Location: A small wooden cabin – Border village.
Time: After the Return (Lirion's Age: 11).Lirion jolted awake, drenched in cold sweat. He looked at his hands; small, soft. He looked at his chest; his spiritual root was dormant, its color a pale white, speckled with fine black impurities he could only see because he knew where to look."I… went back?" he whispered in a child's voice.Suddenly, a translucent blue interface appeared before his eyes, but this time, it was far more detailed:
[Philosopher's Stone System: Activated]
[Key Bearer Status: Stage 0 (Dormant Seed)]
[Spiritual Root Status: White (12% Purity) – Unstable]
[Magic Circuits Status: Inactive (Neural pathways unprepared)]
[Conditions for Advancement to Stage 1:Purify the spiritual root (raise purity to 50%).Prepare the neural pathways for the first circuit.Survive for 365 days.]
[Alert: The stone does not grant power. It only stabilizes what you build yourself. Any error in construction may cause circuit collapse.]Then, the first quest appeared:
[Side Quest 1: The First Breath]
[Objective: 100 deep breaths daily for 30 days.]
[Purpose: Draw in raw mana and purge root impurities through the lungs.]
[Failure Penalty: Loss of 10% daily vitality.]
[Reward: +0.5 years of stored mana, +3% root purity.]Lirion began training immediately. On the first day, after his 40th breath, a severe dizziness hit him. It wasn't just oxygen deprivation—his body was rejecting the flow of raw mana. The pathways were too narrow. By the third day, his abdominal muscles screamed in agony. He cried from exhaustion but pushed through the full 100 breaths, trembling on the cold floor.He was building his vessel from scratch.