CHAPTER 381: CHAPTER 381: ADVANCEMENT DISCUSSION

"Oh, you’re all surprised that I called her mother-in-law? Well, if you think about it, she is already my mother-in-law. So why shouldn’t I call her that? She herself offered to be called that too so..." Audrey explained herself after realising why everyone suddenly froze.

"That makes sense. So much so, I don’t know why we were surprised. Anyway, let’s move on to the next matter" Muku replied then changed the topic.

He didn’t know how the other girls would respond to what Audrey said. And he didn’t want to find out since they could be quite unpredictable at such times. So he would much rather they moved on than linger.

Hopefully, everyone’s position will be solidified soon enough so that such situations won’t be awkward anymore.

He even suspected that Audrey spoke like that to push the others into action.

She was the craziest wife a man could ever ask for. A wife who’s always trying to push her husband towards other women. Sure, it wasn’t random women but still...

"What’s the next matter? Jade who was willing to help Muku change topics asked.

Unlike the selfless Audrey, she was a bit more selfish.

While she didn’t mind having the others join them officially. She wouldn’t go out of her way to make it happen. After all, the more people who joined, the less time she’d have with Muku.

It was already hard to find some time to be together with him with all the things that were happening. So she didn’t like the idea of shrinking that even more.

She’d be more open to that conversation after everything has settled down and they’re back to their steady schedule...

"Glad that you asked. However, isn’t it obvious? It’s time for y’all to break through tho R5 of course! After that, we can organise a new tournament!" Muku replied excitedly.

"No!" All the girls refused in unison.

"What do you mean no? You don’t want to rank up?" Muku asked confusedly.

"No, not no to that. But no to the tournament. Let’s leave it for now until we’ve reached the peak as we did before. Why rush it?" Emily replied on behalf of everyone.

They had all just been crushed by Audrey recently. So they wanted nothing to do with Muku’s tournaments until the bad taste had left their mouths first.

"Oh... okay. If that’s what you want" Muku didn’t argue since again, there was nothing he could do if they didn’t want to do it.

He had only suggested it because he couldn’t wait to see another exciting tournament after the one the girls had. And this time it was going to be one without restrictions. Which meant that this time, no one would have an obvious advantage until it was all over.

Anyway, he could only imagine the epic action for now...

"Now, while you should have all been updated on how to reach R5 the moment you reached the peak. Let me give you a few tips before you start... You know what, let me tell you about the steps one has to go through in the process. The first one is easy enough. Which is obviously reaching the peak. That doesn’t even need to be mentioned. After that is discovering your perfect spirit beast.... This can be easy or hard depending on your encounters until now. If you’re someone who hasn’t been around too much. The process will be longer. However, that shouldn’t be a problem for anyone here. In this process, you think of all the beasts... Yes, Jade?" Muku was explaining to the girls what to do when Jade raised her hand.

"Umm, what do beasts have to do with our advancement?" Jade asked the question on everyone’s mind.

They had obviously been briefed on the matter by the IA but it didn’t explain anything. The way that thing worked was straightforward and rigid. It only pointed you in a direction without saying why. And it wasn’t interactive so they couldn’t ask why.

For that reason, Muku who had already successfully gone through the process was the only one who could answer their questions.

"Oh, that, yeah, I was also confused at that time. Anyway, you all remember how beasts turn into humanoid creatures when they reach R5 right? Well, apparently, humans do the opposite. But our transformation isn’t as thorough as we only create avatars which we control from inside while they literally morph into their new forms. Anyway, as for why that is so, I don’t know. It just is. Maybe we’ll know eventually. For now, it doesn’t really matter, right?" Muku replied to the best of his abilities.

"Oh. Okay," Jade accepted the answer then went silent so that he could continue.

"Now, as I was saying. In this process. You’ll think of all the beasts you’ve encountered. A resonance will occur when you think of the right one. Whatever that beast is, it’s the one with the highest affinity with you. Sure, you can choose to use another beast, but your avatar form won’t be as strong as it should be. So I advise going with whatever comes up. And on the off chance that nothing resonates with you, you can send out a "request" into the world. This is done by literally requesting a spirit beast then sacrificing some mana to the Heavens and the request will be answered eventually... However, this process can take up to two months so I suggest not doing it for fun because once you try it, even if you encounter your spirit beast or realise what it is. You won’t be able to do anything about it until the request is answered..." Muku explained things to the girls.

"Hey! Why are you looking at me while saying that?!" Jade complained because Muku was looking at her while telling them not to randomly try requesting a spirit beast.

Sure, she understood why and was really planning on trying it. But that didn’t mean that he could look at her like that!

"Oh, I’m sorry. I wasn’t looking at you for that reason. You’re just so beautiful I lost myself in your beauty for a moment there" Muku who had long discovered the girls’ weakness shamelessly flirted with Jade.

And like he expected, her face instantly flashed red and she covered it with her hands as she shyly peeked through the gap in-between her fingers.

She would have run away if what Muku was saying wasn’t important.

And just like that, Jade who was about to explode was disarmed by Muku with little effort.

Seeing this the other girls were horrified. After all, it didn’t take a genius to realise that Muku would likely use the same method on them if they found trouble with him.

Just thinking of the embarrassment they’d face after, sent a chill down all their spines.

Internally they all swore to try their best never to find trouble with Muku. Especially in front of the others. He clearly had no shame!...

"Now, where was I? Oh, right, after you’ve found your spirit animal. The next step is the hardest part. You actually require your mindscape for this. So in a way, developing one’s mindscape is also part of reaching R5. Though you can do without. However, doing without is a lot deadlier, harder, wasteful and takes way more time. You’ll understand why in a bit... The way one uses their mindscape is by entering it and creating an exact replica of their spirit animal as they saw it. This isn’t hard since memories are as clear as when you experienced the event in your mindscape. So you can clearly remember every nook and cranny. The replica is created through mana of course. Well, Beast Aura in Jade’s case. Anyway, this process is quite slow for most since their mana control isn’t up to par. But everyone here should be able to do it in a week or so. After that, you must recreate it in real life. Which is a lot easier since you’d already have done it on a smaller scale internally... After you’ve fully created it, the two of you will resonate and you’ll naturally float into it and become its core. From then on, you’d have advanced into R5 and can summon or cancel the avatar with a mere thought..." Muku explained.

"Oh, so what you meant by we’ll understand was that, a person can skip the prototyping in their mindscape stage and straight up build the avatar in the outside world right? In doing so, they’d require a lot more mana in correcting it, it will draw a lot of attention and how does it take more time though?" Layla spoke after Muku finished.

"As expected of Layla. You’re correct in your words. And as for how it takes more time... Well, that’s simple actually. Time moves more slowly in one’s mindscape. In fact, you can make it slower and slower the more you familiarise yourself with it. I bet Freya can slow it down to the point of making one hour in her mindscape feel like a year. I can only make it feel like a few months in comparison. You newbies can probably do a few days for now though..." Muku explained.

His explanation pretty much made the minds of everyone present, including Freya who didn’t know she could do that explode.

How was such a thing possible?! And why did he take so long to tell them about it?!