The iron bar of the Abyssal Cell clanged shut, and just like that, Edward Vistro shut out the whole world of political intrigue and royal posturing. The silence in the cell was thick enough to choke on. Most people would go crazy in that kind of quiet, but Edward? He heard an opportunity knocking.

He didn’t even bother waiting for the guards to clear off. He sat down on the cold, damp stone floor, crossing his legs. His clothes were already getting a healthy dose of grime. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, slowing everything down until his heartbeats felt like they were miles apart.

Those Null-Stone walls had a weird hum to them. They were like magical sponges, sucking up any loose energy floating around. Edward was fine with it. He started pulling in the mana that was naturally all over the place, buried deep in the earth. It flowed through the stone and into his skin. The energy felt like liquid fire rushing through his body, his cultivation speed unrivaled due to his tempered body and his refined elven cultivation technique.

Cultivating by absorbing the ambient mana that saturated the world, he coursed it through his meridian, refined it, and inscribed a circle within his mana core, thereby storing it.

This was it. Time for the last push.

The Ninety-Sixth Circle formed with a spiritual thrum. It was followed quickly by the Ninety-Seventh and Ninety-Eighth. The speed was terrifying. In the Luminaris Kingdom, a mage might spend a decade trying to stabilize these final rings of the Adept stage, as the pressure within the mana core reached a critical threshold. Each new circle fought against the ones already inscribed, like magnets of the same pole being forced together.

With that, the Ninety-Ninth Circle clicked into place. Inside his chest, his core was like a mini sun, blindingly bright with a violent light. It was spinning so fast that the air in the cell started to vibrate, making a faint, high-pitched sound. Even the dust particles were dancing around because of the spiritual static.

And then, the One Hundredth Circle.

With that hundredth ring locked in, Edward hit the peak of the Adept Stage. He was a fifteen-year-old kid with the power of a war-hardened mage. But for Edward, the Adept stage was just a kid’s game. He was already eyeing the next level, the place where people start to rise up over their physical limits.

"Now," Edward said quietly.

To reach the True Mage Stage, one cannot simply add a hundred-and-first circle. The core is now volatile. To continue, the structure itself must be fundamentally altered. Most mages at this stage required a ’Breakthrough Pill’ or the assistance of a Master to stabilize their soul during the transition.

Edward needed none of that, as he quickly activated the Celestial Needle technique, but not for inscription. Instead, he used it to make the whole core vibrate at a specific frequency. All those hundred mana circles started to shake. They blurred together, the clear lines between them dissolving into a wild mess of light.

The pressure was immense. Edward’s skin looked like it was made of glowing glass. Sweat poured off him, but it turned to steam before it even hit the ground. He was compressing an abundant worth of mana into one single point.

The hundred circles collapsed inward. In a crazy burst of spiritual energy that you couldn’t even hear, the mess of light got smaller and smaller. What used to be a messy ball of a hundred rings was now just one, huge, shimmering solid ring of mana. It was thicker, brighter, and way more stable than before.

The foundation of the True Mage was set.

And with that, time for the 101st Inscription.

With the space cleared and the core restructured, Edward took one last, huge breath of the world’s mana. He ran it through his soul, shaping it until it was as sharp and thin as a diamond thread.

He guided that thread toward the new ring.

Skree.

The sound of the 101st Circle being inscribed was like a sword being drawn across silk. It spiraled around the new unified single ring within the core, glowing with a deep, authoritative violet. As it locked into place, a shockwave of raw power erupted from Edward’s body, only for him to draw it back in an instant, compressing it inward before it could escape him and announce the birth of a true mage to the world.

True Mage Stage: Initial Level.

The moment the power settled, he felt his ascension complete.

His Sea of Consciousness expanded violently, its boundaries pushed outward as if an unseen horizon had been torn open. What was once a vast lake had become a sizable sea, that’s capable of bearing far greater strain.

With the expansion, he was now able to use high-tier Epic-ranked spells that were once impossible due to his adept stage’s sea of consciousness. High-tier constructs, multi-layered formations, long-duration battlefield spells—all of them now sat comfortably within his reach. Even low-tier legendary-ranked spells, the kind that could change a whole battlefield, were now in his reach.

His control over space sharpened as well. The range of his teleportation expanded by several kilometers. An increase in his spiritual sense capability followed suit.

As a true mage cultivator, entire schools of magic opened to him.

At the True Mage stage, he could condense elemental forces into lethal attacks, turning fire into collapsing suns or ice into binding blizzards that froze both body and movement. Spirit-sealing techniques allowed him to disrupt an enemy’s spellcasting at its source for a full minute, while essence-locking restraints let him pin cultivators below his realm by anchoring their cores and souls together.

And this was only the beginning.

Exhaling slowly, letting the last ripples of power settle deep within his core. The world outside remained ignorant, unaware that another threshold had been crossed. But to him, the difference was unmistakable.

Now in the third realm of cultivation. In the Seven Kingdoms, a True Mage was a figure of significant power—a man who could lead a city or command a legion. The Flame Phoenix Lord, the Duke, was only two stages higher as an Archmage.

Edward looked at the stone wall, seeing right through it to the surface.

"I need to form four hundred more circles to reach the middle level of True Mage Stage," Edward considered, narrowing his eyes. "With my current realm, and my ability to wield up to the seventh star of sword and martial arts, defeating Father would be trivial. He is only at the peak of the True Mage stage. However, as in every previous attempt to seize the Marquis title, the Flame Phoenix Lord would intervene. Facing them both exceeds my current limits.

I need to reach the High Mage stage."

He closed his eyes again, the 101st circle spinning in the dark, the silent heart of a king preparing to reclaim his world.

********

A/N: We are getting close to a very epic and blood pumping battle arc, please hold still as Edward prepare himself by raising his cultivation base.