“Yawn…. Ughh, that was a very nice sleep.”

Wang Yan stretched his body with his eyes still half-open. He gazed out the window, and saw the blue tranquil sky and the birds soaring into the horizon, putting his heart to peace. He wanted to experience that tranquility for just a little longer, but he soon heard loud footsteps stomping outside to his front door, and the door swung open.

“Get up! It’s time for breakfast!”

“Alright alright, I’m getting out of bed anyways. Don’t be so noisy early in the morning.”

Simon was excited about learning magic, so he wanted to hastily finish breakfast together with Wang Yan and find old man Flugel for their lessons. Wang Yan sighed from knowing his intention, but decided to follow suit anyways. Soon, it was time for their lesson.

“Alright my students. Today, we shall be learning about spell casting. Is there anything that the two of you know about spell casting?”

“Here here! Spell casting is probably the process of converting mana into a spell, and firing them off towards the enemy!” Simon replied excitedly.

“That is correct. You can cast spells by directly thinking of the spell you want to cast, the intended effect and inserting mana to realize that effect. Take for example, you want to cast a water bullet. To cast it, you just need to imagine the mana from your mana core taking on the form of water outside of your body. To shoot it off, you then need to insert more mana into that body of water to control the volume, speed and direction of the water bullet. With that, the firing of water bullet is complete. While the explanation may sound simple, it is hard to accomplish especially during combat when everything is chaotic and hard for magicians to concentrate. Hence, calmness is a necessary attribute for all magicians.”

“I see. By the way, before the Coming of Magic in Earth Realm, humans had created fantasy stories and shows that resembled the magic that appears today. Do we need to chant to cast a spell, or is that just a myth?” Wang Yan inquired.

“That is indeed a very great question, Wang Yan. To answer you, yes and no. Chanting exists, and can help cast spells with much greater ease. This is something that applies across all realms, and there is something called True Words. True Words are words dictated by the Gods to have a direct effect on the spell you wish to cast, making the conversion of mana into the spell automatic. For example, the words Fire, Inferno and Flame. These words are considered True Words since they directly relate to the fire element. If you imbue mana into those words with the intent to cast them, they will manifest extremely easily. The mana control and mental energy required to cast a spell is reduced by as much as ten times as compared to chantless casting.”

With that said, Wang Yan tried to say Fireball with his right palm wide open. However, nothing appeared as he intended. He then looked slightly disappointed.

“Haha, the Fireball did not come out simply because your cultivation was too low. You are only at Mortal Stage One, and can only barely sense mana in your body. Once you breakthrough to the next stage, you will be able to cast it.”

His disappointed expression was immediately replaced with determination and hope to cultivate and be able to use stronger flames. His wish is to become a great chef, even in this magical world.

“Continuing my lesson, while some people use True Words for easier spell casting, others also say it to assist the cognition of their brain, allowing the caster to cast the spell with the respective image. For example again, if you want to cast a Water Bullet, you can say something else other than simply ‘water bullet’, and replace it with ‘Pew Pew’. Even though the phrase does not make sense to others, if you associate that phrase to water bullet, you can subconsciously fire spells at a faster rate; This casting is called False Chant Casting, since it does not use True Words. There is also a rare form of casting called Hoax Chant Casting, which only magicians of high levels can use. They can shout ‘Inferno’ and summon a tsunami, which can be used to confuse your enemies. As long as you don’t imbue mana into the word ‘Inferno’, it will not be activated as a true word and the tsunami will be casted as you intended. However, to use this, you will need to master chantless casting in the first place, making it a hard concept to grasp.”

“Are you saying that I can say ‘Suck My Ass!’ and I can create fire bullets to shoot at them? And using True Words sounds kind of overpowered. Wouldn’t chantless casting be outshadowed way too much? Its only advantage is that enemies wouldn’t know what spells the magician will cast. Hoax Chant Casting only serves to magnify the only advantage of chantless casting, which is confusing the enemies with what spells the magicians will cast.” Simon asked curiously.

“Well… for the first point, I would not know why you would say that to cast fire bullets, but that is theoretically possible. As for the True Words, although it sounds extremely powerful and convenient, it is not all that great either. Firstly, True Word Chant Casting easily exposes the spell you want to cast. Of course, if you can fake the chanting, then that would not be an issue. Secondly, True Word Spells are much harder to control during its manifestation. For example, when you chant ‘Water bullet’ for the spell water bullet, the water bullet does manifest very easily. However, you cannot control the intricate parts like direction, speed and volume directly. When you inject more mana into the spell, all these aspects will increase all the same, unlike chantless casting where you can choose to only increase the speed, increasing the lethality of the spell. Remember, the strongest of spells come only from chantless casting as a basis.”

“Phew… that was a lot of information to take. It all makes sense in my head when you say it, but I can’t exactly repeat what you said with clarity. Can you please r-repeat some parts for me to jot some notes down? Hehe,” Wang Yan scratched his head with a nervous giggle.

“Sure. Which part do you want me to repeat?”

“From the part where…”

As usual, they continued their lesson for a very long time. Wang Yan has shown a blooming interest in the learning of magic when he understood that he can use Fire Magic in disproportionate amounts if he was strong enough. He would also like to be better at controlling the fire to cook. Simon learned everything easily, and absorbed all knowledge that Flugel gave like a sponge.

During their session, they also learned more about ambient mana, and their own mana cores. Magic casting can be specifically into 4 different types: Ambient Chant Casting, Ambient Chantless Casting, Core Chant Casting, and Core Chantless Casting. Ambient Casting is simply the casting of spells using the ambient mana in the surroundings, as compared to Core Casting which uses the magician’s own mana core for activation. While Ambient Casting sounded very advantageous since it does not consume nearly as much mana as Core Casting, it is extremely hard to use especially during combat. The user needs to be extremely adept at mana control to form spells from ambient mana. Hence, almost no magicians were capable of Ambient Casting until they reached Mana Control Stage, where they slowly began to learn how to cast spells using ambient mana.

“Wow, although the lesson was 5 hours long, it felt extremely short!” Wang Yan commented as if he wanted to learn more about magic.

“I know right? But it’s fine, I will make use of the rest of my free time to cultivate and attempt to breakthrough to the next stage. Then, I will be able to use magic!”

“Don’t you want to head out to the market district again? That place was extremely fun, and the food was nice. I want to visit there again.”

“Hmmhmm. That is indeed a great idea. I was just starting to crave Thunder Eel meat. Let us head out there right now!”

“Hehe. I was thinking that we should head out at night, but now isn’t bad either.”

With that said, both of them sprinted out to the Market District yet again. At this time, the district was relatively empty and unlively. There were not a lot of adventurers roaming around and bargaining for weapons and armors. Regardless, the district still gave a warm and positive atmosphere around. Just when they wanted to stroll around the district just like yesterday, they spotted a strikingly beautiful beastwoman. She wore a golden dress with her lascivious body, and sports a pair of golden horns along with a golden tail. She was staring directly at them, and it made Simon’s heart flutter innocently.

All of a sudden, she seemingly teleported right to their face, and caught them by the collar and brought them to a shady area inside the market district. Simon’s previous infatuation with the beastwoman dissipated into the air like smoke, and was immediately replaced with fear and trepidation. Wang Yan was similarly nervous, but attempted to maintain his calm composure.

“Y-you! Be careful with who you’re dealing with here! We are esteemed guests of the Katal Empire; if you mess with us, the consequences you will face are heavy!”

She stared at Simon for a second, and started to laugh with disdain. Although she was being rude and derogatory, the way she brought her hands to slightly cover her mouth to laugh was nothing less than attractive.

“Hahaha! What are you talking about? Katal Empire? This royal self can give multiple finger flicks and bring this Empire into ruins. The Empire has existed shorter than I did, and you dare say that the consequences I face will be heavy?”

With that said, her beautiful fingers curled into a flicking position, and she released her finger upwards. A red ball started to manifest at her fingertips, and shot to the sky at an immense speed.

Poooow!!

The serene clouds that were originally undisturbed and floating around peacefully were suddenly pierced by a strong laser beam, dispersing it and revealing the sky in a radius of 50m.

‘Holy fucking shit! This beast woman was not kidding when she said she can flick this Empire into ruins. The cloud parted from a single flick and sonic booms could be heard from it. This is too fucking scary man…’

When she saw the shivering and frightened expressions of the two, especially Simon, she smirked beautifully.

“Be glad that you have witnessed my power, which many mortals in this lower realm are incapable of witnessing. I only have one order for the two of you. Survive. If the two of you ever die, I will head to hell to personally bring you both back to life and beat you both to half-death states.”

Simon and Wang Yan nodded furiously at her statement. They were too terrified to ask her any questions, and her order was reasonable as well. There was no reason why they would throw themselves into peril voluntarily.

“Also, the two of you better not mention anything about the sighting of me. If I ever hear you both divulge about today’s incident, you will wish so hard that you were never born.”

‘If that’s the case, why even show yourself at all!’ 

Simon begrudgingly thought, but did not dare to voice it out like he always had, since there was a high chance that he would be beaten to a half-death state.

“Sigh… I have secured two of his playthings. Now, I will have to head into that forest to find the other two.”

With that said, she disappeared out of their sight, making their meeting end as abruptly as they met. The two of them dragged their feet out of the shady area, and saw that the residents were flustered and looking at the sky. It was no wonder since sonic booms could be heard and there was a glaringly big hole in the sky. After experiencing that horrifying experience, they were in no mood to venture around the market anymore, and headed back to the palace with haste.

“Sigh.... So what should we do now, Simon? You have always been the smartest, so you should find a solution to that problem one way or another.”

“Well… the solution is to simply just cultivate and try our best. As of now, it seemed like she didn’t have any intention of hurting us. In fact, she’s protecting us. However, she was scary strong, and the idea that we wouldn’t be able to do anything to her scares me. Therefore, the only thing we can do now is just to improve and hope to close the gap between her and us no matter how insignificant it may be.”

“...I guess that is the only option.”

The two of them hardened their hearts and decided to cultivate to the best of their abilities. Although Lera indeed did not intend to hurt them, Simon and Wang Yan were scared to death by her first impression, and it acted as a catalyst for their growth. Since that day, they cultivated earnestly for the next few coming years, while receiving continuous guidance from Flugel.

Wang Yan’s Cultivation Notes

Chant casting, how does it work/help?

• False Chant Casting. People say it to assist the cognition of the brain, allowing the caster to cast the spell with the respective image in mind. E.g. If you want to cast a water bullet, you say a phrase that allows you to relate to that spell. As you associate that phrase with the spell, you can subconsciously fire that spell at a faster rate as you chant the spell. 
• Some words are considered True Words. By using certain keywords, the caster borrows the power of Gods to assist with the casting of magic, making the process of spell formation much easier.
• Hoax Chant Casting, which requires the mastery of Chantless Casting. Cast a spell chantless, and spouting a nonsense phrase to confuse enemies.

Chantless casting

• Much harder than chant casting
• Requires you to form the spell from the very beginning by first converting magic molecules in the environment/body into the respective element, adjust directional properties

Types of Chant Casting

• True Chant Casting
• False Chant Casting
• Hoax Chant Casting

 

Magic can be casted by using ambient mana or core mana. Using ambient mana consumes very little core mana, making it a great option for huge spells. However, ambient casting is very difficult to control, making spell formation exceptionally slow even if successful.

As there are 2 options for the 2 variables (ambience/core & chant/chantless), magic casting has been formed into 4 different types:

• Ambient chant casting
• Ambient chantless casting
• Core Chant Casting
• Core Chantless Casting

 

Properties to note when chantless casting:

• No true words to assist in process
• Converting mana into respective elements
• Apply element with
  • Formation
  • Volume
  • Direction

Cultivation

• The process of increasing your mana capacity and purity by crystallising mana into the mana core.
• Mana can be recovered using four means
  • Healing
  • Absorbing ambient mana
  • Consuming mana-condensed products e.g. potions, monster meat
  • Sleeping
• Mana can be disseminated into muscles for strengthening. However, capacity within the core will decrease accordingly.
• How to improve cultivation?
  • Absorbing surrounding mana using various techniques
  • Exhausting most mana with the mana core within your body
• Can improve purity by refining crystallised mana within mana core
• Can improve capacity by converting mana into crystallised mana within the core to strengthen the core itself.
• An alternative is to exhaust mana within the core too. By doing so, the core will be signaled that the current capacity is not sustainable, thus forcibly and automatically convert condensed mana into the strengthening of the core. However, people generally don't exhaust mana fully due to the excruciating pain from mana deprivation. Only for hardcore users.