Wind Escape Technique and Research into the Soul

After merging with Earth Element, Arnold named it the Earth Escape Art. Naturally, after merging with wind-elemental energy, Arnold named it the Wind Escape Technique.

The Earth Escape Art had been created for swift travel and rapid movement, but it was obvious that wind could make the body move even faster.

Making the body move at high speed was extremely difficult. The faster one moved, the greater the air resistance one faced. If a person's body was not strong enough, the immense resistance could even tear it apart.

However, thanks to his insights into merging with Earth Element, Arnold quickly grasped how to merge with wind-elemental energy as well.

In a forest somewhere deep within the Warcraft Mountain Range, Arnold moved swiftly, his figure utterly elusive and impossible to track.

As Arnold moved at high speed, several faint afterimages could even be seen. They were merely visual remnants left by his rapid movements.

Arnold stared gravely at a tree across from him. It stood exactly one hundred meters away from his current position.

Researching the Wind Escape Technique was similar to researching the Earth Escape Art. It was an auxiliary spell, and casting it was fairly quick. Arnold directly cast the Wind Escape Technique, stomped hard on the ground, and vanished in an instant, appearing beneath the tree a hundred meters away. As he moved back and forth, four or five afterimages appeared within that hundred-meter span.

Though casting the Wind Escape Technique was similar to the Earth Escape Art, there was a subtle fundamental difference. When casting the Earth Escape Art, Arnold merged his body into Earth Element, and the unique Life Force within Earth Element made him feel exceptionally at ease. Although he had failed to comprehend Earth Element's Life Force, Arnold had noticed it while casting the Earth Escape Art.

Casting the Wind Escape Technique, however, was somewhat dangerous. As his body merged with wind-elemental energy, his mental power also merged with the entire world. With the slightest carelessness, his mental power could dissipate between heaven and earth, harming Arnold.

Yet Arnold found a way to merge his body with wind-elemental energy without damaging his mental power.

Arnold improved the Wind Escape Technique. Whenever he cast it, an extremely thin Wind Shield formed over the surface of his body. The mental power Arnold used to merge with wind-elemental energy clung to this Wind Shield. If he remained merged with wind-elemental energy for too long, the shield would pull at his mental power, protecting it from harm from the world.

Furthermore, when moving with the Wind Escape Technique, air resistance was no longer an obstacle. Instead, it became a source of momentum.

Thus, the Wind Escape Technique was considered complete. Of course, Arnold would not be satisfied with that, and he would continue improving it in the future.

Earth Element and wind-elemental energy had led to the Earth Escape Art and Wind Escape Technique. Did fire-elemental and water-elemental energy also have the Fire Escape Art and Water Escape Art? Arnold thought so, but unfortunately, his affinity for fire and water was only low-grade. Once he reached the Saint Domain and had plenty of time, he could research fire and water as well!

Having developed the Wind Escape Technique through his research into wind-elemental energy, Arnold had originally wanted to take advantage of the momentum and comprehend other applications of wind-elemental energy. Unfortunately, he could not figure anything out for the time being.

Another year passed in the blink of an eye. Arnold's physical strength broke through to the level of a Fifth-level Warrior, while his mental power had already approached the intermediate level of an Eighth-level Mage. Merging with Earth Element and wind-elemental energy had caused Arnold's mental power to grow rapidly. For example, he barely used the recorder now, because playing music on it increased his mental power more slowly than merging with elemental energy.

Arnold had a feeling that merging with Earth Element focused on increasing the resilience of his mental power, though it also increased his mental power. Merging with wind-elemental energy, however, improved his mental power more than merging with Earth Element did.

Back in the library of Ernst Magic Academy, Arnold had read a book that introduced a Saint Domain Warrior whose mental power was inferior even to that of an Eighth-level Mage.

Because Arnold had inherited the memories of the young man from Earth, he had seen and understood far too much. By now, Arnold directly considered mental power to be the external manifestation of a person's most fundamental essence: the soul.

Then, could one attack a person's soul directly?

At a low level, this manifested as mental intimidation: using powerful mental power to directly oppress others, even leaving them dazed. But the higher one's mental power, the more capable one was of resisting such intimidation.

Arnold realized that laws should be incorporated into Soul Attacks.

The principle behind a Soul Attack was actually simple. It meant imbuing one's attack with mental power and striking directly at the opponent's soul.

Simply put, it was a mental attack.

It sounded simple, but it was exceedingly difficult in practice. Mental power was ordinarily soft yet resilient, like cotton cloth. What Arnold needed to do now was turn that cotton cloth into a sharp blade capable of wounding, even piercing, another person's soul.

For example, Arnold's usual applications of mental power, aside from casting magic, amounted only to spreading it out to search for others.

Thus, Arnold began experimenting on some low-level magical beasts.

Starting with the simplest method of releasing mental power to intimidate them, Arnold pondered the uses of the soul and mental power.

However, after a week of experimentation, Arnold gained little. His mental intimidation had merely become somewhat stronger.

Still, Arnold was clever. Since he could not yet use mental power in a special way to attack another person's soul, he could simply use a vast amount of mental power to batter the enemy's soul directly. Repeated impacts might not cause much damage to the enemy's soul, but they were still quite effective.

Arnold quickly managed to use this simple method. It required no particular technique—only instantly gathering a large amount of mental power and slamming it into the enemy. Arnold named it Mental Shock.

However, Arnold estimated that this so-called Mental Shock would only work against people whose mental power was weaker than his, such as warriors of the same level.

As for attaching the Earth Law he had comprehended to a Soul Attack, Arnold had no idea where to begin. He figured that once his mental power reached the realm of a Ninth-level Mage, he would surely gain something.

After two full years of bitter cultivation, Arnold's strength had developed across the board. Thanks to the terrifying effects of the Greater Gravity Spell, Arnold's physical strength directly broke through to the level of a Fifth-level Warrior, and he was already close to breaking through to the Sixth-level. His battle qi cultivation had also advanced extremely quickly, reaching the level of a Sixth-level Warrior.

His battle qi cultivation had progressed so quickly due to the enhancement of the Greater Gravity Spell and his physical strength, but its rate of improvement would now slow. This was because advancing from the Sixth-level to the Seventh-level in battle qi was also a considerable hurdle.

Arnold constantly researched magic, and he had also begun preparing to create several ultimate moves for battle qi. He aimed to make the power of his battle qi comparable to Seventh-level Magic.