Chapter 246: 246

In front of the old tree, Michelle rested her forehead against it and sent her soul energy into it.

At first, everything was normal, but when it probed deep into the tree, Michelle froze. “So it wasn’t just a feeling…” she smiled. Deep within the thick tree trunk wasn’t wood but something much more dangerous. “It has been such a long time since I’ve encountered this!”

Though there wasn’t much of it, she could feel Void Obsidian.

She had the urge to absorb the void within it, but that could kill the tree. And that would make the area around the tree no longer as excellent for cultivating soul energy as it was before. As Mavreth’s disciple, she couldn’t ruin the place.

“What a pity…” To make sure she didn’t absorb the void, Michelle retracted her soul energy.

Leaning against the tree, Michelle tried to remember whether she knew about a way for a tree to grow with Void Obsidian inside. If she didn’t know about it, that didn’t necessarily mean it couldn’t normally exist, but it would increase the chance that Mavreth had somehow artificially created it.

After not remembering anything for a long time, Michelle decided to delve into Rivenaar’s memories. He was a monster from the heavenly realm, so maybe he knew something.

But even after going through them a few times, the only mention of something similar was a legend about an extinct species.

They were classified as monsters, but their whole life, they lived as plants in one place.

And their Life Stone wasn’t on the surface of their body. It was within—either among the roots or in the stem.

Aside from the Life Stone, another thing that set this species apart from plants was that they could use soul energy. And it was extremely dark.

Most cases of someone in deep history getting infected by Void Plague were because of this species.

But even then, the Void Plague would quickly disappear. Because even this species didn’t use literal void.

Staring at the tree, Michelle frowned.

Was it of the extinct species? And did that mean the Void Obsidian was its Life Stone?

Or was it something completely new that Mavreth had created, inspired by the species?

Whichever was the case, it wasn’t something Michelle could just figure out. The tree wasn’t alive, so it couldn’t answer her questions. And Mavreth probably wouldn’t tell her even if she asked.

So, instead, Michelle decided to care about something else.

The new poison Mavreth had given her was to be administered directly into her blood. She didn’t have anything she could use like a syringe, so she had to cut open a wound and put it in like that.

That gave two possibilities. Either grind the poison into dust and sprinkle it over the wound, or mix it into water and wash it over a wound.

But that wasn’t what was concerning her. The problem was that she needed to put it into a wound. If she hurt herself, the sweet scent of her blood would attract monsters and beasts.

And if the poison Mavreth gave her was one that would weaken or knock her out, she would be completely defenseless against them.

So she needed to think of a way to avoid letting the scent get out.

Looking down at her body, a thought struck her. She just needed not to let the blood out of her body. In other words, the wound just had to be in an enclosed area—like within her mouth.

But there came another question.

What if the poison’s effects changed because it got mixed with her saliva?

To find that out, Michelle could only take out a pill and study it closely. She cut a piece off and probed it with her soul energy.

Until evening, Michelle kept fiddling with the single pill, trying all kinds of methods to find out whether she could mix it with her saliva.

The last thing she did was spit enough saliva into a cup and throw part of the pill there. Another part ended up thrown into a cup with water.

Just like that, Michelle left it overnight while she went to sleep.

After waking up, Michelle checked the two cups.

Their state was quite the same. Except for the difference in consistency and smell between water and saliva, everything was the same. After the poison dissolved inside, they turned brownish.

To check their effects, Michelle poured a cup on each side of her, watching how it affected the grass.

And as she had expected, in just a few minutes, two small wilted areas appeared next to her.

Considering that the poison was diluted in water and saliva, it had quite a strong effect.

Smiling, Michelle pulled a small bowl out of her spatial ring. Since saliva didn’t seem to negatively affect the poison, it was time to try it out.

Within the bowl, Michelle ground one pill. Then, she pulled out a small knife and brought it to her mouth.

Carefully, she cut the inner side of her lower lip, making sure she didn’t pierce through it. That would lead to the sweet scent getting out.

Finally, she took the bowl and proceeded to sprinkle the contents evenly on the wound.

When that was done, she tightly closed her mouth, not letting any blood spill out. She wanted to avoid unnecessary trouble as much as possible.

The wound stung quite a bit upon contact with the poison, but Michelle ignored it. Instead, she just leaned against the old tree, waiting for the effect to kick in. Mavreth didn’t tell her the name of the poison, so she couldn’t even use that to deduce what it would do to her.

But considering how the grass wilted when she poured out the poison mixed with water, she had a few guesses in mind.

For a while, Michelle didn’t feel the poison working, but when she sensed within her body, she could feel it flowing around her blood. Her guess was that it would attack only after getting to a specific organ.

And she was right. After a while, she felt a throb in her head, and her sight blurred.

The poison activated when it got into the veins nourishing the brain.

But not the whole brain—just the part controlling sight and the sense of smell.

Michelle couldn’t tell that on her own, but Nyxaroth told her. Living within her body, he could perfectly see what was going on.

After entering the blood, the poison got coated in something slimy that prevented it from acting out. But once it got to the brain, the slime disappeared, and it attacked the veins, snapping those nourishing the sensory center.

“Well, that’s troublesome…” Michelle muttered. Because of her superior healing abilities, the cut in her mouth had already healed since it wasn’t even that deep.

But even her superior healing abilities couldn’t take care of bleeding like that. Sure, they could restore the veins once the poison stopped working, but the blood that had already gotten out would stay there. And it could cause trouble if it pressed on something important after clotting.

“What do I do about this…” Michelle frowned. She didn’t want to end up stupid because of a single poison.

One time, she could take care of it, but she was supposed to take the poison every day. If it caused the same problem every day, it would be too troublesome. So she needed to find a long-term solution.

But did one like that exist?

Michelle didn’t really know. In her past life, she was a doctor, but not a surgeon—and definitely not a brain surgeon. She was an internist.

But that was in her past life. At the moment, she had to come up with a solution herself. And for that, she had a few things she could never have in her past life.

Spirit energy, soul energy, and shadow essence.

Thinking back to how Mavreth taught her to thin out her soul energy by creating a tunnel of spirit energy, Michelle decided to do something similar.

Her spirit energy was flowing around her blood, so if she could grasp a hold of it, she could control her blood flow a bit. In other words, she could prevent it from clotting in places that would bring trouble.

But it was easier said than done.

If she moved her spirit energy, it would just move around the blood. The blood itself would move minimally. So to move the blood, there was a need for another power to intervene.

For example, soul energy.

It could be used to create a canal around the spirit energy and blood, forcing it to flow in a certain direction.

But soul energy couldn’t exactly affect blood—only other energies.

So to make the blood move, Michelle would need to use the soul energy to push the spirit energy quite a bit. Then, the blood would follow. But not all the way.

It was clear that to master that, Michelle would need a lot of time. But she was determined to succeed. She wouldn’t let the blood just flow around and cause problems.

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