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Chapter 15: Soul Curtain Awakening

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Especially since the residents of this world have ever really known of one star. A concept such as galaxies doesn't exist in their vocabulary.

They know of other planets. The phenomenon called Harmonic convergence is proof of that. It happens here too, with a few differences.

Lenticular galaxies, a type of galaxy intermediate between an elliptical and a spiral galaxy in galaxy morphological classification schemes.

It contains a large-scale disc but does not have large-scale spiral arms. The way the ether moves within his soul curtain currently is a mimic of that.

His control over the ether has reached a degree where he can accomplish his next goal, and that says a lot considering the vastness of his soul curtain.

He however noticed no difference in his soul curtain. He continued to adjust the movement of the ether to various degrees for hours without rest. Such a process is too taxing to one's soul.

He continued to expand his control over the ether to the limits of his soul curtain to the point that he alerted several existences throughout the castle.

He cared not for such a thing. The change of his soul curtain? It's rare, but it happens. Either by ether herbs or experiencing deep emotional turmoil or simple desires can change it.

It's of course harder than it sounds. No more than one person in a hundred million people gets the luxury of experiencing the phenomenon.

The process continued until he felt it. Until he knew he met the conditions for soul curtain awakening. He felt his soul enter an exhilarating state, a state of extreme satisfaction.

He clearly sensed his soul curtain and its full extent when it was quite hazy. The obscurity of his soul curtain seemed to unravel itself for him, and now, his soul is awaiting his arrival.

'The first sequence is truly like an apple. I have just touched upon its skin. Beyond it is its flesh. Then comes its core. Within the core lies the seed, in this case, it's called the aspect seed.

It sounds rather lovely with a touch of artistic beauty. It's all too beautiful, and I wonder, how much art is there for me to discover and explore? What art will I conceive? And what art will I r...'

He didn't stop but rather continued with the process despite his soul curtain reaching its limits when using this method.

It can no longer advance. His control over the ether will also no longer have any obvious improvement.

The soul curtain will slowly expand across years as one's body and soul get stronger thus the process becomes useless for the soul curtain.

Val had another goal in doing that, he wanted to see just how frighteningly high his ether control can get under certain conditions.

Not even third sequence seekers have a soul curtain as broad as his, yet he was able to manipulate the ether within its vastness.

So one can imagine that if he were to focus on a smaller area, his control should magnify for an unknown number of times.

'They say that the stronger the soul and the vaster one's soul curtain, the more output runes seekers can inscribe.

That in theory can continue until later sequences where seekers become an entire output rune themselves. I wonder... How many? how large will mine be?'

Val wondered to himself, satisfied with the results of his breakthrough.

While seekers can absorb the ether freely into their hearts, it's not so easy for it to exit.

The scholars responsible for studying the ether seeking path concluded that the reason is that when one becomes a seeker, they step in the path of creating their own reality, one isolated from the world.

The seeker's reality gives him resistance to the world, a strange manifestation of resistance. However, the world in return also exhibits its resistance, a faint resistance but it was enough to force seekers to try to fit in.

They did so by creating the concept of output runes and a big part of Its making was one's soul curtain type because they require performing a similar process to the soul curtain awakening.

'Let's leave that for later, for now.' Val stood up looking at his colorful room, a white flower vase painted with a purple flower. For consistency's sake, the flowers in it are all violet.

The room was also painted white with violet flowers painted in several places, giving the room a bit of life.

'I need some paintings... Should I just buy them or paint them myself? Hmm, it's better to explore the beauty of this world before introducing my art into it.'

He then picked the most prominent object in the room, a grey recurve bow. It was exquisitely made with several engravings on its body, a hexagonal formation, and several runic symbols.

'Creating a 3-grade noble artifact when I'm still in the first sequence... I still have a lot to learn about my dear father. However...'

Val turned his attention to the second most prominent object in the room, a white rapier. Its hilt was violet, quite exquisite he has to say.

On the hilt was a crimson polished gemstone. From it, several engravings extended going from the hilt to the sword's body then its tip.

'A 4-grade artifact. I admit I'm tempted, it's lovely. Now that I think about it, can swords be used as long-range weapons with ether arts? Well, I'll tend to that later.'

Val still resisted the temptations though he's succumbing to it, in a way Alvion never expected.

He made his way to the archery range where found his two brothers had already started their training.

He got a general understanding of his brothers at this point. Rhys seems to be the polar opposite of his father to a ridiculous degree.

Noah and Nious on the other hand are even more special. They seem to understand each other without the need to speak and very few can understand them, they're inseparable.

He nodded at them before getting into stance. Something he learned about archery is that stance comes first. The second is stance and then everything else.

His back was straight, his head was perfectly positioned as he took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a second.

He felt the cold touch of the bow in his hand and he felt a myriad of things through his soul curtain, the movement of the ether.

That's all seekers can sense until later sequence, just the movement of the ether and nothing else. They however found a way to make use of that.

That's however are methods for seekers at the late phase of the second sequence or at least, it should be.

A seeker's soul shouldn't be nearly as strong even at the second sequence, something Val knows.

'Is this why I was chosen? Because am special? Or did whoever sent me here make me this way? This is all too convenient for it to be a coincidence but I guess there are other possibilities... No, it's definitely a conspiracy...'

His thoughts didn't distract him from sensing the movement of the ether. How it behaves when in contact with other things.

'Robert.T did well in explaining it in the theory of resistance but witnessing it myself is a different matter. The ether moves slowly in the air but becomes slower or faster in other things.'

He could only feel what he's touching. The cold grey bow thus he could sense how the ether behaves passing through it.

Its speed becomes many times faster, thanks to the material it's made of, ember.

The formation on the bow is even able to absorb some of that ether at all times, something other materials can't do even with the engravings.

The only anomaly in the process is the concept of souls. The soul seems to be a barrier stopping the ether from intruding into one's body.

The ether can move within one's soul curtain albeit its movement will differ. However, It can not move into one's body unless one sought that and unless permission is given.

With his eyes still tightly shut, Val lifted his bow. He gently placed the arrow in its rightful place and started aiming. He could not see but he could sense that his bow is perfectly aimed at the target.

He could sense the ether slow down as it moved through the target dummy, a general picture was made in his mind as he pulled the string, the arrow with it.

His fingers relaxed as the string slipped and the arrow suffered the burnt of all that momentum as it traveled toward its target with a speed surpassing what he could previously do with his previous bow.

The wind didn't seem to have any effect on the arrow, and there didn't seem to be a concept of arrow drop in its vocabulary. Formation masters made resisting gravity possible, to a certain extent.

The dark arrow went through the target dummy as if it went through butter until it reached the High castle walls, It then stopped in its tracks, unable to even cause a dent on the Iron walls.

Val opened his eyes and looked at the target dummy with an obvious hole in its stomach, 'I missed, the target still has a chance of survival.'

And so, a night of training passed with his goal being not missing, as in always getting headshots.