Chapter 208: Passing the Test |
By the third second after the test began, the upper base of the cone formed by the sand inside the hourglass had already become extremely small, almost about to pass through the neck of the glass.
And Fulan’s spell was only barely released at the very end of that second, almost precisely at the moment when the last few grains of sand were about to fall.
As a Second-Tier Mage, Zane’s mind worked quickly. The instant he noticed the situation above, he decided that there was absolutely no way Fulan could pass this test.
Previously, he had merely been making inferences based on Fulan’s actions, but in that instant, he reached a direct conclusion.
Even though Fulan cast very quickly—faster than most mages—the tight timing would still make her fail.
Perhaps if she practiced more, she might be able to pass the test a few days later, but certainly not now...
The moment that thought appeared in Zane’s mind, he saw a strange distortion appear in the air around the dummy.
The cloth covering its body seemed to undergo some terrifying change and became somehow different.
Yet from the outside, the dummy showed no major visible change in shape. It only looked as though the cloth on its body had become more tightly pressed against it.
Zane widened his eyes and thought of the spell Fulan had selected a few days ago, 【Forced Fusion】. Could it be that Fulan had actually already mastered this spell...?
Before Zane could continue thinking, he saw that the instant the second dummy dropped from above, before it had even touched the ground—
the cloth covering its body suddenly clung tightly to it midair, causing some strange and inexplicable change to occur to the dummy.
But it was not over yet. Before the second dummy had even stopped swaying after landing, the third dummy dropped from above as well, and before it even touched the ground, the hourglass in front of Zane stopped counting.
Then a green notification bar popped up before him.
He knew what that meant.
Fulan had already passed this test.
Yet he was still confused by what Fulan had just displayed. He had noticed that she had used the spell she received a few days ago, 【Forced Fusion】.
He did not know that Fulan was not from the Alchemy School. If he had known, he would have been even more astonished.
Under normal circumstances, for a First-Tier Mage to learn a First-Tier Spell, it would usually take several weeks before they could successfully release it. To use it skillfully, it would take at least several months.
But Fulan’s situation was clearly very different from that of other mages. He remembered clearly that Fulan had indeed claimed this spell a few days ago.
He did not know whether Fulan had learned this spell before, but he was inclined to think that she had not learned it at all.
Because Fulan had no need to deliberately choose a spell she had already learned just to deceive him. No matter what, he could not provide her with any substantial help.
Thus, the conclusion that followed was that Fulan had only used a few days to reach the point where she could cast a First-Tier Spell with ease.
And not merely cast it with ease, but cast it in such a short amount of time—a level that a normal mage would need years of immersion in a particular spell to achieve.
Either that meant Fulan was extraordinarily gifted, or her spiritual power far surpassed that of the other mages present, allowing her to compress the casting time of a spell through sheer spiritual strength.
Of course, when faced with such a startling result, he was more inclined to believe that multiple factors had combined to allow Fulan to train 【Forced Fusion】 to this extent in such a short time.
Part of it was that her spiritual power was clearly stronger than that of the other mages.
Part of it was her own understanding of spells.
And more than that, there was even the possibility that she had previously come into contact with related spells.
Only through the combination of all these factors could someone like Fulan possibly bring a spell to this level in merely a few short days.
Meanwhile, Nora blinked, only then reacting to what had just happened.
Her thoughts were not as fast as those of Zane, a Second-Tier Mage. All she had noticed was that Fulan had been channeling a spell down below for a very long time.
Then, just as time was about to run out, the second dummy suddenly dropped down, then the third dummy dropped as well, and after that, the scene fell into silence. The magical hourglass also stopped running.
She did not possess Zane’s experience and insight, so she could not immediately connect the spell to 【Forced Fusion】, the spell Fulan had claimed a few days ago.
She only thought that Fulan had used some spell she had practiced for a long time but that Nora herself had never seen before.
Although she failed to recognize the spell, when Fulan cast it, Nora clearly sensed the fluctuations of spell power from it, as well as the intensity of the spiritual power within it.
That made Nora’s heart tremble.
Because she could sense that the spiritual power Fulan had just displayed was far stronger than her own by a large margin.
As a member of the Joberna Society, Nora had likewise met the requirement that, upon advancing to the rank of formal mage, her spiritual power was already sufficient to pass the first evaluation and thus qualify to join the Joberna Society.
She knew that her spiritual power was among the most outstanding of mages her age. Even among the mages who had just entered the Joberna Society, her spiritual power ranked near the top.
And yet, even with that level of spiritual power, she was still inferior to what Fulan had just displayed...
“What exactly is wrong with the person in charge of the Elemental School at Apprentice City Lodris? How did they let someone like this get snatched away by another school?”
She frowned. Logically speaking, a mage with this level of spiritual power ought to have joined the Elemental School.
But that only strengthened her determination to pull Fulan into the Elemental School.
Although she knew Fulan would not easily change her mind right now and switch over to the Elemental School, she also knew that the Elemental School possessed certain things that every mage longed for.
As long as she kept building a good relationship with Fulan like this and dropped hints again and again, then one day, Fulan would surely come to her of her own accord and ask to switch schools...
Meanwhile, down below, Fulan used her spiritual power to sense the three dummies that had been destroyed by her spell just now.
She could feel that the contents inside the dummies had already been crushed apart by her powerful spiritual power and mixed together, so naturally the magical detection system would register them as damaged.
Even the cloth that had been meant to block attacks had partially mixed together into something that even Fulan herself could not quite describe.
The reason Fulan had been able to produce such an effect was partly thanks to her diligent practice of 【Forced Fusion】 over the past few days, which had raised it to beginner-level proficiency.
Another part was thanks to her powerful spiritual power. Just now, she had not even used her full strength to channel the spell. Instead, she had allocated her spiritual power toward maintaining the spell itself, allowing a single spell to affect all three dummies at once.
By her rough estimate, if she accelerated the channeling of this spell as much as possible, the fastest she could probably manage was 1.9 seconds.
A faint smile curled at the corner of Fulan’s lips, and then she turned and walked out of the testing room.