Heaven's Greatest Professor

The discussion went well with Jenni and Dawn, though it took some time. But that wasn't even the end of it. He would need to sit down with them once more, at the very least, to make sure his plan to mass-produce enchanted suits and armour was viable.

His plan for June was simple as well. He had already shown her how he could boost her refinement speed with radiance essence. June welcomed the aspect of a helping hand, but she assured him that she would like to be dependent on herself right now. Perhaps she feared turning lazy if he helped her regularly...

Moreover, her advancement didn't just correlate to absorbing more essence. The path of a mind mage was very unique compared to any regular ranker, and she hadn't been at all diligent in using her empathic power. June was even very reluctant to discuss the topic.

He knew it was related to a traumatic memory where she lost her father and went into a coma for several years, so he didn't push her right now.

She did plan on using his assistance in learning rune magic, which was something.

Lastly, the most complicated business. He turned to the former captain.

"I agree with this," Agnes said before he could even open his lips, showing his scribbles in the book. "Twelve hours is nothing..."

"Twelve hours for what?" Jenni asked, raising an eyebrow. She was probably thinking something stupid, but Gale didn't bother to clear her misunderstanding.

"I was fairly confident you'd agree with that," he said, shaking his head. "But I want to make sure that it isn't a continuous twelve hours, but divided into four small sessions of two and four hours. After each session, you'll have to take just as much time as rest."

"Twelve hours of rest seems a little too much waste of time," she muttered.

"Well, if you do not intend to rest all that time, you can spend some of that time with us," he said.

Agnes looked around at everyone and nodded, letting out a sigh. "Well, if you agree, can I begin now?"

"Already?" Gale laughed. "I haven't even laid the necessary formations needed..."

"How long would that take?"

He tilted his head in calculation. "It would have taken half a day if it was before my advancement," he said. "But now, it's a couple of hours at worst. Also, I probably need to repair or relay the runes every second day or regularly, considering what we would be dealing with."

"What would you be dealing with?" Jenni asked, feeling like the only one losing out on information.

Gale still didn't answer her question. "You should get busy with Dawn's cultivation and reinforcement skills," he told her. "The representative will be coming in a week."

She snorted and abided by his words, beginning to discuss how they could work on their project together in the best way possible. But then a portal appeared in the middle and caught Jenni's attention once more.

"You have dimension powers?" she asked, jumping to her feet like an eager child. "Wait, whose dimension skill is this? Why does the gate look weird? Where does it lead..."

Before she could ask any more questions, Gale turned to June. "I hope you keep her steady in the work while we're gone."

Agnes jumped into the gate and vanished, while Gale sat down in meditation.

***

Agnes appeared directly into the dark underground soul chamber where Gale had hidden the dark core and the sceptre. To her surprise, he was already there, working on putting out rune formations which would help her absorb the dark essence at a slow and steady pace.

If she were to leave it all to the dark sphere, then her physical form would burst into thousands of pieces with the overwhelming dark essence that would flood into her system.

"Can you operate here without compromising your presence outside?" she asked Gale's soul avatar.

"I have been experimenting a little," he said, not looking back at her. "So far, it's been lacklustre. I can only do simple tasks like meditation, visualisation, or essence circulation—basically, the tasks I'm thoroughly familiar with—while maintaining full consciousness here."

"Those aren't simple tasks," Agnes almost cried. Far from it, to be honest. Any regular ranker needed to be in a flow state for most of those simple tasks.

"However, I do feel more at ease here," he said. "I could probably utilise more of my abilities far more efficiently here. Hmm, maybe if I can alternate the control position and..." He stopped working, eyes flashing with enlightenment. "Well, I can experiment with it later... For now, let's take care of this first."

"How much do you intend to leave the siphoning rate of the formation?" Agnes asked, peering at the glittering runic formations in the air.

"0.02%," he said. Agnes looked like she was about to argue, but before she could utter a word of complaint, he continued. "That 0.02% will be like absorbing a low gold rank essence gem. Mostly because of the source and the nature of the source. I know you can go as far as half a percentage with your unique physique, but it's better to take it slow."

Before he advanced, he could absorb something of this calibre, though from a different source, at 1-2%. But he wasn't sure what the effect would be on his mind if he were to absorb dark essence at that rate. He would probably lose his mind and spirit.

"You need to remember the plan is to make you a gold ranker in a year," he emphasised. "Not a corrupted corpse inhibiting a dead god's will."

Agnes sighed and nodded solemnly. "I have given my word, I guess I cannot complain."

"Good girl," Gale said, as another of his avatars appeared behind her to pat her shoulder.

Agnes glared at the new avatar as it disappeared into nothing.

"Obviously, 0.02% is too low for you to advance to gold rank in a year," Gale continued. "The plan is to increase the rate as you get adapted to it."

"I'm not complaining, but you're being awfully cautious about this," she said.

"I have to be," he said with a sigh. For the next hour, he established the siphoning formation, as it revolved under the dark core, many of its arms latching onto it.

"Is it done?" she asked, feeling more eager than ever.

Gale nodded. "Now, before you begin, I need to learn something from you."

All her eagerness dampened as she could clearly imagine what he wanted to ask. "If it's about the sceptre, I do not intend to take it from—"

"Who gave you the task to collect the sceptre from the inheritance ground?" he asked, walking towards her. "You don't have to answer the question if you don't want to, and I'd still help you... I just feel like I should know about it, considering my part in the play."

Agnes sucked in a deep breath, meeting his gaze. She let the air go. "It's my master," she said. "Well, it's complicated... probably very different from the relationship between you and your celestial master. But it wouldn't be wrong to say they are my master..."

It didn't go unnoticed that she was using they to refer to her master.

"How does your master know about the sceptre being in the inheritance ground?" he asked. "Is she aware of the corpse?"

"I don't know," Agnes said. "My master is very mysterious... I haven't seen them for several years... but I wouldn't be surprised if they knew all the information about me completely."

"They wouldn't know what happens here," Gale told her confidently.

"Well, that's true," she said.

"I can guess how they know about the sceptre," Gale said. "Well, considering how forsakens are aware of some of the inside workings of the place, it would be stupid to imagine some of the higher-ups on our side weren't aware of it."

"The Empire, or most of the council, weren't," Agnes said confidently. "If they did, we wouldn't have been able to take it all away so easily."

"I guess... Anyway, the sceptre, or the better term for it would be a Dimension Lever. Unfortunately, its name fails to show the true grandeur of the artefact."

"What does it do, other than killing a god?" Agnes asked sarcastically.

"Well, that's only a by-product of its function," Gale said. "Its main function is to work as an anchor to the subspace, keeping its dimension and temporal laws steady, so that it doesn't collapse or implode on itself."

"That's why the subspace collapsed when you took away the lever." Realisation flashed on her face.

"So if your master is truly a high ranker, they probably know the existence of something like a Dimension Lever."

"They are a transcendent," Agnes said, sucking in a deep breath. "I wasn't aware of it before, but I'd be damned if they are anything less than that."

Though by her expression, it seemed her relationship with this so-called master of hers wasn't so bright. Well, if they were really transcendent, why hadn't they bailed their student out of outrageous indentured military work, which wasn't anywhere better than contracted enslavement?

"The reason I'm bringing this up," Gale continued, turning his eyes towards the Dimension Lever lodged in the core, "is that the sceptre is of great use to me."

Agnes did not look surprised at all, though a conflicted look appeared in her eyes.

"So if you can organise a meeting between us, it would be great."

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