Mizuki’s words echoed in my head, paralyzing my vocal cords.

  He is the one who fought and defeated us with Jase.

  My jaw hit the floor. I stood there completely frozen, my brain desperately trying to process the sheer absurdity of my luck. This swaying, wine-chugging old man was the legendary human who had teamed up with my 800-year-old True Demon ancestor to smack down the two arrogant elemental deities currently living in my chest? Talk about stumbling into a goldmine.

  The old man, having finally calmed down from his healing-induced euphoria, stood tall. The drunken haze was entirely gone, replaced by an imposing, mountain-like presence.

  "I am Azure Blades," he announced, his voice carrying the weight of absolute authority. "And from now on, I shall train you and pass down my knowledge to you. So, let's begin the training."

  "Wait! Wait! Wait!" I yelled, throwing my hands up in a literal 'time-out' gesture. "What the heck did you say? Azure Blades?"

  My mind raced through the aristocratic family trees I’d memorized. "You mean the strongest Blades' family descendant!" I gasped, pointing a finger at him. "That means you are Leonica's ancestor!"

  Azure blinked, his stoic master facade instantly cracking. "What?!" he sputtered. "My bloodline is not yet ended?"

  "Kind of," I explained, shifting my weight. "Your family was a good friend of my family, the Crimsons, so they adopted the last surviving member of the Blades." I grinned, thinking of my overpowered sister. "Her name is Leonica. Leonica Blades, but now she is a Crimson—not by blood, though."

  I gestured enthusiastically toward the main campus. "Let's go then, we should meet her!" It would be the ultimate flex. Imagine dropping by your sister's dorm room with her supposedly dead, god-tier ancestor in tow.

  "We can't," Azure sighed, instantly shutting down my glorious family reunion plans.

  "Why not?"

  "Because the disciples can meet only after five years," Azure explained strictly. "We isolate to train and be prepared to enter the actual schedule of the Academy. And, only then, we fight to be chosen as the Core Disciples."

  I stared at him for a long moment, my Earth-CEO logic immediately flagging the structural pacing of this world.

  (Ragna thinks: Yeah, what a 'coincidence' that exactly when I, the supposedly reincarnated hero, enter the Academy, all the important structural events are perfectly scheduled according to my timing. I told you all: plot armor. The writer definitely likes me.)

  "No problem," Azure continued, completely oblivious to my fourth-wall break. "These years will pass really fast in our training." He turned and started walking away. "Follow me. I will show you the fastest way to cultivate anyone has ever known."

  And so, Azure led Ragna away from the Academy grounds. They traveled to a secluded, sacred hill—the tomb of the First King and the resting place of all the greatest heroes ever born in Xeria.

  As they crested the hill, Ragna looked around at the massive, imposing stone monuments. He read the ancient names etched into the rock.

  There was the tomb of Hercules.

  There was the tomb of Ram.

  Right at the very top, glowing with a brilliant golden light, was the tomb of Arya.

  I stopped dead in my tracks. I furiously rubbed my eyes, convinced my brain was glitching.

  "Wait!" I shouted, pointing a shaking finger at the grave. "Percy Jackson... seriously?!"

  I looked up at the sky in absolute disbelief. "That means Rick Riordan knew." My entire worldview was shattering. Was Earth just a massive spoiler board for Xeria?

  Suddenly, Yang's spectral head popped out of my shoulder, looking equally confused.

  "I thought we were not sponsoring anyone," Yang muttered, looking directly up past the sky and straight at the reader. "Were we, writer?"

  A booming, exasperated voice echoed out of literally nowhere, vibrating through the fabric of reality itself.

  "Oh, c'mon, he's my favorite writer," the Author grumbled from the heavens. "Alright, back to the story."

  If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  We stood in front of the grand, glowing tomb of the First King. Azure walked right up to the sacred monument, popped the cork on that Supreme Gold-tier wine I had literally risked my life to buy, and casually started pouring it straight into the dirt near the grave.

  My inner CEO screamed in financial agony. Hey! What are you doing?! That's my ROI!

  "This is our First King's tomb," Azure stated calmly, emptying the bottle. "And I discovered something. If we pour wine near the grave, it makes its surroundings many times more efficient for cultivation."

  I blinked. Wait, what? Did he just discover a literal exploit in the magic system?

  "The better and more expensive the wine, the more times efficient the area becomes," Azure explained, tossing the empty bottle aside. "For now, with this one, it would be 20X."

  Twenty times exp boost?! Forget the financial agony. That is the ultimate pay-to-win mechanic.

  Azure turned to me, his expression shifting into strict mentor mode. "You will cultivate here for this year. That term will be finished in four months, as we have already wasted three months." Yeah, no thanks to you playing statue under a tree. "We don't have time for the normal things," he continued. "Reach the Qi Formation stage in these months, then I will teach you a sword technique."

  I couldn't help it. I scoffed. Four months to jump a whole major cultivation stage with a 20X multiplier? Who did he think he was talking to?

  "What are you saying?" I smirked, crossing my arms. "I would reach there in less than a month."

  Azure sighed, giving me that classic 'arrogant youth' look. "Don't be too confident, boy. It may look easy, but it is not. And this 20X effect will be over after 4 months."

  "Oh, I'm not just confident, I'm proposing a bet," I countered. "What if I reach it in less than a month? I'll not wish for much, just give me a good sword if I did."

  Azure looked at me, completely unconvinced. "Alright."

  And true to his word, Ragna completely shattered the old master's expectations. He reached the Qi Formation stage in exactly 25 days.

  Azure was absolutely shocked.

  Having won the bet with days to spare, Ragna decided he needed to optimize this broken game mechanic even further. Taking Yang along for the ride, he wandered across the entire kingdom for five days straight, entirely focused on finding the world's best wine. Using his innate, gamer-like ability to see the literal stats of items, he meticulously scanned the markets.

  He finally found it, but the price tag was absurd: 50 Royal Gold coins (or 5 Supreme Gold). It effectively wiped out half of his total remaining wealth, leaving him with a stash of exactly 55 Royal Gold and 5 standard gold coins.

  But to Ragna's min-maxing mindset, it was worth every single penny. Pouring that mythical vintage on the First King's grave skyrocketed the area's cultivation efficiency to an unbelievable 120X multiplier.

  Riding that insane wave of dense Qi, Ragna didn't just stop at Qi Formation Stage 1. He bulldozed his way to Qi Formation Stage 2 within those remaining 4 months. And he didn't stop there; he kept cultivating continuously for 10 more months, even though he was broken now, he broke through to Stage 3.

  So, let me break down exactly how I pulled off this absolute miracle for those of you trying to keep track of the math at home.

  First off, I’m a True Demon. That’s not just an edgy title to scare the local nobles; it means my body naturally absorbs and processes Qi at exactly twice the speed of an average human. My base rate is already double.

  Now, add in the ridiculously expensive vintage I poured all over the First King’s grave. That gave me a 120 times enhancement. But, like all good things, it didn't last forever. The 120X effect held strong for exactly one month before the premium buzz wore off, dropping back down to the standard 20X enhancement for the remaining two months.

  Between the True Demon biology and the heavily intoxicated sacred dirt, my core was practically gorging on energy.

  As I’ve explained before, cultivating isn't just sitting cross-legged in the dirt, breathing deeply, and hoping you magically get stronger. Let’s get a little technical for a second. Every single major stage requires a completely different mechanical approach. You can't just repeat the same basic exercise and expect exponential growth; the physics of this world don't work like that.

  Take the first stage, Qi Refinement. That process is relatively passive. You are basically taking the raw, ambient Qi naturally layered around your physical body, filtering out the impurities, and consuming it to expand your core's capacity. Think of it like catching rainwater in a cup.

  But Qi Formation? That requires actual engineering. You don't just absorb what's around you; you actively force the environmental Qi to obey your will. The standard method is to pull the surrounding energy and compress it into a localized, highly concentrated source—essentially forging a pressurized sphere of Qi just outside your body. Once the sphere is stabilized, you consume that dense cluster of energy directly.

  The logic here is straightforward: the greater your mental focus, the tighter you can compress the sphere. A tighter sphere means denser Qi, which translates to a vastly more efficient power source.

  Luckily for me, unyielding mental focus was practically my job description in my past life. You don’t survive hostile corporate takeovers, endless board meetings, and the sheer stress of running a massive company without the ability to lock onto a singular goal and completely block out the noise. Stripping away the mystical fantasy jargon, constructing a high-density Qi sphere was just a different form of extreme asset management. I applied the exact same hyper-focus I used to read legal contracts to compressing magical energy.

  But here is where I hit the wall.

  To break through to the absolute next stage—Formation Gathering—you can't just keep building bigger, denser spheres. The old system maxes out. To cross that threshold, you have to conceptualize, design, and execute a completely new method of processing energy on your own. You essentially have to invent a new engine from scratch.

  It sounds easy on paper, doesn't it? Just come up with a new method, Ragna. Yeah, right. It’s the magical equivalent of being asked to invent a brand new law of thermodynamics over the weekend. One wrong calculation, one unstable flow of energy, and you don't just fail—you blow up your own core.

  It is incredibly dangerous, and frankly, I wasn't about to risk detonating my insides based on trial and error. That is exactly why I was standing there, completely broke, staring at my slightly hungover master, and demanding he do his job and teach me.