Chapter 741: Honeybun’s Return

To overcome the plateue he stopped forcing it, closed his eyes, and thought.

The circuit works. The lightning flows through the blade instead of fighting it. But it still destabilizes. Why? What breaks the loop?

He replayed his attempts in his mind, searching for the pattern in the failures.

Every time it collapses, it’s at the same point. When the current completes the loop and comes back to where it started. There’s a discontinuity there, that’s where the lightning escapes.

And then the insight struck, deeper than the first.

Maybe it’s because I’m treating the circuit like a closed loop with a beginning and an end. But lightning doesn’t have a beginning or an end. It’s not a line bent into a circle, it’s a field, seeking every path at once.

His understanding cracked open a new thread for him to hold on to.

_"_I shouldn’t be threading one current through one path. I should be saturating the entire blade, letting the lightning exist everywhere in the structure simultaneously, flowing through every possible route at once rather than one circuit. With no starting or ending point, making the whole sword become a single continuous field of lightning."

It was like the difference between a river running through a canyon and an ocean filling a basin.

He’d been building rivers. The lightning wanted to be an ocean.

The new plan began to refine his entire approach to the puzzle.

He channelled the lightning one more time, and this time he didn’t thread a single circuit. He let the current flood the entire blade at once, saturating every part of the metal’s structure simultaneously through paths without any ending.

The assimilation locked into place and his sword crackled with purple lightning like it had never before.

His understanding of the skill leapt, the second comprehension catapulting him from the low seventies straight to eighty percent.

Moon stared at the blade in his hand, the lightning field coursing through it, and a fierce grin spread across his face.

Eighty percent.

The hardest stretch conquered, one of the element’s deepest secret finally in his grasp.

He was close to having both advanced elements fully assimilated.

"I need to take a break," Moon muttered, lowering his sword and letting the lightning disperse. "This is mentally exhausting."

He’d been pushing his comprehension hard for hours, and the two breakthroughs had drained him.

But he’d achieved what he had set as a goal. The major conceptual leaps were behind him, the underlying mechanisms of lightning assimilation finally understood at a level the technique demanded.

All that remained was practice, tightening the bits and bolts, refining his control until he could call on it instantly and hold it till his mana ran out.

Moon sat down and rested, letting his mind recover for ten minutes before he felt a change in his beast-taming space.

Moon’s eyes snapped shut, his focus turning internally at once to check up on Honeybun.

Honeybun’s aura was rising, climbing higher and higher by the second, constantly and without any restriction. The Jade Turtle Core’s inheritance had done something profound, and whatever process the little turtle was undergoing was still accelerating, its power swelling beyond anything it had before.

Moon hesitated only a moment, then decided to bring the turtle back into the chamber where he could watch over it directly.

Honeybun materialized before him, and this time its eyes were open. No longer lost in the deep slumber of the River, but alert.

The pressure it radiated in the warded chamber grew with every passing second.

Moon watched with narrowing eyes, as the power kept building. The little turtle’s golden shell brightened, crystals glowing brighter across its surface, its body slowly growing larger.

"You are at the edge of five-star... so close to breaking through... come on." Moon encouraged the little turtle..

Then, the invisible barrier shattered, the aura punching past the peak of Five-Star Evolver and surging into the realm beyond, the pressure exploding outward and filling the entire chamber with an oppressive feeling that made Moon’s skin prickle.

Honeybun’s size increased by a feet, its shell shining with a richer, deeper golden luster, its presence transforming completely.

The aura finally crested and stabilized, settling into a new height.

Moon stared, exhilaration flooding through his veins, barely able to believe what he was witnessing.

"...Surpasser rank," he breathed, unable to believe the sight before him.

A turtle that had hatched barely two days ago at Three-Star. That had been nothing but an egg a week before. And now it sat before him radiating the aura of a Surpasser, having crossed the threshold that most fighters spent their entire lives failing to reach, having left the entire Evolver realm behind in a matter of days.

"You crossed it." Moon said, a disbelieving laugh escaping his mouth, reaching out to rest a hand on the larger golden shell.

"You actually crossed became a Surpasser. Honeybun, do you have any idea what you just did? There are fighters three times my age who’d give anything to stand where you’re standing right now, and you got there in two days. Two days!"

Honeybun lifted its head, meeting his eyes with its cute round eyes, and Moon could feel the depth of power coiled within it now, vast like the sea.

He had a Surpasser-tier Supreme companion with him now. A Golden Turtle, first of its kind, carrying the inheritance of its ancestor and an insanely powerful skill from the River of Paths.

And it was only two days old.

Moon grinned, resting his forehead against the turtle’s head, his heart hammering with pride and awe and anticipation in equal measure.

"I can’t even imagine where you stop," he murmured. "I don’t think you do either."

<...Honeybun is strong.>

Honeybun said, staring at him with a smug look.

"You can form phrases now too?!" Moon said with a massive grin on his face. "Yes, yes, Honeybun is the strongest! Hahaha!"

Mirage watched from the sidelines, proud to welcome the newest member of their family, yet feeling a competitive spark ignite in his chest. He wasn’t about to let himself fall behind.

"Come on, show us, Honeybun, what skill did you gain?"