Only two days had passed since the prison break but now seeing the once prisoners walking about freely in the space gave Alric a light hearted feeling.

Although only two days had passed in the real world, in the training space eight days had went by.

The prisoners before that looked like skin and bones were getting back their features.

Some, a lot faster than others. Some of them had already started to regain a little bit of muscle.

Alric could even feel a few of them with magical energy growing.

It seemed as though spending so many years under that array had suppressed the magic of the weaker ones but mana within humans was more like a pipe than anything else.

After years of suppression their magic would come back several times stronger than before.

Alric tried to sense what circle magic the prisoners were at but they all varied and had a wide margin.

Arriving in the training space the first thing he did was check on the gravity crystal he had placed in the center of the training space.

The crystal glowed in a purple hue and emitted mana all around.

Alric had placed one of his prized possessions at the center of the training space.

It was the next step up from his x-ray crystal. The x-ray crystal in its most basic form absorbed mana and converted it to gravity magic, which inturn affected the light rays surrounding the crystal.

However this crystal exuded gravity magic on a larger scale, enough to affect the entire training space. It would absorb the surrounding mana and convert it to sheer gravitational force.

The down side being that the collecting and emitting rates greatly differed so the crystal would have to be regularly ‘refilled’ so to speak.

The gravity crystal that Alric had come to power up had now reached 0.8 percent greater that of the outside world’s gravity but the people within the space had hardly noticed the increase due to the slow gradual increase that they experienced.

The crystal could be considered a very expensive gem.

Although at the moment the gravity in the space was only a few decimal places greater than the outside it was more than enough to make the prisoners adapt and train without even realizing it.

“Merrik, how goes the task I handed down?”

Alric asked the only prisoner that had managed to regain his full faculties already.

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“Sir, due to some strange protection on the books we are unable to replicate them with magic.

Our only option is to rewrite them by hand.”

Alric nodded in understanding. Of course the academy would put some protection on its sacred books to prevent them being copied.

Alric had asked the prisoners in the training space to copy as many books in the library as possible.

Initially he wanted to do this as a means to have his own catalog of books for himself to read at any time. But when he learnt that majority of his gang and the prisoners were illiterate he know he could use this opportunity to kill three birds with one stone.

Firstly, he could use the prisoners to build his own collection then use those same books to help them learn how to read and write. Then after that he would use those same books to improve their magic or techniques.

It was a win-win situation for him so long as the library didn’t realize the books were missing for too long.

Alric had been very cautious with the books. He had tried to make sure that at most the books were only missing for a few hours.

For the prisoners who had basically all day to copy the books this was child’s play.

“And what of the other things I asked?”

Merrik took out a paper before looking at it closely,

“We… well the men are still learning, they don’t take too quickly to this book work stuff.

Most of them would prefer to just train and improve their mana circulation while it is still resurfacing.”

Alric let out a sigh. After not being able to improve for so long it was understandable that they would focus more on the mana they had been parted with for so long. But literacy was a major concern for him.

Afterall, an army without competent men wasn’t an army, it was just a band of beggars.

Alric shook his head,

“From now on if anyone wants food, let them send it in writing what they want. That should inspire them to be more proactive.”

Alric turned to leave but realized something.

“Oii, Merrik, by the way, how many of the books have you guys copied so far?”

Merrik grinned giving a proud expression,

“By my last head could… I’d say about six.”

Alric looked at him with surprise, he had given them fifteen books to work with and only six days had passed within the space since he started giving them books and materials to copy them.

This meant that on average they were doing a book a day. It had to be understood that each book on average had over two hundred pages which meant everyone must have been helping them to maintain such a production.

Alric waved his hand and turned to leave,

“Not bad at all, keep up the good work.”

Instead of leaving, Alric went to the edge of the training space and decided to practice since this was the training space after all.

He meditated trying to stimulate his circles.

As he meditated the other prisoners felt a strange fluctuation in the air only to see their liberator meditating.

His circles became visible as they rotated rapidly around his body producing a bright light show.

The circles around Alric expanded, stretched and twisted as he continued to try and push the boundaries of his ability.

Some of them were already mages and paladins so they could appreciate the fine control that he was demonstrating.

“To already have such fine control at such a tender age…”

Klaus looked on with his jaw agape. He was just an ordinary soldier back in the day, a young mage in fact but he could never dream of having this level of control.

Klaus had joined the military hoping that battle would be where his magic could improve without the help of an academy but now he realized that academies did not hold all the secrets.

Was this not the strength he was looking for? the power to improve and be a beacon of justice and righteousness? Klaus thought his admiration was just sparking but then something more mysterious happened.

A circle of black energy popped into existence and surrounded Alric as he meditated. The circle seemed to imprison the others as it rotated slower than the others. It was obvious that his control of this new circle wasn’t up to par with the others.

The circle almost as quickly as it was created dispersed into thin air and Alric clicked his tongue as he dusted off himself and left the space.