Cultivation Through Artifacts

Since the very first try when Khal attempted to bring the first stone up onto the surface, a bit more than an hour has passed.

Yet even after an hour, he was still unable to bring a single one of them up from the lake's bottom, which was quite irritating for Khal.

He tried to use another object for his help too, like his clothing. Using it as a bag, he tried to put the stone into that, but that turned out just as a useless struggle as everything else.

He even tried to climb up to the surface by the lake's wall on the side while tying the clothing with the stones in it around his waist, but he failed with that attempt too.

Not only were the walls on the side as smooth as glass or jade, but even if he were able to get a grip before he would have had the chance to reach the surface, he would have ended up dying because of the lack of oxygen.

Furthermore, the weight of the stones would make Khal's ascension even slower than normal, so it was just a worthless idea and try.

"What should I do then?", thought Khal calmly on the lakeside, thinking for options that could help him.

Even after the several failed attempts, his eyes still showed clear determinations, while he didn't stop thinking for solutions even for a second.

While Khal was deep in thoughts, Logan on the side opened his right eye gently and looked at Khal.

Seeing that he wasn't giving up even after an hour of failed attempts, he just smiled gently and closed his eye back.

"It is time for him to figure it out."

Unknown to what Logan was thinking, Khal furrowed his eyebrows and thought, "Let's think. He wouldn't give me such a task if he knew that bringing those stones to the surface would be impossible. There is definitely a solution, but it seems I just simply miss it."

Khal moved everything in his head to think of a solution, and it didn't take him long to get another idea.

"What if I try to use my Talent? Would that change anything?"

After thinking about that, Khal just shook his head and thought, "No, that would be useless. My Talent is only useful to detect others and see my proximity. It wouldn't help me in such a situation at all."

Tapping on the ground gently with his fingers, Khal thought for a while more and then sighed.

"Well, it doesn't seem I have other possibilities so let's give it a try. Maybe I can see something down there that I have missed until now."

Instantly as he said that Khal activated his Talent and under a second his eyes turned sky blue while a red vertical slit appeared in the middle.

"Let's give it a try.", thought Khal, and without hesitation jumped back into the lake.

Swimming down to the bottom, he inspected the stone with his Heaven's Eyes in great detail, hoping he will be able to find anything that would help him.

But even like this, the stone looked just as ordinary as ever before.

"..."

"I don't believe that I can't bring it back up with me!", thought Khal with visible fire in his eyes and grabbed the stone firmly.

"Huh?!"

However, the moment he touched the stone, he felt as something inside his body started to move and get sucked away.

As that happened, the stone itself started to become lighter and lighter with each passing second, making Khal to raise the stone in his hand without any problem.

"What is happening here?", thought Khal with surprise, as he watched the stone in his hand turn as light as a feather.

Holding the stone in his hand with great ease, Khal looked a bit surprised, but not for too long.

"Well, it worked so finally let's get to work!", thought Khal happily and without hesitation swam back up.

After breaking the water's surface and throwing the stone out onto the grass, Khal drove back down, while Logan on the side started to smile.

"Finally. Now then, let's see how much he can bring up before reaching his limit."

As Logan waited patiently for the results until then Khal was emerging and vanishing in the lake from time to time, while throwing out several fist-sized stones onto the ground one after another.

So far, an hour has passed and since then Khal has brought up close to a hundred of stones onto the surface. But even after bringing up such a huge amount of stones, it was still visible that several more were still waiting for him down on the lake bed below.

However, Khal noticed something which made him quite confused. Every time he brought a stone back up and threw the stones away, he felt as his body became weaker, while the stones' weight became heavier at the same time.

After bringing up several more, Khal noted that this feeling was true and it just became worse as time went by. This fact made him feel quite troubled but not to an extent to let it affect his work.

However, it didn't mean he wasn't thinking about the reason why this was happening to him.

"It should be in connection with the sensation I feel all the time I touch these stones. It's like they suck away some kind of energy from my body."

And just the moment he thought about this, suddenly a familiar voice sounded in his head, making him realize what that energy truly was.

[Warning! 'Body Essence' has dropped below 20%!]

[Notify! If 'Body Essence' reaches 0%, 'Exhaustion' will occur!]

The instant he heard the voice, Khal realized that what the stone sucked away from his body was not his Talent's power, but instead the Essence inside his body.

Also, when he heard the next sentence, Khal knew what 'Exhaustion' meant. If he wasn't careful enough and depleted his 'Body Essence', then he would fall asleep once again.

And if that happened, it was unknown if he will be able to wake up or not.

Just as it was stated in his 'Status' before, if he fails to avoid the 'Exhaustion' effect and falls into a deep slumber, there was a high possibility of death.

"So it seems, from now on I need to be extra careful how much I use my essence.", thought Khal calmly as he brought another stone back up to the surface and placed it on the ground.

Looking at the 100 plus stones in the grass, Khal stayed silent for a bit then started to calculate in his head.

"It seems, so far with 80% of my 'Body Essence' I was able to bring up 120 stones, meaning if I use all my remaining 20%, I would only be able to bring up 30 more."

After thinking for a while, Khal looked down at the remaining stones at the bottom of the lake and shook his head.

"That won't do it. I must avoid 'Exhaustion', but I also need to bring all the remaining stones up if I want to succeed."

"Is there no way for me to bring up the remaining stones?", thought Khal, but the next second he raised an eyebrow and looked at his hand.

"Wait. Is it possible for me to control my Essence? Can I control the amount of essence the stone should suck away from my body?"

Instantly as he thought about this question, Khal glanced at a piece of stone on the ground next to him and smiled.

"Well, there is only one way to find it out."