Hannah and Kasine joined him just as he had finished hypnotizing the first rat.
“I knew he had escaped to his lab,” Hannah cooed, her lips curving in a sharp smirk as she and Kasine entered.
The sterile air carried their laughter like static, sharp but giving a tinge of familiar warmth to the quiet lab.
“Heh, you can run but not hide, mister…” Kasine grinned at him, but seeing the mana shield around the rat, she lost track of the joke she was about to make.
“You’re starting the tests now?”
“Yep.” Sokram nodded as he pressed the syringe with a few milliliters of a green substance into the rat’s heart.
With a hand on the rat’s back, he began to use guided cultivation.
But monts later, his hand snapped back from the runic shield in an urgent jerk.
The rat ruptured with a sickening, wet pop, splattering the mana shield in a rain of green vapor and slick red viscera.
“Solution number one is a no-go.” Sokram rely shrugged.
With a wave of his hand over the gory ss, embers erged from an invisible fla, dissolving the rat's remains into ash in an instant.
“I’ll help. Did you start from number one? I’ll pick up from number fifty, and Kasine can pick up from the hundredth.”
Hannah walked toward the numbered solutions, rolling her sleeves up to her elbows.
“All I need to activate the mana shield is to inject mana into the runestone, right? I won’t get gooey rat remains all over , right?” Kasine joked, making Sokram chuckle as he pictured the scene.
“Don’t worry, I tested all the runestones, knowing you would co.”
Sokram had brought up twenty rats, but he knew he would need a lot more than fifty because they had prepared nearly five hundred variations of the formula.
All because he wanted to show Nhiria a dramatic struggle before succeeding, so he left the working versions to the very end.
After all, geniuses should also encounter hardship from ti to ti, especially when it cos to groundbreaking creations.
They spent hours killing one rat after the other, but by the ti they ran out of test subjects, they still hadn’t found a working formula.
Seeing that Sokram wasn’t discouraged and only slightly disappointed, Kasine and Hannah refrained from saying anything besides agreeing on the obvious fact: they needed more rats.
Instead of using the Androny guards for that, Sokram went to the slums. He placed posters along the alleys and streets, offering a silver for each living rat that was captured. But he also made it clear he would only buy fifty rats a day.
Then he went back to the Arch Mage's Tower.
The first underground floor was twice the size of the ninth, and the illusion of ti dilation was even stronger there.
Yet, with his Mind Locks lifted and his Hyper Cognition enhanced, Sokram barely felt any strain while reading there.
Contrary to any expectation, he didn’t start reading the books on the shelves. He instead decided to read the books that were gifted to him on his birthday, especially the ones he had gained from Madalyn.
The next day, around midday, Sokram went straight to his lab.
There were a few people from the slums with wooden boxes waiting for him, but he barely managed to get ten rats from them.
But he didn’t mind; he knew word of mouth would spread soon.
Entering the lab, he was surprised to see Kamus there with Kasine, and there were twenty more rats in the cages.
Kasine explained that when she arrived, so people were waiting to sell the rats they had captured.
But since Kasine didn’t know any hypnotic or illusion spells, having barely started learning how to use Spirit Magic, she couldn’t have started working as, without the hypnosis, the rats wouldn't stay still.
Sokram made sure to give the money back to Kasine, knowing her personality.
He even left a few hundred silver coins with her, just in case the sa happened the next day.
After dealing with Kasine, Sokram turned to Kamus, who only ca to inform him, “Your training starts tomorrow. I asked Licarus to give you another two months of sick leave just for it."
Kamus’s voice cut through the lab’s stillness; his tone was sharp.
It wasn't a request. It was an order as Sokram's Grandmaster, "Be at the east gates before sunrise every day from now on.”
Kamus then rembered sothing and looked at Kasine sheepishly as he added, “Your training will last until midday, until your work here is done. So it doesn’t interfere with whatever you’re trying to create now, but don’t think we’ll go easy on you.”
Sokram didn’t argue.
It was a challenge he had craved since his return.
Sokram’s answer was not just compliant, but crisp with anticipation: “Yes, Grandmaster. I’ll be there.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
And after that, Kamus left, leaving them to their work.
Hannah only showed up a couple of hours later, telling Sokram that she had to fly Madalyn to the capital because of so urgent matter with one of the King’s wives.
She also inford him that Hilda had ordered him to have dinner with them at least before going to the Tower from then on.
By the ti they had finished the last batch of tests, they had each tested another ten rats.
During late noon, Sokram managed to buy more rats from the people of the slum, who appeared knocking on their door.
He made it clear that this was the only day he would be buying outside of the ti he stipulated in the posters.
As for the rats, they all exploded, and signs of concern began showing on Sokram’s face.
Still, Kasine and Hannah remained quiet.
Sokram went ho with Hannah and had dinner with his family.
Surprising him the most was Lucille’s presence there.
It seed that after his birthday, the won he declared as his decided to band together.
Which was good, but sotis the looks they cast over him made him suspicious that they were plotting sothing, but he was too busy to pay attention to their antics.
Besides, he knew that if sothing serious happened, Lucy or Sayuri would be the first ones to find him.
And Hannah was there too.
After dining with his family, Sokram returned to the Tower and stayed there until the ti to et Kamus and Leona.
When he t them, Kamus was standing near a few five-ter-long steel cylinders, each cylinder was 8 cm in diater.
One look at the sheer size of the cylinders told Sokram the training would be brutal.
“Good morning, Grandmaster, Master.” Sokram greeted them cheerfully.
They greeted him back in the sa tone. Yet the undisguised wolfish grins sent a shiver of ice down Sokram’s spine.
A familiar tremor that reminded him of pain and progress in equal asure.
Kamus handed Sokram two pairs of mithril rings and explained, “Strip down, no armor, no artifacts, and no boots, only your pants, and they better not be enchanted. Then wear these: two on your wrists, two on your ankles. Today, we’ll be training your body. Tie those poles with that rope and carry them. We are not going far.”
“Yes, Grandmaster.” Sokram didn’t argue.
He had survived this crucible once before; he knew exactly what to expect.
Wearing the rings on his wrist and ankles would seal nine-tenths of his energy.
With only one-tenth of his energy, just picking up the steel poles would exhaust him, as each cylinder weighed almost 200 kilos, and there were ten of them.
Stacked together, the steel mass lood like an unyielding mountain. Sokram was carrying over two tons, tied by a rope soone wouldn't even use to tie a donkey.
Instead of complaining, Sokram anchored himself in the mont.
He controlled his breath until it was a deep, rhythmic thrum and sped up his circulation, channeling energy to his Core until the great weight beca rely a burden he could stagger forward with.
Had Sokram been anyone else, this would be a great effort, but even with only a twentieth of his energy flowing freely, that much was easy for him.
What made it challenging was the need to reinforce the ropes with his own energy so they wouldn’t break.
The main goal of the training was to strengthen his muscles and energy circulation.
Sokram still felt the excessive strain on his muscles, but at least he wouldn’t fall on his back while carrying the steel poles, as it had happened hundreds of tis in his past tiline.
Leona and Kamus looked at him with genuine surprise. But after a double-take and making sure he was firm, they began to walk.
Kamus didn’t wait for Sokram to match their pace.
He only began matching Sokram's pace when the distance between them was around 50 ters.
Only then did Kamus begin explaining, “The first day of the training, you will carry these steel poles for 500 ters, tomorrow will be 100 ters more, and you will add another steel pole to the pile. This increase will continue each day for five days straight, and only then will you have two days of rest.”
Sokram already knew all that, so he only answered, “Yes, Grandmaster!”
He didn’t know where they were going, but he hoped they wouldn’t enter the woods…
Nonetheless, they did.
Even though it beca clear they were heading to a clearing in the middle of the woods near the city, that didn’t excite Sokram one bit.
They had barely walked ten steps when Kamus’s katana cleared leather with a hiss.
A streak of silver light sliced the air, and a gigantic pine tree on his path groaned like a dying giant before it toppled.
The tree fell right in front of Sokram.
Its bristling needles and splintered trunk ford a sudden, insurmountable wall of wood that thumped the earth and vibrated through his already strained feet.
Kamus grinned at Sokram and told him, “You can either jump or walk around it. What will you choose?”
Sokram, of course, chose the most challenging path. And that was to jump over the fallen tree.
But jumping while carrying two tons on his back, while only being able to use a tenth of his mana, wasn’t simple.
If he used too much energy to jump, he wouldn’t have enough to land and maintain his balance.
But Sokram didn’t have just one type of energy coursing through his veins like in his past tiline, so it was manageable.
His muscles coiled and released.
He sprang upward, jumping two ters high over the pine tree in a breath.
His feet didn't brush a single needle before slamming back to earth.
Sokram landed on the other side without losing balance, impressing Kamus and Leona again and gaining him a few complints. “Nice, you picked a brave disciple, Leona, braver than you even…”
“Heh, I’m a better Master than I’m a disciple.” Leona raised her head, shalessly proud, looking at Sokram with approval and avoiding her Master's glare.
“But even so, I’m not going easy on him. After all, he is training to beco a Master like us.” With that, Kamus used One Step - One Stride, and in the next second, twenty other trees fell along Sokram’s path.
And then Kamus appeared right beside him, “You chose to jump. Will you remain loyal to your choice, Killing Blade Sokram?”
“Yes, Grandmaster!” Sokram answered firmly between ragged breaths.
Sokram neither rushed his pace nor allowed anything to break his focus.
But inside, he was getting quite irked with the teasing grin that appeared on his Master and Grandmaster’s faces every ti he exceeded their expectations.
Sokram jumped over another tree, and Leona and Kamus disappeared. When Sokram noticed that, his heart fell.
His pace was slow over to the next tree.
He took in a few deep breaths and jumped, but as he expected, just as he was high in the air, rocks ca flying at him.
With his two hands holding and reinforcing the ropes, he only had his feet to defend himself, but that didn’t make it any less painful.
Sokram, thanks to his Hyper Cognition and Precognition, picked up on the timing of the rocks with a single glance. And, kicking the stone that reached him first toward the other, he avoided the two of them, just in ti to readjust his posture to land on his two feet with a squat.
The pain in his feet spiked white-hot, stealing his breath. Every heartbeat pulsed agony through bone and tendon.
Unbelievable, not for its damage as there was no wound, no bruise, only a deep, relentless throb that refused to fade.
It was a deep, sickening ache that eclipsed all other sensation, forcing his already slow pace into a barely-there shuffle.
The reason for that pain was to force him to strengthen his ntal fortitude and willpower to the limit.
Sokram jumped over tree after tree, not being hit once by the rocks that Leona and Kamus threw at him.
As he cleared the last tree, his body was drenched in sweat, his lungs heaving for air, and his mind roiled in the turmoil of the throbbing pain.
But seeing that he had finally reached the clearing, he forced himself to continue walking, step after step, until he reached the five-hundred-ter mark.
He only knew that he had reached it because he saw Lymus there, sprawled on the floor.
The poles Lymus had carried were already stuck into the ground, perfectly aligned in two lines of five poles.
Sokram only felt pity for his Sword Uncle when he saw the look Kamus had on his face after finding Lymus sleeping.
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