Chapter 39: Breakthrough
"...Are you awake?"
"..." Ethea turned her head toward him, her eyes catching the moonlight from the window as she stared at him blankly.
"Ahem." Soren coughed awkwardly.
"Right. Sorry." He shifted on his futon, choosing his words carefully. "I’m on the verge of breaking through to the Second Circle. My cultivation technique has its own method for it, and it’s completely different from the conventional methods." He paused. "I still have a few questions about all this. Do you mind if I ask?"
Ethea’s eyes narrowed slightly studying him.
Then, after a pause, she spoke.
"...Yes."
"Thank you."
Soren chose his words carefully, keeping the explanation brief.
"The conventional method says to push outward when the pressure peaks. But my technique requires me to suppress the mana instead, forcing it into absolute stillness until the Core implodes and shatters the boundary from within. My problem is judging the timing. If I act too early, it fails. If I wait too long, the pressure will destabilize the Core. When you broke through to the Second Circle, how did you know the exact moment to move?"
Ethea remained silent, her eyes drifting as she pulled up the memory.
Then she answered.
"...You’ll feel it. A moment of perfect clarity. The pressure stops building. Everything stills. That’s the moment you act."
Soren nodded slowly. "Perfect clarity. Understood."
He paused, organizing his next thought.
"The technique says the implosion will generate a shockwave strong enough to destroy the boundary entirely. But it also mentions that the destroyed boundary gets absorbed back into the Core as raw material. My concern is whether that absorption happens automatically or if I need to actively guide it. If I don’t control it properly, could the fragments scatter and damage my pathways instead?"
Ethea’s lips pressed together slightly, considering.
"...Automatic. The Core pulls it in naturally. Don’t interfere. Let it happen."
"Automatic. Don’t interfere." Soren repeated quietly, committing it to memory. "I got it."
He followed up with a few quick questions. Ethea answered each one in turn, her voice tight with effort but firm. Once he had no more questions left, Soren offered a nod of thanks.
"Thank you. Really. This helps more than you know."
Ethea’s gaze lingered on him for a moment before she closed her eyes.
Taking that as his cue, Soren settled onto the futon and closed his eyes.
He took a deep breath, pushing aside his lingering worries about the gate, the father and son, and Ethea. With his mind clear, only the pressure building at his Core remained.
He turned his awareness inward and began the process.
The first step was suppression.
Soren focused on his Core, feeling the Mana circulating inside it like a living current. It wanted to move, to flow, to expand. But, as told in the technique, he forced it to stop.
Obviously, the resistance was immediate. The pressure surged the moment he stopped the flow of mana. His chest tightened, cutting his breath short as sweat broke out on his forehead.
’H-hold it. Don’t let it move.’
He compressed the mana further, forcing the energy into tighter spirals. The pressure mounted until his ribs ached and his teeth gritted together, but he refused to stop.
The mana thrashed against his control like a caged beast. Pain shot through his chest, vibrating against his bones so violently it felt as if something inside was about to crack.
’Not... Not yet.’
He pushed deeper into the suppression, crushing the Mana down until the movement slowed to a crawl, then slowed further, and further still, until finally it stopped completely.
...Stillness.
For a single breathless moment, everything inside him went silent.
No movement, no flow, no pressure.
Just... clarity.
’This is it.’
Ethea’s voice surfaced in his memory. ’...A moment of perfect clarity. That’s the moment you act.’
’Now!’
Soren let go of the suppression all at once.
The mana drew inward, shrinking to a single point of extreme density that threatened to tear him apart from within. An instant later, that pressure exploded outward in a shockwave, shattering the boundary of his First Circle. The impact sent a sudden surge of pain through his entire body, and his back arched and his hands clenched into fists as he tried to scream, but no sound came out.
For a moment, the pieces of the broken boundary scattered. Then, just as Ethea had said, the Core pulled them back on its own. They spiraled inward, drawn by an unseen force, and melted into raw Mana that blended smoothly with the growing Core.
But the pain didn’t stop.
It burned through his pathways, searing and relentless, as the second layer began to form around the original Core.
’URGH!’
Soren gritted his teeth and held on as it slowly stabilized, piece by piece, until the pressure evened out and the burning subsided.
Then everything went still.
Soren opened his eyes, drenched in sweat and shaking. But it was done. He checked his Core, finding two distinct layers spinning together.
He let out a long breath, a weak smile breaking through his exhaustion.
"I... huf... did... huf... it."
He took deep breaths, waiting for his heart rate to slow and the trembling to stop. The sweat on his skin had turned cold, leaving his clothes damp and clinging to him, and every muscle felt completely wrung out.
But beneath all of that, something entirely different was settling into place. A depth he hadn’t felt before. A density and weight to the Mana moving through him, making everything prior feel shallow by comparison.
He looked across the room.
Ethea was watching him quietly in the dark, her ice-blue eyes catching the faint moonlight from the window.
"...I-I made it," he said between breaths. "...Thanks for the help."
She held his gaze for a moment. Then she turned back to the ceiling, but he caught her expression clearly this time. A faint smile brushed her lips, lasting for just a second before it disappeared.
"..."
Soren looked down at his hands and said nothing, but the corners of his mouth curved upward on their own.
He sat there for a while longer, letting his breathing fully settle and the last of the trembling work its way out of his muscles. Then he straightened up and rolled his shoulders slowly.
His body needed rest. Even more than before. But there was one thing he wanted to check first.
’...Status, open.’
Almost immediately, a translucent window materialized in his vision.
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[PERSONAL INFORMATION]
Name: Soren Valmere
Age: 22
Circle Rank: Second Circle (Early Stage)
Hunter Rank: F
[CORE STATUS]
Mana Capacity: 12,847 / 50,000
Core Stability: Optimal
Pathway Integrity: Excellent
Affinity: Ice (Grade 7 — S Rank) | Wind (Grade 5 — B Rank)
[INNATE ABILITIES]
• Accelerated Regeneration (C-Rank)
• Ironclad Body Constitution (C-Rank)
• Iron Will (D-Rank)
• Adrenaline Burst (C-Rank)
....
....
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