Chapter 592: A New Belt

He had been very disappointed that he hadn’t gained any skill levels after the near-death experience. Or at least, he had been. Turns out that having a damaged soul had a weird effect on skill levels. Something about not being stable enough to manage the power increase.

His soul was still a little sore and worn out, but it was a world apart from its previous fractured state. Therefore, the moment he began using these skills, he received many notifications.

[Phoenix Renewal lvl 19 -> lvl 20]

[Phoenix Renewal lvl 20 -> lvl 21]

[Phoenix Renewal lvl 21 -> lvl 22]

[Phoenix Renewal lvl 22 -> lvl 23]

[Phoenix Renewal lvl 23 -> lvl 24]

Over the course of ten minutes of using his healing skill under the guidance of Freya, Julius was able to level up the skill four separate times. Apparently, it really paid off having his soul shattered into pieces. Five levels in one fight was more than he had ever experienced.

Although, to be fair, he suspected that most of these levels came from his subsequent efforts of holding his soul together.

That wasn’t the only skill that had some delayed levels.

[Armaments of the Arcane lvl 26 -> lvl 27]

[Sage of Savagery lvl 26 -> lvl 28]

[Pyrokinetic Embodiment of Ruin lvl 24 -> lvl 25]

[Void Strike lvl 10 -> lvl 11]

[Void Step lvl 12 -> lvl 13]

[Spirit Fortification lvl 15 -> lvl 16]

[Kinetic Shell lvl 16 -> lvl 19]

[Graveforce Impact lvl 10 -> lvl 14]

He had gained many levels. Especially in his rare skills. [Kinetic Shell] had even managed to reach the threshold of rare rank. He suspected that the merging of his three kinetic skills was almost ready. He could feel the three skills slowly weaving together the more he used them. It also felt like his advancement was speeding things up.

Additionally, Julius found out several very important things about his advancement. The first and most evident one was that he was no longer hindered by his mind’s limited ability to control multiple techniques. Well, he was still limited, but that limit had now expanded.

It had been a real struggle to handle his body enhancement, aura skills, kinetic skills, and constructs all at one time. Hence, it made using his void skills such as [Void Step] or [Void Strike], but more difficult on top of his already challenging load. That wasn’t even mentioning things like [Absolute Spatial Perception] and infusing his concepts into his skills.

However, now that the strain has significantly lessened.

Julius took a deep breath as he recovered some of his stamina. If there was one thing about Cain, it was that the man was disturbingly thorough when it came to matters of combat. Cain tested Julius in everything.

The other thing he noticed about his progress was how his body recovered. He was starting to realize what Freya and Cain meant when they said a Tier 4 body required much more focus and energy to recover.

The sheer amount of mana his body required to heal a little fatigue was quite staggering when compared to when he was in Tier 3. Of course, his body was a lot more powerful now, so there was a benefit as well. He could feel how dense his muscle fibers were and how much they had been strengthened by the advancement process.

The amount of mana he had at his disposal was quite extraordinary as well. He thought he had a lot of mana before, but it had more than doubled now that he had advanced. No wonder the Tier 4 he had fought in the past hadn’t been drained of mana when fighting against him. The reserves of a Tier 4 were truly massive. He could only wonder how much mana he would have when he advanced to Tier 5 or even Tier 6.

Still, he was grateful for his larger-than-average reserves more than ever. He suspected that he wouldn’t be able to properly use his body without the mana to fuel it.

Alongside his mana-hungry body, there were other amazing improvements. He could tell that his healing skill was more efficient than ever. It was like his body had been specially recreated for the sole purpose of channeling his life mana. So while his skill required more mana to heal himself, it was much smaller than he suspected it would have been if he hadn’t received the Ruinous Phoenix Body. A body that was heavily focused on healing.

Overall, the improvement in his body and his healing skills’ newfound efficiency heavily outweigh the increased cost of mana.

He also noticed the way his life mana technique, which he had learned from Tezuko Willow, had undergone significant changes. Previously, it felt like absolute hell to control and handle the explosive pockets of life mana he carved into his channels.

However, that had changed. It was like his new body had taken his previous actions into account, and there were already sections in his mana channels that were carved out specifically meant for his life mana to flow through.

The technique still wasn’t easy to use, far from it. But it no longer felt like he was trying to carve runes into a steel wall using a wooden stick while he was drowning. Now, his issue was the opposite. He could tell that his mana was quite a lot more powerful, and he had be careful about hurting himself.

Of course, his advancement wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. There were several glaring issues. One of them was that he was having an extremely difficult time controlling his new body with any ounce of grace. Something that Cain was clearly enjoying demonstrating to Julius.

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He attempted to slip Cain’s jab, but his timing was way off, and he ended up getting whacked by the following strike. He backed up, but used too much kinetic energy and tripped over his own feet, flying five feet backwards. Cain didn’t even bother to chase after him.