"Leave the Ruins? Has your breakthrough gone to your head?" Riyald asked with a hint of worry. William was starting to remind him more and more of his old Disciple, who after achieving a bit of success went out to make a name for himself and was killed in the process.
"It's not what you think, Master. I'm only going out for some ingredients, and I will come right back." William replied quickly. He didn't mention the Thieves' Guild.
Riyald calmed down a bit when he heard William's reasoning, although he was still concerned. A good Disciple couldn't be easily replaced, and William's various Magic Affinities turned him into a great asset for his experiments.
Riyald wasn't going to give that up easily, but he knew that keeping the boy locked up in the residence would do more harm than good, especially if William was determined to leave.
"I will allow you to go out on one condition, Disciple William." Riyald answered after a long time.
"What is it, Master?" William asked.
"Before you leave, you must reach the peak of your current Realm. Only then will I allow you to leave."
William nodded. He planned to do this anyway. Check latest chapters at NoveI-Fire.ɴet
Riyald had William help out with various tasks for the next three days, unsure of how long it would take the monster to finish his Cultivation. For all Riyald knew, William could be gone in a month!
"What about the next batch of challengers, Master?" William asked. He remembered that Riyald wanted William to help increase the number of deaths during the trials in exchange for the Soul Cultivation Technique.
Riyald waved his hand in dismissal, "We don't need to rush this. Besides, someone might become suspicious if too many die. Who would send their Disciples into a dangerous Ruin knowing they would come out empty-handed?"
William understood. He bade Riyald farewell and returned to his room.
Before he started Cultivating, William spent 3750 Potential Points and upgraded his Death Element to S-Rank.
He spent a few hours adding the Death Elemental Sphere to the Artifact Belt, then spent the remainder of the day Cultivating on his bed. He had almost enough Potential Points to upgrade another Element to S-Rank, but William decided to save them since he would be going out soon.
William spent the following day working on a set of clothing. It was surprisingly difficult, but he managed to replicate cotton using the Plant Element, which he dyed a dark grey and formed into a cloak.
Even with D-Rank Tailoring, this process wasn't very difficult. Unless William wanted to make an incredibly stylish set of clothing out of fine threads, there was no need to raise his Tailoring Talent too far.
Using five pieces of Starmetal Ore and another day of work, William formed thousands of small plates with tiny holes that would improve both the defensive capabilities of the cloak, but also allowed him to add many more Arrays than would normally be feasible.
He added dozens of Arrays to the Starmetal plates, then stitched them in between layers of cotton for both comfort and concealment. Once he was finished, he added Intermediate Arrays to the cotton that would prevent normal wear-and-tear.
From an outside perspective, William's cloak would appear expensive but not priceless. Even so, one with a good eye for Arrays might be able to tell that the cloak was unique.
The hood was seemingly just for show, but William had added a few backup Arrays inside for redundancy in case part of the cloak was destroyed.
On the outside of the hood, he used Complete Arrays for various forms of long-range detection. He added Malign Activity Arrays that would detect traps and other Forbidden Arrays, Life Element Arrays that replicated his Life Sense Spell so he wouldn't have to actively use it, and an Illusion Element Array that would obscure his face to others.
Even if he was a bit older than before, William didn't think it would be very hard for a Cultivator to recognize him.
He took the Illusion idea from Su Yanyu, the waitress at the Wild Clover restaurant in the Five Elements Sect. William remembered how before he upgraded his Mind Talent, it was impossible for him to remember what she looked like.
He spent a long time working on many Arrays that would adjust his aura to look less eye-catching to others. The Stealth Talent was amazing at concealing his Mana Signature, Cultivation, and even his Soul Strength, but William felt that showing nothing would make him look too obvious.
William used the Arrays to mimic the Cultivation of someone at the peak of the Golden Core Realm, which he felt was a decent middle-ground from extremely weak to overly powerful.
At least this way, people would think twice before picking a fight with him. A mere five Potential Points wasn't worth the aggression of an entire group of City Guards.
Thinking about his old self in Blue Moon City made William smack his head in shame. At the time, five Points was considerable. Now, however, it was nothing.
William evaluated his work on the cloak. The Arrays all worked as intended, but the Mana Consumption to keep them active was insane. There was still work to be done.
Unlike the Arrays William usually made during fights or when resting for the night in unsafe environments, he actually had to worry about the Mana consumption. Once all the Mana used to create the Arrays on the cloak were expended, he would need to recharge the cloak with his own Mana.
Mana Gathering Arrays wouldn't work well here. While it would be an immediate and easy solution to his problem, it would both interrupt William's Cultivation and also attract too much attention.
The Stealth Talent can't affect William's equipment, and even Concealment Arrays wouldn't help much. The Concealment Arrays would turn the item invisible, but one could still sense the flow of Mana.
One would have to be an idiot not to notice a vortex of Mana approaching William's position 24/7.
The Artifact Belt that William created based on the Elemental Dials used Mana taken from the second layer of space and stored it for later use. Since the Arrays on the Artifact weren't active all the time, there would be no Mana Signature unless the Artifact was actively being used.
The same process wouldn't work for the cloak, since it needed to be active at all times. William scoured his brain for a long time, but he had no idea how to approach the problem.
I need some time to figure this out. For now, let's finish up the Arrays and worry about the Mana later.