Chapter 26: Celestial Singularity Art.
[A/N: This Chapter is important for a better understanding of MC’s Power System. Please read it carefully.]
***
People in this world awakened to mana at the age of sixteen. At least, that was what most people on this continent believed.
But mana was a fundamental force of life. Every person carried it within their blood, just as they carried oxygen.
It existed within a person from the moment they took their first breath, accumulating little by little until their body became capable of enduring its destructive force.
Generally, that happened when a person turned sixteen and the amount of innate mana they possessed depended on how much had accumulated within their body.
But I was different.
Unlike everyone else, I was born with a pitiful and cursed physique, as people called it, because of which even after reaching sixteen, I never awakened mana.
Without mana, there was no way to awaken a talent either because mana acted as an intermediary that evolved one’s soul and manifested it as a talent. That was also the point when the world’s will deemed a person worthy enough to reveal their status window.
That was one of the reasons why my own family hated me enough to bully me like crazy but even as weak as I was, mana existed within everyone and so, I became the first person to awaken late at the age of seventeen but my bad physique never improved.
Because of this, I had countless troubles progressing through the ranks. While monsters like Aurelion and Lily stood at the peak of the Awakened Rank in current time and even normal peasants struggled through the early stages of the same realm, I was still stuck in the Mortal Rank and the gap between us continued to widen.
But later, after going through countless hardships and meeting my master, I learned something.
My cursed physique wasn’t a curse.
It was a blessing.
My master was the one who taught me that. She even called it a boon granted by the heavens.
My body was weak because unlike others whose bodies and souls matured together at sixteen, my soul had been developed since childhood.
I knew the reason.
It was because I was a reincarnator.
But my master called it the Origin Vessel Physique.
Because my soul had matured since childhood, most of my mana and life force were spent keeping it contained instead of increasing my physical strength, resulting in a physique weaker than that of a goblin.
My master worked through the remainder of her life to create a technique for me, a technique that would work only for me, an incomplete technique.
It was that very technique which made me strong in my previous life, although I could never catch up with the true monsters because I had learned it too late.
But in this life, I had no intention of repeating the same mistake. If it had been possible to use it in the Mortal Rank, I would have done so already but people at the Mortal Rank didn’t possess a core to utilise it.
Suppressing my chaotic thoughts, I focused on one specific part of my memories. The memories of the technique my master had created for me.
<<Celestial Singularity Art>>
I didn’t focus on the mana in my surroundings. Instead, I peered inside my own body, sensing every inch of it, every vessel and trying to feel the blood flowing within me.
As I did, my consciousness gradually entered a trance before drifting somewhere else entirely.
A vast empty space filled with knee-deep, pure blue water stretched endlessly around me. Above, a grey sun and a pale blue moon hung in the sky.
The space itself was my soul.
The sun represented my [[Regression]] talent, just like it had in my previous life but it seemed to greyed out since its use was complete...
...and that meant the pale blue moon represented my new talent, [[Insight]].
While the water beneath me was the mana my soul had accumulated since childhood.
Years of accumulation had changed my soul itself, transforming it into something akin to a world capable of storing and generating its own mana.
That was the reason behind my delayed awakening.
Until the age of sixteen, my soul had greedily consumed every ounce of mana I possessed and only after it became self-sustaining did I finally awaken at seventeen.
If I could fully utilise all of this mana, reaching Transcendence or even going beyond it would have been easy...
...but doing so would destroy my body beyond repair.
Even using it at the Awakened Rank was difficult enough. After all, unlike ambient mana, my own mana was far purer because it was born from my own soul.
And that was precisely why it was so dangerous because it had quite the rebellious personality just like me.
So without trying to be greedy, I focused on the blue water around me. It was all my Vector mana but most of it refused to obey my command, resisting my will.
Seconds passed and then minutes as sweat rolled down my forehead. Finally, I managed to barely control less than one percent of it because that was all my current body could endure.
After nearly half an hour, I gathered all the mana I could control and condensed it into an orb and without further hesitation, I willed it into the air and it obeyed.
Immediately, beside the massive sun and moon, a completely new celestial body appeared, blinking like a star and several status windows appeared before me.
[You Have Successfully Formed Your Soul Core]
[You Have Ranked Up To Tier I Awakened]
[Unique Art : Celestial Singularity Art Is Added]
[Unique Skill : Celestial Breathing Is Added]
Almost on cue, my whole soul started trembling as a small hole appeared beside the newly formed core, greedily sucking the mana within it for a few moments before stopping, as if it had become full.
I wasn’t worried.
That hole was the link between my soul and body.
Unlike others who built their mana core within their bodies, my core existed inside my soul while that hole acted as the bridge allowing me to utilise it in the real world...
...and slowly strengthen my body as well.
The world’s will responded to the change immediately, confirming my thoughts.
[Physique has grown slightly]
[H-Rank → H+ Rank]
[Note : Your Existence Has Become Slightly Less Pitiful]
I ignored the unnecessary comment from my [[Insight]] talent and willed myself out of the space as my consciousness returned to my body.
Although the increase was small...
...it was there.
And it was enough.
Enough for me to finally enter the Forbidden Ruins.
