It took Noah three days to wake up.
Not only his mind had been heavily stressed during the breakthrough but his body also needed time to stabilize.
It was a completely new body after all, it wasn't just one with fewer impurities.
'That was gory.'
Noah thought, looking at the remains of his old body all around him.
'I even have some pieces of skin in my hair, I should take a bath before inspecting my new body.'
As he stood up though, he began to notice some of the new aspects of his center of power.
'Wow, I feel so light! And what's all this energy that runs through me?'
His body was made of flesh and "Breath".
The latter was almost immaterial, it was no wonder that the weight of his body had diminished.
'Everything in my body has mixed with the "Breath", which is a form of energy. It's obvious that I would feel so energetic.'
Then, his hand instinctively went toward his chest.
His heartbeat was muffled due to the membrane that enveloped that organ but he couldn't find any problem with its functioning.
'The liquid around my heart should be liquid "Breath" of the darkness element. It seems that, in order to activate the ability of my new body, I have to inject that "Breath" in my circulatory system.'
When a body reached the fourth rank, the "Breath" inside it would reach the liquid stage and give far more power to the user.
'I'm quite eager to test it but I should first clean everything and let my center of power stabilize.'
Noah took a long bath to remove all the remains of his old body from himself.
Then, he gathered all the filth on the floor in one big bucket and used the black smoke to erase every trace of it.
Only the smell of blood remained in the room but, given enough time, even that would disappear.
'I feel so free.'
Noah judged, inspecting his body.
He was still naked, carefully observing every part of his skin.
There were no apparent changes in his external aspect, his skin was slightly purer and his muscles were more defined but, apart from those, he looked as when he was still in the third rank.
'The real changes are in the insides.'
Noah took out an inscribed weapon from his space-ring.
It was Fabian's white sword, its power was in the lower tier of the first rank.
Noah put strength on his grip and the sword directly broke in half!
'I can definitely survive the attack of a rank 4 beast now. Oh, it has been more than a week since I've last eaten and yet I don't feel any hunger. It seems like I'm really distancing myself from the mortal world.'
The breakthrough had lasted approximately three days, most of that time was expended in the reconstruction of the body.
A rank 3 body could survive starvation for a long time but that didn't prevent it from feeling hunger.
Yet, with his new body, Noah didn't feel anything similar to hunger or thirst, he felt like he had just woken up after a satisfying meal.
'Heroic ranks are so different and this isn't even the full power of my body!'
Not only was Noah's body still in the lower tier, but he also had an ability that empowered it!
The problem with the tier though was not solvable.
After the breakthrough, the body would slowly reach the peak of the lower tier as his dantian improved, yet, to reach higher tiers or ranks, he would need a rank 5 body-nourishing technique.
'Rank 5 is simply too far away, I should just focus on my other two centers of power that are still in the second rank. Right, the restrictions on my dantian should be gone.'
It was still day but the Dark vortex cultivation technique had not the same restriction of the Yin body, cultivating during the day would just be slower.
Noah sat on the now clean floor and created a vortex between his hands that were joint on his waist.
The vortex absorbed "Breath" of the darkness element and poured it freely inside the dantian that, to Noah surprise, showed some signs of expansion after just a few hours!
'Amazing! The restrictions are completely gone and it actually seems that the process is smoother! I shouldn't feel any hindrance till the solid stage of the third rank now.'
Noah happily shouted in his mind as he interrupted his cultivation.
His body had just formed, he would rather let it stabilize for a few days before resuming a complete training schedule.
'Now, I should be able to completely refine the Undead chameleon bones.'
Noah took out more than thirty bones accompanied by the same number of empty buckets.
During the last year, the Credits in his possession had increased so much that he could freely buy rank 4 materials without suffering any losses.
Also, since he was hunting rank 4 magical beasts, the discounts on those items had risen, allowing him to purchase even more materials.
He didn't do that only to always have available materials at hand but also to be prepared for his big escape.
A market rich of such a variety of materials was rare in that world, in the whole Utra nation, only the Royal city had it!
Noah didn't want to find himself in a situation where he lacked so many materials that he had to personally hunt each of the magical beasts from which they came from.
Noah put one of the buckets below his stretched arm and casually slashed with his white saber that had just appeared in his hand.
CLANG!
The saber hit his wrist but only a metallic sound resounded, there was no wound on it.
"…"
'I forgot that I can't hurt myself so casually anymore.'
Noah thought after being speechless for an instant.
He pressed the blade of the saber on his wrist and strongly pulled.
He used the real strength of his body at that moment, so it was obvious that a quite deep cut appeared on his skin.
However, after only a single drop of blood fell on the bucket, the cut healed, leaving no trace of the previous wound.
"…"