Chapter 320: Elemental Clone 2.0
"It’s all about instincts, how could I have forgotten that?" Xiang Yu spoke, facepalming in frustration at his own oversight.
The void flame was some sort of space-devouring monster, so it made sense that it would instinctually want to devour the space around it. And this instinct was so deeply rooted within him that he couldn’t suppress it through willpower alone.
If he wanted to control this destructive tendency, he needed to level up either his soul or his mind.
In order to create what he wanted, it seemed he needed to generate his own void energy without relying on the void within his soul. The good news was that he had already accomplished something similar before, so it wouldn’t be as difficult as starting from scratch.
He didn’t need to manifest a full domain anyway, just a small amount of void energy would suffice.
On his palm, a void energy ball materialized.
It slowly grew to the size of a tennis ball before stopping, perfectly contained within his control. Xiang Yu then focused his will and commanded the void energy to stop consuming the space around it. Just as he’d expected, it actually obeyed his command and ceased its destructive behavior.
He shook his head regretfully, realizing that he wouldn’t be able to optimize his void domain anytime soon. The instinctual nature of the void flame was too deeply ingrained to overcome at his current level. Well, either way, he now had a reliable method to produce void crystals.
His qi started condensing around the void energy.
Slowly, the crystalline structure sealed the void energy within, creating a stable void crystal. The process required intense concentration and precise control, but the result was exactly what he had envisioned.
Xiang Yu thought to himself that now he just needed to create a few more void crystals, as well as perform the same process for all ten elements he had mastered. After that, he would finally be able to forge his dream weapon.
Meanwhile, the light clone Xiang Yu held a beast core in his hands, studying it intensely.
He thought to himself that the way he wanted to upgrade his elemental clone ability had to do with understanding this core. And he meant completely, he needed to comprehend all the intricate details, every function and mechanism, every subtle interaction within the core’s structure.
The theory Xiang Yu had developed was quite simple (not really).
Since he had reached the pure blood level, he should theoretically be able to condense bloodline essences from noble blood level and below. This ability was the foundation of his upgrade plan.
He wanted to completely restructure how his elemental clone ability functioned. When he activated the clone ability, instead of the current process of creating a split mind partition and then immediately generating a body to assign it to, he envisioned a more sophisticated approach.
First, he would create the mind partition as usual. But then, instead of rushing to create a physical form, he wanted a bloodline essence to be condensed first, for both the dragon and phoenix bloodlines, or even just one if he chose. This condensed essence would then be placed into a small generated body that remained within him, not yet splitting into an independent entity.
The mind partition would then be assigned to this internal body. Within this contained form, instead of Xiang Yu manually creating a false core and assigning it a specific element, the mind partition would stimulate the bloodlines in the precise way required for natural beast core formation.
Since the clone wouldn’t be fully separated from his main body but would be isolated from connecting to his existing beast core, the mind partition would take advantage of his qi cultivation level to trick the bloodlines into believing that he genuinely needed a core, triggering the natural core creation process.
Once the core formed, the body would finally split from his true body and be filled out with the remaining body parts, becoming a complete entity. This new clone would possess Xiang Yu’s bloodlines at the noble stage, twenty-seventh layer body refining cultivation, and most importantly, its own core. This meant it could access qi independently and regenerate its energy once depleted.
Another significant advantage would be that the clone could potentially use all elemental qi if he designed the process correctly, making it far more versatile than his current elemental clones.
The entire process seemed lengthy and complex when broken down, but it would all happen in an instant once initiated. Even the core creation part would continue gradually and stabilize itself after the splitting occurred as long as the initial formation process was properly triggered.
The only problem he could foresee was the bloodline essence requirement. He didn’t believe a pure blood could simply spam-create noble blood essences on command without consequences.
The energy and resource costs would likely be substantial.
Well, he’d cross that bridge once he reached it.
For now, he needed to focus on getting his proof of concept working first, then worry about the practical limitations later.
...
By dawn, Xiang Yu had successfully created four void crystals.
He thought to himself that the process was genuinely difficult and exhausting, but he suspected the other elemental crystals probably wouldn’t be nearly as challenging to produce. The void energy’s inherent instability and destructive nature made it quite problematic to work with.
On the bright side, he viewed this as practice for his actual void domain, not the one he possessed intrinsically through the void flame, but one he personally made.
After completing the fifth crystal, Xiang Yu decided to pause his crystal-making.
It wasn’t that he felt tired or drained, but rather he needed to shift his focus to another equally important project. The light clone had just finished developing the theoretical framework for upgrading his elemental clone ability, and now he needed to complete the modifications and implement them properly.
The good thing about divine abilities was their inherent flexibility, they could be easily reoptimized and modified as the user continued studying and understanding them. This adaptability was precisely why divine abilities were considered limitless in their potential.
If an ability hit a limitation or reached a bottleneck, the cultivator could simply readjust the fundamental structure and continue practicing to push beyond previous boundaries.
Xiang Yu settled into deep concentration as he began modifying the divine ability to match his developed theory. The process required intense mental focus as he rewrote the ability’s core functions, restructuring how it would create and deploy elemental clones.
After several minutes, the modification was complete.
Although some minor elements had failed to integrate properly during the restructuring process, they were just small adjustments he’d added as potential improvements. He didn’t think they mattered much anyway as he might even naturally gain those enhancements once the ability leveled up again.
After finishing the modification, he decided to put the upgraded ability to the test.
Since he already had the maximum number of mind partitions actively working with existing clones, he needed to recall one clone before he could conduct a proper test. Although he technically could create another partition, this wouldn’t be a fully standalone conscious partition and could potentially interfere with the core creation process.
Wind Xiang Yu materialized before the original.
He stretched out his hand, placing it firmly on Xiang Yu’s chest. Instantly, he was absorbed back into the main body, his consciousness merging seamlessly with the original.
"Now, let’s see if this will actually work..."
...
A/N: It’s done, and I’m alive. yippee