Chapter 36: Practice Makes Perfect

Dana and Hawk spent the rest of the evening practising their skill control together, while Karl focused on finding more about the growth cycles and power increase triggers of various magical beast species.

There were so many, but Karl was certain that if he worked on it, he could find some sort of pattern to the triggers. It should be either something to do with their skills, their body's alignment to an element or some sort of environmental factor. He didn't believe that it was completely random and that it was all up to luck, with study, they should be able to trigger the advancements deliberately.

The meditation and movement of energy to Hawk was certainly going to help, though he couldn't tell how much. But every meal since the advancement had given him a surge of energy, as he was absorbing the nutrients and embedded mana much more efficiently than a regular human would.

That should be something normal for the Elites, as the kitchens did deliberately prepare that sort of meal for every student, so the real difference should be that he could share the excess with Hawk, instead of wasting it.

Once it started to get dark, Dana finished making notes on what she had learned, and then returned to her room for the night, while Karl prepared to eat one more late night meal and meditate on transferring that extra energy to Hawk to help him grow.

The only problem was that they would have to wait until there was a noticeable change to find out if these methods were working, and even then, they wouldn't necessarily know for certain which of the methods were the ones that had the largest impact.

There was no exact measuring method, which was why they had just loosely grouped monsters into categories based on their power rankings, but that also meant that near the boundaries of those rankings there could be some uncertainty, unless the body or power went through a notable change.

For example, when a Devil Cat went through the process of moving from awakened to Ascended, it grew a second tail. That was a pretty simple and surefire way to tell. Many birds would gain a distinctive pattern on their feathers as they grew more powerful, and most mammals would increase in size in a sudden growth spurt.

Windspeed Hawks didn't go through most of that, they kept their appearance, except for the claws. Once a Windspeed Hawk reached the Ascended level, their claws would turn from a dull black, to a translucent obsidian, and that claw material was an exceptional resource for elites learning similar skills. It could be ground up and mixed with monster blood in the same way as the strength stones, and drinking it would increase skill understanding.

[Haha, yeah, make them eat my claw clippings. They grow back quickly.] Hawk giggled in Karl's mind, equating the broken claw parts to human toenail clippings. Just a shed waste product that it no longer cared about.

[Well, if we can help you grow to that level, we can help the others out then. We will show them how far ahead you are, just by being yourself.] Karl joked, stroking the bird's ego for a moment before he began to meditate.

In the morning, they both felt refreshed and a bit better than they had the day before, so that became their routine. Mornings with the mages, afternoons of martial arts training, and then evenings of book studies, while Karl worked on learning all that he could about magical beasts and the triggers that could cause them to advance, while Hawk worked with Dana on their mana control.

His rate of growth was incredible, and while he had an advantage to begin with, thanks to his species, Hawk was rapidly outgrowing anything that could have been expected of a juvenile Windspeed Hawk.

Normally, they wouldn't need to use the [Rend] attack more than a handful of times in a day, as it was primarily for hunting, and occasionally for self-defence. But by the end of the week, he could keep it up for hours at a time.

Dana was also progressing at a crazy pace with his help, and she now had full control over her magic missiles. It was quite impressive to see her hold them in place, or move them around the room with her mind. The process still drained her much faster than she would prefer, but it was a vast improvement on the first day that she started working with Hawk, when she didn't understand at all how she was supposed to control the mana flows.

So, it was with greatly improved confidence that they headed for the meeting spot for the next practical skills meeting.

The same group of fifty-four students were gathered in the field, waiting for the teachers to arrive, and Karl took his spot next to the other team leaders.

Sergeant Rita arrived a few minutes later with the two mages, driving one of the Academy's cargo buggies filled with gear.

"We have something new and fun for everyone today. These are the new experimental products from the weapons development department at the Golden Dragon National Research University. What you all are going to do today is go on a little field trip. The danger will be a bit higher than usual, as you will be leaving the Academy Grounds entirely, and not just going to the outskirts, but the University has asked us to test whether these new weapons with their fancy technology can actually improve the user's strength by a whole rank." Sergeant Rita announced.

The mages were more than a little skeptical, as their powers were based on mana flow and control, which were both internal factors, they didn't use weapons in the same way that the warriors did. If it was just for the warrior classes, it would be a great safety measure for Elites in general, but not specifically for them.

However, when they took the tarp off the cart, there was a box with everyone's name on it. The University really had come up with something for everyone, and the students began to become excited to see what it could do.