Chapter 169: Questionable Methods

“So what now?” Julius asked after wiping the wetness from his face, purposefully ignoring Alice’s and Dante’s smirks.

“Now you should have some room for you to evolve your Fire Concept without your soul collapsing in on itself even with my assistance,” Alice told him.

“Yeah, you never explained that part. I was always a bit confused about that part of the plan.”

“I didn’t want you to be thinking too far ahead. I wanted you to focus on the present. You have the habit of jumping ahead,” Alice reminded him.

He gave an acknowledging smile. “And now?”

“Remember how Dante mentioned that your Fire Concept was a bit ‘lackluster’?”

“Of course, it was very rude of him,” he said while giving Dante a meaningful glance.

“But true,” Julius heard Dante mutter.

Alice gave both of them reproaching looks. “Anyway, he wasn’t necessarily wrong. Your Concept of Fire probably came from your superior skill. However, since your soul was already overloaded and worn down, you probably could not get the actual Concept you would have under ideal conditions.”

I would have gotten a different Concept? He asked himself.

“What do you mean?” He asked deliberately slow.

“You’re saying that you don’t have any ideas?” Alice asked him knowingly.

“A few,” he admitted.

“And…?”

He had honestly been thinking about it for a long time at this point. The idea was in the name of his skill [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] was a telling indicator. A Phoenix was a mythical bird representing life, fire, and rebirth.

The fact that his skill had the word Phoenix in its name had him hoping that the skill would be related to what a Phoenix represented. However, pseudo meant it was an incomplete version of a Phoenix. This made it seem like the evolved version was a completed Phoenix or something closer to the real deal.

Still, he didn’t want to get his hopes up too high. He would rather not be disappointed if he didn’t get the skill he was hoping to acquire at epic.

That being said, Alice was making it seem like the idea had some merit after all.

“A Phoenix Concept is a real thing?” He asked carefully.

“Oh, it sure is. Very rare and very desirable. I myself do not know anybody personally with that Concept. You on the other hand seem to have a fragmented Concept of Phoenix intertwined with your skill going off of the Fire Concept you acquired as well as the nature of the skill itself. This is also a big reason why it is a superior skill and so potent at its rank. Do you really think someone at Tier 2 should have such a powerful healing skill?” Alice smiled at him with a chuckle.

“If it’s so rare, how do you know it’s not just a Fire Concept? Why are you so sure it is a Phoenix Concept?”

Dante grunted and got out of his chair. “You want me to tell you why a Phoenix Concept is so rare?” He asked Julius.

Julius looked up at the approaching old man and nodded eagerly at him.

Dante sat down in the seat next to him. “It is every healer’s dream to gain a life-related Concept like a Phoenix Concept. You won’t find a single healer who wouldn’t be willing to trade both of their arms for a fragment. But it takes a special kind of person to gain a Phoenix Concept. One is that someone needs an appropriate fire and life affinity, which is rarer than you would think. Most fire users are fighters and most life users are healers, two very opposite paths.”

Dante itched his beard before continuing. “It’s not just an affinity thing either. An integral part of your soul must have a deep connection with life and death. Yet, a young Tier 2 like you already has such a connection. It is one of the first things I noticed about you. You are familiar with death and have a weirdly personal connection with it. I don’t know how and honestly, I don’t particularly care either. But you fit the mold. If anyone is going to have a Phoenix Concept I’m going to bet it’s the person who fulfills the requirements and has a bloody skill with Phoenix in the name.”

Julius refrained from reacting to Dante’s statement about his connection with death. He was scarily accurate about that. Instead, he scratched his head awkwardly.

Furthermore, when Dante put it like that, it was easy to see their point of view. Still, even if that was true, that leaves one very large question.

“How do I evolve my Fire Concept to a Phoenix Concept?”

“Beats me,” Dante shrugged unknowingly. “If it was up to me, I would just throw you in a fire and have you constantly heal yourself until you get it.”

Julius averted his eyes to the ground and tried not to remember that was exactly what he had done before to learn his Fire Concept.

Dante was close enough to Julius to realize something was off. The old man leaned closer and impolitely poked around his aura. Julius wasn’t able to fight off Dante’s aura no matter how hard he pushed back and the old man was able to get a sense of his emotions.

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Dante leaned back and looked at Julius with a disgusted but also proud grin. “Seriously?”

He didn’t look up at the man but nodded his head, confirming it.

“You want to try it again?” Dante asked him.

“We’re not throwing him into a fire!” Alice cut Dante off.

“Why not? He already admitted that he’s done it. What’s the harm of doing it again?”

“You’re seriously asking me what the harm is with setting a young boy on fire?” Alice asked questioningly.

“You practically commanded the kid to torture himself for weeks. Don’t tell me you draw the line at this. The soul tempering was probably more painful than the fire was,” Dante argued.

“It was,” Julius instinctively commented before he could stop himself.

“We can try out some other way first,” she said after she gave a sharp look at Julius.

“Like what? Do you have any ideas or know many people who got a Phoenix Concept? I’m sure you can try to find a manual lying around somewhere,” Dante huffed out sarcastically.