Chapter 272 272. ASHAMED
The journey back to the inner region was relatively quick. Noah spent most of his time in deep thoughts, and it wasn't until he arrived in front of the building that featured his room did he manage to place his series of thoughts on hold.
He strode up the stairs without minding the others traversing it themselves. He would eventually get into his room to return to his cultivation room since he needed to refill.
His feelings had long since calmed down, but the internal turmoil remained fresh even after an hour had passed meditating within his cultivation room.
'Am I that much of a bad listener?' Noah wondered still sitting cross-legged with the whiteness of his cultivation room.
Due to the words Elder Sarah had used, Noah recalled Jon from the Enil village giving him similar advice. If the man encountered him now he would puke blood at Noah's incredible strength. That thought managed to lighten his mood but only by a bit.
Having long since finished refilling his core, Noah had to leave at some point, and he soon found himself staring at the ceiling of his room, a state he had found himself in many times.
"In the playground of monsters, I'll need great skill. Not just spells and brutish utilization of my power, but proper understanding of my power," Noah muttered. In truth, he had already come to such a conclusion, even if only inwardly, but now he had confirmed it from someone who held great power.
'She's strong. Too strong for me,' Noah thought. He found himself wondering about the identity of his soon-to-be master. He understood that higher-stage cultivators were strong, but she felt far different. Her speed also continued to leave him astonished.
It felt absurd that a human could achieve such without the same energy that powered him. His feeling of specialness had vanished after her masterful display of power and control over her power.
Nevertheless, Noah believed he would eventually reach that level of proficiency as time went on. If not for his urgent need for power, he would take things slow. In essence, his lack of proper techniques wasn't exactly his fault, his situation wouldn't allow him spend decades honing a set of skills.
Thanks to her show of skill, Noah inevitably gained a mild level of understanding and a few ideas on how to best utilize his speed. This, needless to say, led to curiosity and the willingness to try his ideas out. And in merely two hours of returning to his room, Noah had set out to go look for a training area.
The map at hand provided him with directions to the closest training facility, and he soon found himself standing before a perfectly rectangular-shaped building. The building resembled a big blue box placed on the right side of the busy street, and its entrance didn't fail to show how often it was used by the members of the guild.
Walking into the spiral door, Noah found himself inside a wide grayish hallway filled with many people traversing its length. Quickly beginning his walk towards the end of the hallway, Noah took a right into another hallway, and at its end, he took a left into yet another hallway.
A the end of this hallway, Noah burst into a wide grassy field illuminated with many standing mana lamps. The field resembled a football field, only about twice as bigger, and featuring glass walls standing at over 50m in height.
He had arrived at the training field itself. The hallways he had traversed were riddled with many doors leading into cultivation rooms, although mid-tier.
Since the training area was free to use by the members; its equipment wasn't the best the guild could offer. Facilities like that were a tad bit costly.
"That would do," Noah thought picking a spot at the far right end of the field. He immediately began his dash towards the area, ignoring the few people that were around on the field.
Eventually arriving there, Noah set up the 50m wide circular barrier by stomping his foot on the ground three times. A light flashed on his figure and immediately kick-started the series of activities required to erect the 20m tall barrier.
With that done, Noah took off his mostly-torn coat to remain in the turtle-necked long sleeve and trousers. It pained him that he had barely spent a week with the attire and Elder Sarah had destroyed its mana stone.
His thoughts soon focused on the main reason he had come there.
He planned to mimic the trick of seemingly splitting into five figures, that Elder Sarah had done. Sparks crackled on his skin as he prepared himself to do what she did. He had a vague idea of what to do, but the rest were confusing since they didn't make sense.
"Am I supposed to jump back and forth on a linear path," Noah wondered pushing his limit to around half his achievable speed.
Crouching a bit, Noah jumped to a spot a few feet from his position and jumped back to his former spot. He then slowly began to increase the rate at which he did this, and his figure eventually turned into a blur dashing back and forth on a linear path.
However, Noah found the process unpolished. The ground beneath him had started to feature foot-shaped holes since he was moving at Mach 40 jumping back and forth. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to achieve the same seamlessness Lady Sarah had portrayed, mainly due to the yellow streak he left on his path.
Eventually coming to a stop, Noah found that a bit over 5000SE in the less than a minute time he had used.
That reality laid out an issue that he tried to ignore but couldn't. Unlike Lady Sarah who looked able to move at her incredible speed without any sort of empowerment, Noah could only run at that pace only by burning Speed Essence.
This showed how powerful the lady's body was. She was more of a Speedling than Noah was, and he felt slightly ashamed to agree with that realization.