The misty space was silent. Only the edges of the hexagram that Claude had drawn with his mental power could be seen flashing with a faint light.
But soon, countless rays of light appeared in the space like a sky filled with stars.
Twinkling, the multi-colored starlight was still moving toward the hexagram …
So these are elemental photons. Normally, he couldn't see them with his eyes. He could only sense them with his mental power in such a state.
Claude watched as the elemental photons moved faster and faster towards the hexagram. He couldn't understand why the hexagram would attract the photons that much.
The red ones should be fire elements and the green ones were wood elements. What were the blue ones?
Water elements? The white ones were light elements, so what were the black ones?
Earth elements or dark elements?
No, the yellow ones were earth elements and the black ones were dark elements. What were the silver ones?
Metal elements or lightning elements? What color were the wind elements?
After staring at it for a long while, Claude suddenly recalled what element he had the highest affinity with.
After looking at it for a long time, he realized that the red elemental photons were the most numerous among all the photons heading towards the hexagram.
It was obvious that he also had the highest affinity with fire elements, just like Landes.
That would save him a lot of trouble. Having the highest affinity with the fire elemental essence meant that he could train according to Landes's diary. He would be able to train according to the experiences and insights recorded in the diary.
He was originally worried that if the elemental he had the highest affinity with was another element, he would only be able to use Landes's diary as a reference and wouldn't be able to train according to his experiences.
Following the instructions in the diary, Claude used his mental power to envelop the slowly spinning hexagram in the void. It was as if he had erected a barrier around it that only allowed the red elemental photons to pass through. The other elemental photons of other elements were all excluded.
Soon, the six triangles of the hexagram were dyed red.
After an unknown period of time, the six triangles of the hexagram were dyed red.
Even in his ethereal state, he could feel the heat from the fire elemental essence.
The gathered fire element photons were getting smaller and smaller. This should be enough …
So, he carefully used his mental power to connect the six red triangles. According to the notes in Landes' diary, he slowly guided the fire elemental photons from the triangles into the hexagon in the middle of the hexagon.
This was the magic power that converted elemental photons into its own …
This was not difficult at all. The fire element photons in the six red triangles were quickly thrown into the hexagon.
It was just that the triangles were getting darker and darker, while the hexagon in the hexagon seemed to be a bottomless pit. No matter how many fire element photons were thrown into it, it didn't quickly turn red like the six triangles. It was still dark, as if nothing had changed.
However, Claude noticed that the edges of the hexagram seemed to have thickened a little, giving it a more three-dimensional feel.
The fire element photons from the six triangles were all thrown into the hexagon, but no other fire element photons appeared in the misty space. The six empty triangles didn't have any more fire element coming to fill them up either.
This could already be considered a session of meditation.
Landes had also recorded that in the diary. He believed that it was best not to meditate too much at the beginning, or else it would be quite troublesome to exhaust one's mental power.
It seemed that Landes had suffered from mental power exhaustion before.
Claude didn't feel any fatigue in his mental state.
But just to be on the safe side, he didn't continue meditating. Instead, he returned to his attic and looked at the hourglass on the table. Only an hour and a half had passed.
This also included the time he spent lying on the roof to meditate. It seemed that if his mental strength could support it, he would be able to meditate at least four times in one night.
So, he climbed out of the window and returned to the roof to continue meditating under the moonlight.
However, when he outlined the hexagram with his mental strength in the state of emptiness this time, he realized that the hexagram he felt the first time he cultivated seemed to be thicker. It was not an illusion. The edge of the hexagram that he outlined this time was exactly the same as the first time he cultivated it. It was indeed thicker and had a sense of dimensionality …
When the horn bell of the wargod shrine resounded in the air above Whitestag once more, Claude realized that he had been meditating for an entire night.
He didn't even know how many times he meditated, but he did know that it wasn't less than five times.
He didn't feel tired from staying up all night. Instead, he felt excited.
Landes had forgotten to write down an important fact in his diary, and that was that the hexagram would become more solid and three-dimensional at the beginning of the cultivation process.
It was no wonder Landes described the hexagon in the middle of the hexagram as a well. When the well was filled with mana converted from photons, it meant that he would be able to become a first-rank rune magus.
That was probably an oversight on Landes's part. He only started writing the diary after he became a third-rank rune magus and got his own private room in the first basement of the magic tower.
That was why he forgot that he was already used to it during his cultivation and didn't record it down.
After a night of cultivation, the hexagram that Claude drew with his mental power in his empty state had turned from a flat surface to a three-dimensional shape. It was as if he had used a marker pen to draw the hexagram, but now he had to use a large marker pen to draw the hexagram.
Apart from allowing the six triangles to hold more fire photons, he also felt that it wouldn't be easy to convert the fire photons into mana to fill the well in the middle of the hexagon. It would take a long time.
That was why Landes was so smug in his diary. It was indeed something to be proud of that he managed to become a first-rank rune magus from an apprentice magus in just three months.
Apart from his talent in magic, he had also put in a lot of hard work.
The other apprentices who went up the mountain at the same time as him usually took a year or two to make their breakthrough. As for the female apprentice who didn't make her breakthrough after five years in the magic tower, she was indeed quite pitiful compared to Landes.
Even though Claude and Landes both had the highest affinity for fire elemental energy, his mental power was as sharp as Landes's, and his hearing was exceptionally sensitive, Claude didn't think that he would be like Landes.
He didn't think that he would be able to become a first-rank rune magus in three months like Landes did. He set the deadline for half a year later. If he could leave his status as an apprentice magus in six months, he would be more than satisfied.
As an apprentice magus, there was nothing else he could do apart from meditating.
If he couldn't use his own mana, he wouldn't be able to use any spells or skills.
Landes had clearly stated in his diary that in an era where magical resources were abundant, apprentices could use runes to cast spells with the help of various magical resources.
But now, magical resources were scarce. Apart from using their own bodies as a vessel for mana, apprentices had no other way to cast spells.
Claude was in the same situation. He wouldn't be able to understand the mysteries of magic just because he practiced Hexagram Meditation and became an apprentice magus. Landes had recorded some spells and skills in his diary, but he wouldn't be able to use his own mana before becoming a first-rank rune magus, so he wouldn't be able to test out the effects of the spells and skills recorded in the diary.
As for using magical resources to help him … Cough, Claude didn't even know what magical resources were. Landes' diary was a diary, not an encyclopedia of magical resources. He couldn't possibly explain what magical resources were in his diary either. Only a few of them were briefly mentioned because he worked as a rune magus' assistant in his experiments.
Claude's plan was to focus on meditation and accumulate enough time to become a first-rank rune magus. That way, he would be able to keep up with the knowledge Landes wrote down in the diary.
Food had to be eaten one bite at a time, and the road had to be taken one step at a time.
Since meditating through the night didn't make Claude feel any discomfort and he felt more energetic for the next two days, he decided to meditate instead of sleep to save time.
But on the third night, when Claude woke up from his meditation, he found that the ground floor of his house was brightly lit and surrounded by a large crowd.
The oil lamps in the rows of rooms in the red-bricked house were lit up one after another. It felt like a cauldron of voices.
What's going on?
Is there a fire somewhere in the middle of the night?
Claude didn't know what was going on.
But very soon, he heard the noisy footsteps on the stairs of his house, as well as the screams and cries of his sister and brother, who had been woken up from their sleep, and the little snowhound's barking, unwilling to be outdone …
The hurried footsteps grew louder and louder. The door to the attic was slammed open with a loud bang. His father's panicked voice could be heard. "Claude!
Claude! "
"I-I'm here …" Claude was dumbfounded. What's going on?
Could it be that someone found out that I was meditating on the roof?
"You … What are you doing on the roof?!"
Mr. Morssen, who was in the attic, realized that everything was normal. He angrily poked his head out of the window and scolded.
"It's … it's too stuffy in the attic. I-I climbed up to the roof to cool down and fell asleep …" Claude quickly came up with an excuse. "Father, what happened?"
"What happened?
You still have the cheek to ask?! Come in here and we'll talk! "
Claude obediently climbed back into the attic and spent a long time trying to figure out what had happened.
The cause of the incident was simple. In the middle of the night, Whitestag's patrols happened to pass by and one of them noticed a person lying on the roof of the red-bricked house. That made all the patrols nervous.
This was the residence of the town's chief executive, Mr. Morssen. How could a thief climb onto the roof? Therefore, they began to gather people to surround the entire red-bricked house, knocking on the door and searching to prevent the thief from having accomplices …
Claude was scolded harshly by Morssen. "Look at it yourself. It's cool. You climbed up to the roof for the sake of cooling off. Let's not even talk about the fact that you woke up all the residents in the house. Let's talk about how you fell asleep on the roof. Have you ever thought about what would happen if you rolled off the roof?
This is preposterous … You're too audacious … "
Morssen was infuriated. The captain of the patrols, on the other hand, felt bad. "Umm … Chief Morssen, since it's a misunderstanding, we'll be taking our leave. We're sorry for disturbing your peace."
"Don't apologize. You did the right thing.
You did the right thing, "Morssen said calmly in front of his subordinates." I really have to thank you for this. If not for your vigilance and discovery, this brat might really have gotten into trouble.
Thank you. As a father, I sincerely thank you. "