Chapter 234: The Beginning of Sixth Rank Promotion

It turned out that the status of a Wandering Mage was far inferior to that of other mages. Shaoke's decision to leave the military department behind made Mage Roman and Mage Yisier realize that their relationship might fade in the future, unless Shaoke could advance to a higher tier, and even then, only to become an Eighth Tier Mage. However, the two female mages, Mage Roman and Mage Yisier, were still confident about this, as they had some understanding of Shaoke's advancement speed.

Although Mage Roman and the others left the small town not long after joining the new legion, the three mages kept in touch through letters. Shaoke did not feel at all that the passage of time had negatively affected his relationship with Mage Roman; instead, during this period, Mage Roman visited Shaoke several times, each time after a few days of hooking up before leaving via a small teleportation array. However, her desire to have a child remained unfulfilled even after the war ended, which often led Mage Yisier to tease Mage Roman about it.

When Shaoke's Blizzard 33rd Corps disbanded, he stayed quietly in the small town for seven or eight years, immersing himself entirely in spell knowledge. With ample free time, abundant medicinal resources, and precious books obtained from the Death Mage Corps, his progress was very rapid. Without worrying about the harm that rapid growth in mental strength and magic power might cause to his body, Shaoke repeatedly extended his meditation time by using large amounts of energy-restoring drugs. Of course, the drugs he consumed in the camp were more than double and a half what other mages of the same tier used, but no one questioned this, as these drugs were not from the Blizzard Legion but were paid for by the military department and the royal family.

After the White-robed Cleric left, Shaoke no longer had access to the golden light healing, forcing him to endure his headaches on his own. Fortunately, he had large quantities of high-tier energy-restoring drugs, which prevented his body from being damaged by excessive energy consumption. However, the years of unrelenting pain brought him many benefits. Under the intense stimulation of the silver light, his mental strength and magic power grew rapidly, and his mental space even expanded slightly over time. This left Shaoke both pleased and helpless, even pained.

After seven or eight years of rapid cultivation, Shaoke's magic power and mental strength quickly reached the limits of his meditation space, signaling that it was time for his advancement to a Sixth Tier Mage. At this point, Shaoke significantly reduced his meditation time and began a detailed study of Mage Yisier's experiences in advancing to the Sixth Tier, as well as the notes on precautions for advancing to the Sixth Rank from the Death Mage Corps. He repeatedly simulated the advancement array needed for the Sixth Tier in his mind. This process lasted a full year before Shaoke decided to proceed with the advancement. He got excited and told Mage Roman and Mage Yisier, and after receiving their blessings, he chose the time and place for the advancement.

Seated in a temporary chamber built by the Blizzard Legion, Shaoke waited for the medicinal effects to stabilize before beginning his preparations. The initial steps were no different from previous advancements. He dispelled the pentagram array and the spell structures embedded in it according to specific methods. Although this caused violent fluctuations in the space that had stopped expanding, the silver light calmed it just before disappearing, which greatly eased Shaoke's mind. In previous advancements, the silver light vanished as soon as the advancement array dissipated, leaving no chance to calm the turbulence in the meditation space, which often caused unnecessary trouble. This time, however, the situation was entirely different, saving Shaoke the effort he had reserved for calming the turbulence.

After the turbulence in the meditation space subsided, Shaoke began outlining the array. This time, the advancement array was far more complex than any before. He had to carefully condense his mental strength into fine threads and focus all his energy on outlining the array.

The Six-pointed Star Magic Array in his mental space was successfully outlined in one go after several magic hours. However, when outlining the array in his magic space, he failed twice, forcing him to repeatedly reassure himself that he could do it. After resting and briefly recovering, he used his top-tier Fifth Tier recovery meditation method to quickly restore a significant amount of energy, minimizing the time lost and ensuring it wouldn't affect his advancement schedule.

Once again, he concentrated on decomposing the light bands of magic power into a long purple thread, then began outlining. The complex Six-pointed Star Magic Array for purification was slowly being constructed under his control in the magic space. Although some light bands passed through this space, they did not interfere with his work. This time, after a great deal of effort, he successfully outlined the Six-pointed Star Magic Array.

The two outlined Six-pointed Star Magic Arrays were connected through incantations and gestures and began to rotate slowly. However, this time, the absorption of mental strength and magic power by the two arrays was not fast but rather quite slow.

After briefly sensing the changes in his meditation space, Shaoke followed the methods he had previously simulated to proceed with the next steps. The remaining mental light bands were condensed into thicker threads without decomposition. Under Shaoke's direction, these threads quickly and steadily began constructing a small altar in his mental space. The altar was not large, but it was about five times the size of the floating Six-pointed Star. Since the Six-pointed Star Magic Array continuously absorbed mental strength to maintain its operation, this construction work consumed more than half of Shaoke's energy.

Once the simple altar was outlined, Shaoke chanted another incantation, this time using the Ancient Magic Tongue. According to the books, using a more powerful magical language for this incantation would make the altar's effectiveness in the future slightly greater. The altar's function was even greater than that of the Six-pointed Star Magic Array, serving as a crucial foundation for increasing the resilience of mental strength or magic power and for rapid daily recovery. In Shaoke's understanding from his previous life, it could somewhat increase the speed of automatic health and mana regeneration, but it also had other more important functions, which will be introduced later.

As the incantation was chanted, the altar and the Six-pointed Star Magic Array began to operate rapidly. After absorbing a large amount of mental strength and magic power, they started to shrink slowly. Before that, the altar suddenly split into two parts, one large and one small. The smaller altar quickly flew out of the mental space, merged into the magic space, and settled directly beneath the Six-pointed Star Magic Array. Dozens of silver light threads then emerged from the altar and connected to the Six-pointed Star Magic Array. At the same time, the larger altar in the mental space underwent a similar transformation, but its color remained a pale silver instead of turning purple like the one in the meditation space.

After absorbing all the mental strength and magic power in the space, the altar and the array simultaneously shrank and disappeared. However, the strange fluctuations they emitted could still be detected by Shaoke. Driven by these fluctuations, the meditation space began to expand slowly, stopping only after expanding more than three times.

At this point, Shaoke continued to focus on experiencing these fluctuations, as they would greatly aid his future spell cultivation. Additionally, injecting a large amount of energy could somewhat accelerate the advancement process.

As time passed, the mage, almost out of juice, had to stop this process and begin meditating to recover some energy. Fortunately, he used the highest level of meditation method, allowing him to quickly restore a significant amount of energy in the shortest time, ensuring it wouldn't affect the subsequent advancement steps.

With his energy restored, the altar and Six-pointed Star Magic Array that had disappeared in the meditation space reappeared, this time in a different form.

Through careful observation, Shaoke found that the altar, now countless times smaller, had become a pale silver crystal structure, with threads of mental strength and magic power flowing rapidly inside. The Six-pointed Star Magic Array floated above this altar, but the dozens of silver threads that had previously connected to it had disappeared, leaving only a single thin silver strand pulling it, preventing it from leaving the altar's sky.

The advancement process was not yet complete; more critical work remained. Although Shaoke knew the next steps were even more important, the books on advancement did not mention how these steps would affect future development. However, given the repeated warnings in the books, Shaoke treated this stage with great caution.

After quickly recovering through meditation, the mage began the next steps. Following the book's instructions, Shaoke used the most powerful magic script he could condense and outline: the Ancient Magic Script. He condensed these using his mental strength and began combining them into sentences of varying lengths, each representing different meanings. Some were related to recovery, others to dissipation. Dozens of sentences with different meanings were condensed one after another, and after each sentence, he had to rest and recover, as the significant consumption of mental strength and the spatial turbulence caused by the condensation process prevented him from working continuously for long periods.