It was almost midnight when Kale arrived at his house with Layla, they had their dinner at the nearest restaurant to the house, Layla was tired so she went to sleep the second they entered the house.
As for Kale, he too was a little tired but he had something more important to do, he locked the door of his room and set cross-legged on his bed.
Earlier, he had already found the mistakes of his ‹Wood Hammer› spell but didn't correct them because of the entering the party as a Rookie Wood Mage, now that the party was over, he wasn't reserved and decided to increase his mastery to the Grand Master level.
After a recheck, Kale extended his hand and cast the spell.
A magic circle shined on the back of his palm, suddenly the soft and tender skin around his hand hardened, its surface became rough like tree bark, he could feel his hand getting tougher and even somewhat heavier.
Kale didn't have time to focus on the effects of the spell as his attention was directed into his Origin Chasm observing the change in his ‹Wood Star Constellation›.
The four immovable spell enigmas that were connected to each other by a thin light thread, consisting the ‹Wood Star Constellation› were now changing their position. At the same time, they madly absorbed all the mana in his Origin Chasm to support the change.
'I'm advancing, it's time to choose my core spell…' Kale thought '‹Fast Growth› looks good but there are many replacements for it, ‹Wood Hammer› isn't at the Ethereal level so it's out of the question, there are many offensive spells like ‹Wooden Thorn›, and ‹Camouflage› isn't that useful when used outside the wilderness, the most useful is ‹Life Sense›, I will go with this,'
It took only a second for Kale to make his decision and final it.
All four of the spell enigma got in a triangular formation, with one enigma at the center and three at the nodes, a few more light thread appeared and connected them to each other, the enigma at the center was connected to all other three which too were connected to each other like triangular edges.
The enigma at the center was of ‹Life Sense›, choosing it as the core spell meant that it would go through a qualitative leap after the advancement is complete.
After the formation was stabilized, Kale finally took a breather, with this, his advancement process was complete.
He spent half an hour recovering his mana then focused on his core spell.
Every mage has a chance to choose their core spell with every new class they master. Once a core spell is set, they can't change it, in rare cases where they can change, they would have to pay a high price that could permanently damage their foundation.
Kale chose ‹Life Sense› as his core spell, the grade of the spell won't change but the power it can display would increase, as for how much it can increase? It depends on his foundation and the formation itself.
He had carefully thought before deciding on ‹Life Sense›, an investigative type spell that had high importance when venturing into the wilderness, although the grade of the spell won't change by doing it, like other spells he can still increase his understanding and advance it to Tier 2 spell in time, or he could just buy the spell formula of Tier 2 ‹Life Sense› and advance his own core spell according to its structure.
Kale observed the formation for a few minutes then decided to use ‹Life Sense› and see the effects for himself.
'Life Sense'
A formless wave of energy spread in all directions, Kale looked at his right and saw green light silhouette of a girl sitting cross-legged on the bed and cultivating in a nearby room, his lips curled into a smile 'She didn't sleep, after all,'
He refocused on the activation of the spell, the range of spells kept increasing even after it reached 200 meters which was already the highest range of Tier 1 Life Sense, it only stopped after reaching 300 meters.
'Looks like the enhancement was based on quantity rather than quality this time,' Kale thought.
A Tier 2 Life Sense can scan up to 500 meters of range at most, in a more sophisticated way, although the scanning power of the skill didn't increase but the range did.
Kale nodded in satisfaction, he then stood up and walked to the window, he looked around for a while and finally decided on a target, at the other end of his line of sight was a wild vine climbing on the garden wall.
He extended his hand in the direction of the vine and concentrated, he didn't use any kind of spell but his mana was being consumed by the transformed new ‹Wood Star Constellation›.
The small vine on the wall moved, its branches began to move like snakes as it tightened its grip on the wall and climbed quickly. Under Kale's control the vine climbed up to half the length of the wall in just a few seconds, he stopped after that because although the vine was acting on his orders and climbing the wall but its roots were still in-ground, it didn't grow in any way, if he continued further the vine would be uprooted and his control would be lessened or he might just lose control over it.
Tier 1 mage was the only arrival of a practitioner into the mage class, it had its limits.
Kale was quite satisfied with the results 'Now, it's better to promote ‹Wood Hammer› to Ethereal mastery level, with its addition there would be a minor enhancement in the power of my ‹Wood Star Constellation› too,'
With this thought, he placed his attention on increasing his mastery of ‹Wood Hammer› first.
***
Next day…
Tower Of Trials….
It was the time before the dawn, the sun had yet to fully rise, while its rays had already brightened the sky.
A giant cylindrical tower was firmly standing in a wide-open area, the tower was so tall that from afar it looked like it was piercing through the clouds in the sky. The tower was present at the center of the city, it was none other than the Tower Of Trials.
It was a place containing the inheritances left by almost all famous experts that had served the Blazing Sun Kingdom, which also included the inheritance left behind by the previous Kings & Queens of the kingdom.
The tower was so enormous that its shadow was covering even the buildings that were miles away in the distance.
Everyone was allowed to enter the tower, regardless of their status and disposition. It was a place which no one can control, the force that had the most control over it was Royal Family, and even they only knew the way to deliver resources to the tower, everyone knew that the tower processed in a similar way as a natural High-Level Dungeon if the system wasn't included but no one knew how.
Royal Family timely delivered a lot of resources to the tower so that it can use them to reward the ones who succeed in trials they need to participate in climbing the tower. After all, not just anyone could get the piece of true inheritance but they still deserved rewards if they had the ability.
Countless practitioners, from both inside and outside the kingdom, would come and try to climb the tower to try their luck but how many of them would return alive was hard to say.
A blue car stopped in the empty parking area around the tower, Kale stepped out of it and looked at the mighty tower in front of him.
He observed it for a while then walked to the entrance gate, the gate of the tower was similar to a castle gate in the old-times, moreover it was open.
Because it was still time until sunrise, not many people were gathered here. This was exactly why Kale chose to come to the tower at this time, he didn't tell Layla about it either.
Kale was in his casual wear, he wore a loose T-shirt and pants to be able to move freely, equipped his weapons, and covered them by wearing his black jacket.
He took a deep breath and entered the dark entrance of the tower. He had done some research before coming here, although the trials might not be the same for everyone and can change from time to time but the early floors had a low mortality rate.
The tower didn't have any requirement for its challengers to enter, even if Kale wasn't a practitioner he could enter it but the chances of normal mortal coming out were almost zero, he had patiently waited until he reached Level 10, which was the requirement the Academy had set for students to enter Dungeon.
Kale kept walking inside the dark corridor after entering the gate, when he curiously turned to see the entrance, he saw nothing but darkness.
Just when he turned to the front again, a blurry light window appeared in his vision, it was accompanied by an emotionless voice that reverberated directly in his head.
[Welcome to the Tower Of Trials challenger!]
Just after the screen appeared, a magic circle also appeared on the ground below his feet, it shined for a moment and its dazzling light covered his body then the light dimmed and it disappeared.
[New user registered.]
[Please state your display-name.]
"Anonymous," Kale replied soon after the question was asked.
[Registering the new user….]
[Registration complete.]
[Status created.]
[Name: Anonymous
Class: Mutant Martial Maze
Subclass: Expert Wood Mage
Level: 10
Combat Power: Unevaluated.]
Kale wasn't surprised that the system entity of the tower was able to extract so many details without him realizing it, he had known it before coming here but still, he wasn't worried because according to history there was no way that the tower would leak the information of the challengers to the outside world, it would rather self destruct than revealing its secrets.
..Wuushhh...
After the status screen was created, faint glistering light lines started to shine on the walls around, lighting his way.
The light let him see that he was still walking through the stone corridor and the exit gate of the corridor became visible in his sight.
He didn't get careless and cautiously proceeded further.
Unlike what he expected, there was no trap on the way, once he stepped out of the corridor, the sudden exposure to the light made him close his eyes for a second, when Kale reopened his eyes, he found himself standing into a no-exit arena.
'Space magic or illusion magic?' Kale thought. He had walked through the corridor in a straight line for so long and came to this large arena, the measurement of area inside the tower seemed off when compared to what it looks like from outside.
There were also options like arrays and formations used by Martial Artists but the founder and most of the inheritance givers in this Trial Of Tower were Mages that's why he was more prone to believe that it was magic.
He looked around but found no one there except him in the arena. The illusory screen reappeared in front of his eyes.
[1st Floor Entrance Trial is starting in 01:00.]
[Choose a difficulty level: Easy/Medium/Hard.]
[Note1: Make your choice in the given time or the system will randomly choose one for you.]
[Note2: You can choose to quit in the middle of the trial as long as you are alive but as a penalty of quitting the trial of 1st floor in the middle, you won't be able to enter the trial for the next 1 year.]
[Note3: If you manage to pass the trial, you can not enter the first floor again for the next 5 years.]
Kale chose 'Hard' without hesitation, he wasn't planning to stay in Imperial City for long anyway so the penalty was useless to him. Furthermore, from what he heard the higher the difficulty level the challenger chooses, the more beneficial reward would they get after clearing the trial.
The second he clicked on 'Hard', the window disappeared, six magic circles shined on the floor in the distance, and six silhouettes covered in light membrane came out of them.
When the light membrane disappeared, their appearance was revealed.
They were short and green-skinned, they had very long fingers and feet, coupled with their dome-shaped bald heads, long hooked nose, pointed ears, and greedy grey eyes. They could be summarized in two words ugly and evil.
Kale raised his eyebrow 'Goblins? Interesting,' He thought as his lips curled upwards into an arch.