092 The Teacher Who Protects His Own (3000)

"Is the gap between people really this vast..."

Floating Ice thought of how it had taken him a full thirty days to barely master the Bramble Flower Rune, while Tang had done it in one tenth of that time. The gulf between them was no exaggeration. And to think he had just spent so long consoling Tang in a stream of needless chatter.

In the end, the clown had been himself. Tang had never needed consolation at all; the man had simply gritted his teeth for three days and cleared the whole thing in one go.

The reason he looked so exhausted was not because he had failed to make any progress and worn himself thin with worry, as Floating Ice had imagined, but because he had been far too focused for those three days.

"Senior brother? Senior brother?"

This time it was Xiu Nan who waved a hand before Floating Ice's face.

"Wait... just wait... let me catch my breath first..."

Floating Ice found a place to sit and settled down, using the tea set beside him to brew himself a cup of piping-hot tea.

"You sit too," he said to Xiu Nan.

Xiu Nan came over and sat down as well, casually making himself a cup of black tea. Wisps of steam rose in delicate threads.

Floating Ice sipped his tea in small mouthfuls, his large sapphire-blue eyes fixed on Xiu Nan's every movement, as though trying to read something from his expression.

"Senior brother, why are you staring at me like that?"

Being watched like this for so long made Xiu Nan feel awkward.

"Are you some kind of monster?" Floating Ice blurted out.

"Huh?" Xiu Nan set down his teacup.

"Ah..." Floating Ice drew out a long sigh. "It seems Master has been lucky enough to take in a peerless genius this time. I'm going to have a little junior brother who is a freak of nature too..."

"That's a bit much..."

To be honest, Xiu Nan felt a little guilty. His talent, from beginning to end, had only ever been at the level of an ordinary person. It was merely that his disciplined life had granted him thirty times his usual learning ability, allowing him to temporarily display an unprecedented and terrifying rate of comprehension.

So when faced with Floating Ice's praise, he felt somewhat flustered and uneasy. But on second thought, that disciplined life had also been a reward from completing his main quest.

It ought naturally to count as part of his strength.

It could be considered his ability and his talent, only one that existed intermittently and for limited stretches of time.

"What do you mean, that's a bit much? Don't belittle yourself. If Master found out you had learned the Bramble Flower Rune in just three days, his reaction would definitely be even more exaggerated than mine! Believe me, by the next day he'd be bragging to the other Saints like a rooster that had sprouted gorgeous new feathers, boasting that he had taken on a gifted new disciple..."

Floating Ice seemed to know Omega very well. The middle-aged man, stern-looking on the surface, was in truth quite childlike at heart. And over the past few years, with one disciple after another under Omega's tutelage dying by suicide, he had grown all the more protective of every surviving student.

Without exaggeration, Omega was the most protective of his own among the Ten Saints, and the one most willing to lavish good things on his disciples. Years ago, when one Saint's disciple had made a slight pass at the Third Sister, Green Vine, Omega had marched straight into that Saint's territory and fought him.

Since then, no one reckless enough had dared to trouble Omega's disciples. Would you want the Tenth Saint beneath the White Saint to come charging at you to start a fight?

Xiu Nan gave a sheepish laugh and said nothing.

Floating Ice continued, "You must already have felt it after learning the Bramble Flower Rune: when you use it, your mental acuity rises by a tremendous margin, and your learning ability is boosted just as strongly.

"But all of that amplification is built on your original learning ability. Do you see it now? As the Bramble Flower Rune advances to higher and higher levels, those with extraordinary talent will pull further and further away from everyone else. Because the improvement it grants is based on your existing foundation—the better the foundation, the greater the benefit. Once you reach the pinnacle, the sixth bramble flower, your learning ability will enter an entirely new and utterly terrifying realm..."

"True enough," Xiu Nan said with a nod. He clearly understood the nature of the Bramble Flower Rune as well.

But then he noticed something in Floating Ice's words: the pinnacle of the Bramble Flower Rune was six flowers? He distinctly remembered it should have been nine.

He began probing indirectly, and soon realized that the Bramble Flower Rune practiced by Floating Ice and the others only reached six flowers at its highest. As for his own, it had originally seemed to stop at only four, yet for some reason it had later been completed back to nine.

Could it be that nine was the true limit of the Bramble Flower Rune? Had Omega concealed the later stages of cultivation, first teaching his disciples the earlier parts before leading them forward step by step?

Was this a way of binding them, a means of consolidating loyalty by controlling the later progression path of the core auxiliary rune?

With the limited information he had, Xiu Nan could only infer so much.

The two of them drank black tea and chatted idly. Half an hour later, Floating Ice invited Xiu Nan up to the third floor.

He wanted to show him some of his experimental results.

The moment they arrived on the third floor, Xiu Nan was stunned.

Everywhere he looked were models of mutated runes.

These lifelike extraordinary models were housed inside a tall, rectangular glass casing that stretched vertically downward, with a dark-gold matte metal platform beneath them. Pale blue gas drifted slowly out through small openings.

It was the moon-blue gas Xiu Nan had seen before. This inert gas was remarkably effective at stabilizing mutated runes.

"Tang, come take a look at my work."

Floating Ice waved him over, a bright smile on his face.

Xiu Nan walked over, and his attention was immediately drawn to the mutated rune beside him. It was a miniature monkey model, its arms grotesquely enlarged, as though a body had been grafted atop two thick, powerful limbs.

On its back was also a pair of fierce wings.

Below it was a brass label recording the information.

Flying Mighty Ape, Second Ring. Composed of a Second Ring Mighty Ape and a First Ring Flying Fish. The Mighty Ape possessed immense strength but was exceptionally clumsy in movement, with combat power at the very bottom of the Second Ring. The Flying Fish had a pair of exceedingly swift wings but was extremely weak in attack, with combat power at the very bottom of the First Ring. Combined through the resonance platform, they form a mutated rune that possesses both tremendous destructive power and extraordinary speed. Its combat strength ranks among the top of the Second Ring, and the rune structure is relatively stable...

Xiu Nan turned to look elsewhere.

Burning Fire Crow, Second Ring. Composed of a First Ring Fire Crow and a First Ring Butter Beast. The Fire Crow is an ordinary ring beast, with overall combat power in the middle-lower range. Its main defensive method is a body covered in high-temperature flames, and its primary attack is a thumb-thick jet of fire. The Butter Beast moves slowly, and within its body grow oil sacs capable of producing a special extraordinary grease. This yellow grease can pollute and trap animals, leaving them at the Butter Beast's mercy.

After the two are combined through the resonance platform, the Fire Crow acquires the Butter Beast's oil sacs. Its fire ability is greatly enhanced, gaining an explosive combustion effect, with both burn range and temperature ceiling multiplied several times over. What was once a defensive method has become a field of flame, with a range of fifteen meters. What was once a thumb-thick jet of fire has become a pillar of flame, one meter in diameter and reaching as far as fifty meters...

Beyond these were many more: First Ring mutations, Second Ring mutations, and even Third Ring mutations. This meant Floating Ice was at least a Third Ring Mystic Ring Master and Rune Master.

"After looking all this over, what do you think?"

Floating Ice suddenly asked.

"Compensating for weaknesses with strengths? Reasonable combinations?" Xiu Nan said, somewhat uncertainly.

"Exactly. The core of studying mutated runes is to offset shortcomings with strengths. Perhaps the main ring beast has very obvious advantages and weaknesses, so we preserve its strengths and use the strengths of other ring beasts to make up for its flaws. That achieves the effect of mutation and optimization..."

"And another point is sensible pairing. Perhaps two different ring beasts each possess some ordinary trait. But once we combine those two ordinary traits, a chemical reaction occurs. Take the Burning Fire Crow, for instance..."

Floating Ice snapped his fingers. Since Xiu Nan had already learned the Bramble Flower Rune, he intended to reveal some deeper matters to him in advance.

Floating Ice studied mutated runes, so naturally he hoped Xiu Nan would become interested in them too. That way, he would have someone like-minded.

After that, Xiu Nan learned many things.

Including the mainstream research categories of rune masters. Floating Ice, for example, studied mutated runes. There were also evolutionary runes, which focused on streamlining structure, and the recently emerging combination runes. Each field was profound and immensely intricate.

He also learned the basic skill grades of rune masters, a comprehensive and integrative set of standards encompassing the entire rune formation process and serving as an all-around evaluation.

The tiers were: standard, refined, resonant, crystal, and sage. This same grading system also applied to extraordinary-item auxiliary runes and lifestyle runes.

These sorts of runes were difficult to evaluate by ring level in terms of impact and value, which was why a separate grading system was used.

"Senior brother, why don't you teach me some things a beginner should do... just to warm up for now, I suppose..."

Seeing that the time was ripe, Xiu Nan finally laid his cards on the table and stated the purpose he wanted to achieve.

There was no point speaking in circles. What he coveted was Floating Ice's mutated rune research. The evolution ability hidden within the Saint Bone Mystic Ring urgently needed a whole series of workable mutation paths.

"You want me to teach you first? That's fine. After all, in the first five years, rune masters mostly study foundational things. I know these basics no less than the professors at Flower Sea, so teaching you should be more than enough..."

Floating Ice nodded and agreed.

Xiu Nan kept his face calm on the outside, though inwardly he was delighted.

"All right then. I happen to be conducting an experiment in extraordinary-species mutation. Go to the storage cabinet on the second floor and get yourself a research coat. In half an hour, we'll begin. I'll do the hands-on work, and you watch from the side. I'll explain each step to you as we go..."

For the next day and a half, Xiu Nan stayed entirely in Laboratory B-2. He did nothing but watch Floating Ice perform experiment after experiment after experiment.

It was the fastest way to bring a novice up to speed: send him straight to the battlefield.

Mistakes or unfamiliarity did not matter. What mattered was failure made in ignorance. Once you failed, you would remember the tool you had used, and the point at which things went wrong. That would leave a far deeper impression than preparing thoroughly before ever setting foot on the battlefield.

Time flew by. By now, Xiu Nan had spent five days in the core district of the Milodaren School. It was evening.

A figure in a cloak stood at the doorway of the study.

Xiu Nan was waiting for Omega's first assessment.

He was one hundred percent confident...