Chapter 233: Casual RIft Delving

Reinera POV

Reinera and Julius continued to put off their delve into the rift for the time being. Neither of them was in too much of a rush to get back to Heston.

Especially not when they had two very helpful people, personally tutoring them every day.

While Richard was helping Julius with [Thermal Empowerment], Rebecca was helping her with aura and willpower training.

Although she had exceptional mana control, her aura and willpower didn’t quite match that standard. In particular, it was her willpower that was the thing that needed the most work.

That was where Rebecca came in. She had been a great help for her and her aura. The older woman used her aura to suppress Reinera’s almost constantly.

She had to fight for every inch of the way. Rebecca not showing the least bit of mercy. Unlike many of the tutors she has had in the past who had been much more gentle with her.

She didn’t know whether to love or hate that Rebecca was the complete opposite of that. The woman was like a demon when it came to training. She couldn’t help but think that the woman would be a better fit for someone like Julius.

Speaking of Julius, she looked over to where he and Richard were sparring. Julius had recently gotten his new body enhancement skill and was getting used to it with Richard’s help.

She had not really ever known how hard Julius trained.

During school, she mainly interacted with Julius in the library or the cafeteria. She didn’t see him much outside of that.

And while she knew that he was stupidly strong for his tier, she had always believed that it was mainly talent that had gotten him there, much like her in a way.

It wasn’t until the past few weeks occurred that she began to realize that Julius wasn’t just talented, he was absurdly hard working on top of it.

She had heard things from his other friends such as Lily and Aubrey. They always joked about his training habits, but she didn’t realize that they were actually being serious. She thought they were just exaggerating things, even after she learned of his strength.

They were right. Julius did not stop training.

Long after Reinera was done with her own willpower training, she would spend the rest of the day recovering or relaxing. Despite this, Julius continued to work on his skill far long after Richard was gone.

It made her feel lazy. Even though she wasn’t, she couldn’t help but feel that way. Seeing someone work that hard made one feel like their own efforts were insufficient. It didn’t matter if that person in question was a maniac or not.

“Don’t try to compare yourself to him, Grace,” she heard Rebecca console her from the side.

She briefly glanced toward the woman who had snuck up behind her once again. “It’s hard not to. We’re about the same age after all,” she replied.

“I’m serious. It won’t do you any good. Trust me, my brother was exactly the same way. I tried to keep up with him, but no matter what, I wasn’t able to,” Rebecca said with a solemn frown.

“Your brother, Aden?”

“Yeah. I always like to tell people that his real talent wasn’t his incredible comprehension or perfect affinity, that it was his love for the sword that got him there,” she nodded at Reinera.

Reinera shook her head. Passion was a good word for it. Though, she could think of another word as well.

Obsession.

When she looked at Julius train for over ten hours non-stop, she saw obsession in his eyes. It was a mad glint of something that terrified her. But at the same time, it motivated her to try and keep up.

And keep up she would try.

She turned to look at Rebecca with a determined look on her face.

“Let’s go one more time before we take a break.”

Rebecca didn’t even bat an eye and just smiled at her while shaking her head.

***

Julius POV

Julius was honestly surprised at how open Richard was with sharing his skills. Most people didn’t like the share the details of their skills or abilities, and Julius was included on this list.

Richard didn’t just tell him what kind of skill it was either. He was telling Julius exactly how he got it, including the names of the skills and Concepts he used to combine them.

Then again, it would probably be next to impossible to recreate the same skill as Richard even if Julius knew exactly the process.

Hell, even if Richard personally helped Julius, it would still be highly unlikely to be successful.

Pushing those negative thoughts away, he examined the swirling blue vortex in front of him with a small grin.

“Finally, I was thinking you would never let me delve,” Julius said to the man next to him, not looking at him because he was already aware of the exasperated expression on the man’s face.

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“Don’t be like that. There is no reason why you shouldn’t take a bit of time to acclimate yourself to your tier and new skill. There are times when you need to slow down,” Richard said to him.

“Is that why the Lord Marquis decided to assign you to me and Rebecca to Reinera?” Julius asked suddenly.

He was paying very close attention to Richard when he asked this question. He had been waiting for the right moment to slip this question in, wanting to catch Richard off guard a little bit and get a genuine reaction. After all he had been curious about it for a while now, but just hadn’t had to opportunity to ask.

But his timing was the only reason why he even noticed a flicker in the man’s facial features. His aura didn’t show anything, but Julius wasn’t naive.

Richard would never allow his aura to move outside of his control.

His facial expressions on the other hand… Well, that was something that the man seemed to have a harder time controlling.

“What’s with the odd question?” Richard smoothly asked, as if nothing was wrong. That flicker was gone as quickly as it appeared, nowhere to be seen.