“Are you ready?” Running her fingers through Layn’s black hair, Irea whispered softly.

“Is there any reason to be in a hurry?” Keeping his eyes shut, Layn answered while moving his head around a bit. Even though it was resting on the divine pillow of Irea’s lap, her perfectly athletic body also meant that what was supposed to be the greatest cushion humanity was riddled with the hardness of her bones.

“Well, we are kinda at silent war with the entire upper echelon of the academy, aren’t we?” Moving her hands away from Layn’s head, Irea moved them to the back in order to support herself when her torso also angled towards the ground a bit. “While I know that you don’t really need to get any stronger at this point, I still believe it wouldn’t hurt to obtain even more power before the push will come to shove.”

Their talk was absolutely fake and had nothing to do with what the two of them was actually doing. Ever since their talk with the third prince concluded, a single conclusion was drawn.

All three of them had to prepare. While the prince continued to play the entire situation with his political means, preparing a suitable ground for the confrontation, the two of them was tasked with something way simpler on paper, yet way harder according to local common sense. Because the two of them was tasked with reaching a level of strenght sufficient for them to be accepted into the inner academy right away.

Irea poked Layn’s left side. With a small cut right above her knee pressed tightly against a similar cut on Layn’s back, she had a clear and perfect view of Layn’s state of cultivation. Even though her personal strenght was below that of an archmage, in terms of cultivation, she still reigned supreme, allowing the girl to guide the man through the often complicated processes of growing his strenght.

“Sorry, my bad.” Focusing on his inner state once again, Layn slightly adjusted the flow of his inner energy. Constantly sucking copious amounts of mana produced by his improved rope, his rate of progress was only slightly faster than the pace at which Irea grew. In the end, the number of stones that Layn’s own rope was infused with was only a single piece greater than the one that Irea was using… But her slower growth could also be attributed to the fact that she started from a higher position than the archmage.

“Don’t worry about it.” Prompting her torso back to a straightened position, Irea once again moved her hands on top of Layn’s head to play with his hair. ‘Who would’ve thought that training could be so pleasant…’ Smiling to his own thoughts, Layn once again focused on the cultivation.

According to the girl’s words, even though his strenght was close to the middle-rank two-star expert, his actual cultivation was only in the middle ranks of the one-star. But rather than just limiting herself to using those terms that Layn was foreign to, she actually took some time to explain it to him before they started yet another session of cultivation. Thankfully, from the strange feeling that filled Layn’s mind whenever he attempted to push the flow of his inner energy even stronger, it was clear that he was finally reaching the limits of his current stage.

Pop!

As if something snapped in his insides, Layn’s flow of energy stabilized. But that wasn’t the most interesting part. As if his entire insides turned into a big hole of a void, the energy Layn constantly sucked into his flow… started to overflow. Rather than condensing within its path and increasing the speed of its circulation, every single bit of energy he consumed started to fall into that void… Only to disappear as if to never be seen again. Yet, contrary to what Layn could feel in his body, it appeared as if the aura he always used as an archmage… suddenly appeared in his insides as well!

‘Could it be…?’ In the end, even though the world worked in a slightly different way than it would in Layn’s original time, the laws of magic were roughly the same. And as more and more mana continued to pour into the void confined by the drive of Layn’s cultivation, he could feel that his inner aura… Was actually exactly the same as the aura he grew as a mage!

“Congratulations.” Stopping her hands, Irea pushed her torso forward and down, moving her head above Layn’s face only to place a gentle kiss on his forehead. “You managed to reach the next cultivation stage.”

As her fingers stopped moving around, Irea didn’t cease to caress Layn’s scalp. With her lips moving down Layn’s face from his forehead to his own mouth, her fingers started to massage his earlobes, as if the girl was really keen on rewarding Layn’s small achievement.

“Now that I think of it, how many stages higher you are than my current self?” Suddenly overwhelmed by curiosity, Layn set himself to automatically push all the energy he was consuming through his flow into the void before focusing his mind on the face of the girl above.

“When we started, I was right at the stage you are right now, at the beginner phase of filling one’s potential. Ah, the potential itself refers to how much energy can be stored within one’s cultivation.” Realizing that Layn could still be confused about the ins and outs of the cultivation that Irea understood as something obvious, the girl made sure to explain the situation. “But the truth is… Ever since you gave me that treasure, I forcefully repelled all my potential to recultivate the amassing drive stage.”

Finally lifting her head due to how hot of a day it was and how uncomfortable the two of them were when their own body heat only increased the warmth of their faces, Irea shook her head in an attempt to drive all her sweat out. “As for now, I’m about to reach the awakening…”

Just like in Layn’s case a moment earlier, something snapped in the girl’s body. Able to feel this qualitative change only because their real flesh was touching where they both intentionally injured themselves, Layn instantly focused his eyes on the girl’s face.

“Oh?” Feeling the energy coursing through the girl’s veins, Layn forced himself to move up his head from the girl’s lap, freeing her from the role of his pillow.

“Go and test it out. I can tell how eager you are to do so.” Rewarding the girl’s progress with a kind smile followed by a short moment of patting her head, Layn’s smile became even bigger when the girl instantly stood up before starting to stretch her body. Soon, her opening exercise turned into a sprint, several boxing spars with an imagined opponent and a few jumps… Before the girl suddenly fell on the soft grass beside the archmage with a satisfied look on her face.

“Yeah, I’m quite sure. I somehow managed to reach the awakening stage.” According to what the girl explained before, once a cultivator would fill their potential to the brim, they would reach the merging flow stage. Once at that level of cultivation, one would have to forcefully add motion to all the energy amassed inside the void created by his or her initial flow of mana, so that every single bit of their energy would follow the same, circular pattern.

“Do tell, what does reaching that stage mean?” After taking a quick look at his own inner stage only to confirm that the void inside his cultivation was just as bottomless as it was before, Layn quickly turned his attention to the girl instead. ‘There is no need to hurry. I’m still cultivating way faster than anyone in this world could imagine.’ Reassuring himself with this simple thought, Layn couldn’t be bothered to feel any rush.

“Ah, right, I stopped my explanation on the cultivation on that stage.” With her lips turning into a wide smile, Irea leaned to the back before releasing a deep sigh. As her muscles relaxed, she grabbed Layn’s head only to sneak her knees underneath his back and once again allow the man to rest on the comfortable softness of her lap.

“Once one’s manage to coordinate all his energy and merge the flows, one finally reaches the awakening stage.” This time, Irea didn’t just focus on her inner state. Once she moved her right hand to the side, a huge flame suddenly appeared out of her palm, making the heat of the day even harder to bear with. “Right now, I cannot assimilate all the energy this treasure produces. That would be quite dangerous, hence why I’m wasting it away on this stupid technique.”

Shaking her hand, Irea quickly explained the source and even the reason behind the fire appearing above her hand. “Right now, I need to make sure the aura of my energy will build up slowly but steadily. Only once it reaches my mind…”

Pop!

Before the girl could finish her words, something strange happened in Layn’s magical core. As if all his external aura he cultivated on his own was suddenly sucked inside, the void that wouldn’t give any hints of filling with energy at all, suddenly appeared to be filled to the brim. And as more energy constantly added to the equation, unable to hold even a single drop more of static mana, Layn’s inner energy within what used to be a void hole of his potential, suddenly started to move.

“Ugh…” Already accustomed to the cultivation being quite arduous and time-consuming, Layn momentarily wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say. “It seems like I broke through the filling potential stage.. And that means…” Moving his eyes on the girl, Layn removed the shocked expression from his face only to put a smile on his lips once again. “I’m once again just a single stage behind you!”