William saw the Ice Spike forming in the old man's hand, but wasn't afraid. He had tested the effects of his barrier before during the Array Master test, and it should be able to defend against a Golden Core Realm Cultivator. This old man probably couldn't deal with the barrier in a short time.
As expected, the Ice Spike crashed against the Barrier Array, causing light cracks but no major damage. The old man was slightly stunned as he didn't expect the Array from a non-Cultivator to withstand his attack.
William took this chance to create another Barrier Array, stacking the effects. A third Array was formed, baffling the two old men who began attacking the Arrays together.
William had spent too much time fighting and was low on Mana, so he drank a Mana Regeneration potion. He created a Fog Array and a Concealment Array where the barriers were present to raise his chances of escape. The fog couldn't travel outside the barriers, so from the old men's perspective William just turned into a heavy cloud of smoke.
Flip shouted to warn the old men, "Captains, that's the fog from before. If you break the barrier now he might escape!"
The old man that attacked the barrier first waved his hand, "Nonsense. Mere fog cannot disrupt our senses." he returned to targeting the barrier with his Ice Spikes, joined by the second Captain who was using a sword to slice through the barrier.
The second barrier was broken. William was still inside the Array, but he had a plan. Atticus, can you hide us both with Illusion Magic?
The snake responded by releasing Illusion Mana and covering them both. William didn't feel any different, but he seemed to be hidden from the world itself, as if he was actually in another dimension. He looked to his shoulder where Atticus was fully visible, probably since they were both affected by the same spell.
The third barrier was broken and fog spilled out from all sides like a tidal wave. William and Atticus moved with the flow of fog, sneaking away at a slow pace to avoid disrupting the spell.
The old men quickly attacked the center of the Barrier Array once the third barrier was broken to disable the Fog Array.
Their attack was successful. The nearby fog receded into the Array before disappearing completely. All that remained in the area were the stunned looks of the guards as they discovered that William was nowhere in sight.
"He escaped!" the old men regretted not listening to Flip earlier. They could have locked down the area with an Array of their own, securing William's capture. Now they would have no one to blame. They looked around the site for William, but had no luck.
William didn't know where else to go, so he traveled to the Array Hall and entered his private room. He added a few more layers of defense just in case someone wanted to break in, then asked Atticus to disable the Illusion Spell.
He heaved a sigh of relief. What a long day.
The morning was spent in the Guild, lunchtime was spent in the Array Hall, and most of the afternoon was spent fighting. William hadn't even eaten yet and was both physically and mentally exhausted.
Thankfully he still had supplies from the Space Ring, which included food, water, and a sleeping bag. William decided it would be safest to stay the night in the Array Hall and wait until morning to proceed further. William set up an Alarm Array that would wake him up if the enemy breached half the defenses, then went directly to bed.
A young-looking man was seated at a throne reading a note. To his side was a golden magic scepter, made with the finest craftsmanship.
He raised his head to look at a middle-aged man that had just entered the room, "What is it?"
The man bowed respectfully, then spoke quickly. "Sir, the token we gave to that wandering Space Mage a few years ago has been destroyed."
"That ungrateful old man, how dare he do this to us? We had a deal!" the young man said angrily. "Gather some people, we will hunt him down."
"Sir, based on the information sent back by the token, it was destroyed by a young man wielding Fire Magic. I believe our Space Mage was killed and the Space Ring is now in this young man's hands. The information says he was in Blue Moon City."
The other party at the throne understood what his subordinate was getting at. "This works as well, gather some people, we are going to reclaim our Space Ring and teach this young man a lesson about defying our family."
"Understood." the man left the throne room with a bow.
William woke from a long rest and checked the Arrays in his room. They appeared to be completely untouched. He then checked his System messages, and found nothing other than a few random Potential Point gains from throughout the day. When he was creating new spells, his Spell Master title had risen to Rare, and he now had 186 Potential Points.
His Mana was full, so William felt this would be a great time to add more defensive Arrays to his room. He didn't believe the City guards wouldn't visit the Array Hall after learning his identity.
After a dozen Arrays were placed, William turned to the Cultivation book he had purchased from the store last night.
He opened the first page and glanced over the introduction, then flipped to the second. The book talked about how William should be sitting, then where his hands and feet should be.
William started reading how to absorb Qi and the Mana in the air, but was stopped by a System notification.
-The Host cannot Cultivate. The Talent "Cultivation" is not learned.
"What? This is stupid! I spend my hard-earned money on a Cultivation Technique and you tell me I can't use it until I learn another Talent? What if I never learn the Talent??" William complained out loud.
He tried ignoring the System and reading anyway, but it was as if a mental block prevented him from reading further. It was impossible.
William cursed. He didn't have many Potential Points left as it was, so he could only spin a few times. He decided to try it out. He paid one point for the Ask Function.
System, what category does the Cultivation Talent belong to?
-The Cultivation Talent can be found among the Passive Talents or Random Talents. Tʜe source of this ᴄontent ɪs novęlfire.net
The Passive Talents were 25 Potential Points each and would go up in price by 25 Points on each purchase, but they were currently less expensive than a random talent for 75PP.
William purchased 3 Passive Talents for 150P.
--Talent Purchased: Navigation
--Talent Purchased: Heat Resistance
--Talent Purchased: Hard Skin
Navigation? I'll have you know that I am already good with directions. William wasn't too happy with his new skills.
Hard Skin seemed interesting to William. His skin now seemed to have a sort of luster, as if he was constantly using Earth Magic to reinforce it.
Heat Resistance, however, was mostly unnecessary. William already had an A Rank Fire Affinity, did the System expect him to jump into lava or what? Not to mention the awful Navigation talent.
When William checked his System Menu, he noticed the Hard Skin Talent had been placed in the physical talents category. It seemed that many skills fell under multiple categories in the Talent Shop.
So I can't Cultivate and I have no Points. I guess I need to take out some Magical Beasts again. William left his special room with plans to visit the Guild Hall.
As William closed the door to his room, he heard a voice from behind. "I thought you'd hide in there forever."