A soft private-room bed. A highly nutritious diet provided without anything lacking.
Clean, neat, beautiful nurses.
I liked everything the spotless private room provided.
“Aegis.”
The offer of being selected as an Aegis candidate. Recommended admission.
It was certainly a tempting offer.
It was a once-in-a-lifetime chance to take the elite course with the Hunter Association’s full support.
But that was exactly why I had to be cautious.
Because there was no such thing as free in this world.
The Association currently believed I was an elemental-type Awakened of at least A-rank.
Strictly speaking, it was closer to say I had let them keep believing that.
If they conducted a precise mana measurement during the Aegis selection process, the fact that I had F-rank mana would be exposed in no time.
Then, in the end, I would only be an F-rank elemental-type Awakened.
If that happened, the Association would probably judge that I was no longer worth further investment.
For now, I was receiving this treatment thanks to the testimony from Seoul Station, but it couldn’t last forever.
In that case, well.
“There’s only one way.”
Whether it was an internal energy cultivation method or a mana cultivation technique, I had to learn one.
Since I hadn’t been born with it, that was the only way for an F-rank like me to increase my mana.
The problem was where to get one.
Internal energy cultivation methods and mana cultivation techniques weren’t things you could commonly obtain.
“They’re secret arts to begin with.”
Famous guilds, prestigious families, and famous sects in China.
Or magic towers.
Most of them monopolized such things.
They treated them as confidential and didn’t let them leak.
What an ordinary Citizen A like me, with no background or affiliation, could obtain was nothing but cheap third-rate breathing techniques you could buy with money.
But I had this.
Ding—
As I thought of the gallery, a notification sound naturally rang out.
Then a translucent blue window appeared in midair.
[Heroine Gallery]
I had only just realized it, but the name of this gallery was the Heroine Gallery.
In other words, a gallery where the heroines of the first-round world had gathered.
This gallery contained all sorts of people, including someone who had once been the strongest in that world.
Staring at the search bar on the board, I thought of keywords.
[Mana Cultivation Technique] [Basic Mind Art]
Countless posts came up in the search, but most of them were merely posts lamenting the destruction of the first-round world, boasting to each other about past heroic deeds, or chatting.
Actually finding useful information was difficult.
When I found a post that looked plausible and clicked on it, every single one required some kind of elixir to accompany it.
Elixir, my ass.
I was getting irritated and was about to close the window when an idea suddenly occurred to me.
Should I make a post asking them to tell me?
Title: Tell me a mana cultivation technique I can use right now
Author: Baek Ubin
[ I need to increase my total mana, so tell me some cultivation technique or mind art or whatever, please ]
As soon as I posted it, comments started coming in.
└ Where’d the Gallery Master’s conscience go? lol
└ Start with basic dantian breathing. Why are you looking for shortcuts, tsk tsk
Well, of course.
As expected, there were no replies that looked like an immediate solution.
I was about to press back and close the gallery.
That was when I saw a new post go up, and I clicked on it as if possessed.
Title: Gallery Master, try using this
Author: Archmage
[ I have a secret manual I got from an elemental-type Awakened at the LA Gate who went mad with gambling and was drowning in loan-shark debt.
Elemental Cultivation Technique, Regia.
I’ll write the detailed theory and method below, so learn it on your own.
If you get stuck, post a question. ]
Regia. An elemental cultivation technique.
Thinking it was perfect, I immediately began reading through the post.
But the more I read, the more my head throbbed.
An ordinary hunter had mana dwelling in their body in proportion to the rank they were born with.
That was why those born with talent displayed powerful strength even without deliberately learning a cultivation technique or mind art.
It was commonly said that those who learned martial arts gathered mana in their dantian.
And I had heard they used something called qi and blood pathways.
Dantian, mind arts, mana circles, mana cultivation techniques.
But the core of the Regia cultivation technique that Archmage had taught began by destroying those things.
[ First, break and empty your dantian or mana circle.
Second, move the center of your mana to your heart.
Third, discard your qi-blood pathways or mana circuits.
Turn your heart into a mana core, and circulate the mana that begins from that heart through your actual blood vessels, along with your bloodstream, throughout your entire body. ]
“…Is he saying this while sane?”
A hollow laugh escaped me without my realizing it.
Break the dantian, break the mana circle, and turn the heart into a mana core?
On top of that, circulate mana not through qi-blood pathways or mana circuits, but through actual blood vessels.
This cultivation technique was literally telling me to forcibly circulate mana using the physical passageway known as blood vessels.
Blood vessels were endlessly fragile.
If I shoved mana into those blood vessels, it was obvious they wouldn’t hold and would burst and tear, causing internal bleeding.
I’d die from excessive blood loss.
As if voicing my concerns, the comments were also boiling over.
└ Are you trying to kill the Gallery Master? Isn’t that something only S-rank elemental Awakened did?
└ But it doesn’t matter anyway! As if he could actually do it just because he read that! Even his ancestral spirits couldn’t help him!
└ If you don’t want to teach him, just say so lol. Why tell a newbie something like that?
I was certain. This was absolutely not a cultivation technique I could use.
Even so, remembering that it was a cultivation technique used by an elemental-type Awakened, I licked my lips in regret.
I lowered my head for a moment and looked down at my two hands.
Blue sparks leapt from my fingertips and scattered into the air.
‘…Should I try it?’
Now that I thought about it, why did I keep thinking of myself as an ordinary human?
An ordinary human. Yes, if it were the body of an ordinary human, mixing mana into the bloodstream would be a perfect way to die.
But now, I had obtained the ability of an elemental type.
Was I ordinary?
“Well, I don’t think so.”
I quietly sat cross-legged on the bed.
If my blood vessels seemed like they couldn’t hold and were about to burst, couldn’t I just transform into lightning?
Well, I’d try it first, and if it didn’t work, I’d think about it then.
I closed my eyes and focused on the flow of mana.
Since I had nothing to begin with, I had neither a dantian nor a mana circle.
‘Then I’ll skip the first step.’
I immediately drew the center of my consciousness up to the middle of my chest, to my heart.
[ Second, move the center of your mana to your heart. ]
Thump, thump.
The sound of my heartbeat rang in my ears.
I forcibly pulled the scattered mana flowing through my body toward my heart.
As expected, an intense pain began to spread.
For some reason, it became hard to breathe, and it felt as if strength was draining from my entire body.
But I didn’t stop. I pulled harder, as if grabbing it by the collar, and shoved it into my heart.
[ Third, discard your qi-blood pathways or mana circuits. Turn your heart into a mana core, and circulate the mana that begins from that heart through your actual blood vessels, along with your bloodstream, throughout your entire body. ]
Wait, it said to send the mana that began from the heart into the bloodstream.
How was I supposed to do that?
Right now, I was gathering all my mana and shoving it into my heart.
But how was I supposed to make my heart the starting point and make it flow through my blood vessels?
Thump, thump.
The sound of my heartbeat came again.
As if it were telling me the method.
The heart. For the heart to function… pumping. Right.
Since I was already pushing mana into my heart, the condition of it being the starting point should have been met.
Then, if I released the mana I had been pushing in for an instant—
The moment I thought that, I stopped the consciousness I had been drawing up toward my heart.
Then, naturally, the mana began spreading through my blood vessels.
“Kuhak…!”
It felt as if my blood vessels were going to burst.
Even as I felt the pain, I didn’t stop, pushing the mana into my heart once more.
And then I stopped again.
Following my consciousness, my heart continued to pump.
Through that beat, the compressed mana flowed out through my arteries.
And through my veins, mana headed back toward my heart.
“Uuuugh… kyaak…!”
It felt as if every blood vessel in my body was being torn apart.
The pain was so severe that I foamed at the mouth and groaned.
Just a little, just a little more…!
As I repeated it again and again, I began to feel the flow of mana circulating throughout my entire body.
The moment I thought I couldn’t take any more and used Lightning Transformation—
Ziiiiing— Pazzzzt!
Thump, thump.
Along with the sound of crackling electricity, the rough sound of my heartbeat struck my ears.
The pain subsided, and lightning and mana stretched throughout my entire body along my blood vessels.
An alien pleasure, as mana filled every part of me from the top of my head to the tips of my toes.
Shaaaaaaa—
Feeling a cool sensation, I opened my eyes.
“…Crazy.”
I unconsciously sucked in a breath.
When I looked down at my body, blue mana was flowing over the surface of my skin, giving off gentle sparks.
Ziiiiing— Ziiiiing—
The incandescent lights illuminating the hospital room flickered in time with my heartbeat.
Now, even without my conscious effort, mana was naturally flowing along my blood vessels.
“Ha, haha.”
A disbelieving laugh escaped me.
Everyone in the gallery had unanimously said it was absolutely impossible, but now that I had actually done it, it felt almost anticlimactic.
“Was this supposed to be that hard?”
Even though there was no one listening, I put on a show of bravado.
Even my ancestral spirits couldn’t do it? It was absolutely impossible?
After confirming that the flow of mana had completely stabilized, I opened the gallery window in midair.
Then I began writing a new post.
Because I was curious what kind of reaction they would have.
Title: About the Regia cultivation technique Archmage posted
Author: Baek Ubin
[ I just roughly followed it and it worked? Why wouldn’t this work? lol ]
As soon as I wrote it, comments came in at a frightening speed.
└ ???
└ ??? Ubin, what did you just write?
└ You bastard! How dare you jest about words that could send you into qi deviation!
└ Come on, don’t lie lol. Didn’t they say even your ancestral spirits couldn’t do that?
Suspicion, then surprise and shock.
They soon realized that I had succeeded and couldn’t hide their astonishment.
└ Wait, hey, you lunatic, what the hell did you just do in that hospital room???
└ Why are your mana waves circulating through your blood vessels!!
└ That makes no sense!
└ …This is an absurd talent. Did you truly make your heart into a core with a human body?!
└ No, you crazy bastard, why does it work for you? lolololol
└ Are you seriously a genius? Damn
Watching their reactions, watching those question marks, I clenched both hands tightly.
I could feel lightning mana, so explosive it felt ready to burst, filling my grasp.
“…Ah, this is easy.”
Looking out at the winter rain pouring beyond the window, I stretched out long on the bed.
And smiled pleasantly.