Time wait for no one, Viers spent his days mostly by meditating, training his body, and reading informative books. In his opinion, he was making quite good progress. He absorbed the Mana crystal and felt his body fuller, similar to a person felt after eating a jumbo-sized lunch, the next day that fullness dissipated and he began meditating to absorbed Mana again.

With more Mana in his body, Viers could do some simple things to the water around him. He managed to make the water in his glass floated for three seconds before dropping down, he didn't show or tell anyone about this and perfectly content without unnecessary attention. As he suspected, even with more Mana, he was still helpless to do anything about his mutation.

His crusade to banish the fat invader from his holy body continues every day. Viers used the training routine of the bald caped hero with the power to one strike everything the world had thrown at him so far. 100 push-ups, 100 sit-ups, 100 squats, and 100 km running. He didn't know how to measure his running distance so he just ran, with his healing factor helping him, Viers got used to the routine quite quickly.

His effort had yet to bear fruit, since the day he woke up at the carriage, he had done quite a lot of physical exercise for Earth’s standard and yet his body fat ratio refused to budge down. Viers suspected that his healing factor was the culprit grew stronger, he was so sure of this line of thought, as if his brain had the deductive reasoning of a certain kid detective with initial C.

Earlier, he thought that he had already lost a few kilograms but now he wondered if that was simply his imagination.

Terry knew about his daily exercise and felt strange about the lack of change. “You do know that it’s useless to exercise so much and then eat like an elephant right?” He told Viers one day.

Of course he took care of his calorie intake, but he felt something strange about his body recently. Despite eating only a few mouthfuls of meals, he didn't feel starved. He still felt the pangs of hunger after he ate only a small-sized meal but the sensation was not extreme nor unbearable, the hunger did not make him tired or exhausted, and if he held it on for a while, the hunger abated. He still drank water as usual and his tolerance of thirst also didn't seem to be any different from normal humans.

I don't think my body completely follows the rules of physics anymore… come to think of it, I stuffed my belly with one-third of a big bull, could normal humans do that? I already ate fewer calories than what I expend so how could there was no change to my body? Where does the energy come from? For daily activities, for healing wounds… another reason to be diligent in my Mana-mastery training.

His super senses came sporadically, sometimes it lasted for a few seconds, sometimes a few minutes. No noteworthy or permanent changes so far, he coped with his episodes by trying to made sense about his new senses when they were in a heightened state as much as he was able. His eyes sometimes could see very far, his nose picked up the smell of what his classmates had for breakfast, the fine hair in his body stood up and numerous foreign sensations attacked his brain, for a few weeks Viers had to endure the drawbacks of his power.

His scuffle with Mirella was not resolved, one part because she didn’t talk to him or engaged contact in any way, clearly upset. Another part because of Viers, he stopped trying after the third time, he didn’t really care about this so it was fine even if Mirella never forgave him. He used his time for improving himself rather than mending his relationship with her. However, troubles came in another form.

***

It’s been a month since Viers came to Luxore, he felt the days so short at times and then, the next day already came. Today, it was raining lightly, Viers always liked the rain, both Viers. He saw the weather outside from the classroom window. The rain fell on the window glass with his refection unceasingly, the weather was dark and so was the classroom. Before long, it was brightened with a magic stone encased in glass hanging in the ceiling. It was brighter than candles, Viers thought it was similar to LED light bulbs on Earth.

“Good morning everyone, today, I will teach you the next part of your training, do you want to know?” Nakala came and smiled widely.

The class erupted in jubilation, Viers perked up his ears and became very excited. After Nakala taught him how to absorb Mana crystals, he returned a few days later and asked to be taught the next step, Nakala refused, she said he must let his body adapted first and by rushing this step will not be good for himself. Viers didn’t care and tried to learn it anyway, he wanted to control his mutation abilities as soon as possible, he’d even offered Nakala some gold but she refused even more strongly. Viers could only… let it go.

No, not really, he scoured the town for information. He went to the town library and asked the people in his small social circle, but it ended in failure. The library didn’t have books that could taught people Mana-mastery, Viers suspected the big wigs limited the information from spreading to the common masses. Helpless, he patiently waited for Nakala's next instruction.

“So let’s recap a bit, all this time you have absorbed Mana from your surroundings and make the Mana amount inside you more abundant. I can see some of you are ready for the next step, for those who aren’t, be diligent kids, the next step is very exciting for all of us.” Nakala winked.

“So, even after your body had more Mana than before, you didn’t manage to do anything substantial, yes? You can do something with your Mana to the element of your attribute like make it floats or moves it around without touching it but that’s it, isn’t it? Well, fret not, after this class you will be able to do much, much more… if you succeed of course.”

“The next step in your journey in the Path of Power, is to condense the Mana inside you and create a core.”

Nakala drew a human shape figure on the blackboard. She explained and sometimes added shapes to the board. Each trainee was listening intently, for each word Nakala said.

“The Mana inside you trainees are currently floating around your body just like a mist filling a container. You will condense all of that Mana to a single core, with the existence of this core, the degree of your control will increase significantly.”

“We call the core — Intio.”

“Intio is similar to a monster core, while the monster core exists physically inside the monster's body, Intio didn’t exist physically. It exists inside our selves, the space where Intio resides, we Path-seekers called it the realm of consciousness. You can visit the place easily once you manage to form your own Intio.”

“Intio’s form and shape are different from person to person, my Intio have the form of a fish statue, and Mr. Teldo Intio is an upside-down tiny mountain. Most Intio’s shape have close relationship with the owner psyche and have some influence from their elemental affinity. But no matter what the kind of form your Intio takes, the function of it remains the same, and an Intio form doesn’t affect your strength… think of it this way, your Intio is like you, your uniqueness that differentiates you from other humans even though we are all from the same race.”

“Intio produces a special kind of substance, this mysterious thing… we call — Victa.”

“Unlike the Mana you have now, Victa is very easy to manipulate and controlled, because it came from your own Intio. Victa is the processed, filtered, specialized form of Mana for each individual. Victa is what we Path-seekers use to empower ourselves, we use it to strengthen our body and fuels our spells.”

“My Intio is a fish statue, it will spit out a blue bead from time to time, this blue bead is my Victa. Like Intio, everyone’s Victa is different. Of course, you can only see Intio and Victa inside your own realm of consciousness but it doesn’t make them false or imaginary, they are very real and once you have them, you can feel their presence clearly.”

“Intio will produce Victa automatically on its own, even as you sleep. But the amount of Victa your Intio produced is quite scarce, every Path-seekers have this trouble, the expenditure rate of Victa exceeds the rate of our gain. Victa is very useful but it’s also very limited in quantity, use it wisely because Path-seekers who don’t, dies an early death.”

“So how could we have more Victa? There are other ways to have more Victa but they are all very costly, the most sensible method is to raise the level of your Intio. I said before that I am a rank 2 Path-seeker, yes? Well, that rank 2 stands for how many times I have upgraded my Intio. The higher your Intio rank is, the higher quality and quantity Victa it produces, it will be more potent and efficient to use.

“With our Mana condensed into our core, how could we improve it? The same way you increase your Mana inside your body in the first place. Only this time, the Mana will be concentrated in your Intio. After you accumulate a sufficient amount of Mana, you condensed it to your core, should you succeed, you will experience a qualitative change from before, you will raise in rank and your Victa too shall rise in rank.”

“The rank of Path-seekers stands for how many times you have done this breakthrough, if you trainees manage to form your Intio, it means you will be elevated to a rank 0 Path-seekers. With rank 0 Intio and Victa, you will then start the practical application of your Victa, I hope all of you already put serious thought about whether you will become warrior-type or mage-type, for those who haven’t, you still have time so no need to be anxious.”

“Now, that’s enough explanations in one day, time to teach you all how to make your Intio. Are you ready?”