Refining the Heavens 5 (炼天五)

Chapter 33: Otherworld Techniques (Part 2)

Hidden somewhere in the Blacken Soot Mountain is a sealed cave lit internally by crystal lights. Countless books and scrolls defied gravity and floated around in the inside, and at the middle of them Kairos sat hovering in the air. Magically, the items never bummed or touched each other as they revolved slowly around him. Sparkling translucent tendrils seemed to reach out to every item, turning pages and scrolls alike.

If another mage is in this place, it will be hard to say whether the person will be utterly impressed by the amount of mana harnessed by him or weep from knowing that such power is spent on countless Circle 1 magic: Octopid Coil – an entry-level spell used to grab things out of reach.

The Octopid Coil is usually for apprentices trying to learn how to control and direct their spells. Because it is devised for such a purpose, it has a pretty high mana requirement for such a basic magic.

From Kairos' understanding, mana efficiency is somewhat a huge factor on Axis Mundi though not so much on Gaia where mana suffuses everything.

So it's not surprising that learning how to handle magic properly is an important lesson to begin with here.

Now, the reason why Kairos is using this spell is because he picked up beginner spellcasting as his first book. As an entry-level magic, it was easy enough to learn that even Kairos who have an average amount of talent could quickly familiarise using it.

Of course, given the ill-nature of those who arranged the pile of books and scrolls, he had to dig through the advance and intermediate materials on the top to get to the one he wanted.

Despite all the obstacles his opponents had placed to delay Kairos, the lad happily dove in as quickly as he could and grabbed hold of an apprentice spellbook with no regards to the time constraints.

If the leaders know that he forgo gaining several days' time in order to learn Octopid Coil, they will probably beat their chests in disbelief.

His opponents – a group made up of some of the most powerful individuals on the Axis - expected Kairos to have a good head on his shoulders; perhaps even near the level of having a photographic memory.

They believed that to buy time, Kairos will carefully manoeuvre around the difficult books, picking one of the three categories: Aura, Herbalism, or Spells, until he exhausted all the ones accessible to him.

As someone who is confident enough to accept this bet, the leaders of the three races expected at least this much ability from Kairos.

Oh, how have they underestimate him this much?

What Kairos has can be compared to nigh-omniscience. Well, maybe not to the level of knowing everything at once, but it is as close to it as humanly possible.

After all, the speed he needs to memorise things – any number of things – is instantaneous.

Even as all the books and scrolls are turning, each word is entering his mind through the Veritable Sight or Soul Perception, copied immaculately down to the spacing. But what brings him above the level of simple photographic memory is the way the information are stored in his mind.

No matter it is words, pictures, or sounds, at their core these are all mediums to carry meaning to another person.

In other words, it can be said that all information are passed around in an encrypted form – no matter it is done by sight, touch, taste, smell, or sound - only to be deciphered or decrypted in the brain of the receiver into meaning.

Insight - this is what makes Kairos superior to having photographic memory.

Whatever he learnt will automatically find the right sequence or pattern to exist in his memory. Everything he ever encountered exists in his mind in perfect retention and are connected to each other forming new meanings and unlimited potential. This is why he could decipher the ancient dwarven scrolls and alter cultivation manuscripts safely.