Cultivation Nerd (xianxia)

Chapter 163 - A Delicate Mind

 

"How?" asked the owl. 

After I revealed that I knew about his scheme, his round eyes were devoid of hate and hope.

How I knew about his little scheme was more of a guess on my part. I assumed he wouldn't be dumb enough to charge at me without any plan in mind. He was likely buying some time for his array to activate, the same strategy I had used more than once. It worked better if the opposing side had no idea I was an Array Conjurer.

"If you asked anyone, they would say that's my gimmick. I read many books and know many things," I gave the owl a lackluster excuse. After what he had done, I owed him no explanation.

He should be glad I wasn't giving him a barbaric death after he had messed with the minds of those close to me. After what I had seen at the Song Clan prison, I could be pretty creative in these kinds of things.

Bile rose up my throat just thinking about that place—the man hanging like a piece of meat, the guy having his brains eaten by rats, the one shoved in a barrel, and much more. I clenched my teeth and stopped myself from coming off as a weakling and throwing up in front of my opponent. The last time I had done something like that with an enemy nearby, I had almost died.

"No matter what tortures you inflict on me, I would never betray my Master's trust and spit on his legacy!" the owl declared.

"Torture? What are we even talking about here? We both know I don't have the stomach for that," I said, walking closer to the owl and crouching again. "What I'm saying is that we could work together. You get to keep the inheritance and give it to some other guy. But at the same time, you write down a couple of books on whatever the inheritance teaches, and we will be on our own merry way. You know what, I will even help you find some asshole guy your master can body snatch."

The owl met my gaze, and as our eyes locked, the darkness around the library's third floor intensified. Shadows, once merely cast by the dim light, now wriggled free from their constraints, moving with eerie autonomy. They crawled toward us like hungry worms, slithering across the floor and walls with a life of their own, growing in size and number.

As I prepared to move, my body suddenly betrayed me in a grotesque display. Bloody holes opened across my skin as if punctured by invisible forces. From these unnerving wounds, flowers began to bloom, their petals unfurling amidst the crimson.

"Huh," I murmured, my curiosity piqued despite the shock of the situation. Leaning closer, I cautiously inhaled the scent of the flowers sprouting bizarrely from my body. The aroma was unexpectedly rich, filling my senses with an almost intoxicating fragrance, like a wild, untamed garden after rain. As I breathed in, the scent seemed to coat the back of my throat with a sweetness reminiscent of honey, soothing and rich.

I glanced at the owl. "Does this array have something to do with what can be inherited? This is neat."

It was fascinating, and I wasn't saying this just to play ball. I could feel the pain, hear the shadows crawling on the ground, and even smell the flowers. Sure, this was all an illusion, but it was so well-crafted that it made the illusionary arrays I had studied in the Song Clan Library seem amateurish.

Warmth spread along my body, an alarming yet oddly comforting sensation, as the blood from the flower wounds soaked into my blue uniform, dyeing it a deep, dark red.

"This would be really cooler if you could force the victim to actually feel the sensation of losing blood. Otherwise, this is mostly just panic bait. Also, when the red blood stains the blue uniform, it creates a purplish tint. Still, these things go beyond the simple sensations," I said, shaking my head in disappointment at the illusion's lackluster execution despite its potential. "You should have a dizzying array; make the victim feel weak when they lose so much blood. Also, add an acoustic illusion that amplifies the sound of my heartbeat until it's all I can hear. Make the world blurry, my legs shake, and all that."

I had many more criticisms to lay on him, but I didn't have all day. It was because of these lackluster efforts that illusionary arrays were considered useless. Users were trying to make the victim feel things they had no experience with.

How could someone make another feel the illusion of losing blood if they had never experienced it? The closest the owl had come to feeling such things was probably today, and even then, he wouldn't be able to add the experience here since it was new, and he hadn't had the time to really process it; he was probably running on adrenaline.

It was disappointing to see a creature who had lived for so many years have such lackluster skills in arrays. During his long life, the owl might have grown in cultivation, but his originality and mind had yet to develop to the level expected of someone his age. He was probably older than a hundred years.

As I watched, the owl's downed body began a mesmerizing transformation. Its feathery form started disintegrating into countless flower petals, each delicate and ethereal. The petals fluttered upwards, caught in an invisible breeze, and floated away, scattering into the air around us.

Without hesitation, I lunged forward, my hand closing on what seemed to be thin air. Yet, to my touch, there was the unmistakable feel of a throat under my grasp. I lifted the figure, invisible to the eye but undeniably present in my grip. A strained groan emerged from the unseen entity, confirming its existence. The illusion had shown the owl vanishing in a burst of flower petals, but it was just that—an illusion.

"Perhaps killing you might be the right decision. If this is all you can do, then you're not worth leaving alive after what you did to the librarian," I told him, waiting for any reason to spare him.

I wasn't against killing the owl, but it would be a shame if the knowledge from his master and the inheritance disappeared from this world forever.

The humanoid owl, still concealed by his invisibility, extended his hand towards me, aiming for my head—perhaps hoping I had left my guard down. He hoped wrong. As his hand reached out, it crashed against a translucent green barrier I had conjured. The barrier shimmered upon impact, the force of his attempt causing ripples across its surface. The owl's hand recoiled from the sudden resistance.

"You… wanted… me," the owl continued speaking through gasps and the tight grip I had on his throat.

I loosened my grip, allowing the humanoid owl to regain his footing. As he settled on his two feet, the invisible curtain that had shrouded him faded away. Simultaneously, the illusion collapsed. The aftermath revealed that my uniform was clean, and the blood and blossoms vanished as if they had never been. No flowers bloomed from my injuries, showing that I was unharmed.

He grunted and grabbed at his chest as blood spouted out from where I had stabbed him. The large cut from shoulder to hip looked worse, but it wasn't that deep. It was a clean cut as if made by a scalpel.

"You wanted me to show you what I could do, right?" The owl grunted, rubbing his throat. His voice still sounded a bit haggard from my grip. "I can show you more if you let me touch your head. I will tell you right now that my Master's memory transfer engages a battle between the souls."

"Souls?" I raised a questioning brow.

"Yes. Now, do you understand why I called my Master a genius? A soul is something that no living being can perceive, but my Master made a technique that can interact with it. Transferring memories is a hectic technique, so Master had to put some rules in place to make it work," the owl explained eloquently. He had already given up and seemed to have understood that sneak attacks wouldn't work.

Though he was clearly leaving some details out of his explanation. He was kind of shit at human intrigue.

"Sure, let's try it," I said, putting down the Dancing Jade Armor barrier.

There were three reasons why I was so confident in trying this. For one, I knew the owl couldn't afford to kill me. That would just be asking for death himself, and he seemed to appreciate his life enough and wanted his master's inheritance to pass to the right person. Two, I set a timer that would cause an explosion that would rattle the whole tower, and the librarian would come here. Also, the explosion would blast us apart, and the owl would no longer hold my head. Three, the hidden message on the back of my shoulder in case I lost my memories.

Was there danger? Yes, but it was the fun kind of danger where I could see and learn something new. When would I be able to experience techniques like these again? This could be a once-in-a-lifetime experience! That was why it was worth taking some minor risks.

With everything under control, I let the owl-like monstrous beast's fingers brush against my forehead.

Instantly, the environment around us shifted dramatically. We found ourselves in an entirely different realm—a vast, purple-hued void. The space was eerily empty, save for silent flashes of thunder that lit up the surroundings with ghostly light, creating a surreal and unsettling atmosphere. The owl and I stood a couple dozen feet apart, each rooted to the spot.

"What is this?" I asked.

"This is the Master's memory transfer technique, and the trick I developed to confuse the librarian was derived from understanding this technique," he said, with a confident edge in his tone that hadn't existed before.

As I attempted to move, I was ensnared in a sensation akin to being stuck in a dream where moving was impossible no matter how hard I tried. My limbs felt heavy and unresponsive to my commands. Glancing at the owl, it was apparent he was experiencing the same paralysis.

"Can you at least tell me how this technique works? I spared your life, so the least you can do is explain it before you delete my memories," I offered as I tried to extend my senses to feel what was happening. But, strangely, I couldn't sense anything. It was like I had lost all my cultivation, techniques, and anything else that would have mattered. 

This technique was designed so the victim's cultivation wouldn't matter once the activation conditions were fulfilled. The creator must have been a weak cultivator who assumed he would never reach far in pure cultivation, so he developed techniques like these.

"After many trials and errors, Master learned that transferring leads of memories into a physical mind would be disastrous. In most cases, it ended up with the victim becoming a vegetable; in some cases, their mind was overloaded with so much information that they even forgot how to breathe," the owl explained with a solemn look in his eyes. The confidence in his master was absolute; he never thought his technique would fail. "That is why he developed this technique. Instead of transferring information into the mind, which is a fragile organ, he would transfer it to the victim's soul. Through many experiments, he discovered that the human soul could handle much more than the human mind."

I understood the general gist of what he meant. It also fit perfectly with the second-type Otherworlder theory. The soul carried the information from their first life and not anything else like their brain.

At least this revealed that souls existed, even if we couldn't perceive them.

In the silence of the purple void, a rumbling sound began to build, breaking the unnatural stillness. Behind the owl, a white sphere formed, manifesting suddenly and ominously. It pulsed with a radiant intensity, and with unnatural swiftness, it shot out rays of pure white light that sliced through the surrounding twilight.

These rays bathed the void in brilliant illumination, creating a stark contrast against the deep purple backdrop. As the light touched my skin, an overwhelming feeling enveloped me, a sensation that seemed to penetrate to the very core of my being.

He had mentioned something about soul combat before. Was this it?

As the light from the white sphere intensified, I closed my eyes, focusing inward in an attempt to defend my essence and prevent the owl's soul from overtaking mine. I didn't want to lose my memories of this meeting!

With a deep breath, I tried to reach the deepest recesses of my inner self, searching for a core of strength or hidden reserve that could fend off the invasive force. But a startling epiphany washed over me in this effort—I was already in the deepest part of myself. There was no further depth to myself. This realization was both disarming and enlightening. It suggested that the battle for control, the push and pull against the owl's influence, was happening here and now, at the core of my being.

Contrary to the brilliant white sphere behind my opponent, two dark spheres materialized behind me. Even though they were positioned behind me, I could perceive them with startling clarity, as if they were directly before my eyes.

A shadow began to seep from one of the dark spheres behind me, moving with intent. It surged forward like a wave of darkness, swallowing the white light from the sphere behind the owl.

In this space, we could no longer speak or hear each other. We couldn't even move, and whatever we were seeing was likely just a product of our imagination, our minds trying to reason what we were looking at.

However, our minds were connected, and I could sense the panic, shock, and fear running through the owl's mind as my darkness eclipsed his light.

It wasn't a matter of who was more skilled but who had the stronger soul. Having a twice as strong soul… Well, it was an advantage. It was the same reason why there were weight classes in fighting. But in a soul clash, it was even more unfair because there were no grapples or techniques that would allow someone to take down a bigger opponent.

Suddenly, my vision returned, and I was back in the real world—with the heavily injured owl still touching my forehead.

The library was eerily quiet. There was no longer a sound of clanking or shelves shifting around. It was like all that complex array had died out.

Hurriedly, I disabled the explosive array that was just about to activate.

I brushed the owl's hand away from my forehead and got a better look at the monstrous beast. What a sorry sight it was. The owl was visibly drooling, thick saliva dripping from the edges of its beak. Previously, its eyes sparkled with a sharp, almost tangible intelligence; now they had faded to a dull, listless gray, clouded and unfocused.

He had ended up turning into a vegetable...

"Sorry, I didn't mean to do that," I apologized.

Obviously, deleting memories of our meeting was a dick move. But turning the bird into a vegetable was needless. Yet there was nothing I could do about it now.

"It seems like there was another drawback to your technique that perhaps you didn't know about," I sighed. 

If he won the soul clash, he could add the memories of his master or delete certain memories. However, I doubt he knew this would happen if he lost, or he wouldn’t have been so hasty to use the technique. 

Using these techniques was a double-edged sword. To manipulate someone's mind, the user had to open their own mind to transfer said thoughts. That was an extremely complicated and risky technique.

Despite the apparent danger, it would be fun to learn techniques like this. Though it would be too dangerous to use on others, so I wouldn't do that.

A startling sensation washed over me before my mind could wander off into thoughts about a technique like the one the owl had used. When we were in that strange purplish space, I could sense my own soul... I was my own soul.

Even though the technique had run its course... I could still sense it. It was perhaps even clearer now—the mangled monstrosity that was my soul.

 

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