TBATE: Art and Tess's Second Chance

Chapter 8: Full Power and Improvements

Arthur Leywin's POV:

Over the past seven months me and Tess have made significant progress in mana core stages. I was on the cusp of white core while Tess was getting close to the integration stage.

'I knew she would beat me there.' I thought, half bitterly and half proud at her progress. 'Awe don't be like that, I'm just that good, or should I say, that much better.' She interrupted while sticking her tongue out at me in a smug manner. 

I scoffed and rolled my eyes at her antics while refocusing on my core. I wanted both of us to be at the integration stage by next week so I had plenty of time to help train Sylv and Regis.

The problem with that plan was that my progress has slowed down significantly. It was still faster than my previous progress to white core but it still wasn't as fast as I wanted it to be. 

"Well it looks like it'll take me another few weeks at least to catch up to you." I gritted as I sank into the bed. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath to tranquilize my turbulent mind.

"I'll go get us some food, you can stay here and continue refining your core. Knowing you I'm sure you'll have some miracle figured out that will let you jump to the integration stage" She waved at me while walking through the door. 

'Yeah like that'll happen. Even aether automatically refines my core faster than I can at this point.' I said to myself before jolting up from the bed. 

"That's it!" My gleeful voice echoed across the room. I quickly composed myself from the eureka moment I just had. I sat back into my meditative position and looked at my core.

Instead of purifying my core, I looked at how the aether interacted with my mana core. I saw how aether interacted with the impurities inside my core. 

The aether acted like white blood cells to a disease in a human body. It's as if aether is attracted to the impurities where it surrounds and engulfs them which effectively destroys them. This process is faster now than when my core was at a lower stage because of the amount of impurities it had to deal with. Now that most of the bulk is gone the aether is dancing around from impurity to impurity destroying them. I took control over the aether and used it to manually destroy an impurity in my core. I couldn't destroy the impurities quicker, I could target them faster.It took a while to fine tune the process. Moving the aether throughout my core was like moving through tar. Once I got the hang of it I started rapidly approaching white core. Ten minutes later, I broke through to white core. Tess walked in with our food to see me with a large grin on my face. 

"Why do you have that scary look on your face? I literally just got back." She shook her head and walked over to our dining room table and put our food on it. 

"Well if you must know, I performed a miracle as you put it." I said nonchalantly as I jumped up for the food that was now filling the room with various aromas. 

"I'm the one who said it but yet I'm still surprised. I know I shouldn't be, but I am." She shook her head and chuckled at the absurdity that is me. "So how did you do it this time?" She asked after getting over the initial shock and denial. 

"I studied how aether purifies our mana cores since it's different from using mana, then I started to do it manually." I said while scarfing down my grilled fish.

"Well then I guess I don't need to learn it. One, I'm already close to the integration stage and two, my ability to use aether isn't as close to as proficient as yours." She reasoned as she sat down to eat her own grilled fish. 

We decided to make a bet on who could achieve the integration stage first. The winner gets the first shower while the loser has to do the dishes and take out the trash.It did feel a little like cheating since my aether control was the same as Tess's mana control at this point. I wondered if I should let her win but the thought of a warm shower instead of a cold shower won in the end.It would be close, I had to once again study and learn what the aether was doing to get my body to the next stage since I had never actually reached the integration stage. The aether was constantly moving the now completely purified mana throughout my body as if bonding it to my very being and making my body the mana core. I studied how the aether achieved it and replicated it. Once I repeated it I sped up the process as fast as my mind would allow. In the end I managed to reach the integration stage a whole twelve minutes before Tess did. I wore a wide grin as I strutted over to the bathroom door. After Tess had reached the integration stage she looked at me in shock.