2 02. Internal Energy

In a mud hut, a rough young man looked around at his surroundings cautiously. In front of him lay the corpse of a wild boar, ready for skinning and chopping.

Roy didn't seem to be as arrogant as before, his miserable deaths proved to him that there was no such thing as luck. His deaths toned down his arrogance as it set into him that he wouldn't get a system, as this wasn't like one of those novels where he had read about before.

Roy tightly gripped the blade lying beside him, he was afraid that he would die again like all time. But in due time as the previous person's memory set in, Roy's expression turned weird. He looked at the wild boar lying on the ground as if thinking of something.

'So this is boar which chased my second reincarnation down the cliff and _this_ person was the one who set up the trap for the boar to chase me down. Now that I have taken over this person's body, doesn't that mean that I killed myself?'

Roy felt a little overwhelmed about this weird karmic redemption. As he thought about what happened before, he understood, 'This also means that I can choose which world I reincarnate to. If I die again, I will return back to the void and can transmigrate to one of the spectres of the world that are in the void according to my choice because according to my experience of dying over 9 times, if the world spectres aren't formed in the void then I will die in the new ones I reincarnate in. This is basically endless respawns.'

'But I haven't heard about any type of ability like this in the novels I read. It seems to be my personal ability, but how did it come to be and from where?'

It seemed to have made no sense as Roy thought about it. He then shook his head as he put this thought in the back of his head to think about it later. As for his paranoia of dying after reincarnation, it faded away along with it.

...

The person whose body Roy was in was a simple, average person.

Kruel, 17 years of age, orphaned and a rogue hunter. His mother died soon after his birth, his father was a drunkard and was missing since he turned 11, presumed dead.

Kruel had to take up hunting as an occupation to make his ends meet. He hunted wild animals in the forest and sold them to the village market nearby, most of the time he would just keep them as food for himself.

Roy nodded his head in satisfaction, this wasn't bad for a start. Thinking about his miserable deaths sent shivers down his spine, now that he had a normal start, he could settle with it.

This was the 'Neun' region of the 'Kingdom of Sorailles'. Roy was but the bottom feeder in the strength hierarchy of the 'Kingdom'. According to the power system here, there were legendary figures here known as 'body refiners', who were powerful enough to clash with an army of thousands and come out unharmed, that too absolutely annihilating their opponents. 'Body refiners', as the name suggests, refine their flesh to extreme extents, some were even said to have a physique as strong as stone and are able to block of swords and arrows with their bare flesh alone. Roy at most might just have the ability to fight off the low grade soldiers at the moment.

'The _Grand Solar Art_ won't work, this world does not seem to have any spiritual energy. So neither of the cultivation technique I got from the first world would be of any use. But the techniques of the war veteran old man are universal to any world. If I could optimize them to my use, I might be able to wield 'internal energy'. Internal energy is universal to all, as it is present in all physical bodies— including beasts. I might not be able to refine my flesh since I don't know their techniques and have no idea how it works but I might be able to wield internal energy.'

Roy might have died just after transmigrating but he had the memories of the people of the bodies— whom he transmigrated into. It's basically meant that he had eight memories, because in one of them he became a rat and a rat's memory isn't important. Their experiences and knowledge were all with him for his use, whether it be fighting, cultivation, hunting or any other skills. He just needed to internalize it into his muscle memory of this body.

Suddenly Roy felt a sense of fatigue run down his body. Every transmigration took a toll on his mental state. This left Roy at an extremely vulnerable state. He wearily skinned the boar and roasted it for himself, it was to provide energy to recuperate himself.

...

5 years later.

Near a wretched hut, Roy was sweating profusely as he was displaying a set of weird movements.

For the last 5 years Roy has been living— hunting wild animals and selling them, though most of his time was spent on modifying the internal energy techniques he had in his mind. It was through this that he realized that even if the theory of internal energy is universal to all physical bodies, the techniques of that particular world might not necessarily work in this world. Thus, Roy had to improvise through trial and error method, and as a result during this time he received a lot of internal injuries which were quite fatal enough to take a toll lifespan. But he wasn't concerned as he knew that even if he died, he would be able to reincarnate in this world again.

For now, Roy was confident enough that if he fought a beginner body refiner, he will be able to contend to a draw with pure strength alone and if he used tactics, he might even defeat them. Internal energy came from within the body, it was used through channelling into different parts of the body like the fists and the legs. But this body didn't have much talent to begin with, thus it took longer than expected to cultivate whatever amount of internal energy he had and other than that it seemed to have been that Roy was almost reaching the ends of his potential.

"Brother Kruel!"

Suddenly a rough voice came from behind Roy. It looked like a group of scoundrels, with the tall-bulky man seeming as the leader. This was a group of robbers, who were caught and beaten by Roy.

Last year, while Roy was returning from the village these scoundrels surrounded him with the intent to rob him but were instead beaten up by him, impressed by his strength they surrendered and thus decided to follow him.

Roy didn't mind, anyway he needed some people to help since he spent most of his time modifying his technique to cultivate internal energy. It was later from them that he learnt about a chance to make a small fortune.

The illegitimate son of the King of Sorailles was to pass through the region of 'Neun' in a year to deliver a body refining technique to the Royal Capital. This was a task given by the king to the prince to prove himself. Even though illegitimate, the person was part of the royal bloodline and would be protected by experts, and possessing a body refining technique was bound to attract greed of the like of robbers.

The plan of this group was to kidnap the prince and force out the body refining technique. Roy being interested couldn't resist the temptation too.

"How are the preparations?"

Roy asked nonchalantly, while stopping his practice and wiping the sweat off his forehead with a dry cloth.

Seemingly understanding, the bulky man who couldn't control his excitement voiced out, "It's all done boss. We can leave by tomorrow."

The group of 5 scoundrels couldn't help shivering from the pent up excitement and fear.

"Alright." Roy instead was just smiled at them.

...

In a desolate land, rode a sedan with 15 people guarding it in sight.

The sedan looked quite ordinary and was carried by 4 of the men. The guards looked robust wearing leather armours.

Suddenly a shadow flitted through air and rushed into the sedan, "Prince Elvas! We will be passing through the 'Neun' region now, we are almost at half of our journey!"

Not being concerned, a voice came from within the sedan, "Let's continue! We will rest after reaching the 'Neun' region and the men are also quite weary, it might be good to recover their energy."

"Yes, My Lord!"

Accepted the person, before flitting out of the sedan again.

...

20 miles away from the desolate road.

"Lay the traps, they will be arriving soon."

Roy ordered as he came running from the distance. His job was to scout through the area where the Prince's sedan was supposed to pass through and divert their way towards them.

"You two shall flank from the back and you two shall ambush from the front. As for you, you will be responsible for the crossbows."

Roy called out as he pointed and assigned the task to the group.

The men looked at each other, then one of them voiced out, "Boss, what about you?"

"There might be a body refiner in the group. I will divert him, you take out the guards." Roy said as he put on a mask on his face.

There was a look of admiration on the face of the scoundrels, their boss was strong enough to contend with body refiners. It seemed that they didn't make the wrong decision following him.

...