Chapter 409: Mirror Condensation Breakthrough

That night, Richard practiced his mirror condensation method in his dorm room as usual.

He followed the standard procedure, holding his breath to suppress the ether fluctuations, compressing them from eighty percent down to seventy, then sixty, all the way to the baseline he had spent months mastering.

This time, he tried to push further.

At fifty percent, then forty, his Micro-circulation began to spiral. The ether crashed against his circuits, and pressure flared in his nasal cavity.

For the first few weeks after switching to the mirror condensation method, this had happened every time he tried.

But tonight was different. The Sphinx Lamp sat close beside him. The ripples on the lamp swirled within the glass, drawing the pool of clear water inside his body down with them.

Thirty-five percent. Thirty. His circuits no longer spiraled, and there were no collisions; following the ripples, the ether grew steadily quieter and more stable.

At that moment, a massive influx of information from the entire dorm room flooded in.

Richard opened his eyes. The familiar aching pressure did not strike the back of his head.

His nose wasn't bleeding like it usually did, either. He wiped it with his hand—completely clean.

To solidify his breakthrough, Richard ran through another complete cycle of the mirror condensation method.

Through the second and third cycles, everything remained perfectly stable. His signature artifact was helping him.

Richard pulled out the thin hand-copied manual his aunt had given him.

The first chapter covered the basics, the second detailed the transitional methods, and the third introduced the next stage.

It read like this: once a practitioner reached the Second Stage, the Mirror had to seek a balance between movement and stillness.

If you could keep your Mirror stable while in motion, you were considered to have reached the Second Stage.

Richard used to think this sounded impossibly difficult. It took him ages just to compress the ether while sitting perfectly still, let alone in motion.

But now, he stood up and paced back and forth across the room.

The water's surface shattered at first, but after a moment, it slowly knitted itself back together.

He took a few more steps, and gradually, the surface stopped breaking altogether.

Richard temporarily halted his breathing method. Looking out at the hazy glow of the gas lamps beyond his window, he suddenly understood the line from the manual: the hasty shall never attain the mirror.

A mirror could not choose what it reflected, nor could it choose when to reflect it.

The harder you tried to make it reflect, the more scattered it became. If you stopped forcing it, it would quiet down on its own.

For the past few months, he had been obsessing over it, eager to push through the initial transition period and touch the threshold of the Second Stage.

The next afternoon, while he had no classes, he returned to Room 314.

His aunt was still grading her endless pile of exam papers. Her red pen hovered over the margin for a long moment without dropping—she must have heard him enter.

Isabella didn't look up. The red pen finally descended, leaving a checkmark on the paper.

"Your Micro-circulation has stabilized," she said.

Richard hummed in agreement.

She folded the exam paper and stowed it in a drawer.

"Much faster than I expected. I thought it would take you several more months."

Richard didn't hide the truth, stating outright that his signature artifact had played a role.

Only then did Isabella look up in surprise. Activating her Spirit Vision, she saw the changes in the Sphinx Lamp.

"This lamp of yours has already transformed once?"

She looked at her nephew, her expression far from pleased.

"It took me over a year after my official Signature before I saw the first signs of a transformation. It hasn't even been half a year for you, right?"

Richard didn't reply.

There were some things he couldn't even tell his grandfather, much less his aunt.

Isabella didn't press the issue, steering the conversation back on track.

"Have you reached the Second Stage?"

Richard nodded.

"I have, but I can only reflect. I can't use a Spell Formula while reflecting yet."

Isabella had read the materials herself and had some understanding of the subject.

"To reflect someone else, you have to become completely still.

"But in a real fight, your opponent won't just stand there, and naturally, neither can you.

"How do you combine movement with stillness? For hundreds of years, that has been the hardest hurdle for beginners in the Mirror Tradition."

"I understand."

Isabella pushed the stack of exam papers aside.

"You can't just hole up and practice on your own. If your Mirror needs to reflect people, it's best to find a few live targets to practice with."

Richard had the same thought. "I was planning to ask a few classmates."

He listed their names—just Fischer, Edith, Catherine, and Montagu, his four old acquaintances.

Isabella mentally ran through the paths those four had chosen.

"Classical Records, Star Map, Moon-Hunting, Sun... quite a complete set."

She continued her assessment, "Fischer and Edith are both walking purely academic paths. At the Practitioner stage, they have practically zero frontal combat ability.

"Catherine is Moon-Hunting, so her direct combat skills are decent. Montagu is Sun, capable of everything.

"It's perfect that all four are different. The wider the variety of what you reflect, the better you'll polish that Mirror of yours."

Richard stood up.

"I'll go invite them, then."

"Go on." Isabella picked up her red pen again.

"Be careful when you practice. Don't go giving them internal injuries."

Richard had just reached the door when he was called back.

"Richard."

He looked back.

"What happened with your grandfather is in the past, but if something like that ever happens again, remember to tell us elders."

"I'll remember."

Inviting everyone turned out to be quite easy.

Richard figured it was likely because the Mirror Tradition was incredibly rare across the entire Empire.

His four classmates had probably never met many relevant Practitioners either.

With their curiosity piqued by Richard, they all agreed as soon as a time was set.

They borrowed the largest of the independent underground training rooms in the Academy District.

Fischer arrived earliest, asking a question the moment he walked through the door.

"Can you really reflect what I'm going to do?"

Richard nodded. "Of course I can."

"Then what if I don't do anything at all?"

"Then I'll reflect empty space."

Fischer mulled that over. It sounded reasonable, but something about it still felt slightly off.

Ultimately giving up, he set his book down in the corner and started rolling his wrists.

When Edith arrived, she wasn't clutching her botanical encyclopedia; she walked in and stood silently in the corner.

Catherine arrived neither early nor late. Nodding to the group as she walked in, she stripped off her jacket to reveal a sports skirt, the faint lines of her abs visible on her stomach.

It was obvious that despite being a Scholar, she didn't skimp on her workouts.

Montagu was the last to arrive. He wasn't wearing his dark blue overcoat today, having swapped it for a hunting suit.

Seeing that everyone was present, Richard spoke up, "We'll do one-on-one spars first, then move on to a free-for-all."

Fischer rubbed his hands together. "So, who's first?"

Montagu said, "You and Edith can go first."

Fischer frowned. "Why are we first?"

Catherine wrote in her notebook: "Because both of your direct combat abilities are quite average, so it will end relatively quickly."

Although her expression was cold, there was no hint of contempt.

Fischer opened his mouth to argue, but quickly realized he couldn't.

He and Edith exchanged a glance, their faces bearing the self-aware resignation that they were indeed just there to make up the numbers.

The two stepped into the center of the room. Richard retreated to the side, spreading out his mirror water to observe in silence.

Calling this a spar was generous; it was more like two Scholars desperately trying to recall their pitifully few combat methods.

Fischer belonged to the Classical Records Tradition. Classical Records meant keeping a lifetime's worth of skills entirely inside one's head.

At the Practitioner stage, his combat ability wasn't much different from an ordinary person who had memorized a lot of books.

Gathering ether in his palm, he condensed it into a small book page—one of his very few combat methods.

Edith had chosen the Star Map tradition. When Richard first learned of this choice, he was a little surprised, but on second thought, it wasn't surprising at all.

Star Map focused on stargazing, calculation, and deduction; one could draw upon the unseen star chart overhead to calculate the general direction of an opponent's next move.

But predicting it and actually being able to dodge it were two entirely different matters.

The two went back and forth in the center of the room. Fischer condensed his page and slashed it forward; calculating his move in advance, Edith sidestepped and hurled a small pinch of stardust.

The stardust landed on Fischer's page, corroding it until it was pitted and pockmarked.

After fighting for nearly five minutes, both of them were panting like oxen.

"Stop," Richard called out, declaring the end.

Fischer plopped down onto the floor. "I get it now. I probably have no affinity for frontal combat."

Edith stood nearby, comforting him, "Your page is stronger than mine. At least it can block a hit."

Fischer tipped his head back, gasping for breath.

"What's the point of blocking one hit? Someone with a gun could shoot right through this page and me along with it."

It was no lie. At the Practitioner stage, they both ran the risk of being shot to death if they encountered an ordinary person with a gun.

The value of Scholars walking these two paths was never on the frontal battlefield.

Catherine was up next, and the red-haired girl had already stood up.

She looked at Montagu, stretching her limbs and eager to try.