The Dark Core

Mr. Kron instructed them to close their eyes and follow the process every step of the way. He first asked them to envision a realm of complete darkness, as if they were sitting in a shadowy cave or a forest with barely any light.

Once the image was vivid in their minds, they were to inhale slowly, taking deep breaths through their nose and exhaling out of their mouth. They needed to eliminate all distractions, all of the noises surrounding them.

'Both of them are quite adept at following instructions. I can see that it hasn't taken them long to tune out even the sounds of the kids training in the background; they are truly only listening to my voice.' Mr. Kron mused. 'If I didn't know better, I would have thought they had both done this before.'

It was a surprise to Kron, especially after witnessing how poorly Raze had performed in the physical activities, but everyone had their strengths and weaknesses.

"The next part is the difficult part. In your mind, the darkness surrounding you, you need to visualize it as energy. Imagine absorbing the darkness in the form of energy inside you. When you breathe in through your nose, all the way down into your body.

"When you exhale, visualize expelling the negative energy from your body."

This was partly why Mr. Kron was touching both of their backs. It was a challenging task to completely do on your own, but he could help their bodies sense the energy easier by trying to control the Qi that everyone had in their body.

Then, when the Qi entered, he would focus on building it in the dantian and ensure it didn't overflow or break. He would continue doing this a few times for them until they could do it themselves.

The cultivation technique, building one's Qi, was the basis of all Pagna martial arts. Although the technique could only take you so far, and in the future, when hitting bottlenecks, one would have to try and rely on absorbing items.

Mr. Kron's eyebrow started to twitch slightly as he noticed something happening. When looking at Safa, everything was flowing smoothly. The energy gathering was substantial, and a solid base was building up in her stomach.

The energy had already stabilized in her body. She was a true talent. Although Mr. Kron wouldn't tell one directly, not at a young age, as words were very effective at stunting one's growth if it got to their head.

Yet, the one that made his eyebrow twitch was Raze. He could feel the energy flowing inside of him, but the impurities in his body weren't coming out.

Not only that, but Mr. Kron could feel no Qi entering his main dantian, located a little under one's belly button.

'I can tell that the energy is going inside him, but is his body absorbing it? If it is, where is it going exactly?'

A phenomenon was occurring right now, and it was something that had never happened in history before; it was perhaps something that even Raze couldn't predict.

As Kron suspected, Raze was using the cultivation technique perfectly. This was because the idea of controlling the energy around him in such a way had many similarities to Mana.

When using this technique, though, the energy wasn't going to his core; instead, it was going to his mana core, his heart.

The Dark essence he was absorbing was increasing his affinity with Dark magic, increasing his Dark attribute.

'This is… what are these techniques? Countless mages tried to research a number of different ways to increase their affinity with a type of magic.

'Due to Dark magic lacking research, there were very few methods, meaning one would have to stick to more conventional methods, using beast crystals from powerful creatures and creating special elixirs from rare herbs, but this, it's almost simple meditation.'

With this, it was increasing Raze's power when using Dark techniques, but it still didn't increase the amount of mana he could control. Both things would need to go hand in hand, so eventually, Raze would hit a bottleneck, but if this was a world of magic, he would be a step ahead of everyone else.

"Alright, you two, remember this feeling well, and we will continue to do this every day from now on." Mr. Kron said.

When the two opened their eyes, they could see that the rest of the students had stopped their basic training and were now sitting in a meditating state, cultivating their powers as well.

"Safa, is it okay if I speak to your brother alone for a bit? If you want, you can join the others and practice what we were just doing, but only do what you can." Mr. Kron said.

Usually, he wouldn't have done such a thing for a student cultivating for the first time, but Safa had perfect control.

"I wanted to speak to you on your own." Mr. Kron said. "I'll be blunt when I say this; I don't think the Dark Essence cultivation technique is for you."

'Not for me, not for me, what does he mean, this is perfect for me! I'm able to make my dark energy stronger just by meditating every day!'

"I don't want you to lose heart," the teacher said, his eyes serious but kind. "This doesn't mean you can't practice martial arts, but I might not be the one who can help you."

"What I suspect is that your body already has a large amount of Light energy inside it."

'What? What!!!' Raze was extremely confused but he allowed the teacher to share his theory.

"I'm not certain because I am not a Pagna doctor, but occasionally we encounter individuals whose bodies contain a natural amount of Dark energy or Light energy. Because they are born this way, their bodies are usually very sick and weak. They have a lot of impurities due to the buildup from birth. Now, when we cultivate, we rid our bodies of these impurities. When you were cultivating just now, the energy was being absorbed but no impurities were coming out from your body."

"So, my guess is, the energy was being destroyed by your body that already has a lot of light energy inside it. Whereas a normal body would be an empty vessel of sorts."

Now Raze understood where the teacher's theory was coming from, but the energy wasn't being destroyed, it was just being added to his mana core instead.

"What I suggest is for you to learn a different cultivation technique. There are those that take in more than just the energy of dark and light, however, I do not know of any other cultivation techniques than the one I just showed."

"Perhaps, if you joined the academy or traveled elsewhere, you would be able to learn another cultivation technique. However, if you plan to stay in the Dark Faction, I must warn you."

"The fighting techniques taught by the Dark Clan use Dark energy as its basis along with Qi. Although you can use another energy, it might mean you might not get the best out of that technique."

"Dark energy is more destructive and spreads out wide, so the techniques taught suit that energy. Light energy is more straight and forward."

"One can use different energy to perform different fighting techniques, but the results might not be the best. I will continue to teach you fighting techniques, but I only know techniques belonging to the Dark Faction, so in the future, if you do cultivate another energy, it might not be the best for you."

Hearing all of the information, Raze bowed down, as he gave his thanks. Because he was truly thankful to the teacher. Although this news might have been disappointing for many, for Raze, he was over the moon with what he had just learned.

'That does make me wonder though? If I did learn a different cultivation technique, would I also be able to control Qi in my dantian? Since the energy wouldn't be absorbed by my magic core.'

'Would I then be able to do martial arts and perform magic?'