“Golden Lion… Lets see…” he muttered as he looked through many net archives and eventually he came upon a source historical archive approved by all the biggest Nuntip nations.

“Mercenary group Golden Lion, this group is a righteous order working for the betterment of the continent. The group originated from the legendary Knight’s Order of the Golden Lion which was founded during the era of the demon lord and became Nuntip’s greatest free organization working for peace. That said, at the time of the 4th grandmaster before the replacement for the grandmaster was fully trained, the grandmaster disappeared leaving the replacement and all the order with only the development knowledge up to B rank. This caused a collapse in training. Although they retained their skillful mastery of weapons, the art slowly faded becoming a shadow of what it was. The current group’s situation is even unknown due to the retirement of the 12th leader without a replacement found which basically lead to the group’s dissolution until the ex leader reappears.”

“So that is why he went to Eshen, a country which had a lot of orphans. He was hoping to make an heir to rebuild it. The irony that Helix contained the arts? Does that mean the 4th master died in the dungeon or was it an agreement between the two that Helix would give it to a descendant later on when he felt it was most needed?” He questioned himself.

He didn’t understand anything but he was clear that he had a very massive bomb in his hand but it was something great. Maxwell clearly didn’t know these skills but likely knew their descriptions. Still the power behind every skill was immense. The changes to the form however was irritating but to adapt old arts into new ones, one had to learn to grow. In this dungeon where there are infinite numbers of targets, he had no problems.

He kept reading to find something more and noticed one passage, “The strongest feature a Golden Lion warrior had is their most famous skill, Golden Lion’s eye. A very powerful eye magic with the ability to see their truth and high power to identification. This allows them to find people talented to train.”

As soon as he heard that, he knew for sure this was the skill that Maxwell used.

His eyes burned with anticipation to understand this strange skill and taking the spell first, he began to channel mana into it.

He wanted to understand the spell concept first as everything is stuffed into his brain even if painfully. He still understands after meditating. After that, using the innate skill book would fill the activation gap.

That said, he didn’t expect the pain he would pass to learn it and for over two long hours, the spell spent imprinting knowledge of magic and huge amounts of information constituting the spell. It even included a massive amount of cryptic knowledge of identification and more.

In truth, he should have used the art of identification, then the spell and finally the innate skill.

It went on until he finally calmed down but his body was covered in cold sweat.

A secret to magic tomes is that the more unknown knowledge, the more painful because the knowledge needed to be infused into his memories while those who knew would just build off what is already known.

When he could finally get up, he was a lot more fearful of huge books like this but he knew it was important. His magical knowledge was minimal and breathing hard, he meditated to calm down and regain his used mana before finally channelling into the art of identification.

It burst and gathered into three orbs. Beginner, intermediate and advanced.

The first to enter was basic and it connected with a lot of the eye spell and built off it containing basic magical theory of all forms of identification magic. It was thankfully not so painful. Following that was the next level and it started to give headaches but at least half of it was the combined knowledge of the spell and the basics.

Finally advanced entered and he felt his brain was going to burst and unconsciously channeled Lightning accelerator slowly increasing output until the pressure decreased as his brain reached the capacity speed to absorb the knowledge more cleanly.

This time, it lasted another 2 hours but the end result was far better thanks to the accelerator that enhanced his brain to handle the pressure.

He looked at the last book and already knew basically all the knowledge needed but he knew next to nothing about the effect it had. He activated that one and his body began to get the instincts and it formed a bridge in all the knowledge.

He opened his eyes and they glowed golden but he suddenly shouted as if his eyes would brust and instantly stopped.

“My… my eyes hurt so bad!” he shouted in pain.

He stumbled around until he reached the bathroom before closing them and running it under water. It had rapidly overheated because of the activation and that was a shocking situation to say the least.

Only after his eyes cooled down he pulled it out but shockingly, all the veins in his eyes were visible and he still felt the throbbing.

“What the hell is wrong with this skill?!” He complained.

He returned to bed and began to meditate starting at the most basic information on the spell and it didn’t take any effort.

“Seriously!” He exclaimed, “What kind of spell has a basic requirement of C rank mana and basic development just to activate and not even full power!?” He complained.

He was shocked and continued to examine it and realized that even more than that, he needed to train his eyes by using increasingly complex eye magic which is why all the identification magic was generally eye based in the art. Those that weren’t were more complex and used magic formations he couldn’t make heads or tails about.

Despite all the knowledge being pretty complete, he could feel big gaps. He sighed when he saw that, “I need an actual magic knowledge foundation to properly learn. The few books I got aren't enough, I need to find an academy and see if they can at least tell me the list of books used to teach mages in order.” He cursed.

Still, it was a skill far out of his reach but he now had a foundation in identification magic equal to or better than identifiers. He just needed to complete the magical knowledge to properly understand the gaping holes left in the structure of knowledge.

Thinking about the 20 gold bars he got from the chest, he wondered if he couldn’t purchase a magic tome on the fundamental basics of magic.

He definitely needed this and looking at Storm, he thought that it might be good to get it for him as well.

Not distracting him, he headed to the mage tower and asked about it.

“Fundamental basics? As in the stuff you learn in primary school and most people can achieve? Or the basics of a mage?” the receptionist asked.

“Both.” Logan asked.

“The primary grade in a magic tome is 50 plates while the mage course basics is 10 gold bars. The price is as such because the basics is basically somes the most commonly taught knowledge in every magic academy. This has been determined by a continents wide scholars conference and enforced by the adventurers guild. If you request the advanced basics which expands upon the basics without going to the intermediate stage of magical arts, it will be an additional 30 gold bars because that is a much higher level of knowledge.” he said.

Logan’s face showed an incredible expression and the receptionist quickly brought up every item he picked from the tower’s own cateology system and showed him that it was like she said.

“So expensive!” he said.

“Well, gold pours like water in the dungeon so it is actually cheap. It is basically 100,000 gold coins for the basics and 300,000 for advanced classes. With the current conversion rate of gold to Tip… current is 500:1, the basics cost 200 tip. Most of the cost of this goes to the fact that you learn it instantly.” she said.

“HUH! Are magic tomes really that cheap!” he said.

“Well it isn’t like it is cheap but to make the magic effect, you don’t need much high quality blood. F rank monster is sufficient to make a magic tome for magic basics. 600 tip for advanced basics. Of course, there is a price to this as you have no teacher to tell you the special tips and tricks but anyone getting these is pretty prepared for it.” She said.

Logan signed and agreed but the price conversion was really scary.

“Do you work with Tip?” he asked.

She smiled and knew the importance of gold in the dungeon and nodded. He took out the money for the three and there was only a dull white glow and it barely needed mana to absorb the books and he did it instantly.

He felt the knowledge gathered and built up. The fundamentals connected to what he knew and the life spells he had but from that very basic knowledge the actual basics built up and instantly connected to the art of identification and copied information into gaps.

That said it never blended like those three books that were clearly made to work as a unit.

When he absorbed the advanced basics, he felt like a lot of things filled in.

He sighed and knew he had to go over a lot. He felt a headache just thinking of how much he had to learn and train.

As for Storm, he stored the three extra books in a magic pouch and then asked, “How much do intermediate magic books cost?” He asked.

“This is more specialized so you need to pick from large selections. This is because intermediate enters into the specifics of each element and even advanced elements. This includes all type of magic from weapon magic to magic spells and merged magic and more. That said, the general magic tome of the basic level knowledge is usually 4,000 Tip.” she said.

Logan stopped a moment and thought about the price and was shocked, “So sentient dungeon monsters pay 200 gold bars for that!” he said.

She shook her head, “Sentient monsters learn through instinct more often than not because they use gold as mana instead they want to leave the dungeon more than anyone so they don’t make extra costs for themselves and usually sell anything that can enhance their mana stability.” the receptionist said

Logan looked around and leaned in, “Do they not know about development techniques?” he asked.

The woman shook her head, “Keep it that way or tens of thousands of monsters will join as sentient monsters. It is sort of cruel but we try to control the outgoing population as much as possible. We don’t kill anyone but only let those who can achieve it without the skills. When they get out, they can get the skills if they want.” she said.

Logan understood and decided that he already had plenty to work with. It would just overload him to increase the amount he had to learn from.

He finally returned to fully rest. He gave Storm the three books so that he could learn the basics of structured magic and possibly enhance his control and ability at using lightning that had started to bloom.

“Master, when are we going to continue ascending?” he asked.

Logan thought and thought about all the things he obtained, “I don’t think it will be soon, maybe a month at least so that i have time to relax and go over all the things we got. You also need time to adapt your mana and I have my sword arts that I need to understand. A month sounds good. You can get a lot out of this and are likely to grow even more when you finish filling your body with F rank mana.” He said.

The small lizard boy nodded and returned to his beast form and curled up to train. That said, for Logan to train he needed the scroll out to properly learn the forms. He had no ideas to modify it. He needed some mastery of the differences and he was sure that he would get stronger even with that less refined fighting form.

He paid rent and food costs to the inn for a full month so he wouldn’t have to worry about getting kicked and then looked for private training rooms where he started learning the complete sword art of the Golden Lion. In the rest period when he would train his mana, his mind was working and learning the immense store of knowledge in his brain.

Brain Overclock became his most used skill during this time because his kinetic vision allowed his mind to work much faster basically extending the time he had every day by a lot.

In a short two weeks, he had stuffed himself for all but sleep hours training. Thanks to magic dolls, he could have active fights against a target and after each fight he would spend close to half an hour meditating in Arashi which meant even more hours.

They were fully invested into training the old forms but already Arashi was getting lots of improvement ideas thanks to the modern forms they head but the most important was the changes done within her own body that were most important. Even small changes in certain branches changed a great deal the effect and stability and as they fought the dolls, they would constantly find their own faults.

After two weeks, thanks to all the training when meditating, he accelerated learning through all the attack forms for all three main weapons he used in the old method. From this point he needed a lot of combat experience to start changing them to match the modern version.

At that same time Storm had finished changing the mana in his entire body and as expected, he had a lot of growth. Mana had the most direct growth results in monsters and the compressed mana had even better effect. He doubled in size with about 170 cm of height from his legs to his back and 7 meters of length he was definitely very powerful.

He joined Logan in the training room and began to train with his new form from speed to attack pattern, charging his attacks while moving and shooting.

The knowledge of magic, despite just being basics, had a lot of change in his comprehension. This is especially true for his training, he asked to see the actual scroll when he finished and after finishing adapting, they both started using the old method.

As expected however, the modern version was actually better than the ancient version compared to the actual fighting forms which was the complete method that needed to be filled in.

There was a gap of over 700 to 800 years between the two, it was obvious that the mana development method was much better despite not advancing to A rank.

It was still very complex but the modern one simplified a lot of parts while maintaining the strength which showed the effect that time had on things. That said, they slowly went up the levels to see the changes and as they got near the upper levels, they saw more and more changes to the point that it didn’t feel like the same technique. Logan questioned whether he could continue to the A and S rank if he used the modern version.

“Master, despite this being older and a touch weaker, the technique is stable and continues to a higher peak. Neither master or I possess the knowledge required to change any of this. Maybe only if we fully master this can we actually achieve the knowledge to change something.” he said.

“You're right, let’s use the old version, it will be only a bit lower in compression and purity cleansing ability but we will be able to surpass the limit of the common golden lions of today.” he said.

With a nod, they store away the scroll, leaving it to the side in the inventory and start using the old technique. It had no direct effect except a slightly weaker compression and purification ability but it still worked.

That said, after running the technique for a while he sighed and thought about the presence in his chest and called it out.

Storm looked at it, “Is master going to try to make the spirit beast?” Storm asked.

“I’ll see how far i can get.” he said and sat down in the training room before he started to channel his mana into the orb.

It gathered and he started to gather at the very center as he channeled the old form but it wasn’t that different, only the complex formulas had modernized. The mana started to spin and he instantly felt a lot of leak and began to gather more around the area he was working to capture the leaking mana and push it in again. He ran a flow from outside in along the leaks to reduce the loss of mana.

Soon the mana hit the top and began to circle but there was a huge consumption at that point and he grit his teeth as he saw the filament of the mana pool start to form to contain the spirit.

It continued for a while before he sighed and recalled it.

The mana already processed followed it but the rest dispersed. As soon as he let go, the mana in the form of the mana pool cover released and turned back to normal mana inside his mana pool.

“Was it hard?” Storm asked.

“Extremely, it feels completely without sense how this is developed. I can see why mages don’t develop it, there are too many leaks.” He said.

Storm looked at him in tilting his head, “What if master develops it within your mana pool, it would cut the cost of leaks and you don’t need to focus on containing the mana, only to figure out how to close where mana leaks.” Storm suggested.

Logan looked at him, confused about if that was such a simple solution to it.

After some thought he put it into action. He could feel the location thanks to the fact that it occupied one of his battle beast spots.

He made his body absorb and grind the mana and at the center, the mana flowed along the technique around the spirit and slowly started to grind and form the mana pool again.

Like before a lot of mana leaked but he didn’t have the stress of redirecting leaked mana. That said, he was having trouble closing the leaks.

After some time he activated Brain Overclock to enhance his mental abilities and allow his thinking to increase.

He couldn’t see into his body, he could only feel the energies, it might be one of the causes of trouble in development.

He thought a while and his mind touched upon one of the low rank identification spells which was not a direct identification skill. Instead it is just enhanced eyes meant to see mana. It helped locate magical objects or energies but also to see into the bodies of people and their flow. It was great for doctors who needed to see if there were damages to the flow or weak areas.

He slowly activated that spell in his eyes and opened them.

The world around him had turned black and white while mana was a blue gas. In his arm and on Storm, he saw a burning glow next to the heart and a great deal of mana running in a flowing pattern through his body. For Storm he saw the same but it freely released and pulled into his muscles and bones.

He looked down at his chest but just saw the swirling.

After some thought he pulled it out, the mana pool that formed broke because the center moved from where it had been. It returned to mana but Logan ignored that and looked at the orb itself.

This time he could see clearly why this was happening. The mana of the orb was basically burning itself. It literally released mana in waves and there were countless flows outward as if the environment was sucking it’s mana away and as a result, his mana. That is why it is so safe in his mana pool.

He released some mana and began to try and rotate the spirit but it did nothing for the escaping mana.

After some thought he almost slapped himself, “Right, if it is a battle beast it naturally responds to my orders.” He said and through the command link he began to order it. From the most stable area, the bottom of the flame like orb, he had it start to spin itself. His mana was drawn more intensely as the flames moved on their own and began to form a flat circle but he corrected the shape and slowly it started to form an orb along the side until at the top it dipped down and back into the spirit.

“Did master seal the leaks?” Storm asked.

“Nope but i figured out how to drastically reduce the leaks. Like this, it is only about 20% of the leaks compared to 100% from before. This will make developing it many times easier since the spirit is already doing the flow naturally.”

He instantly started to channel mana into the center and the mana flowed like gas along the spinning orb and as it reached the point where it returned down, it circled up to form the film of the mana pool and using mana as he did before to bring control the rest of the leak the mana pool slowly developed reducing the leaks more and more as it grew until it finally finished at the bottom.

He had used 90% of his mana while also absorbing more but he succeeded.

“There, the mana pool is formed and I can feel it fully adhering to the spirit. It won’t break down like before.” he said and let the mana cover around it go. The mana did not leak and was perfectly stable like an F rank mana pool he had.

He called it back and the mana pool followed but there was a change.

Unlike the wide spread spirit flame it was before, it was a tiny bubble at the bottom of his mana pool now as all the spirit was contained.

“Alright, now we can safely make the spirit animal, the learning curve wasn’t that hard though, it seems mages don’t think outside the box.” He said.

“I was the one who said it, master.” Storm said.

“Yes yes, I know.” He said while laughing as he started petting his head.

“Did you train sufficiently already?” he asked.

“No master, I am still having trouble figuring out control of lightning and even some wind which blends in with ‘Storm call’.” He said.

“Right, we should probably buy knowledge on the elements we have affinity for. It will probably help me a lot with ‘Wind wings’.” He said.

With a nod, quickly went to the mage tower. The price for the basic wind and lightning intermediate level magic tomes was 6,000 each while higher level tomes went as high as 50,000.

Spells naturally were even more expensive.

The price for spells followed the same idea as in Iteno meaning it was 3 times more expensive for him.

He still had a lot of money he had stored up during his time training to open his mana pool. After looking, he purchased two of each basic, totaling 24,000 and then the second volume right after that one for both elements as well.

They both absorbed it on the spot and quickly returned to the training room to not waste time. Trading inspirations they actually turned to one another and began to finally make sense of their innate skills on a more knowledge basis making it possible to focus and enhance their effect and control beyond instinct.

At the end, they turned and fought one another to test their growing power and after an hour, they were both collapsed and bloody, equally hurt.

If anything, it was like rivals fighting after one caught up.

Of course, Logan didn’t use the full sword arts and just the forms.

Still they beat each other senseless but were happy as they started to heal up and returned to their room to rest and recover since they were likely to continue for the rest of the month.

***

“Is he seriously only training with his battle pet?” the guild master said.

“Yes, in fact, he is investing quite a bit of money into getting extra magic tomes for both of them to learn magical knowledge.” she said. “It seems they got some riches in the chest draw allowing them to remain in the city despite the prices even in humble inns. He is truly following what he said and is training hard to balance his body and mana. That said, the people who monitor him say that his aura is getting sharper by the day. It is possible that he is developing his knowledge of the sword by a great deal. We will see how far he goes once he finally climbs up and returns back here. Any update on the Nexus will tell us his current limit.” she said.

“Well, his current actions clearly put him outside the time frame of the last assault and the first failed attempt at a holy artifact. We would have seen him if he went down the dungeon.” he said.

“Are we going to keep monitoring him?” she asked.

“Naturally, we don’t know if he is just hiding himself and is a low ranking member among the people. Any trace of holy power will suggest he actually did steal an artifact.” he said.

The woman looked strangely.

“What?” the guild master asked.

“Well… Helix has been known to produce, on rare occasions, holy artifacts. Would you suggest that he stole an artifact if he pulls one out from the chest draw?” she asked.

The guild master sighed, “All holy artifacts are, by law, to be turned in to the highest authorities.” He said.

She rolled her eyes, “That is basically cutting an entire magic branch.” she said.

“Yes, well they likely want to avoid a holy legend sword appearing again. It is the only known sword to reach black grade and those who command such a sword are said to have the ability to rule the world.” He said.

“If someone can make it, they likely deserve to rule the world.” She commented.

“So you would assume the demon lord should have ruled the world but he and the hero both died.” the guild master said.

“Just saying that even the Nuntip great Empire only has a Blue sword of honor that has been stuck at this color for the last 400 years. If someone can achieve purple, they are very likely to unite Nuntip as emperor.” She said.

“It doesn’t always work like that.” He said.

“You would think so but we have seen it many times in history as the purple sword ushers a great era of war and unification. At the very least a great part of the continent is under the control of a single person.” she said.

The guild master didn’t say much, “Just keep watching him. It would be great if he decided to start joining parties. We could have an agent party with him and gather information on him.” He said.

“I find it hard that something like that happens.” she said.

He agreed and they continued with some other important topics among which is the movement of remaining artifacts to secure dungeon treasuries deep and away from the hands of the thieves but still accessible by those who need it’s power.