"That’s right, he passed the second option of the examiner’s second trial of the sanctuary."
The room fell silent as the captain of the fifth Soul-Squad revealed that Rentaro had passed the second option. The Awakeners’ eyes widened in disbelief, so even staring at Rentaro as if they had misheard him.
Shock and confusion spread across their faces almost instantly.
Then suddenly, the man burst into loud laughter, his voice echoing through the room. After a few monts, he slowly cald himself, clearing his throat as he regained his composure.
"I’m sorry I’m sorry, it’s just so unexpected." The man chuckled softly once again before finally calming down. He cleared his throat one last ti, the faint smile on his face slowly fading into sothing more complicated.
Years had passed.
Generations had co and gone.
Yet throughout that long and endless tiline, he had never once thought there would be another person capable of surviving and clearing the second option of the second trial.
"He isn’t the only one, there are three others, but they are severely injured so they won’t be able to join the debriefing for the fifth trial for a while." The fifth captain said as he glanced at Rentaro. "This is the vice captain of the fifth Soul-Squad, Dante Zogratis, and he’ll be in charge of the debriefing. Alright then, you don’t want to keep him waiting now."
Rentaro smiled, then walked towards the rest of the Awakeners that managed to ascend with bold eyes.
As Rentaro walked toward the crowd of Awakeners, he could feel their gazes settling heavily on him. So stared in pure shock, but most looked at him with anger and envy burning in their eyes.
After all, every Awakener present in the debriefing had suffered through the cruel and exhausting trials of the third and fourth sanctuary just to stand there, a journey that took no less than three whole years. Yet Rentaro had cleared the second option instead.
Which ant that since entering the sanctuary, it hadn’t even been three full days for him.
"Now that we’re all here, we can begin. The trial of the fifth sanctuary is completely different from the first four trials most of you went through." As Dante said, the crowd imdiately understood who he was referring to.
Almost at once, the majority of the Awakeners turned their envious stares toward Rentaro again, their expressions growing even darker as silence filled the room.
"And as such, before you’ll be permitted to take the trial of the sanctuary, you must obtain a Soul-Hunter’s license. That license not only permits and proves your qualifications to ascend the trials of the sanctuary, but it also grants you access to restricted areas, and to join a Soul-Squad." Dante began, and imdiately grabbed the attention of all the awakeners.
"How do we obtain this license sir?" One of the Awakeners asked.
"Here in the fifth sanctuary, the Soul-Hunters association divided the fifth trial into two parts before one can ascend to the sixth, the first two parts aren’t as demanding and suicidal as the last, which brings us to the first part... Soul-Techniques."
"Soul-Techniques?" The crowd murmured.
"That’s right, by now so of you should have grasped the concept of it." As Dante spoke, the mories of the first trial surfaced in Rentaro’s mind. He recalled the abilities Eliza and Timmy had displayed back then, powers that had already seed extraordinary at the ti.
Then his thoughts shifted to the battle against the Supre Adaptive General.
He couldn’t exactly call most of his skill a Soul-Technique, at least not the Heavens authority.
Soul-Techniques, as the na suggests, are abilities specific to each individual class. It couldn’t be replicated, at least not by soone that awakened a different class.
Dante raised two fingers in the air.
"The two principles of creating a good Soul-Technique, Amplification and Enhancent."
"W-wait Vice captain, we don’t understand what you’re talking about. Amplification and Enhancent?" The Awakeners’ murmurs only increased, and Dante sighed.
He stretched out his right palm, then concentrated his Soul-Energy into a single point in his palm.
An imnse pressure shook the grounds of the halls, the Awakeners could all feel the vibrations flowing through the ground, imdiately a blue aura emanated from his palm, escaping it like a cloud of smoke.
"W-whoa." They all marveled at the release of his essence, it was fluid and mistful like gas.
"I belong to the Elental Will of fla class, with the upper stage Grade 3 Soul-Core, as a result my Soul-Energy takes on the color sche of my core." He said, cancelling the concentration of his Soul-Energy.
"Strengthening the Soul-Core is much like muscle building, what happens when you try to build muscle? It tears down but once it repairs itself it becos even bigger and stronger. The sa is applicable for Soul-Core, by working your Soul-Core to its absolute limits, you give it room to grow. That is what we call the Amplification stage."
The awakeners listened with rapt attention, every information was vital and every step vital.
"And Enhancent, concentrating this expanded energy into a single point to create your ultimate technique. That is the main aim of this first part, to pass the first half, you must create at least two Soul-Techniques, strong enough to make us believe that you are near ready to take on the fifth trial. Humanity can’t afford to lose more of its kind."
It didn’t sound that hard at first, but creating Soul-Techniques was much more than tossing Soul-Energy around.
"Now that you’ve been briefed and inford on what to do, ti is not an issue, you’ve been given one month to develop your Soul-Technique, only then can you pass the selection and take the trial of the fifth sanctuary. Good luck." With his final words, Dante left the Awakeners and went on to attend to more pressing matters.
’A Soul-Technique huh.’ Rentaro thought as he recalled all abilities in his arsenal. Asides Tiless, the remaining ability was a skill he got from defeating the Lizard King Folks, and thanks to the God-Tier proficiency returns that converted all his rewards to a Divine Grade Skill, it used up a large portion of his Soul-Energy in just a single use.
’Creating a Soul-Technique is crucial to , Tiless and the reward skill I obtained, Heaven’s Authority are both demanding in terms of Soul-Energy. So till I can level up to a point that using them isn’t a problem anymore, I need other alternatives... I need my very own Soul-Technique.’
"You must be Rentaro Mizuno right? Considering you’re one of those that cleared the second option and blew up the rankings."
Suddenly, a voice reached out to Rentaro from behind. As he turned around, he found a boy standing directly behind him, his white flowing hair covering his left eye. His deep blue eyes carried a calm but sharp gaze, while his lean build gave him a quiet but yet composed presence.
"Who are you? And how do you know my na?"
"Straight to the point huh? Well." A smile curled up the side of the boy’s lips as he pointed his thumbs to his face and said. "My na is Kai Voltia, and I’m your new rival."
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