After resting for a little bit, Shiro decided to leave some nanobots in this location so that she could come back to this place whenever she wanted but there was a slight problem about that thought. With the sheer amount of ambient mana around this place, the nanobots would go out of control if she wasn't here to regulate them every day.
Who knows, the next time she comes back to this place the nanobots might have already consumed the mountain.
"Teach, is there a way for me to come back to this place? It would be a waste to leave here forever." Shiro asked as Stanley nodded.
"If you want, I can make you a few teleport scrolls to this location." Stanley suggested.
"Wait, you can do that?" Shiro asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Of course I can. I teleport all the time. It's only natural that I would have figured out how to make these scrolls somewhere down the line." Stanley shrugged as he brought out a few pieces of old parchment and started to enchant them with tier 5 magic.
Watching him make the teleport scrolls, Shiro made sure that she remembered everything that he was doing. After all, it would be handy if she could do it too. That way her friends could teleport to a specific location should they ever get lost or get stuck in a place.
However, during this, Shiro noticed a strange magic circle within the enchantment.
"Teach, what's that magic circle? It's nothing like anything I've seen before." Shiro asked as it was filled with unfamiliar runes.
"Oh this? It's something that can help you ignore spacial locks. They're the bane of teleportation users. I found this during one of my journeys and apparently it was used by a demi-god to avoid the cages set by gods. So far, it's been working quite nicely and I haven't ran into any trouble when people lock the space around me." Stanley replied with a soft chuckle.
"Oh? Do you think I can use it as well then? My Rift Strider is a form of teleport I suppose so the moment they lock the space, one of my main skills will be blocked." Shiro asked as Stanley nodded.
"Of course. Everything should be recorded in this book."
Reaching into his inventory, Stanley gave Shiro a delicate book with no title.
Flipping through the pages with care, she made sure to remember everything.
"If you read through it, you should receive a system notification saying that you've discovered lost runes and the option to use a new set of runes to create your magic circles should appear."
"Eh? You do?" Shiro raised her eyebrows since her system didn't respond at all.
"Hmm… that's strange. Perhaps it's a unique skill." Stanley frowned.
"It's fine. I'll think of new ways to achieve the same effect eventually." Shiro shrugged.
After creating several teleportation scrolls for this place, Stanley handed them to Shiro.
"These should work even without the Ignore Spacial Lock function so if you study them in your spare time, you should be able to recreate them with ease." He smiled as Shiro nodded her head.
"Thank you. Shall we go back now? Today's the final day of training isn't it?"
"Mn. Three weeks is such a short time." Stanley sighed as he wished he could stay with Shiro more so that he could teach her everything he knew.
"Don't worry though. We'll probably come back for a little bit after the God Trials." Shiro grinned as Stanley smiled.
"Let's head back now."
Opening a portal, Stanley gestured for Shiro to walk through.
Turning around to give Astral Horizons one last glance, Shiro stepped through the portal.
After returning to the mansion, she saw that Helion and Madison hadn't returned yet and decided to take this time to use her Dagger of Divine Insight.
Seeing as though it was just choosing one technique and that it shouldn't take too long, she told the party that she'll be right back.
Walking to one of the training halls, she pulled the dagger out of her inventory and wondered how she should use the item.
All it said was that the dagger will teleport the user into a divine space which allows them to study the techniques used by the gods.
Thinking about how she used most items, Shiro decided to inject her mana into the dagger.
However, the moment she did this, she felt a tug on her consciousness and knew what was coming next.
"Whoever makes these items really needs to stop knocking me out." She complained before collapsing on the ground.
###
Looking at the myriad of doors with a neutral expression, Shiro sighed before glancing towards her system.
[You have discovered the Divine Sword Space. Here you can study a myriad of sword skills. You have to first answer questions by stepping through the doors. Once you have answered all the questions, the right sword skills will appear for you to study.]
"Hm, seems interesting." Shiro muttered.
Walking up to the first set of doors, she saw a row of words light up in the sky.
[In a fight, do you take the initiative or wait for them to react?]
Looking to her left, she could see the door with the words initiative while the door on the right had the word reactive.
Naturally, she was one to initiate the fight so she immediately stepped through the initiative door.
Just as she stepped through the door, she saw a dummy with a sword on the other side of the room as her system flickered once more.
[Defeat the dummy.]
Raising her eyebrows, Shiro summoned two copies of Athera into her hand and wrapped herself with lightning.
Using the Takemikazuchi technique, her body flickered out of sigh and appeared before the dummy.
Twisting her body, she swung towards his head.
*CLANG!
Surprised by the fact that her sword was blocked just in the nick of time, Shiro quickly calmed herself and remembered all her training with her parents.
Using her spare sword to lock against the dummy's sword, she used this chance to push his guard down and kneed him in the face.
Watching the dummy stumble back, she was about to continue when he stomped down and launched himself towards her.
Narrowing her eyes, she raised her arm and parried his blade before flinging the sword out of his hand. Letting go of her spare sword, she grabbed him by the head and stabbed her sword upwards.
With Athera firmly embedded into the dummy's head, Shiro watched as it crumbled to the ground and was turned to ash.
"That was easy." She muttered.
However, her talk was cut short when another dummy appeared and instantly lashed out towards her.
Quickly parrying his blade with the handle of her sword, Shiro pushed his sword away and cleaved down with Athera while he had no guard.
Cutting the dummy in two, Shiro clicked her tongue in annoyance.
"You said defeat the dummy not 'dummies'. It ain't f*cking plural so why is there two of these f*ckers." Shiro complained as more doors appeared in front of her.
Going through each of these doors wasn't too difficult with what she's learnt over the course of the three weeks. If not for her parents' training, she might have had some difficulty as she realised that she could only use the basic elements and just her sword. Similar to what happened in Athera's first inner world, she was limited in the things that she could use.
Cracking her neck, she destroyed another dummy and walked up to the next door.
[Do you wish to become the strongest swordswoman?]
"Oh? The strongest swordswoman?" Shiro raised her eyebrows as this was a rather interesting question.
After all, she had never thought of becoming the best swordswoman but rather the best in general. If she was the strongest in the world, she wouldn't have to give a crap about gods and the system taking away what she loved. Even though Kuromi was herself, she was still her older sister whom she treasured.
If she was the strongest at the moment in time, she could stop the system from taking her away.
Should she only be the strongest swordswoman, it limits the other options such as strongest mage and such.
Call her greedy but she wanted to be the best in everything.
Just as she thought of this, a third door appeared in front of her.
Raising her eyebrows, she read the text on the door and couldn't help but laugh.
[I want to be the best at everything.]
Shaking her head, she pushed this door open and stepped through without hesitation.
Walking through the door, she found herself in the middle of the sea. There seemed to be an invisible barrier preventing her from falling down as clear blue skies and white clouds could be seen above her.
Standing in the middle of all this was a young man wearing a few pieces of armour over his clothes.
"You are quite the greedy person aren't you?" The man asked with a complicated expression.
He didn't expect the trial that he created to generate a third option for this girl. In all his time of being here and watching people use his item to get a sword skill, this phenomenon had never happened.
"What can I say? I'm a needy woman."