Northern Light

"My mom is a sage, too?" Jody was caught off guard by this critical fact that Sylvester casually presented.

"Indeed, you fool. Though what your mother demonstrated most recently was her prowess as a great Heaven's Master, she typically uses mana to condense her serenity force," said Sylvester impatiently, as if he were talking to a monkey. In his opinion, only a dumb monkey wouldn't notice the difference between essence and mana, "Pure Saints only use life essence or pure force. They cannot convert their life essence into mana as sages do. Let's not forget when your mother released her combat soul. Well, perhaps you were distracted at that time, but I was there and saw it very clearly."

"Ah! That's right, she does use mana pretty often. In fact, before that day I had never even seen anyone use essence other than Charlotte," Jody was still marveling over how strong his mother and that expert were.

He always remembered the suffocating pressure of Boss Murphy when he had Jody and Sek cornered. Of course, his mother had still cleaned that goon up as if he were terrible air. There was also the time when his mother was teaching him the basics about sages before he even refined his source artifacts. This had already slipped his mind, as it was so long ago.

"Despite this, it is imperative that you increase your stage. At your current stage, we can not help you even if we are summoned. After all, freshmen typically can't even summon their combat souls at all. You must achieve the sophomore rank, at the very least, before the competition next month. If you don't, then what will you amount to at that time?" Sylvester spoke in a shockingly gentle way as he landed on Jody's head. "You must stop underestimating the power of a sage at once! The sage you killed used less than 40% of his true strength to attack you. He simply underestimated you. He didn't even use his heavenly force momentum. This is why he was foolish enough to perish at your fists.

"A true sage would have many spells or curses prepared to murder you where you stand. Do not expect to get so lucky again in the future. Even if you have a little bit of extra muscle compared to most mortals, it means nothing to the truly adept experts. Those who understand the forces of nature can be terrifying."

"Well, if I didn't find a high-grade serenity crystal, I wouldn't get any real training! This should've been our priority every day. You can do this, still, yes?" Jody asked Sylvester.

"Why do you think I led you to the Twilight Sphinx? Did you not see how many crystals were littered on the walls of that cave? You simply won't need any more serenity crystals. Watch and learn, boy," Sylvester floated over to Eureka and spoke to her in an ancient language that seemed to resonate with Jody's soul.

Jody felt strange, almost as if he could almost understand them. But it still escaped him somehow.

Just as the feeling became more intense, Sylvester floated back over to him, saying, "Twilight Sphinxs can corrode mana stones and beast cores containing neon into serenity crystals. Give her a mana stone."

Jody frowned. Mana Stones were stones formed naturally by condensed energies of the world. Higher-grade mana stones even possessed all seven elements. Apart from being helpful to cultivate with, they were often used as currency. One C-grade mana stone was worth 50 gold. That was 50,000 silver! Mana stones were divided into grades by the quality and quantity of the energy inside. Jody only had 10 mid-grade mana stones, the size of fists.

Five were given by his grandpa, two by his father, and three by his mother. His mother had told him that this was his capital to reach the next rank within two months. Yet, this damn wolf wanted him to squander it! Though, admittedly, he hadn't practiced his sage formula at all this month.

There was only one month left.

"If you give the mana stone to the Twilight Sphinx, won't the new serenity crystal still be yours? Are you not in need of higher-quality serenity crystals? Do you believe your task is to find them simply because your mother likes them? Do you even know how valuable serenity crystals are? You bumpkin." Sylvester's harsh way of speaking had suddenly returned. "You have absolutely no need to use mana stones to formulate as long as I'm here. Not to mention you have an origin gem, this is already a cheat item for your level. That's the same as having 10 high-grade mana stones, let alone this crappy mana stone! Where exactly are you losing here?"

"I can't rely on you, or there's bound to be another huge commotion every time I transform origin! You're the biggest problem here!" berated Jody loudly.

Sylvester was actually speechless for the moment. This was true, after all.

"I can't control my abilities properly because you are still too weak. I honestly shouldn't be able to use them at all, like X, who can't even transform properly." Sylvester sighed before continuing, "Our compatibility rating is high, which is why I can sometimes use more of my power. However, if I do so in excess, our rating will drop due to the soul strain."

Hearing this, Jody calmed down a lot. He knew that Sly had to strain his soul every time he assisted because the main soul was currently too weak to endure it. This made Jody somewhat uncomfortable. 'Strength, ah, if only I had more power!'

"Fine." Jody touched his space ring with his right hand, and a single mana stone, the size of a fist, appeared in his hand.

As if fearing he would change his own mind, Jody immediately tossed it to the hovering wolf pup, who caught it in his mouth. Sylvester then landed next to Eureka and briefly spoke to her again in that ancient beast tongue. Eureka put her paw on the mana stone, followed by Sylvester placing his paw on top of hers as he urged his mysterious ability to absorb energy.

Jody had yet to ask about the nature of this ability.

As Sylvester had never elected to tell him alone, Jody knew asking would yield nothing. Besides that, he would eventually find out through his [Cosmos Revolving Grimoire]. As the stone quickly lost its luster, it actually started to crystallize slowly, then mutate and give off a chill. Two minutes later, Eureka had absorbed all the heavenly energies within the stone, which was now an ice-cold purple and gold crystal.

"High-Grade Serenity! This is a Neon Crystal," nodded Sylvester, satisfied with this outcome. He then used his tail to toss the crystal to Jody, who caught it.

[Imp: Tier 0 Neon Fragment detected.]

[Imp: Would the host like to exchange fragments for Neon Stars? Yes/no.]

"This…this is a neon crystal? This thing has at least three times the energy as the serenity crystal in my room! It's not even half the size, though," Jody marveled at the crystal before becoming startled.

'Yes.' Thought Jody as he withdrew and tossed another mana stone from his space ring for Eureka to suck on.

[Imp: Absorbing fragment!]

[Imp: Congratulations! Awarding 10 Neon Stars.]

[Imp: New items are available for purchase!]

Ten neon stars! He stepped past serenity and formed northern lights! Regular ice force to serenity was like comparing a cup of ice cubes to a 10,000-year-old glacier. Comparing a regular ice force to neon force was like comparing a cup of ice to the aurora borealis. They weren't even in the same dimension. These neon stars would be his capital to attack the next stage of Titanic Rage!

However, he quickly calmed down as he felt the voice of fate from his Grimoire.

[Summon Time: Expired. Guardian summons end.]

The grimoire's pages glimmered, and the two princes vanished back into their pages. As he disappeared, Sylvester sent Jody a message via telepathy, "Perhaps...you are right. It is indeed dangerous for you to rely on me at this time. I may have been a touch impatient. Form origin on your own until you advance to the next stage. I will be able to assist you better at that time."

Did Sly just admit he was wrong? Was this a compromise?

This is a first. Two firsts, in fact.

'However, did he say the next Realm? So then, I would first have to rank up and then once more!' Thinking this, Jody also accepted the fact that he was wasting time by not practicing his force arts more diligently.

Eureka suddenly trotted over cutely with a neon crystal in her maw. Jody picked her up and retrieved his investment. This time he didn't convert it.

"Well, I've got a neon crystal, at last. I'll head back to camp early and practice until Mother returns for our training tonight," said Jody, thinking aloud. "Where are we right now, Sek?

"Reporting to the young master, we should head around five hundred meters east if we want to return to camp," said Sek gently, walking out from behind Jody as if she were there the whole time.

"Oh wow, that's not far at all. Mn. Let's go."