A couple of days later, Kyle visited Michael, who had finally become a Grand Sorcerer.
It was kind of strange to see that his friend had already reached the Third Realm.
For some reason, the Third Realm still felt so far away.
Yet, here he was, Michael, an Initial Grand Sorcerer.
The two of them quickly started studying the book together.
However, they both noticed pretty quickly that understanding this book with their chosen method wouldn't be easy.
That would take quite a while.
They decided to share the first two chapters relatively evenly, but after that, they decided to split the remainder up into chapters.
One person would read one chapter, and the other person would read the other chapter afterwards.
From what Kyle could glean from the disjointed information he had received, creating Spells was very similar to creating techniques.
It was just far more complex and had way more steps.
'Now that I think about it,' Kyle thought. 'Aren't Spells just very advanced techniques?'
'Guess it's like physics and chemistry. Physics is kind of just very detailed chemistry. I mean, if you learn everything about how stuff works on a fundamental level, you could also calculate how things work in conjunction with each other.'
'I dunno. I didn't learn a lot about either subject.'
When Michael had the book, Kyle decided to optimize his available time a bit more.
He wanted to dedicate more time to furthering his own power, and a lot of other stuff was getting in the way.
For example, his mine.
Since Lily was no longer present, Kyle needed to administrate everything, and that consumed a lot of time.
However, he also desperately needed the money.
Right now, he wasn't strapped for cash, but it wouldn't stay like this.
After all, Kyle had to Fart buy all Rank C Materials and Rank B Materials in the world, at some point.
That couldn't possibly be cheap.
He needed the money.
In the end, he decided to give the mine to the Stark Brotherhood in exchange for 20% of the generated profits.
Next, Kyle asked for an exemption from doing missions for the Stark Brotherhood.
Since he would be creating his own techniques from now on and had his own source of income, he didn't need the Stark Brotherhood anymore.
However, the Stark Brotherhood was still a good ally, and there was plenty of potential for cooperation.
Naturally, Kyle's exemption was granted on the grounds of him being the Guild's representative. Noah also didn't need to do missions, after all.
Before Kyle had optimized his time, he had only had twelve hours per day to dedicate to his power.
Six of his hours had been spent being on standby in the Guild, while another two had been about planning the Guild's future and potential meetings.
Another four hours had been dedicated to the mine.
Now, Kyle only needed to spend two hours in the Guild, and that was it.
He could dedicate the remaining 22 hours of the day to his power.
As more time passed, Kyle and Michael managed to finish the manual for the first time.
That took them over an entire month.
The second read took them even longer since they actually had to combine the disjointed knowledge to truly understand it.
This took another two months.
Luckily, their plan had worked out.
Michael was already fully invested in creating Spells.
Meanwhile, Kyle's focus changed a bit.
He focused on finding common ground between techniques and Spells.
There were plenty of overlapping things between the two, but there were also significant differences.
For example, techniques were built to take advantage of a powerful physical body, while Spells weren't.
The only Spells that took advantage of the physical body were Enchantments, and, quite frankly, they were not very good at that.
In a way, techniques were just temporary Enchantments, which were used on certain parts.
If one wanted to play devil's advocate, one could also say that Spells were like techniques since they were also just temporary Enchantments on the Sorcerer's staff.
Yet, there were still plenty of differences.
For example, techniques were designed to use as little Ether as possible, while Spells didn't care a lot about that.
The maximum power output was the most important thing in a Spell.
A mechanism that increased the output by 10% but consumed 25% more Ether would be horrendous for a technique, but almost all Spells would think that tradeoff to be worth it.
Of course, the most significant difference was the method of activation.
Spells very often reduced their significant Ether costs by allowing for a longer time of activation.
It was like saving money by opting for the regular shipment option for a product over the premium same-day delivery option.
Techniques couldn't do that.
What was the point of chanting magic words for an entire second so that one could swing their weapon once?
Kyle wanted to find a middle ground. He wanted his creations to be usable instantly.
They needed to use less Ether than Spells.
They needed to have more power than techniques.
Sadly, this required him to create a new concept of how to use Ether.
Luckily, it didn't need to be completely new.
It just needed to have the useful parts of both.
Spells used more Ether for more destruction.
Techniques used less Ether in exchange for less destruction.
Kyle wanted to equalize both parts.
Medium Ether for medium destruction.
Naturally, the creation should also be usable just as quickly as a technique.
"You realize that this will take a long time, correct?" Theodor asked.
"I know," Kyle grumbled. "I fucking hate it, but I have to do it anyway."
The next moment, Kyle looked at the scattered pieces of ore in his room.
"Actually, maybe that's not such a bad thing."
"I have so many ways to improve my power, and I feel like I'm not even close to achieving my maximum potential."
"I have to learn about the materials. I have to learn about momentum and explosions. I have to create a mix of techniques and Spells, and then, I also have to actually create something usable."
"Why do I feel like there's more to learn than when I just joined the Stark Brotherhood?"
"I feel even more like a stupid nobody than ever before."
"It's like I just finished school and entered university."
"Think learning's over? Ha! The learning has only begun," Kyle said with a sigh.
"Inheritor," Theodor said, "this means that you have finally learned what it means to become powerful."
"What you are feeling is what almost everyone in the Early to Mid Third Realm feels."
"You believe you are truly powerful, but then, you see the true extent of what you can achieve…"
"And all the things you are proud of related to your power suddenly seem meaningless."
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