Group Training

The group of warriors was meditating quietly, each of them expressing various levels of discomfort. However, they persevered.

"Oooh~!" A sudden moan of pleasure sounded out, and Gerald couldn't help but open one eye. It was Xilia, the Dark Elf.

'Of course,' he mused, 'I figured it would be her.'

She was currently intensely watching her hands and body with wide eyes, before turning her sight elsewhere. "It's beautiful," she whispered.

"Sssh!" Gerald gestured for her to be quiet and dragged her away from the rest. "Let's not disrupt them."

She couldn't wait to speak to him and as soon as they were far enough, she erupted, "You could see this all this time?! Why didn't you teach us earlier?!"

"I forgot." His answer was short and completely shameless. He shrugged, "My memory is only almost perfect, even I forget a few things here and there. I had too much on my mind anyway."

She shook her head and turned around, murmuring, "Unbelievable! Who knew such a world was right under our noses the entire time…" She observed the ever-changing colors when Gerald entered her sight again.

"Hey, why do you seem like you have almost no Mana at all?" She asked with a raised brow. "Even the air around you has more…"

Gerald's eyes enlarged and then squinted tight in happiness. He laughed. "Oh, so it works? Perfect!" He was secretly developing a way to hide his aura and the Mana radiation in his body. And it seemed it was working quite well. Or at least he could fool a novice.

"How much Mana would you say I have from what you see?" he asked Xilia.

She didn't answer immediately, and instead looked at the members from Iron Phantom Hawks and compared them. "Hmm, I would say… It looks like you have about 6MP!" she confidently said.

"Good! How about now?" He suddenly released the restraints, and his body basically exploded with light.

"Ah! So bright!" Xilia instinctively covered her eyes, but the light wasn't real so her eyes didn't actually hurt.

"It's too much, I can't see! How can you live like this?" She wasn't used to the intense colors coming from Mana and her sight was impaired because of it.

"You can turn it off, you know…"

"Oh…"

Xilia turned her primitive Magic Eyes off and immediately became somewhat dispirited. "The world suddenly looks so dull…"

***

Xilia was the first to succeed, and it only took her about two hours of intense meditation to do so. Sera was the second at almost four hours, and Eneth was the third to do it at just over five hours.

That's about when they stopped. Sitting for nearly six hours wasn't exactly easy for warriors who were used to constant movement.

Blum was quite close, but his butt became itchy and he couldn't sit still any longer. Even Elly failed despite her attempts. As such, only three out of twelve people managed to do it and step onto a higher stage.

'That's probably the difference in natural talent for magic,' Gerald mused.

"That was intense!" Eneth breathed out and found a wall as a support. "I thought I was going to go crazy for a moment there…" But despite the discomfort, he preserved and was then rewarded appropriately. He could now see the energy in his body and each spell became so much clearer and easier to use.

Almost immediately he realized a few of his mistakes, and instead of using all his strength for every spell, he could now see that just a part was enough. As such, he could almost immediately use double the spells before having to rest.

"It's so good! I can actually see what I'm doing now, instead of struggling like a blind person!" he shouted in elation.

His excitement was contagious, and even Gerald laughed with him. "Haha, this is nothing! Just wait until you can cast spells without even thinking! When it becomes like second nature to you, that's when magic becomes truly fun!"

"You can do that?!" Eneth was amazed.

Gerald nodded, "Sure, just make sure to meditate every day and you should feel big changes taking place in your body."

"So that's what you have been doing! No wonder you consider magic to be your toy!" Sera huffed. She struggled for so long, training and learning, when there was a shortcut!? She was quite annoyed.

"Uh… I still can't feel anything," Ermaz said while scratching his head awkwardly.

"Gerald, why are you even teaching us this? We aren't all mages, you know," Kerius said after giving up on meditation. He did feel some changes taking place in his body, but the itchiness was just too much for him to keep going.

He wasn't a masochist, and five hours of mild torture was more than enough for him.

"Even if you say so, you would still get better control over Mana. For example, your Combat Art would become easier to use. And if you are consistent in your training, you will be able to recover your Mana faster," Gerald said.

"Really?! Well, I guess that's useful…"

He didn't seem convinced, so Gerald turned to Eneth and beckoned, "Hey, make your Stone Bolts again, but just make one or two and hold them tight."

"Huh, what for?" the latter asked, confused.

Still, he did as he was asked. Two Stone Bolts grew out of the ground and lifted into the air. They were about the length of an arm and just as thick. They had a dangerously sharp point on each side.

"Good!" Gerald nodded and then grinned, "Hold them tight!"

His consciousness expanded, and he took hold of Eneth's spell as if it was nothing. Under the weight of Gerlad's mind, the grip of the young mage couldn't hold on for even a fraction of a second.

"Ah!" Eneth exclaimed and stumbled back from shock.

Everyone had a peculiar expression as Gerald started grinning all of a sudden. The two Stone Bolts floated towards him and circled around his body.

"As you can see," he said, "You can take over the spell of your opponent if you are strong enough."

"What?!"

"Oh yeah, and you know those mindless monsters you keep fighting against? They can do it too! Didn't expect that, right? Haha..." Gerald laughed. He still remembered how the Minecrawler Queen made his stone puppet collapse when he tried to fight her. It was quite a shocking revelation for him at that time.

He took a casual stance and distanced the Stone Bolts from himself somewhat and gestured towards the magician, "Alright now, try to take it from me!"

The three girls, Blum, and Eneth looked at each other. They were clueless as to what to do.