Re: Tales of the Rune-Tech Sage

Chapter 216: Cultivation Academia

CH216 Cultivation Academia

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Although humanity had gained the ability to cultivate, that didn’t mean they knew how to cultivate properly. Most humans did so blindly guessing, or based on fragments of knowledge they had managed to acquire.

This led to painfully slow progress when compared to the powerful races, who had long-established, systematic methods of learning cultivation.

The Dwarves, for instance, learned by watching and mimicking their elders. The Elves learned through synchronising with the world itself, guided directly by nature.

The Dragons, however, were on an entirely different level. They inherited the experiences and knowledge of their parents through a unique draconic form of bloodline memory. Even without their elders, a young dragon instinctively knew how to cultivate, thanks to the memories implanted into its mind at conception.

Dragons were also favored by mana itself. For them, cultivating could be as natural as living, breathing, and eating.

Humanity, of course, had no such luxuries. They pursued knowledge however they could—some through upright means, most through nefarious ones.

Unlike humans, the powerful races were rarely plagued by what could be called deceit. Most of them did not lie—some had no concept of lying at all. And even among those who did, deceit was considered beneath them, especially when dealing with weaker beings.

Humanity had no such restraint. Driven by the seven vices, humanity’s forebears lied, cheated, and stole whenever necessary to acquire the knowledge they so desperately needed.

It would not be wrong to say that humanity’s cultivation system was built upon a foundation of lies, trickery, betrayal, and blood.

Even now, many races still speak with disdain of humanity’s so-called hideous and nefarious nature.

And yet... it would be equally wrong to deny the value humanity’s ancestors provided.

For all their sins, those same ’nefarious’ pioneers laid the foundation for the systemized cultivation academia that now existed across the realm.

Knowledge stolen from other races could not be applied directly without consequence. Even with cultivation, humanity remained innately weaker and less talented than the beings they stole from. With such a disparity in starting point, it was impossible to expect success by copying methods directly.

So, humanity’s ancestors studied, dissected, and refined that knowledge. After years of painstaking effort by countless scholars, humanity finally forged the template that became the foundation of cultivation academia—now used by every race on Pangea.

In fact, the grading systems of cultivation used today were developed by humans. The other intelligent races, despite their pride, had no choice but to adopt it, simply because of how simple yet extraordinary it was.

Aside from the grading system—Class 0 to ??? and Craft Tier 0 to ???—humanity’s ancestors also made massive strides in establishing the three primary branches of cultivation: Warrior, Warlock, and Wizard (Mage).

Though warriors were favored more heavily than the other two, the developments in all three branches proved critical.

To Alex’s surprise, humanity’s ancestors were also responsible for the creation of standardised spells.

Before this innovation, Wizards manipulated mana directly, which led to enormous disparities in ability—even among mages of the same rank.

For less talented mages, the introduction of standardised spellcasting provided them with templates to guide their use of mana. This meant that even the weakest could eventually cast spells, provided they followed the method.

For the talented, however, the benefits were even greater. With the framework of standardised spellcasting, they could create and refine spells far more easily. Their progress skyrocketed, and from this innovation emerged an exalted group of mages known as Spell Creators.

With the standardisation of spells came the rapid growth of the Mage branch. It was soon discovered that mastering a set number and grade of spells not only improved one’s magical ability, but also directly boosted a mage’s cultivation. Even more so, the creators of these spells benefitted immensely from their own innovations.

Thus, Spellcasting and Spellmastery became cornerstones of Mage cultivation. It became the accepted standard that a mage needed to learn and master a certain number of recognised spells in order to advance to the next level—something that had been ambiguous and inconsistent before.

For the Warlock branch, humanity’s ancestors made yet another critical discovery: that one could not only become a Warlock by synchronising with the world, but also by synchronising with one’s own bloodline.

In essence, humanity was responsible for the creation of Bloodline Warlocks. And it was no surprise then, that humanity had the largest population of this particular type of Warlocks, compared to World Warlocks.

It should be noted, however, that Elves were still considered the most talented and most numerous of the World Warlocks.

That said, compared to their contributions in the Warlock and Mage branches, humanity’s greatest achievement was undoubtedly in the Warrior branch—or at least, as far as humanity itself was concerned.

Unlike most species, who cultivated internal energy by converting mana and storing it within special cores, humanity had gone an entirely different route—turning the entire body itself into the storage core.

This deviation wasn’t without reason.

As mentioned before, humanity possessed the weakest innate bodies among the cultivation races. Their ancestors, unwilling to accept this frailty, devoted entire eras of research into finding a solution. The result was the Warrior cultivation method humanity still used to this day.

The Warrior path was essentially one of body cultivation. And through painstaking research, humanity’s forebears discovered a crucial truth; what humans lacked in natural talent, they made up for in malleability.

By combining this weakness and strength, they pushed the Warrior system to a unique peak suited only to humanity.

Warrior cultivation typically involved absorbing mana through breathing methods—not only through the nose and mouth, but at higher levels, even through sweat pores and other orifices.

Once inside the body, the mana was dissolved and used to temper the flesh. In this process, mana mixed with vitality and the body’s natural chemical energies to form a unique energy type specific to the Warrior path, known as Internal Energy.

Most races then gathered this Internal Energy within a specialised core called the Lower Energy Core, located just below the navel.

But humanity’s cultivation ancestors rejected this.

Instead, they devised a method of storing Internal Energy directly within the very cells of the body where it was produced. This energy was then continuously recycled, tempering the body over time.

On its own, the improvement was negligible—worthless to races like Dragons, whose bodies were already powerful by nature. But for humans, with their fragile forms, even the smallest improvements accumulated.

Over time, these improvements stacked layer upon layer.

By the time a human Warrior reached Legendary rank, their body, though still unable to rival the innate might of a dragon, had surpassed the frailty of mankind and risen to rival the physical strength of Orcs.

And there was more.

This unique method of cultivation unintentionally granted human Warriors with distinct general characteristics—traits that not only enhanced their power, but also acted as natural indicators of their rank.

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