Roshi blankly stared at his surroundings in the air as his body trembled uncontrollably. He was no fool. He quickly assumed that the black light was definitely related to Ezra Zephyr.
But so what if he knew? Could he say that he was brought to such a state by an unofficial outer mountain disciple? What face would he have if this spread back to the seven peaks?
Thus, Roshi burst into a rage. "Ezra! I will make sure you're unable to learn even a single spiritual energy technique!"
In the night, Roshi's furious and bitter howl rang out like a wild beast's.
A creek flowed in the mountain, making clear sounds as the water beat against the rock.
Ezra's figure was seated on a rock by the creek with his eyes faintly shut. At this moment, his breathing seemed to become extremely weak.
The spiritual energy in his body slowly began to flow in his channels according to the instructions in the Gossamer Steps technique.
The crux of this technique was to knit 106 yarns, and at this point in time, the prince was going to find the location of the first yarn.
This was something he had to do by himself, because even though he possessed a high aptitude that could view the weak points of any technique, he needed to first give it somewhere to start.
Without the first yarn as a primer of sorts, how could the second yarn be found?
The spiritual energy in his body circulated in his channels time and time again, an exceedingly boring process. However, Ezra's heart was akin to a still lake as he concentrated on sensing any strange disturbances in the spiritual energy flow.
Half a day passed in this manner.
Only now did the prince understand how troublesome it was to practice the Gossamer Steps method. He had already used slightly over half a day for the first yarn alone. It was difficult to imagine how long it would take if he were to find and knit even more yarns by himself.
Fortunately, on the 100th round along the route indicated by the Gossamer Steps technique, the prince finally sensed a tiny disturbance.
The instant this tiny disturbance appeared, the long-waiting Ezra immediately turned his Chaos force, directing its full power towards the origin of the disturbance.
A faint prickling pain was felt as Ezra felt a yarn in his body. The moment this happened, the spiritual energy flowing through the route given by the Gossamer Steps technique began to flow little by little.
A certain subtle sensation rose that allowed the prince to understand that he had found the first yarn and knit it.
"Next, I'll have to smoothen the yarns with energy, before infusing it with wind essence." Ezra Zephyr breathed an almost inaudible sigh of relief, before he once again began to circulate his energy, wisp after wisp flowing into the yarn that began to smoothen it according to a unique method.
Inside the yarn, sliver after sliver of spiritual energy gathered as threads, seemingly transforming into a strong rope that soon started to tighten at a unique frequency as it smoothed the yarn as a whole.
This smoothing method was the essence of the Gissamer Steps technique. Only by using this procedure would the wind essence be able to fuse with the yarn later on.
The prince very carefully manipulated his energy as he continued to smoothen the yarn. In the beginning, his control was rather rough and unpracticed but gradually grew more and more polished as time passed, allowing the smoothing process to become much quicker.
Hence, after about four hours, the yarn felt smooth and long, the process was done.
With a slight grin on his face, Ezra gave a light jerk on his wolf bracelet, causing a transparent jade bottle to appear in his hand. Inside the bottle, a tornado swirled.
The gale within this bottle was the so-called wind essence.
Wind essence was formed from the agglomeration of spiritual energy and the wind attribute. It was a rather bizarre but seemingly magical process.
Of course, Ezra had not collected it himself, but had bought it with Spirit jade in the Evil Treasure Pavillion, a tyrannic name for a treasure shop. A single bottom of wind essence had cost him two pieces of spirit jade.
"It should be enough for three days…" Mumbled Ezra to himself.
With a thought, waves of wind began rising from the bottle, transforming into smoke that flowed in through Ezra's nose.
Once the wind essence was in his body, Ezra began directing it through his channels. There was not much spiritual energy contained within the wind essence, making it very easily absorbed or dispersed by the black lightning in his body.
Hence, Ezra needed to guard it with his full attention as he sent sliver after sliver into the yarn he had smoothed earlier.
Wind essence flowed into the yarn, drifting about as it stealthily fused into it.
As wind essence continued to be infused, he began to feel a very faint sensation spreading from the yarn as it started to knit, seemingly forced by the wind.
This went on for another two hours.
The prince suddenly opened his eyes, faint wind seemingly swirling within them, before scattering completely a moment later. Joy appeared on his face.
He had finally completed the first of the 106 yarns of the Gossamer Steps technique!
He lifted his head to look at the sky, discovering that the first yarn had taken him nearly an entire day. At this rate, it would take nearly a month to complete the first level of the Gossamer Steps technique.
There were three levels to the Gossamer Steps technique, only by knitting two sets of 35 yarns would one reach the next level.
"Thank goodness!"
Fenrir spoke. "Thank me, boy."
Ezra grinned slightly. Now that the first yarn was done, he could find the location of the second one. As such, he would be able to cut out the most troublesome sensing process.
At this point, Ezra sent out a thought without any hesitation, he concentrated.
The spiritual energy in his body began to follow the path indicated in the Gossamer Steps technique again, while his pupils seemed to pierce through his body, focusing on the location of the first yarn.
The strange yet wonderful ripple seemed to pulse.
