As Theo opened his eyes he was back at the barracks on his hay bed, “Hey, how are you feeling?” asked Ferdinand who was sitting on the bed next to him, “Arghh, what happened?” asked Theoahe groggily sat up and rubbed his chest and then his eyes.

“You passed out from mana depletion, when you expend all of your mana your body doesn’t just stop using energy, it grabs from your life force to compensate for the lack of mana, so when you get your life forced sucked your body can go into shock, or just resets, which is why you passed out” Ferdinand then handed him some bread.

“I´ve gotta be more careful with my mana management”, Theo said and then ate the bread, “Go ahead and do a little mana restoration that will also make you feel better, and don’t worry we´ve all done it, its common practice to let students who have just awakened to experience this, the fear of it happening again will make you more diligent when managing your mana”

Theo then cast mana restoration and in 8 seconds he had fully restored his mana, “Because you exhausted all your mana your mana core expanded and can now hold 450 mana, there are some practices where awakened deplete their mana cores because this extreme event expands your mana core at a fast pace, but it can be hazardous, the strain on your core if it becomes too much you can die or worse” said Prim, “what’s worse than death?”, Theo asked, “You´ll see in time”.

Ferdinand left and Theo went to bed, the next day after conditioning, Ferdinand said “So yesterday after experiencing mana exhaustion, your core should have expanded, so you should have a little over 400 mana, so I think it's time you learn a battle spell” Theo looked at him excitedly and nodded.

“This spell is a common one, but it will greatly help you if you work it enough, now look”, Ferdinand took a stance with his lance, concentrated and a magic circle appeared in his palm, he then released a powerful wave of energy as he swung his lance forward that went for about 2 meters.

“That is called Arc Slice, it's a very common spell but it can be upgraded depending on your affinity, mine can be infused with air and fire so a powerful whirlwind can follow making it extremely powerful” Ferdinand then handed a piece of paper to Theo, “This is the spell, its also a tier one spell-like mana restoration so it shouldn’t take you too long to master it, learn it so we can start practicing it tomorrow”

Theo took the piece of paper and put it away, they began their regular training, and when night came, Theo began learning the spell, “Would you like me to help you learn this quickly?” Prim asked, “sure, the faster I learn it the faster I get to use it” Theo answered,

Time started to slow down, and the spell started to jump out at Theo, it was as if he could see the spell as something he had always known, after a couple of minutes time flowed normally and the page went back to normal.

“Congratulation, you now know Arc Slice an F-tier spell that needs 80 mana,” Prim told him, “What was that just now? Why do I sometimes feel like time slows down?” Theo asked It’s a bit of my power, I can help you learn spells faster than normal by making you understand them as if it was just a recollection of information” Prim told him “Can this also work with my training?” Theo asked, “This can help you in everything, but you must grow stronger to be able to use it,” Prim said.

As Theo began pondering how lucky he was to have Prim he decided his goal was to become as strong as possible, so he could go back to Vermis and become its protector, “Prim, I´m going to become the strongest awakened in Vermis” Prim chuckled internally and thought that if Theo could unlock her true power, he would become the strongest in the world.

“Hey, Prim, why did I black out when exhausting my mana, shouldn’t I have had 50 more mana from Ray´s pendant?” Theo asked, “Well because you didn’t activate it, would you like me to link the pendant so it will automatically work when you need extra mana?” Prim asked, “Yes please, with that I´ll have 500 mana” Prim then linked the pendants mana to Theo´s core so it would automatically be used by him.

For the next week, Theo and Ferdinand kept up their training routine, Theo improved Arc Slice to tier B mastery and mana restoration to A mastery by practicing every night, he hardly slept, it was astounding progress, his mana core was as 620 and could restore 45 mana a second, Theo could also perform 21 of the 36movese from the flower wind stance.

The day before the tournament as Theo and Ferdinand were sparring, Theo went all out for 15 seconds, he finally managed to push Ferdinand back, and with that, he stopped his attack, “Good job, I think you´re ready for the tournament” Ferdinand said as he put his lance away, “Really? you think so?” Theo said as he began using mana restoration.

“Yes, at most you´ll be facing 3rd ranks, with your current level you should be able to deal with them, the only fallback is your mana core will not be up to par, so you should be very aware and keep your mana usage in check”, Ferdinand told him as he sat down.

“Hey Prim, how come I haven’t broken through 2nd rank?” Theo asked her, “Your mana core is halfway there, do not be impatient, even for geniuses it can take up to six months to break through the 2nd rank, you´ve been awakened for about a month so your progress is astounding” Prim answered, Theo, felt a lot better knowing this.