Chapter 1090: 1090. Hair

Noah felt the breakthrough of his dantian drawing close only after three centuries spent training in that peaceful period.

It was needless to say that such speed surpa.s.sed the realm of the talents, but it wasn't as monstrous as his other centers of power. Moreover, he felt that he lacked something to finalize his advance.

Still, peace worked against those seeking enlightenment. Noah could only cultivate and meditate since no adventure or opponents gave him the chance to test himself.

Of course, Noah would act if the issue persisted for too long. It wouldn't be his first time doing something reckless in the hope that it benefitted his growth, and the Elbas family was always there for him. 2

His training didn't reach that point yet, so he continued to use traditional methods to train. For Noah, that meant using the Seventh Kesier rune, eating peak rank 5 magical beasts, and cultivating with the Demonic Sword.

He paired the traditional training with his many projects. The Divine Cut occupied most of his attention, but he found time to forge and test other inscriptions. Also, he had to deal with Night's constant hara.s.sment. 2

Among his centers of power, his mind had the most remarkable growth. The Seventh Kesier rune wasn't a copy. It was the actual piece of the fur of a rank 7 Kesier Ape, and its benefits were almost miraculous.

Noah struggled to believe how easy it was to enlarge his mind with that divine item. He had even stopped using his spherical rune since he preferred to use all his mental energy in those training sessions.

The Seventh Kesier rune improved the st.u.r.diness of his mental walls too. In those three hundred years, the internal pressure caused by Snore and Night had almost vanished.

His body had improved steadily. Noah didn't have many rank 6 meals in those years, but his lack of hunger made them easier to endure.

Peak rank 5 magical beasts could satisfy him. His level didn't increase with them, but he couldn't do much better even if he went out to hunt rank 6 creatures.

As for those powerful beasts, most of them were hard to find, and Noah didn't want to spend months studying their tracks and planning hunts unless it was necessary.

Some of them weren't on the lower tier either, so he didn't know if he could defeat them.

Luckily for him, the dark star took care of the growth of his body. It didn't matter if it was food, darkness, or "Breath". His rotating heart kept on improving his tissues with whatever fuel it could find.

The dark star depended on his dantian. Any improvement in his darkness would necessarily increase the power and efficiency of his fourth center of power.

His dark matter had become slightly unstable as Noah neared the peak of the fifth rank. It was about to transform, but it still lacked a little push. It would be up to the rank 6 darkness to make it take the last step.

Snore was in the same situation as the dark star. Its existence's depended on Noah's higher energy, so it had yet to become a fully rank 6 creature according to the world's labels.

The Demonic Sword was in the same situation, even if its issues came from Noah's dantian. It couldn't reach the sixth rank unless his individuality moved to the next stage, but it still required a decent amount of nutrients to appease its hunger.

Noah had a few ideas for what concerned his Demonic Sword. His existence had evolved after the breakthrough of his body. Instead, his living weapon had remained tied to his hybrid status.

He felt that he should try to fuse the dark matter with the blade's fabric, but the Divine Cut took most of his time, and he didn't want to approach that project when his higher energy was so unstable.

The same didn't apply for Night. Since the core of the rank 7 Pterodactyl was its mind, Noah could experiment freely with its body without risking its life.

Countless sword forms floated inside Noah's mind. They performed harmless cuts before shattering and fusing with his mental sea once he understood them.

Noah's consciousness was inside the ancient aura of the Cut. That was his longest training session inside the divine inheritance so far. He had been sitting on top of the tower for fifty years already.

The sword arts shown inside his mind covered every possible technique that involved blades. They went from delicate thrusts to a violent series of slashes.

Noah lost himself inside the constant enlightenment. His consciousness wavered until he almost forgot who he was. It was as if everything about him was becoming a sword.

Still, that path wasn't his. The creator of that inheritance was an unparalleled expert, but Noah was different. His individuality could have the form of a sword, but he was much more than that.

That was the reason why he never let his mind wholly lose itself in the ancient aura. He didn't want to lose his path while pursuing methods to improve his power.

Noah wanted to learn from the Divine Cut, not become its copy.

Something unusual happened when the forms that had acc.u.mulated inside his mind fused with his lowering mental sea. Usually, new figures would appear until Noah exhausted his mental energy, but that didn't happen at that time.

Swords entered his mental sphere and ama.s.sed to form a human figure. Noah's focus spiked as the ghostly shape of a man landed on his mental sea and inspected the area.

The man appeared relatively young, not even in his thirties. He had long hair and beard, and the same went for his eyebrows that fell on top of his eyes.

An intense sharpness spread from his figure. Noah felt as if everything about him was a blade. Every hair, every inch of his ghostly shape was a sword that pointed at him.

The man scratched his hair and lifted his eyebrows to stare at Noah's ghostly figure. His attention briefly went on Snore's shape, but he quickly recognized the owner of that mental sphere.

Noah could finally see his eyes when he removed the hair in front of them. The man didn't have pupils nor irises, but Noah could swear that he felt a sharp gaze on him.

There was an unfathomable truth in his eyes. Noah couldn't even begin to understand it, but he knew that it was there.

'Is that his law?' Noah thought, but the man began to speak before he could inspect him further.

"So," The man said, "You must be a fellow swordsman."

His words carried a sharpness that hurt Noah's mind even after it went through centuries of training with the Seventh Kesier rune. Yet, Noah endured the pain to perform a quick greeting bow.

The man began to mumble as he kept his eyebrows lifted. Noah felt naked in front of his empty gaze, but something told him that he had to go through that inspection to reach the next stage of the inheritance. 1

The man eventually shook his head and placed his arms on his waist as he shouted his final evaluation. "You are a brute!" 3

The shout forced Noah to focus on keeping his mental walls stable, but part of his mind remained on the man since he didn't seem to be over yet.

"You swing swords as if they were hammers!" The man shouted again. "You only rely on your physical strength to obtain power. Come back here when you can differentiate blades from maces!" 3

The sharpness intensified until Noah felt forced to cut the connection with the ancient aura. He had to disperse the pressure acc.u.mulated in his mind even after the outside world appeared in his vision.

Once he recovered, he found a one meter tall bird-like creature looking at him with a mocking expression. 2