I don't know if this already has an answer here, however I checked for similar questions and could find none.
I am an undergraduate student in Mathematics. For my summer project, my supervisor advised me to study Local Fields following 'J.P. Serre's Local Fields'. I had not had any course in Galois Theory, Commutative Algebra, etc. till now ( I have these courses in my upcoming semester). As I went through the book, I saw a lot of commutative algebra at play. Similarily field theory and galois theory are also needed. Upon discussing this problem of prerequisites with my supervisor, he advised me to just look up the definitions and move on. He also suggests "you need not get full thorough understanding of this at this first encounter", and that "Maths is to be read non-linearly". But lately, I am having problems complying to his philosophy. I am getting lost in working through small details in the book, which the book just mentions as some fact/trivial statement, and I think this is precisely because I don't have enough familiarity with the objects that I am working with. Due to this, I am not getting any feel of the subject whatsoever. Moreover, at each line/step, I have to look up definitions which disturbs the flow of reading. So, I think it is better for me to first go through the prerequisites of the book. Hence, I would like to know :
What minimum level of prerequisite do I need to sail through this book? I know that even after being familiar with these prerequisites, I might run into looking some definition/concept, but atleast the condition would be better than what it is as of now. You may suggest books that go through the same subject at some basic level. I would appreciate any kind of help.