Sea of Consciousness

Ten days later, within Jeremy's house basement.

Currently, Jeremy was sitting on a chair in front of a working bench while cutting some bits and parts of woods he had collected from the ancient trees since weeks ago.

If one took a look closely at him, they would only see that Jeremy was cutting, splitting, trimming, and carving those wooden parts randomly.

However, if that same person took a look carefully at the working bench in front of Jeremy, they would see that the bits and parts of countless trees were orderly placed in a straight line. Well, if they had to count those pieces, they would be accounted for more than 500-600 pieces in big and small size.

As for how those pieces looked like when they were placed on the table, one could only say that if they were to be accounted separately, every piece of them would look really random. However, if they were to be combined with one another, it would be as if they could become a long staff of more than 170 cm in length.

And exactly that...

Jeremy's fundamental purpose of cutting so many pieces from various trees was to create a 'staff' for himself.

Concerning how to create a staff, Jeremy's method to combine and craft the magic staff was the 'Enchantment'.

Enchantment was one of the many auxiliary branches of the Magic System, and it was actually one of the most important branches at that.

As for a reason, it was because Enchantment was the only way for the feeble mage to craft a magical item for their own use.

Of course, there were also many exceptions, such as a mage who learned how to smith instead of Enchantment. That way, the mage needed to learn a secondary class as a Blacksmith, and they must have quite a decent fire affinity at that to be able to create a magical item without using the Enchantment method.

There was also another example of when a mage learned a secondary class as a Crafter, Tailor, Mechanic, etc.

However, all those secondary classes required much more patience, dedication, and requirements than the Enchantment method. That's why by using the Enchantment method, the mage didn't need to learn a secondary class and didn't need to complete many requirements as those methods.

That's why Jeremy had chosen the Enchantment method as the way to craft his weapon, the staff.

'Finally, the last piece is done...' Jeremy thought to himself after finishing the last part of the staff.

Then he placed the part at the staff's top-most place; the piece actually looked like an ordinary toothpick with a bit of curve here and there. Nevertheless, when it was placed at the top of the 'staff', it surprisingly looked harmonious and concordant with the rest of the pieces.

He was currently admiring and checking the beautiful pieces of art that he had spent more than ten days of arduous work to finish.

After that, Jeremy brought out a furless animal leather doormat from under the working table the size of 2x3 meters, then spread it on the floor. It was the thing he had ordered from Amazon several days ago.

Then he started to bring the pieces of the 'staff' down, placing them, piece by piece, on the doormat.

He did the job very carefully, not to miss or misplace any piece, or else his staff might be crippled in the Enchantment process.

Afterward, with the last piece being placed on the doormat, he brought out a dazzling round golden orb the size of 5 cm in diameters with the weight of around 4 kg from his backpack situated on the working bench.

He had ordered it from Perth Mint Company several weeks ago. It was actually the purest gold on Earth, with the six nines fine of 999.999 of pureness.

Thus, it was now reflecting the beautiful yellow dusk-like ray from the light bulbs on the basement's ceiling into every direction, causing the walls in the basement to shine in a light yellow color.

Right now, even Jeremy, who was looking directly at the orb on his right palm in a fascinating expression, his ice-cold eyes were radiating its yellow light halo.

One of the purest gold on Earth, it was just that mesmerizing and captivating...

After bringing out the orb, Jeremy placed it at the top center of the 'staff' that was being left empty until now.

Then he checked the staff's every nook and cranny to see if anything was missing or being misplaced or not.

*Fwuuu...*

When he realized that there was nothing wrong with the 'staff', Jeremy exhaled a long breath of cold air.

Then Jeremy thought ponderingly to himself while taking a deep look at the 'staff', 'Now, the last thing to do is, set up an Enchantment Diagram for this staff, then inscribe the runes on the diagram. Hmmm... It seems like the first stage of Enchantment won't be anywhere nearly enough to fuse those pieces together.'

'That makes it the second stage then... A bit hard with my current soul strength, but with the help of my sea of consciousness, it should be somewhat possible.'

'Alright, from the looks of it, around 30-31 mL of mana fluid should be enough. But... which diagram will be best for this staff?'

Jeremy, who had been thinking until this point, started to consider the resources he currently had and what enchantment method to be used.

Even after thinking for some time, he still couldn't come up with the best diagram for the 'staff'.

So, he decided to sit down on the spot and closed his eyes, preparing to do meditation.

Not long after, he entered into a meditating state of which, right after that, he tried to access his sea of consciousness.

Actually, a sea of consciousness's primary function was to govern one's mind. It was clearly different from soul strength that was closely related to one's will.

That meant the entity of mind and will were not the same things...

It could be said that the body was the outer layer of a person. Then within one's body, there situated a sea of consciousness that directly influenced a person's mind. Lastly, at the center of the sea of consciousness, something called 'soul' resided there, which was the source of a person's will.

A sea of consciousness acted as the first defensive layer of a person's mind and soul. At the same time, it could also be used to observe a person's internal and external world, which would be increased in power accordingly with higher cultivation or higher class.

For those reasons alone, a person's sea of consciousness must be as strong as their body and soul, if not stronger, to protect the person's Achilles heel, the soul.

That meant, even if a person's personal strength was heaven-defying but had a fragile sea of consciousness, that person might be killed easily by a weaker cultivator or class with a stronger soul and sea of consciousness.

That's why, most of the time, a sea of consciousness could only be accessed by high-ranked classes. Only those higher-ranked classes had the privilege of attacking and invading others' minds and souls, with only a few exceptions of certain races and classes.

In Jeremy's case, it was somewhat different from others, as he had accessed into his sea of consciousness in his past life when he reached a Class 3 Grand Mage. Meanwhile, other people had to struggle to access their sea of consciousness even after they achieved Class 4 of their respective pathway.

However...

In this life, Jeremy could already enter into his sea of consciousness when he had tried to achieve a breakthrough into an Apprentice Mage stage. It happened at the time when his mind and body were utterly exhausted that he achieved a breakthrough.

As for why he never bothered to access his sea of consciousness was because there was no need to access it at all. Right now, Jeremy's sea of consciousness was very small, and it couldn't even be used to attack anyone.

At most, it could only be used to defend against a weak mind strike, search his dormant memories, and also scan a small area around himself with his mind sense that was directly related to his sea of consciousness.

Let us come back to the current situation...

As of now, Jeremy was sitting cross-legged while doing meditation.

Not long after, he...