Once the seal broke Naath did not stop his cultivation of the empty soul method but rather his speed increased further! With his body freed, he ran his true void arts at the same time converting his own martial energy into soul energy. This was one of the two major advantages of his true void arts. He could replicate any energy he had absorbed or encountered before. Naath’s speed skyrocketed from three cycles an hour to seven cycles in a single hour! The rune even with his newfound firmness and stubborn stance was amazed.

Naath was still livid about what the rune had done and refused to stop until he could never be bound like that again! Now that he was free Naath began to grit his teeth and circulate everything faster and faster. Driven by the anger he was feeling his true void arts circulated at a rate comparable to when he was trapped in the fear formation during the entrance exam. Despite the rate he was converting his own martial energy into soul energy at, he was still gaining martial energy. Naath lost track of everything but the singular thought of surpassing the rune’s control.

The air around him became turbulent and the energy in the surrounding area was drawn in and compressed into Naath’s bones at an astonishing rate. Back at the elders’ building on the top of a mountain, all of the elders were currently slack-jawed and simply didn't know how to respond to what they were seeing. The air around Naath was moving towards him at such a rate that it was visible from its density and thickness. The sound it made was like a hurricane that seemed like it wanted to swallow the entire forest. The tree Naath was sitting on began to visibly be broken down into energy and was absorbed by him.

Elder Gui on his lake was also going slack-jawed. Not because of the natural energy Naath was absorbing, but because he could sense Naath’s soul sea expanding at an unheard of rate. Back in Naath’s soul sea, it was as if it were the apocalypse, the rune was stunned at what he was seeing. Naath’s soul sea was being drained, expanded, and refilled once every few minutes! In fact, the energy it was refilling with was so dense that after a few hours the rune heard a “drip” sound. The rune started to vibrate as if it were shaking from fright as it slowly turned around to look at the sound.

When the rune turned even without a physical body he seemed to turn pale. Where he was looking there was a drop of liquid soul energy. This was something that only happened when a person's soul energy had hit a density ten times higher than the person's soul sea could handle if it weren't compressed! If this one drop of energy were not compressed into liquid, Naath’s soul sea would have long since shattered and exploded. Outside of Naath’s body, Brutus sat nearby and had mostly recovered. When he heard the wind whistling and air going berserk he opened his eyes and saw something that made his every instinct scream to retreat.

Naath was sitting on what was left of half a tree and resembled a demon. His every vein was popping out, his skin had changed colour from the incredible blood pressure, his eyes had snapped and it looked as though he had two pupils in each eye. The whites of his eyes were now a crimson red. Combined with the aura of absolute rage and killing intent Naath released, Brutus involuntarily retreated hundreds of feet away. Even the surrounding magical beasts began to retreat away from where Naath was. The inside of Naath’s soul sea was not the only place that changes were occurring.

In Naath’s body his bones began to compress again and again, Naath was cultivating his soul sea and his body at the same time! If this were to be known in the cultivation world, it would shock countless people into a silly state. In a matter of 12 hours, Naath went from entry stage third level bone hardening to peak stage third level bone hardening. The rune felt its mind buzzing and spinning as it saw all of this first hand, even in his tens of billions of years he had never seen a freakish genius like this!

The rune spoke up saying “okay brat that's enough! If you keep going you will do more harm than good!”

Hearing this Naath seemed to become even more enraged and he spoke in a rough growl that even sounded demonic saying, “You will no longer tell me what to do!”

The rune jumped slightly not expecting this response. Only now did it dawn on him that this was Naath’s absolute taboo. Naath, his anger re-ignited began to run his true void arts even harder. Half an hour later something shook all of the elders watching to their cores.

*BANG!!!!*

*SNAP!!!!!*

*CRAAAAAAACK!!!*

Naath broke through to early stage fourth level bone hardening! The pain that usually drove him to the brink and made him want to pass out this time only seemed to motivate him. Not only that but the normal shockwave from his breakthrough was absorbed as new martial energy! Naath rushed true void energy into his martial energy as he rebuilt his bones once more. His true void body became more potent and obvious. He had reconstructed his bones in only a matter of 20 minutes. Rather than slowing down here Naath sped up again. Now a strange mist only Naath could “see” had come out of his body, this mist was not visible by any spectrum of light and seemed to not exist at all. The only way one could know it was there was using martial senses, even then only because they felt their martial energy being drained by some strange force and absorbed like there was an infinite abyss.

The mist was made of true void energy and extended out an inch around Naath’s body. This mist absorbed everything it came into contact with and turned it into energy pulling it into Naath’s true void membranes. True void energy began to be produced and gathered at an almost alarming rate. Naath’s true void membranes as well as his meridians began to expand. This meant the amount of energy he could hold, produce, and move at once began to increase. Naath’s soul sea was almost a literal sea of soul energy at this point. The rune was now absolutely trying its hardest not to shake from the shock and fear it felt at Naath’s talent.

Naath showed no signs of slowing down at all, in fact as time went he seemed to become lost completely in his cultivation. He went into a state of selflessness and after a while, even forgot his own anger. This went on for a few days and Naath unknowingly began to break through again. After falling into this state for a week Naath had unconsciously broken through to mid stage sixth level bone hardening! Elder Gui back at his lake at this point was laughing almost manically, he had truly received a monster of a disciple! He felt pride at Naath’s talent, not fear, he knew this was his disciple and he was more than happy to be a stepping stone on this genius’s path.

Naath after this week finally woke up from his state of selflessness. The first thing he did was check his soul sea and was stunned to find that it had expanded several dozen times its previous size. If before it was only akin to a large field, then now it was like a great plane that stretched as far as the eyes could see.

Naath found the rune and his brows wrinkled slightly as he asked “so is this good enough?!”

The rune refused to shrink back and show weakness saying “hmph this is a good start brat. However, if you think this is enough to stop me from placing seals, think again!You will need at least ten times this to prevent me from doing anything. I was not some simple small figure before I became trapped, Hmph!”

Naath’s scowl grew deeper and without a word he left his soul sea. After this, he began to check over his body and when he saw the changes, he was just as astonished if not more astonished than everyone who had been watching. While he was in his stunned state Brutus came over from who knows where and cautiously approached Naath again.

Naath looked at him and said, “ah sorry Brutus I lost my temper there for a bit didn't I? Don't worry I’ll make it up to you later with a feast okay?” Brutus’s tail began to wag and he barked happily.