At sunset, Zydrax spoke for the first time in eight days.

[Its done]

Ezra's eyes shut open ten seconds later, abruptly exiting Skyfall's mind space and hot to attention, squeezing his numb fists.

"It's done? I don't feel all that different though"

[Only the first part is done]

"Which is?"

[Your mana limit has been reached]

'Hmm?' Ezra instinctively pushed his mana into action.

"Ohh" he was flabbergasted. His mana had quadrupled!

At the same time, his body was longer absorbing mana.

[Mana limit] Zydrax began. [Simply put, you body has reached the limit of the mana it can hold-which is far more than I had expected]

Ezra smiled. "You must be surprised"

[Yes. I didn't think this infant planet had an existence like you in it. You're just good enough to be decent]

"Just 'decent'?" Ezra felt insulted.

Zydrax chuckled. [Take it from me, it's nothing to be proud of, the universe is teeming with beings that would blow your mind]

"I know" Ezra replied.

[Hehe] Zydrax chuckled, Ezra had told him about the advent of the apocalypse in his past life. [No. You don't]

"But you do?"

[Hehehe] he chuckled even louder, his tone colder than usual. [You have no idea]

His laughter died immediately after, almost like it was never there, quickly switching subjects.

[Mythic rank is an outlier among the beginner ranks, and the achieving it isn't straightforward, rather tricky instead]

Ezra listened to Zydrax with rapt attention.

[I could've had advance with only half of your current mana, but with Alvarach at your neck, I had to make sure to chalk up to the brim with mana, so that you may stand a chance]

[The moment you achieve Mystic rank, he's going to take notice and come for you. This time, you won't have the luxury of learning things slowly]

[Thankfully, you have more than sufficient training, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue]

[Using mana stones as your primary cultivation source also helped] Zydrax explained. [Right now, your mana level is twice of your father's]

"So I'm a Peak Grandmaster already" Ezra sought to confirm.

[What do you take me for? It only took this long because you previously had me waste much of my precious essence on saving those useless beings]

"So, how do I advance to Mythic rank?"

[Unlike other ranks, you can't advance by increasing mana. Others try to, but once they hit their mana limit, they find themselves stuck. And because of both fear and the lack anything to guide them, they remain there and eventually perish]

[Your mana capacity has been reached, so advancing to Mystic rank would require something else]

[You have to change the state of your mana itself]

"What does that mean?"

[Right now] he said. [Apart from the core at the center of the chest or in your case, your heart. The rest of your mana is in a particle state]

"Particle state?"

[It's like air. It exists everywhere, but is not tangible]

[Normally, using your core, you align these particles and then meld them together]

[Slowly, your mana would start to coalesce, turning from an air like state to water like. And once reached the threshold, you'll advance]

"How do I know when I reach the threshold?"

[How do you know you're hungry] he asked back. [Your body will tell you]

"What do I do now?"

[What you've been doing until now] Zydrax replied. [Lay down and stay still. We don't have much time so you can leave melding to me]

[Go back to the mind space and keep practising Infinite Forms. From what I saw last time, there's a lot be improved on]

"I know". He'd been practising and now, he felt he was on the cusp of a breakthrough.

He thought about asking Zydrax for pointers, before deciding not to.

'How will I continue to grow if I rely on him for everything?'

With that, he closed his eyes, going back into the mind space.

He thought about observing the process of melding mana particles, but since there was a good chance he'll be fighting moments after his advancement, improving his skills was more important.

'I won't fail this time'

'I protect mother and my vassals'

'I will protect everything I care about'

—------------

An hour later, someone knocked on the door.

"Ezra, I'm heading off"

Armoured and ready for battle, Frederick gave a simple notice, before leaving.

After Cabrera woke up, they sparred to gauge his new level of his strength and get him better accustomed to it.

Once that was done, Frederick had only one thing left to do.

He broke into the castle and took one of Kaldun's weapons for himself.

The spiked hammer.

With most of the guards having left, it was too easy.

He simply walked in and took it.

Bolton warned him about the Emperor's wrath, but who would be afraid of a dead man?

So here he was.

"Mr. Frederick, wait for us"

As he was leaving, the siblings obstructed him.

Armoured with weapons at the ready, Theron stepped with you.

"We're going along with you"

Frederick paused, reading their energy.

'Peak Masters..I guess they haven't been playing around'

"Have you told Ezra?"

"He wouldn't stop us"

Frederick smiled. "Fine"

The siblings cheered.

"I'm going too"

To the side stood Valentine, fully clad in armour with her face full of fury.

"No"

"What?"

"Your mother is here, stay behind and look after her"

"I want to kill the demon that did this to her!"

With a flash of wind, Frederick was behind her, with mana solidified from his hand in the shape of a small knife.

'Sword aura'

"You can't even stop me, how are you going to kill someone stronger than me?"

Valentine bit her lip in frustration.

"I will find a way"

Frederick shook his head. "Only death awaits you against that demon" and walks off.

The siblings also look at her with pity, before following Frederick.

As a master rank combatant of her age, she was hailed as a genius.

But..'Why am I so useless?'

She was yet to enter mid master rank, which was absolutely normal, but she couldn't help but feel stifled.

After long minutes of standing, she drags herself back to her mother's room.

It would soon be midnight.

_________

Once the last of the Artifacts were thrown in front of the barrier, it let off a small green glow.

Evan Neil was a boy born to a commoner in Vonnamor.

Soon after, he discovered that he had gained the space attribute, one of the rarest types in Orion.

That turned into an overnight sensation, and multiple academies began seeking him for enrollment, while gifts poured in from strangers hoping to build a good relationship with a future spatial mage.

He became widely known as a prospective future spatial mage..for a while.

His whole world flipped just a year into a prestigious academy.

He was unable to stabilize any sort of portal, regardless of distance!

Anyone who used his portals would end up torn into bits and pieces, with the strewn parts thrown out to who knows where.I think you should take a look at

Holding on hope, the academy held special classes for him to figure out his edge.

By the mid of the second year though, it was clear to all that Evan was a spatial mage in name only.

I mean in terms of spatial mages, there were others with such afflictions, but they were able to travel through their own portals.

Allowing them to use portals as offensive attacks and develop in the direction of assassination.

But he couldn't even do that.

In no time, he was publicly known as the spatial fail.

By the end of the second year, under the reputation he was bringing to the academy, his scholarship was revoked and he was back on the streets before long.

All his dreams seemed to have crashed and soon, societal pressure threatened to suffocate him.

Against all odds, Evan's was still going strong.

'It's not over until it's over'

Compared to his beginnings where he ate little more than staple food, he was already in a far better condition.

Spatial failure? Trash mage? Who cared about what others thought? Certainly not him.

One way or another, he was going to make it work, he was given spatial talent for a reason.

There was definitely something he was capable of.

He just needed to find out what that was.

Before then though, he found himself gagged in the middle of the night, opening his eyes in another continent.

Cursing his fate, Evan prepared for the worst.

His enemies had finally decided to get rid of him.

Well, he wasn't going down without a fight.

So he could only be dumbfounded when he found that his kidnappers needed his strength for their guild.

Moreover, the guild master himself came, and he was a Grandmaster!

After explaining to him why he was needed, they showed him just how many benefits he would get by sticking by.

Sure enough, he quickly accepted, with the condition that his family be moved to Niton.

With the help of two space mages over the of a year, Evan discovered his edge!

Where other mages created portals, and even sometimes gained the ability to teleport-he got something entirely different.

He could make set mark's on any artifact!

Ezra already knew what it was, but feared that if they straight up told him, he wouldn't be able to become the man he was in his past life.

Rather, they told the two mentors in charge of him.

Even with that, it still took a whole year to see tangible results.

During his time as Kevin, only after the apocalypse arrived did Evan find his true strength, going on to become a legend in a few years.

Let's get into why that is.

The ability to create set mark's wasn't something anyone could do.

Then, among those who could, there were a lot of factors to be considered.

Was it only usable for the mage, or could other mages use it? What were the requirements for activation?

How long was it sustainable for? Would it continue to work so long it was left untouched, thereby outlasting the mage or would it cease to exist after a period of time?

How stable was the portal? How many things could go across at a time?

There were so many parameters to be measured to determine the exact features of any portal.

This was where Evan shined.

His ability allowed him to place a spatial seed of sorts on basically any item.

Once infused with spatial energy, the seed would then sprout into a portal with set coordinates.

Then, the highlight of it all, except for fragile items, the formed portal had no restrictions on the type of goods it could take.

Moreover, the portal could be opened for as long as needed so long the needed spatial energy was provided.

Do you know what this means?!

Other set portals have items they are resistant to.

Beyond that, most of them can only stay open for an hour each day at most, the best one stayed for three hours.

With such portal types, how would it be to have a portal that didn't have resistance to any items, stayed open for as long as needed and didn't need the original space mage to be activated?

Better still, since it could be placed on an item, you could have it attached to a piece of jewellery, ready to be activated at any time.

It was revolutionary, to say the least.

In his past life, Evan had spent more than a decade practising and perfecting his spatial magic.

He was able to open stable portals with a bit of effort.

Moreover, because his portals were initially so bad, he knew more than most what made a portal stable and what made it unstable.

With that knowledge, he made offensive spells using a lesser version of unstable portals as its base.

They were called beams of death.

The movement the attack connected, the space around the person would destabilize, killing the person by squeezing into an u recognizable mess.

With this space, he rose back to fame as a renowned battle mage.

Only after did he discover this unique edge of his.

With it, he became the deputy head of the mage tower less than four years after, and a very, very, rich man.

Right now, with Black Jaws mentorships, he hadn't achieved his battle mage status nor was he now able to stabilize his portals..though he was getting there.

Instead, he'd made significant progress in the aspect of placing spatial seeds.

One of the few things he'd learned and also one of the most significant was the ability to make set portal chains.

It was the same thing Elisa had done across the continent, placing set portals that led to another set portal.

Only..he was able to do this with objects!

After much practice, Evan had become a lot more proficient.

That was how knew the last of the artifact set had been placed.

Tested and tried, this was how Frederick intended to get to Quartez in less than thirty minutes.

It only made sense, it was already the eighth night.

By their calculations, the Grandmasters should arrive tomorrow, hence making this the optimal time to go.

The artifacts dropped by the Black Jaws member at intervals had spatial seeds placed in them.

Frederick and the peak masters assembled in the biggest hall for guild members, with Evan and seven other spatial mages in front of them.

"Its time"

Upon Frederick command, they began to open the portal.

Evan could only calm himself as he hoped with all his might that it worked.

It worked for the previous tests, but none was over a distance as long as this.

'Think positive, think positive' Evan told himself, closing his eyes to feel the position of each artifact.

They were circle shaped artifacts tailored by blacksmith members to create the best effect with spatial energy.

Taking a deep breath, Evan started infusing his mana into the artifacts on the ground.

Through it, he was able to sense the next artifacts.

To make a such a set chain, they made it such that the energy from one would lead to the next and that one would lead to the next and like such till the it reached the last artifact.

Meaning..

*GURUUM!*

The artifact shook a bit, glowing purple before going back still, vibrating at low frequency.

The purple glow shot out of it, creating a purple portal big enough to accommodate a person and still be spacious, except the person was overweight.

The other spatial mages joined in, directing their spatial energy into it, and therefore setting off the chain reaction.

The energy flew into the portal created to land on the nearest identical artifact, activating its portal.

The portal showing only the void before now showed a view on the otherside.

But that was just the start.

The energy was pushed in from the first into the second, and from the second the third was activated, up until the thirteenth portal opened.

This took ten minutes to set up.

Sweating, Evan spoke. "Sir Frederick, you need to hurry. I miscalculated, we can't this open for more than ten more minutes"

"That's plenty of time" Frederick remarked. "All right you heard him boys! We're moving!"

With fast steps, Frederick went through first, a long line followed, giving themselves enough space to avoid mishaps.

With the portals connected to each other, they didn't have to come out of one and then go in again to get to somewhere else.

No, they directly traveled through all thirteen portals, with the first leading to the next until they reached the last one.

They flashed in and out of existence, almost like they were teleporting.

The name chain portal was now better understood.historical

By the eighth minute, the last combatant had crossed through.

Standing in Traxford just minutes ago, they were now in front of Quartez.

Though..they weren't exactly feeling sensational at the moment.

*Blerrgh!*