novelapdf Chapter 436: Black Energy
Chapter 436: Black Energy
The man remained silent for several seconds.
Only the sound of the candles crackling, small flames dancing atop the wicks, casting shadows that moved slowly across the wooden walls, filled the room.
Outside, the wind had died down. The herb garden had fallen silent.
His eyes remained fixed on the small dark box.
Then, slowly, he reached for the wooden lid.
Click. The lid opened.
At that exact moment, a strange sensation spread throughout the room.
It was not a shockwave. It was not an explosion of energy. It was something more subtle, as though the air had grown heavier, as though the light had dimmed, as though the very environment itself was reacting to the presence of whatever lay within.
Kyrian frowned. An unfamiliar Qi leaked from inside the box. It was extraordinarily weak. Almost nonexistent.
Yet, at the same time... it felt overwhelming. It was contradictory. Like a drop of water carrying the weight of an ocean.
Along with that Qi came an unpleasant odor.
It was not exactly the smell of decay, that sweet and putrid scent that accompanies rotting flesh.
Nor was it the metallic, acidic smell of blood that turns the stomach. It was something difficult to describe. An aroma that made instinct scream to retreat.
As though something inside Kyrian, something primitive, animalistic, that did not think but merely felt, was saying.
Danger. Run.
The man pushed the box toward Kyrian.
The wood slid gently across the table with a low creak.
"Take a look."
Kyrian leaned closer.
Inside the box was a small sapling. An unfamiliar plant.
Its leaves were black, so black that they seemed to absorb the surrounding light, creating tiny shadows where the candlelight should have reflected.
Its stem was grayish, pale, and sickly, like the ashes of a campfire extinguished long ago.
Its roots were dry, twisted, and brittle, like strands of broken hair. It appeared completely dead.
However... Kyrian narrowed his eyes.
Even in that condition, even with its black leaves, gray stem, and dried roots, there was something.
A single spark. An incredibly faint trace of vitality. It was so weak that it seemed impossible for it to still exist.
Yet it did.
It was that tiny flame, so faint that Kyrian could barely sense it, that kept the plant from becoming a complete corpse.
"Is it alive?" Kyrian asked.
"That depends on the definition," the man replied.
His voice was calm, as though discussing the weather rather than something both alive and dead at the same time.
"To most people, it is dead."
"Black leaves. Gray stem. Dried roots."
"It does not breathe. It does not grow. It does not reproduce."
"To most people, it is dead. To me..."
He looked at the sapling, his ancient eyes tired, yet sharp.
"...it exists between the two states."
Kyrian turned his attention back to the black Qi escaping from the plant.
It was not smoke, it did not dissipate into the air or rise in spirals.
It was not gas, it had no volume and did not expand to fill the room.
It was simply... present.
"Is this the Qi you use?"
"Yes."
"But do not make the mistake of underestimating it."
The man’s expression became serious.
"Listen carefully. Do not attempt to absorb this Qi. Under no circumstances."
Kyrian nodded, slow and deliberate.
"Why?"
"Because you will die."
The answer came immediately. Without hesitation. Without a doubt.
"A cold death. A painful death. A slow death."
"Your body will rot while your consciousness remains awake."
Kyrian fell silent.
The amount of Qi leaking from the sapling was almost nonexistent, a small dark mist, nearly invisible, dissipating before it could even reach the air.
Even so... it was enough to kill a cultivator of the Core Formation Realm. What kind of energy was that?
The man continued.
"First, you must come into contact with it. Allow it to pass through your body."
"Feel it. Experience it. If there is compatibility..."
He looked directly at Kyrian.
"...you will survive."
"And if there isn’t?"
"You will wish you had died."
Silence filled the small house.
The candles continued burning, wax slowly melting, flames dancing.
The garden outside remained silent, the herbs motionless, the wind absent.
At last, the man sighed.
"Do not worry. I will be here. I will not allow you to die."
Kyrian nodded slowly.
There was no fear. Only... determination to learn something new. Curiosity toward an exceptionally powerful and terrifying technique.
Then, he extended his hand. His fingers approached the small sapling. He could feel it. That black Qi seemed to be watching him. Waiting.
His hand touched the darkened leaf. In that instant...
A minuscule amount of black Qi entered his body.
It was not like an injection, there was no needle, no cut.
It was as though the Qi had simply passed through his skin, like water flowing through a sieve.
But what came next... was as though the entire world had collapsed upon him.
Kyrian’s eyes widened. Pain. A pain that transcended anything he had ever experienced.
It was not the pain of a broken bone, sharp, localized, physical. It was not the pain of a burn, throbbing, searing, consuming. It was not the pain of damaged meridians, constant and draining.
It was something different. Something deeper. As though his very soul were being torn apart.
His body bent violently, his spine arching at an impossible angle, muscles contracting beyond his control.
He collapsed to his knees. Bone struck against wood.
His muscles spasmed uncontrollably, involuntary convulsions causing his arms and legs to move as though they possessed lives of their own.
His heart seemed to stop, a horrifying silence within his chest, as though the organ had forgotten how to beat.
His meridians burned, not with gentle warmth, but with excruciating agony, as though acid were corroding every Qi channel.
His soul trembled, not metaphorically, but literally. Kyrian felt something within himself shudder, as though standing before something greater, something older, something that should never be challenged.
Death. It was death. An inevitable death. Cold. Absolute.
The man immediately rose to his feet.
His body moved with a speed that did not seem to belong to someone so close to the end of his life.
"The incompatibility began far too quickly."
"If this continues..."
But then... Kyrian opened his eyes. His pupils vanished. The violet color, the lightning dancing within his eyes, disappeared.
His eyes became completely white. Not the dull white of blindness. But a pure white. Absolutely. Like light. Like emptiness. Like nothingness.
At that exact moment... the fragment of black Qi vanished. It was not expelled. It was not neutralized. It was not destroyed. It was swallowed.
As though Kyrian’s eyes were an abyss, and the black Qi had fallen into it.
Kyrian’s body stopped trembling. The pain ceased. His consciousness sank. Everything became dark. Absolute silence.
The man watched attentively. He had seen Kyrian collapse. He had seen the black Qi enter.
He had watched the symptoms emerge, the body convulsing, the meridians burning, the soul trembling.
Everything had been within expectations.
But then... the Qi disappeared. It simply disappeared.
The omen of death, that sensation of inevitability, of finality, vanished along with it.