Chapter 227: Intermediate
Hours transitioned into days. His training proceeded far smoother than anyone expected. Because of his experience handling high-level aura techniques that utilized Blood Aura, he was easily able to start using the aura techniques he chose.
Once he reached Novice Mastery in just 5 days, he transitioned to the movement aura technique. Over the course of the next 5 days, he learned the Blood Flow. The only caveat was that he achieved just Beginner Mastery of that technique.
After that, he completely set aside any training related to aura. He closed his eyes and entered the training room in his mind s.p.a.ce. Out of the two offensive spells presented to him, he chose the Fire Nova.
Magic was a concept that he had higher control over and extreme pa.s.sion for. Compared to him, Nefrati was someone who didn"t even know what it was. So her opinions would only make him distracted.
By keeping himself in his training room, a place that Nefrati didn"t know about and couldn"t enter, he wouldn"t be disturbed by her at all. As for her, she was simply confused about what happened to him.
He had closed his eyes and looked like he was sleeping, but that was odd for someone at his stage. She waited for a few hours to see if there was any change to his state, but he stayed that way without budging.
Days pa.s.sed as he remained in that state which kept her puzzled. Meanwhile, Leo was focusing solely on the one spell he chose. Even with the incredible amount of time he had put in, his progress was minuscule.
The entirety of the twenty days almost pa.s.sed but it seemed like Leo wasn"t moving from his place. He wasn"t keeping track of time while practicing and he had blocked off any sound from Nefrati. There was no one to wake him up and tell him that he had run out of time.
Inside the training room, Leo was furiously trying to learn the spell. At this point, he had gotten to Beginner Level proficiency which meant he could use the spell. However, this didn"t satisfy him.
He wanted to be able to use it freely in battle which meant at least novice proficiency. Because he was so fixated on achieving that goal, he had lost all sense of time.
His hands moved rapidly as a surge of magical energy gathered around them, forming a swirling vortex of fiery hues.
When the energy reaches its peak, he pushed his hands forward in a forceful motion, causing the vortex of flames to explode outward. The flames surged forward, in a spluttered matter which made him frown.
His hands stopped moving and the flames stopped in their place before slowly dissipating away.
"What am I doing wrong?" He muttered to himself as he restarted his attempt.
After two more attempts, the flames moved a little more smoothly, but the force behind them was a little lackl.u.s.ter. Leo didn"t lose any determination and kept going.
He looked up to see how far he was from his goal. The golden words on the top of the training room were an indication that he was still in the Beginner stage and that he would need to practice more.
After another failed attempt, he stopped his practice and took a deep breath. He was doing something wrong, but he wasn"t sure what it was. There were two aspects to his magic - one was gathering the fire and the other was pushing it out in a blast. So he had to be making a mistake in one of them.
He sighed and stopped his practice. Instead of going out, however, he went to the book and held his hand on the page. The white room he was in morphed into a marshland where a silhouette appeared in front of him.
Since he was failing, he decided to observe the silhouette and see what he was doing wrong. The silhouette slowly did its motion and released the spell, blasting away the entire area around it.
Leo wasn"t paying attention to the destruction it caused and only concentrated on the magic that was flowing through its body. He realized something that it did that he missed.
He had been trying to control the spread of the fire to make sure it was uniform, while the silhouette was just using all of its power to create an uneven explosion and left it to its own to wreak havoc. His face showed his expression of disbelief. How had he missed something like that?
Fire was an extremely violent element and he was trying to tame it. That decreased the power of his spell far too much.
The training room morphed back into a white room for him to practice. He had elected a plain room because he didn"t need to see destruction. He was only interested in seeing the spell and the effects.
His hand quickly flew into a blur and magical energy gathered around him again. The energy was brought into control with his hands. This time, the magic was slightly larger and more dense. He Beginner anymore, but it wasn"t Novice either. He had jumped to Intermediate Proficiency with that single realization.
Then released the fire energy that he had controlled with his hands.
A large wave of fire exploded outward with great force. He looked up to see if he was right in his expectations. The words didn"t say Beginner anymore, but it wasn"t Novice either. He had jumped to Intermediate Proficiency with that single realization.
Once the high of accomplishing what he wanted slowly faded, something struck him. Time.
He quickly left the training room and back to the real world. His eyes shot open and he took a deep breath.
"How long has it been since I started training?" He asked Nefrati. Because he hadn"t been keeping track of time, he didn"t know whether he was late or not.
"Almost a month." She replied. Finally, he had come out of the weird trance he had been in. He was laying unresponsively for almost three weeks and it made her a little worried about his condition.
Her life was tied to his and if anything happened to him, it would take her with him.
"s.h.i.t!"
He jumped out of the bed and looked around. There wasn"t any change in the room since he entered it, save for the pill box that contained the pill he got from the Blood G.o.d"s temple. After throwing it into his dimensional ring, he looked at himself.
His clothes were still rags, so he quickly changed into a better set. Once he did that, he burst out of the room and rushed downstairs. As he did, he took out the remainder of what he owed the inn.
When he got to the front desk of the inn, it was completely empty, save for the receptionist there. She looked at him and knew he was in a hurry.
"What can I do for you, sir?" She asked him.
"What is the date?"
"28th February, sir."
"Okay. Here is the money for my stay. Keep the change," he said.
He had put down 25000 Starcoins when he owed just 20000. She realized this when she counted the money, but by then he was gone.