In a certain confined martial gym in Divine Shield Academy.

The setting sun was soon about to vanish beyond the horizon, its last few remaining afterglows filtering through the transom windows, printing a patch of gold on the ground inside the building.

A slender boy with a bright red scar on his left cheek, his hair cropped extremely short, stood inside like a stern and grave piece of rock. A ruthless desire for battle was all one could sense coming from him.

Around him, six or seven Divine Shield students lay fallen, scattered on the ground.

He ruthlessly cursed them in an icy tone without showing them any quarter. His voice reverberated in this building, piercing like so many sharp knives into the depths of these Divine Shield students’ hearts as they lay flat on the ground. Compared to their physical pains, it made these Divine Shield students turn even paler.

"You trashes! You all bloody stand up, is that all you’re capable of!"

"So many of you against the one of me, can’t you beat me even like this!"

"Stand up!"

"If you were fighting in a real arcane team, trashes like you would have been killed long ago already!"

"Your hands and feet haven’t been cut off, yet you’re already unable to keep fighting, do you still want to become a member of the western corps?"

Scolded by this scarred boy without even a trace of a crease on his school uniform, two of those fallen on the ground snarled and leaped up. Two different bright fires rushed towards this scarred boy. However, he merely stretched his hands out and destroyed their arcane powers in two exploding balls of fire, smashing these two flying in the air once again.

"Stand up!"

"Too slow!"

"Let me tell you, you’re courting death if you only know to rain down arcane skills when you face genuine masters. Learn first what’s called genuine fighting!"

The icy cold, ruthless insults rained down once again.

When no one was in a shape to stand up again, this scarred boy silently walked alone out of this arena.

The afterglow of the sunset made the figure of his back appear even more slender, even more like a sharp sword ready to wound at any time.

"Captain."

A tall and slender girl brimming with heroic air walked out from an alley between two gymnasiums. It was precisely Charlotte whom Ayrin met before. From her greeting, this scarred boy was the one publicly acknowledged as the strongest in Divine Shield Academy, the academy team’s captain, Ivan Fadh.

"You’re scolding them too harshly. After all, their strengths…"

"Did I say anything wrong?" Ivan coldly interrupted Charlotte’s words. "They all hold the lofty ambition of joining the western corps or the Lannister arcane teams. For them, this isn’t only a competition, but a genuine battle. They can’t knock me down even once with their current level, they really should be scolded."

"I understand what you mean." Charlotte looked at the tip of her own shoes. "I just think that it might produce the opposite effect if you insult them too harshly."

"If suffering humiliation decreases their willpower instead of strengthening their fighting spirit, then for people like that, I will propose the cancellation of their qualifications to join the army and arcane teams." Ivan grimly said, "Letting an unsuitable person obtain glory they shouldn’t obtain is to harm them. Their companions could even lose their lives because of them!"

Charlotte nodded. She actually sensed a trace of warmth beneath his grimness, hence she didn’t argue any further with this boy who wasn’t any different from the captain of a professional battlemaster team. She merely said in a soft voice, "There is a little peculiar freshman in Holy Dawn Academy. They say in their academy that he comes from a Giant Food Monster bloodline, and he progresses extremely fast."

"No need for us to be afraid."

Ivan nodded. He raised his head and watched the sky, watched the last of the sunset glow. "Our western corps is already called the Dragon-Battling Corps. That means that we’re not afraid, even of dragons, as long as our own determination is like steel, as long as we are powerful enough."

After a pause, he grimly added, "I’m not asking my team members to be at my level. I’ll be very satisfied already if they could reach a level like yours."

Charlotte helplessly let out a heavy, cold snort, "Captain, are you praising me or criticizing me?"

…

"His regeneration ability isn’t inferior to pure dragon bloodlines? This mysterious bloodline is really very strange."

In a corridor inside the infirmary, the lazy-looking Liszt said to the short-haired female arcane master Andar, "In order to protect the future star of Eiche, in order to protect a child’s security, don’t leak out information like that for now."

Liszt’s words seemed very much like a joke, but Andar was very familiar with him, and her face stiffened slightly when she heard some hidden meanings behind his words. "Don’t tell me Evil Dragon followers are currently running rampant to such a degree?"

"That’s not a secret actually, anyway the news will spread here very soon." Liszt looked a little vexed. "Evil Dragon followers used to only appear near the border, but lately they’ve penetrated several times deeper inside. Also, the targets of their assassinations aren’t limited anymore to the arcane team members who are particularly threatening to them, they already widened their activities to some young people who are particularly likely to stand at the peak of the kingdom in the future. On top of that, Evil Dragon followers are also appearing more and more frequently."

Andar’s expression became a little graver. "Ok, I understand… Also, be careful when you’re out there on a mission."

"Haha, I’m really still as popular as I used to be."

"… I really don’t know if you’re truly narcissistic or if you just playing the part." Ciaran came together with him in the infirmary, and now she gave him a fierce stare. "Let’s go."

"Alright. You’re more familiar with him anyway. I’ll play your attendant so I don’t leave a bad impression behind."

Ayrin heard footsteps just when he was the middle of watching the ceiling, bored stiff. He saw Ciaran push the door open and come inside, and immediately shouted "Teacher Ciaran" in a happy voice. Then he observed Liszt with a little curiosity when he saw him come behind Ciaran, and couldn’t resist asking, "Teacher Ciaran, which teacher is he now, he looks very powerful."

"Don’t mind him." Ciaran came in front of Ayrin. Before she had time to speak again, Aryin actually said with impatience, "Teacher Ciaran, you came at the right time. I was just going to look for you. I noticed the arcane particles inside my arcane gate seemed to have disappeared. But in the fight against Rogrid, I seem to remember that my arcane particles increased at the very end. This sensation is too strange."

"Do you want to know the real reason?" Liszt said with a smile.

Ciaran suddenly whipped her head around, right when she was just thinking how to answer. She stared ferociously at him, thinking, you said you were going to act like an attendant, and now you’re snatching the limelight.

Liszt shrugged his shoulders as if he read her mind, telling her in a soft voice, "I just want to make things simpler."

"Teacher, you know the reason?" Ayrin was excited all of a sudden. "Of course I want to know the real reason."

"Then, are you ready for a little test? It might be a little painful," Liszt said with a smile.

Ayrin blinked, but he became even more excited soon after. "Of course I’m ready!"

"Bang!"

As soon as his voice rose, before he even had time to react, his body suddenly sprang up from the bed in a twisted posture, lightning fizzling all around him.

Liszt lazily took back a hand radiating lightning and arcane particles.

"Ah!"

Ayrin’s pained shout came out only now.

"You…" Ciaran looked at Liszt, at a total loss for words.

"Doesn’t matter, it’ll stretch his muscles and improve his blood circulation, it’ll make him recover faster instead." Liszt winked at her and asked of an Ayrin whose hair still stood erect and whose body still trembled, "Try to feel now, did the arcane particles in your arcane gate increase or decrease?"

Ayrin’s pain vanished all at once.

"Increase!" He shouted out this word with a blank face one second later, then he abruptly came back to his senses. He grabbed Liszt’s hand and shook it for all he was worth. "Teacher! Teacher! Why is it like this, why do I feel like the arcane particles increased by a lot?"

"So it’s like that?" Liszt smiled faintly. A waft of dazzling arcane particles rushed out of his hand and charged against Ayrin’s hands. "Did your arcane particles increase again? Compared to last time?"

"It increased again a little!"

Ayrin immediately felt that there were some additional brightly flashing things inside the arcane gate, but of course it couldn’t be compared to the earlier sensation of countless arcane particles densely dotted together appearing inside, so he immediately shouted, "It’s just that it seems very few particles appeared! Not as many as last time."

"It seems like senior Plum’s and my guess is really correct."

"Huu." Liszt breathed out a long mouthful of air and turned around to look at the thoroughly-shocked Ciaran, saying, "His body really absorbs arcane particles passively… So, his body will only accept many arcane particles when arcane power and arcane particles combine together to land a powerful attack on him. When I let my arcane particles directly rush at him, his body didn’t accept many of them on the contrary."

"How can such a bloodline talent exist." Ciaran’s mind was a little blank, momentarily losing some of her ability to think.

"Teacher!" Ayrin was already dead excited at this moment. "What passive absorption? I don’t think I really understand, can you explain it in simple terms?"

"To put it simply, it’s a natural talent of your bloodline, causing your body to be just like a sponge. It’s able to absorb someone else’s arcane particles and store them inside your arcane gate. That’s the reason why there are arcane particles inside you even when you haven’t reached the level to condense arcane particles yet." Liszt looked at Ayrin and said, "When someone else hits you, your body will absorb some arcane particles."

"Absorb arcane particles from others?" Ayrin was thoroughly struck dumb. Even he knew that this was something that didn’t make sense.

"Yes, so you’re the prince of taking hits." Liszt couldn’t resist a chuckle. "The fiercer they beat you up, the more arcane particles you can absorb instead. Also, judging from your performance last time, you can even use these arcane particles. That’s why, even if you can’t condense arcane particles yet, as long as you save up enough arcane particles in your arcane gate, you can use arcane skills all the same."

"What?" Dumbfounded was written large across Ayrin’s face. "Then as long as I get hit a lot… I will save up even more arcane particles?"

"That’s the theory…"

"Teacher, please hit me then!"

"Er… We’re not in such a hurry right?"

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