Chapter 1563 A Talk With Skadi
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As the Titans began celebrations, I was still standing there, trying to make proper sense of everything I had lived. It felt like both a dream and reality at the same time. And strangely enough, it also feels like all the new power I gained there wasn't gone. The Runes of these beasts remain within me, and so my strength. The human body I had, slowly grew and transformed, and now it evolved into a Frost Titan.
"Err, excuse me, Skadi. I know it's done and all, but I really need more explanations." I asked her, as she forced me to sit down to her side, while the Titans brought large wooden tables covered on countless slices of piping hot roasted meat.
There were of all kinds, covered on delicious sauces and seasonings I had never tasted before. Titans had a very good cuisine, albeit simple perhaps due to their gigantic size, it was at least better than dragons who just ate everything raw.
"Ah, come on, you don't need to be so nervous around here! We're all family now, Drake!" She laughed merrily, although she was like ten times my own size. She gently patted my head like a mother would do to her child. "You're probably wondering why you feel like the power you gained in the trial is not gone, right?"
"You read my mind pretty much." I nodded.
"Well, the trial itself was indeed a trial, but it was also where your soul was stripped bare." She said. "The Frost Queen, through the ritual she made you undergo, allowed me to drag your soul and consciousness to our Realm, the Titan Records. You're currently located within the Lands of Eternal Frost where all of us Ice Titans' souls reside. With my Authority over this area of the Realm, I stripped you bare of most things, leaving behind the pure soul with the Spark generated from my Bloodline, now within your soul and body."
"So you can really do such a thing?! That's overpowered." I was shocked.
"Only within this Realm, and only to a soul! Due to how complicated it is for a non-Titan Soul to get here, I doubt I could ever employ it on the living, I am already dead after all." She shrugged.
"Oh… When did it happen?" I wondered.
"Long ago, but we can leave that conversation for another day, my son." She smiled. "Anyways, you were wondering what happened to that human soul of yours. Well, the Frost Queen did say you were a Reincarnated Soul, someone from another world with Unique Skills. Once I stripped you bare of what made you a dragon and those abilities, the only thing left aside from the Spark was your very self, the human you once were. This is the reason why your body took that appearance."
"Oooh…" I nodded. "Well that solves that mystery at least. But I thought Unique Skills were attached to souls, how did you strip me off them?"
"I didn't directly grabbed or did anything to your soul, I simply filtered what could enter. The rest was left behind. Your entire soul could not enter, only the part that didn't carry any of such powers." She explained. "So, you ended looking like a frail little human. I thought that such a frail weakling couldn't possibly become one of us, so I made you go through the Trial of Three Steps."
"The first Step you went through was harmonizing with the snow and cold, to accept it into your weak human soul and human body. Slowly, you froze and died many times, but came back over and over again." She explained. "The second Step was consuming the Fruit of Frozen Nirvana, grown exclusively here. You ate fifty of those fruits as you advanced through an endless snowstorm."
"All of those things refined your weak human soul and gave it power like never before. You evolved your past self, something you had only left behind to fully embrace your dragon form and soul."
"So does that mean… That there's no longer a human soul within me? I had no idea it was still there, lingering within the dragon I became."
"It still there, it simply evolved and absorbed the Spark of our Bloodline. Your human soul was refined through tempering and by consuming special Soul Treasures, those fruits." She explained. "Therefore, it has become more than human, your Soul began to evolve into a Frost Titan's Soul! But it was not done yet, you needed more tempering, and to show us you were brave even as small as you were, without relying on your powers and dragon abilities."
"So you made me go through that endless Snow Forest…" I sighed.
"Indeed!" Skadi gave a cute motherly giggle. "You had to develop your Azure Ice Essence first and refine it into your developing human-frost titan soul. By hunting those Snow Spirit Beasts, you were able to consume their power and hasten the process of cultivation and tempering. Over time you hunted it all and made you much stronger. The mammoth was the ruler of that Snow Forest, and now him and every other Snow Spirit Beast lives within your soul, fused and granting you the power to achieve the end of the process of transformation and soul evolution."
"I see… So it wasn't a dream after all, I really hunted living beings, ate them, and grew stronger…" I looked into my own blue hands. "My human soul became a Frost Titan."
"The clothes you made for yourself using their materials are also powerful Soul Gear." She said. "You may keep it, I'll allow it."
"Soul Gear? Wait the clothes are still here too!" I was shocked. "And… Wow."
They were overflowing with a divine soul essence, with an azure color. These clothes that looked so cool in my new body, were Soul Gear. A concept I had never heard of before.
"You're wondering what's Soul Gear now, right?" She asked with a teasing smile.
"I'm sorry, I am quite clueless about many things." I laughed.
"I'll explain, don't worry. Eat some food too, you're skinny!" She laughed out loud, patting my back.
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