Week 2
Alerius was again sited in the back of the classroom during the second lesson which took place a week after the first one. He had spent his first week in the library reading any book he could find that talked about cultivation. He had been trying to come up with a plan that would maximize his ability to change his talent at will but at the same time would allow him to deceive others into thinking that he was following advice he was given by the registrar just in case he was being monitored by someone who could see his stats. His time in the library had not been spent in vain, he had discovered that using the spiritual elixir weekly when your soul has not reached 60 will destabilize the core and if advanced to paste phase when it has not stabilized then the minimum required stats to reach Solid Phase would increase from 60 in all the main stats to 80 in all his main attributes before reaching the Solid Phase. This meant that following the registrars advice would make it hard for him to reach the Solid Phase.
I will just have to think about it later. He thought when Instructor arrived. He had to pay attention because the Instructor had promised to start teaching magic that day.
"Today I will be talking about magic but before I start, are there any questions about what was covered last week?" The Instructor asked.
she continued talking when no one raised his hand "I will start with explaining what magic is. What you call magic is simply the manipulation of aura. Scholars call magic as Aura manipulation or Aura Shaping so in most books, magic will be written as Aura shaping or Aura manipulation. The two words can be interchanged but usually Aura manipulation is used when Energy based magic is used and The term Aura shaping came about because Aura needs to be shaped in a specific shape before it can be crystallized."
She held out her hand and A ball of white light appeared on top of it "this is Aura manipulation." She closed her hand and the ball of light winked out and a silver crystalline sword materialized in her hand. "This is Aura shaping. The sword is made from crystallized Aura."
Wow!
Alerius was awestruck. He had heard about cultivators creating weapons and armor through Aura crystalization before but this was the first time he saw it.
"Whether its energy based magic or Aura crystalization, magic is powered by spiritual energy. The quality of spiritual energy of every one from Gas to Solid Phase is the same. So its theoretically possible for someone in the Gas Phase to Perform the same type of Magic as someone in the Solid Phase as long as that Gas Phase person has the suitable stats. This means that if a dud could some how manage to raise his stats so that they are the same with mine but still stay be in the Gas Phase then its possible for him/her to perform any type of magic that I can do. The only difference would be that he/her would run out of spiritual energy faster."
Really!
Alerius closed his open mouth. he looked around and discovered that he was not the only one who had been shocked by this revelation.
"It isn't all that surprising if you think about it. You all know that duds can recharge circular crystal coins and those contain energy equivalent to that of a Liquid phase cultivator. The only thing stopping duds from performing magic is that they have no way of producing life energy so they can't increase their attributes. the point I am trying to make is that before the Underlord realm, the level of your attributes determine what type of magic you can perform and not spiritual energy. If two people in different phases have the same attributes then the only advantage someone in a higher phase has is that his spiritual energy would last longer if they performed the same magic, so if there in a fight then the one in higher phase would outlast the one in a lower phase."
She turned to the board and wrote:
-aura
-light
-fire
-lightning
-telekinesis
-force field
-aura crystalization
-runes
"At your level, these are the type of aura manipulations you can achieve. Controlling Aura is the foundation of all magic so for the next 6 months I shall teach you about ways of detecting and controlling your aura. Then in the last 6 months of the year that's when I shall go into details about the other abilities."
The Instructor briefly spoke about the other abilities and then talked about types of meditation and visualization techniques used to detect and control one's own aura. At the end of the lesson, Alerius had finally come up with a plan.
*****
Week 22
Spiritual Energy: 39
Life Energy: 139
Natural Energy: 0
Talent: 3.5
Main Attributes
Soul: 40
Aura: 40
Mind: 12
Secondary Attributes
Spirit: 13
Will: 11
Analyze: 12
Perception: 11
Knowledge: 10
Alerius's mouth tilted upward when he saw the progress he had made. He had been taking a spiritual elixir every week for the past 5 months and the spiritual elixir he had taken the previous night had expanded his core to the highest level it could reach in the Paste Phase.
With the help of spiritual elixirs, he had reached the paste phase in the eleventh week of his stay at the academy. He had then continued taking the spiritual until he had reached the apex of the Paste Phase.
Now that he had reached the apex, Alerius decided to increase his attributes by adding 10 for the ones which where below 20. The Instructor had told them in one the lessons that checking the status of other people was a very common ability among cultivators so he had waited until now to increase his other attributes in case he was being secretly monitored. The good news was that the amount of energies one has cannot be seen by other people. Only talent and the attributes could be seen, so increasing his stats earlier would have been found suspicious because someone with talent of 3.5 would not have extra spiritual life energy to spend on other attributes not connected to advancement. Alerius had even bought the Hope Portion last week so that when he increased his attributes, people will think it is because of the portion.
Alerius didn't feel any different as he increased his stats one by one but when the last attribute had reached 20: the world suddenly became open to Alerius, his vision became sharper and the colors in his room became more vivid. When he looked at his body, he could see very faint grey smoke coming from his body and extending to about a meter from his body.
That's my Aura, he thought, it looks just like the Instructor said.
Alerius tried to move the smoke around his hands but the Aura did not move. He went through all the techniques he had been shown on how to control Aura but he still couldn't control it.
I have just increased my stats he thought maybe it will become easier to control once time has passed.
Alerius decided to do the other thing he had been waiting to reach the apex of paste phase for; converting energy.
Alerius hesitated for a while. He knew that to proceed meant giving up use of the spiritual elixir. He first checked his status:
Spiritual Energy: 39
Life Energy: 79
Natural Energy: 0
Talent: 3.5
Main Attributes
Soul: 40
Aura: 40
Mind: 22
Secondary Attributes
Spirit: 23
Will: 21
Analyze: 22
Perception: 21
Knowledge: 20
"I don't have a choice," Alerius said out loud, "the life energy is not enough for me to reach the Solid Phase even if I hadn't increased the attributes."
Alerius now needed all his main attributes to reach 80 for him to advance to the Solid Phase. He knew that this would be the result of taking the spiritual elixir weekly with a soul attribute of less than 60. He was pretending to have a talent of 3.5 so he couldn't have increased it to 60 without it being suspicious.
"This is the price of being weak."
He unclenched his clenched hands and took in deep breaths to calm himself.
Once he was calm, he visualized his core as a transparent sphere containing glowing liquid which represented his spiritual energy. He then visualized the sphere growing smaller until it became as small as a dot.
At first nothing happened but after a few minutes Alerius felt his body start getting hot. At first it was bearable but as the heat kept increasing, it started getting painful. This continued until his body felt like it was on fire. He heard someone shouting only to realize that he was hearing his voice shouting. The pain kept increasing until Alerius passed out.
When he came to, Alerius discovered his body was drenched in sweat. He had been told the first time converting energy was painful because the first time he converted energy his core would slightly crack but he didn't think it would be that painful.
He could feel his hands shake when he remembered the pain. He was glad that he just had to go through that kind of pain once, he didn't think he would be strong enough to endure that kind of pain every time he converted energy.
The pain is behind me now, he thought, I hope it would be worth it.
He then checked his status
Spiritual Energy: 39
Life Energy: 79
Natural Energy: 1
Talent: 3.5
Main Attributes
Soul: 40
Aura: 40
Mind: 22
Secondary Attributes
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Spirit: 23
Will: 21
Analyze: 22
Perception: 21
Knowledge: 20
He let out a weary sigh, "at least it worked and my natural energy has increased.
The conversion of energy had tired him, he now understood why cultivators where advised to convert energy right before going to sleep.
He knew that the weakness he felt would not stop until his soul had recovered even if he slept, so he decide to increase his soul to 60 in order for his soul to be recovering faster so that he can be converting energy daily.
*****
Week 25
It had been three weeks since Alerius had been able to see his own Aura but he still could control it. The only good thing that had happened in the past 3 weeks was that he had discovered that his soul recovered faster than normal so he was able to convert energy twice in a day. The special ability that let him change his talent at will might have also been responsible for his faster soul recovery.
In the past three weeks he had managed to convert 42 natural energy units, he had then changed his talent to 1 and converted the natural energy to 4 units of life energy.
Spiritual Energy: 39
Life Energy: 63 (59 + 4)
Natural Energy: 0
Talent: 3.5
Main Attributes
Soul: 60
Aura: 40
Mind: 22
Secondary Attributes
Spirit: 23
Will: 21
Analyze: 22
Perception: 21
Knowledge: 20
Alerius was starting to suspect that his inability to control his Aura might be related to the instability caused to his soul which might have been caused due to taking the spiritual elixir weekly when his soul was below 60.
Alerius decided to add 10 to his attributes which where in the twenties to see if his control problem would be fixed.
Spiritual Energy: 39
Life Energy: 3 (0+3)
Natural Energy: 0
Talent: 3.5
Main Attributes
Soul: 60
Aura: 40
Mind: 32
Secondary Attributes
Spirit: 33
Will: 31
Analyze: 32
Perception: 31
Knowledge: 30
He saw that the smoke which represented his Aura had thickened and become more clear after the addition of life energy to his attributes.
He tried to move the smoke which covered his arms and this time it moved slightly.
Yes, he thought, I was right
His body brimmed with excitement. Moving Aura, even if slightly was the first step when it came to controlling Aura. Now that he could make his Aura move, all that was left was training.
*****
Week 26
Alerius wiped sweat from his fore head. He had been training hard in Aura control for the past week. He had made a lot of progress in the past week that with a lot of effort he could now make the aura around his hands stretch to about 4 meters away from his body. The maximum distance aura can stretch is determined by dividing the Aura attribute by 10.
In its natural state, aura will cover the body up to about a meter from the body, in this form it is called a Shroud.
Alerius was trying and failing to form a Domain made of aura around him with a radius was 4 meters. A Domain is when Aura from all parts of the body is stretched to the maximum distance possible so that it forms a dome of aura around the body. If he focused on a single body part, he was able to stretch the aura around that part up to four meters but he was having a hard time of stretching the aura which surrounded all his body parts outwards at the same time.
Being able to form a Domain signified that one had a rudimentary control over his aura. The Instructor would start looking at magic the following so he had to at least be able to form a domain by then.
*****
Week 40
"I think by now, we have covered everything apart from runes and aura crystalization." The Instructor said pointing at the board
From his usual spot, alerius could see that on the board the instructor had written:
-aura
-telekinesis
-force fields
-light
-lightning
-fire
-aura crystalization
-runes
Alerius had by now managed to master aura control but it had taken him until week 30 to do so. When it came to magic, he could perform all the abilities they had covered so far though he had to expend a lot of spiritual energy to do so.
"The first 6 months had been spent on teaching you aura control."
Alerius could now appreciate why so much time was spent on teaching aura control as every magical ability demanded different ways of manipulating aura.
"The following month after that, I had shown you how to move objects with your aura and how to create force fields."
The Instructor pointed at the chair that was in front and it started floating. "Telekinesis involves wrapping your aura around the object you want to move and then willing it to move. It is impossible to manipulate foreign Aura, so you can't move any living thing this way. This this is why a Domain and a Shroud are very important to a cultivator."
Aura from different cultivators would repel each other, so it required a lot of spiritual energy to cast magic in an opponents Domain. A Shroud acts as a permanent barrier and lessens the power of enemy magical attacks. The stronger the shroud the weaker the opponents magic would reach the body. Alerius knew that it was because of these two reasons that cultivators liked to use Aura crystallized weapons instead of energy based magic as the former would not be affected by either a Domain or Shroud.
The Instructor pointed on the floor and the chair floated back to the ground. Alerius knew that the hand gestures were not necessary when it came to casting magic. the Instructor was only using them so that the students can see what was happening.
The Instructor made another gesture and the air around her body started shimmering. "Force fields require Aura hardening and are primary used as shields and barriers. This is different from telekinesis because in this case the aura is shaped in a specific shape and hardened while telekinesis requires wrapping gaseous Aura around the object to be moved."
She made another gesture and the chair was cut into two. "It is impossible to directly cut through a living thing's skin with force fields so you cannot directly cut an opponent's head this way. Force fields can only be used to attack bluntly but they are very effective when it comes to defense and will stop most magics."
Alerius knew that the reason why it was impossible to cut through living skin was because Aura was very dense inside the body so it easily repelled foreign Aura.
"The past few weeks, we have covered how light, fire and lightning is produced. Light is very easy to manipulate because our spiritual energy is made from light energy from the sun. It is used mostly in creation of illusions." This time without making any gesture a transparent copy of the Instructor appeared beside her. "At lower levels; illusions lack substance but at advanced levels they can interact with the environment." The copy became more solid and managed to pick up chalk before it dispersed.
She held out her hand and a ball of fire appeared in her hand. "Fire involves vibrating Aura at a very fast frequency," she said, "different frequencies produce different flames." The flame's color started alternating in all the colors of the rainbow.
It appeared simple but it was very complicated; it required constantly changing the vibration of the affected aura between seven different frequencies. Alerius could produce the seven different flames independently but he couldn't replicate what the Instructor was doing, he couldn't even alternate between two different flames.
"Lastly, we went through the techniques used to create lightning: production of lightning requires bringing your positively charged aura and mixing it with your negatively charged aura." The flames disappeared from above her hand and sparks of electricity started dancing on her fingers.
"Today, I shall talk about runes and Aura crystalization." She said and then drew a symbol in midair with her finger. The symbol made of silver light remained drawn in midair. "Runes are symbols which when drawn will produce an effect. This effect can vary from production of heat to control of gravity. I won't go into details just know that Runes must be drawn using Natural Energy and are powered by Spiritual Energy. A rune won't work if drawn without Natural Energy. This is the other use of Natural Energy."
A crystalline sword materialized inside the Instructors hand. Alerius could see about three runes on the blade.
"These runes you can see help to hold the shape of the sword. It is possible to form this sword by shaping Aura into the sword's shape and then crystallizing it but it takes a lot of effort and the sword produced would be different every time. The stability and sharpness is not always guaranteed so Aura crystallized weapons are formed by engraving Runes on your soul. These runes engraved on my soul are the ones you see reflected on this sword. Some soul runes will also temporarily increase some of your attributes when you power them and crystallize a weapon and this is very common in crystallized armor. The amount of space available on your soul for rune engraving is limited so the number of crystallized weapons a cultivator can have is finite."
She then produced two clear crystals shaped like tear drops. One had runes on it while the other one was clear. "These are called Aura Blue Prints. One is a Skill Crystal while the other is an Ability Crystal."
She lifted the one with runes up and said, "this is an ability crystal. Runes for a specific weapon are stored inside and once assimilated in your body, the runes stored inside the crystal will be engraved on your soul. It is activated with both Natural Energy and Life Energy at the same time"
She held up the other crystal and said, "this is a skill crystal, it holds a detailed memory of when a particular energy based magical skill was performed. Once this is assimilated inside your body, you will experience the memory has if it were your own. You will feel everything the owner of the memory was feeling at the time the skill was performed. This crystal helps learn energy based magical skills faster because it would feel like you were the one who performed the skill in the stored memory. This only requires Life Energy to be activated but be warned. Use of too many skill crystals will distort your own personality if your knowledge attribute is low. Skill crystals can only be produced by Underlords so the memory contained in skill crystals belongs to them."
She put the crystals away and said "The main difference between the Aura blue prints is that one helps in crystallizing Aura while the other crystal helps with energy based magics. So if you are still having trouble with the magical abilities we have covered so far, I would urge you to buy a skill crystal from the research department of the academy."
Alerius decided to visit the research department after the lesson to see how much the skill crystals cost. He could use all the help he could get because the tournament would be held the following month.