Ryker exhaled a slow breath, trying his best to control his compulsions. He felt that it was slowly becoming easier over time… but he felt that he also couldn’t relax. The longer he went, the easier it would become. But if he allowed himself to slip up once, just might fight himself falling into an endless spiral.

According to what he had found out about the Adonis Clan, it was surprisingly similar to the Echo Clan that Rosemary was a descendent of. In fact, If Ryker was correct, Rosemary’s Echo Clan had a derivative Spiritual Resonance created from the Adonis Clan’s own, much like Patience’s father had a derivative Spiritual Resonance from the Echo Clan itself.

The difference was that the principles of the Spiritual Resonances were entirely different.

The Adonis Clan had a Spiritual Resonance known as the Temporal Weave. The first portion referred to Time Type Spirit Energy, while the second was related to the net of runes that covered his soul.

The Temporal Weave Spiritual Resonance was unique in that rather than relying on the body to fuel it, it relied on the soul. But as a result, it was likewise manifold more dangerous.

The more Ryker read about it, the more serious his expression became because he realized that he truly couldn’t allow the cat lady to return. Even if they sent people to investigate, that was the far better outcome. He had to delay as much as he could.

Because if all of this was true, the fact that he could pair Temporal Weave with a Pure Soul would make him a person these Clans would want to eliminate no matter what.

Temporal Weave was a Spiritual Resonance that relied heavily on the soul, but what did that actually mean? If the body was fatigued, one would gasp for breath or feel a burning in their lungs, but what about when the soul was fatigued?

The former could be trudged through even in battle, but if the soul was fatigued, whether it was casting techniques, controlling one’s Spirit Beasts, or even staying conscious, it was all impossible.

In fact, if one pushed their soul too far, it could cause permanent harm.

However, Ryker’s soul was akin to a tank in this regard. Even after the Divine Daggers cut into him, aside from a slight tremble, nothing happened to his soul. Even further than that, when he used Temporal Weave for the first time, according to these recordings, he should have at least passed out…

But he felt perfectly fine.

It could even be said the reason the cat lady’s Clan had the center throne rather than the Adonis Clan was precisely because their Spiritual Resonance had too many weaknesses, and unlike the others, it couldn’t be trained to the point one reached an ease of use.

In addition…

… Even during this 97th iteration, it seems that the issues of mental degeneration have not been properly solved. A weakening of the Spiritual Resonance in turns leads to a shut down of the body’s function, presenting as a deterioration of the soul and an atrophy of the musculoskeletal system…

These were the words that truly hit Ryker like a truck.

These people were trying to find a method of dealing with what Ryker assumed were problems quite similar to himself, and as a result, they were tweaking their experimental parameters up until the point his own mother ended up in such a state.

The more Ryker read, the harder it was for him to control his emotions properly, and eventually his heaving breaths were rustling the pages.

He slammed the book down and closed his eyes, waiting until his beating heart could relax. His mother was actually collateral damage to these people.

‘All of these problems seem to be caused by when the Spiritual Resonance is actually used. Could it be that mother was hiding it from me because of that? But in that case, why is it that I haven’t used it a day in my life and yet still ended up with these problems?’

Ryker looked toward the Silver Mirror and seemed to piece things together.

The issue was not as he had thought, but he wasn’t entirely wrong either.

If he was correct, it was a clash of the mirror’s Time Type Spirit Energy and his own Temporal Weave Spiritual Resonance that resulted in this issue. That meant that, technically speaking, he had been dealing with the same mental struggles of the Adonis Clan for a long time already.

However, he hadn’t actually experienced the atrophying or things of the like that these notes mentioned, and the reason for that should be his Pure Soul.

Clearly, his Pure Soul could handle things that other souls could not. In fact, it might have truly been a mistake to hold onto the Silver Mirror for so long…

‘Is it possible that I could cancel a contract and not suffer a weakening of my soul at all?’ Ryker shook his head. ‘Whether my soul is damaged or not, by Circle Talent would still fall out of the realms of perfection.’

After calming down, Ryker shifted his attention to his soul. With a slow and subtle tug, relying on the information he had gathered, he tried to activate his Temporal Weave Spiritual Resonance again.

Almost instantly, his Divined Chains roared to life and rushed out of him, filling the entire room with illusory chains.

Ryker chuckled and opened his eyes to witness the scene. He had truly taken his foot off the gas to the best of his ability, and yet this had still happened. Was there really no way to bring it down to a lower level than this?

‘Hm… Right now, I’m just trying to control the Temporal Weave Resonance, but not the Divined Chain portion. In that case, how about I try to…’

Instantly, the chains listened to his command, but Ryker also began to feel a slight fatigue in his body as though he had started a light jog. Even so, it wasn’t nearly the same sort of fatigue he should have felt using his Spiritual Resonance for the first time.

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Although it wasn’t as exaggerated as passing out, there were many children who balled their eyes out trying to catch their breath.

When one did a workout, it would take time to ramp up to that point of absolute fatigue. But with a Spiritual Resonance, it was like you were teleported through time to the end of a marathon run you had no recollection of. It could truly hit you like a train.

But Ryker felt… Fine.

More than fine, he actually found it quite relaxing.

‘Does this mean I can finally take those chains off the big guy?’ Ryker grinned to himself. He thought he had missed out on unlocking Phoenix’s full potential, but maybe not?

In this time crunch, he really couldn’t afford to drag his feet. If he could unlock all of Phoenix’s talent now, it would be a huge help to his speed of progress.

Ryker retracted the chains back into his body then tried to manifest them more normally. They appeared in the air around him, illusory and without form, but somehow they felt… substantial.

The more he looked at them, the more beautiful he felt they were.

They were chains of dense black, etched with sky blue runes that resonated with an unmatched majesty.

These were the Divined Chains, the Spiritual Resonance capable of locking and sealing even the skies if he so chose.

He had seen his father do battle once against a Spirit Beast. The moment he analyzed one of their attacks, it would never be able to use it again. The poor beast was restricted one after another until it couldn’t do anything but try to swipe at them. But the trouble was that it was never a Combat Type to begin with, so it couldn’t be much more than pitiful.

That was the day that Helios realized that if he wanted Ryker to give his contract for another, he shouldn’t completely emasculate the beast he wanted his son to pick first.

If he had been fighting a junior of the Valorian Clan instead of Patience’s fool of a father, there was even a chance that they could have sealed Phoenix’s Earth Reborn Talent and left him at a huge advantage. At that point, how could he win?

Of course, analyzing a Lineal Talent would require someone of Ryker’s grandfather’s strength, not to mention an extremely long battle, or prior preparation and observation.

But that was part of why Ryker felt so long as his father had that Mythical Grade weapon, he would have had a chance to help his mother.

They already had all the information about the beast, his father just needed to prepare the seals ahead of time and there would have been a non-zero chance of success…

And yet, the Mystery Master Alliance…

Ryker shook his head and threw the thought away.

‘… The cat lady said that the reason all of this was possible was because of the Valorian Clan. Assuming she isn’t lying, at least not entirely… that should mean that my Valorian Clan might be using our Spiritual Resonance too simply.

‘What if rather than just reading and reacting, we can do more than that?’

Ryker shelved the thought. It had already taken several hours just to learn a little about the Adonis Clan, he didn’t have the time to study the Valorian Clan’s records as well. At least not right now.

Every library Ryker went into, though, he cleared all the books, shoving them into his storage device and hoping that he would have enough space in the end.

The space in it was quite large. It had accommodated an entire mine’s worth of material, after all. But there was ultimately a limit.

‘So the Temporal Weave Adonis is a much more powerful version of the Echo Spiritual Resonance. In which case…’

Ryker suppressed his Divined Chain Spiritual Resonance and flooded his body with Wind Type Spirit Energy. Then, he flicked out a wind blade and used Temporal Weave at the same time.

His eyes widened.

The wind blade rushed out and increased its size by more than a hundred fold, growing so large that its tails lashed against the tall ceilings and floors. It cracked beneath the sturdy materials and wind lashed whipped out in all directions, Sending Ryker flying.

Luckily, it was formed of his own Spirit Energy, so controlling and diverting it was a breeze. He even managed to land lightly, but his shock wasn’t abated.

‘That… was easily time times more powerful than just using Time Type Spirit Energy to amplify my Spiritual Energy, and it took a fraction of the cost.

‘It’s not just that… but I don’t need to apply the change within my body either. I felt it just now… I could have sent the wind blade out first, and when I was good and ready, or just when it was about to hit an enemy, I could activate my Spiritual Resonance and catch them off guard, flipping it on like a switch.’

This was huge. To think that he would have only just patched his Time Type Spirit Energy problem a small bit, only to end up with an even better solution.

‘Wait, this isn’t a solution, it’s just a far better method. It doesn’t fix that issue at—‘

Ryker’s eyes widened as he had a thought. He swapped out his Wind Type Spirit Energy, then tried to use his Time Type Spirit Energy.

As expected, it was agonizingly slow. But then, he activated Temporal Weave.

WHOOSH!

His Time Type Spirit Energy suddenly began to zip around his body even faster than his usual Spirit Energy. Ryker was in such shock that he almost didn’t react for a moment. He subconsciously punched out and the world collapsed before him, a clap of thunder echoing out in a raging roar.

Ryker slowly pulled his fist back.

‘Wow…’

He felt like he understood. It was possible that an Ancestor of the Adonis Clan had come across Time Type Spirit Energy in the distant path. When they became a God, they had a bout of inspiration and forged the Temporal Weave Spiritual Resonance as a proxy to allow them to use it freely.

If he was correct, it meant that his Time Type Spirit Energy wasn’t behaving oddly at all… that was just the way it was designed to work.

The world always had balance. When something messed with the law and order, there had to be something to give in return, and the slowing of Time Type Spirit Energy was what gave.

Temporal Weave fixed that…

At the cost of the Adonis family’s sanity.

And now, while Ryker was still dealing with those issues, his own mental hurdles were clearly at a far lower bar than what was described in these teachings.

‘If I’m right… it’s like that this 97th iteration was actually somewhat successful… it’s just that you need a Pure Soul to benefit from it properly, and I just so happened to meet the mark.’

Ryker wasn’t losing his sanity, he felt, at least, that he was still sane. His problem was emotional regulation and controlling his impulses, a problem for sure, but one that was far lower on the trouble meter.

‘Then I guess I did all the research for nothing…’

Ryker wasn’t mad. In fact, he chuckled. This was considered a win to him.

But then he had a thought.

‘Did I…? What if I…’

Ryker saturated his body with Wind Type Spirit Energy, then Time Type Spirit Energy. Then, he activated Temporal Resonance.

He flicked out a wind blade then hightailed it out of there. He dove behind a wall and rolled.

BOOM!

The world shook and shards of wood flew in every direction.

Ryker covered his ears and closed his eyes, crouching to protect his body from any unforeseen events.

Slowly, the commotion came to an end and he rose to his feet slowly and peeked around the corner.

‘Holy shit…’

The room was just fine. Or, more accurately, the walls, ceiling, and floors were immaculate, not having a single scratch on them. However, the bookcase he had just emptied was in bits and pieces.

Just now, Ryker had sent a Temporal Weave fuelled wind blade right at it, but it shrugged it off as though he wasn’t even there.

This time, however, it was unrecognizable.

‘… I guess I didn’t waste my time after all…’

That attack was so much more powerful that it shattered something he hadn’t even been able to leave a scratch on before. That attack was at the level where it could one shot the likes of Auberon even if the latter didn’t underestimate him and brought out all his beasts at once.

The only drawback was that, this time, Ryker really felt the drain on his soul. Even so, he felt that he could still send out that attack one more time before passing out entirely.

‘This is amazing…’

Ryker was rarely so enamored. Even when he got Phoenix, to him the big guy was just the “bare minimum”. After all, Phoenix was only an 8th Circle Talent.

Of course, he would still cherish and protect his Spirit Beast like any self-respecting Mythical Master should. However he was also a realist.

But this was completely different. He felt like he was floating on a cloud. He was only in the 6th Enlightenment Realm, but he actually had so much power at his fingertips…

Then he grinned. He suddenly got another idea.