In this world, or at the least, in the Equas continent, the power growth of knights, or in a broader sense, all kinds of warriors, relied on their individual talent, comprehension or intellect, physique and the cultivation technique, among the known factors. Among the factors that can make a substantial difference, was the cultivation technique, also called as the Vitality cultivation technique.
The crux of this technique is the cultivation of vitality. By accumulating life force from the vital energies produced within the human body, one can enhance the physique as a whole and increase the lifespan. As a result a power many times that of a normal human can be exerted. Furthermore, the highest ability of techniques that can be used by such warriors, is influencing the mana, or the magical energy, in the surroundings to their use. But this required talent, which Charles had none of. It was rumoured that this talent has been seen to depend on the physique and spiritual power of an individual.
Physique can be analysed from the raw power exerted by the body, and it can be improved with resources, unless one is sick to an irrecoverable point. While, the spiritual power is measured using a soul illumination crystal, which was a rare mineral found in the continent. When a person touches the crystal and put their concentration on it, it vibrates a bit and then emits light. The intensity and colours of the light emitted determines the spiritual power and the elemental affinities of the individual.
The colours were in order of lowest to highest: Red, Green, Blue and the intensities varied between dim, shimmer and blaze.
The minimum requirement for being a mage was Dim Green and for a knight was Dim Red. The actual meaning behind the classification was that, an individual with the lowest Dim Red talent has the potential to be a beginner knight close to or at the peak age of his life. This further implies that, he has exhausted his potential to climb the ranks again for the rest of his life.
As a transmigrator, Charles had two reasons for being gloomy. One being, his spiritual power was almost non-existent, the soul illumination crystal would be considered to have been broken, if it didn't vibrate, albeit slightly. It should also be known that there was never such a case in the empire. Every recorded being of Gaia had at the least Dim Red talent. The second reason being, the line that separates him from being a mage was so for that it disappeared into the horizon. In addition the fact that, the chances of early death increases when one embarks on the journey of a knight or a warrior.
A warrior can overcome his limits and exert double or more power than his peak at the cost of his lifespan, by using the explosive vital energy from the sacrifice of the lifespan. And there were very few knights who died of age, without sacrificing their lifespan.
As of now, Charles was a squire. His body was almost filled to the brim with the accumulated vital energy. He decided to form a vital seed in his heart and breakthrough to be a knight at midnight.
'In this way, by the end of the week, I could fight a magical beast that just reached Rank 1 and get the best cultivation technique in the Fire Maiden Empire.'
If anyone else knew his thoughts they would have ridiculed him. It should be known that, given a knight and beast are of the same rank, even the same level, the beast would easily win 99,9% of the time. The rest 0.1% are the ones to come out of the battle alive, without being crippled, even though they lost. Hence, Charles's resolution was the same as inviting the grim reaper for tea and snacks.
Having a short term goal fixed, his eye lids felt heavy and slowly fell down as he slowly drifted off to sleep.
...
It was the same messages again. The continuation of the one he saw before he died.
[Extracting...]
And just as he thought he was dreaming.
He woke up in pain, his eyes wide and slowly turning dull and his whole body turned increasingly pale within moments. He was about to scream, but before he could, he fell unconscious.
A few hours later, Charles woke up, with a bit of headache and feeling drained. He felt starved. The pain and numbness had yet to leave his body. As he lay there on the bed, heavily breathing, his attention was focused on something in the air, as if something was there at the spot where he focused on, something that only he could see.
Watching the HUD screen that magically appeared in front of him, Charles was ecstatic, even though his tired face only showed a loose smile, with his face twitching irregularly.
Charles was not unaware of the system and transmigration novels. He didn't need any more clues than the system screen or HUD to know that he is either controlled by a system or the other possibilities that were firing off in his tired mind, so much that he felt the headache springing up again.
He attributed the feeling of his head being split in two, to the system. Unable to think much and feeling too drained, he slowly rolled off the bed and drank water from the water jug on the table.
Even though his hunger was not satiated, he felt much better than before. Sitting by the bedside, he read the information on the screen in front of him.
[Player 1:
Alias: Charles Emil Novark
...
]
There was a lot of personal information related to him.
[Player can modify the status screen according to his will]
[Player is recommended to recover before unlocking other functions]
Charles changed the status screen to his liking and was disturbed from his 'manly work', by the shout of a girl from downstairs.
"STINKY BROTHERRRR!!!"
Charles still remembered the incident where Rebecca called him by his middle name. He knew the culprit behind it was his very own beloved little sister.
'Time for brotherly guidance!'
He thought as he walked off to downstairs.
But just as he reached the door, he felt lethargic again. By taking constant pit stops between every 10 to 15 steps, he finally reached downstairs to see his sister, the butler Roger and the maids and another guest that seemed to be Rebecca.
His vision was blurring and his steps unsteady as he came before his sister and asked in a hoarse voice pointing to 'Rebecca':
"Why did you betray me to the fire demoness, Claire?"
Claire felt something was wrong with Charles, as she asked in concern:
"Brother, are you okay?"
Charles didn't seem to hear anything and his vision totally blurred as he raised his hands and said:
"Receive your punishmenn..."
His hands lost his strength soon enough as he felt the world spin and he started to fall forward face first.
Just as he raised his hands earlier, someone appeared in between the brother and sister and caught his hand.
Claire was worried in seeing her brother acting weird, but, nonetheless, she was not afraid of being beaten. The brother and sister were harmonious. And even when Charles set out to punish her, it was always by taking her toys or other possessions or just playfully hitting her. He was afraid of hurting others, so nothing more should be said about his attitude to his own family. But she never expected, the princess to protect her.
The princess was caught off-guard when she felt no strength in Charles's striking hand and when he fell face first, his face landed on her sizable shapely breasts.
While Charles felt like his face landed on something soft and warm. He fell unconscious as he let out a final whisper: " So soft..."
...
When he woke up, he was facing a white ceiling.
He murmured softly: "Where am I?"
He felt a movement by his side and heard his sister asking him in a concerned tone:
"Are you okay, brother?"
Claire was a cute girl who had the potential to be a top beauty of this world, to say nothing of his previous world. Although a year younger than him, Claire matured fast and the makings of a beauty were already showing. She had a wild dark green hair, evergreen irises enclosing the black pupil and a breezy aura to her. She was wearing an aesthetic battle dress with a colour combination of black and green, her dress for academy.
When Charles saw the tear marks on his beautiful young sisters face, he felt really sad, as if someone was breaking his heart. He replied:
"I am fine. Why are you crying, silly sister?"
He wiped her tear marks and kissed her forehead in an effort to make everything bad, go away.
After a brief minute of consoling each other, Charles could no longer contain his curiosity regarding the feeling of his cheeks burning a bit and his jaw a bit shaken. So, he asked his sister:
"Why is my cheek hurting?"
Covering her mouth to hold the laughs, she replied in a sly tone:
"Oh! You don't know! You touched Sister Veronica's chest... hihihi"
As if he received enlightenment, Charles said: " Oh! Figures!"
Just then, a lady doctor and two identical girls in fiery clothes came to the room. Charles, at first thought, he was having a concussion seeing two Rebecca's. A moment later, he remembered about Veronica, Rebecca's twin sister who studied with his sister at the Holy Flame Academy. His sister also told him, that the princess was the number 1 genius of her academy and can beat his ass with just a wave of her hand.
He observed that, Rebecca was wearing the same he saw her in previously. While the other twin was wearing a fiery aesthetic robe draped over her elegant white top and skirt. She was also wearing stylish red boots that almost reached her knees.
The lady doctor saw Charles looking at the sisters in trance and broke him out of his reverie by coughing a bit.
"Charles Emi..."
"Charles is enough, doctor!" He said embarrassedly.
While Rebecca and his sister where laughing and the other twin had an amused smile on her face. Charles pinched her sister to stop making fun of him and glared at Rebecca for laughing, who smirked in return.
"Emil!" called the doctor while showering a threatening smiling at him.
"Don't interrupt me again dear! Otherwise, you would have to extend your stay here."
From her expression he knew that, he will really be beaten, if he interrupts her again.
"Your condition is stable now. You can leave."
Charles sighed in relief. But it did not last.
"By the way, I heard that you are going to undertake the trial by fire this week. You must not participate this time, if you will, you will surely die." Said the doctor like its not an important matter.
Charles and the rest were shocked. They couldn't comprehend the doctor's advice.
"What do you mean?" asked Charles in confusion.
"Your vital energy has been drained and you will have to start-over and accumulate vital energy to become a knight, which would take at minimum another 5 years, given your talent. So, take care and get a good rest for the time being." The doctor left after saying her piece.
Claire and Rebecca were about to console Charles in their own ways, when he interrupted them and said a bit gloomily:
"Claire and you two, please leave the room. I need to have some time alone."
They left the room, but Claire was evidently sad.
...
In the room, Charles was checking out his system. Apart from [Status], he found another function:
[Character]
With nothing else to do, he imagined clicking on the option and he fell unconscious on the bed.