42 Spiritual Awakening Stone - Part 2
The elders all sat down and started meditating, seated around the old man sitting on the chair. The scene resembled that of the young pups lying around their mother while sleeping, but it was far from that. Some elders hated this old guy while some were neutral. There were even some on good terms with him, like Lan Yao and the principal who wasn't there.
Speaking of principal, at this moment the doors opened and the young man around twenty years old entered the room. Instead of the red robes all other elders had, his robes were crimson with a golden outline. There star on his chest was slightly different than the others' - it had a crown above it and a picture that obviously symbolized the stone that was in the middle of this room. Instead of the four-pointed star on his chest was a stone that was in front of him at the moment.
There was a secret regarding this stone that only the principals of the academy could know of and that is why it served as an emblem symbolizing the principal of the academy.
The elders who were seated rose up and paid respects one by one to the principal, but the one who was the most polite was actually Vice-Principal Qi Yun. If one didn't know how much she hated this young man, they'd think she really respected him. But this way, it was only meant as a sarcastic greeting with no respect. Qi Jian naturally had to show proper respect because even though Qi Yun was his grandmother, there's no particularly powerful bond between them that she'd go so far to protect him if he offended the principal.
The principal returned the greeting and came in front of the old man with closed eyes sitting on the chair. When he saw his silhouette, his face slightly changed because he had once seen a similar scene recently. But how could it be possible? How could anyone give him an impression similar to this undying old monster that tortured the hell out of him when he was little?
"Xun Zhu greets the teacher!", the principal bowed in greeting.
The old man only nodded and waved his hand while pointing at the children sleeping on the floor, resembling scattered leaves. The principal looked at every child with attention and his gaze stopped at several of them, particularly Xun Bao and Xun Meng, after which he closed his eyes as well and sat down to meditate while waiting for the results. When those kids woke up, they'll have forged a connection with their own Soul Spirit and formed a Spirit Emblem based on that connection.
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Xun Bao found himself in the place filled with endless stars. He was in a situation similar to when Asura Ryuu first woke up in the afterlife and considering it was something he never experienced before; he was naturally afraid. Even though he was afraid, it only lasted for a bit before he regained his usual calm. Compared to how much Asura Ryuu needed to recollect himself, Xun Bao was faster - at least double, if not more.
Xun Bao glanced around himself a few times and felt a calling coming from his chest, leading him to a certain direction. He followed the unknown call and soared away in the sky full of stars. Occasionally, there would be a constellation representing a Soul Spirit radiating its specific aura. There was a large knife-like blade, a halberd, a sword, a crown, even a chicken was suspended in the nothingness and all of them were Soul Spirits of some sort.
The fact is, one cannot absorb them or make a contract with them on their own. Only if the corresponding constellation reacted to the individual would they be able to form a spiritual bond called Spirit Emblem. That's what they were told earlier by the old man. Xun Bao merely followed the feeling in his heart because he felt the 'calling' - the constellation summoning himself.
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Xun Meng woke up in the same space as Xun Bao and the others, but her reaction was nothing one would expect. Instead of being afraid of the unknown, the first thing she felt was a strong calling coming from the deep space where all the stars concentrated, the same as Xun Bao, and aside from that, she felt that the stars were beautiful. She wasn't afraid at the least of the unknown surroundings and the feeling of her body's absence.
Similarly to Xun Bao, her Soul Form drifted off among the stars with the speed several times faster than the speed of light. Just by willing to go where the call was coming from, she was pulled by an unknown force. Contrary to what one would expect, the surroundings didn't black out because she 'flew' faster than the speed of light but instead remained the same. Only the scenery was rapidly changing because of how fast she was going, but otherwise everything was the same.
Whether this effect was because the space they were in operated under different rules or something else, it wasn't clear. What was clear though was that even though she was going several times faster than the speed of light, her destination was far, far away from her starting point.
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Asura Tenka opened her eyes and found herself in the same state Asura Ryuu was in when they met in the afterlife. She was kind of curious because this was how her dear felt after waking up and he didn't even remember who he truly was. It was a very interesting feeling, but she didn't have the time to carefully examine it. Why was it so?
Because in front of her was a sea of stars, as if she was in the inner region of the galaxy. The stars were so densely packed that they resembled the snowflakes falling from the sky. What followed was a fleeting feeling of a certain mysterious call. The call that stemmed from her Soul but was also kind of familiar. She didn't know why, but she felt something important was going to happen, mainly because the call from her soul was very familiar.
Asura Tenka: "Could it be... Heavenly Devil Constellation is calling me? Even in this life I have to... *sigh*"
Regardless of what she thought, Asura Tenka followed the feeling with resignation apparent in her eyes. She didn't want to be associated with the Heavenly Devil tribe either by blood, Soul Spirit or anything else. But it seems... fate is sometimes unavoidable. Her Soul Form was more opaque than her peers, which was understandable considering how strong her Spirit Power was.
Resigning herself to fate, Asura Tenka followed the feeling and soared to the center of the lake made of stars.
