Epic Of The Demonic Sage

Lucius looked at his soul closely and found there to be a symbol printed on the back. The symbol was rather small being about an inch in size, and was of an unknown script that he didn't recognize at first.

But the more he stared at it, the more he felt familiar with it. Then suddenly it struck him.

"The gift? That's the soul mark of my gift, Nexus?" Lucius realized.

He had already learned that the gifts were something that was unique to a person's soul and were part of it. Since he had it on his soul, it meant that it truly was a part of himself. Lucius initially had doubts about his gift too.

He had thought that perhaps he had gotten this from Asher too, since he took over the body. Also, before he came to this world, he definitely did not have that symbol on his soul. This meant that it appeared on it only after he took over the body fully.

Lucius observed it for a bit and ensured that there was nothing wrong with his soul. Having satisfied his need for caution, he decided to go ahead with what he originally wanted to do.

"Hmm… I should start with the coordinates I know from before. If they work, then it'll be much easier for me. If not… then I'll just have to figure out something new on my own." Lucius spoke to himself.

Lucius recalled the coordinates that he had used in his past life and began the process. There were a few thousand coordinates that he had used in his past life. For anyone to remember them would be quite difficult, but thankfully the Barrom clan had also thought of this problem and had worked on it over the many centuries.

What they had done was basically make a formula that would allow one to get the coordinates as they wanted, as long as they were within the limits. This formula accommodated all the coordinates that had been used by the Barrom clan members. All Lucius needed to do was to fill certain values in the variables and it would give him a coordinate.

With that in mind, he began the process and used the formula to get the first coordinate. But just after five minutes, he understood that he had failed, as no effect could be seen on his soul.

'Just as I expected, succeeding on the first try would be some ridiculous type of luck.' Lucius thought.

He came up with a second coordinate and repeated the process, only to fail again. He repeated the process many times and had to stop because he was getting tired.

"Can't exhaust myself here or I risk damaging my soul. Appearing here is already risky as I don't have external protections from interference. Looks like I can only do this when I'm sure I'll be alone." Lucius thought to himself.

He focused on his body and returned his consciousness to it. He opened his eyes and took a look at the clock on the wall.

"Hmm… it's 3 am already. Being able to spend three hours in the form of a soul is already pretty good for a first try." Lucius muttered to himself, feeling a bit impressed.

When Lucius had tried it for the first time and had accessed his soul, he had barely lasted for a single minute before he felt tired. To reach his current time limit of three hours, it had taken him nearly two years of constant practice.

While this time in a new body, he had done the same on the very first try. He didn't know the reason behind it though, and thought of researching it a bit later in the future. For now, he needed to sleep as his eyes were getting heavy.

He turned off the lamp which was also an artifact, and soon slipped into a deep sleep. Time passed and soon the sun rose up.

~knock~knock~

"Asher? Are you up yet?" Kiana called from the outside.

She waited a minute for his response and seeing that there was none; she decided to enter.

"So he's still asleep. Hmm… I guess we should just let him rest, his body should still be recovering." Kiana muttered to herself.

She was about to leave when she heard a groan.

"Ugh… is it already morning?" Lucius asked, with his eyes still closed.

"Yes, it's actually past morning. It is 11 am now." Kiana replied.

'Looks like the exhaustion sustained from the creation of a hell imprint is still greater than normal. Even when I did it for the first time in my past life, I wasn't this tired.' Lucius noted.

"I'll get up then," Lucius said as he rubbed his eyes.

Kiana nodded her head and poured some water into a basin for him to use. Lucius stood up and washed the sleep away with the cold water from the basin. Looking into the mirror, he could still see the red veins in his eyes.

'This'll take a bit to get used to.' Lucius thought.

"You can change up and come down for breakfast. The others have already had breakfast, so I'll set it up for you." Kiana spoke.

"What about father? What is he doing?" Lucius questioned.

He had expected that Gabriel may have asked Kiana to wake him up for breakfast, as he may have wanted for the family to have it together. But now it seemed to be otherwise.

"Since your father hasn't been in the city for nearly a year now, he is surveying the situation of the city. A lot of meetings have been pending with him and he now needs to sort them out. I think he'll only return in the evening." Kiana answered.

"Ah, I see." Lucius nodded his head.

"Oh, and your father has assigned a swordsmanship teacher for you before leaving," Kiana informed.

"He did? Who is it?" Lucius asked.

"Well, you've already met him before, it's lieutenant John." Kiana replied, surprising Lucius again.