I slowly opened my eyes and remained seated for several long moments, allowing the flood of information to slow down naturally within my mind. The Saint Art no longer felt like foreign knowledge forcefully implanted into my consciousness. Instead, it felt strangely familiar, as though I had spent years refining and practicing it until every detail had become second nature.
"So that’s how it’s supposed to work."
The more I thought about it, the more I appreciated the brilliance behind the technique. It wasn’t merely a battlefield attack designed to kill large numbers of enemies. It had clearly been created for someone possessing abilities almost identical to my own.
Space located every target with absolute precision, Time synchronized each of them into the same instant, Silver Force became the executioner’s blade, and Generator completed the cycle by devouring every released soul the moment the attack finished.
Every one of my authorities naturally complemented the others until the entire process became a perfect loop.
Without wasting another moment, I stepped outside my room and formed the familiar three runes of Echo Reversion. The runes floated before me for only an instant before merging into a single symbol, and the familiar pulling sensation seized my soul.
Reality dissolved around me before reconstructing just as quickly, and a heartbeat later I found myself standing alone above the endless waters of the Soul Sea.
The nearest settlement lay far beyond my perception. In every direction there was nothing except the silent ocean stretching endlessly toward the horizon while countless native creatures drifted beneath its surface, completely unaware that they had just become unwilling participants in my first experiment.
I closed my eyes.
My Spatial Comprehension expanded outward like an invisible tide, sweeping across the Soul Sea with astonishing speed. The darkness vanished from my perception, replaced by an enormous map woven entirely from soul signatures.
One after another, countless points of light appeared throughout my consciousness until the surrounding waters looked like a night sky filled with stars. Every beast occupied a precise location, every movement was reflected perfectly within my mind, and before long I had marked exactly ten thousand suitable targets.
"There you are..."
The words escaped me almost unconsciously.
Time answered the call immediately afterward. Rather than freezing the surrounding ocean, I anchored every marked creature to the same infinitesimal moment, weaving their individual timelines together until, for a single heartbeat, they would all experience exactly the same present.
Only then did I gather Silver Force.
Soul Force surged through my body before merging seamlessly with Space, Time and Generator. Four different authorities became one, and I finally understood why the vision had shown the older version of myself standing perfectly still.
Movement wasn’t necessary.
The battlefield came to me.
I slowly raised my hand and closed my fingers into a loose fist.
"Bloom."
For the briefest instant, absolutely nothing happened.
Then the Soul Sea transformed.
Far beneath the dark waters, ten thousand silver flowers blossomed at exactly the same moment. Every bloom appeared directly inside a different creature before unfolding outward in breathtaking silence, their radiant petals tearing through flesh, essence and soul alike.
The ocean suddenly resembled a field of stars blooming beneath its surface, each flower existing for only a heartbeat before fading back into darkness.
Ten thousand native Soul Sea beasts vanished together.
The silence that followed lasted barely a moment before it was broken by another spectacular sight.
Rivers of Soul Force erupted from every direction.
Thousands of streams crossed the ocean simultaneously before converging upon me like countless tributaries flowing into a single sea. Generator awakened instinctively, drawing every fragment into my Soul Sea until the reserves within me surged upward at a speed I had never experienced before.
I couldn’t help laughing.
"...Beautiful."
The technique had consumed a considerable amount of Soul Force, yet the energy returned by Generator more than compensated for the expenditure. If anything, my reserves had actually grown.
The grin on my face widened.
"Only ten thousand today..."
I looked toward the endless Soul Sea stretching beyond the horizon, already imagining what this technique might become as my comprehension continued to evolve.
"...but one day..."
A quiet chuckle escaped me.
"...it’ll be a billion."
The joke was terrible. I laughed anyway.
Still, something bothered me.
The native beasts I had just eliminated weren’t particularly strong. They had served their purpose as a first test, but they weren’t the kind of prey that would truly push my limits. If I wanted to understand the upper ceiling of this Saint Art, then I needed to aim a little higher.
My Spatial Comprehension expanded once more.
This time I pushed it much farther than before.
The sea of soul signatures spread endlessly through my consciousness until, hidden among the countless weaker creatures, I finally sensed them.
Ten presences.
Each one radiated the unmistakable pressure of a Saint-level native Soul Sea beast.
Unlike the previous targets, these creatures were separated by enormous distances. Some lay hundreds of kilometers apart, while others rested deep beneath the Soul Sea where ordinary perception could never hope to reach them.
I marked every one of them.
Time once again bound their separate moments into one.
Space locked onto their exact positions.
Silver Force quietly condensed.
Generator waited patiently.
"Bloom."
This time there was no spectacular field of flowers beneath the ocean.
Only ten.
Ten enormous silver blossoms erupted across the vast expanse of the Soul Sea, each one so brilliant that it briefly illuminated the surrounding waters before collapsing inward. The Saint beasts didn’t even have the opportunity to react. The attack had already been born inside them.
An instant later, ten torrents of incomparably denser Soul Force surged toward me.
The amount of energy pouring into my body dwarfed everything I had absorbed from the previous ten thousand beasts combined.
"That’s more like it..."
I had barely finished speaking when the entire Soul Sea suddenly trembled.
The calm surface exploded into violent waves.
An overwhelming pressure descended from every direction with such terrifying force that the surrounding space itself began trembling beneath its weight. Every instinct inside my body screamed at me simultaneously.
Verilux.
The Seven-Headed Hydra had awakened. My little experiment had apparently been far louder than I intended.
"...Sorry, big guy."
I didn’t wait to see what happened next.
The three runes of Echo Reversion appeared before me almost instinctively, merged into one, and the familiar pull seized my soul.
Before Verilux’s consciousness could fully lock onto my position...
I vanished.
The next instant, reality reconstructed itself inside Gerald’s enormous workshop, where the rhythmic sound of forging formations continued uninterrupted as though nothing extraordinary had happened.
I blinked once.
"...That," I muttered to myself with a satisfied grin, "was probably a good time to leave."