Hearing those words, Alan quickly pieced together the identity of the man before him.
There had long been tales of the great archmage Jacob, who had valiantly given his life defending the Kent Kingdom from a devastating invasion. Yet whispers circulated in the shadows—rumors that Jacob's death was not one of glory, but the tragic outco of political infighting within the kingdom's ruling class.
But now, standing before the lingering soul of the man himself, those rumors felt empty and absurd.
Jacob had truly loved this land—enough to give his life for it.
"So, do you accept?"
The middle-aged man's voice broke the silence, his tone tinged with concern after Alan remained quiet for so ti.
Alan nodded solemnly. "Of course I do. Having a grandmaster like you willing to guide is a privilege. I'd be a fool to decline."
"Good, good. Though let's not throw around words like 'grandmaster.' I rely beca a mage a few years before you did—nothing more."
Despite his modest tone, the man's expression soon turned grave.
"Now, pay close attention. What I'm about to show you is a secret technique I've honed in solitude for many years—perhaps one that no one else in this world has ever mastered. Its na is... Mana Compression."
With that, the man gently closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath.
But Alan could see—what he inhaled wasn't just air. It was a fusion of ambient elents and raw mana, drawn into his body with fluid grace.
The dense dark-elent energy that saturated this space surged toward him like flowing water, funneling into the man's being.
As more and more elental energy gathered, his body began to undergo a strange transformation.
A dark, mist-like aura began to condense at the tips of his limbs. Then, with a sudden flare, the mist ignited—transforming into black fire that devoured and disrupted everything nearby!
"Most of the world only knows how to use elental energy to shape mana for spellcasting."
"But no one ever considers the idea of fully integrating the two."
"And why not? Because elental forces and personal mana vibrate on entirely different frequencies. To force them together often invites catastrophic backlash."
"However," he continued, "I once devised a unique mana circuit before my death—one capable of aligning elental energy and personal mana into a specific sequence and then compressing them with extre force. The resulting power far exceeds anything pure mana or pure elental energy can achieve on its own!"
"Of course, like your unique eyes, this technique requires a touch of willpower to maintain control."
"Now picture this: mana and elents swirling in your grasp like a completely scrambled Rubik's Cube. Your task is to not only solve that cube but to compress it down to the size of a fingernail at the sa ti."
"Go ahead. Try it. Let's see what you can manage."
Without hesitation, Alan followed the man's guidance and began the process of rging his mana and elental energy.
But whether it was due to the man's overly abstract taphor or simply the daunting complexity of the technique, Alan struggled.
He tried several tis but couldn't seem to grasp the essence of Mana Compression.
The man rubbed his chin thoughtfully and muttered, "I can sense your thirst for knowledge, but it's as if your body isn't responding to that desire."
"Let ask you this—can you recall any monts in your past when your emotions were so intense, your body moved before your mind even had ti to think?"
That suggestion struck a chord in Alan.
Yes—there was such a mont.
It had happened in Ironblood City, when he stood alone, facing hundreds—no, thousands—of enemy troops. Back then, he didn't have ti to think. His instincts took over, his body moving before logic could weigh in.
That kind of raw, unfiltered reaction—that was what he needed now.
He couldn't treat mana and elental energy as separate tools.
He had to treat them like limbs—an extension of his very being.
With this newfound insight, Alan tried again.
He summoned the mories of that past battle, allowing the emotions to swell from within. A complex storm of feelings—rage, determination, defiance—rose in his chest.
What had he been thinking back then?
He couldn't recall—and it didn't matter.
What mattered was the resolve: he could not back down. Not then. Not now. Because behind him stood countless innocents.
And as a magus, it was his duty to protect them.
As these thoughts took shape, a radiant light burst from Alan's chest.
It cut through the endless blackness around him, like a sword of pure brilliance, bridging the heavens and the abyss.
Suddenly, Lun Sancta flew from his side into the air. A strange, pulsating energy began to gather and compress along its blade.
Bit by bit, the energy aligned itself by color and structure.
At first, they were massive blocks of color—like puzzle pieces.
But soon, each fragnt condensed further, until they were no thicker than strands of hair.
The middle-aged man's eyes widened in astonishnt.
"Wait! I told you to practice Mana Compression—not to pour the energy into your staff!"
But Alan didn't respond.
As if deaf to the warning, he simply followed the rhythm in his heart, continuously channeling mana and elental energy into Lun Sancta.
Monts later, a terrifying surge of mana burst across the entire void-like space.
Despite the inherent differences between mana and elental power, they were both forms of energy at their core.
And lying dormant within Lun Sancta was a wellspring of Originmana, which acted as a perfect lubricant in the fusion process.
Unlike Alan's personal mana, Originmana wasn't self-generated. And after the staff's latest evolution, its properties had beco remarkably attuned to elental energy.
As a result, Lun Sancta could now not only compress both mana and elentals but also fine-tune their output frequencies—creating an unprecedented balance between the two.
Soon, the energy Alan had poured into the staff had been reduced to the size of a fingernail.
And even then, the process didn't stop.
The staff continued compressing, thodically adjusting the frequencies and maintaining equilibrium.
The middle-aged man watched in awe, hand over his mouth.
He couldn't believe what he was seeing.
The compressed energy on the blade shrank even further—now the size of a grain of rice!
"Stop! You must stop now!" he shouted, his voice full of urgency. "I don't even know what might happen if you continue compressing it!"
"Oh? Really?"
Realizing the man wasn't joking, Alan quickly reached out and grasped Lun Sancta's hilt, halting the staff's ongoing process.
The very next second, he felt sothing within him stir—his mana Overpressure was suddenly activated, resonating with the compressed power in the blade and beginning to surge outward in all directions.
He didn't quite understand the chanism.
But his instincts told him—it was related to how his willpower was balancing the compressed magic.
When he'd recalled his ti in Ironblood City, his inner fire had reignited. The yearning for battle. The righteous fury. The overwhelming need to protect.
Under such emotions, how could mana Overpressure not erupt?
To suppress it would've been unnatural.
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