Chapter 98: Lord Varos (3)
After his regression through time and space, Varos had struggled immensely with awakening his aura. It wasn’t merely because he lacked experience in awakening it.
It might have been easier for him to start from scratch. After all, his mind was still brimming with countless martial techniques from his past life. But such techniques were no use to him right now.
The problem lay in his fundamentally flawed habits. He had always relied on the strength of others, wielding borrowed aura instead of his own. His soul, twisted and altered by years of such dependency, had become incompatible with conventional methods of awakening.
Though his aura techniques mirrored those of an aura user, the way he accumulated and processed energy resembled a necromancer’s methods far more closely. In his state of corruption, he needed a novel method of awakening aura, but none of the martial manuals he had studied could provide a solution.
This was precisely what Varos had warned Karnak about in the past. If he walked a path different from others, he would face problems—problems he had to figure out on his own.
"But as it turns out," Varos muttered, his gaze settling on the fallen Lapicel, "there was someone right in front of me who had already walked that path."
Having been freed from the cursed influence of the demonic sword, Lapicel had mastered the impossible. She had converted the sword's dark aura into her own aura. In other words, she had transformed the sensation of wielding another’s power into that of commanding her own. And that was exactly the approach Varos had been seeking.
"Wait, can you really mimic something like that after just watching it once?" Serati asked him.
"Hey, I may not look it now, but I was kind of a big deal back in the day," Varos replied with a shrug. "I might not compare in terms of experience or finesse, but I can grasp the core concept to a degree."
An aura user of with a certain degree of mastery could replicate the techniques of others after mere observation. The same went without saying for someone on the level of the Martial Kings. Of course, as Varos said, his mastery and precision of the technique was still lacking, but what was more important was that he had grasped it. Now that he had a grasp, all that was left to do was to train and practice.
Varos clicked his tongue as he glanced down at Lapicel. "Once you understand the principle, it’s not that difficult. But why couldn’t I think of it before? Is this the difference between a genius and an ordinary person?"
Karnak nodded. "Well, it worked out in the end. So what's your skill at right now?"