The first thing Red did was check the page of Viran's diary that he had taken. Unfortunately, as the boy looked over the paper, he couldn't help but frown.

'I can barely read this.'

The real problem wasn't Red's limited reading ability, but the letters. Viran clearly did not care for the quality of his writing, and the page looked more like a bunch of notes rather than a structured text. Comparing these scribbles to Eiwin's calligraphy was like comparing night and day. That, on top of the low-quality paper and ink, made each word extremely hard to discern.

'He clearly didn't write this for anyone else to read.'

There were, however, a few words the boy was able to make out. Energy, Moon, Vein, and stone. Other than that, the boy suspected it would take some time before he could decipher the page's contents. Red carefully set the paper aside and began to check his other items.

He had no use for the underground map anymore, but the boy refused to part with it. Then there was also the iron knife. It looked shoddy and in disrepair, ready to fall apart at the slightest touch. It was, likewise, not of much use to Red anymore, but as he stared at it, an idea dawned on him.

Technically this knife had come from the mine guards. Perhaps Goulth could discern something about it that would point towards the origin of those men. Thinking along those lines, Red also decided to store it.

Finally, only one item was left. The insectoid crystal.

Now with the crimson line gone, it glowed even more intensely than Red remembered. Unlike moonstones, the fist-sized green crystal looked more like a gem, and glowed brighter. The boy didn't have much time to examine it when he had first retrieved it, but now was as good a time as any.

Red grabbed the crystal and started to feel for any energy emissions. A few seconds later, a familiar tingling sensation spread through his hand, indicating the presence of Spiritual Energy. The youth frowned in confusion.

'Was it this powerful in the past?'

Red had held it plenty of times in the underground, yet he didn't remember so much Spiritual Energy resonating off of it. The only things the boy could attribute this change to were the contact with the surface and the disappearance of the crimson line. It was hard to tell which one was responsible, though.

'Did Hector notice it?'

Now that Red thought back on it, the elder had given him a weird look inside the meeting hall. With a crystal emitting so much Spiritual Energy, was there even a chance someone like Hector wouldn't notice it? It was simply wishful thinking.

Yet, at the same time, the old man hadn't said anything about it. At the very least, that told the boy he didn't have any intentions of forcefully taking it. It was scant comfort, but Red simply didn't have the time to concern himself with that now.

'Now, for the most important part.'

The boy had gone in search of his stash because of his predicament with that lunar being. The creature had absorbed moonstone energy the youth didn't even know was present in his body before. When his reserves didn't prove to be enough, though, Red also felt something else being taken away from him. Up until this point, he still didn't know what he had lost, but it certainly couldn't be anything good.

His only hope was that this insectoid crystal could recharge his special acupoints and help him to open new ones. Of course, the boy had no idea how to do that, so he decided to try the only thing he knew - practice.

Red entered into his training stance and went through the movements Viran had taught him before until his Veins were stimulated. Surprisingly enough, though, the boy eventually crossed the three-minute mark, completely blowing past his previous record. He was confused about how this change came to be, but he didn't stop his training to think about it.

Eventually, the familiar tingling feeling appeared on his skin. In a hurry, Red sat cross-legged on the bed and grabbed the crystal with both hands. He could feel the energy from the object being slowly siphoned into his Spiritual Veins and form a small stream in his body.

The boy could immediately tell that compared to what he was used to, there was far more energy of far higher purity, this time. This, however, also made it harder to manipulate it within his veins. After much struggle, Red eventually managed to direct the energy towards one of his special acupoints. A sharp pain immediately spread in that region, and the boy couldn't see any changes.

Still, he didn't give up and continued to direct the energy to that same acupoint. After the strands passed through it a few times, Red slowly noticed change. The energy waned, but the pain he felt also decreased. The boy obviously couldn't personally check the state of his acupoint, but he was confident his experiment was a success.

Eventually, the energy dissipated, but the pain hadn't completely disappeared. Red assumed it would take a few training sessions to recharge his special acupoints, but this small success made all the efforts over the last week worth it. Now that the boy had confirmed his plan for the immediate future, his mind turned to another matter.

'That crimson energy.'

Even now, Red could still feel the presence of his companions within the courtyard. There didn't seem to be a way to turn off this power, no matter how hard he tried. And now, the youth began to suspect the changes to his body weren't limited to this new sixth sense.

When the boy first merged with that energy, he didn't notice any evident transformations. His physical prowess hadn't improved, and he didn't feel like his mental capacities had been compromised. Yet now that he thought about it, some weird things had happened after that event.

First of all, when Red and his comrades were running away from the bandits, he had managed to keep pace without becoming exhausted. Nobody thought about it back then when their lives were on the line, but now that the youth had time to reflect on that, he noticed this oddity. His speed had remained unchanged, yet he had doubtlessly managed to run for longer.

Now, there was this other discrepancy he had noticed while practicing. Red had managed to last 50% longer in his practice than the last time he had tried it. Such an absurd increase couldn't be explained by conventional means. Thus his mind turned to the only thing that could explain it.

'Did that crimson energy improve my stamina?'

It was a strange matter. As far as Red knew, an improvement in stamina would generally accompany an improvement in other physical areas too. Yet, nothing else had changed within his body. How could that strange energy target such a specific attribute of his?

Red needed to investigate this matter in-depth, but there was an obvious problem with that. How could he look inside his own body? Was he supposed to rip open his flesh and examine it? The only option the boy could think about was to ask Hector for help. However, he immediately eliminated that option.

What if the elder found something weird inside his body? That would be a very tragic way to get himself killed. No, the only way the boy could figure this out was by careful experimentation. The first thing he needed to study was his crimson sense.

Red had noticed there was a difference in intensity between each presence he could detect. He didn't necessarily know what that represented, but it seemed to be tied to strength. Hector, for instance, had a far more powerful fluctuation than anyone else in the Sect. This made the boy think that this power might sense Spiritual Energy density, but that didn't make sense.

If he followed that theory, Hector, having opened his Spiritual Sea, would have the strongest fluctuation. However, people like Narcha and Eiwin also gave off strong signals to his crimson sense, and neither of them had Spiritual Energy stored inside their bodies. This went against that theory, and Red decided to put it aside for now.

The youth had other ideas, but he had no way to verify any of them. What he could test, though, was how this power worked.

Once he had entered the Sect, Red had noticed that fluctuations differed in more ways than intensity. Allen's fluctuation, for instance, was weaker than most others, but it seemed to be pulsating to his crimson sense. It was almost as if it was in a constant process of growth. Comparing that to Hector's signal, which was much stronger, the child's fluctuation was more active.

Then there were also Domeron's fluctuations. They were harder to detect, seemingly disappearing when Red wasn't paying attention to them. The boy didn't know what that meant, but it was an indication for him not to be completely reliant on this new power.

Red wanted to study as many fluctuations as he could and find a pattern across them. Perhaps that way, he would be able to tell what exactly this new sense detected. Of course, there was still the problem that he had faced while entering the town. So many fluctuations had assaulted his crimson sense that the youth had been overwhelmed.

However, the boy was determined to practice his mental fortitude to resist and parse through that information. He wasn't a fool and could see the usefulness of this power. It had already saved Narcha's life once, and it could do the same for him.

That was, however, a concern for another time. Right now, what Red needed to do the most was to open as many acupoints as he could. After all, as far as he was concerned, the boy was still working on a tight schedule. If he didn't have his third set of special acupoints opened by New Moon, who knew what would happen?

Without hesitation, the boy got up and sorted through a dresser. There, he fetched a glass vial in which the last two Vein Opening Pills were contained.

After that, he went through his exercises again with the help of his newly improved stamina. A few minutes later, the boy felt the tingling sensation and sat cross-legged on his bed, grabbing the insectoid crystal with one hand. He proceeded to pop one of the pills out of the vial and swallow it.

The power spread through his body, and Red directed it towards his Upper Leg Vein. He began the arduous process of opening his acupoints.

By the time the effects of the pill ran out, the boy had managed to open two more acupoints.

'Five down... Five more to go.'