Ryven used his qi to clean himself thoroughly, washing away three days of intensive training. His body felt different now - stronger, more refined, like every cell had been upgraded. The chaos tempering sessions had rebuilt him from the inside out, while his intent-filled acupoints hummed with constant power.
He checked his equipment one last time. The Void Eclipse Sword rested in his dantian, ready to be summoned instantly. His spatial storage ring contained emergency supplies and healing pills, though he hoped he wouldn't need them. His concealment technique was active, hiding his presence from spiritual detection.
Over the past few days, Ryven had watched several Soul Beasts try to claim the flowers. Each time, the Crimson Flame Tiger had killed them with brutal efficiency. A Shadow Wolf pack, a Crystal Serpent, even a massive Earth Bear - all had fallen to the tiger's flames and claws. The battlefield around the grove was littered with craters and scorch marks from the constant fighting.
But Ryven had studied every battle through his divine sense. He knew the tiger's fighting patterns, its preferred techniques, its reaction times. More importantly, he'd seen that it was getting tired from the constant battles. The beast was still powerful, but it wasn't at peak condition anymore.
The Soul Spirit Flowers were almost ready. His enhanced senses could detect the subtle changes as they prepared to bloom. Once they opened fully, their spiritual energy would reach maximum potency. That was when he needed to strike.
Ryven thought about Victoria as he prepared to leave his training ground. His aunt had given him precious resources without asking for anything in return. She deserved one of these flowers for her own breakthrough to Soul Realm. If he could get at least two flowers - one for himself and one for her - this dangerous mission would be worth it.
The journey to the grove took twenty minutes of careful movement. Ryven used his Chaos Shroud concealment to stay hidden while his Void Step technique let him cover ground quickly without making noise. The destruction from previous battles became more obvious as he got closer. Trees were burned to stumps, the ground was cracked and melted, and the air still smelled of blood and spiritual energy.
Finally, Ryven reached the edge of the clearing. The Soul Spirit Flowers stood in the center, their buds swelling as they prepared to open. The spiritual pressure from them made the air shimmer like heat waves.
The Crimson Flame Tiger sat in meditation pose near the flowers, but its eyes were open and alert. The beast's spiritual pressure was immense - mid Soul Realm cultivation that pressed down on everything nearby. Its red-orange fur flickered with inner fire, and its claws left smoking marks on the stone where it rested.
Ryven took a deep breath and deactivated his concealment technique. Time to see if three days of impossible training had been enough.
He walked forward step by step, making no attempt to hide. The tiger's massive head turned toward him, golden eyes narrowing as it tried to understand what it was seeing.
The beast became very cautious for two reasons. First, it hadn't sensed Ryven's presence until he was right in front of it - which should have been impossible for a Foundation Realm human. Second, enormous amounts of pure spiritual energy were leaking from this small human despite his low cultivation level.
"Who are yo-" the tiger started to ask.
Its head rolled off its shoulders and hit the ground with a wet thud.
Ryven looked down at the Void Eclipse Sword in his hand, already dismissing it back to his dantian. The Primordial Sword Form had cut through the tiger's defenses like they didn't exist, severing its connection between body and spirit in a single strike.
"That was anticlimactic," Ryven said to the empty clearing. "It didn't even put up a fight. I guess I really am very strong now."
He sighed and looked at the tiger's corpse. After all that preparation and worry, the actual battle had lasted less than a second. His combined techniques - chaos intent fused with primordial sword arts - had simply been too much for the Soul Beast to handle.
Ryven began the process of harvesting the tiger's inner world, cutting into its chest cavity to extract the spiritual core that contained its personal dimension. What he found inside made his eyes widen.
The tiger hadn't just killed the recent challengers - it had been collecting inner worlds for years, maybe decades. Dozens of pocket dimensions were stored within its spiritual core, each one containing the lifetime treasures of the Soul Beasts it had defeated.
"This tiger was definitely a chronic looter," Ryven muttered as he began sorting through the massive collection. "It's like finding a dragon's hoard, but for cultivation resources."
He started organizing everything into categories. Beast cores went in one pile, ranging from Spirit Beast level all the way up to early Soul Realm quality. Rare herbs and spiritual plants filled another section - some species he'd never even heard of. Weapons and armor made a third pile, most of it damaged but some pieces still valuable.
Then there were the miscellaneous treasures. Cultivation manuals, formation arrays, strange artifacts that hummed with unknown power, and pills whose age and quality made his mouth water just looking at them.
The problem was storage space. Ryven's current spatial ring, despite being a graduation gift from his father, couldn't hold even a quarter of this wealth. He was going to need a bigger container.
Searching through the tiger's personal effects, he found exactly what he needed. A ring that practically hummed with spatial power - superior Unity Grade quality that could hold entire mountains worth of material.
"Where did this tiger find a Unity Grade spatial ring?" Ryven wondered aloud, slipping the massive storage device onto his finger. "Well, it's dead now, so I guess it's mine. Time to go home - I miss home cooked meals."
The new ring made organizing everything much easier. Beast cores, herbs, weapons, pills, and mysterious artifacts all disappeared into the vast storage space. Ryven kept detailed mental notes of what went where - this much wealth needed careful cataloging for future use.
Some items would be perfect for his own cultivation. Others could help his family advance their techniques. The most valuable pieces might be worth trading at high-level auctions for resources he couldn't find anywhere else.
As he finished loading the last of the treasure, Ryven noticed the Soul Spirit Flowers beginning to open. Perfect timing. The five stalks bloomed simultaneously, releasing waves of pure yin and yang spiritual energy that made his bloodline sing with excitement.
He carefully harvested all five flowers, wrapping each one in protective qi before storing them in specialized containers within his new spatial ring. The spiritual pressure from them was incredible even through the containment - these would definitely help both him and Victoria with their next breakthroughs.
Looking around the devastated grove one last time, Ryven felt satisfied with how things had turned out. He'd gained incredible power, claimed precious resources, and proven that careful preparation could overcome raw cultivation differences.
Now it was time to go home and see what his family thought of his latest "minor advancement" during his week-long training trip. He had a feeling that explaining his new capabilities was going to be interesting.