Time flowed differently for Aureus Solaris. For a child of five, a year was an eternity of growth and play. For a reincarnated soul racing against a prophecy of ruin, a year was a terrifyingly short breath held in anticipation.
It had been twelve months since the dinner with King Valerius. Twelve months of playing the role of the doting brother to the three-year-old Celestine, whose silver-blonde hair now reached her shoulders and whose adoration for him had solidified into a fierce, possessive shadow. Twelve months of scouring the Royal Library, building a mental fortress of Runecrafting theory and geopolitical maps.
And twelve months of waiting for Lord Lysander.
The signal came not with a scroll, but with a subtle, rhythmic tapping of a cane against the marble floor of the library. Aureus looked up from a dense tome on Veridian Ley-Line Theory.
Lord Lysander stood at the entrance, his face gaunt, his posture stiffer than usual. The stress of the secret commission had aged the Count, carving deeper lines around his eyes, but it had also hardened him. He looked less like a bureaucrat now and more like a conspirator.
"Your Highness," Lysander said, bowing low. " The renovations to the lower wine cellars are complete. The structural integrity has been reinforced with... the requested alloys."
Aureus closed the book with a snap. "Show me."
They moved through the palace in silence, descending past the servant quarters, past the general storage, down into the bedrock foundation of the castle, areas where the air grew cold and the scent of roses was replaced by the smell of damp earth and old stone.
Lysander stopped before a heavy, nondescript iron door hidden behind a rack of dusty vintage casks. He produced a heavy, intricate key—Dwarven make.
"The Ironhand Forge was... difficult," Lysander murmured as he turned the lock. "They asked no questions about the purpose, as you predicted, but they were insulted by the request for secrecy. They claimed their work deserves to be seen by the Guild Masters. I had to triple the 'rush fee' to ensure their silence."
"Vanity is expensive, but silence is priceless," Aureus replied. "Open it."
The door swung inward.
The chamber beyond was small, stark, and utterly alien to the gilded aesthetic of the Human palace. The walls were lined with panels of dull, grey metal — Grade-Seven Tantalum Alloy, capable of absorbing and dampening immense magical fallout. But the centerpiece was the Mana Observation Array.
It was a sphere of floating, interlocking brass and crystal rings, suspended in the center of the room. It hummed with a low, resonant frequency that Aureus could feel in his teeth. Unlike the sleek, polished scanners of the Royal Mages, this machine looked raw, industrial, and aggressive. It was built to dissect mana, not just measure it.
Aureus walked toward it, his small hand reaching out. He could feel the sensors tracking him instantly. A crystalline display panel on the wall flickered to life, showing a chaotic stream of data, not just a single bar for volume, but a jagged, fluctuating waveform representing stability, density, and purity.
"They calibrated it to the A-Rank Purity standard," Lysander explained, his voice trembling slightly. "They called it 'overkill' for a prototype. They said no human mana source requires this level of granular analysis. They said we were looking for ghosts."
"We are looking for the things that make ghosts, Lysander," Aureus corrected.
He stepped onto the central platform. The brass rings spun, locking onto his bio-signature. For the first time in this life, Aureus didn't have to hold back. He didn't have to project warmth or hide his intensity.
He closed his eyes and let the mask fall. He reached into the core of his soul and tugged on the leash of the [Sacred Aetheric Conduit].
"System Check."
The room instantly flooded with blinding, golden light. It wasn't the soft glow of a child's awakening; it was a hard, coherent radiance. The brass rings spun violently, whirring as they tried to process the input. The display panel on the wall spiked, the waveform jumping erratically before stabilizing into a terrifyingly flat, perfect line.
[Target Status: Pre-Awakening / Latent][Density Equivalent: Tier I (Novitiate)][Purity Index: Absolute]
Lysander gasped, shielding his eyes. "The readings... the needle isn't moving. It's perfectly stable. That's... that's impossible. You haven't even undergone the Ritual. Your channels should be dormant, yet the density... it matches a trained Novitiate."
"It is the baseline," Aureus said, his voice distorted by the hum of the energy surrounding him. "This chamber is my forge, Lysander. And today, I begin to hammer the iron."
He looked at the trembling Steward. "Leave me. Ensure the wards are active. No one enters. Not the King. Not the Queen. Not even Celestine."
Lysander bowed and retreated, the heavy iron door sealing Aureus in with the humming machine.
Aureus stood alone in the light. He checked his internal clock. He was five years old. He had ten years until the Academy. Ten years to take this absolute purity and turn it into a volume of power that could rival a god.
He sat down in the center of the array, assumed a meditative posture, and prepared to execute the first cycle of Regal Regeneration. The theoretical phase was over. The physical conditioning had begun.
…
The heavy iron door clicked shut, sealing Aureus in absolute silence. The only sound was the low, rhythmic thrum of the Mana Observation Array, a sound that felt less like machinery and more like a heartbeat.
Aureus stood in the center of the brass rings. He was five years old. His body was small, his mana channels underdeveloped, and his core fragile. Yet, the readout on the wall didn't lie: [Density Equivalent: Tier I (Novitiate)]. His raw potential at his current age was already equal to a formally awakened student. But potential without control was just a bomb waiting to detonate.
He sat down on the central platform, crossing his legs in a meditative pose he had perfected over twelve months of mental simulation. He closed his eyes, shifting his vision from the physical room to the internal landscape of his soul.
He didn't reach for a spell. He didn't try to conjure a light ball or a shield. Those were parlor tricks. He reached for the engine itself.
'Regal Regeneration. Activate.'
It wasn't a toggle; it was a valve. He visualized the [Sacred Aetheric Conduit] — the unique, golden pathway of his mana circuit, and commanded it to breathe.
The reaction was instantaneous and violent. A surge of pure, hot Light Mana rushed from his core, flooding his small limbs. Pain, sharp and electric, spiked through his nerves. His body, accustomed to the gentle, passive flow of a child, screamed at the sudden demand.
'Too fast,' his adult mind analyzed coldly. 'The flow rate is unstable. The channels are too narrow.'
He didn't stop. He clamped down on the pain with iron will, forcing the rushing energy into a rhythmic cycle. Inhale mana from the core. Circulate through the limbs. Purify the fatigue toxins. Exhale the waste heat. Repeat.
The brass rings of the scanner spun faster, the hum rising to a whine. On the wall display, the waveform spiked red.
[Warning: Channel Stress at 40%][Purity Output: Rising]
"More," Aureus whispered through gritted teeth. Sweat beaded on his forehead, glowing faintly golden in the array's light. "If I can't handle 40% now, I'll be dead at 100% when the Dimensional Sickness hits."
He pushed harder. He visualized the Shadow Blight — the spiritual rot he knew was festering in the court, waiting to consume his father. He visualized the Scapegoat Sacrifice — the moment of exhaustion that had killed him in the original story, the fate he refused to repeat. He visualized Celestine, her eyes wide with terror as the protection of the Solaris line failed her.
That fear was his fuel. That ambition was the forge.
He forced the mana to spin faster. The pain transformed from a sharp spike to a dull, burning ache, the feeling of muscles being torn and rebuilt, but on a spiritual level. This was Hyper-Conditioning. He was micro-tearing his mana channels, forcing his Regal Regeneration to heal them instantly, stronger and wider than before.
[Warning: Channel Stress at 65%][Regeneration Protocol: Active]
Aureus gasped, his small back arching. The golden light around him intensified, becoming solid, almost liquid. It wasn't just light; it was weight. The Solar Coherence quality of his trait was manifesting, making the air in the room heavy and dense.
He held the cycle for ten minutes. Then twenty. Then an hour.
Normal mages, even adults, would be exhausted after thirty minutes of such intense cycling. Aureus felt the fatigue clawing at him, trying to drag him into unconsciousness, but the Regal Regeneration fought back. It was a constant war within his own body: destruction and rebirth, happening every second.
Finally, the limit hit. A sharp, warning crack echoed in his inner ear, the sound of a channel nearing rupture.
'Stop.'
He cut the flow instantly. The golden light vanished, leaving the room plunged into sudden, stark greyness. The brass rings slowed their spinning, the hum dying down to a purr.
Aureus slumped forward, his chest heaving. He was drenched in sweat, his limbs trembling uncontrollably. He felt like he had run a marathon while carrying a suit of armor.
But he was alive. And he felt... expanded.
He looked up at the display panel. The jagged waveform had smoothed out.
[Session Complete][Channel Elasticity: +0.5%][Recovery Rate: Tier I (Peak)]
A grim smile touched his lips. 0.5% increase in a single session. It was microscopic, but it was permanent. If he maintained this pace every day for the next ten years...
He stood up, his legs shaking but holding. He wiped the sweat from his brow. He wasn't just a prodigy anymore. He was a worker.
"Lysander," he called out, his voice hoarse but steady.
The heavy door unlocked and swung open. The Count stood there, his eyes wide as he took in the steam rising from the Prince's body and the lingering smell of ozone and burnt mana.
"Your Highness?" Lysander asked, his voice hushed. "Are you... injured?"
"I am forging myself," Aureus replied, stepping out of the chamber. "Prepare a bath with the Elven restorative salts. And bring me the schematics for the Spacial Gate network currently managed by Volund Aether-Hand. I have a feeling the 'flicker' is about to become a tremor."
He walked past the stunned retainer, his stride a little longer, his presence a little heavier.
…
The Elven restorative salts turned the bathwater a pale, shimmering violet. Aureus sank into the heat, letting the water lap against his chin. The physical trembling in his limbs had subsided, replaced by a dull, heavy warmth, the sign that his Regal Regeneration was knitting the micro-tears in his mana channels back together, stronger and wider than before.
He was five years old. He had just survived a conditioning session that would have hospitalized a newly awakened teenager. And he was only at the bottom of the mountain.
Aureus closed his eyes, summoning the mental image of the Veridian Concord's Power Hierarchy. To the common folk, it was just a list of titles. To Aureus, it was a biological caste system, a towering cliff face where every ledge represented a quantum leap in reality-bending capability and the most precious currency of all: time.
He felt the hum of his own raw density. He was currently standing at the base, the realm of the Tier I - Novitiate. It was the starting line, the rank of apprentices who could barely manifest their element to light a torch or mend a scrape. For a Human, it was a pitiful evolutionary step, pushing the average lifespan to a mere hundred years.
But even this meager power was currently denied to him. He traced the invisible seal on his core — the Gate of Fifteen. Universal magical law dictated that a human's mana channels remained fluid and unsettled until their fifteenth year. Until that Awakening, he was a loaded gun with the safety welded shut. He had the density of a trained mage, but he couldn't cast a single external spell. He was limited to the internal, pressurized circulation of his [Sacred Aetheric Conduit].
'A battery that cannot discharge,' he thought bitterly. 'But a battery that can grow endlessly.'
Above the Novitiate lay the Tier II -Acolyte, the rank of the common soldier. An Acolyte could coat weapons in elemental energy and sustain combat magic for minutes at a time. It offered a lifespan of perhaps a hundred and thirty years, better than a commoner, but still a blink of an eye compared to the Elves. Aureus intended to skip this tier entirely in the public eye.
His mind drifted higher, to the first true threshold: the Tier III - Adept.
This was the standard he would be judged against in ten years. It was the graduation requirement for the Saint-Veridian Academy, the rank of Knights and elite forces. It was the point where the mortal coil truly began to tighten and harden. An Adept could weave complex, multi-layered spell circles, fly for short durations using mana propulsion, and alter the immediate environment, freezing a pond or scorching a field with a thought. More importantly, the body ceased to age like a mortal's. An Adept could live for two centuries.
But an Adept was still a servant.
Above them loomed the Tier IV - Archons. This was the realm of Commanders, High Council members, and Master Artificers like Volund Aether-Hand. An Archon didn't just cast fire; they became the furnace. They could power city-wide wards or level a fortress wall with a single, condensed strike. This was the peak of human ambition for ninety-nine percent of the population. It granted a lifespan of three hundred and fifty years.
'This is where the original Aureus Solaris died.' the thought struck him, cold and sharp.
In the original novel, "The Saint-Veridian Scion", the First Prince was hailed as a generational prodigy. He had reached the Archon Rank at the tender age of eighteen, a feat that shocked the continent. The fandom had adored him for it. But Archons were still mortal. Archons still had limits. When the Siege came, the original Aureus burned through his Archon-level reserves holding back the darkness and died gasping in the mud, exhausted and spent.
'Being an Archon wasn't enough to save him. Being a genius wasn't enough.'
Aureus clenched his fist beneath the water. He would not repeat that mistake. To survive the plot, he had to ascend beyond the peak of his former self. He had to reach the next realm, Sovereign.
The Tier V of power. The rank of rulers. This was Aureus's target. The realm of national treasures and walking catastrophes. A Sovereign's mana density was so high it began to warp the natural laws around them. A Light Sovereign didn't just illuminate; they could solidify light into physical bridges or banish shadows permanently from a region.
'This is where my father sits.' Aureus thought, a ripple of cold disappointment cutting through the warmth of the bath.
King Valerius was a Sovereign. He possessed the power to twist laws, yet he used it only to maintain stasis. He had reached the very first ledge of that glorious peak and simply stopped, afraid to brave the thinning air of the ascent. He had accepted the prize of six hundred years of life, but he lacked the will to use those centuries to challenge the Shadow Blight.
Aureus clenched his fist beneath the water. He would not stop there. He looked toward the mental peak that terrified even Sovereigns: Tier VI - Ascendant.
This was the realm of myths, ancient Elven Elders and Beastkin War Lords. An Ascendant did not just warp laws; they overwrote them. They possessed the power of Dominion — the ability to project their inner world outward, overwriting reality itself. Within a Dominion, the mage was God. Their word was law, and any opposing element was crushed by the sheer weight of their conceptual existence.
And beyond them? The theoretical Tier VII - Celestial, the realm of true immortality.
The gap between his current, bound Novitiate density and the Sovereign Rank was an abyss. To cross it in fourteen years, to achieve it before he graduated the Academy, was theoretically impossible.
But the "theory" didn't account for the [Sacred Aetheric Conduit].
Standard training relied on the slow, passive absorption of ambient mana to widen the core. Aureus's method, the Hyper-Conditioning he had just begun, was different. He wasn't absorbing; he was forcing his channels to expand through the violent, controlled cycling of his own Solar Coherence. He was tearing his soul apart and letting Regal Regeneration build it back stronger, hour by hour, day by day.
He lifted his hand, watching water droplets drip from his fingers. They caught the light, sparkling like diamonds.
"I will not be a tragic hero," Aureus whispered to the empty room, his voice dripping with arrogant certainty. "I will not die an Archon like the script demands. I will climb until the air is too thin for the sickness to survive. I will force the Awakening Ritual to register an Archon's density at fifteen, the rank my canon self died achieving, and I will secure the Sovereign Rank before I graduate."
He stood up, the water sluicing off his small, determined frame. "And when Valerian Aetherus (the harem protagonist) arrives with his chaotic voids and his righteous pity... he will not find a rival. He will find a monster sitting on the throne, waiting to crush him."
Tomorrow, he would increase the stress load to 45%. And he would begin the analysis of the Spacial Gate schematics Lysander had delivered. The Spacial Gate Stability Crisis was approaching, and with it, the opportunity to secure the Dwarven Heiress. It was time to prepare for his first public miracle.