As the sun began to set, casting a warm glow over the training grounds, I finally stopped. My body was covered in sweat, my breath heavy, and my hands still bleeding. But there was a sense of peace within me.
"Haaa…. Haaa….. Haaa….."
With heavy breaths, I was sitting on the ground with my one knee raised and my back leaning on the training grounds' walls.
My hands were bleeding from the cracks, smell of fire enveloped the room.
SWOOSH
Raising my hand, I used a simple wind magic to ventilate the room.
"Haaa…. Haaa…. It had been a while since I have exhausted myself this much…" I mumbled between my heavy breathing.
"I missed this feeling." Since I had been training my magic and focusing on it, my body training was pretty much neglected. At least I didn't train as much as I did before, so my body would always have enough energy to spare.
But, this time, it was different. I had fought with the golems almost for 6 hours constantly and brutally.
You could see the remnants of those poor golems crashed on the ground. Thanks to the elemental magic I had been using, there were all types of remnant mana left in the training rooms.
"Training did well for my thoughts…. I feel much clearer now." Sometimes, taking a simple action would be a lot better than thinking and over-complexing things.
I learned that from a musclehead woman who is in a place now god knows where.
"Haaa…." With that last long breath, I started thinking again, my head much clearer than before.
'What could I have done better at that fight? Why did I lose?' I thought to myself.
Those questions were the questions that needed to be asked.
Then I started playing the fight in my head. First and foremost, this battle had shown me the proficiency of one's magic, and the speed of the chant did not mean everything when it came to fights between mages.
It was also about compatibility and versatility. Since I started later than others learning magic, I focused a lot on my mana control and the speed of my chanting. And to do that, I needed to slowly build myself up, which meant I needed to learn every rank of magic so that my fundamentals were good enough.
However, the strength of your magic and its rank was there for a reason.
This fight alone was enough to show me why the people in charge of this world hid the spells of higher ranks.
Because the disparity was evident.
For instance, all of the magic Diana had used was at least higher or equal to a 3-star rank, while I even used simple 1-star magic.
But since she had access to 3 and 4-star spells, she was able to master it while I didn't. Thus she hadn't chanted for 3-star spells most of the time, while I needed to chant and move my mana in a more cautious way.
That loss of seconds was detrimental in a fight, and I once again was reminded of that truth. Then it was the magic of Elves that she had used at that fight.
'Nature Rhapsody.'
In this world, there were some spells that had different types of forms for each star rank. They were called 'Compound Spells.'
They were extremely rare and were very hard to learn. However, at the same time, they were extremely important for the mage's strength, especially for those with huge amounts of talent.
Almost everyone that knew a 'Compound Spell' was named Archmage now.
The reason why it was very crucial was simple. By learning such a spell, you could adapt its output freely and modify the chant according to your output.????????????????????????????????.????????????
For instance, you could learn the spell as a 4-star mage, but you could even use it as an 8-star mage with the strength of an 8-star rank.
And 'Nature's Rhapsody' was such a spell. It was a spell that enabled the caster to have access to the higher form of mana by making them the God/Goddess of the forest that was created in a place.
It had its own restrictions for the 4-star rank version, but basically, it made the caster impossible in the field.
It was a spell that was the imitation of the term Domain since the thing we call Domain does require Authority, and those that have access to it could be counted by the fingers of one's hand.
That was the reason why I lost because I was against such a rare spell.
'But so what? Just because I am against a Compound Spell, does that mean I should lose?' I asked myself.
The answer was obviously a no. The enemies of the game, the villains, sub-villains, side-villains, or even some random foes did have their own compound spells, heck; some even had their own domain.
Therefore, this was an unacceptable take, and there is no way I could accept this.
But, no matter what, there is always this one thing that made me bloom.
'Being against the impossible.'
Opening the system logs, I could see a huge amount of them accumulated on the ground.
<Ding! Trait [Ego] is resonating with the emotions of the host.>
<Ding! Trait [Prodigy] resonates with the thoughts of the host.>
<Ding! Trait [Child of Mana] resonates with the host's will. Mana obeys the host's command.>
<Ding! Class [Sorcerer of Beginning] resonates with the will of the host.>
<Ding! The host's will is partially connected with the [Will of the World].>
<Ding! The host enters partial Enlightenment.>
<Ding! New achievement [Closer to Truth] unlocked.>I think you should take a look at
<Ding! The host's understanding of mana and the energy form [Aether] is increased.>
<Ding! Class [Sorcerer of the Beginning] has advanced further thanks to the understanding of Aether.>
<Ding! Host's comprehension of [Fire Magic] increased.>
<Host's Fire attributed Mana will now have a denser form.>
<Ding! New personalized Spell [Inferno Cascade] registered.>
Looking at the logs, confirmed. The results were incredible.
Personalized Spells.
A term that was simply used by spells that were created by magicians.
A spell that no one would have any knowledge of. It was a very hard thing to pull off in a world where the magic was controlled by the chants and blessings from the gods.
Since everyone that had always used magic would walk on a path predetermined beforehand.
I remembered while Diana's overwhelming magic shot forward me, I was so focused that I couldn't think of anything aside from the spell I was trying to conjure.
Remember, at that time, I said, 'It is like finding my way blindfolded in a forest.'? That was exactly what it felt like.
I had no direction, no type of instructions. It was me and my past experiences and my comprehension of magic.
That was it, and it was the thing everyone in this world was unfamiliar with, aside from me.
The reason? It was thanks to Augustride Family's legacy.
Since our household's magic does not have the same fundamentals as others, that was the reason I was able to pull off my first personalized magic at that time.
Now, most of the time, mages would start developing their personalized magics in the 4th year of the academy, and they would present it as their graduation thesis at the magic conference.
And doing it in the first year was alone enough to show how big of an achievement this was, though, at the same time, it was something that was achieved a year before, so the system probably didn't give me an achievement because of that.
After all, there was a genius named Jasmine Andrews in the second-year batch…..
In any case, there was also a log that showed that my mana would be stronger now.
SWIRL
Raising my hand, I ignited a fire in my hand. It was simple fire magic of one-star.
But the heat radiating from it was different now. It was a lot stronger, at least 1.75 times normal.
That may not sound strong, but believe me, it is, considering this does also apply to higher-ranked magic.
SWOOSH
I swung my hand for a second as I conjured a 2-star spell [Fire Wave] this time.
BOOM
And the result was an extremely strong explosion.
"No matter how theoretical you are, fighting is always the best," I mumbled to myself.
"This pride I do have…Either it bites me too hard, or it strengthens me too hard."
Raising my body from the ground, I looked at the scene I had made.
"What was I doing? Am I a kid or something?" Shaking my head, I mused.
I had fought with all my strength, leaving nothing behind. At that moment, I realized that winning wasn't the only path to redemption. Sometimes, it was about the fight itself, about the effort and determination to never back down.
In any case, it was about time that I attempted a breakthrough to the 5-star now, both as a mage and as a knight.
After all, all of my stats were about to reach their limits now.
'Though, first, let's deal with that bastard.'
With that thought, I returned to my room…..
-----------------------A/N----------------------------
Hope you liked the chapter. This one contained quite a lot of info dumps, but they were necessary for the future.
You can check my discord if you want. You will be able to see the illustrations here and engage in a conversation with me if I am available.
The link to the discord server is in the description of the book.
Check out my new book if you are interested.
This time it will have a modern hunter theme, where MC will be driven by the feeling of vengeance.
The name is; Hunter Academy: Revenge of the Weakest
