The next few days, Ezra's mind was in turmoil.
The fact that Red Spawn had begun their work hit him hard.
After a few hours of sulking though, Ezra's eyes shone with a greater resolve.
He intended to fish out Red Spawn after completing his revenge, but the sudden revelation forced his plans to change.
Red Spawn had to be stopped, and unfortunately, most did not know of their existence, nor did he in his past life until they revealed themselves.
Horrifying memories played in his mind.
But it could also be said that he owed his past achievements to them.
Had he not been sent to face a group of demon worshippers, most of his squad would have not gotten killed and he wouldn't have the mana technique hidden away.
It was funny how things play out sometimes.
"Huu…"
In any case, that was a lifetime ago. This time, he was determined to do something about it.
But before that, he needed information to plan accordingly.
If they were active since now, yet weren't revealed until 1726 in his past life, then many things were amiss.
All were but assumptions, so he had to be careful to keep his assumptions apart from facts.
Afterwards, he began training with new fervor.
At Advance-rank, his mana pool was beyond words, and to fill it up would take a lot of time as the Mindless Cultivation was naturally slow.
Now, he no longer held mana stones in his teeth as the mana coming down his gullet was not enough.
Rather, he threw it into his mouth - not swallowing, of course.
'Now, shall I begin?'
He began his routine practice.
He'd do slow movements to warm his body before getting into the first of the Infinite Forms.
He practiced the sequences of sixty movements in different orders, noting any new discoveries in a book, and comparing it with the previous ones.
Later, he'd visit the library to study Mages and many other things.
Then, he'd make sure to shower the snake egg in lightning before placing it back in its dark corner illuminated by mana stones.
At dusk, he'd review his combat techniques, proceeding to tinker with the movement sequence, while adding or removing a few for further scrutiny.
Like so, his days melted away.
Sebastian was unable to make headway on the case of the dead boy, a situation that frustrated Ezra.
But what could he do? Rather than fussing over what he couldn't control, he focused on what he could.
All that frustration materializes as harder training. He'd gotten even heavier braces, quadruple what he wore before.
What? He went from Adept to Advanced rank. The increase in strength was to be expected.
Assuming the war ended in a year's time, Ezra set his goal to becoming a Master by then.
It was an unnatural goal by all means, but he learned from his past life that he almost always fell short of his goals.
This meant that, if reaching Expert-rank was his goal, he could fail, but if he aimed to be a Master, he'd at least reach Expert-rank.
Like so, he had Bard concoct potions to speed his growth, especially to augment his musculature.
While this would prove fatal in the future as he wouldn't grow much more in physical aspects, the threat of demon worshippers pushed him to take such risks. He could not allow himself to be unprepared for circumstances he knew about beforehand.
Besides, where would the space for regret be if he died because he was too weak?
Bard promised to keep the side effects to a minimum.
Upon downing three vials of it at once, Ezra was bedridden for two weeks.
It was a nightmare as being unable to move made him remember his infancy.
He felt so stifled it wasn't funny, but upon trying to stand, he puked the contents in his stomach.
Apparently, Ezra was allergic to one of the ingredients in the potion.
That said, he did see its effects.
His body grew slightly day by day.
Then, his mother was looking after him.
When was the last time she had the chance to take care of her son so much? She loved every part of it, hoping he'd stay in bed for a few more weeks.
It wasn't all bad for Ezra since Bard had said he'd needed to halt training while experiencing the growth spurt.
Citing this, his mom didn't hesitate to feed him three more vials of the same potion.
"With this, you'll need another two weeks in bed. Your body will have fully recovered by then"
Ezra was too puzzled to speak, so he just sighed at the ridiculousness.
Like so, Ezra spent two weeks in bed.
He then saw his mother off and picked up new braces along the way.
Coming back, he thoroughly examined himself.
While drinking the potion, he made sure to use mana to disperse its effects all over his body.
He wouldn't want to have arms looking like cinder blocks while his feet were tiny, now would he?
Alas, he soon found that like most fears were unfounded.
The rate of growth was small, intended to take place over a long period of time.
Meaning that he was unable to exercise for a long period as well.
He also halted cultivation because he feared an increase in mana might cause the potion to bring about unexpected effects.
That didn't stop him from weapon's training though.
Now, freer than ever, his dedication to mastering the Infinite Forms bordered on obsession.
And that obsession paved the way for massive transformations.
Throwing hundreds of throwing knives made of blood and taking thousands of sword swings advanced his mastery over both weapons significantly.
He practiced with a staff, short sword and sometimes longswords.
Gaining initial mastery in the thirty-six staff movements, he stopped there and took out Skyfall.
Unknowingly, it held a pleasant surprise for him.
Upon infusing it with mana, Ezra entered a dream-like state where he watched a man perform multiple movements with the scythe.
While baffling at first, he understood that an armament of Kaldun would have some oddities and decided this was one of them.
Then, he imitated the man's movements, discovering new moves while realizing the errors in his previous ones.
The Infinite Forms were once again added to with many taken out, and Ezra found his realization translated into increased mastery for the other weapons he wielded.
Five months passed as he re-learned everything about the scythe. At the end of it, he experienced a breakthrough not in his scythe wielding, but in swordsmanship.
Happiness was abounding as he jumped and punched out.
With that done, he knew he still had ways to go to become a master, so he trained harder.
Once he mastered the teaching of the scythe's apparition, he was pulled into the familiar blank space to face his opponent.
This time, he was unallowed to challenge the scythe wielder with anything but a scythe.
'I see. This is why I was taught how to better wield scythes'
'Eh?!'
At the start of the fight, Ezra's opponent had the scythe blades straighten, becoming a double sword staff rather than a scythe.
'Can I do that…"
*Shin*
"…too?'
He got his answer with his scythe having its blades straighten as well.
'Now I'm glad I practiced those staff techniques' he grinned.
Both opponents went at each other, and the first exchange had Ezra's smirk wiped off.
'What?! It's gotten stronger!'
*Kriiee!*
The blades clashed multiple times as Ezra had to grit his teeth to endure his opponent's attacks.
"Damn" he grunted.
"If only I could use…"
He didn't finish because, as he thought that, the opponent's blade lit with a red light.
Recognizing it, Ezra retreated in alarm, but the opponent followed up and swung his weapon.
Upon contact, an explosion occurred and Ezra was blasted back.
He barely got his footing back before the opponent was back on his tail.
'Damn it! He's not giving me a break!'
With anger, he flared his aura, imbuing one hand with ice and the other with Lightning.
As it neared him, Ezra dropped the scythe, proceeding to hold the blade, hot as it was, with the hand imbued with ice, before punching out with the palm with lightning.
*Boom*
Unable to avoid it, the opponent flew afar, before stamping his feet into the ground.
"Hehe. Weren't expecting that, were you?"
Without stopping, Ezra advanced with no weapon in hand.
His right hand and legs lit up with lightning, allowing him to reach the opponent.
His grin was magnanimous as he landed a fist on the opponent's weapon, hitting him back.
'Why didn't I think of this before?' he realized.
It was maximum stupidity to fight fair with a person beyond one's skill level.
So…
'I'll end this while he's still unbalanced'
He kept at his attacks, increasing the punches as it went.
Of course, as he did so, wounds formed faster, but because he didn't give his opponent space to swing his scythe freely, he incurred far less wounds than he normally would.
Then, it seemed the opponent was inflexible in thinking as he didn't let go of the scythe even in such a situation.
Ezra couldn't be happier. Inflexible thinking was a suicidal act in battle as far as he was concerned.
As the thought then came to him…
'Hmm. It's a rare opportunity. Let's test it'
It was time to end the battle.
