Soul Body in the Old Castle

Inside a room on the first floor of the old castle.

Richard sat cross-legged on the bedboards. He could clearly feel his body gradually growing heavier, like a stone sinking rapidly into water, while his consciousness grew lighter and lighter, like a feather swiftly lifted by the wind.

A tremor appeared. It was a cellular-level vibration produced by the separation of consciousness from the body. Richard could clearly feel blazing planetary magnetic field lines passing through his body, feeding in energy and accelerating the separation process.

"Bzzzzz!"

The tremor quickly reached its limit. Under the control of his Mental Strength, his consciousness began moving out of his body.

But suddenly, Richard felt an invisible force acting on his consciousness, shoving it back just as it was about to leave his body.

"Hmm? What's going on?" Richard paused in slight surprise. This had never happened before. After pondering for a while, he controlled his consciousness and tried to "drill" out through the side of his body. But the moment it "poked its head out," the obstructing force appeared again and forcibly shoved his consciousness back into his body.

The feeling was like sitting in a chair while someone beside you watched you like a hawk. The instant you moved to stand up, that person would pounce on you and pin you firmly to the seat, leaving you completely unable to move.

This... was a little irritating.

Richard was not angry, but he did find it strange. What was causing this?

He had left his body without anesthetics many times before, and there had never been any obstacle. Why was it impossible now that he was in this old castle?

Could there be something in the old castle? Richard thought for a moment and decided not to give up so easily. He would try again.

Steadying himself, he chose a point directly above his body and fiercely controlled his consciousness to leave it.

The familiar sensation appeared. A force emerged, pressing tightly against his consciousness as it tried to break free from his body, striving to force it back inside.

Richard mobilized his Mental Strength and resisted with all his might. Then, in the next instant, he suddenly exerted force.

"Bang!"

It was as though he had overturned something. His consciousness shot out of his body, and because he had used too much force, it passed straight through the ceiling and entered the room on the second floor. Then Richard discovered in surprise that Pandora was curled up in a corner of the upstairs room, her brow tightly furrowed, her amethyst-like eyes staring at some spot in his room below.

"This is..."

With a thought, Richard quickly figured out two things.

First, Pandora could not see him. If so, then Gregory presumably could not see him in his consciousness state either.

Second, Pandora knew there was something strange in his room, and that strange thing was very likely the reason his attempt to leave his body had nearly failed. But what could it be?

Thinking this, Richard controlled his consciousness to swiftly pass through the ceiling again and return to the original room. He looked around, then froze.

Richard discovered that besides himself, there was another consciousness in the room.

More precisely, it could not really be called consciousness. It was something similar to consciousness.

Compared to the solidity of Richard's consciousness, the other thing looked like a thin cloud of gray mist. Nor did it have the translucent cord connecting it to a body.

In other words, it was something that existed independently, apart from any body. It floated in midair in the room, moving occasionally to reveal what seemed to be a woman's face, though it was so vague that even her age could not be determined.

"This is..." Richard's thoughts raced. There was no need to guess. This thing had clearly been preventing him from leaving his body. But why had it obstructed him? And what was it? A soul? A ghost? A spirit?

Richard thought rapidly. In the next moment, he saw it slowly drift closer, almost tentatively. It extended two arm-like appendages and waved them quickly before him, transmitting a very vague mental fluctuation.

Richard carefully analyzed it. What it was conveying should have been several words: "You... me... good... go back... dangerous!"

This...

As Richard pondered its meaning, he saw it float backward again and reach for the translucent cord connecting his body and consciousness.

In an instant, Richard felt an extreme sense of danger. A vague premonition arose in his heart: if the translucent cord broke, his consciousness might never be able to return to his body. He might become something like this thing.

"Whoosh!"

In the next moment, the Mental Strength strengthened through long periods of meditation erupted fully. An invisible force rapidly spread toward the other Soul Body.

"Bang!"

There was a soundless collision. Before the Soul Body could touch the translucent cord, it was directly knocked away by Richard's Mental Strength and hurled violently toward the wall. Then Richard noticed something: it did not pass through the wall. Instead, it struck the wall and stopped there. Afterward, it seemed to have been knocked unconscious, only moving again after quite some time.

Was it because of a difference in density?

Could it be that although it looked somewhat similar to his consciousness, it was an entirely different kind of existence? Like... like filtration in an experiment. Though impurities and a solution were mixed together, when they passed through filter paper—the wall—the solution could pass through, while the impurities would be blocked.

Had it lost its connection to its body and continuously weakened, causing some kind of energy within it to decline until it eventually became like this? Richard thought quickly, though he was uncertain.

He did not know much about the current world. Some of his research had only just begun. Though he had made a few small breakthroughs, things like souls and dragons clearly required long-term research before he could attempt to explain them scientifically. For now, he could only make some simple guesses.

As Richard guessed, he saw the other Soul Body awaken from its "dazed" state and become extremely frightened. It wildly waved its two arm-like appendages, continuously sending even vaguer messages through mental fluctuations: "No... kill... me... afraid... won't dare..."

Richard was about to send out some mental fluctuations as well and attempt to communicate with it, but unexpectedly, it suddenly floated out through the door, drifted outside the old castle, and quickly floated away.

"It left?" Richard murmured inwardly.

The next moment, he shook his head. Richard did not waste any more time. Instead, he directly controlled his consciousness to float upward, rising to a height of over a hundred meters and beginning to absorb the energy of Astral Projection.

A large amount of energy was drawn into the spell source within his body and stored there. After being refined, it became the mana needed to cast spells.

This was the cultivation process of a Wizard—dull and lengthy, but also unavoidable.

After reserving a small measure of caution for the Soul Body that had just fled, Richard devoted all his remaining attention to meditating at full force.

The energy within his spell source rapidly grew stronger...

In the room on the second floor, Pandora's eyes flickered as she slowly turned her head to look into the distance. She sensed that something she disliked had left.

But... that thing had clearly always stayed in the old castle. Though she found it somewhat unpleasant, she had no ability to drive it away. So why had it...

Tilting her head slightly, Pandora looked down. Her eyes flickered again.