"How? I used a tier three basic spell and yours was only a tier one spell. I don't understand." Xavier's face showed immense frustration.
His father smiled at him. "Do you think that it's as simple as that?" His father cocked his head at him.
"What do you mean, father?" His father gave him a look that Xavier had seen a thousand times. It meant that he wasn't thinking things through. "You mean there's something I'm missing? There's some way you elevated your spell's power."
His father nodded, extremely pleased with him. "There are many ways to strengthen spells. The first is a magical nucleus. These nuclei are separated into several different grades. Good, excellent, perfect, peerless, earth, and heaven grade. There are rumors of higher-grade magical nuclei but none that I've ever been able to confirm. There are other ways of course including one which we take very seriously in our family."
Xavier sat up eagerly to listen to his father's lecture. This made him pause as he realized it was the first time he actually wanted to be lectured by his father. His father caught his look and smiled before continuing. "In our family we cultivate in the oldest way. Today we meditate to the third tier of a magical level before we attempt to breakthrough to the next level. Basic mages can break through to the intermediate level fairly easily so long as they have enough time. Once a mage attempts to break through the advanced level, they start having real difficulties. The energy needed to go from an intermediate mage to advanced mage is greater than mere meditation. In meditation we refine elementium into our spiritual world. Once we reach the point when our spiritual world is full, we reach that barrier of break through and meditate more to force energy into our spiritual world and cause it to expand. The issue comes from the barrier between intermediate and advanced being too tough for mere meditation to take in enough elementium to force the barrier to break."
"In current times we've found resources to help us with this issue. Essence stones have vast amounts of elementium in them that can be easily absorbed and force more elementium into our bodies in one instance than we can refine ourselves." His father continued.
"When the spacial cracks first appeared, we didn't have the strength to gain access to those kinds of resources. However, there was something that we did have access to. The outburst of elementium from the spacial cracks caused a great many of the local creatures to mutate into demonic beasts. One of the earliest forms of magic that man had developed was soul magic. When a magical or demonic beast is killed there is a possibility that those creatures will leave behind a soul remnant or essence. As soul magic was developed, we created spells and tools that could capture these essences. These essences could be refined and their energy placed within our spiritual stars. If at any time all of the spiritual stars within a spell are enhanced by a soul essence then the tier of the spell goes up. Normally cultivating, man can only go up to the third tier, but with soul essences they can exceed that. So far, we haven't found the limits of this method."
His father continued further. "Before we found essence stones, we would break through by raising the tier of the stars until it forced a break through. When an essence is added to the stars it doesn't just give the star more energy it also makes the energy purer. The purer the energy is the less it takes to break the barriers between levels. Our family still continues this tradition. Because of that our spells are more powerful than others' at the same level."
Xavier was enlightened by his father's explanation. He kept thinking about it some more and thought about an issue. "If that's really the case then why is it a specialty of our family? Why doesn't everyone still do it if they used to?"
His father nodded his approval of the question. "That's because a better use was found for soul essences. Now we can use them to create a device that speeds up our ability to refine elementium. The demand is far higher than the supply. Soul essences are at a premium. That and the stones mean that not many people can afford to buy soul essences for the purpose of strengthening their stars. After all, you have to enhance all the stars in that spell to make it stronger which means you need at minimum seven soul essences. The cost of that today is ridiculously high."
"If it was so common a hundred years ago then why is it so hard to do today? Have the techniques not advanced with the times?" Xavier couldn't understand how something that was common a century ago was no longer so.
"I never said that it was common a century ago. It wasn't until enough people who did do that had the strength to go get the essence stones that magic technology took a huge leap forward. By then it was just easier to get the essence stones than the soul essences. After all, to get an essence stone you just have to go to a rich elementium area and find one whereas, to get a soul essence, you need to find and kill a magical beast hoping it will leave a soul essence behind which is very rare. Not to mention you need a soul container to capture and refine the soul essence which needs a soul mage to create it. Very few mages awaken the soul element." His father gave a very sarcastic smile. "Which do you think is easier?"
Xavier nodded his understanding. "So really the only mages who've got the opportunity to use soul essences to strengthen their stars are the ones who are out in the wilds fighting all the time." Xavier's expression shifted as he realized something. "I'm guessing that there's not a lot of mages willing to risk their lives in the wilds fighting demon creatures when they can avoid them and mine some stones instead."
His father nodded at his astuteness. "Exactly so. With the stones being so much easier to obtain and the soul essences that are being acquired being used to create elementium refiner accelerators they just don't get used to strengthen stars."
Xavier nearly spat when he heard that. "That was way too much of a mouthful dad. Elementium refiner accelerator? Whoever thought that just had way too much caffeine that day."
His father smiled and nodded. "You're right. They're called E.R.As for short. As for whoever had too much caffeine when those devices were named you have Mr. Mortenson to blame for that. Make sure I'm there when you tell him about the name he came up with for the device he pioneered."
Xavier hurriedly shook his head. "Caffeine? What caffeine? I don't know anything about too much caffeine."
His father shook his head and chuckled. "I'm sure that when you go to your lesson tomorrow and he gives you an e.r.a. that he'll be overjoyed with that sentiment."
Xavier nodded his head quickly and then got to his feet. His father helped him up. "Go get some rest now Xavier. You have an early morning ahead of you."
Xavier went straight to his room and fell into bed without even taking off his training clothes. The next day he went to Mr. Mortenson's class with a new found respect for the teaching master.
Mr. Mortenson directed him into his seat. "I've heard that you successfully summoned your first magical beast." He nodded, "Very good. I've also heard that you have a very strong opinion about the use of a certain chemical substance when naming things."
Xavier went stiff. Betrayed! His father had betrayed him. He must get vengeance. The emotions flashed across his face. Mr. Mortenson watched amused. "Calm down now Xavier. I'm not mad at you." Irritation went across Mr. Mortenson's face, "I am mad that your father laughed at your little joke when he knew better."
Suddenly Xavier thought that the best revenge may be to just let Mr. Mortenson take his. Xavier nodded his understanding. Mr. Mortenson smiled at him and nodded back in response.
"Now let's discuss something a little more central to your education, shall we?" Mr. Mortenson reached into the pocket of his robe and pulled out a jade box. Opening the box, he pulled out a silver armband. It was a dragon in the shape of a mobius strip. "This is your e.r.a."
He handed it over to Xavier who immediately lifted his sleeve and slipped it onto his upper arm. "This e.r.a has some unique features to it. For one as you grow up and your arm mass increases the armband will expand to fit. This is also a growth type e.r.a. At the moment it's not activated. Once you kill your first servant level creature and obtain its soul essence it will activate and begin aiding your cultivation. After you get your first warrior level soul essence it will upgrade and so on and so forth."
"This one is also different in that it is a soul container. After it's activated it can still hold other soul essences and will refine them to use in strengthening your stars. It also has a storage space that will upgrade along with its quality." Mr. Mortenson smiled and nodded his head in satisfaction. "Indeed, this may be one of the best magical artifacts I've ever forged."
"You're an artifact forger as well Mr. Mortenson?" Xavier asked impressed.
Mr. Mortenson nodded. "Yes, though I usually only forge e.r.a's. Anyway, this one is yours. Treat it well."
Xavier nodded his head seriously. This was his first magical artifact. It was very important to him.