Day by day, the convoy continued on its way.
After the first ambush, the convoy was attacked several times more, mostly by goblins. Wendigos never appeared again after the first time.
Illyan, who found the right rhythm during the journey, didn’t feel any boredom at all.
Most of the time was spent learning mathematics with Korin, but whenever the opportunity arose, he would try to polish his body to perfection with his [The Way of the Body].
Despite deciding they should have kept their distance, he and Aurelia found a certain solace within each other as they exchanged a lot of information.
Illyan showed her his training while she taught him the basic knowledge of the magical world.
She also taught him how to seal the Dark Stones he kept with him so as not to waste their energy in the mysterious energy vortex.
“These stones could be used to quickly recover mana or to fuel some kind of construct. Be it a magic formation or machine, it needs energy far surpassing the capacity of the human body. It can also be refined into some kind of magic tool or treasure. The possibilities are endless as long as you have enough of them or they are of greater quality,” Aurelia explained to him in a soft voice. She had already realized that he wasn’t an acolyte at all and could be said to be a self-taught bumpkin.
But she didn’t look down on him. Instead, she felt a little admiration for this man.
He was a warrior who could fight against acolytes yet still yearned for knowledge. This was something she appreciated a lot.
Never limit yourself with your talent.
With her gift, she could feel the terrible affinity he had towards mana. It wasn’t nonexistent; it was just… imperfect.
She didn’t think he could progress much without external help or training for a very long time.
‘But with the life force within him…’ Before, she could feel a very strong life force within him and saw him reconstruct his body in a flash.
Such people weren’t rare if you take the entire world into consideration.
She believed he was born with such strong regeneration and could live at least a few hundred years before even considering his aging.
So it should be possible for him to step into the magical path after training for years.
What she didn’t know was that even if he failed the first few hundred years, his gift would be on a completely different level, which would give him an even longer lifespan.
“How do you grade them?” Illyan asked as he looked at the stone in his hand with a curious glance.
“Well… There are twelve grades corresponding to the Great Primordial Ranking. Do you know it?” Aurelia asked.
Illyan frowned and contemplated her words.
“You mean the Mortal, Novice, Apprentice, and so on stages?”
“Exactly.”
“But these have thirteen stages. Does the Mortal stage not count?” asked Illyan after some thought. After all, people in the Mortal stage didn’t have any energies within their bodies or couldn’t even perceive them. If they did, they were already Novices.
“That’s right. But they are usually named as Grade One and so on. The Novice or Grade One stones are quite brittle, so they are usually refined into purple coins, which is the main currency outside of the Vanaras,” Aurelia said as she took a stone that shone with fiery light.
“However, the stones are usually imbued with different energies and elements as they are created naturally by the worldly energies and change depending on the place where they take a form. However, in this world, the most common stones are the Dark Stones. Especially after the mines were discovered at the foot of the Primal Skull Demon Mountain Range, which caused the thousand-year-long war to ravage this continent.”
Hearing this, Illyan felt the history of this world unravel in his head. He couldn’t imagine how terrifying this war could be.
“I don’t recommend you use the Dark Stones, though, if you don’t want to specialize in darkness,” Aurelia’s tone turned serious.
“It doesn’t matter if you use several types of stones once in a while since absorbing all kinds of elements inside the body could be beneficial. If needed, you could even get rid of the element while just absorbing the energy within. However, once you start to absorb only one type of stone for a long time, the element within it will slowly seep into one’s body and merge with it to an irreversible state. Some people use it to their advantage, but it also seals their path in different branches of magic.”
Aurelia waved the stone in her hand as if attracting Illyan’s attention.
Illyan felt the wave of scorching wind hit his face as he realized that this stone was probably imbued with an element of fire or something similar.
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The stone was different from the Dark Stone as it was pulsing with orange and red colors. It seemed to be more volatile as the colors changed all the time.
“This is the Fire Stone. Of course, it is the most common one with normal flames. The ones of higher grade, for example, turn blue because of high heat. There are also a lot of different variations. Some are similar to each other, while others are completely different.”
“I don’t know what you want to do in the future, but if you want to progress further with your lacking talent, then external use is a must. However, one must go about it in a smart way. Change the types of Mana Stones every time you use them, or in the best scenario, use the Pure Mana Stones. Unfortunately, these are quite rare.”
She sighed after saying all of this.
Illyan was also silent as he absorbed all of the new knowledge she taught him.
These recent days were truly fruitful for him as he learned so much from Aurelia.
Aurelia also benefited from him as he taught her where all of the acupoints were and even showed her a bit of his [The Way of the Body].
He didn’t plan to teach her the technique personally since he wouldn’t spread the techniques of his benefactor to strangers, but he at least explained to her the concept.
What he didn’t expect was that Aurelia managed to use this concept to push her body control to the limit.
This made him envy her a lot, but he didn’t show it on his face.
Illyan knew that his talent would not allow him to stand at the top of his peers.
But he didn’t mind. He would just outlive them one by one.
So, Illyan wasn’t anxious. He would slowly progress on his way as he learned new things.
Slowly but surely.
Right now, he was pondering when to start cultivating the first layer of [Thirteen Layers of the Blood Energy].
He didn’t train his body much as he focused all his time on perfecting his body foundation.
Of course, it wouldn’t be completely perfect, but it would be much better than some Rogue Acolytes who started to cultivate when they were old or with some kind of injury that made their body incomplete.
The flow of energy would be impeded in that case, and the hope of reaching higher stages would diminish every day.
When Illyan asked Aurelia for advice, she nodded.
“My father said that we will arrive in a day or so. Once we settle down, I will help you cultivate the first layer. It should be easy with your powerful body,” Aurelia said with an annoyed expression.
It wasn’t because she needed to teach him. She was actually surprised that Illyan’s company was much more pleasant than she expected. She thought that her grandfather was really good at discerning people…
What she was truly annoyed at was her father.
Illyan was always cautious when meeting with her as they made a deal to keep their distance. While they started to discuss magic in private, they still wanted to be just physician colleagues in the public eye.
For Illyan, it was just his nature, but for Aurelia, it was because of her father.
There was hidden resentment in her eyes as her father tried to control every aspect of her life.
But she didn’t yield as she ran around all the time avoiding him. One of her refuges was the institute where her grandfather lived.
Unfortunately, this time she couldn’t refuse to go on this expedition.
At least, a pleasant surprise appeared.
When she glanced at Illyan, who was focused on polishing his body, she sighed.
If only he had better talent…
How much would he be able to achieve?
But she felt that she hadn’t seen everything he could offer.
The flaws in his body showed how much trauma his body had suffered over the years, yet he survived.
Not even battle-hardened warriors had such blemishes. Even trolls with their super regeneration didn’t have such problems despite being hurt all the time.
It made her wonder if he was hurting himself to refine his body on purpose.
Such brutal techniques definitely existed, but he didn’t seem to own them and would need to rely purely on his regeneration to achieve this body strength and these flaws, which would be insanity to do so.
As she thought this, they left for their caravans as it was time for the convoy to set off.
Both of them didn’t waste much time as they mostly talked directly with each other and didn’t talk about superfluous things like other educated people would do. They were more practical as they valued their time.
Illyan also didn’t want to be seen with her as he had already noticed that Brynjar was staring at him from time to time. He didn’t know what his problem was, but he didn’t want to bring any more attention to himself. Fortunately, he had a good excuse to visit her since he taught her the new medicine methods, something she, as a physician, should learn.
Not to mention, it was Vael himself who wanted him to take care of her in this profession, so Illyan just fulfilled the request of his benefactor. Nothing more, nothing less.
Illyan once again sat down and talked with Korin while waiting in the moving caravan.
The sun was slowly rising as it reached the highest point of the sky before once again falling down.
It was at that moment when the convoy finally left the canopy of the trees as the big clearing unraveled in front of it with a very big construct made out of black stones in the distance.
This black city was Faruin, the mining city of Dust and Iron.
It was connected to one of the mountain peaks with various rails coming inside of the man-made tunnels.
There were no high buildings in the city, or at least none that Illyan could see, but the city was still awe-inspiring to him.
The convoy started to slow down before it fully stopped.
“Hmm? What is happening? Why aren’t we going to the city directly? I waited for two damn months to arrive here and we need to wait again?” Arun, who had been boredly sitting around the entire time, now anxiously asked as he trembled in excitement.
“They need to find out if the city is safe. Who knows what kind of creatures have made nests there during these times? If we entered now, we could very well be eaten by demons,” Neddard, the old man who was usually quiet, said this as his face showed a dark smile.
Arun gulped audibly as he looked at Faruin. The awe-inspiring city now looked demure and gloomy as if it was the dark monster that wanted to devour the world.
“Don’t scare him like that, Ned. This is a normal procedure to ensure safety. Nothing to be scared about,” Tami’s husband, Mufa, said this in hopes of calming the youngest Arun.
Slowly, they left the carriage as they waited.
In the center of the camp, all of the forces converged. Be it soldiers, the gang members of both gangs, or the acolytes, they stood close to each other as they prepared to enter the city through the massive stone gate, which showed the grandeur of the old civilization.
Illyan observed in silence as he didn’t need to go with them.
That could mean two things. Either way, physicians weren’t needed during the scouting…
Or they didn’t dare to risk the life of their best physician there because they weren’t confident they could keep him safe despite all of the experts going too…
‘Hopefully, Ezekiel’s scheme won’t affect me…’ Illyan muttered to himself as he saw the rows of soldiers open the moldy and rusty old gate with a clank and squeaking sound as they entered the abandoned city with resolute expressions.