Upgrade

In the last three months, Krios was able to establish a routine of going to his classes, training, and recuperating. He had been training daily inside his private training room inside building seven.

At some point, he was allowed by the headmistress to bring Loras there with him and they have both shown great progress.

"This place is great!" Loras said the first time he was brought by Krios to his Private training room.

"I've really hit the jackpot being friends with you." Loras added jokingly and they both laughed.

After that, they have constantly and consistently trained together inside the training room. They sometimes sparred with each other testing out their battle arts and skills.

Even on weekends like this one, when they were supposed to enjoy their time, they decided to train and improve themselves.

"By the way, How is that battle art you have been trying to create going for you?" He asked.

Krios had been developing his own battle art over the last couple of months. He realized that most of his battle arts did not fully utilize his insane mana output, which is why he was trying to create something that only he can do.

"It's going well, it's barely useable yet but that's to be expected." Krios answered.

The battle art he was trying to create incorporated the fundamental aspects of mana manipulation, his flame element, and a little bit from the light art he bought a few months back at the Lightbane sect.

Krios has also made strides with his understanding of chaos energy. Slowly but surely practicing its integration to his battle arts causing them to explode in power and lethality. But he has not used it in class sparrings yet so as not to draw any attention. It was too dangerous as it multiplied the explosiveness of his battle arts.

They continued training when all of a sudden, Krios felt the familiar tugging sensation his makes when he is at the cusp of breaking through to the next realm.

In the past three months, Krios maintained his early Mana Compression cultivation and has pushed aside breaking through as he had already broken through multiple minor realms and one major realm in just a span of a month. He was afraid that breaking through successively in just a short period of time would cause irreparable damage to his mana core due to exessive stress.

'I guess its time.'

Krios chose a corner and sat in a meditative position. Loras noticed the silence and found Krios in a meditative state.

'Is he breaking through right now?' He remained quiet so as to give Krios his peace.

This time, intead of five mana compression cycles, Krios needs ten to move on to the next minor realm.

Krios remained steady and consistent with his pace, cruising through the first five mana compression cycles in under six hours.

'He truly is a monster. His pace is impeccable.' Loras thought to himself.

A couple more hours passed and krios went past the eighth mana compression cycle. Loras could not believe how fast Krios was going through this process. A normal cultivator would have taken almost two days to finish this process but Krios was already in his ninth cycle and it has only been eleven hours.

'Truly monstrous. I can't believe I have become friends with someone as talented as him.'

On the seventeenth hour, Krios' eyes snapped open and a resounding boom echoed from his mana core followed by a tiny ripple of mana flowing out of him.

"It's done." He mumbled. He inspected his mana core and found out that his mana has now been compressed even more. From looking like a fog during the morning, it now looked as thick as a puffy cloud in the sky.

Now that his mana is compress even more, he can now absorb more mana inside his core. This also meant that his mana output has now increased significantly.

"Congratulations! You've now caught up to me!" Loras clapped as he walke towards Krios.

Loras has broken through to the mid Mana Compression realm two months ago, but he was in the early Mana compression realm for half a year, which was already considered an above normal pace.

"I'm starving." Krios answered. Although cultivators don't need to eat as often, they also felt hunger from time to time.

"Let's go and have some food before we go back to the dorm. I'm also hungry as I stayed here with you from start to finish."

Together, they exited the training room and went to their dorm mess hall to eat.

The next couple of days were spent on adjusting to his new strength. He cintinued with his routine and was making incredible progress with his mastery over his battle, movement, and defensive arts.

"Are you excited for today?" Loras asked him.

"Not really, but I am looking forward to facing strong mana beasts to test out my strength." He answered.

Today, they were going to the forest behind the academy to train as a class. They are to be dropped off in random locations in the middle of the forest, and have to navigate their way back to the academy as fast as they can. The fastest pair to navigate their way back would receive a special prize from their professor.

"Yeah, me too. I hope to get my hand on some valuable mana beast cores." Loras said excitedly.

Mana beast cores are extremely valuable as they have a plethora of uses. They can be used as a core for weapons, or their mana can be absorbed to help strengthen one's own mana. They can also be sold and can fetch a hefty sum depending on the quality and the state of the mana core.

They all lined up in pairs on a short-range teleportation formation.

"Are you all ready?" Their professor asked them.

"Yes professor." All forty pairs from class two answered in unison.

"Again, may I remind you the fights are allowed, but same as the tournament rules, no killing or heavily injuring one another."

They all nodded and the professor pressed his han on a button and the teleportation formation lit up and buzzed with power. Then, they all vanished into thin air.

All forty pairs were teleported into random locations, with an equal distance from each other. Krios and Loras were transported in the middle of a clearing.

"Do you know where the direction of the academy is?" Krios asked.

Loras closed his eyes and connected with the ambiant wind mana in the environment.

"There." He pointed out to the left of them then they immediately made a run for it.

The forest suddenly started buzzing with activity as everyone else also made their way towards the direction of the academy.

Krios and Loras were on a sprint when Krios suddenly stopped and grabbed Loras by the arm.

"What's wrong?" Loras asked in confusion but Krios just shushed him and pointed towards something.

Loras looke at the direction where Krios was pointing at and his eyes widened. A few meters in front of them slept an enormous infernal tiger. At its side was a plant bearing glowing golden fruits.

"A golden mana fruit!" Loras exclaimed silently.

"Yes, but that infernal tiger is Mid Reconvergence realm already." Krios said.

"We don't have a chance against it, we better leave it alone before it spots us." Loras started walking away but Krios stopped him.

"No, We can take him. I'll try to distract it while you use your wind arts to steal as much fruit as you can."

"That's an insane plan! You'll die fighting that thing." Loras protested.

"Trust me on this okay?"

"I trust you okay? But this is just suicidal!" Loras argued.

"Look, I'm not crazy nor is this blind arrogance. Just trust me. On my signal, you move at your fastest and snatch as much fruit as you can."

"Okay fine. But when things turn south, you and I are out of here."

Krios only nodded and started running towards the opposite side. Both he and Loras concead their mana as much as possible hoping that the infernal tiger would not noctice them. He knew he can't win in an extended fight so he plans to overwhelm the infernal tiger fast.

On a safe distance He conjured a fireball on his hand, then the fireball grew and grew until it as triple its normal size.

'Blazing steps!' He used his movements arts and he blasted off like a rocket in the direction of the infernal tiger.

Moments before his fireball made contact, the infernal tiger snapped its eyes wide open and roared loudly with flame of its own coming out of its mouth.

A calamitous explosion followed suit and Krios was thrown a couple of meters back. The infernal tiger did not give him a chance to breathe as it immediately ran towards Krios' direction, its speed disproportionate to its size.

Krios' spear appeared on his right hand and he tarted away from the infernal tiger which was barreling towards his initial position.

Loras was watching everything unfold while waiting for Krios' signal. He feeling nervous, and he was also fearing for the safety of his friend. But he reminded himself to trust in Krios as he also knew how strong his friend was.

"Blazing steps!" Krios activated his movement arts once more as the Infernal tiger almost caught up to him. It was following closely behind him, moving faster than Krios anticipated.

They were running around playing a game of tag. The tiger was now around fifty meters away from the tree it was guarding and Krios noticed this.

"Loras, Now!" He shouted, then Loras sprung to action.