Many problems appeared with the settlement of the Second Breath.

Fortunately, the others had become strong enough to make Rex deem them suitable to be on the field without needing his presence. Adhara had successfully turned her mana into arcane mana, Kyran, had become stronger from his visit to Iseldra's realm, Flunra had reached a new realm of runic understanding, and even Gistella was now able to keep up with her evolution.

Rex has a reason to limit them from going out before.

But now, the reason was gone.

All of them were capable enough to defend themselves.

He needed to let them venture on their own to be actual powerhouses.

Due to that, he gave them the tasks that he would normally do himself.

In exchange, he remained back in the city.

It was his first time to be in the city while the others were outside, and it felt weird.

For some reason, he felt restless and uneasy all the time.

Especially knowing that the mutated animals had gotten a lot stronger.

Wiping the smile that came suddenly from his face, he looked around the place he was in.

Currently, Rex is on the top-most floor of the force academy.

He had already sent Devo to the spirit realm to check the situation there.

Just like the real world, the spirit realm also has its own conflicts, and the last time Devo was there, there was tension between the royal family, and a couple of the aristocrats. No matter the place, there will always be conflicts.

Devo was tasked to scout the spirit realm and report back to him.

In the meantime, while he was away, Rex's lightning elements were weaker than normal.

But with the Second Breath settling, he also felt his Awakened power was returning to him.

Not completely but slowly increasing noticeably.

Rex has his top off, his muscles are bulging and laced with sweat.

<Desolate Moon Chamber and 10x Perfect Mana Gathering Potion have been purchased!>

Realizing that he had been neglecting his Awakened power—due to his Werewolf side taking over, he decided to put more effort into it. He purchased Desolate Moon Chamber to change the room into the perfect meditation place for Lunar Elementalists.

Unlike his lightning side, his Lunar element was weaker, still in the eighth-rank realm.

It was also still in the form of regular mana, not arcane mana.

A far cry from his black lighting element.

On the other hand, the Perfect Mana Gathering Potion increased his body aptitude.

An item that allowed him to increase the amount of mana he absorbed from external sources.

Having the piles of Lunar elemental stones from Linthia, and more from the Dwarves that had arrived not too long ago—achieving the ninth-rank realm, in his Lunar elements should not be too hard for him.

Rex aimed for a week and he was training hard right now.

Other than increasing his overall power through this, he also wanted to strengthen Amanir.

Since Amanir was bonded with him, their strength was practically linked.

In preparation for the fight, Amanir needed to be stronger.

Glancing to the side, Rex smirked seeing Amanir meditating seriously with his eyes closed.

"All it takes is a little threat and also dangling a reward..." He mused.

Rex only told Amanir that if he kept being lazy he would be tossed and exchanged for a more qualified spirit. Knowing how powerful Rex, and Devo have become, it would be a fool for him to toss his position.

Not to mention, Rex also promised him anything he wanted if he reached the ninth rank.

Adopting the stick and the carrot method as Amanair is akin to a kid.

And as expected, it was working.

Unlike what he expected, Amanir could also aid in cultivating their medias to reach the ninth-rank realm. Rex was not aware of this because his progression with Devo was so fast that he didn't need Devo to do anything.

But with Amanir, he opted for more efficiency as getting stronger faster is mandatory now.

A couple of meters to the side there was a spherical mechanism.

It was the portal of red ethos that was used to strengthen his red force even further.

Because his Werewolf side has gotten stronger to the point of reaching the pseudo-tenth-rank realm, Rex was able to endure more training. He meditated, while the strings from the red ethos portal latched onto him, pulling on his red force energy.

Of course, anyone who tried to do what he was doing would be committing suicide.

Keeping the mind focused on cultivating the medias binding an Awakened—to a spirit is already a hazardous process, and now he was also putting his physique under immense stress from the red ethos portal.

Anyone trying to mimic his training method would find their mind and body torn apart.

Even if one's body and mind were able to endure this training method, he or she would still need to be a masochistic bastard, as the pain was outright ridiculous. One needs to have a deep sense of madness to adopt this method.

For Rex, however, this was the most efficient method.

His body regenerated, his mind iron-clad, and he fulfilled the madness department.

Briefly, Amanir's words breezed past his mind.

"You really are insane..."

Recalling those words when Amanir saw how hard the training was, Rex could only smile.

He's insane but he knew that he was from the start.

"Sanity won't get me where—I need to be. Insanity is the only currency that buys the future I want." Rex uttered whisperingly. "When the mind is breaking and the world is crumbling, only the insane stand tall. Nobody understands that more than me"

Shaking his head, he took a seat and drank to rest his physique.

Despite wanting to keep on going, the strain from the strings was too strong.

Rex needed to take a break once in a while.

But as he was sitting down, he opened a tab to check on something.

He wanted to check his new moon ability but that could be done at another time.

It was a realm and needed to be developed so he doubted it would be of use to him now.

...

<Primordial Step>

Rank: Origin (Eleventh-rank)

Mastery: Low

...

Looking at the Primordial Step skill description, his eyes landed on the mastery section.

"System, using the skill repeatedly would increase the mastery, right? I've used it many times against Yulthat so how come it was still at low?" Rex asked, he felt like he had been using the skill a lot at that battle.

<Yes, to increase the mastery, the user needs to be accustomed to using the skill>

<Notice: the user had not even used Primordial Step more than 10 times, and only by doing the full sequence of the Primordial Step skill would it be counted>

Upon reading this, Rex was shut down instantly.

"Oh..." He mused in defeat.

Mostly, Rex only made a couple of steps before deactivating the skill.

To make the full sequence, he needed to take five steps to reach the peak of the skill.

Since he hadn't done that, probably only doing it once or twice, the mastery stayed low.

Standing back up again, he tried moving his limbs and found that the strain was heavy but he reckoned he still had a lot of stamina. Doing the Primordial Step a couple of times, should not be a problem for him.

Nodding to himself, he lowered his stance and prepared to cast the Primordial Step skill.

He could circle the room while doing the entire five-step sequence.

Swoosh!

Disappearing from his spot, Rex made his first step as his speed drastically increased.

In an instant, he created a sonic boom, breaking the sound barrier.

He achieved that by merely making the first step—and there were still four more steps, and with each step, he would become faster, and faster. As soon as he was about to crash, Rex made the second step and changed direction.

But as soon as he wanted to make the third step, he stepped wrong and his ankle twisted.

"Shit!"

Crash!

Rex crashed onto the wall hard, shaking the entire structure including startling Amanir.

A couple of levels below, the people training their force energy were also surprised.

All of them were training peacefully, but the academy suddenly shook hard.

Just like an earthquake but the source of the loud crash came from the top.

Curious and also fearful, several people rushed to the staircase and headed to the top floor.

Upon arriving at the massive gate, they pushed it open and stepped into the domed room.

Scanning the entire room—the people found a huge crater on the wall to their left, and a man was lying inside the deep crater. But when the man sensed they entered, he quickly stood up with his eyebrows raised, looking at the visitors.

"Everyone okay?" Rex asked, trying his hardest to remain standing.

Messing up the flow of energy coupled with his exhausted body made him exhausted.

It was hard to keep standing up and he was taking a minute to lie down earlier.

"Your Majesty, is everything alright?"

"Yes, yes, it's my fault. Go back and don't worry about it"

After saying that, however, the visitors looked down and saw blood flowing down Rex's legs.

In addition to that, Rex coughed blood and fell to one knee.

But one of the visitor, a man managed to intercept that and supported him before he fell.

<Notice: the user's is exhausted and wounded>

Tch... No adrenaline and here I am kneeling on the ground.

Rex could only sigh, as he never fell to his knees when he fought his opponent—but now that he was training, his body was weaker than normal. He then glanced at the person beside him and surprisingly recognized this person.

It was the Awakened he appointed as the leader of Evelyn's bodyguards, Calder.

He seemed to be training hard.

"Calder, are the others also here?" Rex asked as he went to sit on the side.

Calder helped him go there to sit.

Upon hearing this, Calder nodded firmly, "Yes, Your Majesty. We are doing as you are told"

Pivoting to the side, Calder closed the gate before flicking his fingers.

In an instant, multiple Awakened, twenty-four of them to be exact appeared.

All of them were the ones he met outside of King Jorik's castle, and they all were now turned into Dark Elementalists, due to the affinity they gained, from Rex. Scanning them, Rex turned back to Calder with one eyebrow raised.

"I told you all to reach the eighth-rank realm in a week. How many weeks has it been?"

"Forgive us, Your Majesty! We have failed you!"

Knowing that they were not on par with the expectations placed on them by Rex himself, the Awakened, prostrated on the ground, including Calder. All of them were guilty—as they were tasked by Rex himself and was even given an opportunity.

But all of them failed to reach the eighth-rank realm, it was too hard.

"We tried to find you—and report our failures but it's hard... We didn't know if Captain Linthia should know about our existence so we didn't know how to inform you. Now that the chance arises, we are willing to accept our punishment," Calder said from the bottom of his heart.

Despite being given the chance of a lifetime, he failed.

It couldn't be described how bad he felt right now.

Scanning his eyes towards them, Rex smiled inwardly before he outright laughed.

Even though the Awakened were confused, they remained prostrating.

"In the first place, I never once thought any of you would achieve the eighth-rank realm, in a matter of a week," Rex commented, he was only saying that to make them work hard. "I was already going to be pleased if you managed to reach the fifth-rank realm, and then report to me before I gave you all the spirits to be assimilated with"

Considering they needed to start from the first-rank realm, Rex didn't expect much.

"So, what are you all on right now, fifth-rank?" Rex asked.

Upon hearing this, Callder raised his gaze and answered.

"Most of us are at the sixth while some, including myself, are at the seventh-rank realm"

"Huh...? Huh?! Where did you get the spirits? It's bad if you assimilate with a weak spirit"

"We asked Prof. K and he gave us the spirits"

"Prof. K...?"

Rex used the System to scan their spirits before he tilted his head in utter confusion.

<Notice: All of the Awakened assimilated with a spirit above one-thousand years of energy>

Where the fuck did Prof. K get that? Oh, it must be from the Lunar Bees.

Just then, he returned his focus back to Calder and scanned him.

It was only then did Rex saw his stats were incredibly high for a mere seventh-rank realm.

"How about you force energy? What color?" Rex asked.

As opposed to answering with words, all of them flared their force energy in a union.

Swoosh!

Rex looked at the bright color in shock, "How in the world...?"

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!

Report chapter

Use arrow keys (or A / D) to PREV/NEXT chapter