Eight - Meditation Technique

After some days, under the greeting of the first rays of light, the caravan had finally arrived at the death beach. Looking at the never ending sea, Leylin couldn't help but feel intimidated. From this point forward, the chances of dying would be increased by an incredible percentage.

The path of a magus is called the path of truth, but it could easily be called the path of slaughter. After all, power doesn't come from free and not many people can reach the level of a magus without risking their lives for it.

"Hey, Leylin!"

Turning around, Leylin smiled seeing George. "How was it? Don't tell me your talent is shitty."

"Haha, were you even doubting? This handsome here is a fourth grade acolyte! Father will definitely be pleased after learning about it!"

Leylin chuckled hearing it, but the words made him reminisce about the past of his new body. Viscount John Farlier... I wonder what it will feel like when I finally meet him.

Pondering for a moment, he shook his head and signed helplessly.

George noticed it, but he didn't say anything. Both he and Leylin knew exactly what kind of life was waiting for them. It's normal to feel nostalgic and long for your hometown, but their path was higher than that.

As Kassa had once mentioned during their journey, the higher one stands, the further one can see. Once they become stronger, it wouldn't be a problem to take a trip down to the Chernobyl Islands and visit their family. Right now, they had to focus on their goal.

Unlike the others who had to take the test, Leylin had already gone through his and so, he wouldn't be able to go to any of the other schools, still...

"Where are you going?"

"Are you my father? I'm just taking a stroll around the camp." Leylin said dismissively. He didn't want anyone to know what he was going to do. After all, who knew what kind of mentality mages had. What he was truly interested in was taking a look in the abyssal bone forest dormitory.

After coming to this world, he never once stop to ponder what happened to that guy. Just because he took his place in Leylin's body, does that mean that Fang Ming ceased to exist? The chances of this being the case... didn't seem very likely. After all, this is a world plagued by death, and many other caravans had reached this place sooner, meaning that all of them underwent the trials of the Great Plains of Death.

If Fang Mind had indeed reached this world but through another individual, it might be that he is here.

After walking for a bit and asking around, he finally arrived at a rundown place. The rooms were very dilapidated and there was even moss on some of the houses. The new acolytes of the Abyssal Bone Forest were gathered outside near a large bonfire. Some were celebrating, others were sulking.

"Hey, are you also going to the Abyssal Bone Forest?"

As soon as he started looking around, a boy with a cheerful attitude approached him.

"Actually, I was taking a look... I'm having trouble deciding which academy I should choose, so I thought I could take a look first before deciding."

"I see! Welcome, brother. My name is Beirut, it's nice to meet you! Seeing the way you walk, you must be a noble, usually I would introduce my background, but as future magi, our previous status are already meaningless. Come, I will introduce you to everyone!"

Caught on the boy's positive atmosphere, he could only accept his invitation and take a look directly inside their party.

"Everyone, this brother here is Leylin, he is still unsure what academy to pick, so try your best to convince him!"

Hearing his introduction, many people turned to look, some were interested, while others couldn't care less. Among which, there was one who pretended that everyone around him was air. He was isolated from the others and acted so cocky, that everyone seemed to dislike him.

Pondering for a bit, he seemed to recall a name from the book. 'That one should be Jayden, given his demeanor, I guess it's the real him...'

At this moment, some people came over to greet him.

"Good afternoon. I'm Raynor, a fourth grade acolyte and the leader of this small group." Raynor was a skinny boy, he looked frail and inexperienced, but the pride was clear in his voice. After everyone following him introduced themselves, it was a boy with a head of golden hair and blue eyes who introduced himself.

"Hello, I'm Kaliweir. Nice to meet you."

Kaliweir introduced himself, Leylin quickly noticed that he was acting strange. If he wasn't wrong, Kaliweir should have been the leader of the group, but it was actually Raynor who took that spot, moreover, when Kaliweir introduced himself, he could feel that there was some wariness in the way he spoke to him.

'Is it my imagination?' No, he shook his head, this change is quite great... 'I must keep an eye on this Kaliweir in the future. If he turns out to be Fang Ming, he will grow to become one of the most dangerous people in the world...'

Although he lacked evidence, the change in his personality was definitely an abnormal situation that only he, someone who read the book, would notice.

While meeting everyone, he also got to know Nyssa, the girl who would eventually have a horrible fate in the Abyssal Bone Forest Academy, although he didn't remember what exactly would happen to her.

Having achieved his goal, he quickly left, afraid that Fang Ming and his AI could discover anything important.

After going back to the Ennea Ivory Ring Tower's dorm, he avoided everyone and went directly to his room.

Thanks to the potion he got from his senior sister, Lady Angelia, his wounds had completely healed since a few days ago.

Right now his status had all recovered and he was ready to start the next step of his training using the meditation technique he received.

[Stats Window

HP: 100%

SP: 100%

MP: Locked

STR: 3.0

AGI: 3.0

VIT: 3.0

Lifespan: 125 years

]

After advancing to a knight, the biggest change was definitely the increase of 1 point to every attribute. Not only was he three times stronger than a normal person, he was also much faster than the average acolyte. Those attributes might not mean much when a knight faces an acolyte, but when it's an acolyte with those stats facing another, the advantage is extremely huge.

Moreover, one of the added benefits of turning into a knight seemed to be an increase of 25 years in his lifespan. Although it wasn't much, any magi would be happy to be able to live a little bit more. Who knows, they might even take another major step and reach the next stage.

Sitting on the comfortable bed, he took a deep breath. The small rooms built to house the acolytes of the Ring Tower were pretty amazing. They were supposedly made of a special type of wood that had a calming effect. It could ease the anxiety of the new acolytes and assist them in having a better sleep.

Taking in the pleasing smell of the wood, he sighed in satisfaction and grabbed a small orb from his backpack.

The orb was similar to a crystal ball. It could store information and transmit it directly to the human brain.

Tapping the orb on his head, he fell into a daze as what felt like an electric current started flowing into his head. After a while, the feeling disappeared, and a new piece of information appeared in his head, the Elementary Meditation Technique.

Knitting his brows, he massaged his head to get rid of the headache while pondering on the information he got from the orb.

According to the orb, acolytes were divided into three levels, a level one acolyte was capable of drawing 8 mind runes in his mind while meditating, a level two was capable of 24, while a level three acolyte was measured through a qualitative improvement in his spiritual force.

The only way one can achieve this improvement is to achieve mastery of three spell models, having a total of seven units of spiritual force, and remodeling the mind runes to create a single greater one. Apparently, the biggest difference between a fifth grade acolyte and the others is especially noticeable from this point. Those at the fourth grade and below very rarely can achieve this step without a reactive elixir.

After understanding the situation of an acolyte, he started looking through the information about the mind runes. The first rune was quite difficult already, it was a combination of various strokes that formed a symbol similar to the figure of a tree or a bush.

Moreover, the worst part is that according to the information in the orb, each rune had to be drawn in just one singular motion, meaning that you couldn't stop once you started and there were no rooms for errors.

Frowning, he started drawing the first mind rune.

In order to do so, he had first to meditate. 'Imagine a calm and serene lake... take a deep breath... clear your mind...' It took some time, but at some point, he managed to visualize himself inside what felt like an endless pool of calm water. Imagining a brush on his hands, he began drawing the first rune. After a few minutes trying for the first time he made a mistake and he felt a rebound, as if something had knocked against his head. Gritting his teeth, he continued trying.

An hour later, Leylin was sweating as he collapsed on the bed. Breathing heavily, he swept the sweat out of his face and coughed.

Good lord! He must have tried a hundred times and failed them every time!

Too tired to keep trying, he opened his stats window to take another look.

[Stats Window

HP: 100%

SP: 100%

MP: 0%

STR: 3.0

AGI: 3.0

VIT: 3.01

SF: 2.0

MP: 1.9 (In synchronization)

]

The first thing he noticed was that there was a slight improvement in vitality, moreover some new attributes had been added.

SF probably stands for Spiritual Force, while MP stands for Magic Power. Given my current situation, it probably means that I spent all my Magic Power during my meditation... If it wasn't for recovery, I wouldn't be able to last for so long... Still, this is too difficult... At this rate, I don't know how many days I'll need to complete a single mind rune. It seems that recovery really only serves to Emulate a fifth grade talent. There must be something else to it that I don't know, maybe their learning ability is also higher than others, which would allow them to master the mind runes faster than the other people.

Pondering for a while that indeed seemed to be the case. Just as he was about to sigh, a notification appeared in front of him.

[Congratulations! Your training awarded you 1 TP!]

The moment he saw those words, his mind went blank. "W-what!? Is this true!?" Just yesterday he had already got a talent point, how come he got another one so soon!?

After thinking for a moment, he couldn't help but laugh, that's it! It must be! His theory about the difficulty of the training was probably correct. The harder a training method is and the more effective, the more TP he can get.

Opening his talent window, he started planning in his mind.

[Talent Store

TP: 3

Skill point: 1

Recovery[Rare] Lv 1

Cost: 1000

Revision[Rare]

Cost: 30

Superior Knight Lv1

Cost: 100

]

Thankfully, he wasn't rash and spent his skill point without considering the future first. At the rate that he will be acquiring talent points in the future, it would be wiser to keep it for later, when the numbers start getting frighteningly large and dishonest. He knows that systems like these usually become money grubbers at some point. Heck, he wouldn't be surprised if Recovery level 2 needed a hundred thousand TP to level up.

No matter what, he must keep that hard earned point for later.

As of right now... what he really needs is to unlock Revision, but after looking at it, he couldn't help but feel a little unwilling.

"Didn't the system mention that it's an innate talent? There should be a way to unlock this shit without paying..."

Biting his lips in frustration, he tried to open the quest window.

When he first acquired the system, he couldn't open it no matter how much he tried. Later he got that quest which was basically a premonition of the future. Since he completed the quest, he didn't even think about trying again, perhaps something has changed since that day.

[Quest window

- Completed: 1

- Pending:

•Revision {

Description: ???

Reward: Revision [Rare] Lv 1

}