A few days passed away in a blink of an eye. Azzy continued his academic life as usual.
Claire pestered him daily to fulfill the demands but Azzy could only hold them for a while as his attention was on the upcoming wedding.
On the fourth day, he finally received the first item, the ancient book of Buddhism.
After returning from the academy at around 10 o'clock in the evening, Azzy locked his room and sat on his bed in a lotus position.
"The book contained various techniques but first, you start with Immortal Bodhi art. This technique will let you absorb the natural energy temporarily, powering up your soul orb." The Reaper's voice echoed in his head.
"Now, first concentrate on your surroundings, activate your senses to the maximum while I'll directly transfer the knowledge to you."
"Alright." Azzy nodded and closed his eyes. He started to meditate while concentrating on the surroundings to sense the invisible particles that are supposedly present everywhere.
The Reaper doesn't want Azzy to turn into a monk or worse, a Buddha. That's why he didn't bother to translate all the stories and teachings written inside the book. He only picked up important things that can be weaponized against the future enemies and slowly transferred them to his brain.
Within just a couple of minutes, Azzy was able to sense a countless number of tiny transparent bubbles all around him. It filled his entire room. "Are these the natural energy particles?" He wondered.
"First stage is sensing. The second stage is absorbing. The third stage is temporarily merging with the soul orb. The fourth part is either refining to increase your soul power or expelling to attack your enemies." The Reaper poured the information to Azzy. "You passed the first stage. Now, it's time for absorption. Release your soul energy and form armor around yourself.
Until now, you have used the soul energy to either strengthen your attack or act as a barrier to reduce the inflicted physical damage upon you.
But, now, you will use it as a black hole. The process is the same as absorbing solar energy. It's just that you will use the soul energy as a medium because it takes less effort for the merge."
The process took nearly 30 minutes until a layer of energy can be seen around the soul orb, thereby, increasing the size of the planets within the soul orb too. Azzy felt the presence of the second layer of translucent energy over his soul energy armor.
Once the process is done, Azzy refined the raw form of natural energy and increased his soul power barely by a couple of hundred.
"Now that you are done with basic technique, it's time for you to learn about Invincible Divine body.
It has nine tiers just like the soul realms. Usually, people will strengthen their bones and skull by breaking through to the next realm. However, there exist people like you who train in tough environments and raise their physical strength, ending up being stronger than their peers.
This is one such technique where you will be able to become so strong that when mastered completely, you can go toe to toe with the Supreme realm expert as long as the latter don't use soul energy and skills. Currently, you are considered at the sixth tier.
And once you reach the ninth tier, your body will go under metamorphosis. Your skull and your bones will be like they are made of steel, and your entire body will be like it is forged in a myriad of metals. It's as if you become a living Adamantium."
Azzy was naturally excited about it. The knowledge of the technique began to pour into his brain.
Nearly ten minutes later, he inwardly thought, "I see. So, instead of feeding it to the soul orb, the natural energy needed to be fed to the bones, huh. And the rate of absorption increases with my soul power. So, I need to find a balance between both of their training."
Then, it was the turn of Embodiment of the Heavens, where one can shrink their body to atomic-scale after mastering it completely.
After that, Azzy learned levitation, which the combat instructor Herman occasionally uses, although it was practically useless other than showing off.
Then, it's the turn of the Divine Palm technique, which uses the natural energy to form a giant translucent golden palm to crush the enemies, although its power entirely depends on what level the user's Divine Body is at.
One after another, The Reaper extracted the techniques from the ancient book and transferred the knowledge to Azzy.
By the time everything is finished, it was already dawn and Azzy could only leave for the academy without any sleep.
At around 7:40 a.m., during the sparring session, Claire reminded him again while they were having a friendly spar.
Azzy thought of postponing it again, giving the same excuse that he will surely fulfill the demand when Estella becomes rank-6 and further said that challenging and defeating her will make it seem like he was a bully.
Little did know, Claire purposely spoke of it when Estella was near. The latter frowned.
And during the afternoon, at Practical Combat, by coincidence, the class instructor arranged to spar between the two students with similar strengths, giving the reason that he wanted to see everyone's progress before the upcoming monthly tournament.
He then announced the fixtures with the venue being the Grand Arena.
First match: Glenn and Claire Lefeuvre versus Copper and Calder
Second match: Stephanus and Adam versus Estella Moon
Third match: Mia Leveret, Annabel, and Anner Light versus Larch and Lark Sandrou
Fourth match: Raven Passel and Louis versus Rain Nightingale and Gideon
Fifth match: Instructor Arley Blood versus Azrael and Flora
Sixth match: Claire vs Louis
Seventh match: Mia vs Adam
Eighth match: Gideon vs Calder
Ninth Match: Lark vs Annabel
Tenth match: Azrael vs Estella
****
Ten matches, with each one lasting only five minutes. Claire was naturally happy that God is listening to her, not knowing that this entire sparring session was arranged by Estella behind their backs as she felt her pride wounded by Azzy's comment.
Arley Blood used to be a combat instructor at Eternal Institutions, Silver city Branch, and was acquainted with Estella for several years. When she spoke her intentions of sparring against Azzy, he accepted her wish.
The first match was between Team Claire and Team Calder, where the former easily wiped the floor with the latter.
Ever since her Arcana spirit's grade rose to platinum, everyone gradually realized that she was completely on a whole level compared to the person who fought in the Champions League.
Estella's match doesn't even need to be mentioned. She easily knocked her opponents without even using her Arcana.
The third match was also Mia's favor. The battle made Azzy realize that Mia was better in modern weapons compared to Archery. And there's also Anner. Although she was injured, she displayed enough skills to be lauded.
The fourth match ended up as a draw. But, for some reason, Azzy felt that Louis took easy on Gideon, considering he never saw that amazing speed that he saw on the day of the orientation ceremony.
The fifth match between the instructor and Team Azrael also ended up in a draw. Azzy didn't attack the instructor even once and gave all the opportunities to the little Flora.
On the other hand, he managed to keep up with Arley's speed to dodge the latter's attacks. It brought mixed reactions among his fellow classmates. After all, it's a great opportunity to fight an Exalt realm expert. In their eyes, Azzy wasted it but then again, no one has the courage to say it to his face either.
The friendly matches continued.
In the sixth match, Azzy saw Louis' speed once again but against Claire, the six-ft teenager only focused on dodging and forced the match to be drawn. Claire complained that there's something wrong with that anime-faced guy.
In the seventh match, Mia won against Adam because of obvious reasons. Adam is purely a support type and Mia is a control type. If the guy was good at physical attacks, he might have given a good fight, unfortunately, he had a weak body. The result was decided as soon as the match is started.
Gideon and Calder's match ended up in a draw and they are evenly matched. As for lark and Annabel, surprisingly, the eighth-grader won against Lark despite having lesser soul power and the same Arcana's grade.
"Final match, Estella Moon versus Azrael," The instructor announced it and everyone fixed their eyes on both of them as this is the first time they are going face to face.
"I'll be going all out, President Rael," Estella announced to him in a serious tone. "If you wanted to not lose your face, be prepared for it."
Azzy stared at her in silence. His face was the same, without any expression. So, it is difficult to say what he is thinking about.
"Student Azrael, student Estella, get ready."
*Whistle*
As soon as the whistle is blown, Estella stretched her hands as she summoned not one, but two soul cards.
<strong>"Come out and have fun, Oh the lord of the seas, Levi."</strong>
<strong>"Come out and tear apart my enemies, Oh the lord of the skies, Garuda."</strong>
A familiar 800ft long Demonic Serpent, Leviathan appeared beside her. Along with it, a 100-ft giant eagle appeared in the sky, flapping its wings.
As they saw their opponent, the Leviathan let out a powerful roar and Garuda let out a powerful screech. They were so loud that even Gideon and other kids closed their ears for a moment.
Estella mounted on top of the eagle and looked down at him, "I'm waiting, Azrael. Summon your Arcana."
<strong>"Soul skill: Eyes of God"</strong>
Instead of summoning the black lightning wolf, Azzy unleashed the soul skill.
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