40. Learning

As the process was completed, all the green glow around Feran's body faded away, only leaving the glowing ball the size of a clenched fist hovering in the air behind him.

At that moment, Feran turned his attention to the ones he had been teaching.

"This is the first stage of the Three Divine Ways, called the Divine Core stage."

After thinking for a moment, he explained the origin of the technique to them.

"The Three Divine Ways is a technique created by ancestors of the three domains. The idea behind it is the monsters we see in the dungeons. These monsters have a core in their bodies but don't possess talent or curses like us. However, that means they also don't have to go through curse activation or anything that would limit their power."

He paused for a moment to let them digest what he just said before continuing.

"So, our ancestors who made this technique implemented the same thing, trying to create a core inside their bodies so that they don't have to rely on their talents all the time to reduce the activation of curses in their bodies. However, they failed to achieve that despite their various efforts and trying different methods to do it."

Looking at the kids' curious faces, he smiled and continued.

"After doing several studies, they came to know that a human body and a monster body have entirely different configurations of mana inside their bodies. Knowing that, some came up with the brilliant idea of forming the core outside of their bodies rather than inside. And that's how the Three Dive Ways came into existence."

As he completed his explanation, the pressure releasing from him gradually faded away, and the glowing green core beside him also started to shrink before disappearing into thin air.

"One cannot maintain the state of the Divine Core indefinitely. It depends on the amount of mana one has. As for me, who has learned this technique over several years of trying and failing, I can only maintain it for about five minutes before my mana becomes dry."

Feran explained to them everything he could but the last part. However, before he could go over to explain that part, someone interrupted him.

"You said you learned this technique after several years of trial and error, and now you expect us to learn it in a week."

It was Orion who posed that question. He had been excited about learning the technique since he saw the power behind it, but after knowing that this strange Feran guy had himself learned this technique over several years, he began to doubt whether he should trust these old men or not.

As Feran turned to look at Orion, his face became a little solemn over what he said.

"There are no other ways if you want to return to the outside world. Without this technique, you wouldn't survive even a minute against the last guardian."

Orion still didn't understand how they could learn something that took this guy years of his time.

"I get it. The third guardian is strong and all, but how sure are you that one of us would be able to learn that technique in less than a week?"

Feran didn't know what to say to this. As much as he wanted them to learn this technique, he knew very well that it was almost impossible to achieve that in a week. But they didn't have much choice, so even if their chances were low, he would bet on this with his soul.

"Honestly, I don't have much hope myself that you kids will be able to learn this in less than a week, but it's better to try lest we regret it in the future."

'Damn.'

Orion cursed inwardly at his answer as his mind became occupied with alternatives on how to kill the third guardian.

'It seems I'll have to copy everyone's curses here to kill that third guardian. I can't depend on this hell-difficulty-level technique.'

Runo had already speculated that this would be like this; that's why he let his team members learn the Three Divine Ways while he went to defeat the guardians.

At this moment, Feran continued after seeing that nobody asked him anything else.

"Now I will teach you how to learn this technique," he said, looking at them. "All of you sit cross-legged in a meditative position."

Hearing him, Orion and the others did what was told and sat cross-legged.

But a group of people didn't. Looking over, Feran saw a bunch of pirates standing and whispering to each other.

However, he didn't mind them. Turning his attention to the kids sitting cross-legged, Feran advised.

"Now close your eyes and think of the moment when you activate your skills. Think of the sensation you feel at that time, and try to find its source—the fuel that activates your skills."

It took them some time to understand what Feran meant, and some even activated their skills to feel what he said, but eventually, everyone figured it out.

Everyone but Orion. As he closed his eyes and focused on his despairing moments, since that's how he used his curses, he found himself back in the abyss of darkness, where all his curses resided when he copied them from others.

'Why am I back here when I hadn't copied a curse?'

He thought since he had been here two times and all those times, he had copied others' curses. So he had assumed that he only had access to this place when he had curses that hadn't been activated yet. But it appeared he was wrong.

'It seems I can come here anytime... Is this abyss my energy source?'

He wondered if, since he didn't have mana to power his curses, there had to be something else in their place.

At this time, he heard Feran say something.

"After you have done that, try to control its flow and make it flow outside of your body. That's the most difficult part, so if you don't have success, don't worry, just keep trying until you do it."

Orion wondered if this would work on himself.

'Let's try it.'

He focused his thoughts on the darkness around him, as Feran said, but after trying to control its flow for an hour, he gave up.

'This thing didn't even budge, so how do I take it outside?'

The darkness all around him was like sky and ground; he couldn't understand how he would control that and took it outside.

'If everyone is in the same situation as me, then this explains why it has taken that old man years to accomplish that.'

Pondering over it, he decided he would give the Three Divine Ways a whole day, and if there wasn't any progress, he would continue with his backup plan.

Therefore, he once again put his soul into the darkness around him as he delved into his darkest moments.

Meanwhile, seeing his teammates and everyone else busy learning the technique, Runo decided he would go and finish the second guardian in the meantime.

With that, he went towards the portal he came from and didn't go over to the ruined portal that had become active since he finished the first guardian.

Feran, Walric, and the others didn't stop him from doing so.

Soon, Runo reached the portal and was about to enter when he saw a silhouette come from inside.

It was the captain of the pirates who came here after killing the first guardian. Runo only paused for a moment to see him before entering the portal and disappearing from the hall once again.