Return I

Taking out a book called 'Soul Removal and Conscious Transfer' Liam started to carefully read it with the utmost importance looking for anything that he could've missed.

Even if there is a small mishap during the operation, in the worst case it could have his soul obliterated from existence never to be reborn again.

This book that Liam was currently in possession of was purchased during the rewards selection in the Void tournament costing him roughly 100,000 merit points. 

He had consumed knowledge from countless books and knew the procedure of removing the soul from the body and possessing another being's body however this book 'Soul Removal and Conscious Transfer' had greatly intrigued his curiosity because it provided some of the procedures that he was going to take to make his way back in the past, which was thousands of years ago.

Although this book and the preparations he would be taking were two entirely different things but at least it enlightened him and showed him how wrong he was about his previous notions on souls and possessions.

Originally, he had wanted to separate his soul from the body and use a method to refine it into pure energy far above mana while using forbidden arts to send that energy back into the past as a Consciousness to take over the previous one that was inhabiting the body.

However according to the book his former procedure may raise issues like loss of soul fragments during the soul-body separation which may cause a permanent loss of memory or even mental retardation.

If he had wanted, he could use his soul to inhabit the body of another being to escape his current predicament of death but if he were to do so his cultivation would forever be limited to the nascent soul realm, that is if he were to restart cultivation.

The limitation of cultivation is caused by the incompatibility between the body and the soul leading to conflict for dominance over the other.

If one wants to reach the true peak of cultivation both the body and soul must coexist in harmony, that is the true essence of cultivation. 

When he bought the 'Soul Removal and Conscious Transfer' book in the tournament awards, he received a warning from the world spirit to not continue with whatever he was trying to achieve otherwise there might be severe consequences to his soul, but the world spirit couldn't have ever imagined the grand scheme that he was brewing. 

He was currently 100% sure he could pull off the soul-body separation procedure according to the book just by trying once but just to be on the safe side he had some extra practice on a few of his dolls and it worked like a charm.

Making his way to the far side of the planet far away from his den. There was a large altar engraved into the ground and there were beings chained around it.

Their eyes were like the ones of a dead fish, lifeless and dark, completely given up on life.

Fweeet! He whistled sharply. The wind suddenly started blowing while 9 dark figures appeared behind him with dead eyes and pale bodies, waiting for his next command while showing no sigh of emotions. 

" Start the preparation!" 

WOOSH!! making his way to the middle of the altar he brought out a red-blood color pill with veins while blue color stones surrounded him from all directions on the huge altar.

SPLASH!!

The throats of all beings were all slit by the dead servants of his using a unique dagger with glowing patterns turning the ground red with their own blood. 

Slowly the surrounding blood started to move its way to the altar like it had a life of its own.

When it finally made contact with those blue stones it caused them to immediately turn red as the stones kept absorbing more and more upcoming blood.

With no blood remaining the red stones released a dark red mist visible to the eye while it started to get sucked in by the red pill he was holding.

The veins on the pill started to turn gold in color as a vertex was formed sucking in only that red mist released by those stones.

As the red pill shone in color, he couldn't help but appreciate its glimmering beauty while the red stones were sucked away of their color, turning them transparent.

Swallowing the pill, Liam started to feel an incredibly strong ache all over his body while the vapor that was released arose in the air.

His body was currently going through a phase called 'soul over exhaustion'. The Soul separation pill he ate caused the soul to overheat as the cells that the soul is attached to turn weak, making it easier to sever the connections they had with the soul.

Cha-ching!! 

His whole body turned purple as the connection with the soul was severed while his soul was in an astral form, as the soul no longer had a body to inhabit. 

Looking at his body Liam waited in anticipation.

[Any second now!]

a strange scene befouled in front of his eyes, his own body from the abdomen started to release a black aura while engulfing it for a while before all the flesh started to fall off the body like there was no attachment to keep it together. 

What remained after all the mass fell to the ground like a piece of liquid was his black mana core.

"Begin the next procedure!"