Ancient Demon Spirit

The very moment that Deon looked up, the book in his hands exploded into a golden mist. The mist converged in front of him, forming a rotating golden portal. From this portal, something quite unexpected dropped down.

"Huh?" Deon only had time to let out a doubtful sound, before his soul was pushed into the lifeless body of the child that suddenly appeared before him.

Deon quickly realised that this was the body prepared for him by Blood God so that he could reincarnate into the spirit continent.

He felt a moment of dizziness and had to force himself to suppress the nausea. In the next moment, Deon opened his eyes, surprised that he was still fine. Soon enough though, he realised that possessing this new body was not the final trial.

Whoosh…

An eery noise that made all of his hairs stand on end resounded throughout the palace. Deon narrowed his young eyes and stared forwards as a black shape took form ahead of him. He felt an intense evil like no other that he had experienced before emanating from this shadow. He realised that each of the demons he faced previously were simply pathetic bugs compared to the evil of this lone shadow.

The shadow was a spirit, a spirit called the ancient demon spirit.

The shadow rapidly changed shape as it and Deon were drawn towards one another by an unknown force. It was clear that Blood God had set everything up, neither Deon nor the demon had a choice in this matter!

Boom!

The two finally collided. Deon's pupils rapidly dilated and shrank, he showed an expression of shock as the shadow was directly absorbed into his body.

Suddenly, everything disappeared from his sight. Deon blinked, but found that he could see nothing. He could also hear nothing…in fact, all of his senses were blocked out.

A while passed by in this empty state. Deon eventually noticed that he could make out a faint flickering of darkness ahead. He knew that this was the ancient demon spirit. After pondering for a moment, he attempted to move.

He had no body in this dark space, but he was able to pull himself towards the spirit. The spirit also noticed Deon's presence and stared at him evilly.

Well, Deon felt like it was staring at least, it didn't actually possess eyes, or any discernible features for that matter.

"Blood God's successor, you wish to use me to open your soul space?"

Deon understood exactly what was happening, which was why the ancient demon spirit's abrupt words didn't completely shock him.

"I don't suppose that I have much choice at this point." Deon replied, despite lacking a mouth in his current state.

All of this was explained in the golden inheritance book. To become a shaman, it was necessary to use the power of a spirit to open one's soul space. This spirit would then become the shaman's core spirit, the basis of their power and aptitude.

This spirit would become a shaman's most valuable asset and would stay with them throughout their life. It was important that a suitable spirit was chosen as the core spirit, so that one's progress would not be hindered later on.

"I may have fallen to the realm of 0-Star, but I am still an ancient class spirit. Using an ancient class spirit as the core spirit is impossible for even the most talented of humans. I don't know what Blood God was thinking when he set up this inheritance, but it is your misfortune and an opportunity for myself. If you willingly give up your life, then this doesn't need to be so painful." The shadow spoke calmly.

Deon just laughed when he heard this.

"Could it be that you're afraid I'll succeed, little demon?"

"I see that you have been thoroughly warped by the inheritance trial. Fine, let's not waste anymore time."

The ancient demon spirit wasn't worried about Deon's refusal to give up, but nor was Deon intimidated by this evil creature. The ancient demon was correct when it said that the trial had warped him, but it severely underestimated the resilience that Deon had developed during the underworld trial.

Deon knew that this endless black space was his undeveloped consciousness. When a human wanted to open their soul space, it was necessary to drag a spirit into the mortal consciousness, then to use the power of their own mortal soul to suppress the spirit. Only after fully suppressing and binding the spirit did it become possible to use the spirit's power to open the soul space.

Normally, it would be completely impossible to use this unique demonic spirit to open the soul space, even if it was the lowest rank, a 0-Star spirit. The fact that this spirit could speak and exhibited signs of high intelligence showed that it was anything but ordinary.

Deon's soul was no ordinary mortal soul though, he had undergone countless years of torture and combat, pushing his mental resilience beyond the pinnacle of what should be possible for a mortal soul.

The two beings, one human and one spirit, silently slammed into one another. Deon was instantly pushed back as he felt a terrifying pressure engulf his soul, but the ancient demon was also shocked.

As a 0-Star spirit, its power was limited. It wrapped around Deon and attempted to devour his soul instantly using its greatest strength, yet it somehow failed to do so. If this went on for long, then its energy would deplete and the balance would flip!

Deon felt an intense pain assaulting his mind. On top of the pain, the sensation of being thoroughly restrained from all sides assaulted his soul. An ordinary human would instantly collapse from the fear. They would submit, hoping that their assailant would have mercy.

Naturally, Deon was not such a person. If there was one thing he had learned in his after life, it's that mercy was something that didn't exist in this world. If he wanted something, he needed to take it. If he wanted to survive, he needed to kill. There was no alternative, weakness meant certain death.

Resisting against the ancient demon caused the levels of pain to skyrocket beyond anything he had ever experienced before. This stalemate of the ancient demon expending its energy as Deon resisted continued on for some time. During this period, Deon started to feel his grip on his sane mind slipping once again…

However, just at this moment, he burst free from the ancient demon spirit's restraint!

"Hah!" Deon roared out loud.

"What?!" The ancient demon pulled back in shock, but Deon was a step faster. In an instant, he reached the ancient demon, this time wrapping his own soul around the spirit. The spirit squirmed, attacking Deon's soul with sharp and vicious attacks, but its resistance gradually declined as its energy was finally depleted entirely.

Deon's soul pushed down hard on the spirit, causing it to collapse inwards. The ancient demon spirit lost its form and was forced to condense into a pitch black ball. The moment this ball formed, a strange symbol travelled from Deon's soul and into the spirit.

There were many methods that could be used by humans to bind a core spirit, but Deon was using an extremely unconventional one, in that he was acting entirely on instinct.

Blood God predicted that Deon wouldn't need to use any of the imperfect techniques developed by human shamans, and he was correct. Years of bloody battles where he fought savagely and without thought led to Deon developing keen instincts. Without even understanding it properly himself, he knew exactly what to do in this crucial moment. Any 'technique' would simply be inferior to his natural reaction.

The symbol that was filled with his soul energy imprinted into the black ball. The black ball suddenly became still and silent. Deon paused, then slowly backed away.

The ball gradually unravelled, revealing the ancient demon spirit once again. However, it was now far different compared to before. There was no glimmer of consciousness from its shadowy form, because it had been thoroughly enslaved by Deon.

Deon successfully bound the ancient demon spirit and refined it as his core spirit! He thought back to the golden book and remembered the method outlined in the text which explained the method required to open the soul space.

"Convert the mortal soul into an origin soul…" Deon muttered to himself.

He felt that there was a faint connection between himself and the ancient demon spirit. With a thought, he willed it and the ancient demon spirit drifted towards him. He concentrated as he now gazed upon this creature which had been his foe just seconds earlier.

The ancient demon spirit stuck out an illusory hand and pressed a finger to Deon's forehead. It had already recovered a small portion of its energy, this was enough to trigger the transformation. A black stream travelled into Deon's soul. This small wisp of energy filled his soul, leading to a sudden change.

Bang!

An explosive sound originating from Deon's soul rang out, but his soul was still in one piece. It started to gradually transform. From the original illusory and transparent form, it changed into a solid human shape. This shape was identical to Deon's current body, that of a child with long black hair. This was the origin soul; it emitted a faint golden glow and lit up the surrounding space with a glorious splendour.

This light caused his consciousness to undergo a natural change. The mortal consciousness would evolve into the soul space after the mortal soul evolved into an origin soul, this was a peculiar but well understood change that every newly ascended shaman would experience.

Time passed by slowly. Deon's origin soul sat down within the soul space and closed its eyes, recovering whilst his body absorbed the energy that permeated the atmosphere in the inheritance palace.

This process went on for a total of one week. Now that Deon possessed a mortal body, he should need to eat and drink, but this was unnecessary during the opening of the soul space, since his body was naturally supplemented with the spiritual energy from the atmosphere. This energy was refined and transformed into origin energy within the soul space.

The soul space was a mystical existence, only spiritual entities such as the origin soul and bound spirits could enter. The space was now entirely filled with a faint grey mist, but was still thoroughly illuminated with a golden lighting. Deon's origin soul sat in the middle, within the mist of origin energy.

The walls of this mystical realm were lined with a pitch black demonic energy, this was the energy emitted by the ancient demon spirit. At the boundary of the wall, the origin energy and demonic energy collided, mixing and separating continually.

To bind a spirit as one's core spirit, then to use this refined spirit to trigger the evolution of the origin soul and the formation of the soul space. This was how ordinary humans became shamans and stepped onto a path that transcended mortality!

With this, Deon was officially a shaman!