After explaining everything to the Ravenstein youths, Atticus left them to go about their respective tasks.
After a quick look around the camp and expanse and seeing everything was in order, Atticus headed straight to his room.
On getting to his room, he sat down crossl egged on his bed and allowed his thoughts to drift.
During the five years he was training at the Ravenstein estate, Atticus hadn't neglected a single one of his powers.
In fact, if he had to be honest, his abilities were getting way too much and too fast. He just had too many things to focus on, and this was especially so for his elements.
After he had broken through to the Expert rank and unlocked 2 more elements in addition to the earlier 7, Atticus found it a little difficult to train them all.
His bloodline training required him to always immerse himself in each of its respective bloodline elements' environments, meaning he had to constantly switch between each different element during training, which was dampening his level up speed.
But even with this weakness, Atticus would still choose to have all these elements if he had to make a choice again.
It was simply giving him a lot of options during battle. Each of the elements could be used for different situations and would all be immensely useful during battles.
And if it ever happens that Atticus's mana level became low, he still would be able to put on a fight with all his elements.
His bloodline wasn't reliant on his mana to function but his stamina and endurance. It was an intricate part of him.
It was a power he could keep on using regardless of his mana levels, for as long as his stamina and endurance could take it.
Apart from his elements, his arts too had advanced significantly.
Currently, with Elemental Mimicry, Atticus's ability to mimic the movement to the element had increased significantly.
And Atticus had a feeling that a big change was coming if he advanced it to the next stage.
His Ethereal clock art too had gotten way stronger. Compared to before where he could only maintain it for a minute when he was moving, he could now go as far as a staggering 20 minutes.
And it was way more potent than before. If Atticus wanted, he could move through the camp, and none would even be able to see or sense him.
Apart from all of these, what Atticus had neglected, even though it was a little, was his rune engraving.
And this was mostly because of the intensive training Atticus had subjected himself to.
His mornings and afternoons were always filled with constant training, and given the torturous feeling of losing all of his motivations every time he engraved a rune, Atticus would rather not go through all of that when he still had his hellish training with Magnus waiting for him at night.
He had initially wondered where to get the will renewal potion, but with just a single request from Arya, she had instantly brought a truckload of it to him.
The only time Atticus had ever practiced was at night, after his training with Magnus when he was about to sleep.
After each session, he would drink the will renewal potion and then sleep. This way its terrible aftereffect wouldn't affect his daily life.
It was exactly because of this he had hardly made any progress in increasing his will.
Currently, in his space ring were numerous different types of finished grade one runes. Rune engraving truly had a lot of freedom when it comes to the type of runes one can create.
There were no languages; one simply engraved with intent. Its possibilities were simply endless. And over the years, Atticus had been able to create different grade one runes with different functions.
Given the lack of proper facilities for him to train, Atticus had decided to spend most of the one-month timeframe they had rune engraving.
He swiftly channeled his mana into his storage ring, bringing out a bunch of unused slates and an engraver.
Atticus's will had increased significantly during the years, and the torturous training session with Magnus had a lot to do with this.
Only people with the strongest of wills could remain training with that man for as long as Atticus did.
'I actually kind of miss him,' Atticus thought, shaking his head with a small chuckle.
Then he turned his gaze to the slate in his hands. His intelligence had long since surpassed what a grade one runemaster should be able to achieve.
The only thing that had been holding him back was his will. But for a long while now, Atticus had been feeling it; he was about to pass a major milestone.
He just needed a little nudge.
With each increase of his will, Atticus could feel his character changing. It was as though his character was getting firmer and more refined.
The Atticus of before, while he wouldn't scare easily, would still panic in certain situations. But now?
Now he felt as if very little could scare him. And this current situation was a perfect example of that.
If it had been the 10-year-old Atticus before his large increase in will, he doubted that he would be able to be as decisive as he was with the way he handled their current situation in the expanse.
Atticus cleared his head of every other thought and focused on the slate in front of him.
There was only one way to increase his will and cross this milestone, and that was by constantly engraving runes and renewing his will with the will renewal potion in his possession and then continue the circle.
Atticus closed his eyes for a brief moment, instantly focusing on his intent, opening his eyes just as swiftly. Atticus focused his will and at fast speeds engraved the word shield onto the slate; it immediately let out a blinding red light before dimming.
Without pausing, Atticus swiftly placed it on the side and picked up another slate, fully intending to continue his actions.