Raziel wiped the sweat from his forehead and focused on the stone slate in front of him.
It was the second week of preparation for the Ascension Tournament.
He trained with Zorya for exactly four hours every single morning before the first bell woke the rest of the academy.
His progress advanced at a terrifying speed because the Umbral Paragon core adapted the ancient language.
Standard runes took normal novices months to understand and hours to draw while Raziel's Umbral variant flowed from his fingertips.
He mastered three specific types of seals during the brutal training sessions in the East Basement.
The first was the Seal of Silence.
It muffled all sound within a fixed two-meter radius and provided a massive tactical advantage for stealth operations.
The second was the Anchor Seal and it locked any physical object perfectly still in space for exactly thirty seconds.
This made it a effective combat tool for stopping blades or trapping enemy limbs mid-swing.
