Looking at the castle before him, Edric mused, "The Darkwind family is stronger, more populous, and wealthier than the Windwalker family. Back then, when the two families split, the Darkwind family inherited nearly everything—except for one crucial thing: the Windwalker Castle."
"Compared to Windwalker Castle, this one is utterly inferior!" Edric thought, a trace of contempt flickering in his eyes.
The Darkwind Castle—home to the Marquis of Darkwind, Rhaegor, and his son, Valdrin, was impressive by ordinary standards. Yet, when measured against Windwalker Castle, it fell short in every aspect. Based on Edric’s estimation, its defenses could withstand at most two or three simultaneous attacks from Silver Knights. Its magical formations were crude, its walls lacked the imposing sturdiness of Windwalker Castle, and for someone of his strength—a Golden Knight—it was laughably easy to infiltrate. In fact, he didn’t even need to break in; he could slip inside unnoticed without the slightest effort.
Even the masterfully crafted Windwalker Castle might struggle to detect a Golden Knight, let alone the far weaker Darkwind Castle.
"Having the power of a Golden Knight makes everything so effortless. Just imagine how easy my life will be once I ascend to a Legendary Knight!" Edric thought to himself. At present, he had to remain hidden, guarding his secrets closely. But once he reached the ranks of Legendary, Mythic, or even Ultra Knight, the need for caution would diminish. In time, he would become so powerful that secrecy wouldn’t matter—because no one would be capable of opposing him.
"But that time is still far away," Edric reminded himself. Achieving the rank of Legendary Knight alone would take years. Mythic Knight? Perhaps a decade or more. As for Ultra Knight? It could take a century. Unless he found a way to enhance his cheat system to provide more than 1,000 XP points per day, he was destined to wait long years before reaching that level of power.
That timeline didn’t even take talent into account. Edric's current talent was at the Legendary level—exceptional compared to most people. However, once he broke through to Mythic, that same Legendary talent would become a hindrance.
For ordinary people, advancing without the required talent was nearly impossible. This restriction didn’t apply to Edric, as he had the system, which allowed him to increase his rank using XP. If he advanced to Mythic while still having Legendary talent, he would be weak for his rank. If he reached Ultra with only Legendary talent, he would be the weakest Ultra Knight in history. And if he somehow managed to break through to Super with the same talent, the power gap compared to other super knights would be so vast that he might be killed with a single strike.
While the system’s ability to forcibly increase his rank was undoubtedly overpowered, it came with a major flaw—it left him significantly weaker than others at his level. A prime example was his current situation as a Silver Mage. Despite his rank, he could only cast two spells with an acceptable level of success: one for flight and one for healing. He had failed to learn any additional spells simply because his talent was below his rank, making the comprehension of Silver-tier magic extremely slow and difficult.
Even the two spells he had managed to learn were far from efficient. His Eagle’s Wings spell, for instance, took nearly two minutes to cast—utterly useless in emergencies where he needed to fly away instantly. It could only be used in situations where he had ample time to prepare.
The issue of talent would only become more severe once he broke through to Golden Mage. With his Average talent, he wouldn’t be able to learn a single Golden-tier spell without practicing and studying for years—perhaps even decades.
The only real advantage of reaching Golden Mage Rank was the massive increase in his mana reserves, allowing him to cast significantly more Silver-tier spells. Additionally, once he advanced to Golden Mage, the difficulty of learning Silver-tier spells would decrease drastically.
Because of these issues, Edric had been uncertain about his future path. He had two choices:
The first was to completely ignore talent and break through ranks as soon as possible. This approach would make him the weakest among those of his rank, but he would still have an undeniable advantage—he would always be able to defeat anyone below his rank. As a Super Knight, he could overpower any Ultra Knight, regardless of his talent.
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However, this path had significant downsides. His peers would constantly look down on him due to his weak combat ability within his own realm. He would struggle to learn advanced techniques, his skills as a knight would remain underdeveloped, and his battle instincts would be inferior to those who took their time mastering their ranks.
The second option was to completely disregard talent, focusing solely on knight training. This way, he could grow as strong as possible in the shortest amount of time.
His other major dilemma was whether to continue advancing his mage cultivation alongside his knight training. He had already decided to break through and become a Golden Mage once he accumulated enough XP, but beyond that, he was leaning toward halting his mage progression and focusing entirely on his knight training. Pursuing both paths simultaneously would divide his attention and delay his breakthroughs—something he knew was far from ideal.
Putting aside these thoughts, Edric took out a book—a Silver-rank spellbook he had received from Marquis Windwalker. He flipped through the pages until he found the section detailing the Mobile Invisibility spell.
At his current level, he couldn’t cast this spell without the book. Each time he attempted it, he had to carefully review the spell’s details to increase his chances of success. This was the drawback of poor talent—it took him far longer to cast spells skillfully, and without the book, his success rate would be even lower.
Closing his eyes, Edric focused. Two minutes passed as mana flowed through his body. His form began to blur, gradually fading into invisibility. Just as he was about to disappear completely, the mana within the spell formation suddenly leaked out. With a sharp cracking sound, the spell collapsed.
His body became fully visible again.
Failure.
A backlash surged through him, but he barely felt it. Fortunately, as a Golden Knight, his body was far too resilient for a Silver-rank spell failure to cause any real harm. If he had been a mage without knight training, however, the backlash would have severely injured him—possibly leaving him bedridden for weeks before he could attempt another spell.
This was yet another advantage of training as both a knight and a mage. Even if he failed a spell, he could usually ignore the consequences. Of course, if he ever failed while casting a Golden-rank spell, the backlash would be far more severe.
Mages without knight cultivation had their own methods to mitigate the backlash from failed spells, but Edric didn’t need them. His body was strong enough to withstand it without any assistance.
Edric didn’t dwell on the failure. Without hesitation, he began casting the spell again.
On his third attempt, he finally succeeded. His body vanished completely.
Without wasting time, he followed up by casting Eagle’s Wings. A pair of spectral wings appeared on his back—completely invisible, just like his body.
"With both spells active at the same time, my mana will run out in just ten minutes!" Edric sighed, frustrated by his pitifully low mana reserves.
He hadn’t even cast a powerful spell, yet his mana was draining at an alarming rate. This was another drawback of having poor talent—not only were his mana reserves smaller, but the spells he cast were also far less efficient. As a result, his spells consumed significantly more mana than they should have.
"Once I break through to Golden Mage, I’ll finally be able to use Silver-rank spells without worrying so much!" Edric thought as he flew through the sky.
Golden-level mana was far more concentrated and potent. Once he advanced, he could finally cast Silver-rank spells without hesitation or excessive mana consumption.
The reason he had chosen to use both Eagle’s Wings and Invisibility was simple—while the Darkwind Castle’s magical formation wouldn’t be able to detect him, people had eyes. If he remained visible, even an ordinary soldier could spot him. With Invisibility, he could fly undetected, slip into the city unseen, and assassinate Valdrin without anyone realizing what had happened.
...
There were spells capable of locating a target, but they posed several problems. First, Edric’s mana reserves were too low to cast them repeatedly. Second, he needed intense concentration to cast spells he wasn’t fully familiar with, and time was a luxury he didn’t have. Third, due to his low talent, he would likely fail multiple times before successfully casting such a spell. And finally, only the most complex and advanced Silver-rank detection spells could track someone like Valdrin, who was also at Silver-rank—spells Edric couldn’t hope to cast without years of study and practice.
In short, he had no choice but to locate Valdrin the old-fashioned way.
"He’s probably in that building." Edric narrowed his eyes.
At a single glance, he made an educated guess about Valdrin’s residence. It was an enormous structure, built from gleaming white marble. Its sheer size and prime location at the heart of the city made it stand out prominently. Among the countless buildings in this city of hundreds of thousands, it was one of—if not the—most beautiful and imposing.
From his elevated vantage point, Edric’s exceptional eyesight made spotting it easy.
Flapping his wings, he descended.
Two seconds later, he landed silently on the roof of the grand marble estate.