When the lesson ended, Hathaway had reminded Ronald that elven magic was very difficult to learn and told him not to put all his efforts into it. At that time, Ronald didn't take it to heart, but when Ronald started condensing runes, he realized that opening a dimensional rift was much more difficult than he had imagined.

Ronald exhausted all his mental strength but was unable to condense any runes.

The sequence was correct and the steps were not missed...where exactly did the problem occur?

After Hathaway woke up, Ronald told her about his doubts.

Ronald thought he could get answers from the elf, but to his dismay, she just acted like it was to be expected. Helpless, Ronald could only continue to explore on his own.

Because Agatha was injured, the team rested in place for a week.

During this week, Ronald thoroughly studied how to construct storage magic runes. His mind was filled and emptied over and over again continuously for 7 days. Ronald didn't learn the storage magic, but he successfully advanced to a level 3 apprentice.

The increase in strength that came with the promotion was still very noticeable. Ronald's mental sea capacity expanded a lot, his magic power also increased greatly, and Ronald could now cast area spells.

When Ronald was familiarizing himself with the apprentice-level area magic, Hathaway discovered that Ronald could cast spells without a staff or incantations.

Casting apprentice-level magic without incantations was a hallmark of a formal mage.

Hathaway guessed that Ronald was a genius student from a famous magic university.

This guess was purely because Ronald's performance matched this persona very well - his talent was outrageously strong, but his everyday knowledge was extremely lacking.

This image easily led Hathaway to think of those human mages who had left illustrious names in epic memoirs.

Their first half of life was very similar to Ronald's - they were carefully confined in magic towers by their mentors until they had a certain ability to protect themselves before being allowed to travel around.

Thinking that she had actually received a future human archmage, Hathaway felt a little excited.

Driven by intense curiosity, Hathaway used special methods to check Ronald's rank.

When she discovered that Ronald was still only a low-level apprentice mage, Hathaway looked incredulous.

She thought her magic detector was broken, so she also probed the female members of the Blazing Rose team and cross-checked their ranks afterwards...

The results showed everything was correct.

Hathaway was dumbfounded.

The magic detector had no problems, so the issue must be with Ronald.

Hathaway guessed in her heart that Ronald had a magic detector that shielded against probes, this kind of detector was far more precious than detection-type detectors, and ordinary forces simply could not possess it...

Hathaway became more and more curious about Ronald, and the two showed more and more intimacy in their daily lives. Occasionally, Hathaway would even share food unique to the elven race with Ronald, which was treatment that none of the female team members had received before.

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However, there was also distress in this.

Ronald was very grateful in his heart when Hathaway shared food with him, but Ronald was a little intolerant of her arrogant attitude of "Elven cuisine pairing is number one in the world."

As a person from a gourmet country, Ronald also had his own pride.

He could be servile for knowledge, but would never blindly kowtow.

At the moment, the two were arguing over which diet was healthier.

"The elven race has existed for tens of thousands of years, and our dietary practices have been passed down for tens of thousands of years. Apples with honey is the best pairing refined by our ancestors through continuous trials and improvements. On what basis can you say this is not healthy!" Hathaway shouted at Ronald, looking like an angry, puffed up cat.

Ronald was also a little angry: "Long existence does not represent correctness! Do you know what an echo chamber is? It's when everyone around you says what you want to hear, and then you think it's right, but the actual situation is that you've been locked in a carefully crafted confidence cage. Take my advice, you really should try other foods, then you'll know how embarrassing it is to be proven wrong."

The stubbornness of the elves was fully demonstrated in the argument.

Hathaway tilted her chin and said coldly, "I don't understand what you're saying. In any case, fried fish with apples and honey is the most delicious and healthiest food in the world."

The team's mage Anderson somehow made his way over at this time as well. Seeing the untouched honey-roasted fish on Ronald's plate, he showed a regretful expression and said, "Miss Hathaway, I am extremely interested in the elves' dietary practices. May I have the honor of your sharing?"

Anderson spoke politely and even performed an aristocratic courtesy.

He had practiced this move for a long time and it never failed with girls.

But there were always times when it didn't work. Today, Anderson encountered the first rejection in his life.

"Mage sir, please do not disturb our meal." Hathaway said coldly, turning her head.

These days, whenever Anderson was free, he would show off his gentlemanly demeanor in front of Hathaway. Hathaway was already thoroughly annoyed by this human, and now that Hathaway already knew who was truly good to her, she didn't want to pay any attention to Anderson at all, even with his masculine good looks that strongly attracted females.

Anderson's expression changed drastically. Due to his profession, he was usually treated deferentially wherever he went, for fear of offending him. Capable mages were always popular, and people around them usually pampered them. Take the matter of noble status for example, only formal mages could obtain honorary noble status, while Anderson was only at the advanced apprentice level currently, far from reaching the standards for conferment. But in his daily life, he always acted like a noble, and all the team members knew this, yet no one exposed it.

In addition, he was often fawned upon by female adventurers (Mia), so Anderson developed the prejudice that as long as he beckoned, females would not reject him...

And so he encountered Hathaway's merciless rejection.

Anderson couldn't believe his ears. He hadn't anticipated at all that Hathaway would refuse him over such a trivial matter. Weren't they already friends?

Anderson looked at Hathaway in disbelief, only to be met with her icy gaze.

Anderson opened and closed his mouth, wanting to say something, but his mind was blank.

He was devastated by Hathaway's rejection. At this moment, he even forgot to maintain basic decency.

Although Anderson had verbally attacked Ronald several times, Ronald did not harbor much enmity towards Anderson, because Ronald was very clear about the purpose of Anderson's behavior - it was the clumsy performance of a male driven mad by the desire to mate. Ronald was very interested in elven magic, but he did not have much interest in Hathaway herself, because Ronald deeply understood a saying - "The more beautiful a woman is, the more trouble she brings."

Ronald already had a bunch of problems following his butt, he didn't want to provoke more trouble that he couldn't withstand at his current stage. So the best way to deal with it now was to keep an appropriate distance.

Ronald's aesthetic was being suffocated, not free breathing.

The other members of the team also noticed the tense atmosphere between the three and hurried over from what they were doing.

Ronald didn't want things to get out of hand, so he gave Anderson a way out.

"Mr. Anderson, I think you should go back and calm down."

A tactful person would have already gone down the extended olive branch at this time, but Anderson had been spoiled by those around him into a princess mentality. Ronald's good intentions did not receive gratitude, but were instead taken by the other party as a "victory declaration." So Ronald became the scapegoat for Anderson to vent his inner shame and resentment.

"Who do you think you are, telling me what to do!" Anderson said with a sideways glance and disdain.