บท 82: 82. Bad luck

Noah gasped for air, his acupoints were already refilling the "Breath" in his body but his dantian was completely empty, he had expended every drop of "Breath" he had in it.

'That is the best I can do, I even injured Assea to pass the round.'

He turned to look at the runes and saw that the halo was becoming more intense.

'Don't tell me that there is more? What is it going to be now? Six peak rank 3? One rank 4?'

The scenes from the Twilboia Cliff reappeared in his mind and he trembled a bit remembering the newly advanced rank 4 snake.

'I can't win against that thing even if there were three of me fighting it.'

He sat in the cross-legged position to refill his dantian, he didn't want to go back to the first stage totally exhausted.

'I'll just see what comes out and then break the rune in my sphere.'

The vitality of his body was already healing his wounds as the acupoints rotated, in the ten minutes break he could at least stabilize his most serious injuries.

However, ten minutes passed and nothing happened, the light continued to illuminate the room without creating any other magical beast.

Thirty minutes passed and there were still no changes in the halo.

Noah didn't bother to think much about it and welcomed the extra time given to him to recover as he continued to cultivate.

Healing Assea would take too much time so he focused on accumulating liquid "Breath".

When one hour had passed, the halo dispersed and a peculiar figure was shown to Noah.

He had a loose orange robe with golden lightning bolts sewn on it.

He was levitating in a cross-legged position with his eyes closed and he had a long combed white beard.

The thing that attracted Noah's attention the most though was his incredibly large pointy hat.

It seemed one of those hats that warlocks or witches wore in the games of his previous world but that one was almost three meters of diameter and was made of some metallic material.

Noah was so surprised that he stopped meditating and just stared at the elderly man in the air.

Then the man opened his eyes and looked around him in a confused manner.

The runes at his side exploded and released a powder that flowed into his body.

As the powder was absorbed, his eyes regained clarity and he began to nod.

"Mh, mh, I understand."

Only then his gaze went on Noah that was still looking at him and after nodding a few more times he spoke.

"You are of the darkness element am I right?"

Noah's eyes widened and he gulped sonorously while nodding.

The elderly cultivator saw his answer and shook his head.

"What a pity, what a pity."

Noah wanted to understand more and struggled to stand up to perform a respectful bow before speaking.

"S-senior wh-"

The man didn't let him finish the phrase and waved his hand sending orange powder in Noah's direction.

The powder was too fast and entered his body under Noah's incredulous gaze.

He began to retreat instinctively but an orange halo was already surrounding him.

Noah started to panic but then he noticed that his dantian was being refilled on its own!

The wounds on his body healed in an instant and even the mental energy in his sea of consciousness was restored to its maximum capacity.

Assea's cracked figure recomposed completely and was filled by so much energy that the blood companion came out from Noah's body autonomously and hissed at the ceiling!

"That is indeed a good spell. Never would I have expected that spells regarding puppets would have reached such a level in the future."

Noah was still examining his body that had returned to his peak form.

When the man spoke, Noah's gaze moved to him, only reverence was shown by his eyes.

"Thank you very much, Senior!"

Noah said repeating his bow.

The elderly man placed his feet to the ground and stretched one of his arms assuming an imposing posture.

"The world knows me as Eccentric Thunder, I've accumulated wealth for hundreds of years and set this inheritance ground to find an heir worthy to be called my disciple."

He stared at Noah, a bit of disappointment was exuded from his eyes.

"I am already dead but my will resides in the runes of my dimension. Young one, you are indeed worthy of being my disciple, sadly it appears that both of us have bad luck."

Eccentric Thunder sighed before continuing his speech.

"There are two conditions to become my heir. The first one is to have the necessary strength and you clearly fulfilled that or I won't be here. The second one is for him or her to be of the thunder element."

Noah felt dejected, he had fought so hard only to be punished by his bad luck.

Eccentric Thunder continued seeing his expression.

"I am but a will, I need to obey the rules set by my true self when he created the dimension. Since you passed the test you have the right to obtain my most valuable asset of the darkness element. Rejoice, it's a top tier spell that will accompany you through all your cultivation journey."

Noah's eyes lit up hearing his words and a bit of eagerness invaded him.

"I'm really sorry, young one. The rules that I set up clearly state that anyone that doesn't fulfill the two conditions has the right to receive only one reward. I could not risk that my accumulations might have been expended before I had found a successor. One test one reward, that's the rule. The dimension is now preparing to transfer the diagram directly into your sea of consciousness, you will be sent out soon."

Noah fell deep in thought.

'One spell doesn't help me that much to escape, there are still the elite guards waiting on the entrance to the first stage and I can't possibly defeat them.'

He bowed again.

"Senior, is there another exit from the separate dimension to the outer world?"

Eccentric Thunder snorted and sent another ray of orange powder toward Noah.

"Hmph, who do you think I am? Here, this is the complete map of the inheritance ground. Take it as an apology for the single reward."

Many pieces of information were injected in Noah's mind and he rejoiced to see that there was hope to escape from the Balvan group.

He was about to bow again when a strange idea formed in his mind.

A shameless smile appeared on his face as he neared the elderly cultivator.