Ryker stood in a familiar world. All around him, chains wrapped around natural phenomena that ranged from small-scale destruction to feats of majesty that could destroy the Federation in a single breath more than ten times over.

In quite a short amount of time, Ryker had unsealed nine of these natural phenomena, three to each of Phoenix’s heads.

His theory had been correct. Although his Divined Chains had sealed Phoenix’s talents away just after he managed to unseal them, what they had also done was give him an opportunity.

The way the Divined Chains of the Valorian family worked was as a sort of Seal Type Spirit Energy. This Type worked by understanding the target and countering what they did the most effectively. With a certain mastery of Divined Chains, one could almost immediately seal anything even without much observation.

It was best to look at seals like a series of runes, a special type of formation that worked specifically to counter the powers of others.

And as a result of that, each one of the seals here, locking away Phoenix’s talent, was different from the other. They had bent and twisted themselves in such a way that they were a perfect counter to these talents.

Due to that, Ryker could use his intimate connection with these chains to reverse engineer his comprehension of the talent, working backward from its weaknesses to comprehend its strengths.

He felt like it would have originally taken a long time, but he had underestimated himself. His comprehension abilities had always been profound, and though his Pure Soul’s synergy with his Time Type Spirit Energy really kicked him in the ass sometimes, there was no doubt that a Pure Soul alone was one of the, if not the best talent a person could have.

Wind Blade. Soar. Accelerate.

Fireball. Inductive Touch. Molten Fireball.

Earthquake. Earthen Pillar. Earthen Spike.

Most of these abilities were self-explanatory but a few.

Accelerate was a method of wrapping Wind Type Spirit Energy around you for a sudden burst of speed. It only lasted a short time, a breath or two at most, but it was easily a threefold increase in addition to allowing you to hit your top speed instantaneously.

Molten Fireball was an improved Fireball and it was probably the attack that did the most damage in Phoenix’s arsenal aside from Inductive Touch.

The base level of Fireball was mostly loose strands of flames formed together into a ball, though it looked more like a flying candle flame in the hands of most creatures.

The Fire Type Spirit Energy control the base level provided wasn’t the best and it scaled really poorly with the use of additional Spirit Energy. Meaning, the return for charging an attack was less.

A Molten Fireball, though, was much more like a real ball. In fact, it somewhat looked like a ball of solid bronze surrounded by a ring of flickering flames.

Most Fire Type Spirit Beasts would not gain access to this talent because the pressure such an attack placed on a Spirit Beast’s throat was far too high. They would injure themselves heavily after a single attack. For most creatures, being able to unlock it and cast it just twice or thrice already made them a great talent.

At this level, Fire Phoenix could already cast it over five times without worry of damage. The only real problem was the quantity of Spirit Energy itself. Meaning, Fire Phoenix ran out of Spirit Energy long before Molten Fireball harmed him. Right now, the big guy could only cast it twice.

Inductive Touch was a true killer, though. It allowed Phoenix to concentrate Fire Type Spirit Energy into their claws, increasing their lethality several fold.

Inductive Touch was a unique talent of the Twin Headed Serpent Phoenix, meaning that it could only be unlocked by their kin and it grew with them through life, never falling out of favor and only growing stronger.

With enough training Fire Phoenix would learn to apply Inductive Touch to his teeth, wings or even scales. At the highest levels, it could easily be added to even other talents to explosively increase their fire damage.

It could be said it was an all around ability. The only thing Phoenix was lacking was enough Spirit Energy, because at the highest levels, whether it was for defense or offense, Inductive Touch was nigh unstoppable.

Ryker was actually a bit surprised that a Lineal Talent like this one would appear so early on. It made Fire Phoenix’s strength output far greater than the other two.

It would probably take much longer for him to awaken a Lineal Talent for Wind and Earth Phoenix.

Right now, though, he wasn’t worried.

At this pace, he believed that there were six more talents, each, that he could awaken for them. But this was already the limit for what they could use in the Enlightenment Realms. If he went any further than that, he’d be awakening useless abilities they lacked the Spirit Energy to use until they ascended beyond the Enlightenment Realm.

Of course, there was nothing wrong with being ahead of the curve, so he was already focused on the next set.

Focused Push.

Trailing Blaze.

Earthen Shield.

If he succeeded in uncorking these three, it would give Phoenix some nice balance. That way, instead of relying on clever tactics in battle, they could rely more on the straight forward approach.

It wasn’t that being clever in battle wasn’t good, it was rather that true masters had repeatable and certain counters for certain situations. If you were always trying to think of things on the fly, even with Ryker’s mind, you would eventually hit a wall.

These three would help with that.

Focused Push was for Wind Phoenix, an ability that concentrated a circling wall of wind that formed a sphere around them, pushing any enemies away with force that could be lethal, but wasn’t necessarily so.

Trailing Blaze was a lot like a Fire Type Earthquake, though having its own unique quirks.

With a stomp of their foot, Phoenix would be able to send out a blazing line of flames the length of which would be dependent on Spirit Energy input. Though this ability felt lackluster, especially compared to Fire Phoenix’s other abilities, there were many clever ways to use it.

The most obvious was just separating enemies with a sudden attack, whether it was groups or a master and their beast. In addition, because it was a more permanent alteration to the battlefield, ala Earth Phoenix’s Earthquake, it would force them to take precautions against the hot flames for extended periods of time.

Finally, there was Earthen Shield. It was a necessary ability for Phoenix so that they’d have a better defense than just relying on their strong bodies all the time. They wouldn’t be able to just brush off attacks forever.

Ryker felt that he was making progress with the three.

As the comprehended, he could feel his own understanding of Wind, Fire and Earth Type Spirit Energy deepening as well.

If there was one thing killing hundreds of Spirit Beasts had helped him with, it was definitely honing those skills. He didn’t feel as unskilled as he had been against Desmond.

‘Okay, that’s enough for now,’ he thought after some time.

He had other things to deal with, and he still treated himself as being caught in hostile territory right now, so he couldn’t afford to hole himself up forever and just meditate.

Of course, doing this also wouldn’t help Phoenix quickly progress beyond the 3rd Enlightenment Realm either.

Phoenix could cultivate the normal way and advance with extreme speed. It would probably take them two or three months to reach the 7th Enlightenment Realm and they would definitely reach the pinnacle of the Enlightenment Realm in less than half a year.

The progression of this world was little, but the actual Spirit Energy concentration was easily above 80% of that of Ryker’s home world. As such, Spirit Energy concentration wasn’t even a bottleneck at their current Realm.

The issue was that it wasn’t fast enough. Ryker still didn’t have a full outline of the situation, but this timeline, a speed that the people of this world couldn’t even fathom, wasn’t nearly fast enough.

Ryker opened his eyes to find Patience happily cuddling in his arms. His hand was still placed on her ass, squeezing from time to time as though it was a nice little stress ball. Looking at her happy smile even in her sleep, he couldn’t help but smile genuinely himself.

He shook his head.

‘When’d I become such a lovestruck fool?’

He sighed to himself. He couldn’t keep ignoring it. This Time Type Spirit Energy, he needed to get a handle of it.

Tiptoeing around the issue would only make it so he’d get bitten back in the future.

Right now, his emotional maturity was too stunted. He was like a toddler with the intelligence, experience and urges of an adult. It wasn’t a good combination.

Luckily, some of his hold-overs from his more stoic and unfeeling days carried over, and he was fiercely driven to get some control over himself. Or else who knew how bad he would already be?

The Silver Mirror floated up from near the bed, hovering over the bed and before Ryker’s face.

The reflection of Ryker reclining with Patience in his arms appeared before him. But he seemed to look past it.

An idea had been germinating in his head for a while now. He wasn’t sure if it was feasible, and he had been hesitating for a while already, but he felt that he owed it to himself to take this step.

There weren’t any better options out there, and even if there were they weren’t going to suddenly fall into his lap.

He took out the little dagger… or the Divine Dagger, as Garrin had called it.

‘Such a bland name,’ Ryker thought to himself. ‘I have a feeling that that was most definitely not the original name of the crafter…’

The thought had come to Ryker after he succeeded in using Time Type Spirit Energy to heal his wounds with added speed.

Back then, he had fused his vitality, or Combat Type Spirit Energy, with his Time Type Spirit Energy. He couldn’t do this with any other Spirit Energy because only one type could flow through his Meridians at a time. But because Combat Type Spirit Energy was the energy of the blood, it worked.

That had allowed him to heal a wound that would have taken three days to heal almost instantly…

And that made him think.

What if he nicked himself with a dagger?

This was obviously an insane idea. Whenever this dagger bit into anything, it took everything. Even the bones of the Spirit Beasts he touched with it were left in a pile of ash.

If he did this to himself, wouldn’t he be killing himself?

But there was an added variable here that was really making Ryker think… The Time Type Spirit Energy had been able to heal his arm in an instant, and that required using up a large amount of vitality in an instant, vitality that came from his body…

Essentially, his Time Type Spirit Energy took an instant and made it the equivalent of three days of continuous healing.

Even according to simple math, a few seconds versus three days… just what kind of obscene ratio was that?

By now, Ryker’s thoughts should be clear.

If he used Time Type Spirit Energy, could he trick the dagger into filling itself up without actually killing himself?

It was a heavy risk, heavier than he should take. But at this point, everything was. He had reached a bottleneck on using Time Type Spirit Energy across his body.

Even after reaching the 7th Enlightenment Realm, the time it took for the Time Energy to reach specified locations of his body was still the same, it hadn’t increased at all. This was the only novel breakthrough he had had in weeks, and nothing new seemed to be over the horizon.

The question, then, was would this dagger help him?

Well, assuming his hypothesis was correct, he obviously wouldn’t need to find nine of himself. He could fill the dagger up on his own.

The dagger would then have blood laced with Time Type Spirit Energy, and because it wouldn’t have absorbed his entire self, it should be the only affinity available aside from Combat Type and Time Type.

Of course, this would allow him to use the function of passing this energy onto others. He could then use these beasts to experiment with things he would be unwilling to do to himself.

In addition, there was also the emission function of the dagger. Even if all the experiments didn’t work out like he wanted, he might be able to use his Time Type Spirit Energy for more direct attacks now rather than having to wait for such niche circumstances to take advantage of it.

Ryker moved, slicing the dagger down his forearm.

His eyes were incredibly sharp as he took this risk.

He knew that his talent alone wasn’t enough to make it to the pinnacle he wanted. There were plenty of untalented people that became Gods and plenty more talented people who never reached their full potential.

What was more important than even his talent was his temperament.

And right now, he couldn’t cower.

Instantly, he felt a large suction of force from his arm. It was more subtle and far slower than when he had directly pierced into a beast, but he wasn’t foolish enough to go that far. This was a test, and hopefully one he could pull back from before it was too late.

Almost immediately, Ryker grinned. His senses were focused on the whole of his body, checking for any changes and ready for things to go left.

That was why when they went right, he also knew his gamble had worked out.

The dagger wasn’t just filled by one, it was filled completely. By the time Ryker pulled it back, slightly fatigued, it was already brimming with power.

‘Wow…’ he thought to himself.

But then he understood.

He was already a 9th Circle Talent. Assuming that the blade would create a 9th Circle Talent with enough effort, then Ryker was already perfection in its eyes. His blood was worth far more to it than anyone else’s, so of course he could satiate it with greater ease as well.

But that was only part of it.

He felt a slight fatigue in his soul, one similar to if he used [Soul Ripple] for too long, or the feeling he used to get when he first started floating the Silver Mirror everywhere he went.

‘It pulls on my soul too, not just my blood… that could have been dangerous…’

He had focused his Time Type Spirit Energy on his blood, not taking into account the possibility that the dagger might draw on other things.

Luckily, it seemed the combination of his talent and his Time Type Spirit Energy worked to perfection in this one case.

‘This went better than I expected. I thought I would have to do this once a day for nine days so that my blood would have time to recover, but it seems doing this two or three more times won’t be too much… I just need the beasts now.’

Ryker had a few ideas for that as well.

The capital was obviously the safest location in the Federation. Although there were nearby wildernesses to make use of, they didn’t have creatures nearly as dangerous as the ones around Smoking Tower City.

However… all these nobles had their own methods to train and he could make use of that.

‘I should also bring Desmond, Sofia and Rosemary into the city.’

He still had that promise to fulfill to the old man, and the former two were basically necessities to get Rosemary to cooperate with anything properly.

He felt a hint of annoyance bubbling up, but he pressed it down.

No one was in control of himself but himself.

Patience stirred somewhat as Ryker put the dagger away, planning to stand.

Her hand shifted and landed on Ryker’s crotch as her eyes opened somewhat groggily. The not-immediately familiar feeling in her palm caused her to squeeze and pull at it lightly.

Her eyes slowly cleared as Ryker’s heat was being transferred into her.

“Oh…” she spoke lightly, still only half awake. Even so, she smiled lightly, rolling Ryker’s balls through her fingers and tugging at them a little. She couldn’t help but watch in fascination as his shaft slowly grew to attention. “… I kind of want to feel it grow in my mouth…”

She spoke in the daze of sleep before suddenly blushing when she realized what she had said.

Ryker chuckled. He felt that there was a bold woman stuck somewhere in Patience, but it was being repressed by both her inexperience and ironically, in another sense, her experiences.

There was a lot of pressure on her shoulders and she was always second guessing her own decisions. Her father had really almost ruined such a good woman.

Ryker’s grip on her ass tightened as he squeezed a nice handful.

“Well, you’re the one who woke it up. Are you going to do something about it?”

Patience blinked, but she eventually smiled. She lifted up her leg, placing it on Ryker. She could feel a sensitive little bean grinding against his thighs as her hand grabbed his shaft.

“Okay…” she said softly, almost like an obedient little kitten.

Ryker's protective instincts flared up again as he pulled this woman into a kiss.

**

“This is the training area of the castle. There used to be a continent of guards tasked with bringing in wild Spirit Beast for me and my brother to train with. I don’t know if that practice continued, but there’s definitely a large market for it.”

Patience held Ryker’s hand in her own, bringing him to an arena hidden in the palace.

Behind them, Sofia, Rosemary and Desmond followed, mostly confused and filled with somewhat complex emotions. There was such a mix and jumble that it was hard to tell if what was at the forefront of their minds was the fact Ryker had stormed into the Federation Capital alone and was somehow just fine… or if it was the fact he was holding the Federation Princess’ hand as though it was just a natural thing to do.

Sofia found herself looking at those intertwined hands quite often. It wasn’t the act, but rather the meaning behind that left a sour taste in her mouth.

Why did he look so… Happy?

She could see it on Patience’s face too. The latter was practically walking on air despite the heavy armor she was wearing. That didn’t look like a woman Ryker had forced into bed with him.

Why couldn’t he treat her like that?

Sofia shook her head. It wasn’t a feeling of love or even like of Ryker, it was just a very human feeling of unfairness.

Why did Patience suddenly get a happy ending while she was left half dead in a pool of her own vomit?

She tried to ignore the feeling, but it just filled her with more rage the more she thought about it. She could only take a breath and force it down.

Patience had no idea what had happened between Sofia and Ryker, so she was oblivious to the gaze behind her as she continued to explain things.

She seemed to have completely forgotten that she hadn’t wanted to just be known as Ryker’s woman before. She had practically completely sunk into the role.

“… Even though I don’t know much about the situation in the last year, the Capital always needs wild Spirit Beasts whether that’s for food or the making of other goods, so there’s always a steady inflow. There should be as many as you need.”

Ryker nodded, looking up.

Right now, they were in an underground coliseum. The ground was a sand and dirt mixture that was more compact than sand, but far looser than dirt alone.

It was about 50 meters in diameter from end to end, and there were even a few observation decks above, though no one was here for now.

There were four gates around them, each one being a location where, as Patience explained, wild Spirit Beasts should be stored.

“So 4th Enlightenment Realm?” Ryker asked.

“Yeah, there’ll be some 5th and 6th ones around too, but probably only a few dozen. There are too few with the skill to catch Spirit Beasts that powerful. The vast majority are 4th Enlightenment and around 3rd Circle.”

Patience looked toward Ryker, a hint of worry in her eyes. Obviously not for Ryker’s safety, but instead because she hoped that this would be enough to help him.

“No worries, I’m not really here for the sparring. I just need some… experiment subjects. As for these guys,” Ryker hooked a thumb over his shoulder, “That strength will actually be good target practice for them. Let’s bring out a 1st Enlightenment Realm beast first, I’ll start off slow.”

Patience smiled. “Okay.”

She brought out a wooden disk carved with runes in it. After pouring her Spirit Energy in, one of the gates slowly opened and a roar came from the other side.

A wolf beast charged in. Its eyes were a bright shade of brown and it seemed to use Earth Type Spirit Energy.

“Do you want us to retreat, or?”

Ryker thought for a moment and then nodded. He wasn’t sure what would happen if he did this and he didn’t want to put Patience in danger.

He let go of her hand and they all retreated except for Ryker himself.

The wolf beast closed the distance fast, its Earth Type Spirit Energy suddenly circulating. But before it could succeed, Ryker tapped a foot on the arena ground, causing a ripple of Earth Type Spirit Energy of his own to spill forward. At the same time, he activated [Soul Ripple] and the beast lost its balance, sliding along the ground in a daze as its skill and mind were interrupted.

Ryker took out the dagger and casually chose the function to transfer energy. Then, he watched.

The beast began to writhe on the ground, not much unlike the bunny had. But the difference was immediately obvious.

Maybe it was because Ryker hadn’t given up his entire life, but the transition looked more stable.

Rather than a rapid series of changes like the bunny he had first tested, it was slow, at least by comparison.

Then the beast began to grow.

It was barely a meter and a half tall at first, but it exploded to three meters and then to four.

Its strength was rapidly increased as well following the changes to its body. It went from the 1st Enlightenment realm to the 4th in a single breath, and its talent went from 2nd Circle to the Peak of the 3rd in a blaze of glory.

Its brown eyes turned more brass and amber colored.

Ryker’s lip curled. Seemed his blood wasn’t too shabby.

The wolf roared and the sandy dirt around it trembled, rising from the air under its might.

“Alright, boy. Show me something.”

Ryker’s blue irises flashed with a blinding light.

[Soul Ripple].

He amplified his senses to an extreme. Now that he was only a few knocks away from the 7th Enlightenment Realm, his soul had likewise increased in strength tremendously. Against such a weak beast, he could see its innards just as easily as he could see his own.

Everything reflected in his mind, from its circulating Spirit Energy to the rolling of its blood.

The experiment began now.