Soul Mutation

Barn couldn't verify his suspicions about himself, nor did he have any means of harnessing the power of the gray mist. He could only let it drift gently around his soul like a wisp of silk. It neither touched nor clung to him, yet he couldn't shake it off.

But another matter weighed on his mind, one he was eager to confirm.

"It's time to give it a try." Barn murmured to himself and reached for a crystal-studded staff—the essential medium for casting the Fate Law.

Humans couldn't sense the aura of fate, let alone draw it into their bodies. So before reaching the Holy Magus level, mages had to rely on fate-attributed items to cast those inscrutable fate spells. Aside from that, all they could do was meditate day after day to temper their spiritual power.

Now, however, Barn had advanced to Holy Magus. He was powerful enough to control that strange, unruly force of fate for a short time.

For a long while, he had harbored a question: did the perfect fusion of the soul he had brought with him and the original Barn's soul count as...

A thread of pale golden fate power flowed slowly along the pathways of his spiritual power, finally gathering in his left palm. At the same time, clear Water Element magic power was drawn into his right hand. The two forces remained distinct, but the moment he brought his hands together, they intertwined without the slightest resistance and quietly merged as one—

Soul Mutation!

As the power slowly dissipated, Barn lowered his hands and fell into thought.

During Soul Mutation, a person only needed to possess affinity for one of the seven elements for it to participate directly. But the four Great Rules required some degree of understanding before they could be drawn into the process.

He had some talent for the Destruction Rule, but hadn't yet crossed its threshold. Nor had he undergone the White Tiger Bloodline's ancestral rite, so his Wind Element affinity remained hidden. That meant he had just undergone a dual Soul Mutation with fate and the Water Element.

"A dual Soul Mutation isn't an overwhelmingly heaven-defying gift, but it's comparable to that of an ordinary divine beast, with even greater potential. If I can visit the Four Divine Beasts Clan one day and undergo the ancestral rite, I'll gain the White Tiger's divine ability. Then my potential will rank just below that of a super divine beast!" Barn couldn't hide his satisfaction. At last, he had a clear understanding of his talent.

But a new problem soon arose: how could he bring out the full power of this dual Soul Mutation?

"My rapid breakthrough to Holy Magus must have been thanks to the boost to my soul from Soul Mutation. The stronger the soul, the faster one comprehends laws. That's my advantage for now." Barn pondered, then furrowed his brow. "But the key problem is that fate power can't be drawn directly into the body, much less refined and converted into battle qi. That makes the core advantage of Soul Mutation at the Sanctuary level—fused battle qi—an empty promise."

Storing battle qi and fusing battle qi were two entirely different things.

Before reaching Sanctuary, most warriors focused on a single attribute of battle qi and stored it in their dantian. Once they entered Sanctuary, their meridians became sturdy enough to bear more battle qi. If they then comprehended the laws of another attribute, they could refine their breathing technique and store different types of battle qi in their meridians and dantian, in keeping with the laws they had comprehended.

Even mages with affinity for multiple elements would focus first on a single attribute. After reaching Sanctuary, they would cultivate magic power of another attribute to complement their talent.

For Sanctuary experts with near-limitless lifespans, this was the most ordinary path of cultivation.

But dual Soul Mutators could break through that limit and store battle qi of two attributes in their dantian at the same time. The resulting fused battle qi was ten times more powerful than battle qi of a single attribute! (In the original story, Olivia's fused divine power from opposing light and darkness reached a tenfold increase or more. For attributes that aren't completely opposed, the increase should only be tenfold.)

But Barn couldn't do that at all. There was no such thing as fate-attributed battle qi.

He was still cultivating the Tiger Pattern Secret Canon, a Wind Element battle qi technique. Even if he took the time to modify the technique and refine a little Water Element battle qi, it would do very little to improve his overall strength.

"To make use of my mutated talent, I either need to reach godhood in both laws and fight with fused divine power, or attempt to fuse laws across different attributes. But in a perilous place like Gobada, wasting my energy on law fusion—with its incredibly low chance of success—wouldn't be worth it."

Barn's gaze turned solemn as he looked at the spear-shaped phantom of his soul in the sea of spiritual power. "The Fate Law is far too abstruse and unpredictable. Fortunately, the original story described the Water Profound Mysteries in detail. I'll first make a start in that field, then consider my next steps."

Elsewhere, Declan, the Spine-backed Iron-armored Dragon, was wolfing down his meal. He bit off half a leg in one go and swallowed it, then repeatedly licked the scraps of meat and streaks of blood from the corner of his mouth with his rough tongue. He wasn't willing to waste a single morsel. In the Gobada Abyss, food was always the most precious resource.

"Barn really doesn't know how to save!" he growled around a mouthful, full of complaint. "He finally managed to stock up on food, and now he's wasting it, running off to study Water Element magic!"

There was no way Declan, his contracted partner, could have missed Barn's soul breakthrough.

When asked about his sudden Water Element affinity, Barn had brushed him off with the excuse that his soul had once been severely damaged and, by misfortune turning to fortune, the ordeal had awakened and strengthened an affinity that had previously been too faint to notice.

Declan wasn't the sort to obsess over things. Humans and magical beasts alike could have faint affinities that went unnoticed because they were too weak. He couldn't understand why Barn's had suddenly grown stronger after a brush with death, but he didn't pry.

If he couldn't figure it out, he might as well put it out of his mind. Declan had only one concern now: surviving the perilous Gobada Abyss. Barn's advancement to Holy Magus was a good thing for him, at any rate—even if Barn had indeed wasted a lot of food lately.

"That Ice Snow Lion should've lasted Barn six years if he'd eaten sparingly. At this rate, he'll be gnawing on human flesh with me in another six months." Declan glanced at the remains in his hand. His Adam's apple bobbed a few times, but in the end he resisted the urge to swallow and stored the meat in the spatial pendant at his waist. Safety in Gobada never lasted, and he had to keep enough food in reserve.

Just as Declan had expected, five years after they killed the Ice Snow Lion, Barn came slowly toward him, carrying a long spear that gleamed with a chilling light.