First Spell

Sylas made it his goal to learn at least one spell before he left for the next city. This would at least ensure his safety to some degree, as otherwise he would be easy prey for even the weakest of predators.

Fortunately, his Void Scripture contained several beginner-friendly spells with relatively simple runes and low requirements for the amount of mana to be used.

After going through a few of them, he chose one called 'Destructive Void Orb'. It focused on the destructive properties of the Void element, making it perfect for something he had in mind. It was also one of the simplest, as it had no complex shape or attack pattern.

To cast a spell, one would first have to draw several runes into the air in front of them with the help of mana. Depending on the spell, the number and complexity of these runes could vary greatly. The Void Orb, for example, required only 10 relatively simple runes.

But even this first step proved to be very difficult, as Sylas struggled to paint the runes perfectly. Even the slightest difference in their appearance would change the entire spell. It took him about 20 minutes to draw the first rune without any major mistakes, and another 20 until he could display all of them. Individually, that is.

It took him another two hours to draw all ten runes at once. In between, he had to take regular breaks, as the process was extremely demanding on his mind and required his full attention.

When Sylas was finished with all ten runes at once, he could finally begin the second step.

To do so, he had to channel the mana in his body through specific pathways and then into each individual rune. This wasn't as easy as one might think, since he had to perfectly divide the energy into ten equal strands, each of which was connected to a rune floating in the air.

After another hour, he finally succeeded. By this time, he was drenched in sweat and his stomach was growling again, but he cast his first spell.

The moment the energy entered the runes perfectly, a ball of gray gas began to form in the middle of the runes. At first, it was only the size of a ping pong ball, but it grew until it was the size of a watermelon.

At that moment, it stopped to grow as its power supply was cut off. Sylas screamed with joy as he finally finished casting his first spell. His joy quickly turned to dread though as he realized that the ball of Void attribute mana was still hovering in front of him.

Once a spell had been cast, it was extremely difficult to keep it stable, which was why it was generally recommended to use it immediately. The reason for this could be seen in front of Sylas as the ball began to destabilize and the air began to crack.

"Shit!" Boom!

A huge explosion went off just a few meters in front of Sylas, as he had managed to throw the ball out just moments before it exploded. As the spell destabilized instead of doing its job, it simply released all of its stored energy at once, causing cracks to appear in the ground below.

It seems that energy alone doesn't do the same damage as a real spell. But that is to be expected, otherwise no one would bother with spells.

Still motivated, Sylas immediately started his second attempt. The familiar runes began to form in front of him for what felt like the thousandth time before the gray mass of gaseous energy appeared in front of him again.

Concentrating more on the spell than his success, Sylas noticed something shocking. The energy was continuously destroying the air and everything around it without much effort. This caused the sight around him to become strangely distorted as it even swallowed light. It was almost like a miniature black hole.

Suddenly, Sylas focused on the task at hand, not wanting to repeat the mistakes of his previous attempts. He sent the ball towards the nearest tree, and it actually flew out at a surprising speed of about 100 km/h. There was basically no friction as it simply destroyed the air and space in front of it, meaning it didn't slow down at all.

The moment it hit the tree, there was a loud explo... No, there was just silence. At least it was until the tree suddenly started to creak as it slowly fell down.

Thump

The impact of the tree hitting the ground was so powerful that it could be heard throughout the forest. This wasn't just any tree. It was a 50 meter tall tree with a diameter of at least one meter. His spell had just completely destroyed the trunk of such a monster, leaving only a hole behind.

"MUHAHAHAHA." Sylas couldn't help but laugh when he saw what a single spell of his had done to the tree. What science? What technology? In just a hundred years, he would probably reach heights that would have been unimaginable in the past. Magic was the key to true power.

„If my little spell was so effective, I don't want to know what that old mummy in the cave is capable of. Teleporting me out with a wave of her hand. She could probably destroy continents on Earth if she used her full power.''

Seeing the power of his new spell filled Sylas with joy, but he shouldn't get cocky. If he could do this in less than a day of learning magic, imagine what the beast in the forest could do.

Right now, Sylas' attack power was quite strong, but he still had one major shortcoming: his casting speed. It would take him at least 7 seconds to cast all ten runes at the same time, probably even longer if he was in a fight and under pressure.

For now, he needed to reduce that time to at least two seconds while moving and one second while standing still. Otherwise, it would simply be inapplicable in a fight. Imagine a wild lion charging at him, and he had to stand there and wait patiently for his spell to be created.

Luckily, he only needed more practice, since he had already learned the spell. The only thing standing in his way now was time. There was just one tiny little problem. This single spell had cost him about a third of his mana reserves. This meant that after casting three spells in a row, he would have to sit down and recharge his mana, which would take about ten minutes. If he would have otherwise been able to practice his spells about 500 times per hour, he could only do 18 times now.

Therefore, it took him another 10

hours to "perfect" it. However, perfect was used rather loosely here, as he still needed a whole second. With that, he had unknowingly spent a whole day in a completely new world. And all that without an ounce of sleep.

‚It is time to rest now. As far as I can tell, this cave is relatively safe, as I haven't seen any predators yet. I need to be in the best possible state of mind for any future battles that may come my way.'

Sylas finally allowed himself six hours of sleep. Even though he was pressed for time, it would be even more dangerous if he died on the way to the next town because he was in too much of a hurry. The last day had been extremely stressful, so he really needed to relax for a while.

After waking up, the first thing Sylas did was to check his status screen again.

[Name: Sylas Aetherstein]

[Realm: Early Initiate]

[Affinity: Void (Peak Chaos)]

[Techniques: Void Scripture (Peak Chaos)]

[Bloodline: -]

[Abilities: -]

[Special Abilities: Transmigrator's Luck (12:18:55) (Ungraded)]

[Chat]

[Teleport (5:18:55)]

‚Only a little more than twelve days until my first challenge. It is time to leave.'

Theoretically, Sylas could just stay in the cave and train the whole time, but he estimated that he would have a better chance of survival if he entered a city. He might be able to learn something there, and at least there would be some people around. No one would help him in the forest.

There was only one problem: in which direction should he go? If he was unlucky, he might have to walk for days.

After thinking for a minute, he decided that there was no way to really find out, so he just went straight ahead. That was the direction of the cave's entrance, and he also had the feeling that the beasts behind him were much more numerous during the night.

Navigating through the forest was a bit difficult because there wasn't much light due to the tall trees that held a huge amount of leaves.

‚It seems there's less danger here than I thought. I've been walking for an hour without even hearing an animal larger than a rabbit.'

Craaack

Sylas suddenly heard a loud noise to his right before he saw a huge bear charging through the bushes. It was heading straight for him, drooling from its mouth.

‚I jinxed it.'