After locking the door, Luke made a small mark on the wall to keep track of the days he spent inside the room.
He then picked up a dry food ball, shaped like a small sphere, and popped it into his mouth, crunching it until his hunger faded.
In his mind, he thought, "This food isn't bad… actually, it's pretty good. But how many years can I eat just this? Sigh..."
Afterward, he looked at the manual again and began to carefully reread it.
"It's never a waste to double-check," he told himself.
"This process is tied to my life and the foundation of my future."
According to the book, the first step was to reshape the soul—transforming it from an uneven sphere into a proper, smooth one capable of holding more Qi.
Luke sat down on the black stage and began to focus through meditation.
he started to see and sense the Qi more clearly.
Gradually, he directed his Qi sense toward his brain, searching carefully for several minutes until he located a small dot.
This dot, described as the soul in a physical sense, appeared tiny at first—but in truth, it was vast and profound.
Focusing all his attention on it, Luke examined the initial form of his soul before refinement.
It looked like a stone sphere, rough and slightly mangled in certain parts.
He began to use a mantra mentioned in the manual to move the Qi within the soul, all while carefully sensing the effects the Qi had as it followed the mantra.
At first, the Qi moved chaotically inside the soul, with no deliberate pattern.
But Luke persisted.
After a while, he noticed that the Qi began to form a pattern—it struck certain areas of the soul's wall that were weaker than others.
That's when Luke realized the true purpose of the mantra: to identify weak points in the soul and exploit them, breaking the soul down and then using the cultivator's will to reconstruct it.
Thanks to this discovery, Luke no longer needed to rely on the inefficient mantra.
With his ability to see Qi clearly after reaching the Body Refining Realm, he could control its movement precisely.
Now, he simply needed to guide the Qi and drill through the weak spots simultaneously—minimizing life force loss and ensuring a safer deconstruction process.
So he stopped chanting the mantra and began controlling the Qi particles, shaping them like drills and targeting multiple weak spots.
Within a few seconds, he started to feel a sensation similar to multiple needles piercing his body.
However, the pain wasn't overwhelming—especially compared to what he had endured during the Body Refining Realm breakthrough without using an elixir.
His soul shattered cleanly, and the very next moment, he used his will to mold it again in a more efficient form.
It took him about an hour to finish reshaping the soul into a sphere—only slightly better than before, but a clear improvement nonetheless.
After a few minutes of rest, doing nothing, he muttered in his mind, "This is enough for today. I could continue, but if I run out of stamina in the middle of the process, it could become dangerous."
After completing the first iteration of soul refinement, he could now sense his soul easily without needing to meditate.
He could even see Qi particles without having to focus much.
He thought, "If just one refinement improved my ability this much, what would happen if I refined it a hundred times?"
With that excitement bubbling inside him, he began to actively absorb Qi from the surroundings to replenish his Qi reserves, which had dwindled after the refinement.
Later, satisfied with his progress, he went to bed and slept soundly.