Chapter 263 B4 - Chapter 20 - Pursuit of Knowledge

After an exciting start to the new week, things gradually calmed down. With the race to the third floor officially over, some of the students started to relax and instead enjoy their time on the second floor, especially as rumors about how horrible the third floor was to explore began to circulate.

While it seemed nobody had outright ruined the surprise yet, word on the street basically said, "if you don't have water magic, don't bother," and many students took that to heart. As for Lily, she was hard at work studying water glyphs and learning that they could do a lot more than just baths and washing up. She actually felt a bit bad as she recalled that Instructor Richardus had said something similar back in the orphanage, but it had completely slipped her mind as she focused on her own pursuits.

Lily kept up her stargazing, despite the continued absence of any changes. Her Nebula Veil mirroring the night sky, still being the only thing noteworthy, and considering that happened on the first night, it wasn't great. During one of the nights, it was raining pretty hard, so she stayed indoors and instead opted to work on the Mermaid Lotion with Lotte. Working together, they managed to make a batch that filled a few bottles, and they were eager to put it to the test during their next venture.

Arakil had kept his word and had Lily draw two more scrolls, which she gifted to Thomas and Lotte, who thanked her profusely. However, the next day, while Lotte was still ecstatic, Thomas looked somewhat defeated.

"I thought I had been making good progress, but that scroll you found makes me feel like a novice again… I'm basically going back to basics," he lamented, although despite his complaints, he looked determined to conquer it.

When Lily later asked Arakil about it, he just mentioned that he was "ironing out several bad habits that the boy had formed," which gave her a good idea of what Thomas was going through. Arakil was a stickler for building a proper foundation, and he must have decided to instill that teaching in another victim.

Rose also decided to show up and congratulate Lily and her group for finally reaching the third floor. Naturally, they asked her if she had any problems underwater, and the smug dragon only laughed and shook her head.

"I've never had any problems manifesting my fire, and no amount of water or ice can stop me."

Lily was particularly sensitive to the word "manifest" after Arakil kept repeating it, so she understood her sister wasn't just bragging; she was giving a hint to everyone present. Thankfully, when Lily sneaked glances at her friends, there appeared to be some looks of understanding in their eyes.

Looks like Arakil was right; their own tutors probably gave them some advice.

Rose also took the opportunity to kidnap Lily for an afternoon, taking her to the second floor since they wouldn't be able to meet on the third floor. Down there they spent just an hour resuming the flying practice she had promised to help with, and by the looks of things Rose was getting a lot better at it.

"I swear, Lily, you're my good luck charm. When I'm on my own, it never goes as well as this."

"I'm sure you'll be flying circles around all the Zephyrix students in no time," Lily joked, only for Rose to nod as if it was a declaration.

Her big sister also offered to give away some potions, as apparently she had accumulated quite a collection of them for exploring underwater. Rose was worried that Lily would need plenty of them, but when Lily took a closer look, she realized these didn't use the enhanced formula and declined the kind gesture.

"Sorry, but our potions are better," Lily replied and then briefly explained why.

Rose was quite surprised as she had bought these potions from the store in Kaeling and they were "official adventurer supplies". Evidently, the girl had not been paying attention to Professor Sylwel's talk at the end of the competition, but this also suggested that his experiments, for whatever reason, were not official.

When comparing it to the school store version, they discovered the same situation, which meant that anyone actually in the alchemy class had an advantage when it came to potions, assuming they made the enhanced versions. Lily was puzzled as she couldn't decide if this was intentional to give the alchemy students a helping hand by making their custom potions more desirable, or if anything with Sylwel's name on it was simply that taboo to the outside world.

Seeing that her attempt at gifting potions had failed, Rose proceeded to offer the not-so-subtle advice that Lily should focus on "treasure hunting" while on the third floor. Lily had the sneaking suspicion that Arakil was once again right and that the third floor probably had plenty of enchanted tools not dissimilar to the glyphs she was currently learning.

As for the promised water-air inscriptions Arakil had mentioned, unfortunately they didn't have time to start on them, but he promised to work with Lily on them during their upcoming visit to the library. Yes, it had come around again, and as the weekend drew near, she was barely able to contain her excitement.

The dungeon, classes, her friends, and everything else were certainly enjoyable for her. Still, her number one priority was that special moment where she could be face-to-face with Arakil in his ancient library.

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Thankfully, both Hana and Lotte were understanding in Lily's absence, as by now they had come to expect her to take every second weekend off to herself. It certainly helped that they too had things they wanted to accomplish, as Lotte took extra lessons in the alchemy lab with the crazy professor and Hana went back to the forest for flying practice with Arthur.

When Lily once again entered the dream, it started as usual with her running up and hugging Arakil, before transitioning into the routine of going through the basics, followed by Arakil briefly pointing out any problem areas Lily needed to work on.

Obviously, the water-air inscriptions were going to be on the agenda, but before that, Arakil wanted to see her progress towards Astral constellations. With Lily now before him, it was easier for him to study her condition, and he had her go through all the steps as if she were outside. To aid in this process, he even had the library fade away, revealing an exact replica of the courtyard she had spent every evening in.

Unlike the very first time they tried this, something seemed different this time, and it wasn't just because Arakil rearranged the furniture. Lily's Nebula Veil mimicked the stars again without her prompting it, and she could feel an extremely vague connection to them. Arakil left her meditating alone for quite some time while he silently took notes, and when she eventually opened her eyes, she found herself back in the ancient library, and the starry landscape was gone.

I wonder how long ago he changed the location… This is just like him secretly removing my wand.

"It looks like you are progressing nicely. If things go well, I think you should be able to make your first real attempt at connecting a constellation soon," Arakil said as he finished writing something down.

"Are you sure?" Lily asked. "I know I felt a little connection this time, but I'm still not seeing anything myself."

"I'm quite sure," Arakil chuckled. "As for not seeing anything, you are simply not looking hard enough."

Lily opened her mouth to protest, but Arakil gestured for her to come closer. She closed it and followed his instruction, and he sat down in front of her as if about to meditate himself.

"Go on," he encouraged, and Lily copied him.

Arakil had Lily resume her meditation, and while she felt that subtle connection again, she didn't notice anything different about her or her Mana.

"Look at your Mana Core," Arakil gently instructed.

Lily nodded with her eyes closed and proceeded to go deeper. Once again, she was in her own inner world and saw the glowing silver moon that was her Mana Core. She studied it for several minutes, but couldn't see what it was that Arakil wanted to show her.

"Let me help…" his voice echoed. "Stay still."

She felt his hand softly touch her head as she fought the instinct to fidget or flinch. She felt a warmth slowly fill her, which she recognized as him influencing her Mana, and after several seconds had passed, her vision of her core changed. Suddenly it was like they were zoomed in on it, or right next to it, and she felt like she could almost reach out and touch it. However, she didn't, as she noticed there was something faintly sparkling all over her core.

"What is that?" Lily whispered.

"That, if I had to guess, is Astral Mana."

It sparkled like a thin layer of glitter, barely noticeable against the overwhelming brightness of her silver core. It was no wonder she hadn't noticed anything; this transformation was tiny! Still, seeing it up close like this finally gave her the hope she had been craving, as the vague feeling of a connection had been doing a poor job of motivating her.

Arakil kept the focus on her Mana Core and told her to stop the meditation, and Lily watched as the faint glittery coating faded away. This proved that it was something she was actively producing, and once it was more substantial, they could move on to the next step of guiding it into use.

In theory, using it would be the easy part, as transforming your Mana was the biggest hurdle to make progress. It was quite exciting, and Lily had always assumed Mana was just one big all-encompassing resource. Still, it sounded like at minimum she would have four different states of Mana when Arakil was finished training her, if not more.

Pure Mana for regular spells, imbued for glyphs and inscriptions, magnetic for self-powered glyphs, and finally astral for constellations. I wonder if I'll need to make imbued-astral Mana to draw enchantments on my cloak?

Lily decided to leave her question unasked, as she didn't want to prematurely worry about a future task when she hadn't even taken the first steps. Once she was producing that glittery Mana by the boatloads, then she could start thinking about what came next.

With Arakil's curiosity settled, they then moved on to the expected portion of their lesson and Lily's favorite part. Without the outside influence of the real world, she was finally unshackled and able to freely draw with her mind once more. To get warmed up, they proceeded with their usual game of drawing back and forth, and while Lily tried to pay attention to whether and when Arakil was replacing her wand, she could never point it out.

After they finished their fun mental exercise, they finally moved on to the real meat of the lesson: dual crest inscriptions.

"The first inscription I'm going to teach you is relatively simple in its execution, as it forms a bubble of protective water while containing air for breathing."

"Couldn't you do the same with just air? Do we even need water?" Lily asked curiously.

"You could, but that would be far more taxing than the alternative. Not only would you need to keep the air contained, but you would need to fight the surrounding water from entering. I'm not lying when I say that just using air would take at minimum double the effort and Mana than a harmonious solution.

"I'm sure you've heard the phrase: 'fight fire with fire,' and while it's usually misguided, in this case it's very appropriate. Using water to deal with water is the preferred solution, and it can also offer you some mild protection at the same time. Of course, if you only have access to one, like your friend Hana, then naturally you make do, but she also has the natural affinities to lessen the burden."

Lily nodded.

"Luckily for you, with glyphs and inscriptions, you have no such restriction, and you can take full advantage of the best solution for each problem," Arakil said with a smile.

Lily couldn't help but smile back; she was one hundred percent on team glyphs and fully believed they could do anything and everything, especially with Arakil around. She continued smiling as she listened to his every word with the utmost focus, adamant about absorbing every fragment of knowledge.