Chapter 585 Agnes’s soul avatar (part 3)
Agnes saw Aster jumping out of the palm of her soul avatar to then look at it with curious eyes, which made her softly giggle.
"What do you think, let me tell you that my soul avatar is way more tough than what it looks like~", she said.
Aster chuckled, he was rather curious about her soul avatar indeed, finding a person who not only puts as much efforts in the soul path as the energy path is already really hard, since in the four Heavenly Quadrants, the soul path stops at the Soul King realm.
And those who aren't fixated on becoming Soul Kings, at most cultivate to the Sea of Knowledge realm in the soul path, before completely focusing in either the energy or body path to then reach the peak of the transcending realms, and only after reaching the Heavenly realms would they try to continue advancing on their secondary path, this is more prominent in those who have the soul path as their secondary path, but it also applies to most cultivators regardless of what secondary path they chose.
That being said, the previous is something those who basically give up on pursuing transcendence in their secondary path, do, which is the usual actually since that it the easy way to safely reach the peak of the Transcending realms to then jump to the Heavenly realms.
But Agnes isn't like that, with her talent she could have already entered the Void Manipulation realm in her main path which is the energy one, but she has instead put all her efforts in the soul path after reaching the Genesis Manifestation, because she wants to reach the Transcending realms on it, naturally that will increase the hardships she'll have to face to advance in her main path, but in exchange she'll be way stronger than her peers.
That is one of the requirements that anyone who wishes to be considered a genius has to fulfill, at a Heavenly Quadrant scale, and is something that Lilia and her sisters did back when they were part of the youngest generation, their two paths were at the Transcending realms simultaneously, which only heightens the fact that they all reached the Heavenly realms in their main paths.
"Well, it's hard not to admire such a pretty soul avatar, not to mention a property as rare as "solid" soul energy, something that shouldn't be possible below the Soul King realm no matter how much one condenses it", playfully said Aster, which made both Agnes the real one and the one made out of orange light, blush, which was quite an interesting reaction.
'Oh, so when you are that synchronized with your soul avatar, emotions show on them too', thought Aster, he might have obtained a soul avatar way before he should have, since he didn't have a soul constitution back then, neither he had reached the Transcending realms, in at least one path while also cultivating the soul at least to the middle part of the earthly realms, which are the two points at which one obtain a soul avatar.
That's in part why having met Agnes was quite a strike of good luck, since she also has a soul constitution and probably more important, she is willing to share knowledge about it with Aster, for it to act as a reference for him.
Agnes whose face was blushed suddenly woke up from her stupor as she saw Aster's cunning smile.
"I-I won't fall for sweet words this time, however if you show me what you did to your intent, I will tell you about my soul avatar and the name of my soul constitution!", she exclaimed with sparkling eyes, it was obvious she was going to tell Aster anyway, but she also was dying out of curiosity about the enlightenment Aster reached regarding his sword intent.
Aster chuckled as he decided to follow her game, since this was her date anyway, also her enthusiasm-filled expression was rather cute.
"You have seen me using my intent before right, what did you think about it?", asked Aster as he observed the countless swords buried on the mountain where they had landed, they all had different auras, colors, shapes and signs of decay due to their usage, but they all shared one thing in common, this mountain only contained great swords whose lengths went from 1.8 to 2 meters.
Agnes didn't even have to think about it twice before she answered with total confidence.
"Dominant, explosive and fierce, I specially remember that spirit technique which creates a huge golden pillar of light, I would say that embodies the type of swordsmanship you practice".
Aster nodded, as expected of Agnes who is also quite adept to the sword, her evaluation was quite accurate, Aster never defended when he used his sword, he always overwhelmed his opponent crushing it with force.
"That's right, before my mother allowed me to even touch a wooden training sword, she told me to think on what kind of fights I would like to partake in the future, and she didn't let me do anything else before I gave her a satisfying answer…", mumbled Aster, which made Agnes softly laugh.
"As one would expect from the Lilia who has never been defeated", she said.
Aster nodded, even before he came to know about sword intent and other things like that, Lilia had already given him some preparation for when he reached the third level "concept", and that was without influencing him with her own style.
That little exercise made Aster create a pre-idea of what he wanted from the sword path, when others only put their all, in practicing by swinging their swords, Lilia taught Aster that being a swordsman is not only being skilled with a sword but a state of mind, those are the pillars of the third level of intent which is a really big jump in quality.
To be honest Aster wanted to hear some stories of Lilia from Agnes, but not only he could feel the sharp gaze of that mother of his from within the mind space, but he promised her to not inquire into her past until he entered the Transcending realms or before they returned to the Drage family main territory whatever happened first.
Agnes then gazed at Aster before adding.
"That's what caught my attention, because the sword intent you used at the life and death arena, was extremely opposite to what I have seen you using before and it was… magnificent~", she cutely said.
Aster couldn't help but laugh, he then extended his hands and took out a couple of golden swords from the mind space, since technically using spatial treasures was forbidden in this place, but the mind space couldn't be restrained.
Agnes limited to observe with sparkles in her eyes, in any case, William will be the one to pay for their date, so they could break as much rules as they wanted to.
"Oh, so that's the second trial of this place", said Aster as he saw some of the swords suddenly becoming active as soon as he tried to use intent.
"Mm, of course one's intent won't naturally admit to be inferior to another person's one, especially when they have properties that belong to the same type, the Treasure Graveyard is a trial created at the high ranked Stellar Systems to test how would the members of the current generations fare in comparison with those that came before them", said Agnes.
Aster nodded, those buried swords were only releasing a similar level of intent as the one he was currently trying to use, so it was as if he was competing against the owners of those swords, when they were in a similar level as him, in other words this trial was hard no matter who took it, because its difficulty adapted to the one's level.
"Mm?", Agnes saw Aster suddenly smirking and she wondered what was he planning, just to be amazed at his next actions, previously Aster started slowly using his sword intent on the sword he was holding with his right hand, which made her curious about why he was doing it at such a low speed.
Aster is someone that has set a foot in the third level of intent, in other words he already has a hint of what his "concept" will be and as such, wielding the first two levels is something he should be able to do as natural as breathing, without even the need to think about it as it has become an instinctive thing at this point.
the sword which Aster held with his left arm.
"That is!", she couldn't help but exclaim and then rush towards 'Was he just trying to figure out the point of this test?', was what Agnes thought until her attention was completely drawn towards the sword which Aster held with his left arm.
"That is!", she couldn't help but exclaim and then rush towards Aster with a fascinated expression on her pretty face.
Aster softly laughed at her childish reaction, as much as he wanted to flirt a bit with her, he actually couldn't focus on something else, despite him being really skilled at parallel thinking.
But it was for a good reason, Agnes wasn't the only "one" whose interest was caught by what Aster was doing, another batch of swords, different than the first ones started to radiate their intent trying to interfere with Aster's.
The second batch only joined now for a simple reason, the sword on the left had a different property than the sword on the right, despite both being great swords, in other words, right now, Aster was using two different types of sword intent!
Looking at Agnes who had "Tell me", written all over her face, Aster exhaled and then stopped using intent on the sword on the left to then did the same on the one on the right, only then he relaxed a bit.
Aster who got to witness the rare sight of Aster showing signs of tiredness, woke up from her stupor and she immediately grabbed Aster's left arm, using her spirit sense enhanced with soul energy to see if there was damage done to Aster's body.
Aster didn't resist and allowed her to see the state of his muscles, bones and she even felt how some of his meridians were.
"Sorry I got too excited earlier that I didn't put my priorities in order…", mumbled Agnes, seeing the current state of his bones and muscles made her heart clench, externally he looked normal, but on the inside it was as if he was hit by a giant hammer, a lot of his muscles thorned apart and even his bones which were stupidly tough thanks to the Paragon body, had cracks on them, this happened all over the left side of his body, with the exception of his neck and above.
Looking at Agnes whose expression was as if she was about to cry, Aster softly smiled, his body shone in a bright yellow light, as he used yang radiance to stimulate his already insane recovery speed.
Agnes was marveled at the sight of Aster's thorn muscles and cracked bones, instantly repairing, her pretty sky-blue eyes glowed with happiness as a sensation of relief flooded her chest.
"You could have told me that it was detrimental to do that, here I was constantly asking for you to show it", said Agnes with a pout.
Aster laughed as he sat cross legged on the ground, which Agnes did too, but unlike normal she didn't sit in front of him, but next to him, at his left to be more accurate since she was still inspecting to see if there was permanent or residual damage, she went as far as to palpate Aster's arm and leg to inspect specific important muscles.
If anyone here knew about the body, regardless of being a body cultivator or nor, that was Agnes who directed part of the strong interest caused by her Fey lineage to physical training.
Only after she finished checking, she gazed at Aster directly to then say.
"How in the world did you do that?", previously Agnes got a bit too heated and didn't question how, she got carried away by her curiosity, but after she saw the state in which Aster ended, everything was set aside and now she just wanted to know how did he come up with such a dangerous thing.
Aster saw the genuinely worried expression on her pretty face and he couldn't help but feel a warm sensation in his heart, what he did has no precedent in the four Heavenly Quadrants, and for someone like Agnes who is literally curious by nature it really meant a lot.
To Agnes's surprise, Aster leaned his head against her shoulder, which made ger feel as if a bolt of electricity ran through her body, but she managed to hide her reaction and just waited for Aster explanation.
"I could say that I was lucky, since the sword I'm working to attain, turned to align perfectly with my own attribute", said Aster as he observed his hands.
It's not like there hadn't been other people who managed to learn more than one intent, especially since the natives of the four Heavenly Quadrants had long been stuck at the Heavenly Conqueror realm, so the families with long history had been looking for ways to surpass that threshold, whether they are related to one's realm or not.
Bloodlines, constitutions, intent, spirit treasures, anything as long as it allows them to display a greater might than what they possess is welcomed, of course Aster is way too far from reaching that point as of current.
But what he did is not the same of what those in the Heavenly realms, are practically forced to do as they know that they will hit their limit sooner or later, which is use their virtually endless lifespan to start all over again in a different way than what they had followed up to that point.
According to Lilia, at the Drage family, anyone who reaches the Heavenly Transformation realm, has to select one of the previous as their new focus, since advancing at the Heavenly realms might as well take more time than what one used to go from the initial mortal realms to the peak Transcending realm.
Lilia didn't have to put much thought into it, as the first ever Drage with both black hair and red eye traits, she was urged to never change her focus from developing her bloodline, by her family, naturally she ignored them and did as she wanted, which ended up in her putting her focus on her intent.
Which is one of the reasons as to why she was forced to give birth to a successor by her family, but that's something for later, the point is that those who instead focused on intent prior to the Heavenly realms have two options, either start over by trying to learn a second intent, or try to go for another of the aspects that can increase their strength regardless of their realm.
In other words, it's not that rare to see a Heavenly realm who has more than one intent, that being said, the same rule as the secondary path applies to them, so even if they reached the third level on their first intent with relative ease, developing a second one is amazingly harder and they have to do it from the very beginning, to the point that no one has attained double third level intents as of current, not even Heavenly Conquerors.
"Mom was once a bit "light headed" and told me about the methods that the ruler families had come to surpass the natural stagnation caused by reaching the Heavenly realms, so I always kept that in mind, and recently an opportunity presented itself after I obtained my dragon eyes", said Aster to then add.
"The concept I chose contrary to what one would expect, isn't fierceness, explosiveness or anything like that, what I chose was something that could englobe all the previous, control".
Agnes's eyes glowed, she seemed to be lost in her thoughts for a moment but ultimately, she shook her head.
"It still doesn't explain why you have two different intents that had set a foot in the third level, that is a state that only a few people, all in the Heavenly Comprehension realm or above had achieved, not
to mention no one can use the two of them at the same time like you did, unless they want to die of course", she said with an accusatory gaze, due to how worried she felt a moment ago.
Aster smiled at her, his right hand shone and he casually manifested ghost sword, the nearby swords resonated and tried to get in Aster's way, but his intent responded by aggressively cutting those appeared all over them.
Agnes nodded, at the previous scene, that's what she expected from Aster's using his intent in the Treasure Graveyard, since from her point of view, no one of the owners of the swords in this place would have even been close to be an opponent for him when they were at his age, realm or level, the aspects taken into account for this trial.
In case you wonder why this didn't happened earlier when he used intent on his two hands, that is because he couldn't spare the attention to even retaliate, not to mention those intents didn't really cause him any problem, so he ignored them.
Agnes saw Aster dispelling the ghost sword on his right hand, to then extend his left hand, which made her instinctively grab it with her right hand.
"That's enough, I don't need any more explanation, let me show you more about my soul avatar", she said in a rush worried that Aster will end up in the same horrible state as earlier.
Aster looked at her hand which was holding his, and only then Agnes realized what she did, her face exploded in red, but she bit the bullet and didn't let go of it, despite her heart which was cutely racing due to the close contact.
'There it is again, that tingly sensation on my chest, is that what sister Valentina told me about?', she wondered, before she put the subject at the back of her mind for now, she returned to reality with his left hand as the gathering point, the resulting projection 08:08
was exactly the same as the one he formed with his right hand on intents, causing the swords that emitted it to be shaken as cracks when she saw Aster's left hand shinning too, the color was actually the same as the one on his right hand, but the sensation was completely different, which told her that Aster ignored her words.
But as she was about to say something, her words stuck on her throat as she felt Aster's hand intertwining with hers.
Aster laughed at her cute reaction, as he formed the ghost sword with his left hand as the gathering point, the resulting projection was exactly the same as the one he formed with his right hand on the outside, but there were a couple of important differences.
First of all, though Agnes could see the ghost sword and even previously felt when Aster was manifesting it, now it was as if the sword didn't exist, she actually doubted her own eyes, no, it went beyond that as even with her spirit sense she couldn't properly determine whether there was a sword floating there or not, and she was seeing it.
But thanks to her using her spirit sense while holding Aster's hand, she could tell that there was no damage being done to him unlike before, which made her pretty eyebrows burrow.
As much as Aster was enjoying teasing her, he didn't wait long to explain.
"I have been urging you all to integrate aspects of the three paths in your fighting styles, so how can I not follow what I preach".
Lilia's training starting after his awakening, had a way more positive effect on Aster than what Lilia would have expected, because that day was when Hyperion and annihilation became visible for him.
The previous "him" died due to not being able to stand the pressure of his own strength, and for the Aster of back then who wasn't sure whether Hyperion was an absolute ally of him as he had yet to meet Rya, he decided to walk in the sword path with the direction of absolute control.
Which proved to be the right thing to do, his fighting style, innate strength, lineage and his attribute which represented himself had always been way stronger than others, his problem lied in a different aspect, which is that he had to be stronger than all the previous, if he didn't want to end up being crushed by his own power.
And to Rya's surprise, Annihilation the representation of fierceness and extreme unrestraint, allowed Aster to wield it as he pleased, and now that combined with the concept he was pursuing, produced an amazing result.
"I didn't train two different intents at the same time, I don't think I would have been able to reach this point in the two of them at my age, even if I were to be always in the mind space, no… I trained in my intent as a whole and recently split it into its two major properties using annihilation", said Aster with a smirk.
"…", a sepulchral silence fell on the place for a moment, before three different voices could be heard saying the same thing in unison.
"What!", Agnes, Lilia and even Rya all exclaimed in disbelief.
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