Chapter 8: Genius Trial
After a lengthy two hours of discussion about Heaven and Earth Laws, it was also about time that the two figures came back. Fatigue can can be seen on the two grandpas' faces especially for Reverend Spirit.
"Oh? You still haven't started?" Grandpa Body curiously asked.
"Well as you can see, little Ai and I were still discussing about the dao of Heaven and Earth." Grandpa Soul can only chuckle helplessly as he lost track of time. "I guess we'll have to end our discussion for now little Ai."
"Thank you so much, Grandpa Soul. I've learned a lot. I feel like I can pass this test easily." Ai Zhen cupped his hands as he was really grateful for the knowledge that he gained. From the discussion, he was able to gain roughly +33 Intelligence based from the multiple times of +1 Intelligence and sometimes +2 Intelligence that kept appearing whenever he was enlightened about Heaven and Earth knowledge.
"Hmph." Disapproving snort can be heard from Reverend Spirit.
Grandpa Soul can only chuckle from this response. "You three can sit over at my platform to recuperate fast." He gestured to the three figures towards the platform.
"Oh? Soul's in a good mood. He must had a fruitful discussion with little Ai." Grandpa Body commented as he made his way to the platform.
Grandpa Soul only smiled and when Reverend Spirit noticed this, he was taken aback and was now intrigued with the discussion between the two. "Ai Zhen, the goal in order to pass our trial is to master different skills that we three will display each. I'll go ahead first since the two took a toll in handing the Body's inheritance to his little disciple. That lad must have gone back to wherever he is originally at since his time have already ran out."
"Speaking of time..your trial will only be limited also for 99 minutes. You must master the skill that I'm about to show you for a short time as much as possible." Grandpa Soul added.
"Come." The two moved away from the shade. As the two were out on the blood sun, Ai Zhen's SP started to deplete again in every second.
As the faced each other, Grandpa Soul continued with his instruction. "Take a look of what I'm about to do.."
As Grandpa Soul closed his eyes, specks of red and white aura started to shimmer around him and it slowly spread around until it also covered around Ai Zhen. When these red and white aura covered Ai Zhen, the SP's depletion stopped, this surprised him.
"The skill that I'm using is called [Enhancement]. With the use of Mana, I am able to enhance my body resistance against the hellish heat around. Enhancement skill is not only for enhancing your body, it can also be used for enhancing your attack, defend and any other skills, and that's for you to find out on how you will do it. What I want for you to do now is to master the basic which I have shown to you."
After explaining to Ai Zhen on what to do, Grandpa Soul retracted the red and white auras around. With that, Ai Zhen's SP started to deplete again. "I know that you have a high Spiritual Power at your current level but still I believe that it won't be enough for you to last."
Grandpa Soul made his way back to the base of the tree as he joined with the other two grandpas and left Ai Zhen to learn by himself.
"How much time do you think he will be able to learn and master the skill that I have shown to him?" Grandpa Soul unexpectedly asked the two that were seating on his platform as his gaze still remained on the young man under the blood sun.
"Haha! What are we betting then?" Grandpa Body understood Grandpa Soul's question as it is.
Even though it was just a mere curiosity of Grandpa Soul, he can only shake his head smiling as he knew where will this lead into.
And as if on queue, "Hmph! I'll bet one Spirit Peach that the young man will master the skill under 20 minutes." The competitive spirit of Reverend Spirit against Grandpa Body lit up and made a bet right away.
"Haha! I'll bet one bodhi tea leaf that the young lad will master the skill under twelve minutes." Grandpa Body smirked as he proclaim the confidence on this young man. "That's how confident I am on the talent of this young lad. What about you soul?"
"Hmm..I think I'll bet that little Ai will master the skill under nine minutes." Grandpa Soul simply smiled and stated his bet. "And my bet is Soul Jade. The other two grandpas were shocked to the point that they doubted what they heard.
Soul Jade is a mystical jade that let you see the Heaven and Earth dao laws clearly for a moment. Not only that it also gives you +1000 Intelligence when someone eat this kind of fruit for the first time. That's why even figures like Mortal God would even drool for this kind of fruit.
"So you're this confident huh." Grandpa Body's carefree attitude gotten a bit serious as he took out another item. "Lets change the rules of the betting. Out of four bets, three bets will be about how fast the young lad can master the skills that we'll teach. Each win will get one point. As for the last bet for two points, we will bet on what skill will the young man master longer. I'll bet this longevity fruit that the young man will learn the three skills under fifteen minutes, and the skill that he will master longer is the one that I'll teach."
"Alright, my bet will just be tweaked a bit. Little Ai will learn the skills that we'll teach under twelve minutes each." Grandpa Soul smiled knowingly and agreed. "As for the last bet, I'll bet that he'll learn your skill the longest."
"Haha! I guess the highest winning would be me after all." Grandpa Body couldn't help but laugh victoriously as he eyed Reverend Spirit with contempt.
Reverend Spirit only sneered at Grandpa Body's arrogance as he asked, "What will happen if this becomes a draw?"
"Then Soul and I will just share the prices." Grandpa Body answered Reverend Spirit mockingly right away.
"You!!" Before Reverend Spirit can fight back, Grandpa Soul butted in right away. "Correct, the prices will be shared by the two that got draw."
When Reverend Spirit heard this, he calmed down right away and sneered at Grandpa Body, telling him, "You think that you have won already even though Soul have betted on your skill?"
With that, Reverend Spirit took out another item and bet it. "I'll bet this Starlet Core that the young man will master each of the skill that we'll teach under 20 minutes, and the longest skill that he'll master is mine."
"Don't you ever fucking cheat." Grandpa Body's eyebrows got cold as he stated this to Reverend Spirit.
"Now, now. The bets have already been settled so lets watch little Ai now as he's now about to master the skill that I thought." Grandpa Soul pacified the two lest they disturb Ai Zhen's focus with their ruckus.
Reverend Spirit only snorted as he paid attention to the now perspiring young man.
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At the same time that the betting and the bickering happened, Ai Zhen was calmly standing under the blood sun. He slowly sat on the ground, closing his eyes, not paying attention to the notification of the depleting SP as he began to review their discussion with Grandpa Soul.
As Ai Zhen recalled how the skill works, he cannot help but relate it to the knowledge that he gained the books about Alchemy that he read in the library and to his cultivation knowledge in his previous world. As this was been relate, a process on how the skill works was formulating in his mind.
Just like in Alchemy, using your mana will help you enhance the substance of the certain plant in order to chemically resonate with the other substance which makes the forming of the pill works smoothly. With that process, he controlled his mana to change the environment around that resonates with his body.
The monotonous voice of Yun sounded in his head as a pink aura shimmered around Ai Zhen. Though it was kind of different from what Grandpa Soul has shown nevertheless the effect was practically the same, Ai Zhen's SP stopped depleting. Though what bothered him was the color that was shimmering around him. Isn't this aura uhm..girly?
The three elders were dumbfounded when they saw the aura around Ai Zhen. The two were baffled when they felt that the effect of this aura was the same to what Grandpa Soul thought.
As for Grandpa Soul, his eyes were starting to shimmer in excitement as he saw the brilliant work of little Ai. "Brilliant!" He could not help but exclaimed. "Even though the outcome was different, we can still accept that he mastered the skill that I thought and just made some revisions with it, are we able to agree with that?"
The two elders could just nod in bafflement.
"To think that he combined the two different auras from the skill in ten minutes." Reverend Soul was really astounded with the young man. 'No wonder Soul was that confident of his bet. I might have underestimated this young man.'
"Well, does this count as passed, Grandpa Soul? Ai Zhen embarrassingly looked at the elder that was staring at him in excitement.
"This is more than just passed! You completely changed my perspective in you, little Ai. Come, come!" Grandpa Soul gestured to come back under the shade of the tree as he highly praised the young man.
As he stared at little Ai, he can't helped but look at him like a masterpiece. "Good lad!"
"Haha! Nicely done boy!" Grandpa Body patted Ai Zhen's shoulders vigorously and smirked. "This time, I won't let you have it easily. It's my turn now, come young man!"
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After 5 minutes rest, back in the bloody heat, Grandpa Body and Ai Zhen were standing face to face. The young man was shimmering in pink aura as the elder was explaining how his skill works.
The skill that Grandpa Body was teaching to Ai Zhen called [Conjurement]. The way this skill works was to create a body made of mana which serves like a clone, this has no use other than to deceive. The reason why Grandpa Body made this as his test because want the young man to learn how to control mana that was already out of his body which was the fundamental point of using a skill.
When Ai Zhen was starting to comprehend this skill, he was reminded of the Sea Trial when he was diffusing his mana to attract the elementals around him. He consolidated this process as the first step on learning the Conjure skill. What he was having a hard time was on how to maintain it. This took him ten minutes of series of trial and error until he was able to finally grasp on maintaining the mana in the atmosphere. Finally, for twelve minutes, Yun's monotonous childish voice sounded notifying him that he mastered the Conjurement skill.
The two elders except for Grandpa Soul was greatly shocked on how monstrous the young man's comprehension. They could not believe that there would someone who was this capable. It is unbelievable!
To Ai Zhen, it is true that there would be no one that will be able to do this kind of feat, even the geniuses that he encountered back on his previous life. That's why he could not be arrogant about it and just be thankful with his countless experiences.
"That's 2-0-0 then." Grandpa Soul just simply smiled as he stated the current score of their bet. "Spirit, it's now your turn."
When the two elders saw Grandpa Soul was not that shaken to the feat of this young man, they can't help but wonder if this old man already anticipated this and scheme for their priceless treasure.
With that, Reverend Spirit strode out of the shade to the young man. He can't help but acknowledge this young man and praised him, "Good work, young man. Can you still keep that mana body out?"
"I can only keep this for about in fifteen minutes." Ai Zhen replied honestly.
"Good good." Reverend Spirit smiled evilly as if he was concocting an evil plan. "Learn the skill that I'm about to teach you under twelve minutes then. If you can achieve this, I'll allow you to call me Grandpa Spirit. "
Ai Zhen could not help but think how this old man can be narrow-minded to someone he doesn't like. He knew that this elder was trying to make things more difficult for him.
White and blue specks started to shimmer around Ai Zhen's mana body. While this was happening, the stationary mana body moved and made it act the old man Reverend Spirit's explanation.
"This skill is called [Enchantment]. What this skill does is manipulate the mana in order to make skills move in whatever directions or actions that you want." With that short and concise explanation, the blue and white specks that was shimmering slowly dissipated as the mana body also when he walked back with his cane to the other two elders who were looking at him with frown and disappointment.
Ai Zhen can only wryly smile about it. He has a quarter of his mana left but he's not worried about it since a plan has already been formulated in his mind as the old geezer was explaining and demonstrating the skills. 'Who needs for you to be called as grandpa by me, you'll see how I'll make this name be a mock on you.'
When Reverend Spirit got back to the shade with, Grandpa Body roared right away at him, "You fucker! I will really beat you senseless if the young man fails, you insensible geezer."
"Hmph! Let me see how can you beat me, you goat." Reverend Spirit only snorted and retorted to Grandpa Body with no meaning.
"That was really not nice of you there, Spirit." Grandpa Soul's voice was indifferent as he agreed with Grandpa Body's intention. "You better make it up to little Ai once he pass this trial."
"Hmph! You think I don't know what you're planning, you scheming old man. Don't worry, I'll do my part with no complaints if he'll be able to pass my trial." Reverend Spirit simply replied which eased the scrunched eyebrows of Grandpa Soul.
"Eh??" Grandpa Body was not able to comprehend what the two were talking and couldn't help wonder but then just let it go as they were now paying attention to the young man.
The three elders saw Ai Zhen seating in a lotus position for minutes now with out taking any actions. The young man's eyes were closed and unmoving as his SP keeps depleting. They can't seem to comprehend what he was doing however, what he was doing was creating a simulation of his formulated plan in his mind.
Ai Zhen relate the Enchantment to manipulating a flying sword. What he's trying to do was to apply the logic of sword manipulation into this skill. By that logic, he was able to infer that this is only the continuation of mana controlling which is mana moving. With that, he simulated moving the controlled mana without dissipating in his mind.
Nine minutes have already passed by, as the trials and errors kept repeating in his mind, he can't help but think also why were the three elders gave him this kind of trial. He felt like they are training him for something. He can't help but have this kind of vague feeling.
With that kind of thought, he tried applying the concept of the Enhancement skill. The concept which resist and resonate with the surrounding. 'That's it!'
With this concept, not only the mana would be stable, nature would not also hinder the skill which gives him less effort on using this.
Eyes brightened up and a smile crept up on Ai Zhen's face as he stood up right away. Grandpa Soul was now becoming expectant of what the young man's about to do.