I lay sprawled on the training hall floor, still catching my breath from the last session.

  Meanwhile, Brother Fauz had moved on to teaching Ray and Kenya about elemental aura.

  “Before you release your aura, you need to infuse it with your element first,” Brother Fauz explained, crossing his arms. “Ray, your element is fire, right? What do you think of fire?”

  Ray tilted his head. “Umm… Fire is hot, right?”

  Brother Fauz chuckled at his innocent answer. “Every person has a different interpretation, and none of them are wrong. If you think fire is hot, then imagine your aura becoming hotter than usual. After that, try releasing it.”

  “Okay!” Ray nodded enthusiastically.

  Brother Fauz then turned to Kenya. “Your element is earth, right? What do you think of it?”

  Kenya furrowed his brows, giving it serious thought. “Umm… It’s hard. As hard as a rock.”

  Brother Fauz grinned. “Good answer. Then imagine your aura solidifying like a rock. Try releasing it with that image in mind.”

  “Yes!”

  I focused intently, watching Kenya. Unlike fire, earth was an element I had never seen before.

  Would it really look different?

  After a few minutes of deep concentration, both Ray and Kenya succeeded at the same time.

  Ray’s aura, which was once a transparent mist, suddenly flared into a vibrant red, flickering like flames around his palm.

  Kenya’s aura, on the other hand, thickened into a deep brown hue, swirling heavily, almost as if tiny specks of dust were floating within it.

  “”I did it!””

  “Great work, both of you!” Brother Fauz clapped, nodding in approval.

  ““Thank you for your guidance!”” They bowed respectfully.

  I stared closely at Kenya’s aura, my curiosity still lingering.

  “Brother Fauz, I understand that Ray’s aura is still like air but hotter than before. But why does Kenya’s aura also look like air? Shouldn’t it have solidified like a rock?”

  He laughed. “That’s a great question, Freed.”

  He rubbed his chin, thinking for a moment before glancing around.

  His eyes landed on two small similar size stones nearby and a wooden training sword.

  “Kenya, try wrapping your earth aura around this stone.”

  “Yes.” Kenya nodded and began channeling his aura into the stone.

  While he did that, Brother Fauz balanced the center of the wooden sword on his thumb and index finger.

  “Alright, normally, the hilt is heavier than the blade, so if I put a normal stone on top of the hilt, the sword should still tilt toward the hilt, right?”

  “Kenya, put your stone on top of the blade.”

  Kenya finished infusing the stone with his aura and placed it on the tip of the blade.

  Brother Fauz then let go of his thumb, leaving only his index finger under it.

  “Huh?” Kenya blinked in surprise.

  And instead of tilting toward the hilt, the sword tilted toward the blade.

  “You see that?” Brother Fauz smirked. “Even though your aura still looks like air, the object wrapped in it becomes heavier—as if you placed an extra rock on it.”

  I blinked, trying to wrap my head around it. “So even though it doesn’t change shape, it still affects weight?”

  He nodded. “Exactly. Think of it like an invisible force pressing down. The larger the aura you release, the heavier the effect.”

  He then turned to Kenya, “If your magical power increases, you can make it even heavier—so don’t just focus on how it looks. Focus on the effect.”

  “Yes!” Kenya clenched his fists with newfound confidence.

  A moment later, his aura faded, and the sword tilted back toward the hilt, proving that his aura had indeed altered the stone’s weight.

  Brother Fauz crossed his arms. “Alright, Ray, Kenya, do you want to move on to the next stage?”

  ““Yes, please!””

  “Well, there’s nothing complicated about the next phase. Just keep doing what you just did—but now apply it to your weapons.”

  He gestured toward the training dummies.

  “When you fight monsters, they won’t wait for you to power up your aura. You need to be able to envelop your weapon with aura instantly, just like breathing. Understood?”

  ““Understood!””

  “Good. Once you master that, the final step is to maintain your elemental aura while moving and fighting. Also, don’t neglect your physical training and mana control.”

  After wrapping up their lesson, Brother Fauz turned to me.

  “Freed, once you're done resting, get back on your feet. We’re working on your stamina next.”

  “Yes.”

  With that, I started running laps around the training hall.

  By the time Cheri, Ryan, and Rei successfully released their basic aura, nearly three hours had passed.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  Ryan finished a little before Rei, while Cheri was the last one to succeed.

  They were all visibly drained, unable to continue training, so they sat down and watched the others instead.

  Not that they were interested in watching me.

  It’s just because I continued running alone.

  Not because I’m unpopular, okay!?

  …Okay, maybe just a little.

  Regardless, I had started to notice something important.

  People in this world couldn’t master both aura and mana equally.

  Ryan, Rei, and Cheri were good with mana but slow at learning aura.

  Ray, Kenya, and Gill were fast with aura but weaker with mana.

  Yet, here I was, learning both at an abnormal speed.

  <”Aza, am I really a genius, or did Libertas do something to my body?”>

  【Neither, Master.】

  <”Huh?”>

  I blinked. I was just fishing for compliments, but Aza’s answer caught me off guard.

  【Your abilities are a result of the efforts you made in your previous life, Master.】

  <”...My previous life? What do you mean?”>

  Aza’s calm, robotic voice suddenly took on an amused tone.

  【Master, you couldn't find happiness in reality back then, so you spent years fantasizing about different lives.】

  【You imagined yourself as a hero, a magician, a warrior, a football player, a basketball star—even someone with a harem of devoted admirers.】

  <”...Why does that last one sound weirdly specific?”>

  【Oh, should I also mention your hypnosis fantasies? You seemed particularly fond of those. There were countless fantasies you imagined to find happiness in your past life.】

  <”Okay, okay, stop!”>

  【My point is—your mind has always been trained for visualization. You’ve imagined countless abilities, picturing them so vividly that it became second nature.】

  【And now that you’re in a world where aura and mana depend on mental imagery, you’re adapting effortlessly—just like how you used to escape into your fantasies. So...】

  Aza paused for dramatic effect.

  【Congratulations, Master. Your somewhat pathetic past has finally proven useful.】

  <”Hey! You could have just called me a genius without the unnecessary details!”>

  Really, this damn angel!

  I anticipated a significant explanation, but she was merely teasing me again!

  After a while, I collapsed onto the floor, exhausted.

  I had to return to work at the bar soon, so while waiting, I decided to check my status.

  ? STATUS WINDOW ?

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  Name: Freed

  Age: 6

  Race: Great Human

  Title: Otherworlder

  State: Normal

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  ? Essence ?

  Mana: 20/20

  Aura: 0/5

  Vitality: 25

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  ? Attributes ?

  Strength: 35

  Magic Power: 17

  Mental Power: 15

  Agility: 45

  Dexterity: 27

  Magic Resistance: 18

  Mental Resistance: 16

  Status Points: 0

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  ? Element Affinity ?

  -

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  ? Skills ?

  — Active —

  Immortal Bonds, Appraisal (1)

  — Passive —

  Language Comprehension

  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

  ? Innate Talents ?

  Immortal, Double Natural Growth Rate, Status Manipulation, Elementalist, Learning Acceleration

  <”... Hey, is this normal?”>

  Just two days ago, my stats were practically non-existent—most of them still at 1—but now they have skyrocketed, except my aura, as I only just began learning it two hours ago.

  【Yes. It’s easy to increase your stats when you’re starting from zero. But it will get harder later.】

  So it’s like experience points in a game?

  Leveling up is simpler at a low level but tougher as one advances.

  【Master also possesses Double Natural Growth Rate. And since everything you’re learning is brand new, your Learning Acceleration is also in effect. So you’re actually growing four times faster than an average person.】

  【But the next time you train your mana and aura, only the Double Natural Growth Rate will take effect.】

  Ah, I see...

  So Learning Acceleration only works the first time I learn something new? Once I get used to it, it stops boosting me.

  Yesterday, I practiced absorbing and releasing mana repeatedly, enhancing my mana capacity significantly.

  However, today, since I've only released my aura once and I also can't recover it, it's understandable that my aura capacity just increased by four.

  Though the logic behind the considerable increase in my magic power and mental resistance is unclear, I suppose I don't need to delve into the details.

  It's all good as long as my abilities improve with each session of mana and aura training.

  Then—observing the Element Affinity section, it remains empty.

  Characters in novels often seem to gain power effortlessly, with many starting off as powerful beings.

  I had hoped to progress more swiftly, but once again, reality shatters my optimistic dreams.

  <”Hey, Aza, am I not the main character in this world, by any chance?”>

  【Master, are you feeling unwell?】

  If she had a physical form, her expression would likely convey a sense of confusion, saying, “What the heck are you talking about?”

  Haa…