In the end he just went to the hall to grab a mission for himself again. He just casually took one to exterminate a mutated low-level spirit beast, he was already familiarized with the acceptance of missions as he had already taken on normal beasts in the outskirt of villages for some missions before.
Although, one would usually need to be a higher rank than the beast that they wanted to slay, Leo wasn't really concerned about a low-level beast. After all, he had already slain one on the transitional island.
Okay, maybe the boar that he killed was already on the brink of death and he had support from his girlfriends, but he felt confident in killing one on his own now.
He also kind of hoped that he would need to struggle for a bit to accomplish his mission as he was getting bored, and an easy fight wasn't for his taste anymore.
Coincidentally, the pink-haired receptionist was available for Leo to turn his mission in. He had already familiarized himself with the staff as he was already frequently going out to take on missions.
He made sure to be respectful to them and it seemed like they took a liken to him, though the same couldn't be said for most of the male members of Arcanum, if Leo had interpreted their gazes correctly.
In the short month in which he was proving himself to Arcanum, his appearance seemed to have gathered the scorn of the male members, mainly because of his seeming focus on advancing his body ranks.
Leo wasn't sure if they were jealous of the female attention, he got or because they looked down on anyone focusing on their body.
It wasn't his fault that he could advance with basically no effort in the ranks of the mind and awareness and decided to advance his body the rest of the time.
Either way, their opinions didn't matter to him as he just did what he was expected of him. He turned in successful missions and attended the curriculum, otherwise he had a lot of free time.
Most of the time he had visited his girlfriends to check up on them and give them some advice. They couldn't really discuss any techniques that they got from the manual because of the contract they signed, but Leo was able to tell them what he figured out on his own.
Since automating his cultivation, he had even more free time on his hands, combined with his need for some credits, he decided to accept another mission.
He went to his room and took his bag that was filled with necessities needed for survival. Usually, stuff that he needed to survive without a source of food and water in some harsh environment.
If he were on earth, he would have even more food and water with him, but with the anima inside everything, it made survival on lower consumption of anything quite easy. To a certain degree one could even replace food with cultivation if there was excess of anima of course.
He wore a tearproof robe standard edition of the lower levels of arcanum. Leo didn't really like the muddy brown color of the robes. The color of the robe was determined by the spirit-level a person got in either the mind rank or the awareness rank.
Complete novices that either had no level or people that just entered the low-level in either the rank of the mind or awareness would wear black robes.
Muddy brown robes were for those that entered the low-level in both the mind or awareness rank or advanced into the middle-level in one of the ranks.
In the same vein it continued with dark blue for complete mid-levels or one foot into the high-level, dark green complete high-level or one foot beyond.
Those that were standing steadfast in the level beyond the high-level wore purple robes and presented the rank of the Archmages.
There wasn't much known about the level beyond the high-level or rather those that were in this rank didn't disclose any information about it, which was why everyone just said that those that wore purple robes had entered the Archmage-level.
Leo had enquired how it was done in other factions and for some reason the colors and the condition to acquire them was the same across factions even in far away parts of the world.
The distinction was made since those that had advanced in two ranks at the same time were equal to someone who advanced in one rank twice. So, someone with the mind and their awareness in the low-level was as strong as someone who only advanced in the mind to the mid-level.
Different, however, was it with the body rank. If one had entered the low-level in both minor body ranks, internal and external, one was equal to someone who had advanced in the rank of the mind and awareness to the low-level.
Which might be a reason why this world decided to divide the body rank into two minor ranks. One advancement in the body rank was equivalent to two in the other two ranks.
Therefore, most people in this world would rather advance with their body instead of choosing the way of advancing two ranks simultaneously. Honestly in Leo's mind there were just 2 body and 2 mental ranks. Why they separated the ranks this convoluted was beyond Leo.
Still, it was weird that Arcanum didn't issue any robes for those that had advanced in the body ranks.
Maybe it was because the people of Arcanum didn't really care about the body ranks or resented those that focused on the body, resulting in their unwillingness to issue any other colors of the robes to someone even if their body rank was in the middle level or even higher.
If one wanted another robe one needed to issue one at the tailor himself.
It was a bit ludicrous for Leo's taste, since some people in Arcanum specialized in the usage of the body to trigger or enhance their techniques as well.
Honestly, Leo had visited one of those experts and even those 'body' specialists weren't anything special. Usually, they would only use it to enhance their techniques which in turn makes the strength of the body itself a rather unimportant variable of their technique.
They just thought if one could move to enhance their technique it was good enough for them. No need to actual put effort into the body to push it to its limit.
Leo wouldn't condemn them for their attitude since there really wasn't much added value into putting more effort into something that they wouldn't use for something else anyway.
One had to consider that the members of Arcanum focused almost entirely on the mind and awareness for their cultivation, how they attacked and defended, how they moved about or how they used it for work.
For them, the mind, and the awareness to understand how to influence the world was the only thing they needed to know. Normal or even slightly talented people couldn't afford to focus on anything else.
Their livelihood depended on their advancement in those ranks, and it would be a waste of energy and time to focus on the body as well. In fact, it was already difficult for most to reach the middle-level in those two alone.
The difficulty alone made it that there was rarely anyone that focused on all aspects to advance. Someone like Leo who had the leisure to take their time to advance in every rank was a rare sight and even discouraged by most more experienced cultivators.
To reach the zenith in one rank alone would need a tremendous amount of effort, diligence, and talent to archive yet alone in two or even three ranks.
Leo put that thought away as he slung his bag over his shoulder. He had a staff that was one and a half meters long that he mostly used to walk with.
It was rather plain wooden staff with an emerald as its head. The emerald was held in its place by the branches of the staff twisting around them.
It was a basic staff issued for low-level to mid-level members of Arcanum. The emerald was something his mentor added for him to further enhance the effectiveness of the staff.
He also already learned some spells. They were in fact called mystic moves or something, but Leo didn't bother to remember that bit since the people on this world were slowly adapting the earthling's word usage anyway.
Most would know that spells were cast by those cultivators that used their mind and awareness. Those cultivators were also just called mages even though they didn't use mana or magicka but were using anima like everyone else.
Either way, Leo had learned three spells already. Fireball, a classic that was needed in every mage's repertoire, Ice Spike, in case fireball fails, and Rock Bullet or for those not from earth, Rock blast.
Leo thought he was pretty balanced with these three already but would of course not rest until he learned everything he needed from the low-level ranks.
He already had his eyes on some wind spells and especially on the lightning spells, but he needed more credit to buy these spells from guild's shop. The spells of the lightning variant were more expensive than the others, but nowhere near the level of gravity and time spells, which he was already thirsting after.
He could also learn some spells from the free lessons that they held if the professors didn't talk so damn slow. In the time he spent attending the classes he would have learned the content of the classes thrice over.
He couldn't ask his mentor to teach him spells since there were some legislations that prevented those privileges to be abused.
It would give other Archmages a reason to give his mentor some trouble or so she said. The fact that she allowed him to be able to buy rarer spells was already pushing it, so Leo couldn't really complain.
He hadn't seen any other Archmages since coming to Arcanum as they rarely left their abode, but he wasn't eager to meet them either. He was happy with his current arrangement even with the obstacle called credits blocking his path to new spells.
It wasn't that bad and if Leo were any less talented, he would have been good for the next three months. Usually, most needed a month of mastering a beginner spell to be usable in battle.
That someone learned three spells in one month, while simultaneously creating a new cultivation technique that trained the entire body and advancing to the complete low-level was already more than remarkable.
If others heard of his progress, they would probably seethe in envy, maybe even flip a table for good measure.
He stepped out of the Arcanum's branch. The branch that had Alina Magenda stationed was facilitating the beginner members of Arcanum. It was a recent arrangement that Leo's mentor had to endure as the youngest Archmage.
There had been a declaration of war by a kingdom of beasts in frozen grasslands a few hundred kilometers to the northeast from this branch. Arcanum would be the second place after Northpass, the city in which Leo arrived first, that would be hit by an invasion.
They had regularly sent some of their members to support Northpass to clear some areas. Terra in Northpass was plenty strong and they didn't seem to be concerned by the kingdom of beasts, in fact for years now they used the declaration of war to send their new members to sharpen their blades against the beasts.
The other factions were also eager to send their new recruits to a war to experience some hardship. It was a perfect opportunity considering that there were rarely any beast attacks.
The beasts were content in staying in their frozen lands as further south they would find themselves in human territory and for them unpleasant temperatures.