Regaleon: The Forgotten Knight

Back in the physical world, Aureleah had finally found the solution to her conundrum...

For what seemed like an eternity, the silver-haired Assassin had been trapped at the final threshold of becoming an Etheryean. She had already awakened every Secondary Aether Vein within her three Prime Organs, yet she remained incapable of taking the final step.

The problem had been simple to identify; solving it had been anything but.

Aureleah had spent what felt like countless cycles of thought experimenting with different methods of circulating Aether through her Secondary Veins but every attempt had ended in failure.

At first, she had assumed the problem was the Veins themselves. Then she realized that she had been looking in the wrong direction. In actuality, the problem wasn’t the Veins; instead, it was the Organs connected to them.

As it turns out, her three Prime Organs were competing for Aether.

Whenever Aureleah directed energy toward one of them, the others instinctively drew upon the same supply but before the Aether could sufficiently nourish and strengthen the Veins within one Organ, part of it would be siphoned away toward another and that led to an absurdly inefficient distribution of energy.

It was as though she were trying to fill three enormous reservoirs using a single narrow stream of water. No matter how long she waited, the water would always be divided between them, leaving all three reservoirs perpetually incomplete.

In a nutshell, her three Prime Organs simply required more Aether than the amount she had been drawing from the Essence Pool could provide. So the solution was obvious; she needed more. Perhaps twice or even three times the amount of Aether she had previously been absorbing.

At first, the solution seemed almost embarrassingly straightforward but the moment Aureleah tried it, she discovered another problem; her Primary Aether Veins couldn’t handle the influx.

To put it in a simple perspective, the situation was much like a massive hall connected to the outside by a narrow doorway. The hall could accommodate hundreds of people, but if the doorway was too small, only a few could enter at a time.

Her Secondary Veins were the hall while her Primary Veins were the doorway. And the amount of Aether required by her Secondary Veins simply couldn’t pass through her existing Primary Veins quickly enough.

The phenomenon was a classic case of flow restriction; the Secondary Veins could accommodate the energy but her Primary Veins couldn’t deliver it.

And so, Aureleah had no choice but to return to the phase one and that was to expand her Primary Veins further.

At first, the idea seemed absurd.

Her Primary Veins should already have reached the natural limit of their expansion, yet the moment Aureleah began directing Aether into them again, she discovered that they hadn’t and there was still room for their growth.

It was then that the realization gradually dawned upon her.

For an average cultivator possessing only one Prime Organ, there existed a natural threshold to which the Primary Aether Veins could expand. That threshold wasn’t arbitrary; instead, it was nature’s method of regulating the amount of Aether that could pass through the body’s central pathways without damaging them.

The larger the demand created by the Secondary Veins, the greater the Primary Veins needed to become. And when that natural threshold was reached, the practitioner was expected to stop.

Trying to force them beyond that point was not merely dangerous, it was suicidal. As a matter of fact, the consequence of forcefully exceeding the limits of one’s Aether Veins was known as Vein Rupture.

Unlike Essence Deviation, which could already be devastating, Vein Rupture was often immediate and catastrophic.

The Aether Veins would swell beyond what their walls could contain and tear apart, leading to some of the most violent and gory explosions during cultivation.

Perhaps Aelric had already known about this and that was the reason her warned them to proceed with caution.

But Aureleah had also discovered something else, her limit wasn’t the same as theirs because the existence of multiple Prime Organs had changed the equation.

The greater demand placed upon her body meant that her Primary Aether Veins possessed a correspondingly greater capacity for expansion. And the moment Aureleah realized that, she acted with immediate alacrity.

The silver-haired Assassin began drawing Aether from the Essence Pool. This time, the reaction was instantaneous as the surface beneath her body began to churn and boil.

Mist spiraled toward her from every direction, twisting into enormous vortices before disappearing into her body.

From the outside, Aureleah appeared to have become the center of a miniature storm. Yet she remained perfectly still, allowing the energy to surge into her Primary Veins.

Aureleah had always possessed an inexplicable sensation during cultivation—a subtle feeling that her Primary Veins were somehow slack, as though they possessed more room than they were currently using.

She had never understood that sensation but now she did...

Across Aureleah’s chest, the black patterns surrounding her heart began to move. They twisted and converge before spiraling around one another with increasing speed.

The darkness became so concentrated that it seemed as though an abyss was opening beneath her skin. This went on for several minutes until suddenly...

BOOM! BOOM!! BOOM!!!

A tremendous shockwave detonated outward from Aureleah’s position, tearing through the mist and scattering it in every direction.

The thick white veil that had obscured the center of the Pool was blown apart as though an invisible curtain had been ripped from its hinges.

Sylveris, standing at the edge of the Pool, was the first to be struck. She instinctively raised both arms to shield her face; her silver hair exploded backward while clothes snapped violently in the wind and for several seconds, she could barely keep her eyes open...

The commotion also immediately attracted the attention of the five Etheryeans nearby.

Caelestra stared toward the center of the Pool, her delicate brows furrowing as she spoke. ”That’s strange.”

She narrowed her eyes as he looked at the silver-haired Assassin still in deep meditation. ”I thought she had already awakened all of her Secondary Aether Veins.”

”She has.” Aelric’s calm voice answered from beside her, his gaze fixated upon Aureleah.

Vaelorin turned toward him, his fiery eyes narrowing. ”If she has, then what exactly is happening to her?”

Aelric didn’t answer. Instead, the corner of his lips curved upward. There was something almost mischievous and enigmatic in his emerald eyes as he replied.

”Why don’t we wait until she’s finished? Then she can tell us herself.”

Caelestra rolled her eyes. She knew that Aelric was being deliberately cryptic again. Still, none of them pressed him.

Instead, their attention eventually returned to their conversation but it was different now. A subtle restlessness had entered the group and every few moments, someone’s gaze would inevitably drift toward Aureleah, their eyes filled with curiosity and wonder...

Meanwhile, the explosions finally subsided, a clear sign that Aureleah had succeeded. Her Primary Aether Veins had expanded and now, she could proceed.

Without wasting another moment, the silver-haired Assassin began drawing Aether into her Secondary Veins. This time though, everything was different.

Her Aether didn’t scatter or get siphoned away prematurely. Rather, it flowed through her Primary Veins before moving efficiently into her Secondary Veins.

For the first time, all three Prime Organs were being nourished simultaneously. Fortunately, Aureleah’s conjecture had been correct and the moment that realization settled within her consciousness, she increased the flow of Aether.

The Secondary Veins began expanding before thickening and this was occuring simultaneously across all her Prime Organs.

Minutes passed as she continued with the cultivation. Eventually, the Aether inside her reached a critical point. Her entire body shuddered and the next instant...

BOOM!!!

An explosion erupted from Aureleah, a more intense and violent one...

And as usual, its shockwave was accompanied by its own mystical phenomenon.

The first thing to occur was the sudden drop in temperature. The shift wasn’t gradually; rather, it was instantly. The warmth disappeared from the cavern as an unnatural cold descended upon everything.

Sylveris gasped, her breath escaping her mouth in a mistical form that was visible to her eyes. The others also stopped speaking. Even Aelric’s expression changed slightly when they all perceived that unnatural shift in the atmosphere.

The cold was biting, crawling beneath their clothes and sinking into their skin like thousands of tiny needles.

It was oppressive, almost suffocating in its intensity and for one brief moment, it felt as though winter itself had descended into the subterranean chamber.

At the center of the Pool, Aureleah remained motionless...

In the next moment, black smoke began rising from her body. It emerged from beneath her skin; thin strands at first... Then thick tendrils.

They curled around her like living serpents. One moment they resembled the twisted visage of a wailing ghoul; the next, they stretched into the horned silhouette of an ashura. Then they dissolved... Only to reform again.

The fumes weren’t merely smoke. They seemed to possess intent; a will and character of their own. It was as though the darkness surrounding Aureleah was an outward manifestation of something buried deep within her; something ancient, feral, and profoundly sinister.

As if that was not terrifying enough, Aureleah’s hair began to move next; one strand after another.

Her silver hair slowly lifted away from her shoulders, twisting and coiling. And as if moving with a life of their own, the strands writhed through the air like serpents awakened from sleep. Some lashed outward while others curled around her face. A few even extended skyward, twirling as though trying to grasp something.

The sight was so unnatural that, for a fleeting moment, Aureleah resembled the legendary Gorgon of ancient myth.

Except there was nothing mythical about what stood within the Essence Pool.

Her transformation was neither beautiful nor graceful. Instead, it was bizarre, ominous, and unsettling.

The black smoke continued to coil around her, her silver hair continued to writhe and the freezing air continued to spread. Yet through all of it, Aureleah remained perfectly still.

Then just as they began, everything suddenly stopped. The smoke collapsed inward, the temperature gradually returned to normal, her hair descended gently around her shoulders, and the violent currents of Aether settled.

For several seconds, there was absolute silence.

Then Aureleah’s eyelashes trembled. Her silver eyes slowly opened and the moment they did, a strange, unfamiliar light flickered within them...