Reaper of the Martial World

historical

Book 5: Chapter 100: Second Trial (42)

Spirit Body was actually quite a misleading name for the weapon. While it sounded holy and righteous, it was the very opposite.

The passive ability was innocent enough. With as long as the user sensed the constitution within them, it could communicate with the heavens to awaken it. This required little to no effort on the part of its wielder and was the legendary aspect of the weapon.

However, the active ability was truly sinister. If the wielder was more powerful than the victim, they could directly steal the opponent’s constitution and take it for their own.

There was no shortage of stories of wielders of this weapon seeking out talented children to steal from…

After having their constitutions stolen, not only would the victim have their cultivation based irreparably harmed, causing a drastic fall in whatever cultivation existed, their talent would be forever stripped of them…

It was not difficult to understand why these people targeted children. No matter how talented a child was, that’s all they were: a child. How could they resist an expert capable of subduing a weapon of that caliber?

Much of the taboo around sharing bloodlines stemmed from this exact weapon and the bloody history behind it.

Firstly, one had to understand that there was a difference between bloodlines and constitutions.

A constitution can be born to anyone depending on their Heaven’s Blessing. It was a matter of luck, but also had, in part, to do with one’s talent. The more talented a person was, the more likely they were to have a constitution.

A faith seed worked the same way, however it was tied to a very specific bloodline. It could be considered to be a bridge between constitutions and bloodlines, sharing characteristics of both.

A bloodline, however, was passed down through a gene pool. Much like constitutions, it could be awakened further and stimulated to higher forms. For example, Little Black was birthed by two parents who were both transcendent beasts. However, both the demon qilin and celestial deer bloodlines had the potential to evolve. This was because the celestial deer was once a race of supreme beasts, while the demon qilin had faint traces of overwhelming dragon blood.

When they came together, they catalyzed Little Black’s blood to an all new level, awakening both bloodlines. This, of course, was due to more luck than science. It wasn’t a sure thing for such a thing to happen.

While beast bloodlines followed the following rankings system: Common, Earth, Heaven, Transcendent and Supreme, other bloodlines followed the very same ranking system.

As for constitutions, they too followed a similar ranking system: Common, Earth, Heaven, God and True Deity. True Deities were also known as faith seed wielders. However, that is only because of the changes in modern times.

Although it is true that a faith seed is the equivalent of a True Deity constitution, it can only be considered to be a fake approximation.

Faith seeds are about as powerful as weaker True Deity bloodlines and Supreme beast potential. This is because although the affinities given by them are no weaker than even their peak True Deity and Supreme counter parts, unlike the latter two, it is impossible to rely on them to the end.

In truth, both Ri and Madeleine’s faith seeds provide support comparable to peak level True Deity and supreme bloodlines. This was especially so for Ri since her faith seed was in resonance with her beast bloodline which was comparable to a lower tier Supreme bloodline due to the branch family of kitsune she originated from.

However, they would both face problems, lowering the value of their seeds.

While Madeleine was highly compatible with the Life portion of Amethyst’s faith seed, the reincarnation portion was exceedingly difficult for her. In the same vein, she was highly compatible with the Ice Blue Flame portions, but struggled with the Fire Red Flame portions. Unfortunately, they were inseparable. This meant that while Madeleine could use some portions of Amethyst’s legacy, if she used too much, she would join a path that she couldn’t complete.

As for Ri, although she was a kitsune, her particular faith seed was highly incompatible with her. Like her mother, Ri came from a snow-white Kitsune branch family known as the Snow family. It was a lowly branch because its bloodline was far weaker than others. However, Ri had somehow awakened a faith seed that originated from a family of black-gold Kitsune, the Void family.

Luckily for Ri, her father’s side gave her the compatibility she needed, in part. While Ri wasn’t compatible at all with the space portions of Kukan’s legacy, she was highly compatible with the darkness and chaos portions. This was, of course, because of the Acacia family’s Tree of Life and Death legacy, which contained major legacies that could be considered to follow the wicked path of cultivation. After all, any technique capable of stealing the energy and life force of an opponent could be said to follow a dark path.

Following these lines of logic, one could see the problem with faith seeds. But, Madeleine and Ri were intelligent enough to understand this for themselves. Although this didn’t mean they wouldn’t use their incompatible side – for example, Madeleine could still use her red flames and Ri would still use her flames – they understood that they couldn’t take it too far, or, at the very least, they needed to focus on what they were good at.