17 Chapter 17

The soul power was like the soldiers while the willpower is the general. Only those who have strong willpower can effectively use their soul power. There were treasures and manuals in the world that can make one's soul stronger but willpower is different! There are no shortcuts for it

Only the person itself can make their willpower stronger and they mostly need to experience a lot of hardships and pain. The pain from the will inside the dungeon core slamming on Calter's soul was itself a willpower training!

As long as he can survive, not only will his soul power improved but it will also be the same for his willpower. Naturally, he first needs to survive, if Calter can't defend his soul from the powerful will it would make his soul to crumble and he will die

Fortunately, this was just the second Dungeon Core and he can absorb it without a problem. Even the third one won't be able to kill him. But to the 4th and up cores as long as he didn't advance in rank there would be some dangers

Calter successfully defended his soul and the Dungeon Core dissipated into colorful lights that entered inside him through his forehead. The lights were absorbed by his core and soul

The shocking thing was some mysterious engravings appeared on Calter's Core. It was filled with the wonders of Magic and even though Calter was a former Level 3 Magician he still needs a bit of time to understand it

The engravings were very faint and not yet complete though. Seeing this, Calter decided to absorb another Dungeon Core to see what effects it will have

A new Dungeon Core appeared on his hand and the same process was repeated. His mana battled the mana inside the core while his will and the will inside the core clashed

This time, even though the core was of the same quality than the first one he absorbs today but the will attack was actually two times that of the first one!

It's like the pain he need to withstand was the combination of the two cores he absorbed. Still, he easily withstood the pain and the engravings on his core became more visible and a bit more mysterious

No doubt that if he absorbed a lot of Dungeon Cores it will make the engravings complete and filled with a lot of wonders of Magic

As Calter was confident on his willpower he decided to absorb another one. Adding the core, he absorbed to become a Core Magician, this would be the fourth core. It exceeded his current level by one and the dangers will start from here

The powerful will slammed on his soul causing him to feel a lot of pain, thankfully this was still within his pain tolerance. Just like before, another unit of pain was added to the previous one and combined to give his soul more pain!

He currently has to withstand four units of pain and even with his strong willpower it will take a bit of effort on his part. The fourth core was absorbed successfully and he decided to absorb one last Dungeon Core for safety

He can absorb more than five but pass that level would be a really dangerous move of his. Calter was not afraid of death and his willpower was like an immovable mountain however, he can't risk his life too much for now. Kence was still weak, even if he became the City Lord's disciple, he still won't be entirely safe

The Soaring Magic City Lord is powerful but even in just the Enchanted Star Realm there were still people a lot more powerful than him. There's also the Rank 4 Magician that will descend ten years from now. As long as Kence's well-being still wasn't secured Calter can't let himself die!

The five units of pain slammed on Calter's soul. His physical body trembled from pain and beads of sweat covered his whole body. He gritted his teeth hard and endure the pain. It felt like days for him but in reality, it was only a few seconds

After absorbing the 5th core, Calter opened his eyes and breathed heavily. Fortunately, as long as he can endure even if his soul was badly damage it would still heal instantly

If other Magicians knew this, they would surely tear him to shreds. A damage soul was extremely hard to heal! The fastest time can be days or weeks but the severe damage would take years! This is too much of cheat!

The engravings become more visible after absorbing 5 Dungeon Cores in total but it was still extremely faint. Even then, it has a lot of benefits to Calter

As the highest level of power in the realm was only Rank 3 Magician, their foundations would naturally be weak. Calter was pleasantly surprise that although he can only study the basics of Magic through the engravings but this basic was much higher than what Enchanted Star Realm has!

Even he, doesn't have this much in-depth basic knowledge about Magic. Others say that to build a skyscraper one must first build a sturdy foundation. If you want to become a powerful Magician the sturdier your basic is the easier your path would be!

All of the Calter's cells were jumping from excitement and he close his eyes to immerse himself in studying Magic Theories. As long as he controlled his mind to enter the engravings, countless knowledge would be presented to him. Of course, this was pure knowledge. It doesn't mean that he understood it

Mana... what is mana? Mana is omnipresent in this world. Even non-living things like stones has mana on it

Soul... what is soul? It was the being's core and one of the mysterious things in the world. Through soul one can control mana

Body... what is the body? A body is the vessel for the soul. The stronger it is the more mana it can store

These are just basic things that even Calter knew but the knowledge from the engravings discussed all of these things in a more profound way. It also explained other things but even Calter can't easily comprehend them

"So... it should be like this"

"I was wrong before! This is the correct way!"

"Mana can be use in this way?"

Lots of questions that Calter has before was answered but the more he understands the more questions he has. He forgot time and was absorb by the vast amount of knowledge

Too bad, at certain points the engravings stopped giving more information. If he wants to gain more, he needs to absorb more Dungeon Cores. But for now, he doesn't plan to absorb another core, just the present knowledge he has will occupy a lot of his time to fully understand

It was already nighttime when Calter opened his eyes and he sighed. "I thought that since I'm a Rank 3 Magician in my past life, I don't need to spend time in Magic Theories and only need to absorb mana to advance. Who would have thought that even just the most basics of Magic I'm still severely lacking" this discovery made Calter to be feel down

Absorbing mana to advance in Rank was already ten times harder for him but now he also needs to use his time to learn Magic. He only has ten years of time, if he didn't become a powerful Rank 4 Magician at that time then how can he fight back?

"If only I have endless amount of Dungeon Cores. I might not be able to absorb more but I can let my core devour it!"

Absorbing and Devouring Dungeon Cores are different. Absorbing the core was the best way if he wants to reach higher heights. He can't break through in Rank if his core was not powerful enough. Absorbing 1 core per level was not enough, naturally the absorption was the best way but if he can't absorb more, he can only devour Dungeon Cores

His own core treated Dungeon Cores as food and although it won't make his willpower more powerful but it can make his core sturdier and even nourish his soul

There's no risk in devouring and it only needs some time. But it takes more than 1 core to have a significant effect. Even the lowest kind of Dungeon Cores that Calter is using was already 200 Magic Crystals per piece

If he absorb ten then that's already 2,000 Magic Crystals! As of now as he is a Level 3 Magic Apprentice, he can devour 3 Cores a day. That's 600 Magic Crystals per day!

In ten days that's 6,000

In one month that's 18,000

If he become a Magic Warrior he would need higher level Dungeon Cores that's even more expensive!

"The cost of this path is too expensive, I need to have a constant income" Calter frowned as he racked his brain for ideas. If he learned how to make potions before then this would be easier, too bad he wasn't a Potion Master

"If I don't have enough money instead of giving me benefits being a Core Magician would just hinder my path" Calter's frown deepened. This path may gave him more power but the cost was not something his small Nobility Clan can support

If he became a Rank 3 Magician, even if the City Lord wants to, he might not be able to support Calter's expenses

"Money... money... one simple word but you hold a great importance in my growth" Calter muttered to himself

He can try hunting Magic Beast and sell the materials but it will take too much of his time and might still not be able to support his expenses

"I still have a lot of money now but in the future, this won't be enough"

He has 100,000 from the City Lord

20,000 from Kalli and

10,000 from his Clan

He only has 130,000 as of now. This is too little than the cash he required

"Wait..." Calter's eyes lit up as he remembered something. The engravings has a lot of basic magic knowledge but a large part of it was actually about Summoning Magic

He doesn't know why but the path of Core Magicians seems to be pushing him to become a summoner. When he think of it he realized that it's really suitable for him

Summoning Magic is hard to learn but with the engravings it will become easy for him

Summoning Magic required a lot of mana and a Magician summoning a creature at his level only has a bit of mana left for other spells but he was different!

He can summon more than ten times than a normal Magician or summon a higher-level creature than him!

A level 3 Magic Beast would sell around 50 Magic Crystal. It might seem a lot but it required a group of at least three Magician at the same level to defeat or kill one

With his summons he's like a ten Magician himself. It seems like he can actually make money by hunting Magic Beast. There's no problem of having too low Magic Beast in this world, in fact it was the opposite

There were too many Magic Beast outside the human cities! Humans and the Magic Beast are the two overlords in the realm as they have the greatest number of absolute fighters and population

He might even be able to obtain almost a thousand Magic Crystal in a day if he hunts Level 3 Magic Beast. If he hunts Level 4 ones then it would even be better!

Plus, this can hone his current body. He may have skills but his body was still not used to it. His mind will react faster but his body won't be able to move as fast as his mind

This is a win-win situation for him!

Knock knock

Calter's train of thought was interrupted with the knocking sounds. This immediately made him annoyed. He walked towards the special room's door and opened it ready to scold whoever interrupted him but his words were struck on his throat when he saw who it was

Standing in the other side of the door was Kence with a very dissatisfied look. It was already dark outside, meaning he trained until night time

Kence's face was devoid of his usual happy and joyful look and it was replaced by a not so good one

"Uh-oh" Calter gulped, this is a huge trouble!