Ethan chewed on the roasted at slowly, letting the warmth spread through his exhausted body. It wasn't exactly gourt, but it was enough to calm his hungry stomach. Shadow sat beside him, looking smug as always, tail flicking contentedly as she watched him eat.
Ethan raised a brow at her innocent behavior. Not asking for a single bite? It made him think that the cat probably gulped down sothing big before getting here. As if the little thing could read his thoughts, she gave him a smug smile and then went back to lazily yawning and stretching.
Ethan laughed at her and went back to his people-watching. The town around him continued to bustle with the energy of incoming academy students.
He could hear snippets of conversations drifting from the marketplace, talks of rankings, upcoming entrance trials, and the famous instructors who would be arriving soon. Nas he didn't recognize were thrown around like legends, sparking admiration or nervousness in equal asure.
Ethan took another bite of rabbit, eyes narrowing thoughtfully. If the academy here was important enough to draw this kind of crowd, then it wasn't so second-rate institution. That made things complicated. More eyes, more attention. But also more chances to gather resources, learn powerful spells, and quietly climb the ranks under the radar.
He finished eating, wiped his hands on the grass, and leaned back against the tree with a groan. The exhaustion was still there, humming in the background like a bad song on repeat, but it was starting to fade. Also, he couldn't afford to sit around and bum the entire day. He had a lot of work to do.
First, he needed to gather more information. He heard that the academy had an entrance exam but he still needed to know more details. The best place for this kind of thing was a tavern and it was almost evening already. He stood up, picked a dium-sized joint to begin with, and started his long night of bar crawling.
He slipped into a lively establishnt called The Broken Tankard. It was modest but packed with people, locals and rich brats alike. He found a quiet corner table and listened. It didn't take long before useful information began to float his way.
"…they say the academy's entrance test changes every year. Last year it was a dungeon simulation, the year before that, a combat gauntlet…"
"…one of the examiners this year is from the Silverfla Division. My cousin saw him burn through a steel door with a snap of his fingers…"
"…so kid broke a record in the capital. Rumor is he soloed a blue-rank dungeon in under twenty minutes…"
Ethan flinched at that last one. It was not the only ti he heard about the dungeon records. More than the academy tests, his record-breaking spree was more famous or rather infamous.
He didn't stay long. After another hour of quiet observation, he left the tavern and headed to another one. A similar scenario played out there as well. In the end, all he managed to gather was that the academy entrance exam had two requirents.
One was to at least be an E rank which he was and the other was to be proficient at least in one skill. This… Ethan wasn't all that confident. He knew a bunch of mage skills but he wouldn't call himself proficient in those.
The rest of the night went by slowly and by the ti he dragged his tired body to the garden, he only managed to get an hour of semi-shut eye before it was dawn again. He took a couple more hours of break, followed by another roasted rabbit al.
He was now starting to think that Shadow really liked rabbit at as she kept bringing him the sa thing. Not that he complained. He quickly finished the al before heading out of the town again. It was ti to practice his skill proficiency. He had already decided to get into the academy and he did not want to take any chances.
He walked out of the town and shadow lazily trailed him, her paws silent against the cobbled path. Ethan's eyes scanned the outskirts until he found a stretch of woods far enough from the main road. It would be private enough for testing.
Once surrounded by trees, he took a deep breath and opened his status screen. He quickly reviewed his skills again. Arcane Synthesis skill was now available for a second use.
This was the skill he was most curious about as it fundantally changed his minions, giving them a makeover. There were oh so many things that he wanted to test out with this skill.
He wanted to see if he could use the sa skill twice on a minion and check if it mutated once again. What if he continued using the skill on a single minion repeatedly? Would it beco so sort of overpowered super monster? Or would it negatively affect and make his minion explode or sothing from genetic instability? Was that even a thing in this world?
Or maybe he should use the skill on his already powerful minions like the lesser demons and the insectoids? Maybe that would bring about the maximum benefit?
Ethan let out a sigh and cald down. It was too bad the skill was only available once a day. He needed to figure out how to change that. Maybe skill proficiency was the na of the ga.
For now, he just had to go about this thodically and slowly. To start with, he decided to do sothing similar to what he did the previous day. Mutate another sli and see what happens.
"Alright, let's see if lightning strikes twice." He summoned another sli and the familiar wobbling jelly-like creature popped into existence with a quiet blorp, looking around with clueless curiosity.
Ethan gave it an encouraging nod, even if it had no idea what was coming.
"Your turn, little guy."
He activated [Arcane Synthesis] once more. Mana surged, threading itself through the sli like liquid lightning.
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