…
Blake returned to his room vexed, after taking a relaxing bath which he had missed for how long, He decided to cultivate in order to take the principal's action out of his mind.
The amount of energy needed to fill up the 16th star was astronomical, but there was nothing that couldn't be solved by excess beast cores. Because of the mass migration of beasts caused by the wyvern Blake had more than a bountiful harvest.
He had 12 normal beast cores, 3 chief rank beast cores, and an elite rank beast core. The team had met a klye, an elite rank beast that looked like a coyote and it was also on the run from the wyvern. With the help of the team and with Blake leading the charge it wasn't difficult for them to put it down.
The team had decided to give him the beast core since he had done most of the work, but on the condition that he sold the corpse in the market and shared the profit equally.
"Come to think of it am actually rich, with so many corpses in my dimensional amulet I won't feel the effect of losing 2 thousand points since I can buy all I need from the adventurer's association with gold." Blake tried consoling himself.
[It kinda sounds weird when it is coming from the mouth of a stingy person.] The system chuckled. It was quite happy that Blake's morale wasn't dampened.
"I am not stingy, is it wrong for me to want my money's worth?" Blake retorted.
[I believe you… Yea you are right.] The system's voice was oozing with sarcasm.
Ignoring the system's sarcastic remarks, he said "Why should I be worried about 2 thousand points when the forest is still in a mess and I can always return and make a bountiful harvest." Blake said with a grin.
"All I need to do now is to advance to the champion realm so as to increase my hunting speed," Blake said with an excited look on his face because he was just a few steps away from the champion realm.
Not wasting more time, Blake brought out a beast core and began absorbing its energy.
…
After 4 straight hours of absorbing energy, Blake felt a burst of energy in his body causing the 16 stars and 34 pathways to lit up, forming a 2d diamond and at the center was Blake's' core where all the mana was generated before being distributed through the 34 pathways.
(AN: Not sure if you can visualize it, but see it as a 2d diamond with 4 cardinal points, two lines on each side cross to the other. A star was located at every intersection and the lines connecting them are the pathways.)
"Why is it looking like the base of a construction?" Blake asked with a confused expression.
Apart from the burst of energy, he didn't feel much pain at least when compared to the fusion process, but the formation of the stars and pathways gave him the feeling it was the foundation for large construction.
[Well it is. The champion realm is considered as the foundation of a mage. It is at this realm that one can call him/herself a mage, the warrior stage can be considered as receiving buffs, while the champion realm is the beginning of the real deal.
The abilities of the different elements would be more prominent especially the earth, lightning, and space element.] The system confined his hunch.
"Finally!" Blake exclaimed in joy. Finally, he would be able to act as one with the power of three elements.
Blake quickly contained his excitement and asked. "So, what am I expecting in the construction?"
[Well the so-called construction is that of an hourglass. The Azkelwart hourglass to be precise.
For you to advance to the hero realm you have to fully construct the protective frame of the hourglass which includes; the base, the 4 pillars, and the top.] The system replied.
"I guess there's no time to rest…" Blake helplessly sighed. Right now, he needed his mom's hug because everything seemed to be endless and tiring, but the problem was that everything he was doing was to get back to her.
"Well, time to test out these abilities!" Blake quickly prepared and headed for the concealed space.
…
"Let's begin with fire." Blake wasn't in a rush, so he decided to leave the best for the last.
He started off by conjuring a simple fireball. He discovered that both the fire's hotness and his casting speed had greatly increased.
Blake decided to try out a few things. He first conjured a ball of flame at his right hand before charging up a flame burst at his left, them he executed a semi flame burst to propel himself forward.
"Seems all I needed was to advance in other to triple cast." Blake was marveled by his ability to triple cast.
[Once you advance in realm you will gain an increase in your mana control and since you were not too far from learning how to triple cast it now looked as if it came with your advancement.] The system corrected him.
The system was right, Blake had gone through a lot of fights in the past few days that help him gain some insights and experience in mana control especially when it came to casting spells. coupled with his array drawing training and other similar training aimed at increasing his focus Blake was just a step away from triple casting which his peers were still far from.
"I guess you I right but I still need to work on my mana control, because I still kind of stiff when triple casting." Blake now understood why both the professors and the system placed great importance on mana control.
"Alright, let's get to the main course." Blake's smile was full of anticipation as he wanted to test the powers of an ignitor.
According to the information gotten from both the books on the 2nd floor of the library and the system, the champion level of the fire pathway was the ignitor which mostly dealt with the will of the user. An ignitor had the power to control flames both foreign and the one cast by the user as long as they had enough will.
Normally, pyromancers have the power to conjure flames as long as they had enough mana, but once the fire spell had been released no other changes could be made to the spell. An ignitor had the power to make alterations to the fire-based spells. For example, if a candle was lit, an ignitor can increase the intensity of the flame or cause it to explode by using both his will and mana to command the surrounding fire particles to add up with that of the candle flame.
(AN: Just a reminder. Nature's energy is made up of all the particles 'smaller energy units' of all the elements.)
The stronger the flame in both intensity or size, the greater the amount of will needed to alter it and the will be needed to do all these came from one's psyche. The stronger one's psyche was the stronger he would be as an ignitor.
"Shit what the fuck am I doing?" Blake yelped when he realized his flames were scorching the areas around the ancestral tree, he quickly used his will to turn off the flames.
(AN: I think it sounds kind of weird for an ignitor to extinguish flames but it is better to name it that rather than extinguisher.)
"I need a safer environment to practice my spells, the power of my spells are increasing and if things get out of hand the concealed space might be ruined. The castle's training grounds were ruled out because people will know I have advanced, leaving me with the forest as the only option left." Blake sighed helplessly.
He hadn't thought that being ahead of his peers will cause so much discomfort, unless he was to reduce the intensity of his flames he wouldn't be able to train his fore element in the concealed space.
After trying out a few more things, Blake went over to the lightning element. Although he had the greatest affinity with the lightning element, the space element was still the strongest so he decided to leave it for last.
Just like the system said, the warrior stage was just buffing the cultivator, while the champion realm was the real deal.
The name of the champion realm of the lightning pathway was, electrode because he had truly become a living electricity conductor.
His lightning abilities had under major changes, it had gone from being buffs to being active damage-dealing spells. He could now release the electricity generated from his body like a bolt of lightning, dealing both physical and stun damage to the target.
The chances of getting stunned was dependent on the target's resistance and one's resistance to an element was dependent on his/her level and element.