With such effort being constant, time moved forward at a crawling pace.
Each second dragged on for what felt like an eternity as Kukyo's inner void became the only reason Shiki's mind did not falter.
His body on the other hand . . . Was already showing signs.
Sweat beaded constantly on his skin.
Slight tremors in the boy's otherwise firm and unshakable posture.
Shiki was definitely feeling the pressure, it was only a matter of time before he slipped up.
And so it was.
A tiny, near instantly corrected slip in the control of the sealing and no less than three strong and uncontrolled, highly volatile streams of Gelel Energy escaped from the main flow and devastated the surroundings.
Shiki's protective barrier groaned with the weight of the assault but with the energy being unfocused, it ultimately held.
The boy had no choice but to begin overdrawing his chakra and using it to reinforce his failing physical body.
This could lead to long lasting health complications, reduced vitality, loss of lifeforce and more, not to mention the immediate risk of completely emptying himself and dying.
But he believed all this could be made up for later, either through the Nirvana Seal or even with the Sanguine Pill provided to him by Mito.
So Shiki soldiered on.
After an undetermined amount of time, the fila vestiges of the Gelel Vein were sealed and the boy immediately collapsed in relief.
Beni, who had been worriedly watching from within the corridor outside the chamber by virtue of her Shuigan, immediately charged in.
WIthout hesitation, she used her chakra and rudimentary medical jutsu taught to her by Shiki, to force a special Military Rations Pill down his throat.
It was a dense cocktail of nutrition and calories to burn, with it, the boy's Nirvana Art Dragon Slumber could finally take effect, placing him into a hyper recovery state of hibernation.
For her part, Benihime silently sat beside the fallen Shiki, adjusting his posture and laying his head on her thighs, attentively wiping his sweat and arranging his hair . . .
*
Several hours passed before Shiki finally began to wake up, slowly opening his eyes to see Beni's face looking down at him with a near imperceptible smile and blush.
"Are you okay, Shiki-sama?" The girl gently inquired.
" . . . Yeah. All good now." The boy replied after a short pause.
Once he got up and completely regained his bearing, he could even say he was feeling truly great.
The Nirvana Seal was finally complete, all that remained was the task of compressing and transferring it into his own body.
Shiki did not even need to make any special preparations as the seal would affect him immediately. Only when its contents began to be "downloaded" into his body through a progressive unsealing process, would any effects begin to be felt.
As such, after a short meditation to scan his body and ensure he was apt to begin the seal transfer and compression, the boy immediately got back to work.
The previous overdraw of chakra took its toll that even Dragon Slumber could not fix but Shiki was not that worried. That kind of self abuse was something he would have to become extremely well acquainted with once the seal was in place.
As expected, the transfer went without a hitch.
The patterns engraved into the enormous stone table slowly peeled away, being funneled onto Shiki's forehead, compressed into a tiny rhombus, packed with enough energy and data to put the Nine Tails itself to shame.
The boy's goal was to pack it so full that even an Otsutsuki would be taken aback, that even a Ten Tails would seem tame and minor in comparison.
But such wild ambitions were best left for the future.
For now, the process of slowly disseminating the data and energy contained within the Nirvana Seal had to be started, thus triggering transcendence, as per the jutsu's full name.
The method was simple, the Nirvana Seal: Transcendence could be activated to flood the boy with power and drastically increase his abilities while granting access to special powers but that was just a side effect.
Shiki needed to utilize the harsh methods of the Ryumon, turned up to an even more severe extreme and break down his body and spirit with even various secret medicines being used to enhance the procedure.
He would then trigger the Nirvana Seal, flooding his body with Gelel Energy which was essentially, concentrated life energy with powerful mutagenic capabilities.
This energy would carry the collected data of special abilities and kekkei genkai contained in the seal and use it to patch up Shiki's broken body, restoring it to a state far greater than his previous peak.
So long as he had Gelel Energy, he would not tire and any injury could be quickly repaired so he could literally immerse himself in this self destructive training 24/7.
Despite the suffering in his future, Shiki could not wait to get back to Konoha and begin preparations.
And from now on, he could use Nirvana Art: Samsara to devour any shinobi whose abilities he fancied.
As a power steroid, the Roen sealed inside Shiki had become a bit obsolete but rather than make an attempt to absorb it, Shiki began engineering other plans for the wolf monster.
Anyways, he preferred to save the Nirvana Seal to be a last resort, it was meant for training and self modification and he did not want to tip off certain hidden forces regarding its existence
It was far too similar to the Otsutsuki Kama after all and he doubted those hidden ones would dismiss it as pure coincidence.
That being the case, Roen still retained its usefulness as a nice boost to temporarily push the boy into Kage level without triggering the interest of enemies far too dangerous for the current him.
For now though, it was straight back home.
After he collected the formation to summon the Spacetime Hole for later study of course.
*
For the pair, the return journey was uneventful but the arrival was far from it.
In fact, from the presence of the entire Team 6 in Mito's mansion, Shiki feared for his training plans.
He could clearly see the evil shadow of forced postponement on the horizon.
Additionally, the way the now fifteen year old Uchiha Mei glared at seven year old Mei like he was a cheating husband arriving at home late, was already giving Shiki a headache.
'Seriously Mei-san! I know Uchiha tend to have a couple of screws loose but do you really think a seven year old is going out for trysts!?' He internally shouted.
Then again, Benihime's precocious behaviour did lend some credence to Mei's worries.
Though it was not like Shiki was taken so the bespectacled girl did not yet earn the right to be that territorial.
'Can these females not leave me alone for like . . . at least nine or ten years?' The boy internally begged for the impossible.
Alas it was not meant to be
And so, enduring Mei's accusatory glare, Beni's expressionless smugness at having spent an entire outing with him and Inori's extremely entertained evil grin, Shiki inquired as to why his team was at his home.
"So, what are you all doing in my house?"
+++++
Hey, Author here!
To promote the novel I will be releasing BONUS CHAPTERS on SUNDAYS based on the previous week's power stone count.
100 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter
500 Power Stones = 2 Bonus Chapters
1000 Power Stones = 3 Bonus Chapters
Every earned BONUS CHAPTER on Webnovel will also be posted on Scribble.
Just a reminder that you can read up to a FULL MONTH ahead of this site on pa-treon.
I'm trying to become a full time Author now and I'm not going to be starting any new novels just so I can make sure this one is properly completed.
Find those sweet advanced chapters on pa-treon.com/lusoba without the -