Chapter 625 - Aura Particles (Patreon)

Protectors’ Headquarters Meeting Hall.

As Leyvi entered the hall with Jade, he noticed that the round table now had thirteen seats. He and Jade were the last to arrive.

He really did not like the look of this. It made it seem as if he had become one of the Protectors.

“Hoho. Don’t think too much, Leyvi. It’s only temporary. We can’t exactly make you stand for the entire meeting,” Gandolf said, immediately understanding what was on his mind.

“If possible, I don’t want to come here ever again,” Leyvi replied bluntly.

“This kid really doesn’t like us, Gandolf,” Sugaro chimed in.

“But he’s right. Coming here usually means there’s trouble to solve. I don’t particularly want to come here either,” Gandolf admitted.

Leyvi then took a seat. He ended up sitting between Jade and Voltroze.

“Did you encounter a lightning cultivator? There are powerful remnant charges lingering around you,” Voltroze asked in a mostly emotionless tone.

Leyvi was surprised. There were remnants on him? He had not even sensed them.

“Don’t carelessly pick a fight with a lightning cultivator. Our lightning can easily wreak havoc inside the body, and unless you remove it properly, internal injuries become very difficult to heal. You seem to have come out unscathed, though,” Voltroze continued, offering the advice without much change in expression.

“Hihihi. You’ve got it wrong, Voltroze. He fought a lightning cultivator in the arena and won easily,” Jade informed him with a light laugh.

“Hmm?” Voltroze’s eyebrow rose slightly. “I’m certain this remnant came from a Nascent Soul lightning cultivator. Kid, you’re quite strong, huh? So you weren’t bluffing when you said you could fight a General Level Demonic Beast.”

“Oh, right. The lightning cultivator he defeated was wielding the Almighty Fiend Piercer,” Jade added. “Isn’t that your old weapon?”

“Huh? I didn’t know someone had already inherited my old weapon. When did this happen, Jade?” Voltroze asked.

“Just a year ago. A youngster from the Martial World Sect entered your trial ground after breaking through to the Nascent Soul Realm. He passed your trials with flying colors and managed to bring out the Almighty Fiend Piercer. Because of that achievement, he was made a Holy Son candidate,” Jade narrated.

“Hmph! He has the Almighty Fiend Piercer and he still lost? What a complete embarrassment! Why did the spear ever let itself be taken by that loser? It’s supposed to choose the strongest, not some weakling who folds at the first real challenge!” Voltroze complained, clearly more irritated than before.

“Are you sure it’s supposed to choose the strongest?” Jade’s eyes curved with mischief. “That kid is a big braggart just like you. That’s probably exactly why it picked him. Birds of a feather, right? Hihihi.”

The other Protectors also laughed, though they kept the sound mostly to themselves.

Leyvi glanced at Jade with growing suspicion. The more he thought about it, the less the match with Vikir felt like a simple coincidence. She had been with them the entire time, she knew the arena well, and she had looked far too entertained when the fight began. Had she quietly arranged for him to face that particular opponent?

“Bullshit. When have I ever been a braggart? I only ever state the truth. It’s obvious I’m the strongest among us. Jade, tell me that kid’s name,” Voltroze demanded.

“Oh? Do you want to take him as a disciple?” Jade replied, still smiling playfully.

“Disciple? As if. I’m going to put him through hellish training so he never disgraces my weapon again. I can’t accept a weakling wielding my old spear,” Voltroze said firmly.

...

Somewhere in Ultima City, a certain elite-looking young man lay on his hotel bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. The crushing defeat still weighed heavily on him.

He had believed he could accept losing with dignity, but the memory of being completely overpowered gnawed at him far more than he had expected. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw that calm smile behind the invisible barrier. He was not even in the mood to entertain the ladies waiting outside his door. The usual excitement simply would not come.

“I can’t believe I lost that badly. How is it possible for spiritual pressure to be that strong…?”

He lay there in silence for a long moment before suddenly sitting up.

“…No. This isn’t my fault. He’s called the greatest talent for a reason. Among Qi Cultivators, Protector Alexandra is also considered the greatest talent. At my age, she was already a Soul Formation Realm cultivator. That means Leyvi is probably close to that level too!”

Confidence rapidly returned to Vikir’s face as the logic settled in his mind.

“That’s right! I’m not weak at all! It’s my opponent who was simply too monstrous! Losing to him is the same as losing to Protector Alexandra if she were my age! There’s absolutely nothing to be ashamed of! Hahaha!”

Vikir jumped to his feet on the bed and laughed out loud, completely convinced by his own argument. His earlier depression had been swept away in an instant.

“In the future, there might be even more outstanding Spiritual Cultivators. I can’t let myself lose to any other Spiritual Cultivator ever again!”

“First, I need to be able to see spiritual sense. Let’s buy that thing first. Hopefully it won’t be too expensive. Ugh… I also lost my Tier-4 defensive artifact. What a waste.”

Without any warning, a cold shiver ran down Vikir’s spine. Goosebumps spread across his arms and the back of his neck. An unexplainable sense of danger settled over him, as if something unpleasant was already moving in his direction.

“What the heck…? Is someone plotting against me? Did someone decide to kick me while I’m down? Trying to push me out of the candidacy or something?” His expression darkened. “Dammit! Whoever that person is, you better hope I never find out who you are. If I do, you’re finished!”

...

“The fake memory itself is a bloodline power?” Leyvi was surprised by the revelation.

He was not the only one. Several other Protectors around the table visibly stiffened, exchanging glances of clear disbelief. None of them had expected this conclusion.

“Correct. I conducted multiple thorough analyses of the remains I managed to collect at that time. The composition shows a complete match to bloodline power. There is no mistake about it,” Newton explained.

“But how is that possible? When it turned into that apparition, we didn’t sense any bloodline aura from it at all,” Alexandra stated.

The apparition back then had not been on their level, yet it had still been powerful enough to harm many Nascent Soul Realm cultivators. If it truly was a bloodline power, it should have emitted a strong enough aura for everyone present to notice it easily.

Newton’s expression turned serious. “This is what has truly worried me over the past week. I think everyone here knows how aura works, right?”

It was meant to be a rhetorical question, but Newton had not expected Leyvi to raise his hand.

“Senior Newton, I don’t know how aura works. Please explain.”

Newton’s mouth twitched. He stared at Leyvi for a second longer than necessary, clearly struggling to keep a straight face.

For a brief moment, the heavy atmosphere he had been trying to maintain threatened to collapse. He still could not decide whether the young man was being completely sincere or quietly trolling him in front of everyone.

“Ahem… basically, aura is similar to odor. Odor is made of tiny particles of a substance floating in the air. We call them smell molecules. The more of those molecules there are around you, the stronger the smell becomes.”

Leyvi nodded, listening carefully.

“Aura works the same way. Your energy is constantly releasing unique particles into the surrounding air. We sense those particles as aura, so we call them aura particles. That is how we can usually tell a person’s cultivation realm. The stronger and denser the aura particles we feel, the higher the realm and the greater the amount of energy being used,” Newton explained, keeping the description as straightforward as possible.

“Thank you, Senior Newton. I think I understand. I already had a vague understanding from my own experience, but your explanation made it much clearer,” Leyvi said.

“Good. You need to understand this in order to understand what we are facing,” Newton replied, finally recovering his serious tone.

Newton then continued with what he had originally intended to say.

“For us to detect an aura, the number of aura particles must reach a certain detection threshold. That threshold differs from person to person. The higher someone’s cultivation realm, the better they usually are at sensing aura, which means their threshold is lower.”

He paused briefly.

“So you’re saying the reason none of us could sense the bloodline aura is because the number of bloodline aura particles was below our detection threshold?” Sugaro asked, frowning.

It was not only him. One by one, the expressions around the table changed. The same cold realization settled over everyone present.

What they had faced that day was not simply a weakened remnant. It was an almost undetectable fragment, a fraction so small that even Soul Transformation Realm experts had been unable to sense it as an aura. And yet that tiny fragment had already displayed enough power to threaten Nascent Soul cultivators.

If something so insignificant could do that, then the true source of this bloodline power was far beyond anything they had imagined.

“I sealed and preserved this meeting hall afterward to make sure no aura particles could disperse outside. That allowed me to measure the exact numbers,” Newton continued, his voice growing heavier.

“However, I am afraid I must inform you of something deeply unsettling. The apparition’s aura particles were not merely below our detection threshold. Among the billions upon billions of combined aura particles that were released in this hall that day… fewer than fifty of them originated from that bloodline power.”

The number hung in the air. Everyone’s eyes widened sharply. A few of the Protectors visibly stiffened in their seats.

“It means we are dealing with something unbelievably powerful,” Newton revealed the heavy conclusion he had reached.