Chapter 135: Marked?

Not wanting to waste another second, Sage linked another Warp Worm and finished his search of the Leader’s body before moving away with haste. He went to the surface and tossed the signet ring into a nearby river before entering the Warp Worm and burrowing a few miles away. He hopped out of the worm and shook his head, “Sorry.”

Taking out the Steel Silk Centipede that had dug out the den from earlier he pit the two bugs against each other in combat before using his Twin Soul to finish them both off. Then he stacked up wood on their bodies and threw in his own clothes. Sage had copied down everything about the garments into a Memory Sphere long ago, but he hadn’t taken the time to truly study and experiment. Not sure if the ring or any blood left a trace on him, Sage threw the dark blue robes into the pile along with the bodies of the six from the Cult of the Woodlord. He had taken the valuables from their bags, but he left the bags themselves along with the mundane objects within them. With some stoking from his Divine Breath, it soon grew into a massive blaze, but Sage had enough sense to have chosen an isolated area to prevent a Forest Fire.

Not linking to a new Insect, Sage stepped into the nearby river and dove in. His now nude body getting carried off by the current and drawn away. After nearly an hour the cold was starting to get to him so he unlocked his human seal and slithered comfortably through the water in his Naga form. At the same time he continued to search within his body, just like he had been doing for the last hour. Looking for any traces of changes or markings that could have been left by that signet ring. His fear and frantic wasteful activity were all spurred on by that ring he found. It wasn’t an unknown thing to leave traps for those that killed important people. The bandit or murderer would seek profit and end up with a target on their back. Getting revenge was a powerful motivator and that ring might have marked him somehow.

Sage had torched his clothing and thrown the ring away because he first felt something spread out from it, sticking to him and following him. It had diminished when he threw away the ring, but it wasn’t gone. It was only after he’d completely torched his clothing and dove into the river that the feeling went away. Not wanting to take chances, he was even now still worried and checking his body. Who knew if those people were crazy enough to leave an obvious mark to hide them placing another mark in a more hidden way. When it reached noon the next day, Sage left the river. Sage slithered up onto the river bank in a random stretch of forest land and started to cycle his energy. His aura extended outwards, Connecting Heaven and Earth drew in energy from the sky and from the ground.

He was trying to use the faster cycling of energy and the influence of adding new energy to stir up his system and perhaps point out any unusual spots. He even sent used his Twin Soul to scour his body further. A few minutes later, his caution was rewarded. Sage found a pattern within his body in a place he’d never expect. His Twin Soul found a glowing symbol imprinted upon Sage’s own soul. Sage’s soul looked just like the Twin Soul did, hence the name, a tiny spiritual version of his physical body. Somehow, on the back of the soul was a glowing red symbol.

Yikes… well, I found it. How do I get rid of it?

Sage didn’t have many methods to deal with the soul, but he had more than most. The Twin Soul, specifically. The Twin Soul tried to destroy it, but it couldn’t even leave a mark on the symbol. When it struck harder, Sage’s soul was the one that took damage while the mark was unaffected. Delving into the other Ancestral Techniques that he’d rarely used before, Sage could only grasp for straws.

Anima Cannibal. Consume the Twin Soul by merging it back into his own. He’d used it once long ago as a test, but hadn’t taken the time to perform the process again recently. At the moment, Sage’s Twin Soul was nearly three times larger than his own soul, the result of it devouring the energy of so many crystal spiders along with the wolves and cultivators from earlier.

It’s a long shot, but it’s all I’ve got right now.

Sage began the process, a strange technique where he had to gently vibrate his soul at a specific ‘frequency’. It was somewhat like trying to force your body to start shivering. Just like how it would be much easier if you were cold first, this technique required a specific state of mind. Eventually, he found the right feeling and a few moments later the Twin Soul joined in. The Twin Soul started to quiver in the same manner, but the pattern was opposite of the one used for his own soul. A few minutes later, it was like the two souls were of opposing polarity and they snapped together. Sage felt a strange rush of energy, at the same time his mind got foggy.

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When he opened his eyes again, he looked around to make sure nothing was wrong with his body before checking on his soul again. Looking inward, he found the mark on the back of his soul and saw there was no change.

So far, so good. Now for the real test.

It was similar to before, which made Sage guess that most techniques of the soul followed a similar process. Only this time, instead of resonating at an opposite pattern as the twin soul, his soul swayed side to side like a dancing cobra. Once the right speed and pattern was met then it would slowly separate into two halves. Sage’s goal was form a Twin Soul as usual, but he had to make sure this mark of his was on the Twin Soul and not his own. There wasn’t just one way to perform the Twin Soul Technique, in the ancestral memories from the Twin Ringed Soul Serpent there was a higher level of the technique. One that required more skill and control. It allowed the Twin Soul to be formed with a variable amount of energy instead of directly splitting the soul in half. It would let them put more of their energy into a more powerful Twin Soul to tackle a stronger foe, or the opposite, creating a weak Twin Soul to be sacrificed as a distraction.

Sage made the attempt, but he wasn’t practiced enough. He’d only ever used the technique a few times, it was a longshot. All he could do was use the methods described to try and shift the energy that was splitting apart. He couldn’t control the specific amount, but he could just barely choose the starting point of the Twin Soul’s creation. After a process that took nearly ten times longer than normal, his soul finally split in half and the Twin Soul was complete.

Success!

The mark was on the back of the Twin Soul now, no longer on his own soul. He had no idea whether or not this would truly clear all marks, but it was the best he could do. Sage pulled his consciousness back out of his spiritual sea, letting his Twin Soul out and directly into the bright sun of the day. He let it simmer in the daylight, the extreme yang energy of the sun was very damaging for spirits. Next, he repeated the steps he used long ago on the Twin Ringed Soul Serpent. It wasn’t perfect, but it had worked before. He drew a pair of connected circular formations, like a giant ‘8’. Filling in the details he brought out an alchemical cauldron and the Dawn Pillar just like last time.

Soul Magnifying Wheel.

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