22 The Challenge Begins!

William noticed his mistake and felt awkward. The arrogant noble turned out to be more than just talk and actually knew some things. Even more embarrassing was that Briar seemed to know more about the Life Element than him!

I might need to visit Charlotte. She might be surprised to know I have the Life Element now, but I think she can keep a secret.

"Just a joke hahaha, ok I'll try now." William held his hand under the Goldilocks Leaf like Briar, then drew the vitality from the axil. The vitality was extracted almost immediately, creating a perfectly smooth line on the stem while the leaf fell into William's hand.

-Developed a new magic spell: +1 Potential Point

-New Spell: Absorb

"How was that?" William looked over to Briar, who was staring intently at the Goldilocks plant.

His look turned serious, "How high is your Life Affinity?"

William felt the situation was a bit odd. "E Rank."

"There is no way you're only E Rank." Briar pushed William further to answer the question. His understanding of Magic Ranks allowed him to guess that William's Life Affinity was D or C. But he wasn't even a Cultivator yet, so doesn't that mean William had potential to reach S Rank?

"I really am." William shrugged. Lying seemed to be the best option here. He didn't feel bad at all since it would protect him later.

At this moment, the Potion Master stepped through the Gravity Door. "I've decided to make the challenge today. You two better get ready."

"Yes Master."

"Yes."

The group traveled to the edge of the Livingwood Forest. The Potion Master stopped to say a few words.

"Both of you will be competing to gather the most Goldilocks Leaves. I know where all the plants are in this forest, so for every damaged plant I find afterwards, you will lose 10 leaves from your total.

Clearing parties have been sent to deal with the beast outbreak, but you still need to be wary. I will watch over you both, but I am only one person. Don't blame me if you die." he looked at William when speaking the last sentence.

The Potion Master wasn't worried about Briar in the least. His disciple was both a genius alchemist and cultivator, and his family gave Briar plenty of Trump Cards. Mere Wind Wolves couldn't threaten his life.

William nodded his head in understanding. "When do we have to be back?"

"Be back before the sun sets. Your time starts..now!"

By the time William turned around, Briar had already used his Wind Element to rush into the forest. Thankfully, he seemed to be heading in a direction where William had already looted almost everything. I better get going myself. he turned to enter a different part of the forest.

The Potion Master watched William leave while thinking to himself. I wonder what gives that young man so much confidence to compete with a genius cultivator...

***

William spent the first half hour collecting all the Goldilocks Leaves in sight. His Life Element would fully expand for less than a second to get an understanding of his surroundings, then he would remember the location of the Goldilocks Leaves and collect them one by one. The method was very efficient, as William had almost a hundred leaves.

Briar told William that the Goldilocks Leaves had very little aura. The redhead probably thought William wouldn't be able to use this to his advantage, but he couldn't be more wrong. William focused his Life Sense on detecting oval-shaped leaves with weak vitality signatures, which was probably only possible due to William's high Life Affinity and Mana control bonuses.

By the halfway point of the challenge, William had collected almost 300 Goldilocks Leaves, but it was becoming much more difficult to find any. William still had three hours left, but there were no leaves in sight.

At the same time, William hadn't seen very many Magical Beasts. There was a singular Liffox near him currently, and another that was killed an hour prior. Besides that, William would occasionally hear the sounds of people fighting from deeper in the forest.

The Potion Master, who had been following William the entire time, was depressed. The process of locating Goldilocks Leaves was already difficult for early Cultivators, and just as difficult to harvest properly. William, however, made it seem like a piece of cake. The Potion Master realized that if he didn't help Briar locate herbs, he would probably lose the bet. He left William and quickly searched for Briar.

William's searching continued for a few minutes, but then noticed that the Potion Master's vitality aura had disappeared. I have never felt safer in the forest than now, who knows when I will get another chance like this. William decided it was time to enter the inner ring while the angry elder wasn't watching.

William consulted the makeshift map he had drawn over the last few days, then turned left and headed deeper into the forest. He was already close, so not even five minutes later the trees transitioned to a more vibrant green.

The vitality here was more than twice that of before, and William felt that just breathing in this place was increasing his lifespan. He felt that getting sick in this place would be absolutely impossible.

He didn't encounter any enemies after entering. The others must be keeping the attention of the Magical Beasts right now. William focused his attention on gathering more Goldilocks Leaves. He spread his Life Sense to the fullest like before, and the intense vitality actually helped William find more Goldilocks Leaves. The only difference between Goldilocks Leaves from the inner versus the outer rings was the size.

He continued gathering the leaves, and was glad that they took up less space than Lifeshrooms, else his bag would already be full.

William also noticed a few unusual things in the inner region while gathering herbs. There were a few orange apples that had intense vitality, and a purple rock was lying on the ground not far from the corpse of an old man. William thought the purple rock might actually be an egg, because of its aura of life that was different from plants.

William initially didn't plan to do anything with the old man's corpse, but after seeing a shiny ring on his finger, William swapped to loot goblin mode. He checked everything on the old man, but only found the ring in the end, which turned out to be a Space Ring much to William's delight.

His excitement didn't last when William found there was a haze preventing him from checking the contents of the ring. It seemed to be guarded by an array, so the most he could do was claim ownership since the old man was already dead.

It was a Space Ring nonetheless, so William put it away for now. He continued gathering Goldilocks Leaves without any issue, and returned to the entrance of the Livingwood Forest with his gear.

I guess not every trip to this place is dangerous, or maybe it's just because I'm much stronger than the day I got here. William thought. He thought back to the first day when he nearly fainted from Mana exhaustion and could barely fight a Liffox, to now when those same Liffox were nothing but a joke.

The Potion Master was waiting at the same place as before. From William's perspective he hadn't moved. The old man looked somewhat tired, and his face seemed to have a few extra wrinkles. Briar was next to him, drenched in sweat and breathing heavily. On the ground in front of Briar was around 900 Goldilocks Leaves.

The Potion Master looked at William with a slight smile. With the help he gave Briar, there was no way William could have gathered more Goldilocks Leaves.