The God Virus

At the time, due to the better constitution of his body, instead of two, he had taken just one while keeping the other one to himself. 

'Apprentice-sister, I wonder… what are you doing right now?' The image of the fairy also became clear within his mind at this point. Her graceful movements, elegant figure, and every detail he was able to see became apparent before him as he recalled the scene of her wailing within his arms as they were about to separate for an indefinite amount of time. Virus was currently living that memory once again.

'Be well… till fate wills us to meet again.'

…

Shaking his head in the end, Virus proceeded to pick up the pill bottle as he returned to his room. Thereafter, placing the single-pill bottle on the table beside his bed, he sat in a lotus position before pouring everything within the other bottle into his mouth.

Soon after he closed both his eyes, the percentage of bonding between the first pair of Energy Pathways started to gradually increase.

32%... 33%... 34%...

…

97%... 98%... 99%...

Eleven days later, together with the wondrous aid of the ocean blue liquid, Virus was nearly on the verge of completing the synthesis of his first pair.

'Almost there!' The moment this line flashed through his mind, the unification rate successfully hit a complete hundred percent!

100%!

'Done!'

Simultaneously, he felt a surge of energy inside himself. 

As he had perfected the first level of Liberation and had broken through to the second level, the quality of his energy was now going through a transformation once again. In fact, this transformation was even bigger compared to the time when he had just broken through to the Liberation stage.

At the same time, as the quality of his energy was going through a noticeable rise, from that exact synthesized and perfected pathway, Energy was gushing out into the world itself!

His first finished Energy Pathway could now release energy externally!

'Great!' Thinking the procedure was finally over, feeling very satisfied with himself, Virus was just about to flutter his eyelashes open, when suddenly…

Much to his startlement, he noticed that he could now sense the existence of Origin within his body once again!

Origin was starting to show some kind of reaction from itself!!!

'Hmm?!' This instantly made Virus confused as he could only wonder what was going to happen next. Every time Origin reacted, it meant it was on to something. Thus, Virus's confusion and curiosity were well-justified.

…

And indeed, slowly but surely, Virus began to sense a strange type of connection forming between his pathways and the Origin itself!

'W-what's going on?'

Thereafter, as the connecting bridge was successfully established, for a very brief duration, it seemed the Origin was about to flicker out of existence and disappear once more. However, the next instant, its reaction began to intensify and go wild again!

HUAAA~

Subsequently, a mysterious form of energy was released from the Origin as it all uncontrollably rushed into his thirteenth pathway!

No… the 13th knot within his thirteenth pathway to be more precise!

Next, the twist blocking the path of his thirteenth knot started disentangling itself at a terrifying speed!

10%... 25%...50%!

Noticing this heaven-defying development which truly defied every understanding he had of cultivation, a shiver went down Virus' spine as he had goosebumps all over his body while he thought about this unfathomable object called 'Origin'!

69%... 

84%... 

100%!!!

Soon, in the span of a few minutes, unbelievably, the twist obstructing the path of his 13th pathway disentangled! 

And now that the twist was gone, Origin seemed to immediately suck every bit of that mysterious energy back into itself before it vanished from Virus's detection entirely! It was as if it did not exist, to begin with. 

Notwithstanding, with the block gone now, the volume of his energy began to rise again as what was within the 13th knot joined with the rest of the energy under his control. The only difference in increase this time was the fact it was more of a quantitative increase rather than qualitative.

…

When the process was over at last, Virus's brows jumped before he snapped his eyes wide open! He was shell-shocked!

"H-how… how is this possible?" Full of disbelief, closing his eyes, he focused his awareness on his thirteenth pathway which he could sense again just like the rest of his twelve pathways.

He wasn't seeing things, it was indeed disentangled!

Originally, when he had broken through to the Liberation, other than those untwisted pathways, the rest of them seemed to have been entirely locked away from his reach and sense of detection forever.

However, now, for a second time, he was able to detect and even lead his energy into his thirteenth knot afresh!

Although it was just the thirteenth pathway while the rest of the 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, and 18th passages were still locked, it didn't lessen from Virus' feeling of shock in the least!

'Wait, wait, wait… what could this mean?' 

'Does it mean Origin can open my remaining locked passages from now on?'

His head was instantly invaded with many possibilities, 'But how? And why did it only open one of them? Why did it leave the rest locked up? Could it be just a one-time thing? Or will it continue disentangling one more passage every time I break through to the following stage? Or perhaps… every time I progress by a level, this will be happening? Which one is it I wonder?'

'If it's just a one-time thing, that would be really bad… but that's very unlikely. Why would it bother unlocking one when it's going to leave the rest be?'

'Wait, this happened after I connected my first pair of pathways and turned them into one! Could it be… every time I synthesize a pair, a new pathway would be unlocked indeed?'

At this point, flames of excitement were burning within his eyes as he calculated what would happen if that was indeed the case.

1st+2nd pathways synthesized= 13th pathway unlocked.

3rd+4th pathways synthesized= 14th pathway unlocked.

5th+6th pathways synthesized= 15th pathway unlocked.

7th+8th pathways synthesized= 16th pathway unlocked.

9th+10th pathways synthesized= 17th pathway unlocked.

11th+12th pathways synthesized= 18th pathway unlocked.

"That makes some sense!" He cried in a stupor. This was one of the few and rare times where he was trembling in anticipation while showing an extreme type of emotion.

"If this hypothesis of mine is correct, by the time I reach the peak of the sixth level of Liberation… all my other blocked passages will have been unlocked!!! That means I'll be able to advance to the 7th, 8th, and even the legendary 9th level of Liberation!" He was literally yelling every word at this point while feeling mind-blown.

'Could it be… I was never supposed to untwist those nigh impossible passages in the Energy Disentanglement stage, to begin with? It was needed to be left alone for the Origin to solve in this stage?'

'No… perhaps, seeing how I was incapable of disentangling the rest, the Origin is stepping up personally?' 

Currently, he was feeling as if a new world had been just opened up in front of him. As if he had just discovered a new world!

"I-I need to progress by another level in order to make sure this hypothesis of mine is correct. That it will continue happening!" An unshakeable amount of determination was discharging from all over Virus's body now.