Prime Originator

Just like any other day in the Royal Palace, it was boring yet tiresome for the life of a shadowguard to be stationed here. 

Rarely does anything ever happen to or in the Royal Palace, but despite that, the shadowguards are required to observe everything with alertness while keeping themselves hidden in plain sight.

At this moment, the shadowguard stationed to keep watch over the Outer Palace was yawning from the top of a building not far from Violet Plum Courtyard.

Suddenly, an invisible forced tugged at him and the shadowguard became alert once. There was no one on the building top except him.

"Who's there? Is it time to rotate shifts already? You better not be playing a prank on me." The shadowguard said to seemingly no one. 

The invisible force came again, but stronger, causing the shadowguard's body to slide a bit towards the edge.

"Oi, oi, cut it out. This is not funny!" 

A hint of nervousness was heard in the shadowguard's voice. The shadowguard could not tell where the person was pranking him came from.

If this was someone from their shadowguard group, it was impossible for him to not have heard of such a prodigy with this high level of stealth.

But, if it wasn't another shadowguard, then who or what was it? A ghost?

The invisible force came again, but this time stronger than ever and directly pull the shadowguard over the edge. The shadowguard was shocked and horrified as he grabbed onto the edge to stop his fall.

However, the invisible tugging force did not stop and continue to increase its force over time.

"Ah… S-Stop! I'm going to fall… Ahhhhh!"

The shadowguard plunged headfirst. At the bottom of the building, a young man was standing there while looking up at him. The young man was Leon.

Just when the shadowguard was about crash into the ground, his falling momentum suddenly came to a halt a few inches from the ground. His body soon slapped the ground with a soft landing afterward.

"Y-You need me for something, Your Highness?" The shadowguard asked after kneeling one knee, disheveled, and dismayed by what just happened. 

Leon did not answer immediately as his mind was elsewhere. It was apparent to him that Divine Will had some limitations. 

He had noticed this limitation when he was treating Lily's mother earlier, but it seems that the consumption of mental strength increased by twofold when he tries to control a living person of equal mass.

When the other party becomes resistant to his control, the consumption even increases exponentially. 

'A clash of wills?' Leon thought. 

He still had plenty of mental strength leftover, but it was not the sort of consumption rate he could keep up for long.

He concluded that it was extremely inefficient to be used directly for combat, but this type of crowd control ability could still be used at crucial moments to catch his opponents off guard. 

It was a trump card that can decide the life and death of his opponents.

"Your Highness?"

Leon finally focused on the shadowguard and nodded. "How much are you aware of the bullying between the senior maids and new junior maids?"

"Forgive me, Your Highness. I did not know such a thing was taking place." The shadowguard apologized with surprise.

"You are tasked to watch over the palace, but you don't know such a thing had been going on for so long?" Leon's brows were furrowed.

"Most of the shadowguards have been dispatched to other cities and neighboring kingdoms to collect intel, Your Highness." The shadowguard lowered his head and continued, "Currently, it is just me and another person taking turns watching over the Outer Palace on a 6-hour rotation."

"I see. That was my oversight. You do not need to apologize." Leon nodded in understanding. 

The palace was far too big for one person to watch over at any given time. It appeared he could not punish the other bullies immediately without evidence.

"From now on, I want you to investigate the palace maids and record every misdeed and form of bullying they commit and report back to me. The training camp should have a lot of recruits, yes? Take some people to assist you. I believe some actual field experience and direct teaching from a senior shadowguard on the job is more effective than training in the dark underground all the time."

"However, if the bullying is found to be excessive that it threatens the life of the junior maids, you must intervene and report to me immediately. Two junior maids nearly died today, if not for my direct intervention. I do not want a repeat of this, is that understood?"

"Yes, Your Highness! I hear and obey!"

The shadowguard complied submissively with an exaggerated salute. There was a certain majesty and something in the air the prince carried and the prince's words that compelled him to gladly demonstrate his loyalty. 

Leon was surprised. He was not purposely using Divine Will but felt it could also empower his speech to give a more commanding and reverential presence.

"Go." 

Leon waved.

After the shadowguard left to carry out the task with haste, Leon returned to his room and took out the box of paper and pen. 

It was time to record some of his knowledge down and compile it into a book, then have it mass copied for the people of the kingdom to learn. 

He did not have the energy to be transmitting his knowledge to every person. He would only do it a few more times on a few selected individuals and have them teach others with the help of the book he would soon compile. 

This was the best method Leon could think of without delaying his cultivation too much. Of course, Princess Faelyn might be slightly disappointed. He did mention that the elven princess could attend language class, but he did not say that he would be the one teaching.

Once the people of the kingdom understand the ancient language, they can begin studying the relics and recovering the lost technology of the ancient civilization on their own.

Furthermore, the ancient language was a simplified version of the runic language. Once they master the ancient language, it will be easier to comprehend the runic language.

At that time, the kingdom is bound to experience a great technological advancement.

Leon began to practice writing on a piece of paper with his Divine Will. After he got the hang of writing with Divine Will, he increased his writing speed by double, writing on two pieces of paper at once with the additional ink pens.

This was something Leon could already do upon awakening his memory. It was a unique nature of possessing the dual personalities of two lifetimes. He was capable of two separate thoughts be dividing his consciousness.

However, with his current soul quality, Leon believes he could further divide his consciousness and achieve an even greater writing speed, although he was not exactly sure to what extent he could divide his consciousness until he tested it himself.

Slowly but surely, Leon increased to writing on three sheets of paper at once, then from three, he went to writing on four sheets of paper at once!

When Leon tried to push the number to five, problems began to occur. His thoughts became messy and incomprehensible scribbles began to appear on the fifth piece of paper like it was drawn by a 3-year old.

"So, four is my limit… for now." Leon mumbled. 

To write on 4 separate pieces of paper at high speed, the consumption of mental strength was not little. Leon had expended a fair bit of his mental strength today already. 

After pilling up 20 pages worth of Ancient-to-Gaian language definition and explanations, Leon took a break and entered the Archive to study some soul recovery pill recipes and knowledge. 

He crosschecked on the ingredients required and became disappointed that the simplest Soul Replenishment Pill still missed a single key ingredient.

"It seems I would need to revisit Extreme Misty Forest in the near future to look for more rare herbs." Leon frowned. "What else can I do? Oh, I know."

Leon went back into the Archive and searched for pill recipes related to mental strength recovery. There was a difference between soul recovery pills and mental recovery pills. 

Although both also recover mental strength, the effects contrast greatly. Soul recovery pills replenish his mental strength almost immediately, but mental recovery pills only boost his natural system's recovery rate of mental strength over time.

It was a difference between recovery amount and recovery speed. The superior one was clear.

Nevertheless, mental recovery pills would still save him some time, and the ingredients are most likely to be more common as it had more to do with stimulating the body, and less to do with the soul itself. 

It was not wrong to say that the body nurtures the soul.

"A Tier-3 Spiritual Replenishment Pill can speed up the recovery of mental strength by 30%... If taken before sleep, the effects of the pill can further improve by 50%, making it 45% recovery speed, huh? That's almost half. Not bad. Do I have enough Tier-3 Spirit Herbs for this?" Leon spoke to himself. 

There was a high chance he had all the ingredients, but he was not sure they were all been grown to Tier-3 Spirit Herbs. 

After a quick look at the ingredient list for the Spiritual Replenishment Pill, Leon nodded pleasantly.

"Great! I have all the ingredients. I didn't expect one of the ingredients to be the Achromous Valerian Root though. It seems I can't gift away too much of these anymore until I grow more of them." 

"My future in-laws really enjoyed the herbal tea though. I'm afraid they will call my stingy.." Leon smiled wryly and rubbed his chin. "Maybe it's time to introduce a different type of herbal tea to them?"