Emery's recent breakthroughs could be considered a big achievement for him. He had increased his understanding in the plant, water and earth elements to its next level. On top of that, his spirit force had reached a whopping total of fifty, which meant he had reached Acolyte Rank 4.
Based on his deductions, the acolyte rankings increase seemed to follow a rule. And that was whenever his spirit force increased by ten, his rank would get upgraded.
[Plant Spirit - high stage]
[Water Spirit - middle stage]
[Earth Spirit - high stage]
[Darkness Spirit - Inestimable]
[Battle power 23 (17)]
[Spirit force 50 (31)]
[Fey Bloodline - stage 1]
[Acolyte Rank 4]
Despite all the progress he had made so far, however, the black dragon's nasty comments started coming once again. Killgragah said, "Aghh, I can't stand it anymore. You are regressing instead of moving forward! This is worse than I thought."
Emery couldn't understand what this chained dragon was talking about. In his point of view, the continuous practice and results he had received in the past three months were more than satisfactory. Granted that cultivating his four elements one by one each time may take longer because he remembered Magus Minerva had said to not cultivate them at the same time else his body would explode, still, was slow progress to the eyes of a mythical being be enough of a reason to receive some booing?
He rose to his feet and approached the black dragon, fearlessly. Even though the dragon had spent the majority of its time sleeping or gazing at the outside world, sharing the same room would somewhat make some sort of connection between the two. And since this black dragon seemed to not like mincing words, Emery felt more comfortable talking back in the same manner, "Can you stop being annoying? I'm doing my best here and you're breaking my concentration."
"Grahaha! Your face, your face! You look so proud when you should be ashamed!" roared the black dragon. "Again, you are in a room filled of Khaos energy, but what have you achieved so far? A shameful rank four acolyte. I feel like if In this rate i will need at least a 5 year nap till you reached magus rank."
Emery clenched his fist. "Damn, you never say something nice, do you?"
"Show me something worthy then. I say what I see. And if that was what you call your best, then you're as bad as an ogre shit, kid!" bellowed the black dragon.
Emery gritted his teeth. He wanted to give this damned dragon a good solid punch, however, this was just the way this being spoke. Still, he hated that when he had something to say, the more this dragon looked down on him. Blood was starting to pound in his ear when he said, "My spirit aptitude is B, and I have four affinities as an acolyte. I'm not as talented as the others and I can only work hard."
"Boohoo. If that's your excuse, then you might as well give up now, boy. Hard work and talent can only get you so far, you need something else more than those," said the dragon.
"Then care to enlighten me, 'Oh dear, great and powerful, Killgragah, the Guardian of Khaos?' "
Killgrahah opened its massive jaws, as if it was about to say or eat him. However, not one word came out as it lied back down, ignoring Emery.
"Tch, you're a dishonest dragon, that's what you are!" Emery burst out. The black dragon opened its eyes as it stared at Emery. "That's right, you're no mighty, great or powerful. You're a fraud! You said you'd guide me but what have you done so far, huh? Well, let me tell you then what I see; a big-ass, lazy, phony, black dragon, all talk no do! The thing you only do is say nasty, unhelpful things!"
Emery finished his outburst with a great of his chest. He looked up to Killgragah who had just risen from its position and opened its wings. The black dragon started flapping its expansive wings and Emery was starting to get blown away when a blob of energy covered him and threw him in the air right hovering before Killgragah, the great dragon.
They went higher and higher until they were close to the black swirl at the ceiling; Emery could no longer see the ground. The dense energy of Khaos started to feel like little blades poking him at all parts of his body. Emery became nervous at the thought of this black dragon might drop him, but he stomped on the ground to regain some courage before staring straight to Killgragah with raging eyes.
The black dragon and the puny human gazed into each other's eyes for a good few seconds before the dragon said with its deep voice, "I wonder… Are you really brave or plain stupid. Still, I did promise I'll guide you, and I, Killgragah, does not break promises."
After the dragon said its thoughts, a wave of energy exited the dragon and entered Emery's body. Emery floated higher as he felt his mind was being overloaded with energy, but when the transference stopped, he opened his eyes only to find he was back in the illusionary space where the Faceless man had always appeared and mocked him.
A voice called out to him, and indeed the Faceless Man was there. It said, "This is my form when I'm taking a peek into your being. Your hopes and your pain are able to manifest itself through me and I have seen all of them. I applaud your courage, but I despise your naivety. Nevertheless, I, Killgragah, am bound to find the new master of Khaos, let us see if you are worthy."
Emery once more floated upwards in the dark room of his mind along with the Killgragah in the form of the Faceless Man. Soon enough, they reached a small sphere which housed four separate lights. There were two dominant lights, the green and yellow; a slightly smaller blue light and another one that was so minuscule that it looked like a dot compared to the others, that was his dark element.
"The sphere is what we call a Spirit Core," said Killgragah. "Look at how tiny and insignificant it is. The four elements that reside in your core are like separate entities and are trying to cancel out one another. You see, whenever you cultivate an element, the energy that passes through your core is fed to only one of them; that element takes up a huge part of your spirit core, making it harder for the other elements to grow and interact with each other in a healthy manner; therefore, your progress is greatly suppressed.
"This distasteful way of humans cultivating the elements is utterly foolish. Us, dragons, have long mastered the elements even before you humans began to understand the meaning of civilization. Funnily enough though, you puny humans think you are the rightful masters of the galaxy.
"Do you understand now, kid? The reason you're having trouble advancing darkness is because you have your hands full keeping the three elements from killing each other! Give all you have to darkness. The darkness element rules over space, so make it your core, the overlord of the three elements. Expand your core, dominate them and only then you'll become a magus worthy of the Lord of Shadow!"
The illusion shattered into thousands pieces and Emery opened his eyes. He was back near the swirling ceiling where the dragon had taken him as it kept flapping its dark wings.
Emery recalled the first time he had heard about the elements from Magus Minerva. She had mentioned that magi who had multiple affinities must be careful in cultivating two elements at the same time, since that would bring an unfortunate result.
"I know what you are thinking, kid! You want to ask why then merging or cultivating two elements at the same time are prohibited right?"
He nodded.
"That's easy. It's because humans are not brave enough, the practice does involve a lot of risk. Many ancient humans have tried it only to fail again and again. Over time, the wrong cultivation became the standard and this ancient method soon faded into obscurity in the annals of history."
"Then, if I were to fail—"
"And that's why I think you are stupid!" interjected the dragon. "You're thinking of failure already when you haven't started yet and are mostly relying on good fortune to come your way!"
"Okay, how not to fail then? What is it that I should do?"
The dragon snorted and said, "For starters, this technique can only be done during the early stages of elemental cultivation, and those who attempted it were magi or supreme magi already. Their cores had already solidified, so it was too late for them.
"Second, you need to prepare yourself, humans have a weak psyche. If you can't handle the pain of being ripped apart, you'll lose everything.
"And of course, a place with high spirit density will increase your chances. Currently, you have plenty of that in here."
Emery was silent as he thought about it. But it looked like the dragon wasn't finished yet.
"Look, you want to get stronger as fast as possible, right? Once you have achieved success, the energy of Khaos in this spatial space will benefit all of your elements at the same time. You will no longer have to endure the stares of those in the academy as if you are some sort of trash. Yes, I have seen your fears. If that doesn't motivate you though, revenge will be within your grasp against that woman and those who have killed your father. So, let the power of darkness become your primary source of power."
Emery became pensive as he considered everything the dragon had said. Ever since he had been practicing the elements, it was indeed becoming harder and harder to understand the elements each one of them, even more so with the darkness, which had been deemed as one of the rarities even within the whole academy.
He then had thought about any hidden motifs this dragon may have; only one explanation came into his mind, this dragon probably had plans in using him in the future, however, Emery would use his knowledge too. A mutual benefit per say. Two were able to play this game and he would not be on the losing end if that were to pass.
"Well, I have told you the way. It's your choice to do it or not," said the black dragon as they landed back on the ground.
Emery only had one word to say. "Okay."