Chapter 17

After one month,

Taking a deep breath, Cain rose from his meditation. It had been one month since he joined Shadowgrave Academy.

During this time, he attended many lectures on topics like the Basic Wizarding Language (Elbef), Basics of Shadow Spells, and the basics of flesh and blood modification. Despite its notoriety compared to subjects like alchemy or potion-making, Cain still chose flesh and blood modification.

Cain found himself increasingly drawn to flesh and blood modification, even though he had not previously been interested in things like gore or body modification. He assumed this was due to the awakening of his darkness attributes.

"Haaah, now I've embedded all the runes in my mental space, and the only condition left to promote to first-rank wizard apprentice is a Spiritual Energy of 15 or above," Cain muttered to himself.

'Status'

[

NAME: CAIN RAVENCLAW

RANK: ORDINARY HUMAN

SPIRITUAL ENERGY: 14.8

MANA: 0

PHYSICAL: 13 (A NORMAL HUMAN HAS A VALUE OF 1)

MEDITATION: DARK ABYSS MEDITATION METHOD

SPELL: NONE

COOLDOWN: 1 month and 5 days

]

Looking at his Spiritual Energy, Cain was certain he could be promoted to a first-rank wizard apprentice if he meditated for a whole night, thanks to his 4-star talent and advanced meditation method.

After visiting the library and reading many books to enhance his knowledge, Cain learned that meditation methods were divided into two categories: Basic and Advanced. Advanced meditation was known for its faster speed in improving spiritual energy and providing bonuses in spellcasting. Some high-level advanced meditation methods even included innate spells.

After refreshing himself for a while, Cain sat cross-legged on his bed to practice the Dark Abyss Meditation Method. Meditation techniques can replace the need for sleep, so most wizards meditate instead of sleeping.

After a night of meditation, Cain felt himself getting closer to becoming a wizard apprentice. Eventually, he sensed a peculiar feeling in his head, indicating that his Spiritual Energy had surpassed 15.

Suddenly, he felt immense pain emanating from his body and mental space, causing him to bite his lip to endure the uncontrollable pain.

Fortunately, the pain subsided after about 15 seconds. Although Cain knew that becoming a wizard apprentice would be painful as the body needed to adapt to holding mana, the intensity was still overwhelming.

Cleaning the blood from his lips and the sweat from his face, he took a deep breath to steady his erratic heartbeat.

'Status'

[

NAME: CAIN RAVENCLAW

RANK: WIZARD APPRENTICE (1ST RANK)

SPIRITUAL ENERGY: 17.6

MANA: 176

PHYSICAL: 21

MEDITATION: DARK ABYSS MEDITATION METHOD

SPELL: NONE

INNATE SKILL : DISGUISE , ABSOLUTE FOCUS.

COOLDOWN: 1 month and 4 days

]

Seeing "Wizard Apprentice" in his rank column brought a smile to Cain's face. He noticed that his Spiritual Energy and physical power had significantly increased. He now understood why even newly promoted first-rank wizard apprentices were feared by knights, as they possessed the strength of a Great Knight.

Feeling a type of power within his soul, Cain accessed it and a dark wisp-like energy condensed on his raised hand.

"So this is mana," Cain muttered excitedly, realizing that comparing his mana to a knight's life force was like comparing a fly to a dragon.

While life force seemed like a piece of energy that could multiply one's strength, mana felt like a living energy that could adapt to its user's needs.

But as he knew, most of the mana produced by wizard apprentices was colorless, so it might have been his advanced cultivation technique that made his mana dark-colored. Therefore, he used his disguise skill to make it look like the colorless mana common among wizard apprentices.

As he pondered more about it, a terrifying feeling enveloped him. He realized it was coming from Zyrk in his shadow. Fortunately, Cain had used his skill to hide Zyrk's aura from others.

As Zyrk emerged from the shadow, Cain felt an even more terrifying presence than that of Wizard Bach during his time on the ship. Checking Zyrk's status, Cain saw significant changes.

[

Name: Zyrk

Species: X_{¥=!;✓©}€{_(";$

Fighting Power: First Order Wizard (Realm of the Contractor +1).

Skills: Shapeshifting, Shadow Manipulation (medium), Shadow Hunting, Mimicry, Multi-Element Resistance (except Holy and Fire), Fear Manipulation, Immortality, Madness Inducement

]

Cain knew this was due to Zyrk's promotion to the Official Wizard level, as Zyrk would always be one level ahead of him. If other wizards knew about this, they would be incredibly jealous, as many had suffered and nearly died from various dangers to achieve such a promotion.

This power to promote Zyrk effortlessly made Cain even more aware of how much power Ruit has hidden in him.

Checking Zyrk's skills, he found no changes except that Shadow Manipulation had advanced from basic to medium level, and a new skill, Madness Inducement, had been added.

[MADNESS INDUCEMENT: THIS SKILL INSTALLS MADNESS INTO THE MIND AND SOUL OF THE TARGET, INCREASING OVER TIME. APPLICABLE TO THOSE WITH LESS OR EQUAL STRENGTH THAN THE USER, AND HAS LITTLE EFFECT ON STRONGER ENEMIES.]

The skill was similar to Fear Manipulation, but it induced madness instead of fear.

As Cain pondered more about it, Ruit emerged from his hand, and a new skill entered Cain's mind. This skill was called "ABSOLUTE RATIONALITY" and allowed him to remove unnecessary emotions, making his learning efficiency and situation handling almost machine-like in precision.

Cain was pleased to gain this skill, knowing it would be helpful during important processes like experiments, fights, and spell learning.

Now as he was promoted to wizard apprentice, he was ready to go to the building he had visited with Oron the first time he came here to get resources for getting promoted to a first tier Wizard apprentice.

Now that he had been promoted to wizard apprentice, he was ready to visit the resource hall to obtain resources mentioned by both Wizard Cyrus as well as Oron on becoming a first-tier wizard apprentice. It was the first building he had visited upon arriving at the academy to get Shadowless Meditation as well as five mana stones.

After getting ready, he put Zyrk on his shoulder and headed towards the resource hall.