Chapter 35: Blink
Abium isolated himself in his room for the next seven days, entered the spiritual realm more than six times, and increased his Spirit Power up to 4.2!
His improvement was much faster than he had expected!
He finally ended his meditation on the eighth day, walked out of the wooden bed, and looked outside through the opened window.
Abium soon saw full of people on the street road. Many shops and workshops were arranged near the roads, and the whole street was bustling with full of life.
'The town appears peaceful as usual.' He nodded inwardly and looked at the morning sky.
After a swift glance, he realized that the time should be around nine o clock and closed the silver curtain.
'It's time to create the mana imprint now.' Abium thought to himself and took out the book from his spatial ring.
He sat on the concrete floor, opened the book, and soon saw a complicated array circle on the first page and a detailed description.
He quietly read the description and realized that this complicated array was just the beginning!
'Hmm?' Raising his eyebrows, he flipped the page and checked the second page.
Soon, he saw another similar array circle drawn on the second page and turned solemn.
He continued to check each page for the next few minutes and finally heaved a deep sigh.
'It seems becoming a mage isn't an easy thing. To create a Mana Imprint, I need to engrave all 342 array circles on my soul form's abdomen area and let them connect using my Spirit Power. Wait. Soul form?' A frown appeared on his face.
'Does that mean I have to engrave these arrays in the separate spiritual realm?' He showed a confused look on his face and soon continued to read.
'Once the array circles are connected, I've to guide this mana imprint to my heart region and let it act as a connecting point for the physical body and the Sea of Consciousness… Hmm, I've no idea about the Sea thing.' He shook his head and decided to focus on the current work.
For the next few hours, he remained in the same position and started memorizing everything in that book.
After that, he recited the strange chanting and entered the spiritual realm.
A second later, he found himself standing in the middle of an empty void and looking at the faraway star-like clouds.
Then, he looked at his hands and noticed that his appearance looked clearer than before.
He first raised his hand and tried to draw a runic letter on the empty void. To his shock, a whitish rune letter appeared before his face and hovered without being affected by gravity.
'Interesting,' Abium nodded, lowered his gaze towards his abdominal region, moved his foggy right hand, and started drawing the first array circle using his finger.
After that, he wrote the rune letters inside the array circle and finished inscribing the first array circle on his soul form within 5 minutes.
Once he ended this process, the array circle glowed in golden color and got shrunken to the size of a small dot.
It then moved towards the soul form's heart region and attached to that place like a parasite.
On the other hand, Abium stared at the dot in surprise and then continued to inscribe the second magic array circle on his soul form.
He remained in the spiritual realm for more than 40 hours and continued to create the magic array circles one by one.
Two days passed when he finished inscribing the final array circle on his soul form.
At that moment, a new heart-shaped golden cloud appeared around his left side chest region and glowed continuously.
'Mana Imprint!' Abium focused his full spirit power on the glowing heart and tried to connect all those minute array circles.
Thankfully, he didn't face any problem connecting the array circles and even linked the Mana Imprint with the deepest part of his soul.
The golden light turned into a streak of rays the next instant, absorbed into his soul form, and then disappeared!
'What happened?' Abium got anxious inside and soon sensed a mysterious connection with his soul, body, and even the outside environment.
At that moment, Abium knew that he had finally created the 'Mana Imprint'!
'Perfect.' He soon left the spiritual realm and opened his eyes before looking around.
At that moment, he sensed the people staying in the nearby rooms, in the reception hall, and even on the outside street road and got stunned.
"I can sense their movements, hear their voices and even perceive their bodies through this Spirit Power. Amazing." He muttered in shock and soon noticed that the surrounding mana was being absorbed into his body.
No, the mysterious mana power moved towards his heart area first, disappeared like they were never there before, and soon appeared inside his spell model in a completely different form.
'They are stored in my soul? Moreover, why do I feel like only the fire-elemental energies are extracted and stored in the spell model?' He hurriedly checked his body status and noticed that mana points increased quickly.
When the mana point reached around 8, the mana absorption speed also slowed down and then stopped.
'So, it takes only a few minutes to refill the elemental energies in the spell models, huh.' He nodded thoughtfully, shifted his attention towards his spatial ring, and checked how much money he had.
'I currently have eight gold coins and a few silvers. They should be enough for the rest of my journey to the capital. But I need to give some amount to Claude and others.' He frowned and soon shook his head.
'I'll think about it later.' He first wanted to construct the second spell model and improve his strength.
'It's time.'
His lips curved upward and formed into a smile.
With a smile, Abium took out the spellbook from his spatial ring and searched for a zero-tier spell suitable.
Abium knew he could only construct spells based on his elemental affinity and began to contemplate deeply.
'i have a 'High' Affinity in Darkness and Space and 'Good' affinity in Fire.' He wondered which affinity spell could help him in battles.
Every mage could only construct six or seven spells in their minds for every tier.
So, Abium had long thought of choosing two spells from darkness, two spells from fire, and another two spells from space element.
'My current weaknesses are agility and defense. I can use sword arts for attacks and have already constructed the [Fire Orb] spell. So, I don't need to construct more attack spells.' He thought of choosing a spell that would help in the most dangerous situations.
He searched the spellbook for a while and marked a few Zero-Tier Spell models like Flame Touch, Blink, Blue Flame, Mind Burn, Dark Bolt, Fear Touch, etc.
After some analysis, he finally chose the [Blink] spell.
Blink spell was a short-distance teleport spell used mainly by the Spatial Mages. Although he only had an average spatial affinity, he thought choosing this spell would benefit him during battles.
Following that, Abium sat on the concrete floor and used his spirit power to construct the blink spell model inside his mind.
There were a total of twenty rune letters in that blink spell model. Using his Spirit Power, he slowly inscribed 20 rune letters inside his mind and finished the spell model construction process after four hours.
Then, an extraordinary thing happened as he made the final touch and inscribed the last rune letter in his mind.
Buzz!
His surroundings started to vibrate, and the spell model inside his mind flickered intensely.
After that, spatial elemental energies in the surrounding atmosphere got absorbed into his mind and soon entered the crystal-like hexagonal-shaped spell model.
"Success!" He muttered out loud.
Abium focused his attention on the spell model and cast the [Blink] spell.
The second later, spatial elemental energies appeared around his surroundings and warped his body as a whole. Simultaneously, Abium felt that the space around him distorted and pulled him somewhere.
His vision turned blurry as his figure vanished and reappeared outside his room.
Abium stood outside with a dazed look a second later and soon broke into a smile.
'I like this spell.'
He quietly studied the blink spell model for a few more seconds and soon realized how it works.
'Once I cast this spell, I can shift my body to any point within 20 feet.'
Unlike the other spells, the [Blink] spell could enable Abium to choose the exact time to teleport, the correct destination, and even orientation.
For example, he could blink right before the opponent attacks him, reappears behind the opponent like a shadow, and kill him swiftly.
'As long as I use this spell perfectly, I can even assassinate powerful people or Demons.' But Abium knew that he had to construct the upgrade version of the [Blink] spell to achieve that feat.
Shaking his head, he cast the [Blink] spell again and reappeared in his room.
Then, he checked his status bar and noticed that only 4.1 mana points remained.
'Each time I cast a spell, it cost two mana points. I need to use them carefully.' He thought inwardly and shifted his attention towards the status bar.
[Name: Abium
Age: 16
Race: Half-elf (???)
Class: Apprentice Mage
Health: Normal
Attributes:
Strength- 3.4
Agility- 3.4
Vitality- 3.2
Mana- 8.4
Spirit- 4.2
Skills:
Master Swordsmanship, Intermediate Sword Aura.
Magic Spells:
Zero-Tier spells: Blink, Fire Orb.]
'Hmm, I've grown pretty strong in just 20 days. If I act carefully, I can even kill Watson without much trouble.' But he knew killing the Apprentice Necromancer or any other Apprentice Mage would still be difficult for him.
'But this is more than enough now.' He nodded.