Prayer Space and Seal of Holy Light

After hearing the system's words, Benjamin froze.

It wasn't that he was particularly shocked, but rather that the system's words suddenly reminded him of a detail.

When Grant was preparing to use divine arts and the Holy Light was gathering, Benjamin's attention had been drawn by the magical fluctuations released first. The situation had been quite critical at the time, so Benjamin hadn't paid much attention to it, but thinking back now, it really...

Those fluctuations were far too similar to the fluctuations of spellcasting.

"According to the data I've collected and analyzed, the fluctuations of Grant's divine arts and the fluctuations of your Water Ball Spell are essentially identical. Both involve mobilizing discrete elements for one's own use," the system said, not forgetting to add a final jab, "Though, his fluctuations are several hundred times stronger than yours, of course."

Benjamin ignored the system's mockery. After all, if this discovery were true, it would be of great significance to him.

Therefore, he asked another question: "Are you sure?"

The system said impatiently, "Of course. When has any of my analysis results ever been wrong?"

"..."

Hearing the system's guarantee, Benjamin felt even more uneasy.

After thinking it over, he decided to verify this matter.

If divine arts and magic were truly the same thing in essence, it would mean he could learn both magic and divine arts. More importantly, it meant that the theories behind divine arts could be applied to magic.

The development of divine arts was undoubtedly far more advanced than that of magic. He could completely borrow those theories and apply them to his own magical cultivation; wouldn't that be much better than sitting here and racking his brain in the dark?

Finally, he saw another path.

Of course, all of this was based on the premise that divine arts and magic were truly the same in essence. If the system's conclusion was wrong, then thinking about all this would be in vain.

Thinking of this, Benjamin got out of bed and walked out of his room.

"Where are you going?" the system asked.

"To find Grant. He's been studying divine arts for so long; there must be a lot of materials and textbooks on divine arts there. I'll go get some to look at," Benjamin replied.

He certainly wouldn't be stupid enough to go to The Church to learn about divine arts—that would be like taking off one's pants to fart, a completely unnecessary act. Grant lived under the same roof as him and was his own younger brother, which was incredibly convenient.

He didn't want to drag this out any longer. Since he had an idea, he would act on it immediately; he couldn't afford to suffer from procrastination now.

Thus, under the system's guidance, Benjamin arrived at the door of Grant's bedroom.

After a moment's thought, he decided to knock first.

What if he snuck in and got caught? It would be better to ask for it openly. Anyway, Grant was so dim-witted that he could probably trick him into handing over the items with some made-up excuse.

After the incident at the castle, Grant should still feel some guilt toward him.

No one answered.

Benjamin hesitated for a moment, then knocked again.

Still no answer.

Benjamin raised an eyebrow. Since that was the case, he couldn't be blamed for entering without permission.

He gripped the doorknob and turned it gently. Feeling that the door wasn't locked, he couldn't help but feel secretly pleased. He carefully twisted the knob, opening the door while trying his best not to make a sound.

A series of snores drifted from the room.

Benjamin walked in and saw Grant lying on the bed, covered by a thick quilt, sleeping like a log. Seeing this scene, Benjamin wanted to laugh out loud; it was as if heaven was helping him.

He tiptoed inside, reached the bedside, and called out softly, "Grant, Grant, are you asleep?"

A round of snoring was his only response.

Benjamin immediately relaxed, no longer feeling anxious. He walked straight to Grant's desk and began flipping through the stacks of books arranged there.

Kingdom Plant Encyclopedia, forget it... Chronicles of Hori Kingdom, this is too thick... Selected Past Exam Questions for Priesthood Qualification, stay away from me... The Rheology of Continental Language Families and Marginal Cultural Studies, what the hell is this... 101 Life-Benefiting Stories, what a moron...

Finally, Introduction to Divine Arts—this was it!

Just as Benjamin was filled with joy and tucked Introduction to Divine Arts into his robe, a soft cough suddenly came from behind him.

Benjamin felt a chill run down his spine.

He turned around in a hurry, but there was no one behind him. Grant was still sleeping soundly on the bed, his face buried between the pillow and the quilt, snoring away without the slightest sign of waking up.

Seeing this, Benjamin didn't feel relieved; instead, he felt even more terrified.

Holy crap, is it haunted? If there's no one here, where did that cough come from?

Clearly, this cough hadn't come from Grant in his sleep, because the snoring hadn't stopped when the cough occurred—it was impossible for Grant to snore and cough at the same time.

Damn it, there was someone else in this room!

Could it be Michelle? Was she still hiding in this mansion, using some method to conceal her tracks?

Or... was it someone from The Church?

The latter thought was even more terrifying than the former.

Just as Benjamin stood there hesitating, his hair standing on end, another cough came—a very soft cough, one that was clearly being deliberately suppressed, coming from under Grant's quilt.

"..."

Benjamin understood in a second.

He immediately felt relieved. So that's what it was! It had scared him to death, but it turned out... it turned out...

He had underestimated his younger brother.

Benjamin tried to suppress the slightly lewd smile on his face, walked back to the bedside, and said softly to Grant, "Grant, I can't sleep tonight, so I'm borrowing a book from you to read!"

Grant's snoring paused for a split second before returning to normal, as if he were truly in a deep sleep.

Benjamin smiled, walked out of Grant's bedroom with a swagger, and then thoughtfully closed the door for Grant.

"What exactly happened? Why did you do that? Why couldn't I understand any of it?" the system suddenly popped up, appearing quite oblivious.

"Stop pretending. I have nearly a terabyte of adult films stored on your hard drive; don't act all innocent here," Benjamin retorted speechlessly.

After a moment of silence, the system emitted a few very strange, lewd mechanical laughs.

Just like that, despite the "small interlude" in the middle, Benjamin successfully obtained what he wanted and returned to his own room.

He climbed back into bed, put away the Bible that belonged to the mages, and opened Introduction to Divine Arts.

Unlike the crude revolutionary propaganda pamphlets of the mages, Introduction to Divine Arts was compiled more thoroughly, systematically, and richly. The opening chapter went straight to the essence of divine arts: using spiritual power to communicate with the Holy Light drifting in the surrounding environment and borrowing the power of God to perform incredible arts.

This coincided with Benjamin's understanding of magic—replacing Holy Light with water elements and the power of God with the power of nature.

This was enough to verify the system's conclusion that "divine arts are magic."

Benjamin continued reading, and the book explained what kind of people could practice divine arts and what kind could not. This made him think of the system saying, "Benjamin was tested to have zero talent for divine arts."

If divine arts and magic were the same, why did he have talent for magic?

The book stated that to practice divine arts, one needed two qualities: powerful spiritual power and an affinity for Holy Light. If spiritual power was poor, divine arts would easily fail; if affinity was poor, it would be difficult to gather Holy Light. Both were indispensable.

Applied to magic, this should mean needing spiritual power and an affinity for water elements.

After asking the system, Benjamin discovered that in his initial tests, both his spiritual power and his affinity for Holy Light were very poor, which was why he had been classified as having zero talent for divine arts. But magic also required spiritual power; if his spiritual power was poor, how had he learned magic?

"Hmm... that is probably the reason why you are always unable to learn these spells," the system suddenly said.

Benjamin thought about it and had a sudden realization. No wonder the Water Barrier always failed; it was because his spiritual power was insufficient. As for his affinity for water elements, comparing it to the descriptions in the book, his was probably not very good either.

This result didn't make Benjamin happy.

It meant that he would never be able to learn magic like those who were gifted.

Looking at his consciousness space and the blue characters, he understood that even asking Michelle would be useless. He could only walk his own path and play the "black technology" card to the end.

Fortunately, as he read on, Introduction to Divine Arts introduced a special case: even people with poor spiritual power and affinity could learn divine arts and reach a very high level.

The book called it: "Opening a Prayer Space and Condensing a Seal of Holy Light."

Seeing this, Benjamin immediately perked up.

Finally.

He read a few more lines of introduction and could confirm that the so-called "Prayer Space" was his consciousness space, and the "Seal of Holy Light" was the magical characters.

The book didn't have much to say on this point, stating that this method was extremely dangerous. When opening a Prayer Space, one was easily invaded by demonic forces and could become a vegetable who had lost their mind. Moreover, no one really knew how to open a Prayer Space; those who truly succeeded did so by accident, and very few people in history had ever truly succeeded.

Benjamin recalled his own experience and just wanted to complain that losing one's mind had nothing to do with demonic forces; it was just getting lost in the depths of the consciousness space and never being able to find a way out.

However, after introducing the drawbacks, the book also introduced the benefits of this method: by using a Prayer Space, one could store drifting Holy Light, the channeling time for releasing divine arts was very short, and one could even cast spells with just a thought; divine arts released using a Seal of Holy Light had power and controllability that ordinary methods couldn't compare to; and having a Prayer Space meant one didn't have to work as hard as others to train spiritual power, would never encounter bottlenecks, and only needed to continuously strengthen the Seal of Holy Light within.

After finishing these introductions, the book also wrote that the fourth Pope had practiced using this method. And this Pope was also the one who completed the unification of the Hori Kingdom, the "Son of God" who truly brought The Church to its peak.

Seeing this, it would be a lie to say Benjamin wasn't excited. This passage was equivalent to telling him that this path was not only viable but also had a bright future. If he kept at it, he would be a great man of his time.

This made him not only excited but also feel fortunate.

After all, according to the book, people who opened a consciousness space were one in ten thousand.

He really had to thank the system. If it weren't for the system's spell loops, he wouldn't have been able to enter the consciousness space by mistake, let alone get out of it.

Thinking of this, filled with anticipation for the future, Benjamin held the book and continued reading.

However, when he reached the part about how to specifically cultivate, Benjamin felt as if a basin of cold water had been poured over his head, and his excitement plummeted to the bottom.

The book said: Each person can condense at most three Seals of Holy Light. Each Seal of Holy Light represents one divine art. In other words, people who practice using this method can only learn three divine arts in their entire life. Using any other divine art would double the failure rate.