This should be enough; the quality of these plants is actually pretty high. I should be able to develop my mana heart into the third stage with this much." Agnar laughed.
Agnar then went to the marketplace to gather the supplies necessary for the potion.
After gathering the supplies, he started back to his old apartment building where he, his little sister, and his little brother lived. His father was a weak Champion who was killed during the first catastrophe. His mother was also a weak Champion, but she managed to survive the first catastrophe. However, after the disaster, she had to work many jobs in order to support the family. Ultimately, she died from overwork. Agnar later found out that the reason she needed so much money was to pay off debt that his father had accumulated from buying battle equipment during the first catastrophe. She also needed to pay "protection fees" to her higher ups for keeping her and her husband alive for so long. He also later found out that she was force-given drugs every day and forced into prostitution as well to keep their family safe.
Agnar would be furious if someone was to talk about his mother. His mother worked so hard for them and eventually died due to some petty and distasteful bastards. Agnar tried to calm himself down and he soon arrived at his rundown and dilapidated apartment.
…
"Bwada, me hungwy." A tiny and squeaky sound appeared as Agnar walked through the door to his house. It was Agnar's little brother, Kai, a 3-year-old little boy who had crow black hair and dim purple eyes. Kai was almost an exact replica of Agnar.
"Hey, you're back. I made some food and I told lil' Kai to wait for you, but I guess it's impossible for a little kid to wait, haha." Agnar's little sister stuck her head out of the kitchen to greet him. Her name was Nevia, a 14-year-old girl who once again, showed great resemblance to Agnar and his family.
"You guys can eat first, I have something I need to do really quick." Agnar stated as he walked into his room.
Agnar put all of the supplies he bought on his desk. He then started to brew the enhancement potion.
"First, extract the nectars from the lily flower, then pour sparkling water in the cup along with the nectar, smash the mana enhancing plant and dump it into the mix, finally, add a single drop of vanilla extract, a mint leaf, as well as a stick of cinnamon. Now it's time to mix." Agnar said as he lit a small fire using his magic. While the fire was heating the mixture, Agnar then used wind magic to blend the ingredients up. After a few minutes, the potion was done.
"Seems easy at first, but through my extensive research, I finally perfected the brewing method." Agnar laughed as he chugged the potion down his throat.
Agnar felt the surging flow of mana through his veins, he quickly discerned a massive ball of viscous substance in the center of his mana heart.
"Blurrg!" Agnar spat out a disgusting ball of black substance. It smelled like a dead rodent that was rotting away in a basement. He quickly activated dark magic and disintegrated the black ball of viscous substance.
"Seems like I've reached the 2nd tier mage. This should be the equivalent to being around a middle D tier Champion." Agnar sighed. He knew that although the Champions were organized into letter tiers by the government, there were also the ranks for Blessings. He recalled that the ranks were Talen, Minas, Niveru, Vimeu, Montaq, Rawl, Tamil, Rebis, and Agnes. There could be blessing ranks beyond the Agnes rank, but the highest rank ever recorded was a man who could manipulate atomic particles at the Agnes rank. This man's name is Yevalis, but he is on his downfall after receiving a near-fatal injury from an unknown ranked beast.
"Hurry up! Dinner's getting cold!" A sharp voice sounded that snapped Agnar back to reality from his deep thoughts. "Coming!" Agnar replied back.
Agnar decided to find that tonight. He walked out to the dinner table and enjoyed an appetizing meal with his siblings. Kai was laughing loudly and poking Agnar's face with a fork while Nevia tried to stop little Kai from disturbing Agnar. Agnar gave a little smile, he knew that these peaceful times would soon come to an end; the second catastrophe was coming..
…
After dinner, it was around 9 pm already. Nevia situated Kai into his little bed and went to bed herself. She told Agnar to not stay too late, but the nagging was shrugged off by Agnar. He decided to leave the house in around 2 hours. Meanwhile, he would attempt to break into the 3rd tier mage by circulating his mana veins through meditation.
Two hours later, Agnar still had a long way to go before he reached 3rd tier mage. He decided not to dwell any longer and jumped out the window of his apartment.
"Wind Burst!" Agnar murmured internally as wind started to blow around his foot. He dashed from building to building with extreme speed. In a few minutes, he was already nearing the edge of the city. As he arrived into the sparse forest situated outside the border of the city, he noticed an intense amount of bloodlust coming from 500 meters to his west.
"Looks like I've got company. This should be good training." Agnar smirked as he walked toward the direction where the bloodlust came from.
Suddenly, a loud screeching sound blared through the air and a shadow lunged its body towards Agnar. Agnar casted a mana shield to block the incoming attack, but to his surprise, the shadow completely bypassed his shield and bit into his shoulders as blood gushed out.
"AGHHH!" Agnar yelled with anguish in his voice.
As the shadow appeared in front of Agnar, it was revealed what beast it was.
"Looks like a Shadow Tienzen to me, a C ranked devil type beast." Agnar gave a wry smile as he sighed internally. He knew that it would be hard to take on a C ranked beast at his current strength.
The Shadow Tienzen gave Agnar no time to process his thoughts as it lunged towards him once again at blurring speeds. Agnar attempted to pierce the beast's weak point with spears of light, but it failed. The beast bit off Agnar's left limb as it licked its lips with satisfaction. Agnar cried out in agony as he stumbled backwards. Blood once again gushed out of the spot where Agnar's right arm was supposed to be. Agnar's vision was starting to become a little blurry due to the loss of blood, but he rubbed his eyes and ignored the blurriness.
"Dammit, I'm gonna die at this rate." Agnar bit his lips as a drop of blood trickled down his chin. "Wait.. physical attacks should be it's weakness. Time to put the hours of close combat training with my sensei to use." Agnar had a moment of realization as the Shadow Tiezen once again approached him with full speed.
"Here goes nothing, Jeta Style: Jade Pierce!" Agnar yelled out as his fingers started to look like they were hardening and they locked into a certain position. As the beast leaped towards Agnar's head, looking to finish him off, Agnar's claw-like fingers had already reached the beast's blood-red eyes.
KKSSSCHHHH!! A tearing sound rippled through the air as Agnar's left arm had completely torn through the head of the Shadow Tienzen. Agnar retracted his arm and looked at the bloodied corpse of the hound-like devil creature.
"Huff, huff, huff… Ahh..." Agnar sighed as he laid on the soft earthy grass below him. He attempted to stop the blood from flowing out of his shoulder and non-existent right arm by constriction. After he was done, he tried to get up and search for that, but was hit with a sudden wave of fatigue and passed out right after getting up.