After Oliver Zeus finished talking to Alice Zenovia, he left her office. He felt like dragging Michael behind him but was also aware of the good rapport he had with Alice.
Oliver clicked his tongue just loud enough for Michael to hear before he closed the door behind him.
"Is he into you?" Michael asked suddenly.
"Hmm? You mean Oliver?" Alice responded with a slight surprise, "I don't think so. I never asked him though. We're better off as friends and colleagues, either way."
She looked into Michael's eyes and shrugged, "More important is that you're officially a Variable now. That means you will get a stash of resources that have been adjusted to the special training we've handpicked for you. The special training is customized and will help you to grow rapidly in the next few weeks."
Alice retrieved a tome from her War Rune. She threw it toward Michael and continued explaining, "Leviathan Diffusion is a technique that focuses on energy circulation and how to weave energy into your body and Artifacts to unleash their full potential. I am going to teach you an energy circulation technique that will allow you to unravel the Origin energy's potential, and absorb more energy from the surroundings and Energy Stones."
"So you're hoping that I'll advance to Tier-3 in the next few weeks using Leviathan Diffusion and the massive number of Energy Stones I've been given?" Michael asked to see if he understood Alice properly.
"That would be the optimal result," Alice nodded, "But I think you won't advance to Tier-3 that easily. If I'm not wrong you need as much energy as Kaleb to refine your War Rune, maybe even more. That shouldn't make any sense because an Awakened with a 7-Star Soultrait requires nearly thrice the energy an Awakened with a 6-Star Soultrait requires. Either you have multiple 6-Star Soultraits, which I genuinely doubt, or you have Soultraits that require more energy to be refined. It could also be because you have so many Soultraits as there is a theory that possessing more Soultraits leads to an exponential growth in energy demand."
Alice simply shrugged but didn't try to probe Michael about the number of his Soultraits or their power. It was obvious that she was curious, but she knew better than to ask Michael. He wouldn't give her the answer she hoped for, and their relationship might turn awkward as a result.
"Okay, but the goal is to give me enough resources to refine my War Rune rapidly. The Apex Nutrition Serum is for my body and mind to be refined to perfection at the 2nd Stage, whereas the Energy Stones ought to be used for my body, and mind, but mostly my War Rune. I see," Michael murmured to himself, retrieving Leviathan Diffusion from Alice.
"Let me teach you the basics first. After that, you should spend most of your spare time in the Origin Expanse to make use of the time dilation. Other than joining some teams to spar with them every now and then, and asking me for pointers about Leviathan Diffusion and everything else that might be of interest, you should stay in the Origin Expanse!" Alice said in a tone that left no room for refusal.
"Yes, yes. I understand," Michael said nonchalantly, opening the tome to start reading, "Do you want the tome back, or is it mine now?"
Alice didn't think much about Michael's question since he didn't sound particularly interested in hearing the answer, but the opposite was actually the case. It was crucial to know whether he could use extraction on the tome to procure a Wisp of Knowledge from it, or if he had to study the energy circulation technique in the old-fashioned way.
"Keep it. We don't really need this technique anymore. It has been years since we used parts of Leviathan Diffusion to integrate it into our Inheritance Technique. The tome is of no value for us at this point," Alice answered, her words attracting his curiosity.
'A portion of Leviathan Diffusion has been used to improve their Inheritance Technique? Doesn't that mean the technique is a lot rarer than Caesurium Menta and the other techniques in my possession?'
Michael was starting to feel excited. He stepped closer to Alice and smiled brightly, "Let's get started. I can't wait to practice Leviathan Diffusion!"
Four hours of thorough teaching followed Michael's excited exclamation. He listened intently to Alice's guidance and tips until she thought that he should pick up his resource package as Variable and enter the Origin Expanse to experiment with Leviathan Diffusion.
Michael was more than fine with that. He rushed home while simultaneously sending the drone courier to his place with the variable resource package.
The package arrived at the perfect time. He arrived in front of his room as he saw the drone approach. Michael let the drone scan his body to identify him before dropping the resource package into his hands. Afterward, the drone disappeared, leaving Michael alone to enter the room.
A second spatial bracelet had been delivered to him, just like that.
Michael accessed the spatial bracelet, only to notice that it was filled with Inferior Energy Stones. There was nothing else.
He tried to ignore the enormous wealth he'd been given today and focused on the task ahead. In the meantime, he completely forgot about his trade with Alice. Initially, he wanted to trade some Mythic Scrolls with her, but Leviathan Diffusion distracted him too much.
As of now, Michael wanted nothing more than to extract the Wisps of Knowledge from Leviathan Diffusion to improve his mastery and understanding of the technique as quickly as possible.
Michael entered the Origin Expanse and sat down on the floor inside his cozy room. He unleashed Extraction and enveloped the Leviathan Diffusion tome in a dazzling golden glow.
Six hours later, Michael's clothes were drenched in sweat. His breathing was ragged, and he felt like he was about to collapse on the ground.
It had been much harder to extract Leviathan Diffusion's Wisp of Knowledge. Still, he made it possible – after using the purified energy within two Energy Stones to keep his energy storage full.
The tendrils of Extraction made it easy to devour the purified energy within the Energy Stones. The energy entered his body near-instantaneously through the tendrils of Extraction where Michael could then use Pandemonium's Requiem to circulate the energy through his body wherever it was needed.
However, circulating Origin Energy through his body was not the forte of Pandemonium's Requiem. Absorbing energy was.
Michael could use Extraction to absorb energy from the surroundings and other objects. Therefore, Leviathan Diffusion was perfect. It was almost as if the technique had been created for him. Its' forte was energy circulation, not energy absorption, after all!
Michael consumed Leviathan Diffusion's Wisp of Knowledge right away without taking even a moment to rest. He was impatient and desired to start practicing the technique right away. Unfortunately, the flood of information was more intense than he anticipated. Michael's mind was flooded with information and knowledge imprinted straight into his brain.
He spent another six hours panting, his clothes drenched in sweat, and his entire head feeling like splattering into countless pieces. Fortunately, nothing like that happened.
Michael digested the Wisp of Knowledge within six hours before he fell asleep right after. He woke up the next morning with a wide variety of new knowledge in his head.
"Reaching profound mastery of Leviathan Diffusion in the next few weeks shouldn't be an issue. By then…I should be able to combine Extraction's power and Leviathan Diffusion well enough to improve my strength several times faster than before!"
Since he was eager to start, Michael didn't waste any more time. He retrieved a small stash of Energy Stones from one of the two spatial bracelets and released dozens of extraction tendrils. Each of the tendrils tapped into the purified energy stored within one Inferior Energy Stone. He devoured the energy within and transferred it straight inside his body.
From one moment to the next, Michael's body began overflowing with origin energy. He began to practice Leviathan Diffusion and circulated the origin energy through his body. Using Leviathan Diffusion to control tides of origin energy felt a little bit weird at first, but since Michael possessed the knowledge of the tome he knew that it was normal to feel like this. Therefore, he persisted knowing that the discomfort would disappear with time.
Controlling the tides of energy precisely, Michael led small streams to the pillar of light where the energy was absorbed and consumed. As the pillar of light was filled with energy his War Rune was being refined. Michael's War Rune worked tirelessly to refine as much energy as possible. But this time everything was much easier. Leviathan Diffusion controlled tides of energy that were split into countless small streams. The streams were weaved into the pillar of light in a natural setting where the War Rune had a much easier time digesting the energy to improve its refinement degree.
Michael was a little clumsy at first but given the knowledge he'd extracted earlier, he took note of his mistakes quickly. He noticed his flaws and mistakes and fixed them within minutes. By the time the first batch of Inferior Energy Stones was consumed, Michael reached the basic mastery of Leviathan Diffusion.
Three days later Michael attained the Intermediate mastery, and one week later his mastery was already at the Advanced level.
Michael continued to focus on his War Rune's refinement degree until the end of the third week. He'd been tirelessly consuming Inferior Energy Stones to improve his War Rune and didn't leave the Origin Expanse even once. Michael had yet to start refining his mind, and body as he wanted to either way.
Nonetheless, he attained profound mastery of Leviathan Diffusion, creating the foundation to consume a tremendous amount of energy at once. That was perfect to not only improve his War Rune in the future but also to accelerate the energy circulation for his body refinement and mind refinement.
'I have only 5 weeks departed before the departure. Let's make use of that!'
