Keith looked at her with and unreadable expression on his face. He breathed out a sigh before he started explaining.
"Before we start comparing the two energies we must first know about where these energies originate from. I'll start with explaining what is soul essence," he said as he looked at Natasha to see if she was listening.
"Soul essence is an abundant energy that exists in any and every universe. This energy can only be manipulated by awakeners who tread on the soul path. Soul fighters channel this energy into their soul cores in order to use their talents. Since you already know that description, I will tell you where soul essence come from. When people and soul beasts die their soul exits their body.
Before the soul goes to heaven or hell there are sent to the soul realm which is the place where you go when entering soul rift," he said.
"What is the soul realm and how are they connected to soul rifts and soul essence?" she asked with a bit curiosity in her voice.
"I was about to get to that until you interrupted me," Keith said, a bit irritated from her sudden interruption.
He glared at her for a while and added:
"As your punishment, you'll have to hunt down fifty-five soul beasts"
Natasha's face paled but Keith knew she was pretending so as to trick him to reconsider the punishment. Natasha had tried this on multiple occasions but it never worked.
"The soul realm was created by a being beyond mortal comprehension. I can't say the being's name or I'll will perish. Legends says this being was responsible for the creation of soul essence. Now when this being created the soul realm, another being who was more powerful than him proposed an idea. The idea was to create soul rifts serving as portal bridging the mortal realm and the soul realm. The first use of the soul realm was to remove energy from dead souls and that energy is known as soul essence or death energy. The second use for the soul realm is to increase the strength of mortal beings"
"Why is soul essence called death energy?"
"When the first mortal awakened soul essence he called it death energy since the energy had the subtle by undeniable scent of death but over time people ended up calling soul essence since it increases the strength of the soul," he answered
"I think I understand now. So, the soul realm is a place we enter through soul rifts and the person who created the soul realm intended for it to be used only from removing a certain energy from souls," she said.
"Yes"
"I want to ask why did that other being want mortals to grow stronger? I thought beings like that would rather keep their power to themselves," she asked.
"Great question. The reason he proposed that idea was many other beings just like him would find their next successor very easily," he answered. Of course, was talking about Celestial but he chose not to disclose the Celestials' names since knowing their names would kill Natasha.
"That makes total sense if you put it that way," she said with a look of understanding. Suddenly a question popped up in her head. She asked, "Wait how do you know about these beings?"
"I'll answer that question when you are peak Soul Sovereign," he said in a serious tone.
"You are joking right," she said as she looked at him as if she had seen a ghost.
"No, I'm dead serious," he answered. The seven known ranks on the soul path namely: Soul soldier, supreme soul soldier, soul knight, soul warrior, soul emperor, soul saint and soul sovereign. Being a soul sovereign was basically impossible especially for someone like her would have red soul circuits and even if she had black or white soul circuit reaching that rank would take about thousands or even millions of years. She started wondering what type of secret was he keeping that he was only obliged to tell her if she was a soul sovereign.
"You do know that is impossible for me since I have red soul circuits"
"Don't worry, I know an alchemist that can help you with that," Keith said. "Now let's talk about spiritual energy. Spiritual energy is also known as life force energy was discovered by a man who couldn't use soul essence. Due to that he was always bullied from a young age and people treated him like trash…No even trash was treated better than he was. One day, he stumbled upon an ancient scroll that taught him how to absorb a different type of energy which he called life force energy before calling it spiritual energy later on. The reason he called it life force energy was because it allowed him to absorb the life force of other creatures and increase his own life force energy"
"So, the main difference is that soul essence originates from dead souls whilst spiritual energy is extracted from the life force of living beings," Natasha said with a look of understanding on her face.
"Yes," Keith answered.
"Thank you for telling me this invaluable information Master Keith," she said as she bowed.
"You're welcome. But there is one thing you must do before you go hunting…"
"What is it master?"
"You must swear on your soul core that you won't disclose this information without my permission," he said. As she heard those words she froze. Swearing on your soul core is like the equivalent on your life for a soul fighter. Natasha wasn't planning on disclosing this information but now because of Keith's statement she started to wonder why she mustn't disclose this information.
"Why must I not disclose this information to anyone?" she asked.
"If the government knows that we know of this information, they'll silence us for good and will kill all of our loved ones in the process," he said flatly without a trace of fear in his voice. Natasha's body shuddered after hearing Keith's words.
The fact that Keith disclosed this information meant that he trusted her so she decided that she would be a trustworthy ally that Keith can rely on.
"I Natasha FlameRoar swear that I shall never disclose this information and if I ever disclose this information Master Keith would destroy my soul core," she said and tattoo which resembled a lotus flower appeared on her hand and it disappeared moments later as if it had never existed in the first place.