Chapter 27: Level up! [3]
Jaden lay asleep at the centre of the boundary of the training room. A few moments later, his eyelids trembled as they slowly lifted... He groggily rubbed his eyes and stood up.
A frown appeared on his face as he looked around. A few moments later, he remembered that he was learning the circulation of 2-star spells... more like he was forcing himself to.
"Why is it so hard?"
Jaden thought as he rubbed his face.
"My whole body is aching because of it..."
Learning a 2-star spell was even harder than mastering a 1-star spell... Jaden had his grimoire and [Epiphany Zone], increasing his overall understanding, but he still could not learn a 2-star spell...
It was his second day at the church, and he still had to learn the nine 2-star spells and a few martial arts to level up... but considering the difficulty of the 2-star spell, the time was not on his side.
He sat in a lotus position and began absorbing the elementals around him, and turned them into mana. Jaden’s mana was very similar to the mana found in the environment. Due to his eight-elemental physique, this, however, did not make things easy for him, as he had to absorb all eight types of elementals to generate mana... it did give him the advantage of his mana being much purer, and he had way more mana than normal Initiates.
The enhanced Intelligence stats also increased his control over mana and his overall understanding.
Even then, it was not enough for him to learn a 2-star spell within the remaining time, and Jaden knew this... so he simply chose a different method to tackle the issue.
"I have to increase my enhanced Intelligence stats..." he muttered as he looked at the door leading to the room with martial arts manuals.
He stood up and walked toward the door. He pushed open the door and stepped inside... just as he did so, a blue screen appeared before him.
[Found learnable martial arts [6] within the vicinity.]
————[System]————
Learnable Martial Arts:
Sword Art
• Basic Sword Forms – Simple yet disciplined strikes, guards and other forms of sword. ★
• Falling Petal Sword – Sword art of flowing, accelerating slashes, light yet deadly. ★★
Movement Art
• Dashing Step – Simple acceleration technique that sharpens footwork. ★
• Gale Steps – burst of wind under the feet for faster dashes. ★★
Body Strengthening Art
• Iron Body Form – channels mana to harden flesh and bones. ★
Fist Art
• Shattering Fist – imbues punches with explosive force. ★
————[System]————
Jaden raised an eyebrow and looked at the screen before him... it took him a moment to read it, and after that, a frown appeared on his face as he muttered.
"That’s all?"
’Only 6...’
He heaved a sigh and turned back to the training room as a message appeared before him.
[Execute [Epiphany Zone] with the listed martial arts?]
[Confirm | Deny]
Soon after reaching the centre of the boundary, he spoke with a serious look.
"Confirm."
The world turned white.
Jaden stood on the mirror sea as he held a martial arts manual, which was titled [Iron Body Form]
’I should work on my body first.’
Jaden had decided to strengthen his body before trying to learn other martial arts...
He flipped the page of the martial arts manual and began reading. The first page listed rankings of martial arts.
It read:
We mortals who always relied on Arcane finally decide to walk our own path... Path of martial — A path carved by the sweat and blood of our ancestors to make something which could empower all of us, not just the chosen ones.
Over the course of history, we have mashed the two paths—Path of Arcane/Magic and Path of Martial—together, and because of that, we get these rankings:
1-star martial art: Basic forms or movements which use mana.
2-star martial art: Forms or movements empowered by elementals.
3-star martial art: Art that gives birth to an aura. ( Mana + Will )
4-star martial art: Art that enhances the aura into a transformed aura.
Jaden read the page with focus, and then he frowned as he mumbled.
"This also only has information about 4-star... is there no magic spell or martial art above 4-star?"
He thought about it for a few moments before shaking his head, taking a deep breath as he added.
"I shouldn’t waste my time on useless thoughts."
He flipped through the martial arts manual, focusing on the martial forms and mana circulation listed.
It read:
Martial arts have a different method of circulation than magic spells. In martial arts, mana flows from the mana core to the lower abdomen, where a bowl is located. The bowl flows pure mana to a few minor mana veins—these veins are much stronger and wider than normal minor mana veins, allowing the body to wield pure mana.
These selected few minor mana veins are called Martial channels, and the bowl is called Martial Core.
The Martial channels also connect to the elemental points, but they require the mana to flow in a specific cycle within the channels.
"I see..." Jaden muttered before placing the book on the ground and taking a horse stance as shown in the manual.
He then circulated his mana based on what was written; the mana flowed out of the mana core to the martial core and flowed towards the martial channels present throughout his body.
His body began to perspire as the pure mana coursed through his martial channels, and just as it did so, he began to change his stance, forms and movements based on what was written in the manual.
At the beginning, it proved harder for him to control his mana circulation while constantly changing stances, but over time it became easier and easier...
Soon, he was following the forms depicted in the manual with relative ease.
After about six hours, a blue screen appeared before him.
[Congratulations, you have learned a 1-star art: Iron Body Form]
[Experience +15 (Art Learned)]
"Hehe..." Jaden grinned widely while staring at the screen.