Awakening

Alex suddenly awakened from the enlightenment felt that he was still in the middle of the essence core formation.

The lotus seed attentively attracting the essence around to form the essence core. Just like when the process is about to reach the critical point, the lotus seed suddenly started to burn.

An intense black flame started to burn the lotus seed. The flame slowly retracted into the lotus seed. The lotus seed, after getting burned by the black flame, completely changed into a black seed.

Alex who saw the changes was startled, but he didn't panic, because he believed that the black flame won't bring him any harm. He firmly believed that this black flame will be the important key for him to become a cultivator.

Soon a terrifying suction erupted from the black seed and started to madly absorb the essence from the surroundings. Including the essence from the pill was being madly absorbed by the black seed.

The black seed started to inflate like a balloon by madly absorbing the surrounding essence. The shadow of the golden lotus also got absorbed by the terrifying suction.

Dave and Lara who were worrying about Alex's situation were startled when they felt the terrifying force sucking away all essence in the room. This sudden situation made them snap out of their previous emotions.

"What's happening? I can't sense Alex's situation through my sea of consciousness." Lara asked puzzled.

"I don't know what's happening, it's like some strange power blocking us from spying on him," Dave replied.

"Then what is this suction force, it's more terrifying than before. If this keeps on then the formation will soon collapse because of insufficient essence." Lara said.

Dave soon waved his hand and a lot of essence stones and essence crystal fell on the formation from his space ring.

Essence stones are used by cultivators in the Essence gathering realm, Essence flowing realm, Essence condensation realm.

Essence crystals are used by cultivators in Earth profound realm, Heaven profound realm, Spirit profound realm.

As soon as the essence stones and essence crystal appeared, the black seed started to devour all the essence into the black seed.

Soon the black seed's size achieved five times bigger than the normal essence core formed by cultivators but still, the seed didn't stop from getting inflated.

Soon it reached 10 times bigger than ordinary Essence core.

After some time it grew 20 times bigger than the normal essence core.

When the size of the black seed reached 30 times the normal essence core, the suction force suddenly stopped.

Soon cracks started to appear on the black seed.

CRACK

The black seed shattered, suddenly revolving a beautiful black color variant essence core. As soon as the black core was revealed, a strange sensation appeared in Alex's mind. He felt that he could feel the connection between him and the black core.

The shattered pieces of the seed suddenly turned into the essence and rushed into the black essence core. Soon the black core started to fill with Essence in the gaseous state and his cultivation realm began to raise.

Early-stage of Essence Gathering realm

Middle-stage of Essence Gathering realm

Late-stage of Essence Gathering realm

Alex Devan soon reached the peak of the essence gathering realm and only one step away from Essence Flowing realm.

Finally, the essence core started to calm down. Now Alex has an essence core that is nearly 30 times bigger than the ordinary essence core and besides this essence core, there was the broken essence core formed by the forbidden pill.

Alex who felt a huge amount of essence flowing inside him was happy beyond words. When he was about to sense the situation of his essence core, suddenly a shock hit his head.

A strange mark appeared on his forehead and soon disappeared and a strange set of knowledge appeared in Alex's head. Alex slowly opened his eyes and had an even wider smile than before.

He soon calmed down and started to sort out the gains he had during this cultivation.

Soon Alex sensed his essence core and found that his essence core was nearly 30 times bigger than others, he quickly felt happiness and sadness. He has heard that there are people with special physiques who condense essence core 5 times bigger than ordinary cultivators.

He was happy because he felt that he has 6 times bigger essence core compared to those geniuses. Furthermore, he felt sad because he needs 30 times the resources of an ordinary cultivator.

"I don't know whether this was a blessing or curse, either way, I have to cultivate with it. At least with this advantage, I can offset my inability to practice martial arts."

Alex suddenly wants to find out how much essence does he have compared with an ordinary cultivator. Soon he thought about the ratio of conversion in each realm and started to do mathematics.

100% gaseous essence = 10% liquid essence.

10% Liquid essence = 1% Solid essence

So for cultivator with ordinary essence core.

100% Gaseous essence = 1% Solid essence.

So for Alex who has 30 times bigger Essence core, his current essence is comparable with cultivators at the Early stage of the Essence condensation realm.

When Alex discovered this he couldn't believe himself, a cultivator in the late stage of the Essence gathering realm is comparable to a cultivator in the Early stage of the Essence condensation realm in terms of essence sounds unbelievable.

Soon his concentration fell on the variation of his essence core which was in black and because of this the essence inside the core also transformed into black color essence.

A variation occurs to a person with a special physique and the essence core will be highly compatible with the special physique.

So if a cultivator with fire type physique condenses a variant essence core, red color essence core. It means the essence inside the essence core will have fire properties due to the variant essence core.

The main point is that Alex doesn't have any kind of special physique he doesn't have any affinity with any elements just like the essence of heaven and earth. For such a person to have variant essence core is somewhat unbelievable.

His variant essence core is formed due to the appearance of the black flames, so he thought it should have a special ability. After repeated examination, he finally found out the specialty of his variant essence core.

He finally figured that he has absolute control over these black essences. Alex is someone who couldn't sense the essence of heaven and earth, so even if he condenses the essence core, he still wouldn't be able to manipulate the essence inside the core. But this problem was solved completely due to the variant essence core which gives him absolute authority over the usage of the black essence.

The final gain he got from condensing the essence core belongs to the fourth effect of the heaven devouring pill. It's inheriting the special ability of the heaven-grade ingredient. He got this skill which was also the most needed for his future road of cultivation.

*Heaven Grade Skill — Essence Gathering*

This ability helps him to gather the essence from his surroundings and can freely control these essences. He not only can gather the essence of heaven and earth, but he can also take different essence from different ingredients.

He can use this ability to gather essence into the essence core, which was originally impossible without sensing the essence of heaven and earth.

After completely gasping the gains, Alex opened his eyes with a big smile on his face.

When he opened his eyes he saw the room filled with essence completely blocking all the sense of a cultivator. Alex too struggled to see anything besides him.

"What the hell happened here? Why is there so much essence?"

" Don't tell me it's because of me? But I don't even remember doing anything which may result in this situation. It looks like there is no other choice other than showing off."

"Heavenly Skill — Essence Gathering."