Fighting the Poison

Thick beads of sweat crawled down Jack's forehead and went into his eyes, irritating them in the process. Still, Jack kept his eyes open despite the stinging sensation and focused fully on controlling the spread of the poison within him.

But he was losing the fight.

The poison went from his heart straight to his lungs and he felt every breath of air harder to make. His chest began to feel heavy, as if it had been filled with molten lead and it was sinking to the bottom of his gut. With each passing second, his breaths became smaller and more rasp.

Jack struggled with his breathing and he started to wheeze, which made him sweat all the more profusely. With ever beat of his heart the poison spread further inside his body and even entered into his meridians. If he hadn't had reforged them in accordance to the Harmony of Everything then they would have started corroding the moment the extremely toxic substance came into contact with them. However, given his supreme-grade meridians, the poison flowed through them to every inch of his body, contaminating him entirely.

The poison passed through each one of his two-thousand acupuncture points, open and unopened alike, as blood started to pour out of his even facial orifices. His stomach rumbled and he was beset by constant retches as his body was beset by seizures.

Jack was dying, and he knew it.

'Maybe this isn't so bad.' He thought to himself. 'Maybe, after so long, I can finally rest.'

There was something enticing in the idea of the sweet embrace of deathly release that Jack couldn't help but ponder seriously. He had spent thousands upon thousands of years in constant fighting and always in pain; perhaps this was his karmic retribution.

But then the image of his loved ones during his surprise birthday party inundated his mind. Jadelere giving him a book and companionship; Erik sharing his vast knowledge and precious treasures; Leah gifting him a weapon and, by extension, her trust; Adras, his mother, showering with tender love and affection, always there to support him no matter how mischievously he acted; and Ichabod, his father, recognising him as a man and sharing a glass of strong spirit with him.

How could he let them down by giving up? There was no chance that he would do it!

Jack roared and placed his hands in front of his chest in the manner indicated in the Harmony of Everything's first chapter of body cultivation. Technically, he wasn't supposed to begin with this stage of body cultivation until he broke through to the Foundation realm and had some basic understandings of the first chapter, which was still far beyond his current progress; meaning there was a very real chance that he would suffer from deviation. However, he didn't have the option to afford not doing it now.

The qi within Jack's dantian surged and flowed throughout all of the meridians within his body like lightning, revolving in the manner described in the Harmony of Everything. Wherever it passed, it would break down Jack on a molecular level and reconstruct him at the same time. Rivers of extremely pure qi which had been accumulated within the dragon-shaped ring poured into his body and flowed through him, spreading all throughout him and swiftly overtaking the poison's advance.

Jack's inside and outside began cracking as if he were a porcelain doll about to break in a million pieces. This was similar to the first stage of body cultivation; but back then it had been a gradual progression and this time it was happening all over him simultaneously.

His mind had to suffer under the onslaught of unimaginable agony as he experienced his entire being put through a grinder in a cyclical manner. Anyone else would have long died from the pain, but Jack refused to buckle up under it. His consciousness was clear and his breathing steady, despite his heart beating in overdrive.

Whilst this was happening, something truly astonishing happened with regards to the poison: it was being absorbed into Jack's qi and its properties were being used to further strengthen Jack's body. The Harmony of Everything was a method that harmonised everything, as its name indicated, but Jack was marvelled to discover that it could harmonise toxins as well. Clearly, he had underestimated this method.

With his confidence soaring, Jack grinned and continued directing the qi within him to flow and rebuild him.

Jack let out a deep breath and rose to his feet with a swift jump up, a bolt of light emerging from his eyes as he released a deep growl. He felt as if some unseen shackles on his persona had suddenly disappeared and he had been liberated as the strength of his flesh had reached an unimaginable level. Furthermore, without realising it, he'd broken to the ninth level of the Martial realm because the poison had somehow helped him with unblocking the remainder of his clogged acupuncture points.

He closed his eyes and felt the marvellous sensation of the qi within the air flowing unimpeded into him through every pore within his body. Similarly, he was amazed to discover that the poison that had, at one point, threatened to kill him had now been fully integrated into his body.

Just to confirm it, Jack took the needle with the concentrated dose of poison and used it to pierce his carotid artery. To his surprise, he couldn't pierce his skin as easily as before and he even had to use some of his qi to do it. Once the needle finally broke through the surface of his flesh, he excitedly noticed that the poison no longer had any effect on him. It didn't even feel uncomfortable!

The entire process took him merely a few hours, but he felt as if it had been days because he had been constantly subjected to agony during the whole duration of it. However, the boons and gains he'd obtained because of it weren't easily quantifiable.

In addition, he had now discovered that if he practiced the body cultivation method of the Harmony of Everything whilst he was poisoned, then he would build up an immunity to it, and potentially others, slowly working up to an immunity to all poisons. This was a surprise benefit that many martial artist would kill to have the opportunity to enjoy.

Furthermore, now that he'd developed an immunity to the poison, he could use his blood to fully refine an antidote. In addition, because he had used a concentrated dosage of the poison, it wouldn't require a large quantity of his blood to do so.

Jack pulled a knife out of his storage ring and used it to slice his wrist which he then raised over the cauldron, allowing the blood to flow steadily into it. Just to ensure that nothing went wrong and that the refinement process didn't go amiss, he urged a drop of his blood essence from his heart to flow out of his wrist, too.

Although the act of using up a drop of his blood essence drained much of his mental and physical strength, Jack used it up without a second thought because doing so would increase the chances of success significantly.

Once he was content with the amount of blood that had accumulated within the cauldron, he wrapped up his wrist in a bandage and sat down with his legs crossed before the cauldron to begin the refinement process anew. When he sent out his spiritual sense to direct the process, the cauldron responded with even greater ease as it channelled the heat of the flame to burn the impurities from the blood.

The cauldron reacted to the drop of Jack's blood essence by absorbing a small part of it. This alarmed Jack and he tried his best to stop this from happening, but he was too late. The moment the cauldron had absorbed a portion of the drop, it seemed its appetite had been roused because it voraciously absorbed the rest of the drop instantly. Suddenly, the eyes on the draconic figures lit up brightly as an ethereal dragon roar resounded from the depths of the cauldron. The light from their eyes spread down their scales and the once black dragons became nine golden dragons wrapping around the cauldron. Jack could have sworn that they were dancing in joy but, upon closer inspection, he saw that they hadn't changed their positions.

Whatever the case, as soon as the cauldron finished changing, Jack felt a connection within the depths of his consciousness to the cauldron. He closed his eyes and decided to inspect this and determine whether this was a benefit or a tragedy.

Within his spiritual sea, the area within his mind that could best be described as the source of his spiritual sense, nine figures of golden red-eyed dragons had appeared and floated loftily and proud high up in his spirit sea; as if they were the supreme beings of the universe and all other creatures owed them fealty. Jack could perceive that they weren't genuine dragons nor were they living, breathing, beings, but they still had a part of a dragon's presence, meaning they weren't too far off from the real thing.

Jack tried to urge them to move but was met with their unshakable resistance. He then tried to use his spirit sense to force them to a corner in order to examine them in detail in the future. However, the dragon figures reacted by fighting back and they even barred their fangs to him, trying to devour his spirit sense.

Jack was furious.

These dragon figures had come into his spirit sea and not only did they refuse to heed to his commands, they even attempted to bite him. This was unacceptable.

Jack erupted with a killing intent so profound, that it was like a demon lord had come from the very depths of Hell to walk the planes of creation and burn it all to cinders. Jack roared within his spiritual sense and blanketed the nine dragon figures with his intent. The dragon figures were obviously startled by this because they halted with their attacking and gave Jack's spirit sense another glance.

They froze in place.

Jack was standing in the spirit sea with his hands to his sides; his eyes flashing with such murderous light that they couldn't meet his gaze. It was as if they had seen two endless black holes that threatened to devour them.

Then, he roared.

It was a roar full of anger and hate and a promise of death. The nine dragon figures felt the immense spiritual pressure contained within that roar and crashed down to the surface of his spirit sea. They lowered their wary heads to not face Jack and cowered in fear, regretting having decided to come into this man's body.

Jack didn't care where they came from, or what their intentions were; all he knew was that these nine dragon figures were enemies that needed destroying. Jack raised his hands and drew all of his spiritual backlash to release a strike that would send these figures to oblivion without a chance to return. Even if he received a backlash from this, he would rather suffer that than surrender his spiritual sea without putting up a fight.

The spiritual power in that strike was something that the nine dragon figures felt clearly and they instinctively knew that if they didn't submit to Jack then they were certainly destined to be utterly destroyed.

With a cry of anguish, all nine dragons flew up high in Jack's spirit sea and returned to the same positions they had on the black cauldron. Then they spread their wings in a manner that they connected with one another to form the shape of a cauldron. Once they did this, they froze like statues and kept that position.

Jack was surprised for a moment, but he dared not lower his guard. He sent a spiritual probe to the cauldron in order to gauge the dragon's response. They allowed him to push them in poke them in whatever way he desired. Furthermore, Jack could tell that the dragons were willing to subordinate themselves to him and were also allowing him to refine them into his spiritual conscience.

Jack was stumped.