I Am A Notorious Hidden Boss In The Alternate World

Bringing up the possibility of blocked pores, Albion's eyes flashed with a quick look and found out all of Fenriri's pores were blocked. 

"Oh, it seems all your pores are blocked. If it's like this, then you won't be able to absorb spiritual energy through them—for now anyway," Albion nonchalantly stated without concern.

"Does Master have a way to unblock them? How much faster can Fenriri absorb spiritual energy if the pores are unblocked?" Fenriri inquired curiously.

"I naturally have a method to unblock your pores," Albion stated confidently with a nod before saying, "Depending on your proficiency, increasing your absorption rate by a hundredfold or higher is not out of the question."

"A H-Hundrefold?!" Fenriri's eyes gradually widened in shock.

"Of course, even if you are terrible at absorbing through your unblocked pores, your absorption rate would still increase by tenfold at the very least," Albion casually added.

Generally, there are only two main reasons for blocked pores.

The first reason was being in possession of a unique physique with such inherent disability, which in itself was a rare case.

The second reason is unhygienic practices, not washing and cleaning oneself regularly, allowing impurities to build up and block one's pores.

Looking at Fenriri, her case was certainly not due to the first reason.

"Your pores have been completely blocked by impurities. Even if you do not wash regularly, impurities should have accumulated and blocked your pores to such a degree."

"Eh—?" Fenriri immediately exclaimed before she said, "That's not right, Master! Fenriri is not dirty! Fenriri cleans herself regularly!"

"And how exactly have you been cleaning yourself?" Albion asked.

"How…? Our world is so cold that it is hard to have any form of running water at all. So we can only eat ice to stay hydrated and clean ourselves like this," Fenriri proceeded with a short demonstration by licking the back of her hand.

Albion's lips quickly twitched. 

"Your entire tribe clean yourself like that…? How are you supposed to clean your entire body like that… You know what? I don't even want to know." 

Albion shook head speechlessly.

Shortly after, Albion gave Fenriri a stern look, cause her to stand up straight obediently while her heart began to pound nervously for some reason. 

"It seems like I will have to make you take a bath if we want to expel all the impurities in your body effectively," Albion stated with narrowed eyes.

"A bath…? What's a bath, Master?" Fenriri did not know what a bath was, but she had a vague idea while feeling even more nervous.

"You'll find out soon enough," Albion stated impassively. 

Shortly after, Albion found a spot slightly deeper inside the cave before a beautiful black sword flashed into his grasp. 

He immediately hacked the ground and easily cut out the hard earth like running a hot knife through butter with uncanny sharpness.

"Ha, what a good sword. Definitely great for digging a hole," Albion praised the sword. 

If the Dark Emperor knew that his prized weapon, a Grade-6 Obsidian Sword, was used for digging holes, he would have turned over in his grave—not that he had one, though.

A few moments later, a large bowl-shaped hole was quickly dug out of the ground before Albion used Empyrean's Decree to fill it up with snow from outside the cave.

Albion's Ashura Flames was shortly used to melt the snow, and before long, the melted snow quickly reached a boiling temperature as Fenriri saw it bubbling with surprise. 

Shortly after, Albion began pulling out several spirit herbs from his Ashura Ring and extracted all the herbal essence out of them with Ashura Flames before tossing them all into the boiling water like he was adding seasonings and spices to a big cooking pot.

After the preparations were completed, Albion immediately turned to Fenriri and ordered, "Get in."

"You want me to get inside of that, Master?" Fenriri gazed at the boiling pool of multi-colored water and felt a subtle chill before she hesitated, "But Master, the water is boiling hot… I don't know if I can—Ahh!"

"No buts," Albion stated after giving Fenriri a sudden kick in the back.

Splash!

Fenriri fell into the boiling bath with a big splash before she quickly cried, "Hot, hot, hot! It's so hot, Master! Fenriri is getting cooked! Nooo! Fenriri doesn't want to become wolf stew!"

As Fenriri wailed in panic and horror, she soon realized that the boiling water was quickly brought down to a not-so-hot temperature that she could tolerate within moments.

Her resistance quickly died down, and soon, she began playing around with the warm water while feeling an inexplicable sense of comfort and relaxation despite having her clothes completely soaked.

"This… This is kind of nice, Master…" Fenriri floated on her back lazily with a look of bliss before she muttered, "So this is what a bath is like…"

At the same time, the mixture of herbal essence soon began working its magic as it was shortly absorbed into Fenriri's body before black grimy substances were expelled from her pores.

"Ahh! What are these things?!" Fenriri gave a startled cry at the discovery. 

"Those are the impurities hidden inside your pores," Albion calmly explained before he asked with an amused smile, "Do you still think you were clean?" 

"Fenriri is in disbelief! How can there be so many impurities?!" Fenriri's eyes gradually widened in disbelief as more and more impurities were expelled from her body, turning the bathwater grey and foul.

Even her sensitive nose began to twitch due to the foul smell coming from the murky water. 

Fifteen minutes later, Albion shortly took out a towel and new clothes he found in the Ashura Ring and placed them on the ground beside the bath for Fenriri.

"Get changed after you're done."

Albion left those words with an impassive expression before leaving the cave and gazed into the distant thick blizzard of ice and snow with Eyes of Ashura, hoping to find some more spirits herbs.

A few moments quickly passed before Fenriri walked out of the cave in her new yet oversized clothes while glowing like a holy object—or rather, she was like a newborn butterfly that just shed its cocoon.