Ken was creating a new Alchemy approach on the run, and its specialty was injecting medicinal effects into food.
The young alchemist knew that he couldn't concoct a pill under Edmund's watching eyes without arousing the latter's suspicion, but he could cook a meal!
'I will call it Soul Protection Salad,' Ken amused himself in his mind as he dug in. The taste was bland as there was no taste, but the child took bite after bite without hesitation. A scene that every parent dreams of seeing unfolded; a child eats their nasty salad without any resistance.
The Soul Protection Salad's effect was not hard to guess. By extracting so many essences of ingredients with soul properties, Ken created a dish with the same effect as a pill that would coat one's soul in a layer of Qi for a while, nurturing and protecting it.
'I'm ready, my strongest weakness is my soul until I advance to the next stage, so it's better to protect it.'
Ken stored back the furniture and the cauldron in his storage ring and entered the now-unlocked room. He asked the elder about any hidden formations in the room.
"Hmph. There was one that contained my coffin, but since I was directly inside it, I could easily destroy it, unlike the door."
"Easily? How long did it take you?"
"Ahm, 1833 years," Edmund confessed with an embarrassed tone.
'Another improbable lie. His pride in his declaration was obvious, there's no way it took him that long. He just can't leave the coffin as Elder Galen's runology knowledge transcends his comprehension,' Ken felt a sense of pride in Galen's mastery when he remembered how he got the elder's recognition.
'Ah, this manipulation is annoying. I must get rid of it somehow,' the young teen muttered to himself when he noticed the marks in his soul acting out.
After chatting with the elder for a while, Ken pushed the coffin's lid and hurriedly looked toward the corpse's neck. The corpse belonged to a black-haired middle-aged man with tanned skin and a distorted furious expression that eternalized his anger toward his captors.
"I'm finally free! Hahaha!"
Edmund laughed merrily, and his voice disappeared. Ken knew it was his cue to start working. He hurriedly lifted the elder's head, revealing the man's nape. At the same time, he felt a strong force engulfing his soul, trying to consume it and take control.
Despite the imminent threat, Ken remained calm and worked with maximum efficiency. He injected his Qi into the black circle-like mark on the corpse's nape, and a collar was ejected, appearing around the man's neck.
He could feel the layer of protection made by the Soul Protection Salad was getting overwhelmed quickly, but he didn't let it hinder his movements or break his focus. He hurriedly smeared a drop of his blood on the collar from a wound he opened in his finger and channeled his Qi into the artifact to bring it under his control.
It was a race against time, and Ken took first place. Edmund took second place, but unfortunately, there were only two contestants.
As soon as Ken finished imprinting his Qi on the collar, the desperate elder lost his ability to attack his new master and his soul was sucked back into his body.
"Wait? I'm inside the coffin? How am I here???" The elder bellowed when he understood the situation. However, Ken remained apathetic to the man's plight as the other climbed out of his grave.
"Kneel," Ken let out a single word, and the elder was forced to obey.
"THE SLAVERY COLLAR!" Edmund screamed in rage when he recognized what was compelling his movements. He believed he was free when he was out of the elders' control anymore when they ascended; he believed there was a glitch in their plan.
"First, you are not allowed to tell the supreme elders anything or do anything that might harm my interests in any way. Next, I'm still curious, what did you plan to do with my body once you took over? My body has different attributes than your soul in addition to the normal inhibitions of merging foreign body and soul."
Ken asked the kneeling elder. He could see that the elder would die soon. When the elder told him he would age to death once the coffin was opened, Ken was even more sure of the man's evil intentions. Nobody just accepts death.
"Normally there's a limit to how much time a soul can be out of one's body. The limit is a result of the person's continuous change and development; nobody remains the same throughout time, and if the soul and the body grow in different environments, they'd turn incompatible, and the human will perish."
"I see, and..?" Ken waited for the elder to finish his explanation.
"And the situation was different now because of the coffin. The coffin separated my soul, mind, and body from one another, and as you can see, nothing happened to me. My soul lived outside my body for two thousand years and lost any attachment to it, allowing the soul to occupy whichever body I want, albeit the merging wouldn't be perfect," Edmund explained against his will when his master asked him questions.
"And why choose mine over everyone else in the secret realm?"
"Because it'd be risky to try to take over a fifth-rank body. You are at the fourth rank which would allow me to create a Nascent Soul compatible with your body and my own soul, acting as a bridge. Your foundation seems much better than anyone else's, so I picked you. It'd be best if I could get a body without a core, but the elders restricted the entrance of cultivators under the fourth stage."
"I get the gist of the situation. Anyway, how long do you have left to live? Your first wrinkle already appeared," Ken poked the man's wound.
"I… probably around 10 minutes, maybe 15."
"Let's maximize our gains from your remaining time then with a few more questions."
The 𝘮ost uptodat𝑒 novels are pub𝙡ished on fre(e)webno(v)el.𝒸𝑜𝘮