Is that a Wisp?

The nine pseudo-energy meridians were ready, and fusing them would be the last part. That was Krune's idea, but how exactly would achieve fusion? That was an entirely different matter. He was pretty sure that the Myriad Energies Technique was incomplete, so he still lacked the part that showed how the fusion was done. But from what he had heard from old man Su Feng, everyone considered this technique a very ordinary one. In that case, he wouldn't be able to find it.

'If I want to fuse all nine meridians, I will have to rely on myself. And since someone was able to create it before, I should be able to repeat it. There's nothing else to do. I can only try it out and see what happens.'

Krune tried to squeeze the nine meridians together. Sadly, nothing happened. He then put spiritual energy in between and made them attract one another, but nothing happened either. He also tried to enlarge one and put another inside. Unfortunately, the meridian broke, and he had to reform it again. He attempted to fuse three at a time and then combine the fused three after, but that didn't work as well. After a full day of trying only to fail, Krune was already running out of ideas.

'Could it be that I'm wrong? Does fusion not exist? Was this technique really made to be used with only nine meridians? No, that's definitely not it! I'm definitely missing something!'

Krune spaced out a little and looked up, trying to obtain more ideas, when suddenly, he noticed one of the spiders building up the web on the roof. The spider was connecting its points one after another. What initially was just a star-shaped thing, slowly started to take the form of a real web. Every time the spider circled around the web, it got bigger. It was at that moment that Krune's mind felt like it was struck by lightning!

'Right! It's not that I can't fuse them, nor is it because I cultivated it wrongly. The first stage is indeed made for me to form the nine pseudo-energy meridians, and that part is right. But it wasn't for the purpose of fusing them. It was for the purpose of practicing!'

Krune felt like he had achieved an epiphany. When he tried to form pseudo-energy meridians for the first time, he would take an entire day or more. But once he knew how to make them, reforming them for later use was so easy that he could make them appear in less than a minute!

'Since that's the case, then I already have all the experience that I need. My meridians are already formed, but they can't be fused since they're a complete product. With that, I only have one option now...'

In an instant, all nine pseudo-energy meridians broke into countless specks of spiritual light. It wasn't the same as dissipating them for later use. They were totally gone this time. If Krune wanted to reform them, he would need to recreate all of them from scratch once more. Of course, he wouldn't recreate all nine meridians in one minute, but he was sure he could recreate them in less than a day. But that was not what he was going to do. The time for practice was over. It's time to take the next step!

'What I need to do now is to form all nine meridians at the same time from scratch. But instead of forming them separately, I need to form and attach them together. I need to use all nine of them to create a single sturdy meridian. If I'm not wrong, each of the nine pseudo-energy meridians has its own properties and purpose. If not, then why is it that after I formed the first one, I still took more than a day to form the second? If they were the exact same, it should have been effortless to create the second one, right? If my speculations are correct, they should be able to convert spiritual energy just like any other natural meridian!'

Krune didn't waste any time as he started working straight away. At first, as soon as Krune tried to form all nine at once, they immediately broke apart. Let alone form the initial shape, they didn't even gather together to start with.

But Krune wasn't dispirited. It was just his first attempt, and he could tell where it went wrong. It turns out that when he was forming the nine meridians, his poor control over the process made it so that some meridians were forming faster than the others. That created a conflict between their spiritual energies, so that's the first thing he needed to address for his plans to work.

----

Time went by, and soon two weeks passed.

Inside the cave, one could see that nine meridians were taking form together. Their energy was pretty much the same, while at the same time, they were attaching themselves with each other and fusing. Krune had already spent an entire hour in this trial, and so far, this was the furthest he had gotten. By now, even if he failed again, it wouldn't matter. Krune was absolutely sure that his conjectures were right. This was how the Myriad Energies Technique should be. It all depended on himself now.

The forming of the meridians was practically done. Their energies were harmonizing with each of their properties, and gradually, their energies were as one. By now, it seemed like there wasn't even a need for Krune to maintain the process. They looked like they were attracting each other to the point where one couldn't even say that they were nine different meridians at some point.

But Krune didn't dare to slack off now. Even if everything seemed to be going well for him, he would keep giving his assistance for the final step. Even though he can try again later if he failed, there was no reason for him to not strive forward for success now!

'Click.'

An hour later, Krune heard something that seemed like it had been attached. It was quite weird. Krune never felt that the pseudo-energy meridians would create such a sound. But he didn't even have time to think about it. Because not long after that, the spiritual energy in the surroundings started to tremble!

'Brummmm....'

Krune was alarmed!

'What's going on?!'

As a wisp and a being made out of energy, Krune could feel that the spiritual energy around him seems to be...excited! Yes, the spiritual energy around him was really excited as if it had found a long-lost friend!

Without delay, all the energy in the surroundings started to flow in the meridian that had just been created. That's right, it wasn't coming for Krune, but for the meridian itself!

'So much spiritual energy! And it seems like the shape of the pseudo-energy meridians is becoming smaller.'

Krune wasn't seeing things wrongly. The large meridian was really getting smaller. Although it was still bigger than a single pseudo-energy meridian, it wasn't at the same size as the nine meridians put together. It kept shrinking until suddenly, the meridian started to break apart again, which made Krune's heart sink!

'No, no, no! Why is it breaking?'

But he only had to give it a couple seconds of thought to immediately understand the reason.

'There isn't enough spiritual energy!'

Krune was frightened. The energy meridian absorbed all the spiritual energy around him, while more spiritual energy from further away came to fill in the void. But that still wasn't enough! Krune's only chance right now was to use the Demon Core that he got from the Four-Winged Demon Crow. He really didn't want to use it since he was planning to use it for his own cultivation if he succeeded in creating the new meridian.

Unfortunately for him, there was no more time to hesitate. Krune made up his mind and grabbed the demon core, expecting that its energy would be enough. At the same time, he was afraid. The demon core's spiritual energy was unlike the energy of heaven and earth, so there was a chance it would break his new meridian apart. But he truly didn't have any other choice now.

Much to Krune's surprise, not only could the meridian absorb the energy from the demon core, they immediately converted all the spiritual energy coming out of it. Not to mention that the conversion could be said to be almost instantaneous! Krune didn't know, but even natural meridians couldn't possibly convert spiritual energy this quickly!

Ten minutes later, the cracks on the meridian disappeared, and it looked normal again. Slowly, the spiritual energy from the surroundings started to calm down. The rate of absorption from the demon core became slower the more time passed. Krune finally let out a sigh of relief at this point. It seemed like the process of forming a meridian was finally coming to an end.

'Crack!'

Krune heard this sound, but he didn't even need to look to know what happened. All the spiritual energy from the demon core was gone, so it broke into powder and scattered on the floor. The demon core that almost cost his own life to obtain had disappeared just like that. Krune felt slightly gloomy, but not for long. The flow of spiritual energy from heaven and earth also stopped entirely. Soon, the final process of forming a meridian came to an end.

Just as Krune was about to test his new meridian, it suddenly started to shine!

'What's happening? Is it not over yet?'

---

At the same time, many galaxies away, in a dilapidated cave in the middle of a mountain on an unknown planet, a statue-like old man was sitting in a meditative position. He was totally covered in thick dust. Who knew how many years, centuries, or maybe even millenniums has he not moved? If people didn't know any better, they would definitely think he was dead.

But just now, that statue-like old man suddenly opened his eyes. They looked like they could see through anything and anywhere, like nothing in this universe could ever hide away from them.

He then looked in a certain direction, his gaze penetrating into space-time. The direction he was looking at was, of course, Krune's planet, the planet of Makui.

The old man was a little surprised and let out a gentle smile. He could see Krune inside the cave looking at the energy meridian, obviously alarmed for not knowing why it was shining at all.

"Haha! So this little friend is a wisp. No wonder, no wonder. The Myriad Energies Technique does indeed fit wisps very well, and this one seems exceptionally talented at it."

He then sighed and said with a light chuckle.

"I guess there's still hope after all!"

He kept looking for a little longer. One could see expectation on his face. It looked like he had been waiting for Krune for countless years.

"Little friend, don't disappoint this old man, okay?"

He then stopped looking and closed his eyes. Who knew how long it would take until they're opened again.

---

Back at Krune's cave, the meridian had finally stopped shining and settled again. He couldn't make heads or tails as to what had happened. He didn't feel anything change after that brilliance either. He waited a little longer to make sure nothing else was going to occur, but it seemed like it was truly over this time.

'Phew... Now, then. I hope you don't disappoint me. My future accomplishments depend on your performance!'

The meridian's final form was pretty much the same as any of the previous nine pseudo-energy meridians, but almost three times the size of a single one. As he thought, the nine meridians were now one single sturdy meridian, and he could feel the energy of all nine meridians coming from this single meridian.

Krune then calmed his emotions down before starting to cultivate using his new meridian. He only absorbed a little bit of spiritual energy at first in case something went wrong.

To his surprise, that bit of energy was instantly converted and fell into his core straight away. Let alone needing to wait and harmonize with the spiritual energy inside his core, it felt like this had always been part of his core's spiritual energy to start with. It was added up to his cultivation in an instant.

'Great!'

Krune was instantly ecstatic! Slowly but surely, he started to increase the amount of spiritual energy gathered from the surroundings. An hour later, he had already reached the same rate of absorption that his nine pseudo-energy meridians could do at the fastest speed. But surprisingly, there was still space for more! Krune kept at it, gradually gathering more and more spiritual energy. It wasn't before two hours later that he finally could feel that the rate at which the meridian could convert the energy had finally reached its limit.

'Amazing! This is already almost three times the speed of my previous nine pseudo-energy meridians working together! And this is just the first one. Once I build more pseudo-energy meridians like this, it will only get faster! No, wait. This meridian now works the same way as the true meridians from the other races. They can't be called pseudo-energy meridians anymore.'

Krune pondered over it a bit and quickly decided on a name.

'From now on, I'll just call them Spiritual Energy Meridians or Energy Meridians for short.'

Krune enjoyed the feeling of success a little more, but it didn't take too long for him to calm down.

'This is just the first step. I still have a long way to go. If not for that Four-Winged Demon Crow's core, my meridian would have shattered, and it would've ended up in failure. I can't start creating another one right now. There's simply not enough spiritual energy here. I'll have to stick to my initial plan. I have to break through to the 5th Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm first. No, with this speed of cultivation, it shouldn't be a problem to break through to the 6th Stage.'

'After that, I'll look for a low-level spirit vein that doesn't have too many strong beasts guarding it and take it for myself. While doing so, I should also gather more demon cores. I have the feeling that the more meridians I make, the more spiritual energy will be necessary.'

Krune steadied his mind and put all his focus into cultivating. His luck was finally turning for the better.