"Miss Doris, are you going to get serious or not? Why are you still holding back?"

With deliberate control, Hilia maneuvered her magic puppet to evade the attacks from Doris’s puppet. Seeing Doris flush, she added with a smile:

"You know, Miss Doris, your puppet’s attacks feel like you’re being coy, sweetheart."

Boom!

Doris’s puppet erupted in flames, like a messenger from hell.

The wind began to stir on the field.

Hilia noticed sweat forming on Doris’s forehead, her complexion visibly paling.

Huh? No, does this move seem like it’s about to explode?

So easily affected by praise?

Hilia quickly snapped to full alertness.

But just then, a voice suddenly came from outside.

"That’s enough for both of you, stop now."

With the sound came a peculiar wave of magic power affecting Doris and her puppet, causing the flames to gradually shrink until they disappeared.

Doris looked toward the training ground entrance and saw Abros. She immediately complained, "Mr. Abros, our training isn’t over yet. Why are we being stopped?"

"Look at what you’re doing. Is this combat training? If I let you continue, I don’t know if Hilia will be injured, but you’d need to be carried out."

Doris remained silent, tears welling in her eyes, her lips pouting melodramatically.

Though it was Doris’s inability to accept loss, the understanding Hilia nonetheless apologized: "Sorry, Miss Doris, I didn’t realize you were so sensitive."

This ’apology’ made Doris’s nearly uncontrollable tears pour down.

Hilia tilted her head: "Huh? You’re actually crying?"

"Alright, come down now, don’t forget what I said before class." Abros urged Hilia from outside the training ground.

"Fine then."

Hilia regretted provoking Doris.

She should have dragged out the fight until the class ended.

Now the class was only halfway through, and she had made Doris cry. Next, Abros would assign her a new opponent.

So, who would her opponent be?

Hilia quickly scanned all the training grounds.

Hmm?

Where did Benovia go?

Could it be that my opponent is her?

Just as she considered this, Hilia suddenly saw Abros stop, so she stopped as well.

"Your opponent is her, go ahead, I’ll be watching from below."

Hilia looked across at Benovia and fell silent.

It really is her?

Abros snorted coldly.

"One leaving early, the other skipping class. Are you both so confident, thinking you have no rivals? Then fight to your hearts’ content under my watch. If I’m not satisfied, both of you will write a ten-thousand-word battle summary."

Hilia looked at Benovia, and they exchanged glances, with Benovia giving an innocent look.

She looked at Abros and said, "Professor, the time is almost up. If we fight now, we’ll only warm up. Why not wait for the next class to train?"

Abros chuckled, "We’ll train next class and this class too, until class is over. Start now, I’ll be watching."

Benovia looked at Hilia, blinked: "Apologies."

With that, her magic puppet charged forward.

Hilia braced for battle, letting her puppet be fully prepared to react to any changes.

But soon, she relaxed.

Benovia’s puppet attacks looked swift, fierce, and precise, but they were wide and unfocused, clearly using unskilled melee tactics, relying on reflexes to attack and dodge.

Hilia noticed Benovia’s focus was entirely on Abros, evidently watching for his reaction.

Abros didn’t say a word, just seriously watched them.

Seeing this, Benovia attacked more boldly, her movements wide and uncoordinated, abstaining from magic, merely clashing with Hilia’s puppet.

A one-sided clash.

Hilia’s puppet, apart from the Heart of the Magic Puppet and spine, was made from materials inferior to Benovia’s puppet. Without using magic, attacking felt like merely scratching, better to focus on evasion and adapting to the puppet’s movements.

Perhaps noticing Hilia’s intentions, Benovia’s attacks became faster, punches and kicks sped up as if her puppet had received wind attribute acceleration.

And so it continued until the class ended.

Benovia nodded at Hilia, said nothing, then left directly.

Very much in line with her typical public demeanor.

Very low-key.

Hilia watched her leave, still savoring the puppet’s test results.

The spine from a Tier Five creature provided almost instantaneous response time to the Heart of the Magic Puppet.

Unfortunately, the strength of the other materials was somewhat lacking, still slow to receive commands.

Hilia didn’t plan to upgrade now, intending to consider replacements upon advancing to Tier Two.

After all, no matter which material it was, she couldn’t afford it currently.

Hilia was quite satisfied with the current test results.

However, Rose immediately doused her enthusiasm: "You’re satisfied with this? You’re currently only tapping into 50% of this puppet’s maximum potential, still far from enough."

"50%? Lord Rose, do you know how much potential Benovia reached?"

"Her? 30%."

"And Doris then?"

"35%."

"Doris is actually higher than Benovia?"

"Because Doris’s puppet quality is far inferior to Benovia’s."

"I see, hehe, then I feel pretty satisfied."

Rose rolled his eyes.

Satisfaction comes from comparison, right?

Not incorrect.

Not striving for the utmost, just being stronger than everyone else suffices.

"Next, it’s time to prepare to absorb all the fish fins and aim for Tier Two!"

Hilia anticipated the future, a month ago, she couldn’t have imagined reaching Tier Two before the end of the semester.

Now, Tier Two seemed within reach.

Over the next week, Hilia returned to being busy, this time occupied with cultivating.

She had already mastered Sleep Meditation Skill, but it wasn’t sufficient; sleep meditation was just basic, merely utilizing sleep time, and in terms of meditation efficiency, it couldn’t match any specialized meditation skills.

At school, once students successfully accumulated magic power with the Basic Meditation Skill, they’d be taught the advanced Divine Prayer Meditation Skill in meditation class.

This meditation skill, passed down by the Holy Court, in Rose’s view, was an outdated version from a thousand years ago, totally inadequate for current meditation needs.

So Rose made some modifications for Hilia, giving her a custom meditation technique.

"Meditation techniques also have attribute enhancements, for example, an ice attribute physique using the Ice Meditation Skill doubles the efficiency compared to a non-attribute skill.

"However, the magic power gained is of the ice attribute, requiring conversion to use non-attribute or different elemental magic, which reduces power. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

"But if you directly use ice attribute magic power for ice magic, both power and casting speed can be enhanced, choosing an attribute meditation skill at Tier Two is a quick way to boost strength."

"I’ve customized a meditation technique for you, and when you reach Tier Two, you can also select another. If you wish to excel in one element, you can start learning it now, want to?"

"Is my puppet’s Heart water attribute? Does it affect anything?"

"Ice and water share origins, not a major issue."

"Learn!"

Thus, under the new meditation technique’s blessing, Hilia steadily approached the threshold of Tier One.