Christian rolled around the bed, unable to sleep. Pictures of what happened remained vivid in his mind. This was not the first time he had seen the female form since Jim's memories have countless scenes of him watching these adult movies, and Christian had peeked a few times, not to mention the real scenes he had with his girlfriends and eventually fiancée; however, this was the first time it happened to him in real-time.
'Damn it, if I don't sleep tonight, I won't be in the best shape for tomorrow's test,' Christian contemplated. He decided to meditate again to empty all his thoughts and control his desire. 'Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta…' Christian repeated the Greek Alphabet to focus his mind, and every time it would sway to the incredible sight of today's event, he would start over until he could finish reciting it a few times without an issue.
Finally, he regained control of his mind and fell asleep peacefully. Christian doesn't know whether it was due to fatigue, the two meditation sessions, or the harp's ability, but he had one of the best sleeps of his life. Christian was disciplined, so his biological clock always woke him up at six in the morning for his meditation, but today, he slept through it.
"Good morning," he said to Xin'er and Lucretia, who were already eating breakfast. "Hello," Xin'er replied, but Lucretia lowered her head and mumbled something through the bread in her mouth.
"Did you guys sleep well?" Christian asked as he poured himself a glass of water.
"Better than ever," Xin'er replied, and Lucretia just nodded. The three then had breakfast in silence as the room fell into an awkward silence. Xin'er felt something, but she was not sure. Luckily, she asked no questions, or the situation would have worsened.
"Xin'er, how are you feeling?" Christian asked. "Still dizzy?"
"I'm fine after a night of sleep and eating something," she replied. Christian was measured by the amount of life energy he took from them, meaning some rest and nutrition were all they needed to recuperate.
"That's good to hear," he nodded. "By the way, I meant to ask you: how do you know so much?"
"Hmm? I've said it before: my mother taught me," she replied.
"I know that, but how does she know so much?" Christian asked. "Knowledge is well-controlled in this place, and she's not from a bloodless family. So, how does she know so much? Was she ever a member of the library?"
"Cristos has a point," Lucretia suddenly said with food in her mouth. "Your knowledge includes legendary things that even I've never heard about."
After hearing them out, Xin'er was deep in thought, so Christian swiftly added, "You don't have to answer me if I'm prying into your personal life."
"No, it's not that," Xin'er replied. "I remember asking my mother the same question when I was a child, but she told me I could learn the truth if I ever became a [Master]. I've buried that memory until you brought it up."
"How mysterious," Lucretia chuckled.
"Indeed," Christian said. "Maybe Xin'er's mother is from a secret society of [Masters]. Her field of study is herbology and magizoology, right? Maybe that secret society hunts down rare magical herbs and mythical creatures.
"No, better yet, her mother is from a secret family, cast out for breaking the rules. She trains Xin'er in the hope she will one day become powerful enough to return to the clan with her head held high.
"Hmm, another possibility is she's secretly royalty, yes, a princess who ran away because she married a commoner. She hopes her offspring will have enough achievements to return to her kingdom and show her elders she did nothing wrong marrying Xin'er's father."
The room was deathly quiet as the two looked at him in shock.
"What? Lucretia is not the only one with a knack for storytelling," Christian shrugged. "In fact, I consider myself somewhat of a writer, even though I've only written one…story."
Xin'er broke the silence with uncontrollable laughter. Lucretia followed, and Christian could not help but be infected. "I thought you only knew about magic and nothing else," Xin'er giggled.
"I didn't know you had the talent to be a Bard," Lucretia nodded.
"Don't put me in one box," Christian protested. "I'm a man of many talents."
The three had a great time during breakfast. They laughed as they ate, and for a brief moment, they forgot their worries. Once the meal ended, Christian suddenly thought of the test and asked, "How much time do we have left?"
"The last time I checked, it was 15 hours," Xin'er replied.
"Check?"
"There is a floating timer in the main hall."
"I see," Christian nodded before returning to his room to change and check on Menes. He also took this opportunity to check on the food reserve since they would be back to eating that disgusting ant meat after leaving this place. His next destination was the main hall to check the timer, but once he arrived, he saw the others staring at a red door.
"What happened?"
"This door suddenly appeared when we came here to relax," Lucretia unconsciously answered. Then, her face turned red when she realized what she had done.
"Exit?" Christian read the words written on the door. "Well, it's self-explanatory. Should we check it out?"
"Wh…Why would we do that?" Lucretia asked.
"Don't you find it odd that this door appeared out of nowhere before our time is up?" Christian commented.
"Hmm, not really."
"Every part of the trial has been for a purpose, including this resting area," Christian analyzed. "So, what's this door's purpose? It could be a hint that we can leave early since this test is technically a race, but it could also be here to allow participants to take a preliminary look at the upcoming trial and prepare."
"Or, it could be a trap," Lucretia argued.
"Also a possibility," Christian agreed. "Regardless, I think it's worth taking a look." The two were immediately hesitant, so Christian took charge by taking out his wand and telling them to stand behind him. He first surrounded the team with his most powerful Protective Charm before slowly opening the door.
A dark world, surrounded by mist, welcomed this team as the door opened its jaws. A terrifying chill rushed into the room, making their mind and body tremble. Christian opened his mouth to say something, but had to stop as he noticed cracks in his shield.
"What the hell?" he uttered unconsciously. In the short time it took him to say these words, his shield was on the verge of collapsing, forcing him to cast the spell again. "What the hell is this place?"
"How can this be?" Xin'er muttered in horror.
"Do you know what this thing is?"
"It's a Negative Energy Field," she answered, but the previously chatty Xin'er did not elaborate further out of shock and fear.
"We need more than this," Lucretia added.
"It's something powerful Necromancers usually use to build their undead army."
"Are you saying this place will turn us into undead?" Christian asked.
"Yes, the negative energy inside will corrode your body and soul to turn you into a mindless undead," Xin'er explained with a pale face.
"How can we navigate through it?" Christian asked directly. He did not want to focus on how potent this field was—he wanted a solution.
"The easiest solution is to control the negative energy and disperse it, but only someone with deep knowledge of the Dark Arts can do such a thing."
Christian frowned. He was aware of negative energy and knew how to manipulate it. The Zombie Immortality Method that Voldemort tried to entice him to use involves the application of negative energy. However, Christian's knowledge of the subject was theoretical as he had never used or trained them.
"Well?" Lucretia asked.
"Well, what?"
"Are you a master of the Dark Arts?"
"On a theoretical level, you could say that," Christian answered truthfully. He learned much about the Dark Arts from Voldemort, so his knowledge was probably higher than that of most third or second-rate dark wizards. However, besides the Life Energy Spells, he had never used the others.
"Xin'er, are there any other ways?" Christian asked as he continued providing energy to his barrier to ensure it remained intact.
"Light magic, Fire Spells with Extreme Heat, or Positive Charm like Patronus," Xin'er answered. "That's all the methods I know to deal with negative energy."
"You're not a priest/cleric, and you haven't started learning Arcane Magic, so we can rule out light magic," Lucretia analyzed. "The Patronus Charm is the main requirement to become an [Official Wizard], so I doubt you've learned it at such a young age. So, that only leaves the Fire Spell option."
"I doubt my Flame Charm is intense enough for this situation."
"Then, what should we do?"
"There are still 14 hours before leaving this safety zone. That's plenty of time for me to learn the Patronus Charm."
"Are you crazy?"
"No, I'm not," Christian said with confidence. Harry Potter cast his first Patronus Charm when he was thirteen, so he was confident he could do it when he was only twelve.
"Do you even know anything about the spell?"
"I do," Christian admitted. He had read a few books about the Patronus Charm. He was even adept at mobilizing his positive emotion since Professor Quirrell, or the Dark Lord, once gave him some tips on using positive energy to increase the potency of curse-counter spells. All these advantages are why Christian is so confident he can learn the spell independently.
"Are you sure this will work?" Lucretia asked.
"It has to," Christian replied before closing the door. He headed directly to the kitchen to get some food, and to his surprise, the food had disappeared. However, before he could say anything, more food conjured out of nowhere.
"I will be training inside the bag of holding. Don't worry about me, even if you don't see me for the next ten hours," Christian advised his team before returning to his room.
'Let's see how this goes,' Christian thought as he sat cross-legged on the floor. He first reviewed all the knowledge he needed for the training, followed by a short meditation session to maximize his focus. Christian had skipped the morning's meditation, and this one happened to replace it.
Once everything was ready, he started choosing what memory to use to mobilize his positive feelings.