Elder Palace

"Alright stop it with the nonsense. You two continue guarding and I'll look for our master.", Miss. Klein told them while chuckling.

She then continued on with Ivan and Serge following her. The two guys stayed back and continued guarding. Elder Lin on the other hand said goodbye and left first.

Ivan and Serge were unable to fly on their own and it was banned to summon pets, so they could only walk towards their goal. If they had to walk at their usual speed then it would have taken days if not weeks for them to arrive at Miss. Klein's master abode. Luckily the robes they were wearing had formations engraved which, when inside the sect's formation could speed up their movement speed. As such the time needed could be greatly shortened. And with the ways designed for this type of fast movement it wasn't problematic to really use the formations as well.

So after walking for about an hour they arrived in front of a palace sprawling at the side of a mountain.

"This is where my Master and her close disciples stay.", Miss. Klein introduced.

The paöace was too big to see at once. Standing before it, it was only possible to see parts of it, with other buildings vanishing in the distance.

"Isn't this a bit too big?", Ivan asked in surprise.

Miss. Klein chuckled, "This is one of the smaller palaces owned by an elder.", she told them. "And it isn't as if only master and her disciples stay here. You can say that this is like a small sect. There are all kinds of mortals as well as craftsmen. Just about anything you would need, you can find here."

"Isn't that a bit redundant?", he asked confused.

"Yes and no. The distances here are big and the sect is big as well. There are so many disciples so it is better to distribute them and make secondary centers, which are the elder palaces. For high ranking things you have to go to the center where the different professions have their central pavilion."

The palace wasn't guarded but they had to cross a formation that scanned their robes. He didn't know what would happen if he didn't have a robe, pass, or something similar, but he was sure that it wouldn't be anything good.

The palace was filled with people who were busily running here and there. It was just like a city, with shops and everything. With Miss. Klein leading them they soon arrived in front of a large gate behind which there was just forest to be seen. Like with his villa it seemed like the important people here too liked to live in nature instead of the bustling city.

A short time later they stood in front of an old-style building. It was built of wood and didn't have any glass windows. Instead there were formations fulfilling the same function. To Ivan and Serge it looked primitive and uninviting, although it could be said that it had some charm if one liked the style.

The interior was similarly old-school. There was no modern furniture or anything like this. Instead all functions would be either fulfilled by hand or through magic devices.

In the center room they finally met Miss. Klein's master, who was sitting on a hard wooden school in front of a desk, filled with books. Books that spilled over and filled the whole room. It looked like this elder was extremely focused on researching something.

"Put these books down there.", the woman said while gesturing towards one of the last free spots on the floor. She didn't even look up and seemed to have forgotten to check who had entered. This was something that surprised Ivan, shouldn't someone with her power and cultivation is able to easily observe their surroundings even when focused.

Miss. Klein smiled and said, "Master, you know you shouldn't lose your focus like this.", she reprimanded.

The elder looked up and a smile appeared on her pretty face, "You are back.", she exclaimed while jumping up and rushing towards Miss. Klein.

Her face looked quite young, not older than eighteen or so. And her behavior could be said to be the same. She didn't behave like an elder but more like a small girl. In fact, the way she started to chat with Miss. Klein made one question the fact that she was the master. Now it appeared more like she was a younger sister.

The two of them were ignored as the two women chatted happily with each other. They even sat down together on the floor, while Ivan and Serge were left standing at the entrance of the room.

Ivan saw no reason to stay standing. Their chat was sure to continue on for a while. So he made some space on the ground and sat down as well. He then closed his eyes and started to meditate. He wanted to get a better feeling for the atmosphere here and how, if it would affect his use of mana. With Miss. Klein's warning fresh in mind he didn't try to absorb energy into his body with his training skill but that didn't stop him from trying to get a feeling of it.

The problem was that whenever he tried to move the energy, similar to he would do back home, where he would then absorb it, it felt as if he was trying to move a mountain. A mountain deeply rooted.

He didn't know if it would be dangerous for him if he absorbed energy but he realized that it was currently impossible to even move it. His mind just wasn't strong enough. Of course, this observation directly led him to another training method he could try.

Since it was necessary to have a strong mind to influence the energy, then wouldn't trying to move this mountainlike energy be a great way to strengthen his mind. Just when he thought this far, he instantly started to put his theories into practice.

First he would try to reduce the amount of energy he was moving even further. Although what he had tried before was already the smallest amount he could grasp, this didn't mean that with training he couldn't decrease it. It was just that he hadn't had to do so before. Back in the realm of Mythelem his goal had always been the opposite. With the thinner energy, it had been his goal to move as much energy as possible at the same time since that would increase his training speed.

So his training now went in the exact opposite way.

It was as if small splitter were shaved off from the mountain. They were negligible in the whole picture but still showed that he had made progress. Each time he managed to shave something off, he got closer to his goal. Maybe sometimes if he had a fine enough control he would be able to even absorb some of it.

The only problem was that doing it required a huge amount of concentration. So it didn't take long until his mental strength was exhausted and he got tired.

Being careful he directly stopped as soon as he felt the slightest sloppiness in his thoughts. What he did could be dangerous if he suddenly messed up and absorbed the energy although he wasn't planning to. Who knew what would happen then. Maybe he would even explode, something he wasn't willing to risk. Exploding fucking hurt and the damage to his body wouldn't be completely fixed even with 'Reincarnation'.

That was something he had found out over time. There were wounds that 'Reincarnation' didn't fix directly. Instead, he would have to wait for them to heal like anyone else. These wounds were mostly connected with cultivating and not battle wounds. All of his battle wounds, which he had experienced until now, would always be gone after going through reincarnation.

When he had first experienced it he realized that the skill wasn't a safety net for every situation, allowing him to do what he wanted. No, he still had to be careful. Of course, dying in a controlled way could greatly help him.

Having exhausted his mental strength he felt sleepy and since the women showed no sign of stopping their chat, he kept his eyes closed and let his thoughts drift away.

Originally he had planned to stay awake and just let his thoughts drift awhile, letting his mental strength regenerate slowly. But who knew that not long after making that decision he fell asleep for real.