Kiro woke to the smell of baking bread. The soft rays of the rising sun streamed in from the entrance of the cave, illuminating his surroundings. Rynn and Seira were now laid comfortably over their chairs, sleeping a few feet away from him. He sat up, and despite the awkward position, his muscles felt perfectly at ease. Was this from his cultivation, or did the chairs themselves have special properties?

A loaf of deep red bread flew towards him, waking him from his speculations. A moment later, the door opened, and Aer stepped in, another three loaves levitating in behind her.

"Wakey wakey, my dear disciples! I know those chairs are comfortable, but we have a long day ahead of us!"

He hesitantly took the food, smelling it.

"Aer, this wouldn't happen to contain more sparkleaf, would it?"

The Saint gave him a wink, rousing the others with a gust of wind. "Yep! And a host of other medicinal herbs, to make sure you guys are well fed and nutritioned. You only ate a single meal yesterday, so we're going to have to make up some ground. Cultivation isn't the only source of energy you need! Don't worry, though. There's a lot less sparkleaf in here, so the effects won't be as drastic."

He took a bite, but once again, it just tasted like a normal, extremely tasty loaf of bread.

"How did you do that?"

Seira abruptly sat up, nodding. "Yeah! How do you make such good food?"

Aer ignored them. "Today, we're going to start our second day of training. Yesterday was all about gauging your skills, and to be honest, I didn't expect for you guys to actually defeat the golden drake. It held power comparable to the Condensation stage, which says good things about your futures."

Rynn gave a proud smile, sitting up as well.

"Where was I? Oh, right. Because you three are at different levels — and different Levels — from one another, I'll be training you separately. Rynn, take this."

She tossed him a red pill. "That'll bring you up to the peak of Purification. I'll warn you, cultivation won't always be so easy, but in the earlier stages you can basically just throw mana at the problem until you advance. I have similar pills for you two, but you won't be using them today. Instead…"

He felt a small breeze, only to realize that the chairs had been pushed back to their original spots.

"I'll be training you personally."

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***

Seira sat next to Aer, adopting the lotus position out of habit. Her master had insisted they sit on the cold stone for this lesson, which was slightly confusing because they had a perfectly fine table just across the room. Still, she didn't question it too much. Her old tutors had asked her to do stranger things.

"The first and most important thing about using a new aspect: you need to understand it. I don't just mean at the surface level, either. Your mana embodies a concept, and it's up to you to know exactly what it wants."

The Saint ran mana through a slip of paper, releasing it into the air. It fell graciously, twisting and turning in loops and ribbons before finally settling onto the floor.

"Mana is a force of change, and it's up to you to know how it wants to change and how you can work with it. Seira, what is your aspect?"

She shook her head, bringing a bit of mana to her fingers. "I don't know. I wanted to ascend to destruction, but something slipped and I ended up with this."

Aer nodded. "Right, because your understanding of destruction wasn't deep enough. From what I can tell, you're aspected to something in between combustion and corrosion. It works pretty well as a substitute for destruction in most cases, but as you saw with the golden drake, there are some substances that seem to be immune to your attacks."

That was actually a relief. It wasn't that Rynn had somehow overtaken her in the span of hours, she had just faced an enemy that her aspect wasn't suited for. There wasn't anything she could have done.

"But there are ways around that."

Aer produced a small glass vial, and shot a bolt of electricity at it. Seira winced, but after the spots in her eyes faded, the vial stood there, unharmed.

"You see how glass looks to be a perfect counter to my aspect?"

Seira nodded.

"Well, it isn't."

The Saint produced more lightning, and this time she held the stream of electricity to the bottle. After a few seconds, the glass cracked, the scorched fragments dropping to the ground.

"One way to get through these things is with raw power — with enough mana, anything is possible. However, this method is inherently inefficient, and it won't be much use if you're fighting someone of a similar stage."

She produced another glass bottle, and this time she slashed at it with a stream of air. Tiny glass particles exploded out in a puff, settling on around them.

"Now that you have a broader aspect, you need to learn to use all the facets of your mana, not just the one that looks the most powerful. If you had just used normal fire, like Rynn had, you would have been able to melt the drake's scales clean off."

She nodded. If she had saved enough mana to conjure a stronger blast, it would have done more to the drake than a broken wing.

Aer reached into her pocket, but her hand came out empty. She snapped, and a gust of wind blew away the dust.

"Remember: The mark of an experienced mystic is not their stage, nor their aspect. It is the efficiency with which they perform their techniques."

She pointed to a third bottle, which sat atop the table. With the slightest breath of wind, it tipped over the edge, once more littering the floor with glass shards.

"There are a hundred thousand ways to harm your enemies, but it's up to you to figure out the best."