"It's ready, Michael," said Marina as she finished with the formation. "Thank you, love," I said as I slowly stepped out of bed and walked toward the center of the formation. Soon, I reached the center of the formation and sat down slowly while Marina watched with attention. Yesterday, I fell down mid-way. I did not stop the fall with my energy; I let myself fall before sitting down with my efforts. Buzz! As I sat, I activated the formation, and a few minutes later, I had my whole body covered in thick, hardened blue-green paste, which was now more than thrice thick as the first time. It is thickening over sessions, but today it is extra thick. I need it this thick today because I plan to take a leap today, and it will be very dangerous, and I truly hope it will be able to help me through the harm. I greet my teeth as the fire from the external runes transfers internally; the fire is seven times greater than the first time. I had used seven small kindles, five yesterday, but I added two more today. It is a huge risk that the marina did not approve of, but I need to take it to heal myself faster. I was getting a very bad feeling, like something extremely dangerous was coming, and we needed to be ready to deal with that. Finally, half of the fire had entered the runes inside contained in the runes, and it was better to stay that way. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞 An uncontrolled leak will have huge consequences, including death. I begin to take deep breaths, readying myself for the pain that is about to come. It is bad and dangerous, but it is something I have to do. Twenty days had already passed since I have started to practice, and I needed to heal myself before the month was over and, thus, these dangerous risks. Hmmm! The hmm rang out through the runes, and with it, they sent abyssal fire through the body. The amount of fire was even greater than that peak it had reached during the first session, and the pain it began to give forced the tears out of my eyes, and it was just the beginning. The fire spread through the body, and like always, I am keeping an eye on everything. I did not let even this soul-burning pain come my way. As the fire spread, it began to burn the substance; at the current level, only the purified essence of body and soul that is mixed with divine energy had begun to melt and merge with my body and soul. All the unmixed purified essence of the old snake's body and soul had fully merged with me; what had remained was one that was mixed with divine energy, which made it harder to melt and merge, but in today's session, I planned to get rid of it all. So, that only purified divine energy and above-the-limit substance will remain. Hmmm Hmmm Hmmm After the first humm, the second humm came, and after it third and then the fourth, each one bringing more abyssal fire out of the runes and melting the substances at greater and greater speed. By the time of the seventh minute, the fire had crossed yesterday's limit, and at the eighth minute, the last of the old snake's purified body and soul essence mixed with divine energy also fully melted and merged with me. Now, with all the purified essence of the old snake's body and soul merging, there are only two things left, which are purified divine energy and above-the-limit substance. As that happened, a change occurred; it had not occurred in all the sessions. The runes begin to shift, and a few more formations appear. One of the reasons I chose this method was because of its versatility; one could modify it according to the need and not the purified essence of blood and soul had completely melted. It would not be efficient to work with old parameters; thankfully, I prepared for its days ago. Hmmm Soon the runes finished with their changes, and they hummed again, sending a large amount of abyssal fire, which made me greet my teeth hard that they began to make the sounds. As this fire spread, it began to make the purified divine energy drip down, while even above-the-limit element had also begun to melt slowly. In this session, I have not only planned to get rid of the purified essence of blood and soul of the old snake but also divine energy. I just hope that my body will be able to bear the abyssal fire and merge with a humongous amount of divine essence. This divine energy had come from sacrificing thousands of faithful; it is a lot, even when it is purified and concentrated. My body should be able to merge with it, especially with the new change that occurred a few days, which would clean me. Without it, I would have needed to excrete more than half of these things I am merging with. While these substances may be purified and my body and soul may be different due to rule-bending power. I could not absorb it ceaselessly, as it is still anathema; too much, I will have to bear dangerous consequences, which are worse than death. Thankfully, I have a blessing that is helping me with cleansing. Still, even with its aid, I am being careful, looking at every minute change carefully. No progress will be worth changing the fundamental nature of one. Hmmm Humm Hmmm One after another, hmmm spread through my body; with each hmm will come great pain, but it will also melt more divine energy and some above-limit substance. "Ahhhh…" Ten minutes passed, and now I was screaming hoarsely; the pain had become too much that I could not remain quiet, but despite that, I did not stop; I would not stop till my body reached the fire it could bear or the substance it could absorb. Another twelve minutes passed when I finally stopped; my body and soul had reached the limit of fire they could bear. As for divine energy, it had been fully absorbed three minutes ago, leaving behind only above-the-limit substance. This is not the only good news; there is another one, which is quite unexpected, and I thought it would take me a few days before I could do it, but it happened today. A blockage in one complete circuit of magical veins had been cleared; with it, I would now be able to move my energy around. With this complete circuit, I will be able to project the strength that is near Grand Lord. This strength is not enough for me to join the battle, but with it, I will be able to do things which I haven't been since I was injured. Crack Crack Crack A minute had passed, and the fire had returned to the goblet, while cracks began to form rapidly on the hard paste covering me and those pieces that were falling and disappearing into my core. There is still quite a lot of herbal energy had remained in them; they will be useful. Even if they are not, I could not afford to throw them. I have been burning through my herbal inventory at a very fast speed, and it is not normal resources I am burning through, but Grand Lord class. I have already burned half of the resources I have collected for my breakthrough, and by the time I finish, I might burn through them fully. I have also been asking Pyramid for a lot of resources, and thankfully, there was no complaint; for that, I am very grateful. I will need to kill quite a lot of Grimms to replenish my vaults; thankfully, there are a lot of Grimms that need to be killed. It would have helped a lot with my condition if they had just handed me the storage of the old snake. They had found it the day I had asked them to; they just did not give it to me. I am sure their tremendous fortune is waiting for me, but Pyramid is unwilling to do that till I clear away all the corruption inside me. They are also having problem opening; the storage is a very powerful artifact with a lot of failsafe. Even the codebreaker of the Pyramid, which is the most powerful of all the storage-breaking artifacts, is unable to open it. They should just give it to me; I don't think that the code-breaking formation etched on my storage ring is going to have any problem in breaking through it. After storing all the pieces of herbal paste, I cleaned myself with energy and got up slowly, and found out I was having much fewer problems than it was before. It is because of me getting rid of all substances except the limit element. "How are you feeling?" asked Marina as I sat beside her on the sofa, "Good, very good," I replied, and to that, she gave me a look. "No, not good enough to do that; I think we will need to wait for a few more days before we do that," I said with a smile, and I could see the faint spark of disappointment appearing in her eyes before it had disappeared. "You should be feeling fine enough to heal that mentee of yours now?" she asked, and a smile appeared on my face. "Yes, I think it is time to wake him up," I said as I got up with much more ease than before and walked toward the formation.