The Master of Cards Chapter 61: Dark Attribute

Alex returned to Earth. He went back to the dojo to rest and see if the old man Ren had returned. However, two months had passed and there seemed to be few signs of Ren.

"Third Card Dimension... I wonder how the old man is doing." Alex muttered. He entered the dojo and decided to take a good rest. Ever since he entered the Card Dimension, he hadn't been able to sleep properly. Although with enhanced physical ability from training and manifesting cards as well as upgrading them, his need for sleep had lessened considerably, peace had a way of inducing sleep.

The next day, Alex woke up and freshened up. The first thing he had to do, was to use the dark attribute special item Night Grass. He had spent two months in the Card dimension already and found no hints of Dark Attribute monsters or items.

He took out one of the grass. The grass was a deep black in color, and if Alex couldn't sense the dark attribute concentrated within it, he would've imagined it was a poisonous grass of some sort. Alex read the instructions of using this grass, it actually had to be grounded into a paste and applied topically over the body.

Alex shrugged, this was indeed quite different from other special items he had used before which he could either consume directly or simulate the energy flow through to enter his body.

After preparing the paste, Alex applied it all over his body. Initially, he felt a cooling sensation spread through his skin, but after a few minutes, the cooling turned into a calm breeze that reminded Alex of a windy night. The dark attribute energy was gradually absorbed by Alex's body and entered the Dark Base Card, forming a single dot on it.

Once the dot formed, Alex tried urging his vortex card into helping the Dark Base Card to form the Rank 1 Dark Attribute Card, however, Alex shrugged after a few minutes of inactivity.

"Oh, I forgot I need the vortex card to digest one hundred fragments first. I ended up not getting the required number of fragments this time around." Alex spoke to himself.

He sighed and continued to apply the rest of the Night grass as well. The very first Night grass gave him 1 dot, the next two gave him 1 dot.. and the final six gave him 1 dot. In total he had six dots on his Dark Bse Card.

"The effectiveness of the special item keeps on decreasing with repeated consumption. I have six units of stored Dark Attribute energy in the base card, so if it works just like the Light attribute, I have enough energy to form a base card and upgrade it to grade D. I just need to collect a hundred fragments next time I enter the Card Dimension." Alex analyzed.

Alex then went to train in the gravity chamber and he found a terrifying increase in his physical strength, flexibility and mobility. He was able to easily move around in 20 G gravitational force, which was ridiculous for a Card Initiate.

"Is this the reward from managing to kill that blood drop? Blood Rebirth, Entity, I have a lot of things to investigate. But first, I need to see what the limits of my new found strength are." Alex thought.

Alex logged into the Adventure House website. He had around twenty thousand points to his credit. Alex searched for combat arts. He had become very proficient in Basic Military techniques, but after seeing Nia's powerful movement art, he felt insecure.

Alex looked through the Adventure House's list of combat arts.

"Tiger Fist, Lumberjack Lariat... the names all seem tyrannical, but the level of the arts is the same as basic military boxing and less refined." Alex shook his head.

Eventually, he reached the section of combat arts which were more expensive than he could afford and still didn't find a satisfactory fighting art.

Alex sighed in despondency, however, he noticed a section in the Adventure House website which had a weird name. Ancient Martial Arts.

"Ancient?" Alex looked into the section with some curiosity, to find a collection of very simple named scrolls. Within the list he found a scroll that he was familiar with. Old Ren had given him this scroll of "ten point exercise" when he wanted to break his physical limit to reach the third level in his inner world. The torture exercise, as Alex had called it.

"So that was an ancient art. A low tier ancient art." Alex sighed.

He then looked through the arts to find an ancient art that could not only help break the body's first limit, but also be used in contact.

Eventually, he found a scroll worth about eighteen thousand points. The name of the scroll was simple and ugly. It was called Painful Vibration.

Alex read through the description of painful vibration and found it to be quite interesting. It was a simple, but painful art. It had one simple exercise and the rest of the art was a set of fighting moves. Alex looked at it, and felt like this method suited his masochistic style when it came to physical training.

Without thinking further, Alex ordered the Painful Vibration scroll to be sent to the dojo. The item would be delivered the next day, so Alex decided to go out and relax for the day.

At that moment, Alex took out his phone and discovered texts from several people. Some were from Lily who messaged that she had returned to the city for a couple of weeks of leave, before heading into the Card Dimension for the first time.

Alex thought for a bit and called Lily.

"Hey Alex. I haven't been able to reach you in months. Where are you?" Lily asked in surprise.

"I just returned to the city. I saw your message saying you had just returned from Star University. Want to meet up for coffee today?" He asked.

"Sure! I'm not exactly doing anything today. Why don't you come to my house?" Lily replied.

Alex nodded. "Sure."

Chapter end