Hard choice

*Crack!*

After saturating the Core with energy, it cracked under pressure from within, its smooth surface of a perfect sphere covered in a spiderweb of thin, sharply twisting lines glowing with blinding light.

It then was broken along those cracks, and then as if suspended in time, the energy that was ready to explode from within froze.

It started very slowly flowing in between the shards next, as streams of energy and small crystals flowed into it from the torrent of Spiritual Qi around the Core.

This was already the third reformation, and now the entirety of the Spiritual Qi and residual crystals were completely absorbed into the Core.

The Dao Runes orbiting around the Core slightly expanded their orbit when it was shattered, but did not abandon it completely.