Cal felt a small amount of mana leak out of tana as he blocked a strike from Gabriel’s spear. It had been almost a year since he had started creating his new style and he had only completed it a month earlier. This was harder than it sounded, if he had just wanted to learn to a style he would have just had to practice the style until the system recognized it as a style then it would appear in his status. Conversely, if he was trying to make a new style he would have to nearly perfect the style, and then he would gain the skill.

However, what Cal was trying to do was something in between those two. he was trying to create his own style based on a fusion of two existing styles. It was difficult to fuse the styles because if he learned to use either one well enough it would become its own skill and he would be unable to fuse it with the other. So Cal had been walking on a razor’s edge trying to learn how to use either one just enough so that he could use it but not enough to have earned the skill.

After about 11 months of hard work and nearly constant practice, Cal had done it. he had created his own style and named it the frostbound style. The frost-bound style was able to use Gabriels mana blade style and create small nearly unmovable ice crystals every time something hit Cal's sword. However combining it with alucards two bladed style gave him the option of blocking or deflecting an attack without creating an ice crystal.

The combination made Cal's style extremely dangerous but also very hard to use. Not only did he have to focus on the fight that he was in but he also had to decided whether or not to create ice crystals and if he did decide to make them he had to try and block in the correct spots to make the ice crystal where he had needed it.

After Cal had created his style alucard and gabriel had started a nearly endless sparring session. Cal's only reprieve was when he needed to eat and sleep, and both of those times were reduced due to alucards spells, and with those same spells, Cal could regenerate all of his pools in an instant which kept him practicing for hours on end.

Though the endless practicing was mentally exhausting Cal could see obvious results. Not only had his sword skill and style leveled up multiple times but his spells had all tiered up at least once and he had learned to use nearly all of his skills and abilities affectively in combat.

Currently he was sparring against gabriel. Cal's style of creating the unmoving crystals was nearly a direct counter to gabriels style, which relied on countless quick stabs from his spear. However, this didnt seem to bother gabriel as he continued to push Cal back without being hindered in the slightest.

Currently, Cal felt his back press against something and realiszed his mistake. Gabriel had forced Cal to move in a full circle and Cal was now forced to fight through his mess of ice crystals. which, due to gabriels speed had been haphazardly formed. As soon as Cal had realized his situation he hatched a plan.

Once they had both entered the field of floating ice Cal activated flurry with it snow started falling down in a miniature blizzard obscuring Alucard’s vision while simoltaneously improving cals, and giving him a sort of sixth sense that could sense everything within the snowstorm. Cal went on the offensive and started attacking. Gabriel despite his many disadvantages was easily holding his own however he was unable to move much due to the limitation on his vision and Cal began to form a net of ice crystals around him

after a minute Cal's ability ran out of time and flurry began to fade. Cal could have renewed it but he didn’t need to as the snowflakes faded from view all that was left to see was Gabriel standing in the middle of an icy prison.

“Haha, you finally did it,” Gabriel said happily as he easily walked through the ice crystals shattering them on contact.

The first time Cal had seen this he had been shocked, when he had been shown the manablade style it had seemed as if the ice crystals were nearly impossible to break. after seeing Cal's shock Gabriel explained that anyone with a certain percentage of strength higher than Cal's own could break the ice crystals.

“Yeah I finally found a good synergy between my style and flurry.” Cal said in answer to Gabriel’s comment.

That had been the goal of their current training. they had both known that it was impossible for Cal to even think about beating Gabriel or Alucard, but the two of them had tried to train Cal to beat opponents who were stronger than him. The best way that they had come up with was to lure an opponent back into a field that was littered with his ice crystals and then from there use flurry and finish off the trap. it was a good strategy but still left him defenseless if his opponent could break the ice crystals.

To counter that Cal had thought to use boreas’s rage with imbue strike, but it was still impossible for him. With the boost in his pools that he had from being a vampire (Alucard explained that he had kept the doubling of his pools because when a person evolved they kept some of the benefits of their previous race, having once been a vampire Cal had kept the doubling in his stats and for nightwalker, he had gotten an increased sense of night vision). Even with the boost from once being a vampire Cal was unable to cast boreas’s rage with imbue strike.

According to Alucard, it would take well over a thousand possibly ten thousand to cast. Once they had finished their spar Cal was preparing for the next training session when Gabriel stopped him. “We are down to the last few days until you will have to start my trial and there are a few things i would like to have you do first.”

cal dispelled his swords which disappeared with a series of sparks and snowflakes. “What would you like to do” asked Cal who sat down on the floor despite the inch of water that was sitting there.

“First you need to read the book that your grandfather said was a world quest. I don’t believe he was wrong about that and, if possible, I would like to help you complete it.”

cal nodded in agreement and took off his necklace. He reached into it and pulled out the book it was bound in green leather and was the most expensive-looking out of the books his grandfather had given him. Despite how nice it looked Cal had never read it and this was the first time Cal had even opened the book.

As soon as he looked at the first page he had an odd experience. He had instantly known the entire contents of the page. he was confused for a second before remembering the ability he had been given. Speed reading was an ability that gabriel had given him and it allowed him to absorb the entire continents of a page without needing to read each individual word.

After realizing how easy it would be to read the book Cal quickly flipped from page to page until he reached the end, the book detailed the life of an ancient songwriter by the name of sam, and his love for both music and a certain woman. Sam was so devoted to this woman that he created a language specifically for writing love songs. once he made the language he spent several months writing a song, and once it was complete he went and sang it for the woman he loved.

Alas, the lady that he loved did not understand the language in which he sang, but was still moved by the tone and melody and was determined to confess her love. However, her love was not meant for sam and, spurred by the song, she married a nobleman who she had admired for years.

Being driven to madness by his loss and grief sam committed suicide. However, the system, which recognized sams achievements, made sure his legacy would live on which is the purpose of the book. As soon as Cal had finished reading the book three prompts appeared.

[You have unlocked the quest section of your status]

[you have received the unique quest samellans betrayal: reward unique class]

[you have received the hidden quest ruler of kaar: reward unique class]

before Cal could read through all of his prompts Gabriel commented. “It seems you finally got the quest section of your status. I always thought you’d open it and the others at level 25 because of...” Gabriel was cut off as he fell over and started twitching on the floor. It was reminiscent of the time that Cal had seen Gabriel punished.

Alucard came strolling over with an amused and disappointed look on his face. “Well, now that he went and did that you will be forced into his trial.”

cal looked slightly alarmed and said. “Wait why would that make me go into the trial.”

Alucard just smiled and said, “you know that I’m not allowed to tell you stuff like that.” Alucard paused for a moment and seemed to decide something.

He then put on a carefree and slightly excited face and threw his arm out to the side. “If Gabriel was willing to risk retribution with those words then why can’t I. alright cal, I give you the rights to my inheritance and I will give you all of the needed information to find it.”

with that, a red light streamed out of Alucard’s chest and into cals. Cal suddenly got a list of prompts.

[you have been given the quest I was once a king]

[you now have authority over the forgotten keep of ains valley]

[you have received an instinctual map to the treasures of Alucard first king of the vampires]

using his skill speed reading Cal instantly knew what all of the prompts said and didn’t have to spend the time to read through all of them. Instead, he got to watch as Alucard had long cuts ripped open along his chest as he fell backward twitching.

Before he could step forward to help Alucard, Cal was surrounded by a white light. He then reappeared in an arena that was oddly reminiscent of wear he had fought kaze in his adult form. A prompt appeared in front of him.

[Welcome to the arena of the cursed your scenario has been decided]

[archalin the cursed inventor has created a demonic beast called the clockwork angel. you must slay it before it destroys the village]

[possibles clears you can achieve]

[kill the demonic beast: easy]

[destroy the beasts core: hard]

[warning the field separating you from the beast will collapse in 5:34 minutes at that time the beast will attack you]

[trial has been scaled to the unique entities calaeris windlab, kelaris, and calee-aris]

Cal watched as the timer ticked down a few seconds before looking to see if he could see the beast. To his surprise, he could, it was eerily staring at him from across the barrier. The beast was a few feet taller than Cal was himself and was just about as wide as he was, but that was where the similarities ended.

The beast was a chalky white and tan color all over its body which seemed to be covered in an odd mixture of scales and feathers. Its arms were much longer than that of an average human and they reached well past its knees almost touching the ground. On its back was a pair of wings that stretched out almost 2 yards to either side of it. they were the same chalky color but Cal noticed that one of the wings seemed to be ripped and he could see some bright bronze gears turning along the tear, and upon closer inspection there seemed to be small rips like that all along its body each showing a glint of bronze.

Cal then looked up at the beast’s face and for the first time, he began to feel fear. Its face looked like a bird mask that had been cracked perfectly in half and then glued back together while it was not perfectly aligned and its eyes which were a bright red popped out of its head and were making direct eye contact with cal. Cal stumbled back as the beast let out a mightly squawk.

Cal then decided to start preparing. First, he summon iclyn and tana then he infused iclyn with his mana to create the mana blade. The great thing about mana blades was that the mana infused into the blade would circulate from inside of his body to into the blade and then back into his body. the circulation would continue endlessly not costing Cal any mana to maintain. Cal would only lose mana when he used the manablade’s effect in which case each ice crystal would cost 3 mana.

Cal tried to think if there was anything else he could do to prepare himself but decided that there wasn’t and started to wait for the clock to run down. Once the clock ran out the creature didn’t move for a while and Cal was just fine to wait it out.

Suddenly it started sprinting towards cal. It had started about 30 yards away and in just a few seconds it was in front of cal, swinging one of its overly long arms at him. Cal blocked with tana which was the one that did not have the mana blade infused with it. Tana cut into the creature’s arm for about an inch when Cal heard a clang and his blade was stopped short.

He tried to stab it in the stomach with iclyn but got similar results, he was only able to cut it a little before his blade was stopped short. However, because he had used iclyn an ice crystal formed and ripped an even larger hole in the creature’s chest. As the ice crystal formed Cal caught a glimpse of a black orb the size of an apple but it quickly moved away from the opening. Cal assumed that was the core and started to form a plan.

He continued cutting away at its outer layer revealing as much of its bronze frame as he could. Soon all that was left of the creature was its mask and its metal frame and Cal could clearly see the core moving around the inside of the creature. Cal waited, blocking the creature’s blows until the core moved into an opening in the chest at that time he lunged forward with tana.

However, the creature seemed to have been waiting for this as its core moved out of the way and the creature bent over trapping Cal's blade in its chest. Cal tried to pull his blade free but was unable to. This distraction caused Cal to lose focus long enough for the beast’s arm to swing in from the side sending him flying nearly ten feet.

By the time Cal got to his feet, the beast was on him. He was able to block its first blow but he had lost his rhythm and was only just able to make the second blow land on his arm instead of his head. He was sent flying again but this time something felt terribly wrong with his arm. When he got up he was unable to move his arm that held tana and had to continue the fight with just iclyn.

When the creature attacked again it started draining Cal's mana as it struck at his blade over and over again. Cal knew that he had to change something about this fight or he was going to lose. He continued fighting when an odd memory came to mind. One winter when Cal was younger his grandpa had brought out a training dummy with limbs that he could move around.

it was supposed to be used to show Cal forms but it turned out that ice had frozen one of its joints and caused it’s left arm to be unmovable. Cal was glad for the sudden recollection as it gave him an idea. The next time the beast attacked instead of blocking as he usually did Cal dodged and lunged forward stabbing into the creature’s shoulder joint.

As he hit it an ice crystal formed and because Cal was lucky enough to have hit it between two gears the crystal formed around the creature’s shoulder making it so that it was not only unable to move its shoulder but was also trapped in that one spot.

Before the creature could try to find a solution Cal ran to its other side and performed a similar maneuver and now both of its arms were stuck. Now Cal was left with just its core darting around its chest cavity. And with a carefully timed strike Cal was able to hit the core, but he didn’t cause much damage to it and the beast went berserk, flailing around its legs causing Cal to need to take a step back.

Cal wanted to wait for it to calm down before trying to make another strike but the creature continued to flail around its legs so Cal decided to take a new approach. He used gust with imbue strike. And sent a long and thin blade of air flying toward the creature this attack also managed to hit the core, but this time a small chip fell off of the core and the creature’s movements started to slow down.

Cal was now confident in his ability to close the distance and ran in and stabbed the creature’s core then dodged back to avoid the creatures legs. He did this a few more times before the core was completely destroyed and the creature had died.

[you have defeated the clockwork angel you received 300 xp]

[congratulations you are now level two you have gained 3 free stat points]

Just like the previous time when he had finished Alucard’s trial a bright light appeared and Cal was teleported into a small room with two chairs and a table. this time Gabriel was sitting across from him.

“Why was that so much easier,” Cal asked.

Cal had received a much worse wound in his broken arm than he had in his first trial but even with that the fight had been significantly easier than the vampire prince.

”The fight was easier because you are trained now when you fought the vampire prince you had only slightly less power than you do now but your efficiency in using your abilities and spells makes your combat power much higher”

cal accepted the explanation and carefully sat down while still cradling his arm. “Can you do anything about my arm.” Cal asked gesturing at his obviously broken arm.

Gabriel just shook his head. ”nope that’s not my department. even if it was, I and Alucard have interfered enough. you can choose your rewards but then you will have to leave instantly.” Cal nodded and suddenly he was standing in a different room with a table that was lined with ten items.

Gabriel went down the list and told Cal each item’s name: clockwork sword, living glove diagram, sword spirit diagram. complete fusion skill, mana infusion, dragon golem diagram, mana vein skill, inventors spy glass, complete understanding, and 1 clockwork coin.

“Can I get a description of all the items.” Cal asked after looking over the items

“no and if you try to examine any of them that will count as your choice. Now choose whi...” gabriel froze in the middle of his sentence and Cal heard a voice coming from behind him.

“Not letting you even examine them, now thats just unfair.” Cal tried to turn to see who it was but he was also unable to move.

Suddenly brock stepped in front of him and asked. “Would you like to know which ones will be the most beneficial for you.” Cal wanted to answer but was unable to.

Before anything could happen there was a bright flash and another figure appeared. “Brock i told you that you could not interfere in my trials.” this person was large, at least 8 feet tall and wore nothing but a pair of baggy pants. His upper body was covered in scars and muscles and he had long hair red hair.

“Yes yes I know but scabuigkgiuladflefsafdafds” brocks words became unintelligible but from what Cal could see the new person understood. Something that brock said seemed to surprise the new person and he took a step back and looked at Cal then back at brock

“is he really,” the new man asked in surprise.

Brock nodded and said “Shylo, you can see why I need to do this I won’t interfere in any of your normal trials but this boy will be added to my list.” shylo nodded in agreement then disappeared.

Brock turned back to Cal and said “sorry about that but I am going to make a deal with you. if you choose the fusion skill, living glove diagram, and the mana infusion skill I will permanently decrease the cooldown time for my skill to 3 months.”

with that brock disappeared and Gabriel continued as if nothing had happened. “..ch four rewards you want.”

cal considered ignoring brock out of spite but brock had not led him astray yet, and he didn’t think he would this time either. “I want the fusion skill, living glove diagram, and the mana infusion skill.”

cal waited for Gabriel to give him the rewards but Gabriel just nodded and asked, “what will the fourth one be.” Cal thought through the rest of the items. he was not at all tempted by the clockwork sword, the inventor’s spyglass, or the clockwork coin. That left the dragon golem diagram and the sword spirit diagram.

Cal was leaning toward the dragon golem diagram but something in him told him to take the sword spirit and Cal decided to trust his instinct. “I'll take the sword spirit diagram.”

Gabriel nodded and another bright light flashed. once the light faded, Cal stood in a strange room with walls that were made out of stone the only feature that he could see were small holes in the walls and a massive iron door.

“Where are we” Cal heard someone say in a harsh voice. Cal spun around to see an angry-looking Belinda, a confused arisu, and a boy that Cal didn’t recognize. Before Cal could answer he felt his bond with kaze light up with intense joy and Cal spun around in the direction that he could sense his familiar.