Aur calmly took a bite of grilled pork meat, immediately experiencing its juicy texture filling his mouth.
"Young master, how is it?" Lucy asked, smiling. "This is pork nurtured by mana. Although it isn't as good as tier one beast meat, it is still tasty."
"Ho," Aur exhaled warmly, enjoying the delicious meal. However, his focus wasn't here; instead, it was on his mental space after he had broken through.
Unlike in his previous state, when the entire mental space was filled with colourless mana, there wasn't a single drop of any mana left—it was completely empty and vacant.
If Aur looked at the barriers of his mental space, he would notice a significant change: they had become stronger and thicker.
Suddenly, Aur willed it, and a strand of mana came from the outside, entering his mental space, where it started to be slowly refined.
Aur patiently waited. Since he wasn't in meditation, the process took several times longer than necessary.
Although one could still gather mana from the outside when not cultivating, the process was at least ten times slower than when fully focused.
Even if he didn't do anything in the outside world without meditating, the speed of refining the mana from the outside was still sluggish.
Only when meditating could one focus on the mana, and its efficiency increased to a terrifying degree.
While Aur was contemplating, a small drop of light blue mana materialised in his mental space. Though just a single drop, it caused the spells floating in his mental space to rotate, as if excited by its presence.
Curiously, Aur infused these drops of light blue mana into his wizard hand spell: his vital spell.
Instantly, Aur's eyes began to glow with a pattern in the real world.
With shock, he suddenly looked towards Lucy.
Lucy was startled by the abrupt change in Aur, and she slowly felt her body becoming weightless, as if she were floating in the air. Aur appeared smaller in her eyes.
"No, I'm in mid-air!?" Lucy thought, her eyes widening as she looked down at the ground.
Bang!
Suddenly, her head planted into the floor as the force that lifted her vanished.
"Ouch," she grimaced in pain.
Aur's eyes slowly stopped glowing as he looked at Lucy, who had planted her head on the ground.
His expression was one of astonishment, not because she had fallen, but because a single drop of blue mana had been able to enhance his spell to such a terrifying extent.
"I am Aur," he announced with a smile, presenting his badge.
"Eh?" The guard was a little surprised upon hearing the name and looked at the badge to confirm its authenticity.
"Have you really reached the tier one wizard realm?" the other guard, who seemed rather inexperienced, curiously asked.
"Shut up!" The guard who was verifying the authenticity of Aur's badge exclaimed, his face turning pale.
"Please," he pleaded, looking earnestly at Aur.
"It's fine," Aur magnanimously reassured him, shaking his hand.
After checking the badge and confirming Aur's identity, he respectfully returned it to him.
Under the warm and respectful gaze of the guard, Aur was guided to enter. Only after Aur had entered did the guard sigh with relief, still feeling some lingering fear.
The young guard who had asked the question curiously looked at his seniors with a questioning expression.
"What are you looking at me for, you young brat?" the guard's expression turned stern as he simmered with sheathed rage.
"Why are you such an angry old man, Albert, and I am curious why you are so respectful towards Aur?" the young guard asked.
"You don't know?" Albert's expression softened slightly upon hearing this.
"How could I know? I just came to guard here last month," the young guard replied, his expression turning into a frown. "Even if that guy Aur turns out to be a tier one wizard, so what? He can't touch us. We are the guards of the leader of the village," he added with a hint of arrogance in his voice.
Albert looked at him with a deep gaze.
"How old is Aur? And he should be in the third year if we count his seclusion right now," Albert said, letting his words sink into the young guard's mind. However, the young guard became even more confused.
"Do you know that in the history of the academy, there are only a few people who could be counted on one hand who have actually reached the tier one wizard realm during the academy's five-year run?"
"This!?" The young guard's eyes widened with realisation when he heard Albert's reminder, and his heart turned cold.
If Aur could reach this level, he wouldn't be a simple guy.
Even causing him some displeasure might incur his slight eerie. With his status, if it was confirmed that he had become a tier one wizard, then a simple word from him could spell trouble for him.
"Thank you, Albert," the young guard said, his voice filled with gratitude.
Albert simply nodded silently.