Spirit Soul

Holding his head high, Kyle approached the white line as he said in a confident voice,

"Okay...I've adapted to everything I wanted, and tested out everything...let's end this farce!"

Saying so, Kyle lifted his hand in a slow manner.

Barely a moment had passed before soul force began to gather within the raised hand, slowly compressing a soul force droplet.

It looked like he did it effortlessly. Kyle immediately liquefied two drops only to shoot one of them towards the closest target.

It was set up approximately 30 meters away from him, but the distance didn't bother him.

Hitting the target's outermost ring without any issues, Kyle simply shot the second droplet of soul force after the first one.

After that he took a single breath in order to keep a calm mind before manifesting three dozen wind blades around him.

All of them were roughly of the same size and Kyle shot them towards the respective targets without hesitation.

His aim had improved making him even hit some targets with two blades at once.

With this seemingly easy execution, Kyle had finished the trial after only a month had passed.

His performance and speed exceeded everyone's expectations.

However, oddly enough, nobody assumed Kyle to be a prodigy or anything like that, even after what they saw.

In the end, he was not a prodigious talent in controlling his cultivation energy or the wind affinity.

But there was something else about him that made the young man special.

This something was special and not everyone was able to procure it that easily.

What he had was a fierce determination, and an unbending will to advance.

In addition to the two traits, the third most important factor was the thirst to procure more knowledge and understand everything.

During the last month, Kyle had spent most of his time asking questions.

That seemed a simple task. But understanding the answers was definitely difficult.

Not worrying if Li would get annoyed or think of him as a dumb person, he continued to ask more questions.

Kyle made good use of the fact that Li was available to answer him.

So, he would ask even the smallest details of the things he didn't understand in order to clear his doubts.

Because of his incessant questions, he had annoyed Li extremely.

However, that was only up to the moment in which the Lich realized that Kyle's questions were no more shallow.

He had exhibited a keen sense of understanding and his doubts were becoming more profound with each new one he asked.

By being able to digest and understand the answers the Lich gave, Kyle was able to further improve his knowledge exponentially.

Sometimes, even Li had to think about certain questions and what kind of answer he should give Kyle.

His doubts were making him scratch his head and come up with adequate explanations to understand it using the meagre knowledge he had acquired until now.

However, this was necessary in order to prevent the young man from asking too many questions that had nothing to do with cultivation energies, compression of cultivation energies, affinities and everything else around the topic of cultivation.

If Li's explanation wasn't thorough, Kyle would simply ask too many questions because it looked like he wanted to get to know everything.

After all, he had been a scholar in the past, and there was a good reason for it!

Even if it was not something he was able to make use of, there was a quote Kyle liked a lot.

[Knowledge is power]

The saying had been useless in his past life, as despite being knowledgeable he was deemed weak. B

But now that he had reincarnated with the ability to cultivate, and the chance to nurture his potential, there was a newfound meaning to the quote.

As such, Kyle had decided to experiment using theoretical knowledge every now and then.

This allowed him to grasp the truth of everything he had learned relatively easily.

Because of that, he finished the trial once he noticed that the Lich was trying to conceal specific information that would have otherwise allowed him to pass the trial.

It was sad that Li didn't reveal much more than the things that could be deemed as a necessity to pass the trial.

But Kyle had no other option than to accept that fact.

Thus, passing the trial was the best decision he could take in order to continue exploiting the trials in his favor.

Kyle had long since realized that he was being trained and grilled by the Undeads in order to make him do something.

However, he also noted that they were trying to evaluate him rather than forcing anything on Kyle.

Due to this understanding, Kyle was able to focus on the tasks much better than earlier.

This, in turn, allowed him to pass Li trial within a single month as his mind hadn't been distracted.

Once he put his attention on something, there was nothing holding him back.

The only issue he could face was innate talent but even that didn't seem to be a problem anymore.

His brain, body, and energy were distinctively cultivated.

And, his entire being would only continue to become stronger as his body would be reinforced, his mind enhanced, and his soul force refined!

Knowing this, Kyle was able to become more confident in himself, his capabilities, and his future.

WIth that in mind, he clenched his fist as he breathed heavily.

He attempted to overcome the exhaustion that had been caused by his lack of sleep, and the overexertion of his soul energy and brain.

Even his soul veins were aching heavily, while his soul core felt sore.

Meanwhile, his mind felt as if it had been beaten to pulp and mashed multiple times.

Yet, to Kyle's misfortune, he was unable to rest as he saw a portal manifesting in front of him.

"Congratulations, you will now face the last normal trial. Good luck, and be prepared for the end!"

Hearing this from the Lich, followed by his mana fluctuations  made goosebumps spread all over his tired body.

Just at that moment he heard Li's low and whispered voice.

It seemed to be filled with emotions which nearly shocked him.

Never even in his wildest imaginations would he have expected to hear the Lich's emotional voice that said seemingly simple words.

"Don't disappoint us!"

He didn't say this in a forceful or aggressive tone as if he was trying to make Kyle do something he didn't want to.

Rather, Li sounded as if some of his desperation had been replaced by a shimmer of hope.

But before Kyle could think more about what made Li become emotional, he was dragged towards the portal.

Instead of fighting against the pull, Kyle went with the flow and accepted it readily.

It allowed him to think properly.

'Last normal trial? What does that mean, and what exactly did Li indicate with "prepare for the end?"' It was confusing, but at the same time, Kyle felt relieved.

The trials would end could only mean that he could escape this castle.

These were the exact words he had been waiting to hear for a long time, but the hidden meaning was that he was likely to be able to continue with unique trials,o r that he could leave.

Kyle doubted that he was allowed to leave just like that, but the intel was still useful.

The only issue was the word 'end', and figuring out what exactly the Lich wanted to tell him.

Despite his suspicion, Kyle didn't think that it was necessary for him to think too much about everything that happened in the Razkadan castle.

In the end, he simply had to wait for what would occur next as even all of his preparations were rendered useless.

Somehow, the Razkadan castle, or to be precise the Undeads inhabiting the castle would always know a way to surprise him. After all this was their home and he was a stranger.

By now, he had understood that surprise awaited him almost at every alternate step.

The last normal trial brought him to the beautiful scenery of a small lake with lotus flowers blooming.

Right next to the lake was a small forest filled with all kinds of sounds from various beasts.

Yet, that was only a glimpse of everything Kyle had seen so far in the castle.

Death loomed over it by and large so it was shocking for him to see the biggest and unexpected contrast.

Somehow, everything seemed to be alive.

The moment Kyle noticed this, the magnificent scenery began to change.

The beautiful, lush surroundings were slowly withering as if thousands of years had passed, ending the era of life, bringing forth nothing but death.

Just a moment that felt like an eternity to Kyle, the shadow of a withered tree began to transform as it turned into a gate.

Staring into the gate of darkness, he saw something shine.

Upon looking intently, he saw that it was the bent blade of a dark blue, shining weapon.

Suddenly, an eerily calm voice resounded in his ears.

"Hello Kyle, I'm Nitran, the Reaper of the Living.

Glad to meet you, youngest reincarnation of the Old Souls!"

A being, shrouded in darkness greeted him. It had white eyes with no pupils staring at him the moment it emerged from the darkness gate.

It held a Scythe, and released the distinct energy currents of a unique type of death-aura which Kyle had never sensed.

It caused him to shiver for a moment but soon after he sensed an odd familiarity that caused him to unintentionally blurt out a single word.

"Soul?" Yet, a moment later, the words said by Nitran, the Reaper of the Living flashed through his mind. As he repeated the words in his head, 'youngest reincarnation of the Old Souls' reverberated through his mind multiple times.

Kyle nearly tripped while digesting the shocking thought that Nitran knew that he was one of the reincarnations of the Old Souls.

But, before he could fully come to terms with that the Reaper was already messing with his mind.

"Oh, you figured out my death aura's mutation in a single glance? That means our assumption of you knowing what souls look like, was true...interesting!"

It was as if Nitran was toying with him because he was unable to think straight while being stared at by the bright white eyes.

They were simply too frightening and distracting, which Nitran, the Reaper seemed to be fully aware of!

The eyes were hallucinating him and the more he stared at them the more he felt as if he was going insane.

In order to not lose his mind, he had to keep moving. This made everything even worse because he wanted to calm down.

In order to remain calm, Kyle wanted to stand still.

But as it was not possible, and his mind just kept coming up with the worst possible scenarios.

'Not only does he know that I'm a reincarnation of the Old Universe, and the youngest reincarnation at that, but he also knows that I can see souls owing to my Spirit Soul!! That's bad, but how does he know all of that?

Maybe Karnias was really a reincarnation of the Old universe, and he told them? But why would I have to undergo these annoying trials if Karnias were still here?'

Kyle's thoughts were running wild the more he thought.

But it was nothing compared to the moment the Reaper said something.

Upon hearing his words, Kyle's entire being petrified as he stared at Nitran in shock.

"So...this Fox is a Spirit Soul...I see…. I'm sorry to tell you this, but we would like to know where Karnias is too. He left the young Lady alone, and only comes back every now and then. As for your trials, we have a reason to subject you to the trials, young one!"

Staring at Nitran as if he had gone insane, Kyle's expressions turned into confusion.

There was only one thought in Kyle's mind that seemed to be malfunctioning.

'He...can read my mind?'

Kyle had trouble believing this crazy idea but just a moment later, he received an answer that shocked him to the core.

"Yes, I can!"