Chapter 75: Illuminate

Chapter 75: Chapter 75: Illuminate

Returning to Dormitory Building 17, Eric locked the heavy oak door of Room 401 behind him, engaged the brass privacy array, and pulled the linen blinds shut against the twilight.

With the evening entirely open, he had no intention of resting. Drawing clean calligraphic lines on flat parchment was only half the battle. For another hour, Eric ran through dozens of drafts across scrap vellum, his Rank-C *Skill Comprehension* smoothing out every jagged corner until the hexagonal *Illuminate* matrix flowed with mechanical precision.

"Alright," Eric murmured, blowing loose carbon dust off the desk surface. "Time for the real trial."

He reached into the linen pouch issued by Professor James and withdrew an F-rank low-grade mana stone. It was a cloudy, rough-hewn pebble, barely the size of an almond, bearing faint crystalline fractures along its unpolished edge. Beside it, he retrieved the institution-issued runic stylus, a slender instrument tipped with a hardened mythril nib engineered to channel an awakened tamer’s liquid mana directly into dense mineral mediums.

The moment the metal nib touched the stone’s crystalline lattice, Eric felt the stark difference.

Carving a rune wasn’t like gliding ink across paper; it was an act of microscopic surgery. The mineral density resisted every stroke, demanding an unbroken, microscopic release of mana to burn the conduit channels into the crystal without fracturing the matrix. His first attempt was rough, his forearm muscles stiffening as he fought the stone’s internal grain. Still, he managed to etch the full hexagonal framework without cracking the outer casing.

"Let’s see if the matrix holds," Eric murmured, channeling a thin thread of starlight liquid mana into the primary anchor node.

*HUMMM.*

The stone flickered with a faint, cloudy white radiance for roughly three seconds before sputtering and dying out completely.

Eric didn’t look discouraged in the slightest. "Well, that’s something. First time for everything."

Wiping the pulverized crystal dust away, he reached for a second stone and began again.

On his third try, an erratic pulse fractured the core. On his fifth, a feedback loop snapped the circuit before completion. But with every failure, Eric’s fingers adapted to the mineral resistance, calibrating his mana output with razor-thin control.

By his eighth attempt, the mythril nib danced effortlessly across the crystalline surface. The geometric lines locked into place with a satisfying, almost audible click of arcane alignment.

Eric channeled a pulse of mana into the ignition terminal.

*SHIIIING!*

A brilliant, pristine white radiance erupted from the pebble, banishing every shadow and illuminating the entire suite as brightly as the midday sun. The matrix hummed in perfect equilibrium, self-sustaining its luminescent circuit. Judging by the mana retention rate, it would burn unbroken for at least thirty minutes.

It was an officially certified, functional rune stone.

"That is genuinely awesome," Eric grinned, holding the glowing gem up to inspect the clean facets. "Rune crafting has serious tactical potential. If a basic illumination matrix can hold this much stability, what happens when I get my hands on high-tier offensive or kinetic barrier blueprints?"

He terminated the mana feed with a mental pinch, watched the radiance fade smoothly back into the crystal, and stowed the finished stone into his spatial inventory.

"Another major subject to conquer," Eric exhaled, collapsing backward onto the plush mattress.

He raised his left wrist and pulled up his synchronized academic calendar on his smartband:

[WEEKLY INSTRUCTIONAL SCHEDULE]

- Monday: Monster Evolution Research (Major) — 17:00 Venue: RB- 1

- Wednesday: Rune Crafting — 18:00 Venue: RB- 4

- Thursday: Martial Arts & Weapon Mastery — 10:00 Venue: RB- 7

- Friday: Beast Anatomy & Structural Biology — 14:00 Venue: RB- 5

"Four classes a week," Eric analyzed the spread. "Light classroom hours, but heavy expectations for independent study. Still... It’s a hundred times better than my old Computer Science Engineering course back on Earth. That degree was four straight years of hell."

Shaking off the nostalgic thought, Eric pushed himself up and took a seat on the woven meditation rug. He retrieved a cluster of high-grade Soldier-rank mana stones from his spatial inventory and summoned Coal from the beast space.

"No slacking off, buddy. Let’s get back to cultivation."

*Caw.*

Coal trilled softly, grasped a crystalline core within his ivory talons, and began quietly siphoning the raw elemental energy into his dark marrow.

Eric closed his eyes, engaged the *Seven Star Mana Circulation Manual*, and allowed the passive, crystalline aura of the *Ring of Tranquility* to wash over his nervous system.

The suite fell into an unbroken rhythm of silence. Hour after hour, pure starlight mana coursed through his seven celestial nodes, compressing, refining, and dripping like liquid diamond into his Mana Heart.

It felt like any standard evening of intense cultivation, until—

*SWOOSH—!*

The ambient mana trapped inside Room 401 didn’t merely circulate; it violently collapsed inward.

A sharp atmospheric vacuum formed near the corner of the room, pulling wild currents of raw energy directly toward the brass coat rack. Eric’s eyes snapped wide open, breaking his meditation as a sudden, suffocating wave of heavy shadow mana pressed down on his chest.

"What’s going on?!"

Eric looked up. Coal was perched atop the brass hook, his obsidian wings spread wide as a shroud of inky black vapors swirled violently around his frame. His bone-white beak crackled with microscopic arcs of dark energy, his feathers hardening into razor-sharp obsidian blades as his core spun at an astronomical velocity.

"Coal, you’re breaking through?!" Eric’s face lit up with pure exhilaration. "Hold the line, buddy! Shatter that bottleneck!"

For three breathless minutes, the dark vortex whipped across the suite, held in check only by the room’s reinforced isolation wards. Finally, the chaotic vapors funneled completely into Coal’s chest, vanishing into his core with a resonant, ringing chime.

*CAWWWWWWWW!*

Coal threw back his head and let out an ear-piercing, triumphant cry that vibrated with newfound vitality. His wings flapped with crisp, wind-splitting force, his bead-like black eyes glittering with razor-sharp predatory focus.

Eric quickly pulled up the system interface:

│ CONTRACTED BEAST STATUS

│

│ Name: Coal

│ Race: Bonepecker Crow

│ Cultivation Stage: Soldier

│ Level: 3 (0%)

│ Rank: D

│ Element: Shadow

│ Skills:

│ - Skystride (Rank C)

│ - Shadow Talons (Rank D)

│ - Shadow Clone (Rank D)

"Soldier Level 3!" Eric cheered, extending his arm as Coal glided down to land with a heavy, solid thud on his forearm pauldron. "You’re the best, Coal! That was fast!"

Before the words could fully clear his lips, a sudden, scorching rush of residual feedback flooded through their soul tether.

Because of the symbiotic bond linking tamer and contracted beast, Coal’s breakthrough sent a pure, concentrated wave of refined shadow-tempered mana surging backward into Eric’s Mana Heart. Eric’s liquid reserves swelled violently, washing through his newly purified meridians like a tidal wave.

Eric hurriedly opened his personal panel:

│ STATUS PANEL

│

│ Name: Eric

│ Race: Human

│ Cultivation Stage: Soldier

│ Level: 2 (72%)

│ Talent: Appraisal (Rank D), Skill Comprehension (Rank C)

│ Skills:

│ - Shadow Steps (Rank D) [Mastery: Major]

│ - Advanced Swordsmanship (Rank D) [Mastery: Major]

│ Contracted Beast: 1/2

Seventy-two percent.

A single breakthrough from his contracted beast had catapulted his own progress across nearly half a level in a single night.

Eric clenched his right fist, feeling the starlight mana humming with destructive density beneath his knuckles.

"I’m sitting right on the cusp of the bottleneck," Eric grinned, his pulse hammering with pure, unbridled ambition. "With the Seven Star method and Coal pulling ahead, it won’t take more than a few days. Soldier Level 3 is right around the corner."