Chapter 19: 19
Ray put his hand down and inspected the damages.
The old man was dead, but he didn't go down without a fight. His stump was proof of that.
Not only was the flesh burned, but the bone wasn't spared either. His bones weren't refined yet, so the old man's move turned his bones to ashes. The only positive was the fire burnt every nerve as well, so the pain wasn't as intense as it looked.
It was an annoyance, but Ray wasn't particularly worried. He was not a regular creature; normal laws couldn't be applied to him. With enough time and cultivation, he had the feeling that his hand could regrow to its previous state.
Whether it would take weeks or months was unknown, but it would happen.
The overwhelming energy emanating from the middle of the dome woke Ray from his trance. He was reminded of the main reason he climbed the mountain.
He walked to the dome and inspected the ground for clues. He had to throw piles of rubble out of the way since the building was annihilated under the onslaught of the battle.
After digging for a minute, he paused, his eyes widening in excitement.
This was it! He could feel a large pressure coming beneath his hand: it had to be what he was looking for.
He frantically dug into the ground, eager to reach the source of his goal.
Each time he struck his hand into the rock, he would dig half a foot. If he had his left arm, it would have been a quicker process—his pace was fast nonetheless.
A few seconds of digging later, his arm came to a stop. He had a fervent expression on his face, which he wouldn't recognize if he could see himself.
An orb made of pure white material lay in the dirt and stones. It wasn't touching the stones, but floating an inch above them.
The orb gave off a strange feeling of pressure, but Ray welcomed that feeling.
He also felt an inexplicable connection to the orb, as if it should be one with him. He felt an intense desire to just… eat it.
Without realizing it, his arm moved toward the orb, a hungry look in his eyes.
He grabbed the orb and dropped it into his mouth.
…
Reality sunk in.
'What did I just do?'
Why did I put a random object in my mouth, like a newborn baby?
He couldn't think these thoughts for long, since he had a bad premonition about the orb.
An intense fullness started to well inside of him. It wasn't from eating too much food, but similar to when he absorbed a ki crystal. The only difference was the ki crystal felt gentle and nourishing, while the orb felt like a raging stampede of ki. Even worse, he didn't feel it disappearing, the pressure was only increasing!
There was only so much ki a body can hold without exploding. As a skin refining practitioner, Ray was well aware the orb was beyond his limits. If he didn't do something about it, he would die.
His mind rushed through ways out of the situation, the timer for his death slowly ticking away. As each second passed by, he could feel the energy starting to destroy the tissues making up his body.
Luckily he noticed his stump of a hand pretty quickly, and an idea its way toward Ray's brain.
He channeled all the ki in his body toward his stump and prayed it did its job. He didn't have many options in this situation, so he could only hope he gambled on the correct solution.
The energy started healing Ray's arm the second it came into contact with the barrier of the injury.
From an outside perspective, the flesh was growing at a rate visible to the human eye.
The pain from his hand was reintroduced as the ki healed his nerve cells. It was painful, but what was a little pain in exchange for a working arm?
As the energy went to work on the stump, a feeling of relief washed over Ray. The root of the problem wasn't fixed, but he had some time until he faced death.
He estimated another hour until his hand regrew and the energy would accumulate again. The speed was crazy fast considering his initial estimation of months. It wasn't even a healing method, simply forcing down energy and hoping it heals.
He took a deep breath and sat down in the dome. He didn't realize it, but he was sitting in the same spot the old man cultivated.
'What now?'
The orb was an amazing cultivation resource, whatever it was. The only problem was his lack of strength, which would lead to his doom.
Of course, this problem wouldn't have happened if he didn't eat the orb. No matter how hard he thought, he had no explanation for why he decided to do that. It was like his body moved on its own—an instinct.
He thought long and hard for an hour, but he came up with no good solution in the end. He simply had too little information on the object.
Toward the end of the hour, he could feel the threat of energy death peering over his shoulders.
He had one solution, but it was a brutal and gruesome solution he would rather not use. He came up with it fairly quickly, but because of its gruesome nature, he tried to spend the rest of his time finding an alternative.
Of course, if there was no better method, he had no qualms about experiencing whatever pain was required.
After stealing his mind, he put his fingers into his stomach, piercing his skin with ease.
Bursts of blood sprayed everywhere around him, but it didn't affect him in the slightest.
His fingers cut through his flesh and opened his stomach. After going through the skin, not much force was needed since his insides were unrefined.
He carefully grabbed the orb and brought it out of his insides.
His body was in pain—extreme pain. Ignoring pain to attack others was always easier than ignoring pain to continue mutilating yourself.
He dropped the bloody orb on the ground and laid down on a smooth rock. His breathing was heavy, each breath spitting out some blood, but he would survive.
Under normal situations, he might have died before recovering because of his weak insides. Another reason he waited an hour was to accumulate energy inside his body so he could immediately heal himself.
His hand was already regrown, so he directed all the energy toward the cuts in his stomach.
At a rate faster than his hand, the skin around his stomach closed, and he could feel his internals healing to peak conditions.
This way of recovering was by no means an efficient healing method; it was reserved for those rich in ki.
Now that his injuries were gone, he stared at the orb, this time in a rational manner.
If it wasn't in his body wreaking havoc, the orb was an amazing cultivation tool. It was why the powerful bandit leader chose the mountain to cultivate.
Now, the orb was in his hands.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone