Sora gazed at the strange, changing landscape in front of him.The ground rippled like water, though it was solid rock, and shadows stretched and twisted. Parts of the surroundings distorted as though viewed through a warped lens.
Everywhere he looked, the [Spatial Elent] was abundant, its presence tricking his eyes and teasing his senses. Tiny rips opened everywhere in the air, revealing gaps in space, while small objects drifted through sudden portals that appeared and vanished.
Extending his hand, Sora felt the strange energy envelop him. He had achieved basic control over [Space] and no longer feared the elent's destructive and unpredictable nature.
To test his knowledge, he ford a small orb of [Earth] and sent it through a portal he found in front of him. Monts later, the orb reappeared from another portal far away, keeping its speed and montum.
Experinting further, he pushed a much longer object—a few hundred ters long rod—through the portal, only to watch the portal suddenly collapsing and cutting the rod cleanly.
'So there's a limit to what each portal can take... And when it collapses, it'll cut what was going through it. I need to learn how to create and test these portals.' He thought, enjoying discovering new fields and elents.
Curiosity consud him as he explored the effects of the [Spatial Elent]. He spent weeks experinting, discovering that by twisting space, he could reduce the distance between two points, achieving quick movent without relying on portals. With more practice, he created a small, hidden space within the [Spatial Elent]—a rudintary pocket dinsion for storing or concealing items. It wasn't perfect, but it was proof of his progress.
'I'm not sure how Adebayo hid his presence and group in Nara, but I should be able to use this elent to veil my presence in the future.' He considered uses for each discovery and his brain never stopped working, looking for ways to catch up to others.
'What are the limits of this elent? Can I stabilize larger portals, or are they inherently fragile?' He tested different shapes and sizes, observing how the portals behaved. Circular ones seed more stable and were harder to detect, while angular shapes, which fluctuated noisily, were easier to sense but caused overwhelming destruction when they collapsed. 'Making portals stable requires higher elental affinity and extre mana control.'
Another technique erged as he managed to bend space all around himself, creating illusions and mirages by distorting how everything appeared. He frowned as he tested the technique. 'So this is an optical illusion? It doesn't ss with my opponents mind, but their sight. How can I integrate this into my combat style? Maybe pair it with a direct attack to confuse my opponent. This feels like one of the countless techniques I discover but never use. Who knows?'
'I need sothing more practical. The small portal's ability to cut through objects is what has the most potential for now. I should search in that direction...' Considering his fighting style and thinking about what he preferred, he stopped studying other aspects of the [Spatial Elent] and started developing skills he could use in battle.
Playing with the smaller portals, he sharpened them into a razor-thin blades, and stabilized them. These 'blades' were capable of cutting through anything he found on the planet. Each slash was precise, the spatial edge cut through objects like butter. 'This feels incredible.'
Satisfied with his newfound abilities, Sora began training his resistance to the [Spatial Elent]. True to his brutal thods, he took off his clothes, letting the elent bombard every inch of his body. His [Adaptive Regeneration] and mastery over life force kept him alive as he endured the torture, gradually building his resistance.
'I should really take the ti to build my resistance to the [Dark Elent] and the [Light Elent] but I'm unable to damage my body with those elents with how weak my mastery over them is.'
With the first month nearly complete, Sora turned his attention to refining his training environnt. He opened the configuration panel and adjusted the gravity settings. So areas were modified to accommodate Hiyoko, ensuring his companion could train in the outside world. In his own zones, he pushed the gravity even higher.
"I can already feel my passive body forging speeding up," he muttered, closing the panel. "And now that my current mastery over the [Spatial Elent] is high enough, I can finally focus on my next goal."
Summoning the elents, Sora began evaluating each one. His [Fire Elent] mastery had grown significantly thanks to Netsu boosting his affinity, quickly catching up to [Earth Elent] and [Lightning Elent] he used the most. He turned his focus to [Wind Elent] and [Water Elent], aiming to balance all five. After weeks of training, his control over the elents reached a level where he felt confident tackling the next challenge: evolving his [Elental Nexus].
Recalling the process and hints he'd gathered within the storm of the 8th trial, Sora summoned the elents into his palm, letting them flow and interact. He started by fusing pairs, observing the rules governing their combinations. Higher mastery over an elent increased its dominance in the fusion, but Sora discovered that by actively controlling the fusion process, he could influence the resulting properties.
Unhappy with the [Elental Nexus] ford naturally from the five elents mixed with the [Spatial Elent] that was only slightly stronger and more erratic than the original version, he decided to attempt this new fusion thod.
'By carefully balancing [Water] and [Earth], and slightly leaning toward water, I can take that elent's main characteristics, with [Earth] adding supporting traits. Such fusion results in an elent similar to water, with extre weight, and the ability to be condensed that water did not have.'
Amazed, he pushed his test further and discovered that he could also change the property he wanted, creating the ideal two-elent-fusion after countless attempts.
'This requires an insane control and perfect understanding of the elents. The slightest mistake results in instability or a useless elent... If it's this difficult with two elents, I'm afraid creating the perfect [Elental Nexus] will be near impossible.' Understanding the difficulty of his project, he sighed.
With [Space] as the primary ingredient for crafting a new [Elental Nexus], he began by introducing the obedient [Earth Elent], [Wind Elent], and [Water Elent] elents into the mix, urging them to rge their strongest traits with the [Spatial Elent]. These three elents, being the most compatible with [Space], blended, offering low resistance to the fusion process.
The joy on his face disappeared when he added [Lightning Elent] and [Fire Elent] to the mix because chaos erupted. These elents fought against his control, destabilizing the fusion. He threw every trick and ounce of concentration into taming them, but his attempts ended in failure ti and again. Frustration started building up as he realized the fusion process demanded far more ti than he anticipated.
'I didn't even begin choosing the elental properties I needed, and it is already blowing up in my face.'
Sora paused, reflecting on his failures. "If I can't fuse them for now, there are two ways around this. I can either make my [Spatial Elent] stronger so it can forcibly suppress the rebellious elents, or improve my control over the rebellious elents. The first thod is simpler and more efficient in guaranteeing the fusion, but the second will help adjust the elental property the [Elental Nexus] will take from that specific elent."
He started with the first thod, by honing his control over the [Spatial Elent], refining it repeatedly until he could no longer improve. Without even trying the fusion, he then focused on the other elents, pushing his control to the limit.
Enjoy exclusive content from empire
After months of practice, he attempted the fusion again, this ti guiding the elents with greater care. Slowly, he crafted an [Elental Nexus] that aligned with his vision. It had the unique properties of [Space] while borrowing traits from the other elents. The result was an extrely powerful fusion, more stable and versatile than anything he created so far.
"This..." Sora whispered, testing the new power, "This is insane. Can anyone even resist a blow from this?" He shivered at the thought of testing it on himself. 'Wouldn't it be ridiculous if I died trying this skill on myself? It's such a sha this trial doesn't allow to use my innate ability, or I'd definitely try.'
Looking around for a suitable target, he sighed. "There are only the three of us on this planet. I'll need to add beasts for the next month's training."
With his training with the [Elental Nexus] completed, Sora's thoughts changed to another idea he had been considering. 'I have too many abilities and limited brain capacity. I want to reach a point where I can use them all to the fullest. Bombarding my enemies with countless abilities is the dream.'
He'd watched Emily and Kara use their clones, each requiring imnse control and focus to maintain. 'But I don't like having to split my focus to fight. Unless my ability to multitask drastically improves, I don't want that restriction when fighting. I prefer being fully focused on smashing skulls with my Sledge Hamr with my overwhelming physical power.'
He envisioned sothing greater, "I want autonomous clones… or abilities that cast themselves automatically! I don't want to control each ability by myself; I'd rather they act on my intent and fight for ." His mind raced with the possibilities, more confident than ever that, given ti, anything was possible.
Weeks of experintation followed as Sora attempted to create clones suited to his needs.
There were [Elental Clones] with high damage output for each elent. He had designed them to use surrounding elents to fight, and he could also supply them with mana if elents were lacking. However these clones were fragile, and he found their impact too limited given the amount of focus they required from him to control.
One clone, modeled after Kara's clones, relied on [Life Force], but it felt like a cheap imitation. The quality of these clones depended heavily on the strength of his Life Force, making them weaker than him. Their main purpose was to heal him upon sacrifice, but Sora ultimately considered them a waste of ti.
The clone from his [Martial Titan] class was more promising after a few upgrades, able to function as an extension of his body and wield lower versions of his original skills using mana. But it too lacked independence and its own thought process. Despite the improvents, Sora found himself nearly tempted to write it off along with the rest.
Ignoring the countless variations of clones he'd created, Sora sighed.
Disappointed, Sora dissolved the army of clones he had created. "None of them are good enough. They're just mindless extensions of ." He sighed. "What's missing? Maybe… they need a brain. Or a soul? But how do I do that?"
He had tested them in many ways, with different environnts and situations, but they could only manage basic tasks. They lacked initiative and couldn't make even the simplest decisions.
Uncertain about the path forward, Sora shelved the clone project for the ti being. It was a frustrating experience, but he resolved to return to it later, better prepared to tackle the challenge.
As his sixth month began, he headed to an area he'd designed specifically for training his ntal defense, filled with hundreds of high-level spirit monsters. Here, he intended to hone his [Focus], [Faith], and [Peak ditate] skills, inspired from his second trial and the Spirit Race's might.
[Focus] proved easier to advance than [ditate], likely due to his strong foundation and the perfect training environnt. Within weeks, he evolved it and unlocked [Peak Focus].
When he activated [Peak Focus], his field of vision narrowed to a small angle, and the world around him slowed, granting a feeling almost akin to Kara's [Ti Acceleration]. With complete awareness of every inch of his body and mind, he could feel, understand, and even anticipate any movent in his limited view.
In contrast, [Peak ditate] provided a deep sense of calm and understanding of his surroundings, while detaching him from the action and his body, limiting his ability to act on what he perceived.
'What if… I could use both at once?' he thought, sensing the potential. '[Peak Focus] drains quickly and limits my vision but makes react instantly and efficiently, while [Peak ditate] enhances clarity and calm but makes it harder to react.'
Determined to overco the challenge, Sora trained his mind, repeatedly attempting to fuse the two skills. Each failure brought him closer to understanding the subtle balance required, pushing him closer to a breakthrough in his ntal mastery.
1 free chapter in early access and around 48 advance chapters ahead available on Patreon
Thanks for the support ! I'll see you guys tomorrow !
Reviews
All reviews (0)