The Whisper of the Nightingale

Chapter 68: Fighting Nocebo

A human mind is a powerful thing; through sheer conviction a person may push their body way beyond what is biologically possible. This held true even in Raven's old world - they had even had a name for it there - but here, where spiritualists were more in tune with the essence of the world, it was even more so. In fact, one could argue that it was precisely the conviction that the Divine Skill Imprints gave them that allowed spiritualists to push themselves even further and manipulate spirit essence as a power of their own.

But this aspect of the human mind is a double edged sword.

As the killing intent laced spirit essence of Raven's Ode of Woe bombarded the mind of the man calling himself the Blood Hound, the would-be assassin hadn't reacted in time to put up any kind of defense, and the second Raven's attack touched his soul prism it was already too late.

By then he didn't just believe he was going to die, he knew it.

Instantly his body responded and started to shut itself down on its own. It happened faster than Raven had expected and before she managed to pull back her attack, the man had fainted - or perhaps more accurately, shut down enough to the point where his consciousness left him.

Raven stared blankly at the dying man in front of her. She clicked her tongue disapprovingly.

'I guess I haven't really gotten the hang of it yet; my latest breakthrough has made me a bit unbalanced. . . .' Although Raven trained relentlessly, it was still rather rare for her to find the opportunity to use her powerful mental attack to its fullest, and with every jump in her cultivation the effectiveness of her Divine Skills would increase as well, making it harder to control.

For three years, Raven had been cultivating regularly in that mysterious space provided by the academy founder's benefactor and, although Raven hadn't dared repeat her Day of Light experience in the Spirit Hall Tower, she had still improved by leaps and bounds.

Over these years, Raven didn't make even a single new spirit connection, keeping her at 374 connections, but those connections had changed greatly; if they, in the beginning, could have been considered as frail threads, they had now swelled into robust ropes, all of which absorbed spirit essence from the world at an astounding pace. With this improved absorption pace, it had only taken a year for Raven to step into the Champion realm and not too long ago her cultivation had soared to the point of being considered a mid Champion.

As such, Raven was the first ever nine-year-old to enter the ranks of the top 1% of elite spiritualists on the Trinity continent who managed to raise their cultivation so far - much to Headmaster Swan's immense delight. At first he had been a bit reluctant to agree to Raven's request for personal revenge, but, as he learned how quickly she was improving, Headmaster Swan immediately changed his mind. For him, the most important thing was now to make sure Raven survived - if that meant putting the nation in a tricky situation for a few years, so be it.

Raven looked back at the two sleeping twins not far from her before she glanced at the other man whom she had knocked unconscious with the Ode of Woe earlier. Although he was weaker than the Blood Hound, Raven hadn't hit him with the skill straight on either so he was still better off.

'Four people, huh. . . . How annoying,' she sighed, but despite her inner thoughts, Raven hoisted the two strangers over her shoulders with ease. As for the twins, a softly glowing membrane of spirit essence appeared underneath them, lifting them gently from the ground. She used no Divine Skills to pull this off and instead relied on the ability to manifest her own spirit essence outside of her body. It had started with a small ring in Elder Willow's class nearly four years ago, but, since Raven's Spacial Dash relied on this concept to work at all, Raven had trained the technique to completely new heights.