quickly, Dyon’s soul qi began to wrap in on itself, forming complex inner workings several levels more complex than Lilith had ever seen before. But, moments later, those runes quickly became bone, then flesh, then a layer of skin, then thick fur.

In just a few moments, an adorable little mouse appeared. It sat on the steel-like tables with its eyes closed as though taking a lovely little nap. But, very quickly, as soon as it lost the support of Dyon’s soul qi, it began to grow old and whither away.

Its lush black fur quickly turned grey and began to shed. Its lively pink skin turned a grotesque pale shade of green and grew wrinkled. And then, as though that wasn’t enough, it collapsed into a pile of ash as though it had combusted from the inside out.

Lilith paled beside herself. It wasn’t that the sight was too disgusting. If compared to the void beast remains in this very room, it was several levels better. However, she subconsciously felt that she had just witnessed something horrible, too horrible to even be put into words.

It wasn’t until she caught Dyon’s haggard breathing coming from beside her that she snapped out of it, turning to him with a worried look on her expression. She turned just in time to see the last flickers of Dyon’s burning soul.

The small wisps of illusory white flames danced across his skin one last time before vanishing.

Dyon smiled lightly as Lilith’s exaggerated worry. She even went so far as to dab the sweat on his brow away. He was just a little tired, it wasn’t as though he was dying.

“This is the truth.” Dyon said after he caught his breath. “Constructing a body of flesh and blood isn’t impossible, it’s just that the requirements are several times more stringent.”

“Is it because you need a stronger soul to sustain it?”

“Not necessarily. There are countless methods I could use to sustain it without placing the burden on myself. I have many ideas, one of which is replacing blood with a nutrient rich substance of my own making. It wouldn’t even be all that difficult either.”

Lilith couldn’t help but look toward Dyon in awe. Has his array alchemy really reached this level? Even creating life wasn’t impossible? If such a truth was known to the immortal plane, what kind of uproar would it cause?

“The real problem numbers two…” Dyon said somewhat solemnly. “… There are two pillars of life that I will never be able to replicate no matter how hard I try. The first is blood essence.”

Blood essence was something that Dyon could hardly fathom. There was a reason he was so shocked when the blood sprite that cannibalized the Dragon King’s body was capable of bypassing the laws of the Heavens to absorb it anyway.

“However, even that problem isn’t too large. Blood essence just breaks down to the lineage advantages passed down through clans. Those abilities are ultimately constructed by fundamental runes. Complex combinations of them, yes. But, not impossible to comprehend.”

In his battle with the three facet Overlords, Dyon had plundered the abilities of many high level species from the cyclopes, to the three legged crows. So, he knew it wasn’t impossible. All he had to do was hunt enough of a species down.

“The real barrier is the secret of life itself.” Dyon jaw set. “The soul. I have no way of recreating a soul.”

A sense of understanding came over Lilith. Heavenly herbs were known as ‘life forms’, but they very rarely formed souls of their own. As a result, replicating them was very easy for Dyon. However, true living beings with flesh and blood all had the impossible to reconstruct things hidden within them. How could it be possible to create a soul?

“Can’t you forge the body and then… find a soul to fit it?”

Dyon grinned. “It’s an excellent idea. The only issue is that souls and bodies have to be compatible. You’d ultimately have to reconstruct a body in the image of a soul, and there are already countless techniques that do that. In fact, my master and her husband were resurrected by one of them. By then, I wouldn’t be doing anything groundbreaking, I would just be finding a new method to do something that already had many solutions.

“That said…”

Dyon grabbed at air, causing a blackened soul to appear in his palm. It was the soul of the jellyfish void beast.