Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 176 - 175 - Heart of the Relic

The Relic sprawled not only across its cavern, but even deeper into the earth than any suspected.  The 3 known flowing streams of Qi went towards the center but then dropped many kilometers beneath the known surface.

The 3 flows come together in a chamber at the heart of the Relic.  There, the other 3 elements also stream endlessly into the heart.  They collect in the center to forge an island of ever moving sand.  Once the sand pulses at maximum capacity, the Qi disperses to even lower channels to relieve the pressure.

The surge Lind and the Aether Sect noted was caused by that dispersal and there were gated passageways along the exit channels to move the Qi along.  An endless cycle of Qi leaving and returning all to that center island.

The cylindrical structure was at the very center of the Relic and was normally only the 6 elemental streams and the sand, but something new had washed up on the island's shores.  It was a naked human with burnt skin and only a storage ring on his right hand.

Very slowly, Lind opened his eyes as his head pounded.  He had no idea where he was or what had happened at first, but it slowly came back.

He had tried to stop Kelvin, or rather the heart demon that had possessed him, from hurting anyone else the only way he could.  He had to kill him.  It was the same old problem of Lind's severe lack of power, but that time it seemed like it would work out.

He had dispersed the shield over the fire Qi stream and Kelvin was off balance.  The man was falling and burning already when corrupted Qi had successfully manifested to pull Lind in.  He had been caught off guard because he thought external Qi manipulation would not work.

Apparently the heart demon proved it was possible, or at least it did not care what it took to pull Lind in with it.  After that it was pain within and without.

His fire core had gone wild in his dantian, already at the peak, so it tried to transform but Lind clamped down on it hard.  He used his other 5 elements to smother the flame essentially while pushing his Sky Touch to its maximum to survive.

He had been banged around the channel and wondered if it actually ended or if he would simply be consumed by whatever needed so much Qi in the Relic.  The last thing he remembered was suddenly being in mid-air and falling.

The feeling of sand under his body was surprising but at that moment he summoned water and a healing elixir to help him.  The water was fine, but the elixir shattered the moment it appeared.  He was confused but then he saw them.  All 6 streams of Qi!

He was on a shifting pile of sand right in the middle of all 6 elements.  It was not like the beach or desert where it could be whitish or tan colored, but instead he saw all 6 elemental colors blending together in the granules.  Golden sand mixed with black.  Blue sand mixed with red.  Green sand mixed with a very dark brown.  All 6 of them matched his quality of cores!

"Amazing!"  Lind drank from his water skin but then his reality hit him.  He had no clothes on because they had been burned, but most of his robes were engraved with formation arrays.  They would self-destruct in his current environment the same as the elixirs.  He also had a bad feeling.

He summoned some meat from his ring and as with the elixir, the meat seemed to blast apart into nothing the moment it left the ring.  This was very bad!

Soul Realms, while stronger and faster than mortals, still had many of the mortal weaknesses of sleep, food, and drink.  Lind had to eat and drink to survive as Qi alone was not enough.  World Realms had it much better as they could forgo sleep and food for a long time.

He sunk into his ring and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Body Refining Realm meet.  It would not fill him up, but he could eat it.  It was very low though.  Still he brought out a few preserved strips and sat in the middle of the shifting sands.

His dantain was fine now that a balance had been reached but only just.  If he did not have 6 elements, he would have been killed while he was passed out.  His meridians and body seemed fairly ok.  The burns were not serious and no broken bones or torn muscles.

He thanked the spirits for his good luck.

"What is this place?"  Lind looked around and felt even more awe.  Tightly held in their channels, all 6 elements streamed down from far above his head until hitting the pool he sat in.  It was about half full of sand but he could tell there had to be more below.  Between each stream at his current level were indentations with symbols above all 6 of them.

As he looked up, at regular intervals, were more indentations.  There were 5 indentations in a row.  Far above his head was a shimmering formation at the center of a stone disc while there were 6 holes lined up on the gaps between each elemental stream.

Lind could make out up to the 3rd indentation the symbols but the 4th and 5th were too high from his current position.

If he was to guess, it was at least 2 kilometers tall.  Given the overall size of the dome, it was not very large yet it had to be important if all the streams collected there.

The diameter was something close to a kilometer, maybe a bit more but the sea of Qi made it hard to be sure.  His Eyes would overload if he tried to use them externally.  His Sky Touch was working overtime to regulate his body at the moment so it could not be spared to investigate either.

"Kelvin…"  Lind snapped out of his inspection as he saw the shards of bone burnt black floating nearby.  Even as he watched, it evaporated a little bit more.  The man had allowed the heart demon to win and had burned to death in the channel Lind pushed him into.

Lind prayed his soul found solace in his next life.

"Annabelle and the others, damn."  Lind knew they would think he was dead.  He had taken measures if he ever died but it was surreal being alive while knowing all would assume he was dead.  Only Cyntialla, with her mark, would know the truth but no one could reach her.  For once, he wished Trynith could find her if no other reason than his rage would bring comfort to his family and friends.

Lind was unsure of how long he had passed out but even after a few days, it would not be unreasonable to assume he had died.  Kelvin had been burning even as they flowed down the channel.  If a World Realm burned, it was impossible to conceive a Soul Realm holding on for too long.

He sighed and tried to cultivate.  It was hard but now that he was in the center of all 6 streams, the pulses were easy to predict and avoid.  He recovered and began to study the chamber more but there were no signs of stairs or ladders to climb out.

"How do I get out of this place?"  Lind looked at the indentations and then froze.  Between fire and light was 'lightning' and between water and light was 'illusion.'  Lind looked at the rest and began to understand.

The other four were mist, vacuum, gravity, and magma.  Lind recognized the basic combination of each of the 2 elements on either side.  He began to experiment.  Bolts of lightning, flows of magma and the others were thrown at each indentation but there was no effect.

He wished he could use his Eyes but it was far too dangerous in his current situation.  His Touch, on the other hand, had some leeway now that he had adapted.  Lind carefully stretched out his senses but the storm of Qi was painful.

It took hours, maybe days for all he knew but he finally touched the indentation.  The flow of Qi entered the metal and stone but he realized the problem immediately thanks to his ability of peak grade 3 elixirs.

World Realm Qi.  He had to be at the World Realm to get a response from the indents.  Lind was frustrated but all the other clues of the Relic pointed in that direction.  He looked at the next set up and frowned.

"What is a lightning storm?"  He knew what it was literally but in the context of the chamber it was odd.  The indent was still between light and fire but those 2 elements could not be considered a storm.  Light and fire could create stronger or weaker bolts of lightning by combining them, but a storm would need more.  It would need at least–!

Lind looked at earth and fire and saw what roughly translated as fire mountain.  A volcano!  He was right!.  The next layer was a 3 element combination!  A lightning storm was earth, fire, and light.  A volcano was fire, earth, and darkness.  He had never considered using the Qi in such a way before.

Lind suddenly grasped what he was looking at.  It was mastering the World Realm combinations at possibly a certain quality to trigger the indentations, but to do what?

He felt the sand shift and then his mind froze.  He looked down and suddenly grasped what he was standing on.

"A dantian.  I am in a dantian!"  It was a Relic built to mimic a World Realm dantian with all 6 elements!  Moreover, it was meant to be primary elements only.  Just as he taught the aether children to cooperate to wield their Qi, this area was to use exactly such a method to produce the results of this chamber.

He still did not know the purpose but he began to see the goal.  Cooperative use of elements to produce a certain level of power at each indentation.  While it was satisfying to understand, it still left Lind at the bottom of the chamber with no way out.

He began to meditate and try to digest what he had learned.

The concepts were easy enough as he had been learning how to combine his own Qi but Soul Realms were generally internal users or conjurers.  He could empower his body with the elements or summon limited effects via artifacts or weapons.

The only exception Lind had found was his manipulation of physical forces to induce the world to accelerate or allow favorable conditions.  He wondered if he could do the same now.

It only took a glance for him to see the impossibility of such a test.  The constant flow of Qi streams coupled with the surges made such an idea unfeasible.  It all came back to the same problem.  He had been using his Sky Touch to achieve his manipulation of World Realm Qi but in this place it would scatter as he could not focus on the Qi and protect it at the same time.

He would run out of Qi before even doing 2 indents.

"What am I going to do?  I will run out of food long before I can get out of here."  Time was not his ally any more than his rations.  Lind reviewed his storage ring and frowned deeply.  He could conjure water easily enough but based on everything else in his ring, he only had a few months at best before he would starve to death.

"If anyone has ideas I am open to them now."  Lind spoke out loud but only the flow of Qi with the rumbling of the sand answered him.  Sighing, he resumed his lotus position and cultivated while he brainstormed.  There had to be a way out of this chamber.  There just had to be.